[Mkguild] Healing Wounds in Arabarb (50 of ?)

[C. Matthias]

Healing Wounds in Arabarb
By Charles Matthias



Lindsey wanted to help Jerome come back to his 
senses, but he could tell that the poison was not 
going to give him much more time to live. But no 
matter how he tried to touch his mother's spell 
with his will, it seemed to slip out of his 
grasp. He could grip like Jessica and Kayla had 
described, and even draw it out a few inches from 
beneath the Curse's shroud, but then it would 
melt through his fingers like putty and slip 
away. It even seemed to hide further out of view 
so that it became more and more difficult to even find.

These few times he was able to touch the spell 
were interrupted by long and longer tattoos of 
anguish pounding in his skull and threatening to 
erupt from his bowels. He heaved several times 
but only brought up rancid spittle for his 
efforts. His veins felt like they were on fire 
and yet despite the warmth of Jerome's robe, he 
shivered as if he'd been abandoned in the snow.

Jerome sang a little song to him at the back of 
his canine throat. It was soothing even if he 
didn't know the words. It also seemed familiar to 
him and it was only after he had finished its 
long, winding melody and started over again that 
the boy recognized it. It was the Song of the 
Sondeck, something he had heard Charles and 
Jerome sing to each other while trying to find their calm.

He almost cried when the idea came. He tried to 
swallow and clear his throat, but that only made 
him cough. His tongue felt heavy and thick. 
Lindsey forced it to work. “Jerome... your calm. Find your... your calm.”

Jerome stopped singing and licked his black nose. 
He'd let his face distend into a snout again, 
something that Lindsey would have objected to had 
he the energy. “My calm? Oh yes. But I should 
keep watch over you. I'll find my calm soon. I 
promise. It's too dangerous now to be distracted.”

Lindsey grunted and lifted his eyes to stare at 
the beastly visage of his friend. He'd never been 
as close to him as Charles or even James had 
become, but after nearly six months of travel 
together, fighting for each other's lives against 
odds so terrible that he could scarcely believe 
that they'd actually won, it was impossible not 
to care deeply. He wasn't going to let Jerome 
fall back into Gmork's paws so long as he still drew breath.

“Please... do it... for me.”

Jerome looked clearly pained and his snout pulled 
back into his face. He leaned away a moment, tail 
tucking between his legs. Lindsey noted that 
there were scratch marks along his chest and 
thighs as the fur there thinned. They didn't look 
like they'd been made by a wolf either and he 
knew they hadn't been there two months ago. But 
he had no time to wonder about that. He kept his 
gaze fixed on his friend's golden eyes, eyes 
tormented by the thought of abandoning a friend. 
“You... can't protect me... unless you are calm. Please.”

“But...” Jerome whined and lowered his ears. 
“I'll try. But I'm not leaving your side.”

“I.. don't want... you to.”

Jerome nodded and settled back on his haunches, 
sitting with his hands planted in front of him as 
if they were paws. He tilted his head back and 
closed his eyes, remaining in a beastly posture 
though his upper body was mostly human in guise. 
Lindsey trembled beside him as he fought the 
pain, the drumming in his head reverberating 
through his ears and down his chest. It only seemed to get louder.

Beside him, Jerome stirred and rose into a 
crouch. “Someone is coming,” he said and began to 
growl as his snout pressed out, fangs glistening with fresh spittle.

Lindsey took several shallow breaths and realized 
that the pounding was not just in his head. 
Somebody dressed in armor was running down the 
hall. He looked up just as the figure approached 
with sword drawn and stepped through the portal. 
His heart leaped and he cried, “Father!”

Alfwig stood in the doorway in leather armor with 
sword in right hand and dagger in his left. He 
lifted both blades in a familiar fighting stance 
and glowered at Jerome. “Get back from my boy, beast.”

Jerome growled and put one paw on Lindsey's back. 
“I will not let you hurt him!”

“Jerome, no!” Lindsey gasped, as he used what 
little strength he had to push himself up off his 
hands and knees. The world swam as he did so and 
it took all his meager strength to keep from 
falling back down. “This is my father!”

Jerome blinked and then stopped growling. He 
lowered his head and blinked golden eyes at him. 
“I know you. You were the man in the dungeons.”

Alfwig stared at Lindsey and then at the pup and 
finally began to nod. “You were the one Gmork was 
training. What are you doing here? Didn't Gmork make you his own?”

Jerome growled a bit, but stopped himself. “Don't 
speak of my father that way! Lindsey was 
poisoned, he needs help. My father will save him.”

Alfwig spat on the ground and took a step into 
the laboratory. He glanced at Lindsey but kept 
his eyes and his blades pointed toward the 
wolf-like beast. “Where is Calephas?”

“Dead,” Jerome replied. “Drowned in the river with his slave.”

Alfwig spat again, and a smile briefly flashed 
across his cheeks before his worried frown 
returned. “Lhindesaeg, what did he give you?”

Lindsey trembled and had to fall back to his 
hands and knees. “Arsenic. He... said... that 
unless...” he coughed and fell face first onto the ground. “Father...”

Alfwig did not move. “I'm here.”

He took another quick breath and squeezed the 
words past his lips, “Unless mother's spell... 
keeping... me human is gone... I'll die. As dragon I'll live.”

His father's face was stolid through the unkempt 
beard, though his eyes were soft. Still, his grip 
on his blades never wavered, nor did his regard 
for Jerome. Gmork's pup no longer hovered 
protectively over Lindsey's back, but he did meet 
those blades with a narrowed, suspicious gaze. 
That slight distraction kept him from 
understanding what his son meant for several long 
seconds. But telling the tale last night brought 
it back before Lindsey succumbed to another fit 
of coughing. “The spell cast to make you human? 
The one your true mother placed on you when you 
were first hatched? If its removed you'll become a dragon?”

Lindsey nodded slightly. At his side he felt 
Jerome flinch. Under his breath the pup muttered, 
“Father doesn't like dragons.”

“Your father,” Alfwig sneered as he spoke the 
word, “is not here.” He stepped closer. “Now get back. This is my son.”

Jerome's jowls twitched but he did take a few 
steps back, crouching on hands and feet, both of 
which looked more like paws. His tail pulled 
close to his legs but not quite between. Lindsey 
glanced at him and coughed again, “Find... your 
calm!” His jowls flecked a bit but he did close 
his eyes again and turned his ears back.

He felt Alfwig's firm hands, hardened by 
calluses, rest on his back. He gently lifted the 
Sondecki robes from Lindsey's back and set it 
aside on the stone floor. “Your mother did tell 
me,” he said in a soft voice, “how to remove the 
spell if ever I needed to. If ever you asked me to.”

Lindsey smiled faintly and then clutched his 
sides tightly when another wave of misery swept 
across every pore of his flesh. He jabbed his 
tongue against the back of his teeth to keep from 
biting it. Between pounding blasts like knife 
thrusts between his ears he managed to squeeze a single word, “Please!”

His father took a long deep breath and then knelt 
down beside him. He kept his sword pointed toward 
Jerome, but sheathed the knife and set his hand 
on top of Lindsey's sweat streaked hair. “I love 
you, Lhindesaeg. Focus on breathing. I never 
wanted to say these words, but I could never forget them either.”

His voice sank into a chant-like tone, bereft of 
rhythm but seeming to echo with each syllable. 
Lindsey breathed, listening to the words, his 
eyes kept shut to everything to keep the vertigo at bay.


“With these my words I now revoke,

The spell that lady dragon spoke,

To human shape the body latch,

On she from dragon egg did hatch.


“Return daughter mine, my words command,”


Jerome began to growl and he said, “Two humans are coming,”

Lindsey opened his eyes and saw that his father 
was scowling at his friend, but he did draw his 
dagger again and move to stand just inside the 
laboratory door where he wouldn't be seen. Jerome 
crouched closer to the boy, stretching a furry 
arm across his back protectively. Whatever the 
incantation was supposed to do, Lindsey felt 
nothing but the sickness spreading through his body.

But he could hear a pair of booted feet running 
down the hall, rudimentary leather armor rubbing 
and rasping with each step. Lindsey wasn't sure 
who he hoped it was. If they were Resistance, 
Jerome might lose what little self-control he had 
and try to kill them out of the twisted mental 
control that Gmork had over him. If they were 
Calephas's soldiers then Alfwig might be fatally 
wounded by them and Jerome still might lose his 
self-control. At least they were wearing boots; 
that meant it wasn't Gmork. There would be no 
hope for any of them if that beastly mage were to 
appear. Lindsey and his father would be 
slaughtered and Jerome would never be free from that monster.

Who it really was he never would have guessed.

When the young man and older woman stepped 
through, it was not her voice that rang out 
first, but Alfwig's, wretched and starving. 
“Elizabaeg!” He stepped forward, blades still in 
hand and wrapped his arms about her, rubbing his 
face against hers. She gasped in surprise and 
held him close, her voice catching unintelligibly.

Jerome continued to growl but he didn't move from 
where he crouched next to Lindsey. The man who 
came in with his mother and who was dressed as a 
soldier of Calephas gasped and jumped to the 
side, nearly bumping into the long worktable as 
his eyes went wild with fright. “A pup! Get away from that boy!”

“No!” Alfwig snapped, reaching out one arm toward 
the familiar-looking soldier, his unkempt face 
white. “Leave him be! He is not to be touched.”

Jerome's golden eyes narrowed and he growled at 
the soldier, jowls lifting to reveal sharp fangs. “I'll eat you.”

Lindsey gasped in agony but the words still came. “Jerome! Calm!”

The pup's growl faded as he crouched lower 
against himself and closed his eyes again, tail 
tucked low. The soldier stared at him with 
trembling arm as he looked between Alfwig, the 
pup, and Lindsey. “What is going on here?”

“Aye, what,” Elizabaeg said with a tremble in her 
voice. “Gwythyr, stand guard outside for now.” 
The soldier frowned but did as he was told, 
casting a wary glance at the pup. Jerome's eyes 
were closed and his face still and almost 
peaceful. Once the soldier was gone, Elizbaeg's 
anxious eyes passed between her husband and her 
son. “Alfwig, you, I thought you were dead. And Lhindesaeg. What's wrong?”

“Poison,” Alfwig told his wife as he gently put 
his hands on hers and stepped back from her. “A 
poison that is killing him. Calephas gave it to 
him before he fled. He's dead now. I'll tell you 
later. But I can save Lhindesaeg. It... will turn 
him into a dragon... forever.”

Elizabaeg's face flashed through fear, anguish, 
anger, a hundred other minor shades of each, 
before settling onto weariness and sorrow. “Is there no other way?”

He shook his head and held her hands in his own. 
“No. You knew this might come. I hoped it 
wouldn't but it has. Let me save him.”

Elizabaeg stepped out of her husband's embrace 
and then knelt down next to Lindsey, not even 
paying any mind to the wolf-like man crouching at 
the boy's side and murmuring insensible words to 
himself. She stretched out one hand and pushed 
her son's hair back over his ears and then kissed 
his forehead. “I love you, my little boy. My son. 
I'll love you no matter what you are. I always have.”

Lindsey tried to smile but fell into a trembling 
fit. Elizabaeg kissed him one more time and then 
stepped back a pace. Alfwig kissed her on the 
cheek and then knelt beside Lidnsey again. He took a breath and began to chant.


“With these my words I now revoke,

The spell that lady dragon spoke,

To human shape the body latch,

On she from dragon egg did hatch!


“Return daughter mine, my words command,

To the body thy life began,

Dragon and man thy sires dost be,

What was dragon return to thee!


The spell is undone, vanish now,

Thy heritage from high come down,

I give thee back, sweet daughter mine,

Give thee to thy mother from high!”


The words came to an end, and Lindsey could see 
that golden glow hiding beneath the Curse flare 
into such brilliance that for a moment all of the 
pain he felt was gone. The spell swelled with 
light, piercing the Curse and Jessica's spell. 
Brighter, brighter, and brighter it grew until 
the very sun was a pale shadow in a world of pure 
radiance. It flared brighter even than the 
titanic explosion that consumed Marzac. And then 
like a multitude of startled butterflies it dispersed into nothing.

Lindsey opened his eyes as he felt a gentle 
warmth coalesce his childish body. The agony 
remained from the poison, but it, like everything 
else, seemed to grow smaller. With each breath he 
took his lungs and chest expanded, but they did 
not shrink again. He recalled that horrible night 
when the Marquis had transformed him into a 
kangaroo and the way his flesh had molded to that 
evil man's whims. It had been painful and unnatural. This was neither.

He felt as if he had just removed a full suit of 
armor and he was stretching out on a nice fur rug 
in front of a pleasant fire while drinking wine. 
Everything in him relaxed and stretched out, his 
shape distending only because it had been 
cramped. Lindsey savored the transformation with 
a sigh of long-withheld relief.

Both Alfwig and Elizabaeg took a step back as 
Lindsey's neck stretched away from his shoulders, 
face distending into a crocodilian snout, while a 
pair of white horns sprouted from behind his 
ears. Those ears stretched backward like fish 
fins as his face and neck decorated themselves 
with smooth scales, gray in hue with the lightest 
of vermillion chiaroscuro at each edge. His 
tongue stretched with his jaws, teeth curving 
into sharp fangs and lips dwindling into 
reptilian fixture. Lindsey stretched his jaws and 
flared his nostrils as if drawing breath for the first time.

His arms and legs swelled, shifting in proportion 
until his knees lifted from the floor and clawed 
hands and feet lifted his body up into a 
comfortable quadrupedal stance. His claws were 
tough and dark, good for gripping stone and 
chewing earth. His fingers he noted were long and 
flexible, with usable thumbs like Pharcellus had. 
His thighs were thick and powerful, good for 
leaping and driving himself into the air.

 From his backside sprouted a long tail that 
flowed with his body, lined with a ridge 
decorated in that same vermillion hue, and ending 
in a spade-like fin as wide as both his hands 
together. It felt natural to him and moved back 
and forth gently as he shifted from side to side 
to observe what had become of himself. This was 
followed by the growth from his back of two 
slender wings, thick leather folds of flesh that 
nestled against his back like a sheltering 
awning. He thought to stretch them out, but 
decided against it in so small a room as the laboratory.

The changes took only moments and when they were 
over, where before had been a ten year old boy 
now crouched a gray-scaled dragon, very youthful 
in appearance and size. He was longer from nose 
to tail-tip than his height as a man but only 
just. And standing on all fours, unless he lifted 
his head on his neck or rose up on his haunches, 
his eyes were now even lower to the ground than when he'd been a boy.

“Lhindesaeg?” Elizabaeg asked with one hand to 
her mouth and her eyes uncertainly passing along 
his new length. Alfwig's face was locked in stoic 
regard and no words passed his lips.

“It's me, Mother.” At least that is what he tried 
to say. His tongue felt strange to him and the 
words came out distorted and jumbled. More 
slowly, he focused on each syllable and framed 
the words with his new tongue, throat and jaws. 
“It's me, Mother. I'm... a dragon.”

“Aye,” she said, bending over to cup his jaw in 
her hand and to gingerly move hr fingers across 
his brow. Lindsey felt her touch, though his 
scaly hide was not nearly as sensitive as human 
flesh. “How are you feeling? Is the poison still...”

To his great relief the agony coursing through 
his body was already beginning to abate as if the 
Arsenic could not abide being inside a dragon. 
The pounding in his head fell away with each 
moment until it was a sullen throbbing like a 
vast army marching away into the distance. His 
stomach still complained, but now it was more the lack of food than the nausea.

For once Calephas had told the truth; turning 
into a dragon had saved his life.

“I'm better,” he said in his slow halting way. He 
would need time and practice to teach himself to 
speak as fluently as he had before. Certainly it 
was possible – his older brother Pharcellus never 
suffered from an uncooperative tongue. “It 
worked. The pain... is... reef... reef... leaving.”

“Can you move? We don't want to stay here,” 
Alfwig asked. His father shifted to his right 
side and ran one hand down his son's back just 
beneath his wing. “And what of your friend?”

Lindsey craned his neck to his left to look at 
Jerome. The Sondecki crouched on his haunches 
like a wolf, but his arms and upper body were 
mostly human in guise. Without his garments the 
old scratch marks along his chest, arms, and 
cheeks were clearly visible. They weren't from 
any beast that Lindsey could discern. But despite 
those wounds his face was placid and relaxed, 
long triangular ears drooped as if in slumber.

The new dragon had seen both Charles and Jerome 
reaching for their Calm many times on the journey 
to Marzac and on the journey home to Metamor. 
Charles had even explained to him why Sondeckis 
would seek this place in themselves that they 
called their Calm. There they could find the 
balance of emotion, the clarity of thought, and 
the mastery of the magic that ravaged their 
bodies with a rage uncontrollable and fatal 
otherwise. It was not meditation in the religious 
sense, but it was just as necessary.

And even with all that Gmork must have done to 
Jerome to make him into a pup and to make him see 
and love Gmork as a father as he so clearly did, 
it was also clear that Lindsey's friend could still reach his Calm.

“Jerome. He'll have to stay with me.” Lindsey 
lifted his legs one at a time, both fore and 
rear, as he spoke to try and become familiar with 
how they moved. He'd never been four-footed 
before and while whatever draconic heritage he 
had made it feel natural it also felt completely 
new. “He may hurt anyone else if... if I'm not 
there. If he goes back to the mage...”

Alfwig frowned and nodded, putting a gentle hand 
on Elizabaeg's shoulder. She leaned into the 
touch while her eyes roved slowly across her 
son's alien shape. “The mage brought him to the 
dungeons with me three, four, five weeks ago. I'm 
not sure how long it was. He'd visit him every 
day and talk to him for a few minutes to an hour 
or more. Your friend fought at first, but 
eventually he started growing ears and fur like the other pups.”

He lowered his eyes and swallowed. “The last few 
days he's been trying to get him to eat the flesh 
of men. And last night he brought down the body 
of one of his pups who'd been slain. Jerome 
snapped and I thought he'd become one of that 
mage's pups for good.” Alfwig paused as if he had 
more to say but wasn't sure whether or not it was 
wise to say. “I'm glad I was wrong.”

He turned to his wife and smile, somewhat bemused 
and tired, “And you, my Elizabaeg, how many did you bring into the castle?”

“Nine of us,” she said with a long sigh. “It's 
not much, but it was all we had. We should have 
the armory by now. They're going to need our 
help. But...” She stared at the dragon who gazed 
back at her with his newly vibrant 
crimson-flecked amber eyes. Lindsey tried to 
smile, but wasn't sure how exactly to do that 
with a draconic snout filled with sharp fangs. Pharcellus made it look so easy.

“You want to stay here,” Alfwig said in a soft, gentle voice, “with our son.”

She lowered her eyes and her neck tensed as her 
hand curled into a fist. “He isn't... my son.”

“I am!” Lindsey almost shouted. It took him a 
moment to coordinate his limbs, but he did step 
close enough to her to put a forepaw against her 
leg. “I am your son. You raised me. You. I love you.”

She trembled, but did reach out and stroke her 
fingers across his scaly cheek, curling them up 
around his fin-like ears, and to the pearly horns 
that pointed straight back from his head. “I love you, too... son.”

Alfwig patted him on the side and then stood. “We 
cannot stay here. Calephas may be dead, but...” 
he eyed Jerome and then said nothing more. “But 
we need to help the Resistance and we need to get 
the both of you somewhere safe. Can you walk?”

Jerome turned his head to one side and shifted 
about on his legs again. After a lifetime of 
being two-footed, he just had to admit that he 
didn't know how to make his limbs work right. “I 
can. But it's going to take getting used to.” He 
glanced up at the walls and the table with 
potions, and then back at the broken chains. A 
hiss escaped his throat. “But I do want out of this room.”

Elizabaeg was quick to stand and move toward the 
door, Alfwig at her side and his sword in hand. “What of your friend?”

Lindsey looked at the mostly-human Jerome and 
sighed. The Sondecki looked completely placid and 
relaxed, his lupine ears not even turning at the 
sound of their voices or their steps. The new 
dragon turned his tongue, finding it easier 
already to form his words, “I'll wake him and bid him to stay at my side.”

But just as he reached out a hand to shake his 
friend's fur-coated thigh, Jerome's eyes popped 
open and his face contorted into a rictus of 
horror. A single barked word erupted from his 
throat, “Father!” And then, he bolted into the 
air over the dragon, his body twisting and 
coating itself anew in the silvery-black fur of 
the wolf, forepaws landing on the other side. His 
tail brushed across Lindsey's wing and then 
Jerome was through the open door like a bolt and 
off down the hall. The three humans and dragon stared dumbfounded.

“Oh no!” Lindsey cried as he tensed his leg 
muscles and jumped forward, finding his footing 
easier than he expected, but still awkward. “Help 
me follow him! We cannot lose him!”



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May He bless you and keep you in His grace and love,

Charles Matthias


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