Marti Södergren sighs deeply. Almost all night long and most of the morning she has tended to the unfortunate sorcerers and sorceresses who are still at the infirmary and whose wounds from the battle need to be treated and looked after. Now there is nothing she wishes for more than to finally sink into her downy bed and sleep for at least eight hours straight. Alas, this will not happen any time soon. As, instead, she has to walk down all those long corridors to the dungeons to see to the very man who is responsible for her overload of work and sleepless nights. Moreover, what Tissaia told her, did not sound like she will be done in a jiffy. She heaves another sigh. Yawning loudly, she walks on.
When the experienced healer enters the cell, the prisoner is still in the exact same position as Tissaia described it to her, lying on his side and staring at the wall, not reacting to any noise or movement she makes. The flame-haired enchantress - not her natural hair colour, but she has been dying her locks for so many years now that she hardly remembers what her natural hair colour is - steps closer to the cot to examine the patient. He looks very pale, sweaty and battered, and surprisingly young to be the commander of an evil enemy invasion army. Many here at Aretuza would probably rejoice at the man's suffering, even at his death. However, not Marti Södergren. This is not the first and, considering the current political situation, will surely not be the last war Marti has served in as a healer. Being a professional at her life-saving job and not caring for politics at all, she has always treated the injured from both sides of the battlefield, no matter their nationality, gender or rank. She never lets any feelings of antipathy or hate interfere with her calling. The only thing that might prevent her from paying as much attention to her new patient as to the injured mages is her utter exhaustion. Once again, the sorceress sighs and yawns. How she wishes Triss Marigold were able to help her with her many patients, but unfortunately she is among the badly wounded and, although also very professional, it would probably not be a good idea to have her treat the Nilfgaardian commander, even if she were fit enough.
Marti hunkers down next to the cot and feels the sick man's forehead. It is clammy and too warm for her liking although he is trembling in the cold. Either he is running a fever, maybe caused by the festering laceration next to his eye, or the prisoner is suffering from hyperthermia. Hopefully not the latter as it is a common symptom associated with malignant catatonia, a life-threatening condition that might progress rapidly within a few days or even hours. It would be a lot harder to treat than a simple infection.
The enchantress checks her patient's other vital signs. His breathing is laboured and too fast, his pulse weak and the heart rate more than one-hundred-and-twenty beats per minute. The muscles throughout his body are rigid and, in addition to the fever shivers, Marti can observe tremors at the extremities. The pupil reaction is normal, though, when she shines a light directly in her patient's wide open eyes. However, he does not blink or react in any way to the visual stimulus. The typical symptoms of catatonia, and not very surprising after what happened to him. Although catatonia is often associated with an underlying psychiatric disorder like schizophrenia or depression, it can also be triggered by strokes, seizures or head injuries. What Tissaia has done to the prisoner must have had a similar effect on his brain functions. Not to forget the astronomically high levels of pain, stress and anxiety her interrogation methods must have unleashed, factors that can lead to catatonic episodes even without injuries to the brain. If he - and she - are very lucky, the Nilfgaardian's current state could also just be a prolonged aftereffect of the seizures and wear off by itself soon. Hm, in any case, close monitoring will be required, at least for the next couple of days. Marti sighs once more. And shivers. It is lousily cold in here. She casts a warming spell on herself. For a moment she considers casting one on the prisoner, too, then she thinks better of it. As long as she does not know for sure what the cause is for his elevated temperature, a warming spell could prove detrimental and dangerously exacerbate his condition, especially if it is hyperthermia, not a fever. Which is not easy to determine. But not impossible. If you know how to and have the necessary test apparatus.
The sorceress rummages inside the big bag she has brought with her and which holds phials filled with potions, boxes of pills and all kinds of medical utensils and equipment. The sooner she gets started with some treatment, the sooner she will be able to finally retire to her chambers and her spacious four-poster bed in the Aretuza guest wing. But first she needs a blood sample for further testing. Marti pushes the sleeve of the Nilfgaardian's black shirt up to the elbow he is not lying on, disinfects a spot with a promising vein on the inside of his lower forearm, produces a syringe from the bag and expertly inserts it into the blood vessel. The barrel of the instrument is soon filled with the dark red, life-giving fluid. She retracts the syringe. With the help of her magic Marti quickly seals the puncture site and stores the blood sample in her bag. Alright, what is next? There is not much the sorceress can do about the possible damage to the prisoner's brain. Nevertheless, a muscle relaxant, a powerful analgesic and a strong sedative might help with the catatonia if it is mostly caused by anxiety and agony. She takes another syringe from the bag and several meticulously labelled phials, then moves the plunger and draws the content of the first phial up into the barrel. She frowns. Where best to inject the potion? Usually she would prefer the thigh or deltoid muscle of the upper arm, however, the shirt sleeves are too thight to be pushed further up than the elbow and neither can she ask her catatonic patient to strip to the waist or drop his pants. Considering the way the man is lying on his side, it will be easiest to slip down his muddy pants a little and inject the drug into the upper outer quadrant of the buttocks. Marti puts the syringe down onto the bed for a moment, opens his belt and pulls back the black uniform pants with the grey stripe applications as far as necessary. The prisoner does not seem to notice. Nonetheless, Marti knows one should not assume that patients with catatonia are totally unaware of their surroundings and cannot feel pain only because they do not react. Contrary to appearances, some patients can recall in detail what happened during their catatonic state. So the healer is as gentle as possible when she successively injects the inert man with the fluids from several of her glass phials. As she expected, he does not make a sound or flinch although it must have hurt.
Then there is only one more thing Marti can do for the Nilfgaardian at the moment. Carefully the sorceress cleans the cut next to the man's right eye, disinfects it and heals it with a muttered spell. As it is already several days old, it will leave an ugly scar, but if it is the injury that is causing the fever, his temperature should go down soon. If not, well, she will have to think of something else.
Before Marti leaves the dungeons, she rummages in her bag again and takes out an oblong wooden box and a small leather pouch containing a bracelet of silver threads interwoven with several semi-precious stones and crystals of different colours and adorned with a magical amulet. She fastens the bracelet tightly around the sick man's wrist, then places the box on the floor next to her patient's bed and murmurs a spell. The box springs to life. It begin to vibrate and emits a low whirring sound not unlike the buzzing of a bee. The stones and the amulet on the bracelet also begin to hum softly. The ingenious apparatus will alert the healer if the Nilfgaardian's vitals should, all of a sudden, deteriorate sharply and signal a life-threatening medical emergency requiring immediate intervention. Marti hopes it will not be necessary, but better safe than sorry. As Tissaia made it more than clear that she wants the prisoner alive. Whatever for she did not elaborate on.
The tired enchantress puts the activated box back into her bag, slings its strap across her shoulder and, with another sigh and yawn, leaves the dreary prison cell. Unfortunately, she cannot head straight for bed, though. First she has to go back to the infirmary and run some tests on the blood samples. While the samples incubate, she will have a good two hours to refresh herself a little, have a second breakfast and maybe take a quick nap. And then she will have to return to the dungeons for more treatment, this time based on the test results. What a shit idea to answer Tissaia's call for help. She should have stayed at home instead with Pumuckl, her ginger tomcat, ignoring the urgent teleprojection. Well, too late for regrets. Hopefully, she will only have to stay here for a few more days, and then she will spend a whole week in bed with her cat. Or in a bath tub. Preferably not with Pumuckl as he hates water of any kind, but maybe with the ginger-haired stable boy from across the street? Well-built as he is, he would certainly be a nice addition to her collection of flings and affairs. As well as a worthy contribution to her reputation as a seductress. Some fellow sorceresses, obviously the jealous ones, even stoop so low as to call her a nymphomaniac behind her back, Marti is aware of that. Well, everybody ought to understand that having some kind of counterbalance to her very stressful and demanding work is vital. Other healers indulge in illegal drugs or highly unhealthy amounts of alcohol. Indulging in sex with varying partners from time to time seems like the least harmful distraction, at least to Marti Södergren. It is definitely something to look forward to. If she does not die of sleep deprivation and excessive labour before she can go home and have it off with the ginger eye candy, the human one, of course ...