O' lost the comely days of spring, of flowers bloom and nights alive
O' lost the summer's kiss, her hot desire, her blister burdened love
Where autumn's slow decay, frost tinged hope dies, falling from frozen finger
Away to winter's end will we know, I dare not consider.
 
It has been said that the way of faith leads bloom to hope, and risk in this shall be rewarded.
Whoever believes such, tempted by a light heart, lays doomed in their own folly.
 
Where hope is lost, and the blind faith in the way of existence stripped bare
There lies the true power, The power of self

— From the journal of Chole Raicravd

Darc sighed and jerked his head up, yet again, waking himself from his half sleep. He really ought to turn in for the eve, out here in the hollows one really had to conserve energy. Of both the personal variety as well as the electrical. Besides if he was foolish enough to leave the light on some one might assume he was still open for business and he might never get a good nights rest.
 
He stretched and started to get up when he heard a tap at the door. Because of course he did. He sighed and picked his hat up off the desk, setting it jauntily on his head. One didn't want to great customers looking less than presentable, even if you had to turn them away.
He'd only been in this town for half a month but the nightcalls had already been slowly tapering off as he was managing to get things done for the people. It gave him a warm satisfaction to know he was really making a difference out here.
 
"Comiing!" He sang as the bell on his front desk chimed. They must have let themselves in, not uncommon but it would make turning them away much more difficult. Perhaps they only needed a refill on medicine. He hoped that was the case. He opened the door separating his current home from his business and blinked at the fullness of the room. Must have brought the whole family with them.. that wasn't good, it was likely an emergency and there was no way he'd be able to get them to all leave without promising some sort of service first. Or possibly making a house call.
 
"Doctor Wecd, I presume?" Asked the woman in the middle of the group. He was struck by her loveliness and he felt maybe staying up late wasn't so terrible, just this once.
 
"Why yes ma'am, Darc Wecd, at your service." Darc tipped his hat to her and was rewarded with an amused smile. His heart did a little skip flutter and he walked the rest of the way into the room. He didn't have the heart to tell her he wasn't actually as decorated as to be a Doctor, not after that look.
Ah he recognized them all now, the traveling musicians that had been outside playing the last day or two. He hadn't had a chance to stop and listen, but he could hear it from his office. It had been lively and pleasant, by his recollection.
 
"At my service, how fortunate." She moved forward away from her friends to meet him at the counter. "I was worried you were closed for the night."
 
"Ah, yes, well..." Curses.. walked right into that one. "Duty calls and I must answer. What can I help you with this evening? What troubles you?"
 
"I heard you were studied in medicine syntheses and poison antidotes." The woman's smile turned a bit sad as she leaned on the counter, swatting away the hand of one of her fellows who was going in for a second ring of the bell. The mischievous seeming young man went to mess with the medicines up on the shelf instead.
 
"Oh dear, I'm not sure who told you that." Darc flushed. "That was my major in school, yes. But I can't say I was any good at it, I'm a simple traviling physician now." He turned to the young scamp. "Please don't touch any of that, if you wouldn't mind."
 
"A'sorry." He moved back to the group in was Darc would describe as a waltz. Musicians... so, free spirited.. yes that was a good way to put it if he did say so himself. And he did.
 
"Don't be so down on yourself Doctor, you had very high marks."
 
Darc flustered again, not sure how to take an attractive woman having such an interest in him and his schooling. "I.. Well you know so much about me, I'm flattered. Could i get your name perhaps?"
 
"Oh! How rude of me. Chole, Chole Raicraft." She seemed to enjoy his floundering, which he supposed was good. At least he was amusing her. The name seemed somewhat familiar, but he couldn't place it. Was she a famous musician? "As for my trouble... I.. I have Cryolidhium poisoning."
 
He stopped getting flustered and frowned, coming around the counter to talk with her better. "I'm truly sorry to hear that Ma'am." It was a serious ailment to be sure. "I believe they have treatments for that in the city, but a little physician such as myself.. Sadly I don't carry it."
 
"Oh, don't fret so, Doctor Wecd. I didn't come here looking for that stop gap measure of a medication." Oh that was a relief. "I came for a cure." Oh... that was worse.
 
"A cure? I think, and I'm not trying to be rude or modest here, I think you would be much better served talking with some one in the field, There are many brilliant Doctors at the medical collage who could do much better. They have all the up-to-date research, the highest tech laboratories, the finest resources." He took his glasses off and cleaned them on the duster of his coat.
 
"I'm am dreadfully sorry Doctor Wecd, I feel you misunderstand me." Darc could almost feel her smile as she got closer and put a hand on his chest. He was a bit taken aback at the gesture and froze in place, his face heating. "I mean to say, you will create me a cure, or you will die trying."
With that she gave him a shove, causing him to stumble back against the counter. As soon as he did the other musicians pounced, pulling him bodily by the arms up onto the surface.
 
Darc was still a bit shocked by all this and didn't seem to consider putting up a struggle just yet. "I am in no way qualified to do such a thing." Perhaps they thought he was holding out on them. Which really went against his principles and that miffed him a bit to think they would consider it.
 
"Oh, you are, you are. You just haven't had the proper motivation, my dear Doctor." She motioned to one of the ones that wasn't holding him and they handed her a glowing shard of what he was sure was Cryolidhium, it was hard to mistake it for much else.
 
"W-what do you mean?" He was getting a horrible sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, and it was spreading down into his legs. A tingle of pure fear.
 
"Now now Doctor, don't ask questions when you already know the answer." Her sweet smile seemed some how sinister, though the expression itself had not changed. "I mean to infect you."
 
Darc's body finally reacted, as the realization of the danger he was in hit him at last. He struggled against the two holding him with all his might, kicking and flapping his wings. He tried to jerk his arms free but the two of them seemed to have had more practice at holding people down than he had at getting free. And suddenly his wings were trapped. The younger one had jumped up on the counter and sat on them.
 
"Shhh shh." The young man cradled his head and started petting him, as if he thought that would make Darc calm down and accept what they were going to do to him.
 
Darc managed to get one hand somewhat free and he reached to the woman in a desperate plea. "P-please don't.." The hand was quickly recaptured and brought under control. The last ruffian, as he was now considering them, grabbed his kicking legs and firmly held them down.
 
"Don't worry Doctor." The woman said calmly as she headed over to join them. "As they say in your work, 'This will only hurt a little.'"
 
Darc's head slid down the boy's lap some as his legs were pulled away for any purchase they may have had on the counter and the ruffians held him down firmly, giving little to no room to wiggle about. His heart sped up as the woman knelt over and started to unbutton his coat. Only moments before the gesture would have been welcomed, he thought bitterly as his mind tried to escape the situation he himself could not.
 
A hand coming down on his beak to keep it shut brought him out of his daydream and he wondered to himself why he hadn't screamed yet. He very well may have gotten help if he had, and now it was too late. He vaguely wondered just how they were going to infect him with the poisoning without causing an explosion. Wasn't that how one usually got the the illness? Out of morbid curiosity, and a lack of else to do, he looked up at the woman between the fingers now half covering his eyes. He instantly regretted it as he saw her draw back her hand, the shard in it like a dagger, and bring it down toward his now exposed chest.
 
He tried to scream as the pain radiated out in jagged lines from where he'd just been stabbed, but all that came out was a muffled garble. The woman pushed the shard deeper, putting all her weight into it and he was sure he would die. A lung or his heart, something was surly going to rupture. He whimpered and the world stared to fade. Just before everything went white he heard a sweet voice cooing to him.
 
"I lied."
 
And he fainted, escaping this torment to blessed darkness.

Chole let out a breathless sigh as she watched the little doctor's eyes roll back in his head. Well that was much easier than she'd anticipated. Word of the man's nature wasn't just hearsay and speculation. He'd been marvelously timid and easy to subdue.
 
"My dear friends, I do believe we've overstayed our welcome. Let us away, shall we?" She flicked the cute little crest on the doctor's head and straitened up. "Inga, Roche, would you two be so kind as to escort our dear Doctor Wecd to the Landrunner while we gather his effects? If you could wrap a bandage around him for the time being I would greatly appreciate it."
 
She waited a beat for them to accept and start moving the unconscious doctor before offering Victor a hand for getting down, as if he needed one.
 
"Victor, be a love, why don't you, and put your energy to good use by keeping a look out for us." She smiled at him as he took her offered hand and hopped down from the counter gracefully. He spun around under her arm, wrapping it around himself, and gave her cheek a little nuzzle before letting go to do as instructed.
 
She waited as they left, and put a hand on Otto's shoulder. She could feel her pianist shutter slightly, knowing he was struggling at the sight of blood.
 
He seemed fine with it when it was in the form of retribution, but his kind heart just couldn't take seeing innocent's injured. But he knew it was a necessary evil that would hopefully lead to a better world in the end, otherwise he wouldn't have helped.
 
Though he had faltered slightly, letting go of the Doctor's arm at one point. She wasn't going to punish him for that, she was grateful he cared enough about her well being to see it through to the end.
 
"Come, lets gather his belongings. We don't know what he may need, and I'd like it too look like he simply moved on to the next town."
 
Together they quickly but neatly gathered everything from the draws and shelves and closets and packed them into the carrying cases Wecd had under his bed. She had to give the Doctor this, he was a very orderly man. One had to be when they moved about as much as he, she supposed.
 
Everything had a place when packed properly and all this belongings fit into only three bags. The process of neatly putting things where they went seemed to calm Otto, as she had expected it would.
 
She grabbed the Doctor's hat and cane before penning a short note in the man's name. She smiled at it, feeling she'd done a fine job giving it his flourish, and turned out the lights, closing up behind them.

Thank you for your hospitality in these, too few, days we have spent together.
I am glad to see so many of you doing well, but I must be on my way. There are other villages without a Doctor who so desperately need one. I will always look fondly on our time together, dear Mudhollow.

But duty calls, and I must answer.

— Doctor Darc Wecd