Chapter 5 #2
“Hi, Kellan.” I spoke in a soft but firm voice, one I used to calm patients. After making a beeline for the sink, I quickly washed my hands and took a seat at the table, gesturing for Kellan’s hand. “I’m Rowan. I’m a traveling healer. What did you do?”
I gently lifted the bandage, careful not to worsen the damage. The cut was deep. Stitches were a must.
“I was putting some fence posts up, and I slipped.”
“Okay, I need to clean this out, then I’ll stitch it up and bandage it. Your brother went to get my medical bag.”
Kellan’s eyes flared wide. “You can do that?”
“I can. I’ll use dissolvable stitches. They’ll wash away naturally in a week or two, so, unless it gets infected, they won’t need to be taken out. You’ll just have to keep it clean and covered for a while. I can give you an ointment as well.”
Griffin stepped forward and placed my old leather medical bag on the table. The young boy, Alex, must have been damn fast to get it so quickly. Muttering a quiet thank you, I started pulling out antiseptic supplies and a suture kit.
“Washing it may sting a little.” I scrunched my nose at Kellan, who took a deep breath and nodded bravely.
“How old are you?” I asked to distract him while I doused a cotton ball in rubbing alcohol.
“Seventeen,” he said in a shaky voice.
“Still in high school?”
“No, I got my GED last year.” He hissed when the cotton made contact, instinctively flinching back.
“Impressive. Sorry, I know this hurts, but once it’s clean, I’ll numb it before I stitch it up.”
“No numbing.” Kellan shook his head, his face still grimacing. “The stuff Doc uses makes us feel like ass for days.”
I had to fight back a chuckle.
“I won’t use what Jenkins uses—it seems that he and I have very different healing styles,” I soothed, focused on cleaning the wound. “I use a natural herb mix—place it on the skin for ten or so minutes, and it numbs everything. Makes getting stitches a breeze. Does that sound okay?”
I looked up at the young dragon. His first shift was probably only a few years ago. There was so much life ahead for him, and it frustrated me that he’d already been treated poorly by a doctor who was supposed to do what was best for him.
Kellan thought for a moment, face still tight with pain, then nodded. “Yeah, okay.” His whole body was rigid, with visible nervousness on his face. What the hell had Jenkins been giving this horde that they would rather be in pain than take the numbing?
Satisfied with my cleaning of the wound, I searched my bag until I found the jar of the green, pine-scented paste and smoothed a liberal amount over the wound.
“Give this ten minutes to work, then I’ll get you stitched up and good as new.” I smiled at him. “I’m betting Jenkins uses human anesthetics on wounds like this. I’ve found that those can linger in a dragon's body for several days. Does he use needles?”
“Yeah, they’re horrible and itch like hell.”
Griffin chuckled, nodding to the paste I was slathering on the boy's hand. “I remember that smell well. That’s good stuff she’s using, Kellan. Rowan used it on me several times.”
“Really?” Kellan raised his brows.
“Yeah, that gash on my upper arm? She put that piney paste on it to numb me up good before sewing me back together.”
Kellan nodded, relaxing. “It actually feels good,” he commented, surprise lacing his tone.
“That’ll be the anesthetic,” I said.
Within minutes, he was numb enough for me to stitch up and send him on his way with a clean bandage and some basic care instructions. He’d calmed down by the end, happy with my work, even mentioning that he was relieved it was me taking care of him, and not Jenkins.
I would be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy that, smirking as I looked away and put my equipment back in my bag.
“I couldn’t feel it at all,” he said.
Dragons healed fast, so the neater the sutures, the better their wounds would heal. If the stitches were even slightly crooked, the injury would likely scar. A straight line typically meant no scar and better overall results.
“The benefits of good, natural medicine. You guys heal so darn fast, you just need a little helping hand from Mother Nature.”
“And you’re looking after Rory, aren’t you?” Kellan asked, flexing his hand, an impressed look on his face.
“I am. I only just arrived, though. It may take some time.”
“That’s great. Doc’s been saying he’s critically ill. He says all the young here have ‘weak constitutions.’” There was no mistaking the sarcasm in Kellan’s voice, and I waved away Jenkins’ words.
“Load of crock, if you ask me.” I snorted. “I’ve seen you and your brother. I wouldn’t say you two are weak in the slightest. You seem like healthy young horde members to me.”
Griffin grumbled unintelligibly from the doorway while Ma frowned.
“They’re healthy boys, but the dragons born more recently have struggled with sickness. We haven’t had any births in a while, and it’s not from lack of trying,” she admitted.
That’s odd. I finished taping the bandage over Kellan’s hand.
“Hmm, Griff mentioned there hadn’t been any births recently.
I’ll take a look at the records and see what I can find out.
You’re the only horde I know of experiencing that—the horde I just visited in Montana had a triplet birth while I was there.
There must’ve been at least ten toddlers wandering around the place. ”
“Anything you can do would be much appreciated,” Ma said, fussing over Kellan.
“It’s the least I can do, given you won’t stop feeding me.” I smiled, standing and turning to my patient. “Keep that clean, and I’ll check on you tomorrow, okay?”
Kellan nodded, and I faced Griff, beaming at him, hands on my hips. “What next?”
He smiled back. “Well, it’s early, but why don’t we go take a tour?”
“Can I steal some clothes to sleep in?” I asked, stretching lazily in a yawn as we entered Griff’s room. “Mine are getting a bit funky. I need to do some laundry while I’m here.”
Griffin snorted. “Like Ma would let you do your own laundry. She already thinks you hung the moon. She’ll be stealing your clothes at the first opportunity. Take whatever you want out of my closet. What’s mine is yours.”
“What’s mine is mine, and what’s yours is mine.” I laughed, throwing a pillow at him.
“Who decided that?” he asked indignantly, batting the projectile away with ease.
“That’s my fee for saving your life,” I said, sticking my tongue out at him as he chuckled.
“I can’t argue with that. Go shower, stinky!”
After grabbing a clean pair of underwear and a large T-shirt, I took a quick shower, saving the shampooing for another time.
The borrowed shirt covered my ass, and the simple black panties didn’t expose much cheek.
Griffin would survive if he saw a bit of my ass, anyway.
He might have joked, but we weren’t into each other like that.
Once done, we sat on the bed, passing snacks and whiskey back and forth.
“Doesn’t this remind you of the time we were lost in that shitty little town in Oklahoma?” Griffin asked with a chuckle. He was sober; alcohol hardly touched dragons, whereas this very human woman was already feeling the effects of the single-malt.
“When we raided those dinky vending machines? These snacks are way better,” I declared, holding up the cookies Ma had made earlier, insisting we take some with us after I’d stitched up Kellan.
Griffin got up, grimacing. “Yeah, if memory serves, we had good ol’ Evan Williams whiskey that night.”
“Ugh, yeah. That shit gave me a killer headache the next day. You stupid dragons were doing fine, of course.”
I laughed as Griffin flopped back onto the bed, grinning up at me. “It’s not my fault you’re a weak human.”
Faking shock and indignation, I kicked him in the side—hard. It practically bounced off him, and he just kept cackling. Stupid dragons and their stupid muscles.
“Hey! Not—”
Griffin was cut off by the bedroom door slamming open. In the doorway stood a giant, hulking man. An Alpha. He looked around the room, nose flaring. Everything about this man screamed power, from the heavy set of his jaw to his wide stance and intense, black eyes.
One thing was clear—he was pissed.
Every single muscle in my body tensed. The guy’s eyes darted between Griff and me, taking in my semi-dressed state and the bottle of whiskey in my hand. I could feel the fury radiating off him, hot and directed right at my best friend.
“Alpha Orsen, what—” Griffin started, but the Alpha didn’t listen. Instead, he lurched forward, barreling toward Griffin, grabbing him by his shirt and reeling his enormous fist back.
The sound of the punch was sickeningly loud.
“Griffin!” I shouted, jumping off the bed, but I didn’t dare intervene. An Alpha could easily tear me to shreds. Two dragons fighting was a messy business, and I didn’t want to be collateral damage. But this was Griffin. How was I supposed to let this guy just beat on him?
“Stop!” I called out.
This new dragon didn’t seem open to reasoning; he landed blow after fast blow, propelled by some unreasonable anger. Where was the rest of the horde? Surely there was someone who could come to Griff’s defense who wasn’t a pants-less, human healer?
The Alpha pulled back and snarled at Griffin, rage strong enough to melt steel as he growled, “What the fuck are you doing with my mate?!”