Behind those blue and red eyes

The fourth encounter: Snowdrops (part 2)

The herbs and spices barely touched his hands as he searched through them. He looked at the hundred potions on the shelf but seemed not to find anything of use. Too little for those wounds, too little for dulling that pain. If he were that kind of monster he would have cursed already. How on earth would he have prepared that closet if when while in an emergency it became useless? He was on the verge of tears but maintained composure and looked for ways to resolve his dilemma. Calmer, he took the few containers that were of use and put them in a basket with some food and beverages to help him distract himself from the pain.

"DID SOMETHING HAPPEN BROTHER?" Poppy's voice startled him. "WHY THE MEDICINE?" He took a minute to get his senses straight. "Acorn fell and hurt himself, he doesn't want to worry anyone so it is a super duper secret." He lied to his brother with a straight face. "CAN I HELP?" Poppy's eyes were pleading. "No need bro, I have everything under control" Poppy seemed a little sad but it served a greater good.

He walked slowly towards the door as if he hadn't had any worries. Under the gaze of Poppy's eyes, every step felt like dropping concrete to the ground. Dry cold heavy steps filled the room with their sounds. Any movement felt weird and wrong, a masquerade that robbed seconds of the life of the fellow skeleton waiting for him in the open. Once at the door he forced a smile towards his brother and held his breath as he walked through the door.

The air received him with some kind of mockery, blowing wind onto his head with a grin. He morphed from a happy easy-going older brother to a desperate friend that could lose someone just by taking a minute more than necessary.

He appeared the closer he could to the old tree he always used to hide and put the basket on the ground. "I'm back" he nervously said and noted how dull the sound of static was as if someone was turning the volume down on a TV. "I have some medicine, I put it on a basket so you can apply it yourself" Then again there was no response. "I'm getting nervous. Can you move your arm if you're hearing me?" But there was no movement.

"I'm sorry, but I have to come close. '' He said as he approached the tree. As he grew closer the smell of blood filled his nose thrills but he felt some relief noticing there was no hint of dust in the air. He could teleport but he didn't want to scare him to death, so he walked fast instead.

The tree revealed the skeleton body to Lavender, and he froze in terror; there was a lot of blood and the ribs grew out of his chest like branches of a tree. He knelt in front of that body and reached out for the medicine in the basket. He applied first an ointment that would prevent infection, afraid of hurting him, he moved his fingers with the greatest of care putting just a little ointment at a time with soft touches here in there.

The following step was not of his liking, but as with all hard things in life, it was unavoidable. He pulled up his sleeves and inhaled deeply. His hands were shaking but he controlled his breathing till there weren't. He held the first rib that was poking out his chest and with a firm hand pulled into his rightful position. It let a crack sound out. Then he took bandages out of the basket and used them to hold together the rib, after that, he tried to hold in place the rib by using bandages around the scapula and clavicle.

He continued with the rest of the bones one by one, till that skeleton rib cage looked like a spider web. Some of them pointed to the outside others to the inside, but all of them were equally damaged. Whatever had caused that to this monster had surely moved a lot inside him to cause those kinds of wounds.

Blood tinted the white of the fabric slowly as the time passed through them like a breeze, and he felt so, so tired. He had purposefully let him be unconscious through the worst part of the process, now he needed to wake up.