Bambi and the Duke

Though she had washed the boy’s knee with the little amount of water, she didn’t forget the wetness on the palms of her hand which was caused by the blood when she had covered the wound.

”Are you joking? There’s no wound there! I think it’s enough of you playing doctor. We need to leave now,” the maid exclaimed in frustration, looking down at her with an impatient expression. Vivian didn’t understand what had just happened but she did stand up, giving the boy a look with her brows furrowed in confusion.

Both the maids headed back to the carriage to load all the items they had bought from the market. When they left the market on their way back to the mansion, the coachman oversaw the large pit on the wet dark ground which was covered with dark water, camouflaging the presence of the pit. This resulted in the carriage wheel to get stuck in the pit which refused to be pulled out by the two horses.

The Coachman putting in his effort pushed the wheel when the two brown horses tried moving forward which helped in the wheel coming out of the pit. The wheel had been damaged though and there was no saying when the carriage might breakdown before they would reach the mansion. Having a spare wheel which was carried at the back of the carriage, the coachman got to replace it while the two maids got down from the carriage.

As they waited for the carriage to be fixed, Vivian’s thoughts turned to the boy she met in the market. She had seen the boy fall, the blood that had gushed out from his skin yet when she had cleaned the wound, not a scratch was seen on his knee. She didn’t understand what happened. Was it the water? Or was it the boy himself who couldn’t speak? Questions circulated in her mind as they waited in the deserted forest which wasn’t far from the market.

Unable to contain the questions, she asked the maid who had accompanied her who was busy looking at the tips of her braided hair, ”Evangelin, where did you get the water from?”

The maid looked up from her hair, ”What water?”

”The one you brought for the boy in the tumbler.”

”At the barrel outside the local inn,” Vivian doubted it had anything to do with the water. The maid named, Evangelin came to stand next to her, ”We are lucky the carriage broke down else we wouldn’t know what to answer with the close to twenty minutes of being late. Did you know that the fair is going to be put up in the town soon? To think that we didn’t even hear about it because of where we work,” she tched before closing her mouth shut when the coachman sent her a side look.

Vivian didn’t find anything wrong with what the maid had to say but that didn’t mean talking about it openly was safe. To the coachman, it was as if Vivian would tattle tale on them as she appeared to be the one close to their master while to Vivian it was the coachman who would tattle tale on them as he looked at them with narrowed eyes.

”Do you think we’ll be able to visit the fair?” Evangelin asked her.

”I am not sure about it,” Vivian responded to hear a sound carriage being pulled from a distance. The wheels rolled on the ground, hooves of the horse hitting the wet mud as they walked to only halt in front of them, ”Mr. Wells,” she greeted the curly haired vampire who stepped out of his carriage.

Jerome who had been passing by the same route of the forest had asked his coachman to stop the carriage upon seeing Vivian standing by a carriage that was being repaired.

”Did the wheel break?” he asked them to which their own coachman replied back with a yes sir, ”Hmm. Benji, could you please help him with it,” he turned around to speak to his coachman, ”Seems like you have been standing here for quite some time now. We should be fortunate that it hasn’t started raining yet.”

”We are fortunate for it,” Evangelin answered staring at Mr Wells as if stars were crossing across her eyes. Vivian couldn’t help but smile at it. Jerome Wells could be considered to be a fairly attractive man, not as good looking as the pure-blooded vampires but for a man who came from an average vampire family, his looks and attitude preceded it enormously making him look no less than a pure-blooded vampire.

Mr Wells smiled at the maid, shifting his eyes on to Vivian, ”How have you been?” he asked her.

The last time they had spoken to each other was the day before Paul was executed.

”I have been doing well, thank you for asking,” she bowed her head and she then asked, ”Where you headed for work somewhere?”

”I wouldn’t say it’s work. My brother has come from Valeria with the Lord to speak to the magistrate of the town that resides not far from the establishment. I haven’t seen him in some time and thought it was a good time to meet him.”

”Mr Wells, you have a brother?” Evangelin asked not able to keep her curiosity.

”I do,” the vampire smiled, ”A younger one who works for the Valerian Lord.”

After a few minutes, the new wheel was fixed to the carriage which looked good to go. Thanking Mr Wells for his help, they left for the Carmichael mansion. By the time they reached the mansion as expected, Leonard was back with the housekeeper. Vivian and Evangelin weren’t questioned about their time but that didn’t mean the housekeeper didn’t interrogate the coachman on what took them so long to get back to the mansion. The coachman being a dutiful man didn’t miss to say that Mr Wells had helped them which Leonard heard but didn’t comment or react to it.

Back in the kitchen, Vivian couldn’t get her mind off the fact that something had gone amiss at the time they were in the market. As she diced the vegetables evenly, she wondered if it had something to do with her. She looked at her left hand, staring into it. She shook her head at the thought.

Human or vampire, no one held powers such as that, except for the high priestess who used incantation spells. But she had seen the boy bleeding and that was where her doubt laid. Something healing up so automatically had never happened before, not that she could remember.

As if to test her reasoning and thoughts, being brave she took the knife she held, looking around the kitchen carefully to see if anybody was seeing her. Her eyes fell back on the knife, clutching it tightly in her hand as she brought the other hand close to it. Gulping she readied herself, the knife hadn’t touched her skin but she could already feel the pain of her skin being sliced.

Not noticing that the housekeeper had only entered the kitchen when she was staring at her hand, she held her breath, bracing herself as she ran the sharp knife over her skin. Flinching in pain she dropped the knife.

”Vivian!” came the sharp voice of the housekeeper, startling her, she looked up to see him standing at the entrance of the kitchen, ”What are you trying to do?!”

”Ah, I...” she trailed not sure how to answer his question. She hadn’t expected him to come by as he had only left the room but it looked like she was caught red-handed.

”Follow me,” the housekeeper waited for her to start walking and when she did, he left the room. She followed him with her wounded finger that was wrapped in her good hand. The housekeeper didn’t stop to talk to her and he instead continued to walk, taking her through the corridors away from the people who worked there. The maids whom they came across didn’t dare to look at them and instead, they continued to do what they were doing.

On their way to wherever they were headed Vivian looked down her wrapped finger, unwrapping them to see the wound still in place. She knew it. Somewhere deep down she had been wishful that in some way she was special but that wasn’t the case. Not only did she assume her theory of her being able to heal wounds but she had also cut her finger to be only caught by Jan.

They came to stand in front none other than Leonard’s room, knocking the door twice they heard him respond.

”What is it, Jan?” Leonard asked sitting at his desk with a pair of glasses that rested on his nose. Realizing Vivian stood behind his housekeeper he looked up from the parchment of papers he held in his hand.

”Master Leonard, I would like to inform you that the maid here was about to drop her blood in today’s meal. Vivian’s head snapped to look at the housekeeper. Was that what he thought? Leonard’s eyes fell on her. The housekeeper continued to speak, ”As all the pureblooded families have been informed and have given the same orders to all the staff who work in the kitchen, adding blood of their own for their master or mistress’s meal is considered to be an offence. It is something unacceptable to do and it seems like a ploy.”

”I didn’t-” Vivian began in her defence but Leonard cut her short.

”Is that true? Did you try adding your blood in the meal?” he questioned, his brows so very slightly furrowed.

”No, I didn’t!” she hurried with her answer.

”Do you deny that you didn’t cut your finger out of purpose?” the lowly vampire turned his scrutinizing gaze at her.

”It was by mistake,” her words came out in a low volume.

”Master, believe me when I say that this girl tried to soil the food which was meant for you. We never know what the blood might contain, there are substances that can be endured by humans when consumed but not by vampires,” Jan spoke in an accusing tone.

”I wouldn’t do that,” how dare he accuse her of something without a base, ”I was cutting vegetables. There’s no way I would have mixed it with the food.”

”We never know,” the housekeeper’s bright red eyes gave her a look before he turned to his master, ”Being raised by the human who brought in death, it’s never too much to be careful about people, master.”

”I think one should be careful of outsiders who don’t know anything about the mansion. Like I said I wasn’t planning to cut my hand to mix the blood in master Leonard’s meal and I am sure he would have noticed it,” seemed like the housekeeper didn’t actually like her and it made her wonder. Was it only her or was he like this with every other servant of the Carmichael’s household?

”Hence, the question of why-”

”That’s enough. Jan, leave us alone. I have something to talk to Vivian,” Leonard turned in his seat.

”Yes, master,” Jan bowed his head.

”And close the door,” when the door shut close, Vivian held her finger which continued to sting in pain while feeling Leonard’s eyes that stared at her, ”Are you going to stand there all day? Sit down,” not knowing where exactly to sit she looked for an empty place, her eyes going to the chair she sat and then the bed, ”On the bed,” he directed her with a sigh as he got up to walk towards one of the cabinets of his room.

Picking up the first aid box, he made his way to sit next to her. Raising forward his hand he took her wounded hand to inspect the slice of her finger which looked rather deep, the smell of her blood wafting across his nose.

It wasn’t the first time he had dressed her wound. When they were little children, Vivian was prone to falling down or hurting herself out of nowhere. The younger Leo had always tended to her wounds, he took it as his responsibility, after all, she was his Bambi. His to look after.

That didn’t mean he could overlook what he heard from Jan.

”Why did you cut yourself?” he asked bringing up her finger to place it in his mouth. She winced in pain when his tongue grazed over the open wound.

”It hurts,” that didn’t stop him from sucking her fingers that only brought more pain, ”Leo...”

He pulled her finger which was clean from blood except for the slice of a line that was staining red again, ”Answer me.”

”I wanted to check something.”

”Check what? If you would bleed?” he asked, his tone sarcastic. He knew she was clumsy but to cut her finger in an open front was definitely not a mistake but a purposeful wound. To add, Jan had seen her cutting and he doubted the man lied.

She looked away from him when he pulled out the bandages from the box, ”You would laugh if I said it.”

”Have I ever?” he asked her, using the cotton to dab on her finger. No. Leo wasn’t the kind of man to laugh, he would rather mock her for thinking something so strange.

Though he didn’t ask her again, it didn’t mean he wasn’t waiting for her to explain what she just did and she knew that. Seeing him apply some kind of antiseptic gel on her finger she saw his blonde hair fall across his eyes. His movements were gentle and careful on her.

”Today when we went to the market, a boy fell down,” she began her story and heard him hum to continue with her story, ”The boy couldn’t speak and he was bleeding too much, in pain,” Leo would have asked her to leave the boy be but he doubted she had it in her soul to leave someone helpless and turn her nose away from it. Not uttering a word, he looked at her to show that he was listening before he began covering her finger with the bandage,

”I wanted to help him and asked Evangelin to get some water to wash it. There was too much blood and in that time I placed my hand on his knee but when the blood stains were washed, there was no wound there,” this caught Leonard’s interest, ”It was rather strange. I mean one minute he was bleeding and the next he wasn’t, so I...”

”You thought you healed him,” he completed her sentence to see her nod her head sheepishly, ”I must say your little demonstration on yourself doesn’t seem like you had anything to do with the healing.”

”I was wrong,” Leonard finished aiding the wound she had caused on herself, she could feel the slight amount of disappointment sink in her chest as she admitted to him.

That night, Leonard visited the church to meet Sister Isabelle who was lighting the candles one after the other.

”To what do we owe the presence of our Duke at this hour of the night?” Sister Isabelle asked with her back still facing Leonard.

Not beating around the bush, he asked, ”What do you know about healers?” hearing this Sister Isabelle’s hand stopped before she turned to look at Leonard. She blew the candle out that was in her hand.

”What do you want to know about them?” her intelligent eyes that once was bright now looked at him with dull eyes.

”Everything.”