*Rafe*
Standing at the foot of a bed next to Jerim, we look at one of the feeders who has suddenly become very ill. Like the others that have died recently, this one has severe body aches, can’t keep anything down, and is pale with a high fever.
“I’ve tried all of the treatment options I’m aware or,” my friend whispers, “but I just don’t know what to do. Nothing seems to help, and none of it makes sense.”
The patient appears to be sleeping. Either that or she is simply unconscious at this point from the illness or the treatment. She’s a forty-five year-old-female shifter who has been in our care for over twenty years since she was gathered during one of the cullings from her village of Graysummit.
I’m not sure what to say or do because Jerim is the best doctor I’ve ever known. He lists all of the medications he’s tried and shakes his head as he says, “None of it is helping.”
“Have you been able to improve the conditions of any of the shifters who suddenly have these symptoms?” I ask him.
He shakes his head again. “No, not really. There was a time when I thought the young man who died two days ago was getting better, but he ended up dying overnight.”
As we are speaking, Jerim’s assistant, a much older woman, appearing to be about sixty but really centuries older, who has worked with the feeders for many decades, comes over to check the feeder’s vitals. Bertha reports back with a shake of her head. “I’m afraid it doesn’t look good, sir. What would you have me do?” Her words are laced in kindness, but it’s clear she’s upset, too. She’s worked here for so long and never seen anything like this.
Jerim is at a loss. “Have you contacted the physicians in any of the other towns?”
Bertha purses her lips together. “I did reach out to Professer Mandila at the university. He asked if I’d like for him to come and have a look, but I hesitated. Sir, if we let many others know we have a problem… it won’t look good for you. Many of those individuals were also considered for this position, and they might question His Majesty’s judgment.”
She turns and looks at me for a second, and I see a hint of something behind her eyes before she turns away.
“Thank you, Bertha.” Jerim dismisses her, and I beckon for him to follow me outside. There’s no point for us to linger in the woman’s sick room when he can’t do anything to help her at the moment.
We walk outside to the feeders’ garden where several of the people we depend upon for our food are laughing and enjoying each other’s company. Fragrant flowers bloom in a myriad of color. Red roses are one of my favorite, probably because they remind me of blood, so we walk over and sit on a bench next to the largest bushes. My eyes travel across the space to where a few of the new feeders are sitting on a carpet of velvety green grass talking to one another. They all look healthy. Dressed in the yellow uniforms of the shifter feeders, their dispositions seem sunny to me. It’s not as miserable here as those in the villages tend to make people think.
“I don’t get it.” Jerim shakes his head and then drops his elbows to his knees, hunching over. I don’t want the other feeders to see him so distraught but we needed to talk in private, and I didn’t want to use telepathy. “Maybe I should resign.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” That’s the last thing we need.
He turns to look at me over his shoulder. “Well, I clearly don’t know how to help these people, and I can’t let my pride be their downfall.”
I let him get his angst out for a moment before I ask him the question that’s been nagging at me since Bertha made her appearance. “Bertha wanted your position, yes?”
His forehead wrinkles as he tries to understand why I am asking. Then he nods. “A lot of people did.”
“Of course, but did anyone else who works here now want it?” I want to know.
“No, no one else is qualified.” Jerim sits up straight. “Why are you asking?”
Shaking my head, I think carefully about what it is I’m trying to get at. I don’t want to be wrong; I don’t want him to think I’m being accusatory for no reason, and even if I do suspect that Bertha has something to do with what’s happening here, that alone won’t solve the problem. “Was she on duty the night the man you were telling me about passed away?”
“She was.” Jerim runs a hand down his face, tugging on his chin. His eyes move slightly side to side as he thinks through it. “She wouldn’t….”
“I should certainly hope not, but does she have the opportunity to do something to these people. That’s the biggest question,” I remind him. “We’ll have to figure out if she has and what it might be later. What I need to know right now is if she has access to be able to do something to them.”
“Of course, she does,” he says. “She’s on duty when I’m not most of the time, and there’ve been plenty of times when she’s been the only one around.”
“Walk me through the process of collecting the donations,” I tell him.
“It would be better if I show you,” he offers.
I nod. “Can you do that right now?”
“Yes.” He stands and gestures for me to walk along the path. I join him, and we begin to walk along the windy pathway that runs through the garden and to the other side of the building.
Many of the feeders smile and wave at us. Some are reading. Others are playing board games or working on hobby activities, like painting. We both greet them cheerfully, though it’s not genuine. Ordinarily, I would love to take time to check on the new arrivals, but I have a mission now.
“We gather blood several times a day. Not from the same people, of course, but we find when we rotate their schedules, it helps us to produce better quality blood, and the feeders aren’t as worn down.” Jerim leads me inside to what looks more like a medical clinic than the residential part of the quarters we were in a bit ago. It’s still pleasant and cheerful here, with pastel colors on the walls and floor, plenty of art, and comfortable furniture. Bright windows let in plenty of light. But it’s definitely got a more serious tone to it than the other part of the feeders’ quarters.
Several people wearing lab coats go in and out of small room where I assume the blood is collected. Jerim follows one of them inside. “Good morning, Brenda. Would you and your patient mind if the prince and I observe?”
“Good morning.” Brenda greets both of us with a kind smile. She looks young, maybe about thirty, but I have an idea she’s much older than that. Vampire ages can be so deceiving. “Of course, Dr. Jerim. I can’t imagine George will mind.”
I turn to look at the feeder on the bed. He’s probably in his fifties, and I believe we’ve met before on one of my previous visits. “Good morning, George.”
“Good morning, Your Highness, Dr. Jerim.” He smiles pleasantly at us, looking relaxed with his head on the pillow, his arm ready for the needle.
Brenda pulls a white sheet of gauze out of a cleaning solution and wipes the needle with it before working it into his arm. It’s attached to a bag, and immediately the blood begins to flow.
“That’s pretty much it,” Jerim says, “for this part of the procedure, anyway. It doesn’t take long for them to donate. Then, Brenda will remove the needle and clean the wound, put a bandage on it, give George a cookie to keep him from getting dizzy, and he’ll be on his way. It’s much the same way for the donators in the villages. Their blood is kept cooled and transported here, whereas the feeders’ bags go straight to the kitchen.”
“And there’s been no sign that anything is wrong with any of the blood that’s been donated?” I ask in a whisper so as not to worry George or Brenda.
“No, the chefs who prepare the blood always test for things like that before any of the vampires in the castle are served.”
“Donated blood goes out to the towns and cities, doesn’t it?”
He nods. “It’s all checked as well, both before it leaves local clinics and when it arrives.”
“And if something is wrong?” I ask.
He shakes his head. “It’s rare. We don’t allow anyone showing signs of sickness to donate, and shifter blood is quite strong. The cells within the blood itself do a great job of fighting off illnesses. We have to be more careful with fae blood. It’s a bit more fragile. But if something is detected, it’s reported back to the site where the blood originated so the clinician can speak to the person whose blood was collected and provide medical attention if necessary.”
“And do we think that this is actually happening in the villages?” This is an aside.
Jerim shrugs. “I have no reason to think it wouldn’t.”
He hasn’t seen the state of some of these villages. I think of Ainslee’s sick mother. She wasn’t donating, but I bet she could’ve given blood if she would’ve been able to get to a clinic. Blood from the villages of our conquered peoples usually go to vampires in the village. The feeders in the castle mostly feed the vampires in the castle.
I take a step over toward the container that Brenda pulled the gauze out of and give the solution a whiff. “What is this liquid the gauze is soaking in?”
“It’s a solution designed to sterilize the needles and clean the open wound so that there’s no infection,” Jerim explains. “We’ve been using the same alcohol base with some soothing herbs for centuries.”
It doesn’t seem like much. The needle is so small; it only punctures the skin for a moment, and then the wipe is basically used on the surface of the skin. If anyone were trying to get something poisonous into these people, it would make more sense to do it through their food.
Yet, when I lift the solution to my nose, I smell something in it that catches my attention. I’m not quite sure what it is, but it doesn’t sit well with me. I feel like I’ve smelled this odor in the past and been told something that I should remember.
“What is it, Prince Rafe?” Jerim asks, always so formal even when we are just spending time together as friends. Even if Brenda and George weren’t here, he’d call me “prince.”
“Do you think this smells right?” I ask him. “Do you smell anything unusual?”
Jerim steps over and takes a whiff. “Smells like alcohol to me. And aloe. We use that as a calming agent. I don’t smell anything else.”
I nod. It’s probably just my imagination then. “Can you show me where the food is prepared?”
“Yes, it’s this way.”
We say goodbye to George and Brenda and thank them for their time, and then I follow my friend down the hall. He shows me the kitchen where the chefs are preparing lunch. “We recently started a garden,” he explains. “A lot of the herbs and vegetables for their food are grown here.” We step outside, and he shows me around. Immediately, I am suspicious. “How recently?”
“When I first came on. But everything here is legitimately healthy. I’ve had it all checked out,” Jerim assures me. He walks me by all of the plants. “Carrots, potatoes, corn, mint, rosemary, cloves, aloe, thyme, and over there are the fruit trees. Apples, pears, and plums.”
I linger next to the herbs. I smell the aloe, but near the herbs, I catch that faint smell again from before. “Are any of these herbs in the sanitizing fluid?”
“I don’t believe so,” he says. “Why do you ask?”
Shaking my head, I tell him, “That smell I thought I noted in the solution is stronger here.”
“Could it be the aloe?” He walks over to the plant and breaks a piece of it open, releasing the scent into the air.
“No, it’s not.” Puzzled, I look around again. I can’t figure it out. I believe it’s coming from the cloves. But there’d be no problem with putting cloves in food or cleaning sensation. I’m not familiar with cloves or much shifter food, so I will have to take Jerim’s word for it that all of this is healthy for them. “Who maintains the garden?”
“Franklin is our head gardener,” he says. “He’s also a clinician.”
“And you speak with him often?” I don’t know Franklin well. I’m hopeful he is trustworthy.
Jerim nods. “Yes, Bertha worked with him to establish the garden, and he maintains it with the help of some of the other staff. Until the problems began to arise, Bertha handled it’s oversight, but then I stepped in wondering if there was something wrong with the food.”
“That makes sense. But you found nothing.” It’s not a question. “And the meat?”
“It comes from the same butcher that serves the rest of the people who eat meat in the castle and the surrounding area. No one outside of the feeders has been sick with the same symptoms, so I don’t think it’s the butcher or dairy provider. I have spoken to them, and they assure me all is well, and nothing has changed.”
An idea pops into my head. “What if you switch to the kitchen gardens for a bit to see if that makes a difference?”
Jerim drags a hand down his chin in thought and nods. “I can do that.”
“Then all of this will go to waste.” Bertha appears from a back entryway, looking annoyed.
“I’d rather waste some food than have another person die, Bertha. As a physician, I’m sure you can agree that it’s the best course.”
She narrows her beady eyes at me and nods, and suddenly Bertha has become the number one suspect on my list.
Using telepathy, I tell Jerim, “Keep an eye on her. Literally. I don’t trust her.”
“Bertha?” He is surprised. “She’s completely trustworthy, sir.”
I have given an order, and he will follow it, so I say nothing else, but I think we are on the verge of something here.
One of my attendants steps through the door. Surprised to see him, I tilt my head to the side and wait for him to approach before I ask, “What is it, Ted?”
“I beg your pardon, sir. I know that you are quite busy.” He looks down at his shoes, and the sun reflects off his balding head, nearly blinding me.
I take a step back. “Is something the matter?”
He clears his throat. “There was an incident in the dining nook this morning, after you left, sir, and now, well, the princess is asking for you.”
“Fuck me,” I mutter, wondering what in the world Ainslee has done now. Did this mean I’d be forced to spend the rest of the afternoon soothing Riley. “Which princess did our new guest accost? I’m assuming not Sophia.”
“What, sir? Oh, no. It’s Princess Ainslee who is asking for you, sir. She was threatened and attacked—by Princess Riley.”
“Attacked?” Suddenly, nothing going on in the feeders’ quarters matters nearly as much as it did a few seconds ago.
I turn to Jerim whose eyes are large. “Does she need medical care?”
“I don’t believe so, sir. She’s in her room,” he says to me.
“Thank you, Ted.” He bows to me before he leaves, and I tell Jerim, “I have to go.”