The crow and the beast - Kaz brekker

chapter 35 - fighting illnes

Needless to say, our crows did not sleep that night. Cara had send nina and inej to agtehr supplies 'get as much herbs and medicine as you can find' she had told them. As much as she loved kaz right now he was of no use to her back at the slat with his inability to touch people so he and jesper got send out to look for a cause. She kept Matthias with her in case of angry parents, she needed some muscle around at least now that her hand still wasn't fully healed.

she had gathered as much information from the dregs about the sick as possible and ordered some of the parents to bring their children to the slat. She and Matthias had moved all the tables to the side and had made some of the longer tables in makeshift beds for the children.

meanwhile Cara had turned her room into her study, she would work on a finding a working medicine here. it was almost midnight when the first patients arrived, she had ordered Matthias to keep them as comfortable as possible and send the parents out, even though she was fairly certain this sickness targeted children she couldn't be careful enough.

she had the utmost difficulty with starting her research. She had given all the children something to bring their fever down, at least that had helped a little. Most of them were sleeping right now or at least trying to. First she thought this might have been a virus, meaning there was little she could do.

she was by far no scientist and did not have all the resources needed to do research – not that she knew where to start if she had it. So her best way to solve this was sadly by trial and error. It sounded cruel but since she had this many children she could test things out quite quickly.

so she looked through her books, she had been doing so for hours when kaz and jesper returned. Kaz had his head hanging low and jesper didn't look much better. "so? What did you find out?" kaz walked over closer to her while jesper went back to the main hall.

without another word kaz took her hand in his gloved ones. "its not good news love." Cara didn't care, any news was better than none. "so?" kaz signed. "what we see here is the aftermath of an attack on the dregs. We are currently trying to figure out who did it. We traced the cause of the sick back to a shipment from a week ago that came to the slat. The dregs who worked on unloading the shipment were the first ones to have their children fall ill." Cara looked at him, he was not telling her something.

"and where are those children now? If we can get them to the slat we might get a better understanding –" kaz shook his head. "they're dead" Cara opened her eyes in shock, this was bad. kaz spoke again. "the best doctors in ketterdam tried their best to find out what was wrong but none of them managed to cure the children"

Cara took her hand out of his gloved ones. "I am not giving up kaz. these children might be the future of the dregs. We cannot just give up." Kaz couldn't bring himself to smirk at her, he knew she wouldn't give up. "what can I do for you love?"

"you can start by bringing me a big cup of coffee, I am going to need it." Kaz nodded and stood up to get her what she had asked him.

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by the morning Cara hadn't slept at all. She had gone to the children at least 3 more times to look over them, giving them more medicine against the fever and some painkillers. She did not want to give them to much medicine because to much would make their bellies burn.

she noticed the fever always came back with a vengeance after the medicine had reached its limit. She yawned when she turned another page in the book she was going through. She needed to find something. Then her eyes landed on one particular sentence: 'in some cases of infections the initial sickness might be caused by a virus but turn into a bacterial infection after a few days. in this case the already high fever of the patient will get worse over time and when no treatment might become fatal over time.'

"I GOT IT" she yelled out loud to nobody in particular. She immediately grabbed to a book she knew contained all the information she needed. All she had to do now was ... find the right mixture of medicine to kill the bacteria.

the door slammed open and revealed a very worried looking kaz, he was wearing his night outfit and he was there so fast he even left his cane back at his room. "what is it, why did you yell?" Cara couldn't contain a giggle. He looked insane.

his hair was a mess, he was breathing heavy. He had one hand on the now slammed open door and his other hand against the doorframe. "kaz I got it, I know what I can do to try and help now." He limped closer to her and she now noticed he did not even bring his gloves. He had been so worried about her he had forgotten his whole 'armor'; his cane, gloves and his signature coat with hat.

he sat himself down on a chair next to her. "tell me how I can help." Cara explained to him that it was most likely a bacterial infection, everything initially pointed towards a virus meaning the patient needed to battle it with their own immune system but if it really turned into a bacterial infection halfway through the sickness they could make antibiotics to help them fight it.

now it was a matter of finding the right balance, they couldn't make it to aggressive or they might do more bad than good with it but it needed to be strong enough to help them. but making a whole new antibiotic was impossible in this time frame so they would need to mix and match.

no that was not a good idea, they would risk the bacteria to become immune ... she looked over to kaz who was looking at her in anticipation of her command. "I want you to go back to sleep." He cocked an eyebrow at her. "I am serious, when I figure this out these children will need to take whatever I make every 6 hours but I already feel like I might sleep for at least 12 hours after this so I need you to be awake when I sleep so you can make sure they take the medicine."

Kaz nodded. "alright love, but you wake me up as soon as you are done okay. You should get some sleep as soon as possible. you look horrible." It was Cara's turn to cock an eyebrow now. "well thank you for the compliment sir." Kaz smirked and when he stood op he pressed a light kiss to her forehead before making his way back to his room.

she looked back at the corner of the room where all the medicine and supplies were, this was going to be a long few hours.

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she had done it, she had found the balance. She had researched the different kinds of antibiotic and what not to mix them with so she would know what she could mix them with. She had come up with a mixture that would kill the bacteria hopefully but it would protect the children's intestine against the belly ache it would surely give them by adding the right herb extract.

She went downstairs with the medicine and saw both nina and inej sleeping in the middle of the room, they both sat on a chair at a table in the middle of the room full of patients. All the patients seemed to be either sleeping or silently groaning in pain.

She looked at the door that was open to let fresh air in the establishment, both Matthias and jesper guarding the door. Cara walked over to the closest child and woke them up gently to make them take the medicine, at first they refused but Cara was persistent and made sure they took it.

she went around the whole room like this and by the time she was with the final child she heard the familiar tapping of a cane coming down the stairs. With the sound inej and nina both woke up and looked around quickly to gather as much information about the situation as possible.

kaz stood a little away from the children, near the bar while inej and nina stepped closer to Cara. Cara had noticed the first light shining through the windows and door so she guessed it was around 7 in the morning. She handed a box with at least 100 makeshift pills to nina.

"please make sure the children take it at 1pm and then once again at 7pm." The weight of the night finally made itself known in complete and utter exhaustion as Cara fought to regain her balance. Kaz was quick to come to her side, not caring how close he was currently to other people. He put his arm around her waist.

"lets get you to bed first, we will take care of it from here." Kaz helped her get upstairs and to his room. without even changing her clothes he helped her get into bed, he pressed a kiss to her forehead before making his way back to the door.

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Cara didn't know what time it was when she woke up again. what she did know was that kaz was sitting next to the bed, he had dragged his armchair to be next to the bed and made himself comfortable enough to sleep.

Cara got up from the bed and made her way to the bathroom to take a quick shower. When she got out of the bathroom in a fresh outfit she felt ready to battle the world again. Kaz was already waiting for her with a plate of food. "I didn't want to wake you kaz, you looked peaceful in your chair." Kaz rolled his eyes. "I woke up as soon as you left the bed. now here, eat this before meeting me downstairs."

Cara gratefully took the plate of food from him before making her way downstairs. Now she could see she slept long, it was already well into the morning as she heard voices from downstairs. She made her way downstairs and immediately saw that a lot of the parents were there with their children, sitting next to their makeshift beds and talking to each other.

Cara didn't know if this was good or bad news but when the first parent that spotted her got up and took her into a bone crushing hug she knew it must be good news. "thank you so much for saving my son"

more parents had noticed her now and one by one they all came to hug her and thank her. After a few hugs from the male parents she noticed kaz was not looking to happy so she politely declined any further hugging blaming it on her shoulder.

nina came to greet her. "the fever started to go down after the second dose of medication yesterday. We already gave them the first dose this morning and most children have stopped complaining about belly aches to, also the red in their eye's is slowly fading away." Cara smiled and nodded. She looked around the room and saw a few children smile, it made her proud.

When she looked over at kaz she didn't expect any smile or happiness from him but she saw he had the slightest smirk and gave her a nod. She went to find inej and jesper and ordered them to get more supplies to make more pills. She expected the children needed to take them for at least another week.

she looked over every child one by one and indeed their fevers had gone down and they looked a lot more active and alive than they had yesterday. She told the parents that they could take their children home this evening when she had made more medicine.

The day flew by as she made the rest of the medicine and when the parents got ready to take their kids home she was once again overwhelmed by gratefulness from the parents. Kaz had helped her clean up the makeshift study she had created in her old room.

everything returned to normal by midnight, kaz and her were laying in their bed together both staring at the ceiling. "tomorrow I will repair your window" Cara said to kaz. she felt him grin. "a replacement was already delivered the same day you broke it, just haven't had the time or patience to deal with it yet."

Cara moved herself so her head was laying on his chest and he was quick to wrap his arm around her resting his hand on her back. "I have a surprise for you tomorrow." Cara cocked an eyebrow. "is that so?" Kaz drew circles with his hand on her back. "I hope you will like it, it cost me a lot of kruge." Cara giggled. "oh no not your one true love, not kruge" Kaz chuckled, a sound she wished she heard more. "for you love, anything."