faderift | [Closed] I'm so tired

WHO: Anders, Vandelin, and later Nathaniel
WHAT: An overworked healer is forced to take a short break
WHEN: Current
WHERE: Darktown
NOTES: None atm

It seems like every time he cuts back there's more to do. He'd promised Nate he'd take things easier, but this spreading disease means there are more patients than usual, more supplies being used than usual, and more time needed than usual. It's out of his hands, he feels, because there just aren't enough healers in the city to help everyone. Even now, when treating the injured and ill in Darktown, he's feeling like he simply can't o enough.

"This is why we need free, fully-trained mages everywhere," he's muttering to one of his helpers when everything feels a horrifyingly familiar level of heavy again. This time, when he falls, he's even more afraid. Spells like this only ever get worse and there's no comfort to be found in the tight-packed dirt floor of his Clinic. ...and on top of every other indignity he can see a bug crawling toward him and there's nothing he can do about it.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Maybe," he says, faraway and trying to envision any theoretical way, in all the additional study he's done since he arrived here, in which a mage not already in the room could have paralyzed Anders and leeched all his strength away that quickly and thoroughly. Not without the usage of some kind of invisible glyph, perhaps, and there's nobody here but Myr, to his knowledge, who could do anything even remotely approaching that kind of magic. He does not actually entertain that thought for longer than the half-second in which it occurs to him.

"That still leaves the question of motive, though, and even presuming that any mage allowed into the Gallows wants to hurt you badly enough to actually try, it wouldn't make sense to do it like this. And it wouldn't account for the other mages suffering the problem, though I don't know who they are." He has to concede the point; nobody else has pissed people off quite like Anders has. It's hard to imagine any mage he's met here going out of their way to harm another mage for anything short of Anders' level of infamy.

"It probably isn't a theory worth pursuing right now. But--look, we can't have you sitting here on the freezing floor; that's not going to improve your health. Here." He offers a shoulder to lean on, hoping to help Anders up onto a bed. "Let me get hold of your husband. He should know. Does he know?"

He leans on Vandelin as the other mage starts to help him up.

"There are a few mages allowed into the Gallows who would gladly hurt me like this and gladly try. You've no idea how badly things went in the early months I was here. ...but it does not account for the others, you're right." If Vandelin thinks Anders is stalling a little on the other, he'd be right. The sideways glance probably helps confirm it as they get to a bed and Anders relaxes on it.

"Nate... knows some." He reaches up to rub the back of his neck, looking a little sheepish. "He can't do anything to help and I haven't wanted to bother him by making him worry. But he should know." It's hard to be weak. It's hard to be vulnerable. His body is not giving him much option in the matter, though.

"Please call my husband, if you don't mind."

Vandelin knows that sentiment well. He's been on both sides of it now, and while a couple years ago he might have identified wholly with Anders, might have respected his stoicism and wanted to help him maintain it--he can't help but envision Nate alone in an office and oblivious to the possibility of impending loss, the way he'd always been when Kit was away on one of his endless missions or another. It's not a position he'd wish on anyone anymore, no matter how tangential his acquaintance with Nate is when weighed against his friendship with Anders.

"All right. Hold tight and I'll be back."

He doesn't wander so far, though, that Anders can't hear him--he wouldn't stand for that if he were the one on the bed, having to let others talk about him where he had no way of knowing what they were saying.

"Warden Howe? It's Enchanter Vandelin. Can you spare a moment? It's about Anders."

Nathaniel reaches for the crystal so quickly he knocks it away, and has to chase it to the floor before answering.

"Yes? Is everything all right?" Anders' health has been so fragile lately, he's not sure what he expects from this.

He can hear the concern in Nate's voice and he closes his eyes, feeling guilty even though he's not sure there's anything he could have done to prevent this. Not heal in Darktown at all? They'd have no one. There's enough against them already, and he can't do that.

Vandelin can't help his own pang of regret at that audible worry, wishing there were nothing of concern to relay. But there's nothing for it.

"I don't want to alarm you," he says, "and he doesn't want to alarm you, but he isn't well. He took ill at the clinic and had a weak spell for several minutes. It seems to have passed and he's improving now, but if you can come, he would really like to see you."

It had seemed prudent, perhaps, to avoid the word 'collapse' until Anders can explain that himself in person.

[Closed] I'm so tired

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject