"There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says "Morning, boys. How's the water?" And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes "What the hell is water?-David Foster Wallace
Mrs. Crell dragged Taryn into an unused servant's room, deposited her on a lone, wooden chair, and quickly closed the door, locking it behind her. Taryn could still hear muffled exclamations and chatter coming from the hallway.
"Now, girl," Mrs. Crell walked swiftly until she towered over Taryn, "I don't know what's going on, but I want answers. Now."
"I-I was just in the garden, Ma'am," Taryn began, looking down at the floor.
"Doing what? Who gave you permission to be in the garden?"
"No one, Ma'am," she could hear the blood rushing through her ears. "I was just… I thought…"
"You were picking flowers for your mother weren't you?"
"How did you know?" Taryn gasped, looking up to meet Mrs. Crell's intent gaze.
"I know. And I also know that it was her birthday just a fortnight ago. And a little mouse told me you asked the steward for the afternoon off." Her voice remained steely. "It was thoughtless, Taryn. Sweet, but thoughtless."
"I know I wasn't supposed to be there-"
"Just what exactly would you have done if someone had caught you steeling?" Mrs. Crell snapped, brows tightening. "Tell me—what would you have done if someone found you there, helping yourself to the possessions of our benefactors?"
"I-"
"You would have lost your job. And your hand. And you wouldn't be getting' either of them back." She sighed, "I hate to say it, girl, but you are damned lucky to have found that corpse of a man. The maker doesn't drop bodies from the sky for just anyone."
"I suppose he has a sense of humor, then." Taryn muttered under her breath.
"What was that?" Mrs. Crell said, "No, never mind. Listen, I ought to report you to the master. It's my duty to make sure the staff is running cleanly."
"No! Please don't!" Taryn cried, jumping to her feet. "Without this job, I'll starve! And so will my mother! Please, ma'am you can't do this!" She could feel pressure building up behind her eyes and a rock suddenly lodged itself in her throat. Her stomach lurched painfully, trying to claw its way up her abdomen.
"How can I trust you, girl? What right do you have to stay here?"
"Please, please," Taryn croaked, "I'll do anything, I swear."
Mrs. Crell froze, her eyes darting to the side thoughtfully. "Anything, eh? Well, I suppose we can work with that."
She collapsed slowly onto the nearby bed steepling her fingers beneath her chin.
"We need to keep a close watch on our new guest, it seems. I don't trust anyone who shows up unannounced." She turned to Taryn, brow wrinkled in thought. "You, my dear, will be my eyes and ears until I decide otherwise. You are to inform the doctor that you are his new nurse. You are to report to me every night just after midnight in the kitchen. And," her eyes gleamed in the stream of light from the window, "you are to run directly to me the minute he begins to awaken."
"Ma'am?" Taryn hesitated, "He looked… Well, he looked quite dead when they brought him to the doctor."
"Even more reason to watch closely then," Mrs. Crell replied, standing up. She strode to the door and unlocked it. "Taryn," she said, facing the door, "If there's anyone in this world you should mistrust, it's the dead."
She strode out into the hallway.
It took Taryn a few moments to calm herself before leaving the room. She walked down the hallway, listening carefully, but the crowd had dissipated, leaving only the sound of her own footsteps.
She stopped in front of the doctor's door, took a large breath and knocked. "Go away!" the doctor's voice called through the thick wood.
She knocked again, "Doctor, it's me Tary-"
The door swung open and the doctor looked down at her. His robes were smeared with grime and his shoulders were slumped in fatigue.
"Taryn, good to see you here. What brings you around?"
"Mrs. Crell said that I was to be a nurse, sir"
His drained, glazed eyes looked down at her for a moment before he stepped aside. "Yes, do come in. I could use the help right now."
The door thudded shut behind her as she entered the room. A shaft of light fell onto the bed near the window. The man from the garden lay there; his face had been washed and his robes disposed of. White linens twisted snugly around his waist.
"I feel that I should warn you," the doctor said, striding towards the patient "that I will not tolerate you spying for Mrs. Crell" He glanced over at Taryn's sharp intake of breath, "Yes, I know. She's not as crafty as she likes to think." He looked thoughtfully at the ceiling, "Well, actually, she is. I'm just smarter than she'll admit."
A cold tremor trickled down Taryn's spine. "Sir, I have to report to her. I'll lose my job otherwise."
"Well, now. We can't be having that." He said, rummaging through a pile of medical supplies. "Ah! Here it is!" he said, pulling out a small needle. "Light a candle for me, please."
"Why?" Taryn asked, retrieving a candle from the corner of the room. She stuck the wick in the flames of the fireplace, waiting only a second before it caught fire. She hurried back to the doctor.
"Because," he said, holding the tip of the needle in the small flame "it is imperative to sterilize the needle before attempting to sew the ectodermal tissue back together." The needle was slowly turning a dull red. "That ought to do it," the doctor said pulling the needle away from the flame. "Hand me the thread, if you will."
"That's not what I meant, sir" Taryn said, grabbing a ball of thread from the cupboard, "Why keep me, if you know that I'm supposed to spy on you?"
He stared intently at the needle, attempting to thread it with the thick, white fiber. "Because I need a nurse, that's why," he grunted. "And she's not the only one who can have spies. I've always wondered how many of her lackeys I've successfully guessed. I know for sure that red head who follows the mistress around like a lost puppy, and the stable boy who came in with a broken arm…"
He finally managed to thread the needle, "Now come here," he said, standing over the man, "He's got a gash along the left side of his torso, just deep enough to slice a good chunk of muscle." He pulled down the sheet, revealing a laceration running down the length of the man's waste. Blood trickled from the corners of the wound, weeping down onto the bed beneath, staining the sheets a rusty red.
"We need to avoid the possibility of infection, so go retrieve the water that I boiled. It should be above the fireplace." Taryn hauled the large pot from above the fireplace, shuffling back to the bedside. "Good, now you're going to need to irrigate the wound. Just pour water on the gash. Slowly." The muscles around the lesion spasmed as she emptied the water onto the man's torso.
"And now we can begin sewing this man shut. Taryn, I'll need you to hold the skin together." She put a hand on either side of the gash, pushing the two flaps of skin together. More blood seeped from the edges of the wound. "Yes, yes, very good," the doctor said, then pierced the needle through one flap of skin, then the other, and began to sew the gash shut.
The procedure took scarcely less than five minutes. After the doctor tied a final knot and cut the string, Taryn let out a sigh of relief.
"Well, that went well," the doctor exclaimed happily. His blood-shot eyes betrayed his exhaustion. "Taryn, I'm going to have to ask you to watch over the patient for the rest of the afternoon. I'll write you a note for Mrs. Crell. Memorize what it says, and report it back to her. Word for word." The doctor picked up a quill and inkpot from a nearby desk and scribbled a message onto a piece of parchment. He handed it to Taryn.
"I'll be in my quarters. Come get me if his condition changes." He departed, casting a cursory glance back into the room as he left.
Taryn walked back to the patient, and sat tentatively on the end of the bed. His face looked undisturbed in the evening light. Thin stubble lined a strong jaw. A long nose led up to closed eyes situated upon an ashen face. She could see the light rise and fall of his chest as he breathed steady, shallow breathes.
Who is this man? she thought as she turned her gaze towards the window, watching the clouds pass by in languid, thoughtless existence. Her gaze drifted back to the man, eyes falling onto the wound.
She returned her attention to the clouds.
Author's note: So it's four am in the morning and I have no idea why I'm awake. I don't even believe in the hours between three and six am. As always, if you're feeling like it, leave a review. I appreciate any feedback. Also, I wonder who this mysterious almost-corpse is? Hmmmm... Three guesses.