by M E Wolf
After Jintari was shown the many plants in the garden, the old woman took her to the orchards of many types of apples, pears, peaches, mangoes and many other varieties of fruit trees. Jintari could not believe how large the farm was and was tired from walking the entire area of it. It had to be thousands and thousands of acres to hold that much food. There were even flowers and this puzzled her most since the fields were endless where the flowers grew and there were more flowers than anything else on the farm.
Then she awoke and realized that she did not awake yet, even though her favourite flower from the field was in her hair. She hurriedly got dressed into her brown leathers and packed all of her stuff realizing that she had spent quite some time at the farmhouse and did need to get to that inn, Goblin Carcass or something like that. She went down the stairs and was handed some food for the road from the old woman. After placing the food in her sack she said her good-byes and left the farmhouse to travel again on the forest road. The trees were packed closer together than they were before she had reached the farmhouse and made it somewhat difficult to travel along the road.
She continued at a brisk walk as tree after tree branch brushed by. If she was any bigger than she was right now she would not have been able to continue, as it was she suffered many scrapes and scratches from the tree branches and rocks under foot when she either walked into a branch head on or slipped on a loose stone or slippery mud from the previous night’s rain. With pine needles stuck to her clothes and under her clothes she was constantly itching and scratching her legs, back, chest, neck, feet, hands, face and other places that she was not sure why they were itchy, she just scratched them.
The nights in the forest were worse with the bugs crawling all over her as she slept just a ways off the side of the trail. Mosquitoes were always dancing about her and taking their daily withdrawals of blood from her. Black flies, deer flies and horse flies danced around her all the time making their jolly buzzing noises as they nibbled and bit her on every inch of her body and seemed to even get under her leather clothes and bite on literally every inch of her and stayed there in the throws of a carnival celebration and some even laid eggs and even more feasting took place.
Jintari’s health took a toll for the worse as the flies, bugs, rats, mice, lice, viruses, bacteria and any other organisms tried to take control of her body. Her food could not be held in her stomach and if it could it would not do her any good since some weird worms inhabited her stomach.
She was pale green, sweat of fever was always on her brow and the flesh on her bones was almost non-existent. When she walked she dragged her feet and almost crawled. Jintari lost so much weight that she almost could not pass for a woman, but resembled a sick and tired child more. As she neared the Goblin Carcass, she collapsed and just could not get up.
CHAPTER SIXTY TWO
“One of our serving wenches found her outside the inn early one morning when they were smoking their fowl cigarettes. They almost did not bring her in because they did not want to be in trouble. Imagine them smoking in one of our uniforms and befouling it with the disgusting smells of cigarettes.”
The barkeep’s wife, Gretchen, was obviously upset. Unconscious, the girl still was and they were doing as much as they could to keep her warm and clean and making sure that she at least had a chance to survive. None of them knew how she had gotten infected with all those bugs and worms and such, but they had to remove some everyday and when they thought that they had gotten them all out, they found more. Barkeep Gus flinched at the disgust he heard in his wife’s voice and saw in her face as she wiggled her nose and turned up her upper lip in a half-snarl and then spoke.
“I do hope that whatever she has is not catching. Granted she does not look as green as she did when she was first found and the worms in her stomach are all that is left of the vermin that infested her tiny body.
“She looks like a little child even though she has grown six inches since she has been here, which is entirely unbelievable considering her condition. We need to get some sort of medical professional here besides a veterinarian, although the veterinarian has been real helpful in keeping her alive.”
They were outside the door of the girl’s room, since her arrival no one got much sleep if any. Everyone loved her already as though she was their daughter, sister, lover and friend. Patrons always asked how she was doing and just as Gus mentioned the veterinarian, he stepped in the hallway accompanied by a lady with glasses who appeared to be very well aged, if not old. There were no wrinkles on her face, but her entire hair was gray. Her age could not be discerned and she moved with the grace of a gazelle whenever she walked forward. She reminded everyone of a queen, but they knew that she could not be.
The veterinarian introduced her to the barkeep, and his wife,
“Barkeep Gus and Mistress Gretchen, this here is Doctor Vetria. Her methods are unknown around here, but she is willing to help the girl. I have done all that I can do for her and it is now up to this lady to help her further.
“She does cost quite a bit of money and I do not know how much talent this girl has, but you could probably have her work for the healing that she is to get. Vetria, the girl is behind this door. Do you need me for anything?”
Vetria was very stunning to the veterinarian, and his heart beat up through his throat anytime he was near her. Women usually did not effect him at all and the fact that this one effected him most of all scared him. Vetria responded too quickly, like she was prepared to reject any offer of help. It was actually because she used her bag of herbs lightly, and the doctoring actually came from an inner healing ability that could put her on the wrong side of a burning stake or hangman’s noose.
“I am all right. All that I really need is already in my medicine bag. Thanks for the offer, Cory.”
Vetria patted the leather satchel that was slung over her left shoulder by a strap and entered the room with the girl. The moment that she got into the room she could smell sickness, rot and death. She almost did not go to the bed for fear of the girl being already dead, but when she had arrived at the edge of the bed and checked the girl’s pulse she noticed that she would not last long in the bad conditions that were set up in this room.
Going to the door, she opened it and called to Gretchen to get lots of hot water, linens and a clean robe for the girl. She asked for some lye to disinfect the room, some clean towels and a clean metal wash tub to be brought up to the room. A steel bin was asked for to put the dirty linens and cloths that were used to clean the room, so that they could be burned.
CHAPTER SIXTY THREE
Once Vetria was given the materials that she had asked for she shut the door and asked that no one be allowed to enter the room while she helped the girl. She grabbed all of the linen, the girl’s clothing and anything else that came into contact with the girl and stuck them in the bin to burn. The girl was naked now and Vetria could see the extent of her infection and realized that she could not be healed by conventional means.
Even if she was able to heal her, she would still have trouble if this room was not cleaned thoroughly enough. Vetria also did not want the veterinarian into the room with her because she would have to take off all of her clothing to prevent herself infecting her clothes with the filth that was clinging to this girl. She walked to the closet and placed her hand just inside it, concentrated on the enchantment she would have to set in the closet to protect her clothes and the other things that must have been the girl’s from the foulness that plagued most of the room.
It was fortunate that the foulness had not quite reached the closet yet, even though the rest of the room was already consumed with the corruption of illness. She took off all of her clothing, including her rings, earrings, necklace and even the clasp that held her hair in place. The wig was also placed into the closet. Her satchel, after she removed from it what she needed to disinfect the room, was placed in there as well. Once she was completely naked, her body looked perfect and had no age to it at all. It was as though
she wore the wig only for dignity, since she did not appear older than twenty even though she had passed the age of twenty some years ago.
CHAPTER SIXTY FOUR
Vetria walked back over to the bed that the girl was lying on. When she placed her hands on the girl she could feel the girl’s week pulse as her heart was slowly suffocated by the disease or diseases that riddled her little body. The girl’s blood actually was calling to her and this is when she had realized that this girl was a daughter of her mother. It meant that the girl was Dochani even though she had no outward appearances that she was Dochani, but she did have the two hearts that Dochani had and this was probably the reason that she was still alive.
She wondered how this disease had affected her in the first place considering that it took a lot to infect a Dochani with anything unless it had been laced with silver. That could explain it and then again it might not. It would also depend on how she actually got here because with the Dochani anything was possible. Focusing on the bugs and worms and other contagions in the girl’s body, Vetria killed them with her natural Dochani abilities and began to repair all of the damage that they had caused.
It took some time and almost all of Vetria’s energy to heal the girl completely and this time she actually nearly looked her age, which being a Dochani was quite old. She was actually four thousand years older than Jintari, which happened to be roughly forty thousand years old considering that Jintari did spend quite some time in that vortex and was about thirty six thousand years old. With some of her last energies, Vetria placed Jintari into the tub and washed all of the grime from her body and let her soak while she disinfected the entire room.
Bone tired, after cleaning the room and burning the dirty linens in the bin and the old grimy clothes that were on Jintari, she dried her off and after placing clean linen on the bed got in bed with her sister and they both slept. They both were so tired after that ordeal that they did not notice that Gretchen had someone come in and remove the bin and tub from the room.
Vetria and Jintari both slept for many days and recuperated from sickness and healing respectively. Gretchen continued to make sure that the linen was clean while she had waited for the two to wake up. When they did finally get up, Vetria had a lot of questions for Jintari, even though she was not likely to be able to answer any of them, at least not at the moment. After Vetria and Jintari got dressed they went down stairs to the lounge and ordered something to eat.
CHAPTER SIXTY FIVE
Barkeep Gus was fretting about how Jintari would pay for the last few days that she stayed and the costs of her medical care. He knew that she could probably play the guitar and sing, but was not sure how well she would actually play. Considering the fact that most of his patrons were men, it might help if she did not wear much, but knew that Jintari would most likely reject most of the costumes that were typical among the hired talent at his inn. Jintari had ordered a tuna sandwich with lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber, relish, mustard, salt and pepper.
Vetria had ordered a turkey sandwich with lettuce and swiss cheese, salt and pepper with a dab of mustard. A garden salad with lettuce, tomato, cucumber, feta cheese with a light vinaigrette dressing was on the side of each of their dishes. A bottle of brandy that was lightly spiced and had a touch of cinnamon was in the middle of the table next to the small candled center piece. Both had a fluted glass filled to the brim with the brandy and the candle was lit. Barkeep Gus decided to talk to both Vetria and Jintari while they ate their sandwiches and drank their brandy. Vetria looked at Jintari as she finished her third glass of brandy.
She worried about the girl and her enthusiasm for brandy and hoped that she did not make a habit out of drinking so much. Gus paid no mind to Jintari’s openness to drunkenness and began to speak considering his words very carefully,
“Jintari, Vetria has told us that you share some of her blood as in you are sisters. I am not sure how she has come to this knowledge, but we have paid out a lot of money to get you to a stage that you can start to recover.
“We are not sure how much money you have, but it may require you to work for us. There would normally be many different positions available, but there are only two in your case to pay off your debt considering that it is kind of high. Your debt is equivalent to six hundred gold pieces.”
Jintari looked shocked. It would take her many years of working in this dump to amass that amount of money and there was a matter of how much she would need besides to live here while she worked. She grabbed the bottle of brandy and was about to pour some of the half full bottle of brandy in her glass, but decided against that and brought the bottle to her lips, tipped it and her head back and drank the rest of its contents. With her face flushed, she ordered another bottle of brandy through a throaty belch.
Barkeep Gus, face red with embarrassment and the fact that he saw a flash of flesh as Jintari undid the top two buttons of her blouse allowing more breast than should be shown in a public place show as she leaned into the table to sip her brandy without spilling it, tried to continue talking with as much dignity as he could muster.
“Ah hem, Jintari this may take some time for you to earn that much money to pay us back. Maybe it will take a year or more, but you will have to earn the money some how and there are only two positions available as I said.
“The positions that are available to you are either as a dancer or a musician, mainly a singer. Can you dance or sing Jintari?
“It might be quite difficult to sing or dance while you are totally intoxicated from the brandy you have been drinking this afternoon.
“Would you like to speak about this? First, I should probably tell you about how much you could earn in a night. Every night is variable and is possible that it may mostly depend on how many tips and how much our customers purchase during the time you are to play or dance.
“You are to receive two percent of the proceeds while you dance, four percent of the proceeds while you sing and fifty percent of the tips that are given to us for your performance.
“There are no up front fees for your services, so if no one comes to the inn while you are performing then you would get nothing accept your room, the room that you currently have and three meals a day plus as much as you can drink.
“Remember that no matter how drunk you are, you will still have to perform so try and keep your brandy habit at a minimum if you are not able to perform drunk.
“One last thing before you do a performance tonight, please do not take off your clothes during your dance or singing performances because we do not run a strip joint. Is that understood?” Barkeep Gus hoped that she could perform no matter what condition she was in because he could see her being drunk every time that she would perform.
CHAPTER SIXTY SIX
Most people that he knew could not talk while they were drunk let alone sing or dance. Their words were usually slurred and Gus could not handle having one of his performers drunker than his patrons. Jintari knew that she would have to perform this evening. She was not really sure of what she would perform, as to what type of dance she would do or what song she would sing and she would have to do both.
Being drunk enough to have all of her inhibitions leave her was not the problem. Sure it helped, it helped a lot. The problem was she might be too drunk not to slur words or not to take her clothes off and that would be a definite problem because she felt real hot at the moment and with her clothes discarded she would feel so much better. Absently stroking her neck and the valley between her breasts she began to speak, obviously she definitely had too much to drink.
“Hic! Oops, sorry.”
Jintari covered her mouth and smiled apologetically.
“I think that I am really drunk. My words might be bad, but I hope you can still understand most of what I say. It is obvious that I don’t really have a choice whether to work for you or not considering the debt that I owe you.
“The money, room, and food seems all right, but I hope that you don’t keep me here longer than I ha
ve to be and that if I stay for a bit to earn some extra money that I should be able to.
“Also, I should be able to leave whenever I want to, after the debt is paid in full of course. So, when is my first night to start or better yet, how long am I to work each day?”
She realized that two more buttons somehow got undone and it nearly caused both of her breasts to be completely exposed, one of her nipples could be seen if the angle was right, then again almost any angle would show both nipples at least slightly. Quickly fastening the four buttons before too much damage was done, she waited for Gus to stop coughing and his eyes to sink back into his skull, and speak.
Cough! Cough! Cough!
“I am glad that you can accept this proposal to eliminate your debt to us. If you wanted to work after the debt is paid that is entirely up to you and we would be pleased to have you here performing for us.
“As to how long you will work each day, that is up to you, but you should be prepared to dance at least three hours a day and sing at least five hours a day for a minimum of eight hours a day.
“We do not suggest that you dance more than six hours a day or sing more than ten hours a day, which means that you should not work more than sixteen hours a day.
“It would just make you too tired to perform the next day and you must perform each day. The time of the day is up to you.
“Certainly, we must know what time of the day you will start because we need to let our patrons know when you are performing since it is their purchases and tips that will decide what your pay is each day.
“Today is different, in that the time you have to perform is in an hour from now. We have already notified our patrons of your performance.
