Between being summoned to Head Healer Elliot's office, and half a dozen small issues since to make everything was in place, by the time Elixa finally made it on to the third floor to do something she considered productive, she was itching to get going.  Her new robes were a bit more structured than the simple apothecary ones and even thought they were ones for Healer in Training, she still felt rather fancy for wearing them.

Undoubtedly they would be splattered in something very soon. That was how it worked! Finally released to seek out her mentor, she waited respectfully at the foot of a patient's bed, listening, but her eyes also busy looking down the ward at everyone else hard at work. One healer was changing a dressing on an oozing wound, another was closely inspecting a rash on a new patient's neck, wand tip lit. Further down a patient belched loudly, and apologised, symptoms subsiding.

The patient she was quietly stood by the feet of did not seem to have any obvious rashes, oozing wounds or audible symptoms, but was listening to the healer and nodding at irregular intervals. Elixa blinked, suddenly paying more close attention to the interaction, realising the patient hadn't spoken  word since she had arrived, but was instead making small hand gestures and occasionally scribbling down with a quill.

Poisoning that caused loss of voice amongst other unknown symptoms. An inhaled poison perhaps? Burned throat? An accidental consumption of a potion with magical influence over the throat? You'll be figuring all that sort of stuff out soon, she thought to herself, glancing between the two before her, having not wanted to intrude before, now actively studying them both instead.
"Sorry," she apologised as the patient looked her way, a little heat rising to her cheeks. "Observing the consultation. Didn't mean to interrupt."

It was never quiet on the third floor, which Arc quite preferred since it meant he always had work to do. New patients, new faces, new cases to puzzle over. This patient, though, was fairly tame. He didn't mind that either. It was a nice change from the throng of patients who came in with boils and burns and all manner of ailments that had to be deciphered and puzzled over while the patients themselves kept their mouths tightly zipped shut.

He didn't notice Elixa at first, busily writing down the details of whatever the patient had gestured to him or scribbled down on the parchment in a more legible healer manner. It was only at the sound of her voice did he look up. The patient looked back at him with a most irritated and inquiring expression on his face, clearly questioning the intrusion of this newcomer.

"Don't worry, sir," he assured the patient calmly. "She's a healer-in-training on this floor, so you'll be seeing her around. Just think of her as another healer. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to see to other patients first. Please have some rest and I'll return with the remedy."

He walked past Elixa, but stopped to hand her the patient's folder. "Read it. You have one minute."

"Read it. You have one minute."

Elixa's eyebrows shot up and she grasped the folder quickly with both hands, feeling that morning was already becoming one for having things thrown at her.

Quickly, quickly now…

No history of any sort of cough or cold prior to the symptoms coming on, not felt unwell recently. Records of consumption, a hedgerow walk. Her eyes skimmed down the list of questions, forming a picture in her mind.

Red berries, not from a bush but from the ground. She closed her eyes a moment, her mind quickly scooting through her memories of British woodland plants with red berries…

Her eyes sprung open, looking to the patient before her.
"Swollen throat, loss of speech, swollen tongue?" She thought aloud from the patient's feet, and her face spread into a wide smile, forgetting that she was diagnosing his predicament not playing a guessing game for a moment.

"Lords and ladies? Bright red berries all clustered together on a stalk." She momentarily clasped the folder towards herself, using both hands to show the shape to the patient. The chap still looked irritable towards her, impatiently wanting his voice restored rather than to be the subject of education.

Elixa glanced to Arc, that meant just treating the symptoms, it was nothing too serious unless the swelling closed the throat so he couldn't breathe.

"Wyethia for the throat - it's not caused by infection but by irritation or allergic reaction, and colocynth for any colic that arrives?" She suggested quietly to the more experienced healer, still clasping the notes.

Arc kept his blank expression on as he listened to Elixa. She probably hadn't noticed his gaze as he observed her actions, listening to her as well. When she was done, he nodded slightly in response before pulling out the note he had hidden in his sleeve before handing the folder over to her and tapped it with his wand. It immediately folded itself into a paper airplane and flew off down the stairs.

"Mm." The indifferent sound would have probably irritated an overly enthusiastic learner. He turned around to the patient. "Treatment will be in a few minutes." Then he beckoned to her and stepped carefully out of the patient's hearing range.

Once they were far enough, he turned back to Elixa and took the folder from her. "For a former healer-in-training, you've not done too bad, but this is about the easiest you will get here today. Still, I'd give you maybe half the full score, simply because you didn't keep the patient in mind." He raised his eyebrows as she gave him a look of indignation. "You're in the presence of a human, not identifying and analysing case situations presented to you on a piece of paper. I know you've been an apothecary for a while, and it's hard to forget being one, but I'm sure you can at least try next time."

He gave her a slight pat on the shoulder. "First thing in the morning though, and while I have to say my poker face might not be that great when it comes to being told you've not done that well, I'm really not that strict. I just wanted to see what you'd do under pressure. We can fix your mistakes, no problems."

The paper came flying back, this time carrying a phial tied to its underbelly. Arc nonchalantly took it out of the air. "He already has had colocynth, he was having some toilet trouble when I came in. Infusion of wyethia at a dilution factor of four to prevent any future allergic reaction and soothe the throat, but funny that we don't have any cure for it, don't you think? Sounds like a future project, could be fun." He jerked his head back towards the patient's bed. "I'm going to go administer the treatment, and I just want you to watch this time. Be mindful."

Arc didn't wait for an answer. He trusted Elixa to take charge of her own initiative - she'd done that plenty when it had come to flirting with him! He'd be disappointed if she stood too far back or did not mind her manners.

With a speed that would have made even Elixa gape, he smiled at the patient; no one would have even managed to realise he'd been deadpan just a few seconds ago. "Thank you for waiting, Mr Vordun. Does your throat feel any more constricted? No? Alright then, if you would be so kind just to drink this. It'll take about two minutes to settle in and start working, so don't worry if you don't feel better immediately."

The patient drank it down and made a face, but he handed the phial back to Arc. The healer gave him a slight bow. "You'll feel better in an hour, give or take. When you're done, please drop by the apothecary on the ground floor with this." He placed a written prescription on the table beside Vordun. "You will need to take colocynth for the rest of the day, but hopefully you will be better tomorrow. Do you have a contact to whom I can send a notification that you will be spending some time in the hospital, someone who will miss you such as an employer? No? Alright then, please just stay here and rest for now, and you can leave whenever you feel better." He turned away, tying the phial back to the airplane and then sending it off, before heading out into the wider space of the main ward, away from all the patients.

Whereas Elixa relished the puzzle so soon after stepping foot on the ward, Arcturus looked anything but. He'd adopted his usual neutral mask it seemed when she turned to him. As she offered Wyethia and Colocynth, he didn't seem too impressed. Had she got it wrong? She was so sure!

Aghast, she followed Arcturus down the ward until they were out of earshot. Half the full score? He'd given her a minute! Arc could see her irritation and elaborated. He didn't give her much time to respond before they were trailing back to administer the Wyethia.

Turning on her heel she trailed him closely,
"Alright, fine, next time." She muttered, rounding the other side of the bed for better view of the administration. Then without further hesitation they were off again. Elixa giving her own shallow bow to Mr Vordun before following Arcturus.

"Simple enough, yes. I didn't mean to, that was stupid of me. Sorry." She apologised, frowning. "Are you working your way down or are you on assigned beds? What am I most useful to do?" She put her hands on her hips, the frown changing from frustration to one of determination. "I'm later than I wanted to be up here, Elliot summoned me downstairs." She scowled down the ward. "Doesn't think I am up to the job before I've started. Grmph. I'll regret it later, but all I want is to get stuck in. Anything I need to know before we do?" Her dark eyes fixed Arc closely and her lips pressed into a straight line.

Arc suppressed a smile at Elixa's earnest -  he knew she wanted to just get on with it, and it would do no good for him to look like he was mocking her. Not after seeing Elliot. He stopped to one side of the corridor to let other staff pass and motioned for her to do the same.

"I know you want to get going, and I don't blame you," he said. "Elliot can make you feel quite outraged, doesn't she? But this is the morning rounds, Elixa, we don't start straight away with assigned beds. Ward rounds go first, long-term patients after, and then appointments rear their heads. Routine is important. It sets a rhythm in the ward, and no patient demands to be seen first when they realise there's a system. All right?"

He paused for a moment, and then added, "Well, that's just my personal view. Anyway, the next patient will just need seeing to. And since you're raring to go, you do it." Arc gave her a wry smile and gestured at the next bed. "I'm sure you know the routine."

"All right." She echoed, and gave a nod. She knew how the day worked in general but had rarely spent hours up here, normally dashing from one place to the next if she wasn't downstairs in the apothecary.

Elixa gently indicated to the bed she assumed would be next, adjacent to Mr Vordun's before she approached. Her eyes caught the swollen feet protruding out of the bottom of the sheets, and a pair of boots were on the floor, sliced open beside a sealed paper bag with the hospital crest which presumably also contained other clothing. Neither would fit round those feet.

"Good morning." Elixa greeted calmly and smiled politely. "Healer in Training Mordent, and Healer Hollingbury." She reached for the notes, "How are you doing Madam Briggs?" Her eyes quickly scanned over the notes of the admission, treatment given the night before.

"Barely slept, they've kept me awake all night." If Elixa had to describe the witch, she would have put Briggs on the more portly side. She had long brown and grey hair which curled into ringlets and an ample bosom. Her records stated she was in her mid sixties, and had been hiking in the Scottish highlands - which explained the boots.

"Describe your symptoms this morning?" Elixa asked, drawing to the woman's beside from the foot of the bed, still carrying the notes. A self-inking quill made its way from her pocket.

"It's like I have cramp in them both still. That's why I tried to remedy it when we made camp." The witch gestured to her feet again.
"And the swelling followed after the treatment, a reaction?"
"Ivy - a stupid mistake, I'd picked up the wrong packet from my home supplies."
"Ah. Well," Elixa held back the thought to say 'could be worse, could have blown your toes off.' or something along that line. She could feel Arcturus nearby. "The cramping hasn't eased overnight? May I take a look?"

Elixa set aside the notes and bent over the woman's feet, sniffing gently before examining the skin. There were blisters, as well as swelling. The notes had measured the swelling, and Elixa could see without even measuring at that moment that the swelling had greatly reduced from the previous night. She would measure it in just a moment.

"Do you often suffer from cramps, madam?"
"Only really when walking great distance."
"And do you often walk great distance?"
"Once or twice a month - ten miles or so."
"And between times?"
"Well, nothing too out of the ordinary…" The patient looked a little bemused by the query from the Healer in Training bent over her feet, hands clasped behind her back to avoid the temptation to touch. These feet were undoubtedly still quite painful.
"Does the skin itch?" The patient nodded.

Elixa straightened, examining the woman's reaction carefully as she continued to ask questions.
"Do you feel any numbness or pain in the sole of your feet?"
"They do feel a little numb there, though I get these awful shooting pains too, makes me wish my feet were all numb."

Elixa's frown of concentration over the feet fell away, her polite smile returning as she scooped up the notes and carefully added to them.

"Madam Briggs, we'll bathe these again in lukewarm water and treat with calamine lotion. The swelling had gone down considerably from the previous night, though we will take another measurement to study this." She rooted around her person for the item - not accustomed to the new robes. "Then we'll begin your course of Pulsatilla[1] for the cramps and the pain, and raise your feet a little more to help the swelling drain. Ah, here it is." The tape measure emerged between her fingertips and sprang into the air, carefully measuring three points on each foot at the direction of her wand while Elixa noted them down in the log.

She glanced round to Arcturus, just to check she wasn't clearly overlooking something if his pokerface had dropped.

1.

Pulsatilla Painful sensation of numbness in soles of feet and in balls of the toes. Red-hot swelling of feet, extending up to calf, with stinging pain. Swelling of top of foot. Oedematous swelling of feet, worse in evening. Piercing shootings and incisive pains in heels (towards evening). Shootings in soles of feet and extremities of toes. The complaints are worse when one allows the feet to hang down. Adapted to persons of indecisive, slow, phlegmatic temperament; sandy hair, blue eyes, pale face, easily moved to laughter or tears; affectionate, mild, gentle, timid, yielding disposition- the woman’s remedy. Weeps easily: almost impossible to detail her ailments without weeping.Source

Arcturus stood quietly to one side, close enough to hear Elixa but keeping a distance so that she didn't feel he was creeping on her neck. He knew how that felt; a healer he'd trained under in his earlier years had done that and it had been really difficult to concentrate. Well, eventually he'd do that to her, but not now. This was the time where he wanted to see what she could do.

He carefully tucked his hands into his sleeves and observed both patient and healer-in-training. The patient occasionally glanced at him, but Arcturus' stoic, almost statuesque pose and silence sealed the fact that he wasn't involved unless Elixa mucked it up - and he trusted her not to.

She didn't let him down. Attention to detail, thorough checking, clear diagnosis based on observations and data presented. Perhaps he didn't need to teach her much on the bedside manner, although some reminders would do once in a while. That wasn't a problem, it wouldn't hurt much, and she could easily remember eventually. Well, there was also the fact that the patient wasn't much of a challenge, but that could be changed later. He glanced at the next bed to check if he could set up a challenge, and then did a double take. Oh, no...the next patient was more than a challenge. He summoned the patient's notes quickly while the aforementioned patient was looking away.

When she looked back at him for a moment, he simply nodded at her as if to keep going. He watched her finish writing in the log and set it aside. A mediwitch had already hurried up to them and was waiting for them to move on somewhat impatiently. He nodded to her and beckoned to Elixa to come with him.

Once they were clear of the patient's hearing, he stopped and turned to look at her. "I can say you've impressed me without any bias," he said, smiling gently. "I don't think I need to supervise you when it comes to the easier patients, you can deal with that on your own now."

He flicked through the notes that he'd accio'd from the next bed. There hadn't been much change in this log save for the lack of a record for any administered dose for the day. He was hardly surprised given the patient.

"For this next patient," he said, his voice much lower than usual despite the fact that they were distant from the beds again, "I will need to ask you to stand only within hearing range. Mr Hodgeworth requested very emphatically that only he seen by a male staff. As you've probably noticed, there is a higher number of female healers on this floor than there are male, so I have had the pleasure of dealing with him, administrating treatment and all." He smiled, or rather, showed his teeth. "He gets very belligerent regardless, and I suppose your presence will make him even more annoyed. But, well, patients are patients." He flipped through the notes.

"This Halloween he got drunk and accidentally drank one-quarter of a bottle of Doxycide before he realised what he was doing. I don't know how he's still alive. Either way, his friends got him here and he's been having treatments, so he's not bad and only requires having his system flushed out now with a laxative along with small dosages of the antidote being administered." He looked at her. "Apart from the patient himself, not much of a challenge.

"So here's your real challenge. First question: What ingredients of Doxycide are toxic? Second question: Using Golpalott's Third Law, how would you blend your antidote to counter the ingredients and ensure they are of correct concentration? Third question: Name an ingredient of the blended antidote that is toxic for ingestion and identify the dilution factor to render its toxicity harmless to the patient while keeping its healing properties intact." Arc smiled at Elixa's expression. "The theory exam is around this standard of difficulty, although I can't speak for times when the examiners get tetchy. While I deal with him, you work out those questions in the background, I want the answers ready when I'm done."

He headed towards Mr Hodgeworth. "Good morning, sir, how are you doing today?" he said, giving the aged man a smile. Mr Hodgeworth scowled at him.

"I'm not feelin' any better! Why do I have to drink such a tiny bottle o' this stuff? And these bathroom breaks are ridiculous, I swear I know every part of the door by now in the toilets!" Despite the frail appearance of the patient, he certainly could get loud. "My donations pay your salary, son, so I expect the best from this place!"

"Of course, Mr Hodgeworth." Arcturus' tone was nothing but polite, and he was still smiling. "You don't have to worry, sir, you're making good progress. As long as you take the medicine we give you, you'll be fine."

"You better do, or I'll write to the board about you! I've got friends on there, you know." The patient watched Arcturus fish out a small phial from one of the pouches on his belt, and then caught sight of Elixa watching in the background. His eyes bulged out a bit. "That woman over there better not be eavesdroppin'!"

"She's a healer-in-training, Mr Hodgeworth," said Arcturus patiently, adding the contents of the phial to a glass of water. "You'll be seeing her around for the next two days."

"Didn't I say I wanted a man to see to me?" the patient demanded. "I'm not havin' a woman give me my medicine--"

"May I remind you, Mr Hodgeworth, that I'm still here." Arcturus took out another bottle. "I remain seeing to you, sir, not her."

"Good. Women! I don't trust them one bit, ask them to do something and they'll do something else. Too bad my donations are also payin' her, I'll have you know that if I could say so I'd dictate my money goes to only the men in this place."

Arcturus wasn't fazed by any of this; mostly he was trying to not show any mirth because, quite frankly, it was all ridiculous to him. But treatment was serious business, so he focused on that while the patient continued to rant, tuning the aged man out to measure the laxative.

"Please drink these," he finally said, cutting through the belligerent ranting. "It'll take half an hour for all of it to settle, so please be patient. Drink the remedy first, sir."

"Nah, I want to get this all out of my system." The man lifted the laxative to his lips, and then looked at Arcturus with a rebellious air. His expression drained away the moment he did at the sight of Arcturus' steely gaze and lack of smile, and he meekly changed for the glass of the mixture on the bedside table. The healer stood there watching him until he'd drained both.

"Thank you for your patience, Mr Hodgeworth," he said calmly, the smile back on his face. "I hope your trip to the restroom later will be easy on you."

"Yeah, all right, you skunk," the patient muttered. Arcturus turned on his heel and rejoined Elixa.

"So?" he asked, as if all that hadn't just happened. "Answers?"

"Throats, feet, what have we got next?" Elixa asked as she handed over to the mediwitch to bathe Madam Briggs' feet. She smiled genuinely at Arc's praise and gave a self conscious little shrug.
"Aw thanks, and I get to enjoy all the swollen feet on my own." Elixa made sure to keep her voice down as she replied, heaven forbid a patient overheard.

"Who's up next?" She asked, having spotted Arc was already clasping a set of notes. Hearing range? What the? Hodgeworth?!

She resisted the temptation to turn around and steal a look at the next bed. Hodgeworth was a name she had heard healers mention in low voices over coffee . He was a pain in the bum, and that was if you were very polite about it.

Still, despite being instructed to observe, Elixa carefully listened to her mentor's requests, her eyebrows lowering with each question as her hands clasped behind her back extended thumb, first and second finger to link the three questions in her mind.

Hodgeworth could really moan, she thought fleetingly before she considered the questions. Unfortunately the grumbly old chauvinist broke her concentration by less than politely pointing out she existed.

"Answers?"
"Who drinks a quart of doxycide?" Elixa replied in a low voice, eyes narrowed at the wizard beyond her mentor. "Turns out a chauvinist old fart does, pity it wasn't the bottle."

Her hands were still knotted by the fingers behind her back and her lips barely moved. She didn't much care if Arc gave her a look for that - it was true.

"Doxycide contains bundium, dragon liver, cowbane, tormentil…" her eyes raised to the ceiling as she ticked off the list in her head, "… streeler shell and hemlock. Basically all of it apart from dragon liver and the tormentil are poisons in some sense."

Elixa rolled her shoulders, considering the second question. She didn't like the fact she couldn't answer it off the top of her head. "The answer to the other two are with quill and parchment, especially considering I don't know how big that bottle of doxycide was - and it's sold in more than one concentration - or if he brewed it himself, correctly." She frowned and dropped her head a moment, exhaling. "You're not meant to answer with questions, I realise."

"No, you're not." Arcturus smiled. "But that was mean of me. Still, you tried, and you identified the ingredients. I didn't expect you to be able to count that quickly anyway. It's not a problem." He winked at her. "Maybe by the end of the year."

He glanced at the patient they'd just left; the man was watching them beadily. "Best to leave him alone. We know all the little details - here." He handed her the file. "All the answers."

A quick glance showed that Hodgeworth was still watching them. "We should be moving on, but that's it for now. All the other patients are either being discharged later on today or having just come in and they're not under me. Later on we'll be dealing with appointments, but for now I guess...long-term patients."

Arc turned around to look at her. "Even when we get patients like Hodgeworth - and worse, trust me - we still have to treat them as patients worth our service. When you've dealt with enough people like him and then some for over a decade..." He waved at his face. "So don't expect to develop a poker face overnight. You need to be able to stand your ground with these people, and yet still speak to them as if you're just looking out for them. I wished they taught that in healer training, but this is probably something that comes with exposure."

He gestured in the direction of the long-term wards. "Want to go deal with those and see how you fare, then?"

"Definitely by the end of the year. Hmph, you're just scoping out my levels of knowledge, I understand." She delivered the briefest of smiles, still frustrated.

"… we still have to treat them as patients worth our service…"
"Yes, yes. I know." Elixa replied, not meaning to come across quite so impatiently.

The invitation to move on and focus on the longer term patients was greatly received to move on from her irritation. She shot Hodgeworth a passing glance before they left.

The long term patients were further down the ward where it was a little quieter. There wasn't quite the hustle and bustle but there were often close family members sat quietly by the bedside keeping them company.

The first beside the doors which bore A. Hollingbury on the chalkboard above the bed was a gaunt young woman, accompanied by a tired young man of similar age, sat reading the newspaper to her. On spotting Arcturus, he paused mid-sentence to see if he was approaching before tailing off and folding the paper over.

"Good morning." Elixa greeted quietly, but clearly, addressing them both. She reached for the notes, glancing to Arcturus as the young man greeted them, but the patient raised her hand from the sheets in greeting. Her pallor was grey, she did not look particularly bright.

Opening the notes, Elixa realised that this was a more complicated case. There was a series of measurements from hair, skin, blood and urine, charted over time to measure levels of Arsenic[1].

With a bit more time, and not stood in front of the patient, the healer-in-training would have relished the chance to study the notes in more detail to understand how the absorbent sludge had been calculated which was part of her treatment. It did not necessarily look all that palatable to drink.

The notes from the night staff mentioned convulsions, which explained the lethargy in the patient. The prognosis was not particularly good either.

She glanced to Arcturus, passing him the notes.
"Levels." She uttered quietly, trying to be rhetorical before she approached the patient with a gentle smile, deciding that a little smalltalk might be a better option than to launch right in as she was an unknown face.

"Did you see the pictures of the smallest pygmy puff in there?" She asked, nodding to the the paper in the young man's hand. "Can hardly believe it's not charmed." She smiled. "We've not met before, but I'm shadowing Healer Hollingbury, Elixa Mordent. I'll need to take the usual samples. Is that alright?"

The patient gave a thumbs up, and her partner leafed through the paper to find the photographs, holding them up as Elixa touched her wand to the young woman's head, plucking two hairs painlessly, curling them into a paper envelope that had been slotted into the notes in readiness.

The urine was a case of swapping the pot beneath the bed, and Elixa stooped down to the floor to take a sample. All part and parcel. She couldn't imagine it was a very happy life at the moment for the girl.

She took a moment to cleanse her hands and looked to Arcturus.
"Ok to observe you take blood? It's been a while since I last had to."

1.	Arsenic Poisoning

Arcturus had to remind himself that she'd gone through training, and at least once had caught sight of her trailing after Joy Torret. Perhaps he was getting caught up in the old newbie spiel. Well, it was about time to drop it, and to be fair it was a bit of a relief to stand to one side and watch Elixa demonstrate what she was good at. And she was good at small talk, frankly. It was something he had to train himself into doing, and even then it was not entirely genuine, since he usually had too much on his mind.

He flipped through the notes as Elixa gathered the components for testing, frowning slightly. As much as they had been working on the problem the best they could, getting the levels to go down was difficult. They could hold the poisoning back, but not reduce it to a significant amount. Something was up, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it, and he hadn't had the time to start tracing backwards to a possible cause--

"Ok to observe you take blood? It's been a while since I last had to."

"Sure." He shut the folder and slipped it back into its sleeve at the end of the bed. Later he'd take it to go and work on it in his office once appointments were over, and perhaps discuss it with Elixa to get her into the paperwork side, but for now blood. And as his oft carried bloodwork case strapped to his belt showed, this was something he did with regularity.

Armed with his wand, he gently stepped forward. "Could you roll up your sleeve, please?" Most of the time his own sleeve hems rested at his elbows rather than his wrists; he'd now removed his wand holder since his belt had a holster for his wand anyway. That one was for off-work times. The bloodwork case was opened and one of the small ceramic bowls in it taken before he shut it, careful to not shake up the case of its valuable contents.

For him the procedure was normal, always smoothly done since any hesitation had the possibility of hurting the patient, even with a desensitisation charm. As with most healing procedures, anything could go wrong if done improperly. Arcturus carefully desensitised the crook of her elbow, the patient clenching her fist with an obvious resignation to the regularity, before making the careful puncture. He'd surreptitiously written the estimate for the depth of the vein in the notes because he unfortunately had forgotten before when he was younger - today he was relieved that he didn't have to check it today, as he gently coaxed the blood out and let it run into the bowl.

She'd be watching, he always knew she would. He could feel the patient's eyes boring into the top of his head, and not because of his hair. She never really asked, but sometimes she would stare at him as if expectantly waiting for a potion that would finally rid her of this affliction. As much as he deeply wished he could do that, there was no such option. She knew that too. It didn't stop her from hoping.

"Staima." The blood resumed flowing like nothing had happened. Arcturus silently and swiftly added a few drops of essence of dittany from his belt to the puncture, and it closed up without any mark. The contents of the bowl he transferred to an empty vial he kept for his bloodwork purposes and then handed it to Elixa without so much as a word.

"That's...how I do it anyway," he said lamely, suddenly aware that except for his muttered incantation of the Blood Flow Charm, he hadn't said anything else. For some reason he had grown silent while taking blood these days. He wasn't like that before. "Did that help? It's best if you watch other healers do it as well, we all come up with our own methods eventually." As he spoke, he pointed his wand at the bowl in his other hand; there was a hasty, rough scrubbing sound before he opened his bloodwork case to return it to its place. "There's no one right way as long as it's within hospital guidelines. And hygienic," he added, lowering his voice. "The stories I could tell you."

Arcturus was frowning at the notes. Amongst them were the measurements from days before, and a graph inked out above them. At a glance, lines descended quickly and then seemed to level out, still above a horizontal line indicating near safe levels in the body. Without a little reading and understanding how the absorbent sludge was meant to work, Elixa was not aware of how quickly things should be progressing. Either way, Arcturus' expression did not give her reason to be worried at a glance.

At the other side of the bed, able to see clearly, Elixa's hands fell to her side, envelope with hair in one hand, and the bottled sample of urine in the other. Arc's movements were gentle, simple, a touch of his wand, then again, letting the blood into the bowl. The patient watched unflinching, curling her arm away only after he had finished with the dittany. All the while the young man with her watched with far more engaged interest than the patient.

She hadn't even realised Arcturus had not spoken aloud of the steps he was taking until after when he uttered "… how I do it anyway." as he handed her the blood. The two glass bottles clinked together gently in her hand and she looked down at them both thoughtfully while he cleaned up.
"Another time," she agreed, glancing down at the patient and companion with a faint smile. "These will be tested for the levels of arsenic still remaining." She spoke, generally addressing the other three, going through the motions. "I suppose I can do that for you today, I would very much like to understand your condition to better treat you." Between her tone and the way she looked at the young witch, who was probably only in her twenties and undoubtedly fair when not full of toxins, she conveyed a genuine concern.

"Have you had any new symptoms since you were last seen? Any changes, any queries?" She asked, feeling it might be prudent to ask such.
"Nothing more than the fits in the night, I thought I was through those." Elixa glanced to Arcturus for further information. Were they a feature of treatment? Or were they indication that the poison was not retreating? Poison levels couldn't increase unless they were entering the body in some way, or it was producing it.

Elixa reached out very gently to take the patient's wrist and take a pulse, a tiny pocketwatch procured from her pocket to measure time to multiply.
"Well, the results from your blood today will allow us to adjust your treatment, bring that under control." Her fingers lifted, and she bid them both good morning as she followed Arcturus away.

"Now that's a curious one. Feels like she would make a case study in one of the reference books you've loaned me." Her hand went briefly to her collar as she thought about things. "Has it been established how she was poisoned?" Elixa asked, brow furrowed. What a puzzle. "And thanks, by the way. For the demo. I didn't want to accidentally gouge her arm when she's so weak." Her cheeks flushed a little.

Still preoccupied with digesting the graphs, Arc didn't quite hear her until he surfaced out of his thoughts in time to catch "...make a case study in one of the reference books you've loaned me." He shut the door behind them so that the patient and her visitor wouldn't hear anything else.

"No, the maintaining of levels is still up in the air," he said, in response to her question. "Which is odd. Arsenic poisoning can come from contaminated tap water, but it needs to build up over time. This one is a steady level which means..." He trailed off, unsure of exactly what conclusion he could come up with that didn't involve implying the hospital's own supplies were contaminated.

"No worries, I suppose you haven't really been taking blood that regularly?" he asked her as they headed down the corridor of wards. Some of them weren't under his name, as indicated by the brass plates on the ward doors, so he skipped them entirely. "It's not a problem. You'll probably start doing it on the easier patients this week to get you back into gear."

They'd reached the end of the ward. The last ward was under his name, but a quick check revealed that it was empty save for a house-elf cleaning up. Arcturus gave the house-elf a respectful nod and shut the door so as not to disturb the cleaning process.

"Well, seems like we're done in terms of the rounds." Arcturus checked the time. "Timely too - it's almost 11, I'll need to go back to the office and pick up that patient's notes on the way. Will you be wanting those notes, or are you going to join another healer on their rounds? I don't...was there a schedule or something for your training?" His brow furrowed as he tried to recall. "It's been ages since I had to train a healer-to-be."

The healer waved a dismissive hand to let Elixa know he wasn't exactly that concerned about her schedule. "Focusing on the now. All of that just now was to see if you still remember your training regarding patients." He smiled. "I think you're doing well for someone who's just got back into the game. Alas, you can't be with me the whole time...gotta put up with the other healers, I'm afraid, and they're not much like me. There's your challenge. Personally I'm impressed. If you keep it up you might be able to sit for the exams within a year or so. Later on you might join me for behind-the-scenes potion concocting, I assume? If not to test for the arsenic patient."

"This one is a steady level which means…" Arc trailed off and Elixa's brown furrowed, glancing back over her shoulder a moment, having a thought and then dismissing it. This wasn't a murder mystery, this was life and a hospital.

"… haven't really been taking blood that regularly?"
"No, when one is in the apothecary, there's no need. That sort of thing is done already. Not even when I worked for Drammes did we do that. I consulted on symptoms, but not the blood." She shrugged as they walked. "Next time, I just really would have felt awful for hurting her in that state, poor thing."

The final ward was empty, and with a dip of her heart she realised that her time for now following Arc was drawing to a close.
"I think I have to catch up with Jules now." She explained to Arc, "I think i'll be dotted about all over the place, but better that than stuck re-learning from the beginning." The Healer in Training shrugged but fell quiet, listening to Arc's explanation of the morning. She was genuinely touched.

"Thanks Arc, that really means a lot to me." Her hand moved as if to rest on his arm to convey how it had, but stopped short. Even if he'd just been a friend she'd have placed it on his arm, but because of what they'd promised, and because of all that had been of late, she refrained.

"I will, I'll see you later. Thanks again for this morning." She gave him a nod and a smile before retreating down the corridor, straightening her robes, which weren't at all out of place to begin with.


End