Vanessa's childhood and her years in Vesuvia before the plague

Chapter six

The next morning Vanessa woke up and stretched still not feeling the best. Julian walked into the guest room with a plate of food. 'Hey you're awake how are you feeling? I brought you some food as you haven't eaten yet' Julian said walking over to her and sitting beside her on a chair. Vanessa curled up and moved away from Julian as she still didn't trust him. 'Why should i take any food from you? And I'm not feeling well at all' Vanessa said not looking at him.

'Because you need to eat, it will help you feel better' Julian said, placing the plate on the side of the bath. Vanessa glanced at the plate before looking away.

'Vanessa come on at least try and eat a little bit please' Julian said trying to convince Vanessa to eat as she really needed to.

Vanessa shook her head 'I don't want to eat anything' . Sighing in annoyance, Julian continued to convince her to eat.

In the meantime, Nazali had arrived at the palace and was having a discussion with Nadia who was catching them up on the strange events that had occurred.

"What do you mean there's a mermaid in the palace?" Nazali remarked with a flash of confusion and fascination in their eyes.

Nadia chuckled while she murmured, "Well, long story short, Lucio wanted his pirates to find him a rare sea creature he could add to his menagerie. Before he knew it, he had a mermaid in his hands,"

"Wow, how amazing! Is the mermaid injured in any way at all?" Nazali questioned.

"She has the cut on her arm from Lucio scratching her and a few small cuts on her tail from her being brought to Vesuvia," Nadia replied while sipping on her tea.

"How did Lucio end up scratching her?" Nazali asked.

"Apparently, Lucio tried to 'shake her hand' which supposedly scared her so she tried to run away but the truth is that he was being way too handsy with her. While she was trying to escape, Lucio grabbed her which resulted in his prosthetic claws getting caught on her skin. It was pretty bad, she got an infection from it, " Nadia responded with sympathy in her tone for the vulnerable mermaid.

Alerted by the mention of an infection, Nazali whirred, "That doesn't sound good at all! Hopefully Julian tended to that wound, didn't he?"

Furrowing her eyebrows, Nadia sniggered while she continued, "I guess he did at first. He had to gain some of her trust but at the end, he managed to bandage her up and disinfect the wound. However we did have quite an incident yesterday that I'm personally annoyed at him about..."

"What do you mean, he made a mistake? Tell me Dia!" Nazali cried as they became increasingly suspicious of what their protégé had done wrong this time.

Exhaling out after taking a long sip of her tea, Nadia informed, " Last night, Julian took it upon himself to monitor Vanessa after the whole ordeal of her passing out from the infection. While the mermaid was sleeping, I accompanied him and had a discussion on what was going to happen with her next,". Nazali nodded eagerly as the Countess began to shuffle in her seat for comfort and resumed, "I was about to leave when I realised that Vanessa , the mermaid, didn't seem like she was breathing. For most of the conversation, her snores were a sense of background noise but all of a sudden- it was silent, ".

"However, mermaids can hold their bre-" Nazali informed but was harshly interjected by Nadia.

"Listen! I am no doctor so I thought what any normal person would think. She's stopped breathing! So I warned Julian about it. However he didn't have the same reaction as you unfortunately," Nadia groaned with frustration.

In shock and disappointment, Nazali exasperated " I can't believe it! Did Julian think the same as you?"
Nadia nodded slowly while muttering, "And he made me panic the whole palace. It was an utter disaster! The servants aren't happy with him at all and neither am I! I think you should put some sense into your protégé. That wasn't very doctor-like of him and if the city had heard of his mistake, the precious name you built for him would have been in shatters...". Without sparing a second, Nazali bolted out from the parlour room they had their discussion in and raced up the stairs-rage bubbling inside of them.

"He's in the guest room!" Nadia announced to the sprinting Nazali before she continued with her daily duties for the day.

Nazali soon got to the guest room and was about to loudly rebuke their apprentice when they caught sight of Julian kneeling beside the bathtub, pleading in Nevivon to the stubborn mermaid in the tub.

'Please Vanessa. One bite, I promise you there is no poison in here!' Julian begged the reluctant Vanessa which Nazali overheard.

'I said I don't want it! Leave me alone!' Vanessa boomed, yanking the plate from Julian's hand and furiously throwing the pile of food at his face.

'Vanessa...' Julian moaned, giving up on trying to feed her; he walked out of the guest room and closed the door behind him.

As the Doctor was about to go downstairs, Nazali rifled, "Stop right there Julian!"- causing him to stop in his tracks.

"Hey Nazali what are you doing here?" Julian asked confused as to why his mentor was there.

"I'm visiting Vesuvia and decided to stop by the place. Nadia was just catching me up on what's been going on here. She was just telling me about the mermaid that Lucio got and what happened last night" Nazali said glaring in disappointment at Julian.

"Oh she told you about that," Julian said, looking down guiltily. 

"Yes she did and I could slap you right now! First of all how could you forget the main factor all merkind are skilled with? They know how to hold their breaths! It's so obvious Julian, I taught this to you everyday when you were only a trainee. Why did you forget it now? Secondly, did you not recognise the difference between someone who's holding their breath and someone who's unconscious? Tell me this, if you thought she was unconscious- the first step you would do is to tilt her head and open her mouth to see if her tongue is blocking her airways. All of the hassle of going straight into compressions shows your just... rushing into it! I feel you're betraying me Julian! You're completely going a different route to the steps I've taught. You have to understand that you're dealing with something as fragile as somebody's life- you have to be more aware!" Nazali rebuked harshly with their fingers blaring out with agitation.

Overwhelmed by the speech Nazali had hammered at him with, Julian felt shame for disobeying his teacher from his actions last night.

"Nazali I'm sorry I didn't mean to do what I did. I wasn't thinking straight" Julian apologised to his mentor.

"It's fine Julian I forgive you, but does the mermaid trust you?" Nazali asked.

"I don't think she does," Julian said.

"Great! That's just fucking great, isn't it?" Nazali asked rhetorically.

Julian looked over at his mentor in shock as they had never sworn before.

Slightly flustered by swearing in front of their protégé, Nazali muttered "Sorry about that Julian, just a little worried about how you're going to get anywhere with her if she isn't going to trust you. I heard you trying to feed her- she sure is feisty!"

Julian relaxed as his mentor began to ease up and joke with him; he replied "I know! She keeps holding a grudge with everyone here, I don't know how to get through to her?"

Nazali's face suddenly glowed as an idea popped up in their mind, they recommended" I know! Why don't you talk to Asra about this? He knows how to see through many of his customers and gains their trust easily? He is a magician after all,".

Smiling intently, Julian exclaimed "Of course, why did I not think of that! I'll send him an invitation right away. Thanks Nazali!". Immediately, Julian scurried off to his lab in which he began to scribble a hurried invitation, rolled it up with a spare ribbon and placed it in Malak's beak- flying away to send it to Asra.