The Chronicles of Harold the Healer Ch. 06

"Thank you, Healer Harold," Marvin replied, holding the box with his left hand so he could shake the Healer's hand. Frankie followed suit. "Let's go home, Frankie. We'll get you to school after lunch. They will understand." Harold grabbed his staff, then opened and held the door for them.

"Virginia, Joe, it was good meeting you. I'll be back at some point today to have a look around, if that's OK." He wiped his eyes on a sleeve.

"Any time, Healer Harold," said Virginia, blowing her nose into a tissue she'd taken from a box on her desk that was hidden by the wall.

"You know how to make an impression," said Joe, wiping his eyes on his sleeve.

"He sure does," said Dana, also wiping her eyes, as the two of them left and closed the door.

"Oh, that was hard," Harold finally managed to say, leaning on his staff, and then on Dana when she put an arm around his shoulders. "I really hate doing that."

"Will you be OK?" she asked, looking concerned. "I could feel how much energy you were drawing. That's quite the spell." Harold removed his hat and wiped his eyes again on the sleeve of his left arm before putting it on again.

"It was draining, but I'll be fine. I had a good breakfast," he replied as they moved past the stationery shop and looked in the window. "I can come back later and get my paper. There's no sense in lugging it there and back. And there's the bank," he added, pointing across the street. "I was about to walk past it when you called me over. So, I have to go to the bank to get some cash to buy the paper I need to write my final report and formally free myself from the Order of St. Thrimble." He suddenly had a thought and put his hands in his pockets. Aside from the medals, there were some coins in both of them. "Hmm, I think I have enough on me to buy the paper, but I'd like to get my medals into a safety deposit box for safekeeping. By the time I get home, Leila will really have to be a necromancer to restore life to my cock." Dana snickered.

"You are too much of a letch to let mere fatigue keep you from having sex. Remember back when you were in seventh year and I was in ninth and I came by your room to find you asleep at your desk amidst a pile of books and notes? I dragged your chair over to your bed, dumped you on it, then got your pants off? It didn't take long for that wonderful cock of yours to get hot and hard, just the way I liked it."

"I woke up wondering why I was feeling so good after stressing out on all my assignments, and there you were with your wicked little grin riding me with your clothes still on. A situation, as I recall, that didn't last too long. But old age has taken its toll," he added with a melodramatic pose.

"It felt really good to have it in me yesterday," Dana replied, giving him a push. "Was it your idea to have Leila shove the Joy Buzzer up my ass? That felt so good, and it totally ruined me!" His look of innocence was all she needed. "I will need your help to return the favour, sometime this afternoon before Marcie gets home from school." She could feel his uncertainty mixed with lust, and he could feel her desire for "revenge", and could see the promise of infinite pain in the steely gaze of her bright blue eyes should he try to cross her. He cleared his throat and replied,

"I will see if I can fit some sack time into my busy schedule. I'm sure that Leila won't mind. She may even be expecting something." They walked south on the road for a few minutes in companionable silence. "Hmm, that looks like it fits the description," he said, spotting a house on their side of the road. "It really does look like a fixer-upper. It's such a shame when a place is neglected like this." The field around the house had not been planted, or even plowed, and was growing weeds of some sort.

"I definitely want a closer look at this to see if it's still structurally sound," she replied, a frown creasing her forehead. "It could affect how much it will cost to get it fixed up." It took a minute for them to walk up the weedy driveway to the house, which was a decent-sized two-story structure whose exterior definitely needed some work. There were three windows on the top floor and what looked like a living room with three windows side by side to the left of the rather battered front door. All looked like they hadn't been cleaned for quite some time. Dana pointed out a couple of spots on the roof that even Harold could see were sketchy at best.

"We're being watched," said Harold quietly. "Centre window upstairs." Dana looked up and saw two pairs of eyes looking at them through the grime. Realizing that they had been spotted, the eyes disappeared, then the bottom sash of the window lifted slightly.

"Who are you?" demanded a gravelly woman's voice.

"Hello, I'm Harold Moser and this is Dana Magnussen," said Harold, projecting the soothing voice that he used for calming animals and, occasionally, people. "We heard from Sam Turner that you wanted to sell the place and we're interested in buying it."

"How does two thousand Sovereigns sound? We'll even cover the cost of moving your stuff to Havisham on top of it," Dana added. There was a long pause in which they could hear the woman arguing with what they presumed were her kids in whispers. "I'm willing to bet that we'll have to gut the place and completely rebuild it, if the foundations are OK, otherwise we'll have to build a new place from scratch," she murmured to Harold.

"Two thousand Sovereigns is way more than this place is worth, even with the land," he murmured back. "I know nothing of renovations, but I'll bet you a doubloon that it will cost twice that to fix it up."

"I was given a budget of ten," she replied. "Even with renovations, I'll be coming out ahead."

"You're right, I do want to sell the place," said the voice. "But it needs some work."

"That's not a problem. We'll come back later this afternoon with the moving wagon and another for transporting you and your family, along with the legal paperwork, ten Sovereigns in cash and a bank draft for the remainder," Dana replied. "You can be gone today and in Havisham by tonight, if that's your wish."

"Do you want to come outside so we can shake on the deal?" Harold inquired. "If not, we'll go. It would be nice to actually meet you."

"Come back with the money and you can meet me all you want."

"All right, if that's your wish. Please bear in mind that I am a Healer and I am here if you need me, no questions asked. I am sworn to confidentiality." He shrugged and they turned to go.

"Could you... bring us some boxes? We don't have anything to pack with," said the woman, more subdued.

"I will bring some as soon as I can," said Dana as a stray breeze ruffled their clothes and threatened to steal Harold's hat. "We understand that you've been through a really tough time, and we're here to help in any way that we can. We'll go now and get you started." They waved and started to walk away.

"Healer Harold, please stay. I... I need someone to talk to." He and Dana embraced quickly.

"I'll be back as soon as I can," she said, marching down the driveway. Harold turned back, went up the three steps to the verandah, which wrapped around the right side of the house and was in dire need of a fresh coat of paint. Some of the boards didn't look so good either, and he gingerly tested a couple, feeling more sag than there should be. He heard footsteps approaching the door, which opened cautiously, and he made sure that he was standing in the sun with his most winning smile.

"Hello," she said rather uncertainly. "Please come in." He followed her inside and she left the door open. "We need some fresh air in here. I have to remember that I don't need to be afraid anymore." She was only about five-foot-five and thin, with shoulder-length, unkempt hair that was a mousy brown, and her brown eyes seemed haunted. She didn't seem all that old, but her face was lined with worry, or fear, and had a fading bruise on her right temple and a partly-healed cut on her left cheek. She looked like she hadn't changed her clothes or cleaned herself for a few days.

They were in a tiled hallway, with a spacious living room on the left that had a wooden floor. She moved rather stiffly into it and opened the three windows that were next to each other. The wall facing him had a fireplace with a large heap of ashes in it and on the stone semicircle in front of it. Its mantel was bare. The walls were bare but showed signs of once having had paintings on them, and there were a few fist-sized holes in them. A battered wooden chair was to the right of the fireplace and a stained and torn three-seater couch was by the wall that faced the windows. A large closet, whose folding wooden doors were leaning against the back wall was on his right. It was empty. The ceiling above was cracked. A few steps beyond the closet's far wall was a set of stairs going up to the second level. At their summit stood two children who were vaguely illuminated in the dim light up there.

"Hello there," he addressed them gently, casting a ball of Mage Light that glowed in a warm, inviting yellowish colour and sending it up the stairs towards them. They stared at it in open-mouthed astonishment, and he saw that they were a boy of about thirteen and a girl of about nine, and none too clean. "I am Harold Moser, a Healer formerly of the Order of St. Thrimble," he introduced himself to all three. "Please come downstairs so I can talk to you." The badly scuffed shoes of the children made soft crunching noises as they walked downstairs, eyes on the Mage Light as Harold made it lead them.

"There's a story here, and not a happy one," he said quietly. "What can I do for you?"

"I'm out of matches. I have some oatmeal and raisins to cook, but no way to light the stove."

"I can do that." She led them down the hallway to the kitchen at its end, grit crunching underfoot. They passed another open door on their left, through which was a small room with a bathtub and a water pump for it. The stone kitchen floor had been swept, which was a good sign. The stove was against the rear wall with a window above and slightly to its left that overlooked a shabby backyard. The stove and its pipe were in good shape - the things seemed to be built to withstand an earthquake, it seemed to him. The area for the wood was clean and stocked, ready to be lit, so he closed the door, stepped back two paces, made the motions and said the words and it was lit, with an audible sigh of relief from the three inhabitants. "I'll clean things up for you, too." He hit the floor and counter with Clean spells, making a noticeable improvement.

"Can you clean me?" piped the girl, speaking for the first time. "We don't have any soap."

"It will make you feel better," he said, looking to her mother for permission.

"Clean all of us. Please," she said. They stood next to each other in the middle of the room and he obliged, directing the grime to appear outside. They looked at each other in astonishment and relief.

"Thank you, Healer Harold. That feels so much better," said the boy. Both of the kids had sandy brown hair, brown eyes, and looked like they needed a few good meals in them. "I'm Randy Morton, and this is my sister Lita. Can you clean the whole house?"

"There's a similar spell that's self-powered, once I set it off," Harold replied as their mother filled a pot with water from the kitchen pump and put it on the stove. "Instead of moving all of the grime to a place of my choosing, it consumes some of it to keep the spell going. A place of this size will take about forty-five minutes. Are you OK with it, ma'am?"

"Please, go ahead. I'm a little behind in my housekeeping," she replied with an ironic smile. They watched in silent fascination as he concentrated, then made the motions mostly with his hands and arms, seeming to gather the Magic and weave it into complex patterns of green, brown, light blue and dark blue, along with saying various sentences in an unknown language. After about half a minute, he had a ball of multi-coloured light that was large enough to fit in his hands.

"As you can see, this is a complex spell," he said, looking rather fatigued. "The cleaning part is easy, the self-powering part is moderately complex, but the time limit I have to put on it is the hard part. With no time limit, it would get out of the house and keep cleaning the world." He walked to the wall of the hallway just outside the kitchen and slapped the glowing ball onto it, saying another few words. There was a faint hissing and crackling and the glowing circle began expanding in a ring, leaving a much cleaner wall behind it. "I paid for many a night in various inns with this spell," he added.

"Cool!" exclaimed the kids, all cares temporarily forgotten, as the ring continued to rapidly expand, all the while having its colours shifting. "Let's go upstairs and see it clean our rooms!" It had already started on the stairs as they raced up. Harold looked out the kitchen window and nodded in satisfaction at the steady stream of grit, dust, and general grime that was appearing in mid-air.

"I can tell that you want to know our sad story," said their mother as the water began to boil.

"I did say 'No questions asked'," the Mage replied, retrieving his staff and leaning against the scruffy, but now clean, table that was on the other side of the kitchen. "But I was hoping." She looked a lot better now that she was cleaned up, but she'd clearly been through a lot.

"I'm Cathy Morton." Harold offered Polite Bow #2 in response as she moved the pot of water to a cooler part of the stove and dumped in the contents of a bag of oatmeal and another of raisins that she had pulled from an otherwise empty cupboard. "My husband Ed died four days ago, about three months after getting accidentally kicked in the head by a horse." Harold's eyebrows rose in surprise.

"Usually, people get killed outright when that happens," he said. "Oh, sorry."

"Every person has said that," Cathy replied, stirring the oatmeal with a wooden spoon. "I'm sure that you would know better than most." He nodded again. "Healer Leila was able to repair his fractured skull and deal with the swelling of his brain, but it was a severe brain injury. The seizures started a week later. Two of the St. Thrimble Healers, including a man named Hendrix, came by and were able to help with them, but were not able to completely stop them. His mood changed, and he became forgetful and angry as it progressed, and he had violent outbursts no matter what we did," she said sadly, feeling the half-healed bruise on her face. "He finally collapsed and died in the middle of a rage. He's buried in the backyard," she indicated a weed-free mound about fifteen feet away from the back of the house. "Some men from the town were kind enough to come by and do it for us." Tears were streaming down her cheeks as she continued to stir the thickening oatmeal. "I wished every day that the damned horse had just killed him!" She got three bowls and spoons, put them on the counter, and spooned the oatmeal into the bowls, getting every last bit of it out of the pot. "Kids! Food is ready!" she shouted up the stairs as Harold transported the bowls and spoons to the table. There was a thunder of feet charging down the now clean stairs and the kids wasted no time sitting down and starting to eat. Cathy joined them.

"Thanks, Mom," said Lita between mouthfuls.

"Excuse me, but I think I hear Dana returning," said Harold as he heard the distinct sound of a horse's hooves, jingling harness, and a rattling rig. He left them to their meal and went down the hall and out the front door. Sure enough, Dana was driving a cart with high sides of wood slats, clearly made for transporting goods. The black-and-white horse looked like it had been going at a good clip, as it was breathing fairly hard. "You wasted no time, I see," he said as she dismounted and gave him a good look.

"It was a sad story, wasn't it?" she asked, folding him into a warm hug. He nodded, his expression bleak. "I brought a box of muffins, three chicken pot pies and three bottles of milk as well as these moving cartons and the legal documents for the transfer of ownership of the property." She opened the lid of the seat on which she had been sitting and removed a legal-sized envelope.

"That was fast," Harold remarked, mounting the cart, getting into its back and starting to toss the folded-up cartons onto the ground.

"I made a good guess when I got back to town and went to the bank first." She removed a small bag from her left pocket that clinked metallically. "I asked the teller, who looked sorry and sympathetic and told me to check the lawyer's office next door. Apparently, she was determined enough to go that she had everything drawn up even before her husband had died. I have ten Sovereigns worth of coins here, which will be more than enough to get her started in Havisham, as well as a bank draft in the envelope for 1,990 more. She can be gone as soon as they get their stuff packed."

"That probably won't take long. I think that they'll wait until the house cleaning spell has finished," he indicated the bright, multi-coloured line that was advancing along the front of the house and its roof and making a noticeable improvement as it passed. "That will clean everything, including clothes in dressers and bedding. They're finishing some oatmeal in the kitchen."

"Hey, there you are!" said Dana cheerfully as Harold stacked and picked up the dozen three cubic foot boxes. The two kids had run out the front door to look at the horse and wagon.

"Randy and Lita, this is Dana Magnusson," Harold introduced. All three bowed respectfully to each other as Cathy appeared on the porch. "Dana, this is Cathy Morton," he continued as they all walked the short distance to her, and more bows were exchanged.

"I brought you some food, some cartons, and the legal documents and money," Dana said to Cathy, indicating the envelope. "It might make me more popular than Healer Harold," she added with a grin that they couldn't help but return, especially when he made a show of pouting.

"You have no idea how much this means to me," said Cathy, struggling to contain her emotions. "My parents live in Havisham and we will find a place as near to them as possible. Let's go to the kitchen." Harold brought the cartons and Dana brought the documents and the food in a large cloth bag and they made their way to the kitchen, with Dana looking around. Dana extracted a small bottle of ink and a pen from the pocket that didn't have the money in it, then pulled the documents from the envelope and laid them on the table.

"Let's make this official," she said, and they both signed and initialed in all the indicated spots on the three double-sided pages. "This is a bank draft for 1,990 Sovereigns," she continued, handing Cathy the fancy document printed on quality paper, "and this is ten Sovereigns worth of cash to help get you started," she continued, placing the small bag of coins on the table and screwing the cap of the ink bottle on tightly. Meanwhile, Harold had given a box to each of the kids. He showed them how to arrange the flaps to make a secure bottom and sent them upstairs to start packing their stuff. Mission accomplished, he stood and looked out the window that was in the door outside.

"When your husband was buried, Cathy," he said when they were done with the transaction, "was there anyone to say anything?"

"No," she replied quietly as she and Dana joined him. "It was very good of them to volunteer and come do it, but there was nobody but us to watch. We each put in a shovel's worth for the symbolic effort, but that was it. It was hard enough to do..." She trailed off.

"Then there is one last thing that I must do." He opened the door and walked outside, followed by Dana and Cathy, stopping when they reached the grave. A white wooden cross was at one end, with letters painted in black stating Ed Morton's name, his birth and death dates. Harold placed himself at the foot of the grave with Dana on his right and Cathy on his left as a cumulus cloud passed in front of the sun, adding a sudden chill to the breeze that ruffled through the weeds and rustled the leaves of a nearby maple tree.