Delphinium, or A Necromancer's Home (TCoLaD Book 2)

Surgery

~ (Continued) Iunday, 13th of Aprilis, 11831 ~

"Vivien!" Pierre yelled out as he entered the home. He stepped aside so the father could come in with his daughter, the mother beside him. Wolfram came in last and moved in front of the parents to help Pierre with his things.

Jourdain was the closest advisor and met up with them, Vivien not far behind. "Have an empty room on the ground floor made into a surgery—quickly! Clean sheets, my instruments, boiled water, ether." He threw off his outer jacket without waiting for a servant to take it, his hat following, though his cane he placed with some care off to the side.

"I will help," Elizabeth said. "I know enough blancræft that whatever surgical means you use she will feel more comfortable at the very least."

"Let me," Vivien cut in, "I—"

"Of course, my dear," Pierre told Lizzy, ignoring his steward. He was still angry at the doctors of his hospital, at the people of Spadille, and for the moment that extended to his staff. They had let this happen. He would only allow those he trusted implicitly into the room.

She nodded, tying her hair back and pulling up her sleeves while she followed.

The spare room was quickly set up and Pierre and Lizzy entered as the father placed his ill daughter on a covered table. Wolfram moved over to the instruments to double-check that they were all there, clean and ready to use.

"None of our cræft," Pierre said quietly to Wolfram as he got ready at the side of the room. He put an apron over his clothes and Wolfram received one as well. "I have not had much practice, as you can imagine, on fée and I will not experiment on her." It would have eased his mind if he could check her body with magic, or help induce a painless sleep, but the risk was too great. Lizzy's blancræft and the normal procedures would have to do. "Go bring the ether."

Pierre read over her notes again as Wolfram left. The hospital had begun to document her ills. Sharp pains in her side, vomiting, and fever. There was nothing more specific. These could be a number of things. Pierre shook his head—the girl had been in the hospital for three days, according to her father—this could have been diagnosed and even treated by now.

The girl's parents were still in the room, and Pierre smiled at them as he walked over to his patient.

"Monsieur, madame, I have little to go on with what has been written at the hospital. If you could please step aside, I would like to examine her closer before anything invasive is done." They nodded their consent, and Pierre turned to his patient. Lizzy stood at the other side of her bed, waiting and watching. She gave him a quick smile before concentrating on the girl. Alise reached out to grab her mother's hand.

Pierre gently put pressure on her stomach, first in the front and then at her sides. Nothing on her left side, but when he touched her right side, she whimpered.

"There, it hurts on the right," she said.

"I'm sorry, ma petite, I need to see exactly where this hurts." When he moved his hands to her lower side, she gasped. He pressed the same area again, slowly, and suddenly wrenched back his hands.

The girl looked at him, confused, but made no cry of pain this time.

"Good," Pierre said. "And forgive me, Alise, for causing you pain. But now we can make it all better."

"It is her gallbladder," he said to her parents. "It is a rare case, not often happening in children. If I had yanked my hand away and it had caused her pain, it would be her appendix. Likely there are stones in her gallbladder that have inflamed it. This could have troubled her for months on and off, even years, if it was forgotten when the pain stopped, but now it is too much. It is an easy enough procedure, though." He had seen it done, and practiced the surgery on a corpse... which he later restored and resurrected to try with a living body. It had gone fairly well the second time, though needing to kill the man at the end had not given him the time to observe post-surgery.