Young Writers Society

Apothecaries couldn’t make promises. Vampires, werewolves, they could promise and deliver. I will turn you, and it’s done. Apothecaries had a much different story. Sure, I could promise a patient treatment, but I cannot tell them they’ll live with a good heart. They often didn’t. Medicine was an art of trial and error, and error usually came with a life attached to it. Sometimes, no matter how hard we tried, things just didn’t work. I thought there was beauty in that, but now, I understand the anger many felt with such circumstances.

That despite the heavy dosage, Joan still shivered. Every bump in the night made her leap out of bed, clutching her chest and scanning the room until one of us came to her aid. Occasionally, the sound of marching feet passed by the home. They never peaked in, never even knocked on the door, but poor Joan cringed every time they came too close. “Why would a vampire lord need a human military?”

“Loyalty and entertainment,” I responded. Joan was always flabbergasted at succinct answers; specifically, mine. When her head tilted like a dog, I went on. “The more busywork his cattle are given, the less they’ll have time or thoughts to rebel. War is for the men and sorrow is for the women. It’s a saying my mother told me.”

“Yet here we are,” Joan whispered, her eyes drifting towards Arthur. As the baby began shrieking again, he was the first to rise.

“Here we are.” That was the end of that.

Of course, there were still questions of the past lingering in Joan’s mind, but she’d come to learn the Apothecaries’ way. Truths of the world had to be shared in silent, terse moments. Words were raw and bloody, but prose and silent nods were bandages to bleeding wounds.

More footsteps followed, and poor Joan whimpered throughout the night. Well, until Edna kicked my foot. “Before Andrea beats you and the girl with Arthur’s cane,” she muttered, gesturing to Joan. I had suffered that fate once as a young girl, and I was sure Joan wouldn’t want doom as well.

Slowly, I crept towards her bed mat and lay beside her, rubbing her shoulder lightly. Her shivering stopped, but she was still curled in a fetal position. I tried massaging her back, yet she giggled at the administration. “Quinzel?” she called shyly.

“Yes?”

“May I confess something?” she asked quietly, “You mustn’t tell the others.”

“Of course.”

Joan flipped over, her hands acting on her pillow. She smiled so innocently, yet her cheeks were streaked with tears. “I’m horrified. I’ve naught a clue why I agreed to this clinic.” Poor, sweet Joan’s eyes watered as she spoke.

I reached for her cheek, rubbing out the tears from under her eyes. The girl held my wrist tenderly, keeping it in place. Even so, she smiled. I kissed her hairline shortly. I didn’t move away from her, certainly not now, and my lips stilled on her forehead.

“As am I,” I murmured, “And Arthur, and Edna, and especially the old hag.”

“Living corpse,” Joan added.

“Indeed,” I said with a sigh. A long silence lingered between us, only interrupted by the subject of our gossip snoring. “I would burn incense for you, but it’d be rude considering the occupants. Perhaps another time.”

Joan didn’t speak. I called for her, but her eyes had already closed.

The village girl, who came to be known as Cassidy, brought us to the ‘clinic’ as soon as the sun peaked over the horizon. Cassidy bounced with every step, a beaming smile on her face. “Isn’t it wonderful?” she exclaimed, presenting us with a shack that had seen better days. It had been looted, burned several times, and lost most of its structural support from a tornado years ago.

Arthur, Edna, and Joan went inside to inspect the interior. All I could hear was yelps and gasps, both from the splinters and sheer shock of the disrepair.

Andrea stood by my side as we inspected the exterior. “Stupid child!” she shouted repeatedly. “Insolent, indignant, moronic!” Spiteful words were spewed left and right, eventually turning into nothing but a blur of white noise in my ears.

When the trio returned, Joan looked completely humiliated. Edna was pacing around the yard, a small ‘tsk’ noise emitting every time she spun around and shook her head. “The repairs will take weeks, certainly, but it is not unsalvageable. Arthur emerged holding a defeated and sniffling Joan’s hand.

So began the rite of passage. Andrea stormed up to Arthur and yanked his cane from him. While Arthur tried to fight back, it was in vain. Arthur wobbled out of balance and stumbled into the closest wall to stay standing. Joan shrieked and screamed, running circles around the clinic to try and avoid the old woman’s wrath. Even when Edna tried to step in, arguing “She’s just a maiden!” Andrea ignored her pleas and smacked her sister over the head with the gold bulb at the top of the cane. I rubbed my cheek in sympathy as Edna slid to the side, leaving a perfect open for poor Joan.

The village girl, Cassidy, kept trying to fight for her, though. Despite Andrea waving that cane like a madwoman, Cassidy fought for control of it. Joan, with a nasty bruise on the side of her face, screeched and whimpered like a dying cat. She cried apologies when she the cane swung at her shoulder and made a sickening crack when it landed on her hand.

I’m not sure what moved my feet after that. I’d been in the same shoes before as a young girl, beaten between an inch of my life by a senile old lady, but I’d never stepped in before. Only now, seeing that pale and vexed girl shout and sob did I feel any sort of drive.

Out of the apothecaries, I had one thing that many of the others didn’t. Arthur’s leg had been limping since birth, Joan suffered ailments of the mind, Andrea’s age was quickly upon her, and Edna couldn’t do much physical activity (lest she cough a lung out). I was in perfect health. It was easy to snatch the cane from Andrea and hand it back to Arthur. It was even lighter work to pick up Joan and cradle her against myself. She whimpered into my shoulder, holding as tight as a newborn would to their mother. “Crazed old woman,” I spat, “Beating a child so! Have you any clue what kind of attention you could’ve drawn!?”

Andrea’s brow furrowed, wrinkling her face like an alligator’s skin. “If she had known not to cry like some foolish baby-!”

“She is a baby, Andrea!” I retorted. “Good heavens, ma’am! I have no clue why we have yet to put you down like the dog you are-”

Arthur, ever a benevolent force, stepped between us, gently pushing our shoulders. “We are more dignified than play yard insults, aren’t we?”

Andrea cackled. Despite her human origin, I’m sure she could trick any drunkard into thinking she was some awful sorceress with that laugh. “Arthur, if you hand me that cane that I’m sure I can show you dignified!”

Edna stomped her foot on the ground. “Enough, sister!” Finally, it seemed like the old woman’s features softened. “You’ve always done this- always! I can’t believe the gall... Just like father,” she mumbled, taking Andrea by the arm and dragging her off. “Come now, before steam blows out your ears.”

As the women walked back up the hill, Cassidy approached us shyly, reaching out to smooth out Joan’s dead ends. “Is she always like that?” she asked quietly. Arthur and I nodded. “Oh, how unfortunate...” she sighed, then went inside the clinic. “Well, there’s many old books in here. One of them must be medical practice. I wouldn’t know, but I suppose most of you would know how to read.” Arthur shrugged and laughed amicably and entered the clinic again with her.

Joan and I sat alone outside. I laid the sniffling girl on the grass, rubbing each limb that had a deep purple bruise growing on it. When she finally regained words, the girl sat up and dug her fingernails into me. “How could you!?” she screamed. “You let her beat me!”

“Joan, please-”

“No!” That was the first time I ever heard a strong declaration from her. “Andrea is too old for her own good! We should-” Joan stood up, wincing once the sting of a bruised kneecap rushed her. “We should put her down like the dog she is! Like the bit-”

“Watch your language,” I warned sternly.

Joan gritted her teeth together. She looked at me with such a fiery defiance I’d never seen before. “Don’t act as if you disagree with me. We need to poison that old cow before she kills one of us!”

“Watch your tongue, Joan!” I said, again. “You’re angry, but that’s no reason to talk of killing an elder woman!”

Joan stormed around in a circle, gripping her apron and staff tightly. “Yet it’s fine for us to speak of Andrea beating us within an inch of our lives!”

I noticed a trickle of read matting between her messy black hair. “Stop talking.”

“Ha! As if!” she yelled back. “I won’t be silent about such a thing!”

“Stop talking. You’re bleeding.”

On cue, she tripped over her own feet and struggled to stay upright. I helped her sit back on the grass, taking the bandana from her head and dabbing it on her bleeding wound. Joan chuckled lightly as she leaned against my shoulder. “In fact,” she said, faking confidence, “This only proves my point.”

After wiping the blood, I took a handkerchief and doused it in alcohol. I tried to gently apply it to her wound, but she still flinched and cried when I let it soak. Thankfully, it was I taking care of her and not the others. I was used to her weakness and sensitivity. “It’s not big enough for bandage. You’ll be alright in a day. Simply don’t lay on that side, correct?”

“Correct,” Joan mumbled.

“And Joan?”

She perked up at my call.

I glanced over my shoulder to make sure nobody had returned. “Do not rush. Andrea’s days are numbered. She will be six-feet-under in due time.”

Joan smiled. Then, she caught a glimpse of my handkerchief. “I’ve never seen that before,” she said, tilted her head like a puppy as she observed the butterfly embroidery.

I grimaced. “From a lover- long ago. Before this.”

“Your husband?” Joan asked.

“No, after that. They weren’t from this part of the continent.”

“Oh,” she hiccupped. Then, Joan giggled. “I’ve never met a foreign man. You’re the most “foreign” I’d ever met,” she ran her fingers down my dark skin. “Was he handsome?”

I pursed my lips, looking to the grass beside me before I could answer. “They were a treat for the eyes.”

“Was he kind?”

“The gentlest being I’d ever met.”

“What happened to him?”

“Turned out to be a kitsune.”

“Oh. Never heard of that.”

“A trickster spirit from the East.”

“I see. What was his name?”

I sighed. “If I say, you mustn’t tell the others.” Joan nodded, making an X over her heart with her fingers. I took a breath.

“Her name was Maiko.”

I waited, expecting the worst to come. Disgusted stares, perplexed expressions, mocking laughter... But Joan did nothing.

Joan simply hummed, shifting herself to lean on me completely. “That’s a beautiful name.”

“She was a beautiful lady.”

“Mm, no doubt.”