A Deathbed Drama

“You should know better than to go flying off after children twice your age,” Kimbralina Sparks scolded the youngster who was wincing beneath her needle. The little fae boy’s wings shuddered each time she pierced his skin, even though she had rubbed his skin with a numbing ointment and given him two frost petal blossoms to stave off the sharpness. He was badly shaken up from the fall he’d taken, and miraculously fortunate that a cut on his forearm had been his only serious injury.

The healer finished her needlework with a double knot and patted the boy’s mop of dirty hair daintily. “There you are. But don’t you go tearing those open, or trying to keep up with the older kids again. I might not fix you up so perfectly next time.”

The boy grinned up at her, eyes crinkled cheekily. “You’ll always fix me Miss Sparks… won’t you?”

“Of course, Alvin… get home now, and make sure one of the other flying monkeys walks with you. I don’t want you falling over with all of that frost petal in your blood!”

“I’m alright,” the little fae flexed his arm and expanded his wings. “It makes me look like a warrior.”

A snort escaped Lina’s lips before she could stifle it. “Surely it does,” she said when the boy glanced at her, “just don’t let others learn the truth of its origin. After all, a warrior is only as good as his legend.”

Alvin nodded and tottered out of the exam room a little unsteadily. Lina sighed and set about sanitizing the padded bench he’d been seated on, and then set her tray of tools aside for an assistant to properly cleanse and re-stock in the drawers. The little fellow’s injury had taken some time to tend to, and he’d come in right at the end of her shift. She wasn’t physically tired so much as emotionally exhausted from dealing with the problems of others all day long.

She removed the red robe that marked her as a healer and replaced it with stout silken clothing and a pair of solid leather-soled slippers. Her confident, callused hands tucked her journal into her black bag, and with the strap snugly about her shoulders she rolled her shoulders and fluttered her wings, flitting upwards through the private entrance in the exam room’s ceiling.

The swift beating of her gossamer wings floated her over the reception area. She waved down to the secretary and turned to glide down out of the massive old-growth tree that housed the clinic in its canopy.

“Miss Sparks!” A voice hailed her from a distance, and she twisted around mid-flight to gaze into the gathering darkness. A strange shape was coming towards her out of the sunset, carefully navigating its way between the treetops. She recognized the voice of one of their most experienced rescue fliers, and immediately landed on the roof of the clinic in order to steady her hand and shield her eyes. As the shape drew nearer she made out the distinct features of two rescue fliers bearing a third, unconscious fae between them.

Lina bit back a gasp, and then waved them in and dropped back down into her exam room, popping her black bag open.

The injured fae was Eligbra Stormwing - one of here deceased parents’ oldest and dearest friends.