32. Lady Zoila II

“Uh, er... Uh... P-Pleasure to m-meet you.”

The young doctor bowed his head in reverence, taking the hand of the lady and doing his best to hide that he was trembling like a plate of gelatine.

*Jesus Christ! I stink and I'm dirty... Did he really have to bring me to meet his family in such a state?*

“Likewise, child. What's your name?”

“J-Joseph. Joseph L-Lee S-Selden, my lady.”

“I see you come from a place beyond our lands.”

“That’s r-right. I'm English.”

“Raise your head.”

The boy nodded and looked up. He stared into the icy grey eyes of the matriarch. He noticed several thin lines on her face, especially around her eyes, and a few almost imperceptible ones on her forehead.

*These kinds of wrinkles...usually belong to someone who studies a lot.*

Her overall figure was quite attractive for a grandmother of two young adults like Tariq and his brother.

*Speaking of which...*

Joseph turned to the young man, noticing that he didn't even lower his chin to gaze at him. He definitely was taller and bulkier than Tariq. He was frowning, scrutinizing everything about Joseph with his one eye. Unlike the prince, this one – Gerrard - had *very German* features. A pointy nose, strong bone structure, and a prominent chin. Lady Zoila had them, too, although they were softer.

The doctor offered him his hand.

“Spare me, milksop.” And just like that, he turned his back on Joseph and walked away, the sword’s sheath glistening under the sun.

Joseph stayed like that, his hand still outstretched, for a few more seconds, his mouth open in disbelief at such a display of rudeness.

He hid his hand inside his coat.

*Well, of course… Not everyone is eager to shake hands with a dirty, crippled peasant, after all.*

He felt Prince Tariq's hand on his shoulder, squeezing it. When he looked at the other boy, the first thing he saw was that he was blushing hard.

“I apologise for his behaviour. He...has his reasons.”

“Oh. Don't worry about it.” The doctor forced a smile to his face, manoeuvring his body to distribute his weight to just his uninjured leg.

But as he tried to relax his legs, he stepped right in the middle of his right foot, right on the injury.

An excruciating pain, as if he had been impaled by a bull, shot up his entire leg, almost reaching his crotch.

Joseph bent over, in such pain that he could have thrown himself to the ground .

“Ahh! Ugh!”

“Oh, shit! Come here.”

Tariq promptly put his hands behind Joseph’s back and under his knees, lifting him into his arms.

It hurt too much this time for Joseph to even think about offering up any objections. He just held onto the prince's neck, shutting his eyes and breathing deeply to keep from crying.

“Take him to your bedroom.”

“Yes, Nana.”

***

The white marble fireplace, framed by laurel engravings and Ionic columns, was lit, fresh wood crackling in a bold, welcoming flame.

They were in a broad room with a king-sized bed which was covered by a Moroccan canopy. Its curtains were made of an earthy beige linen, held back by golden ties. The sheets were a similar colour. There wasn't much furniture: a wardrobe, chest of drawers, and a desk, all in cherrywood, and a bookshelf containing many volumes. Everything was immaculately tidy. There was a white carpet under the bed which was flaked by two nightstands, also in cherrywood. A set of empty golden candleholders rested on top of the nightstands, decorated with lion heads and bat wings.

The only thing in significant quantity, Joseph noted, were plants. From the Georgian window he could see the foliage of a few pines, but there were also many plants around in the room. Devil’s ivy grew along the canopy, and there were three huge Birds of Paradise next to the bay window. An olive tree sat close to the desk There were many smaller terracotta pots with plants he didn't recognise, except for some violets, and a salmon and yellow pair of begonias.

All of this would be a pleasant and remarkable sight, but the pain in his foot was unbearable.

“AAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!”

*Fuck my dignity.*

Tariq laid Joseph down on the bed, putting some of the larger pillows behind him to keep him sitting up.

The doctor's eyes were growing blurry; everything in the room was spinning and he began to see dark spots. He noticed Lady Zoila had a dagger, using it to cut through his boot and sock. Then she sat on the bed and pulled Joseph's foot into her lap on top of a white towel. Behind her, there were two young girls dressed in white bringing in coloured rocks, various instruments, a golden amphora, and a huge silver basin.

*What the hell is all this for?*

The smell of rotten fish and pus filled the room.

*Smells like gangrene...*

Joseph gagged and broke out in a cold sweat. He begin to panic when he realised the smell was coming from his wound. He looked at it and felt the blood rush from his head. His foot was completely dark, the skin purple and brown. The lump around the wound was nearly black, and from the edges a pasty stream of pus dribbled profusely, like lava from a volcano. But what shocked him the most was that the lump was moving, struggling...as if there was something alive under his skin.

If he hadn’t been a doctor, he surely would've fainted straight away.

“Alright, you imbecile. Why didn't you bring here sooner?” Lady Zoila said to Tariq.

“I'm sorry. I didn't think it would be this bad, Nana. He seemed to be getting better, until yesterday.”

“And what happened yesterday?”

“My dorm mate disappeared. He was abducted by an astral aberration that night. I asked Joseph to give me directions to the places he might have gone, but he insisted on coming along with me.”

The doctor's cheeks began to tingle.

*Did he just call me “Joseph”?*

The woman stared at Tariq with wide eyes, her hair curling around her neck.

“An astral aberration? Manifested here?”

“Yes.”

“Have you reported this to your father?”

“Yes, Nana.”

As Joseph's foot rested in Lady Zoila’s lap on top of the white, fluffy towel, she poured the contents of the golden amphora on the wound. It was a hot oil with the wonderful fragrance of lavender and verbena. The lump kept moving, now even more agitated, but the doctor noticed it didn’t hurt anymore.

Immediately, the dark colour lightened to a reddish tone.

*Is she… How did she do that?*

"Where was he when this wraith bit him?"

"At a crossroad, with a memorial to a murdered family."

"Another materialised astral being from the Umbral...?"

"It seems so."

The woman sighed, shaking her head vehemently. She grabbed a knife with a white handle, the blade shaped like a half moon.

She stared at Tariq, frowning until her eyes looked sunken.

"Don't *ever* try to play the hero again. You understand? They're after you… I forbid you to do anything beyond your father's instructions."

"Nana, they were-"

"Don't talk back to me."

Tariq lowered his head, nodding.

Joseph felt something heavy in his chest. He turned his face away, deeply embarrassed.

*Maybe I'm the one who got him in trouble… I definitely should've stayed in the infirmary...*

He was brought back to the present moment when he felt the woman pull down on his foot by his toes with an uncanny strength, stretching the wound.

Then she cut his flesh with the half moon knife, her hands like those of an experimental butcher.

"Aah!"

Joseph raised his hands, trying to sit up, but it was too late.

A thick black fluid oozed out of the cut, covering the pus.

*Is that...my blood?*

Lady Zoila pressed at the lump as if it were a giant blemish. Joseph went pale at what came after.

Dozens of white maggots, fat and soaked in some sort of yellow secretion, were purged from the wound, falling right into the silver basin which was held by one of the girls. As soon as they touched the water, they disappeared in a puff of smoke.

*M-My God...*

Lady Zoila kept squeezing the wound until all of its contents were expelled. His skin looked normal again. There was only a pink tint around the cut.

The matriarch grabbed a pale pink crystal, around 15 cm long, with six sides. Squeezing the wound shut, she put the tip of the crystal above it, dragging it along the entire cut. Like an eraser on lead, the injury was gone, as if it never existed.

*JESUS CHRIST! IS THIS EVEN REAL?!*

Joseph couldn't close his mouth even though he had no words. His wide eyes kept looking from Lady Zoila, to Tariq, to his foot, and back again.

As a doctor himself, his chest felt as if it were about to explode in euphoria. Not even in the most deliriant knight stories and Arthurian legends had he experienced anything like this.

"This is...incredible!"

Lady Zoila raised an eyebrow.

"Did you see everything?”

Joseph’s forehead wrinkled in confusion, but his smile didn’t falter.

"S-Should I not have?”

The woman looked over at Tariq, smirking.

"Perhaps you got it right with this one."