Vhalar 28
It had started two trials earlier as gossip. A new drug, another way for the people who couldn't cope with the world as it was to opt out for a little while. Ashira had largely dismissed it. What did one more drug matter? Eventually she might learn about it because it could be useful to her, but there were so many for people to choose from that really one more made no difference. This so called Heat might have been new, but what it did to people wasn't. Weaklings choosing to abandon reality. Old news. Very few addicts ever really got clean, or really wanted to. They just moaned and whined about how hard their lives were, and then if you were lucky they managed to kill themselves before they became too much of a drain.
She'd seen it before back home. Rarer than here, people in Oakleigh didn't have the time, nels or access to the drugs to obliterate themselves the way people in Andaris did, but there were always a few. Their families and communities had to care for them. They showed up in the clinic again and again with damage they'd done to themselves. What did they contribute except heartache? Heartless perhaps, but Ashira triaged everything. If these people would not help themselves why waste what could save a productive member of society? Even times of plenty were not times when one should waste, and lately there had not been much plenty to be found.
But she was still offering her services as a healer after coming to Andaris. She wasn't hired often. The Order was here, and there were other more experienced healers. If you had the coin.
Of course these opinions were easier to keep when everything was at arms length. If for example, you have been roused from your home and dragged down to Lowtown, into a house that was barely more than a shack, just maintained enough that the kingsmen do not demand it to be pulled down by a crying girl-child to find within the dirty home her mother and two older brothers unresponsive on the floor in their own sweat and filth, writhing at visions only they can see.. Well, that was something else all together.
For a moment, Ashira stood, taking in the scene. Horror and disgust warring for control, until both were quashed by something stronger. Training. Professionalism.
"Fetch clean cloths and water, fill the bath. Tepid, not hot, not cold."
The girl couldn't have been more than eight, but if she was old enough to fetch help, she was old enough to be of use.
"W-we don't have a bath Miss." the girl replied, cringing as though she expected a blow. She had enough bruises under the dirt that perhaps she did.
Another barely perceptible pause as Ashira switched gears, reminding herself where she was.
"What's your name girl?"
"Gracelynn."
"Gracelynn, fetch me water and cloths, can you do that?"
"Yes Miss. Are.. are they going to die?"
"Not if I've anything to say about it, now off with you!"
was a pleasure to read! Your style is lovely.