Morning all and welcome to the Fifteen Minute Novel. Here I take the start of a story idea and work on it for fifteen minutes a day. I started with an old writing prompt that interested me, cleaned it up a bit to fit the basic outline of the story I want to write and then set aside fifteen minutes each week day to see it grow. Each morning’s writing starts with the last sentence of the day before. And so now we have the story of Kasca…
Day 143: She didn’t think anyone was watching, but it never hurt to be careful.
She didn’t think anyone was watching, but it never hurt to be careful. For now, there was a new day to start. It began as any other. Quieter now without the threat of an epidemic looming and with the sky gray and lowering. Thus far this winter saw bitter winds sweeping across the city and some freezing rain but there had been no snow.
‘I don’t know if they get snow here,’ she thought. This was her first winter here and while she exchanged pleasantries in the market, she wasn’t close enough to anyone for a lot of conversation to be natural.
‘It also doesn’t help that I am usually hurried.’
Kasca also knew that many in the market held their distance out of respect. She was not just a healer but a healer with magic. That carried bit respect and a certain kind of wariness with the others. It was different from the way she grew up, with magic more or less marking her for death. It may not be deadly, but her magic still marked her.
“Weighed against death for existing and it is still a benefit,” she decided.
While the shop was open, there were few people walking around and she doubted she would get many who wanted to simply peruse her shelves. With the fire going in the workshop and the door between her workspace and the shop open, the shop was not frigid. Its warmth lay mostly in the walls providing an escape from the wind more than heat from the fire.
It was more comfortable than the out of doors, but it wasn’t a space to spend a lot of time slowly browsing. She expected any customers she had would be visiting out of need rather than a desire to dry a different type of pomade.
Kasca tied on her apron and began retrieving the various components for a potion she wanted to work on. It was a formula she found in one of the books she searched and thought that as things were quiet, now would be a good time to play around with it. As she set her items on the worktable, Kasca heard the bell over the door ring signaling an arrival.
“I will be with you in a moment,” she called. Kasca set her items down and went into the front room. To her surprise, it was the magistrate standing in her shop. He was looking around as though taking a tour. Kasca saw several people from his household, from his wife and sisters to his messenger, arriving to pick up items. He himself never visited.
‘So I suppose it is all new to him.’
To Kasca’s surprise, the magistrate was not alone.
“Ah Mistress Healer,” the magistrate said when he saw her. “I am so glad we have caught you in a slow moment.”
“It seems the infection has died down,” Kasca said. “Thank you for sending assistance when it was at its height.”
“Of course, of course,” he said waving a hand magnanimously in the air. Behind him the other man cleared his throat. “Ah yes, we have a visitor,” the magistrate said. He stepped to the side and gestured to the man he brought with him. “This is Mage Jeron,” he said. “He is the King’s personal magical advisor.”
Kasca smiled at the mage. “It is a pleasure to meet you sir,” Kasca replied.
“And I am absolutely delighted to meet you,” Jeron replied. “When the Blood Death again reared it’s head this season we feared another wave of deaths would decimate the population. I’ll admit when we heard a remedy was found, all of us were skeptical and we watched the city closely to see the effectiveness.”
“You wanted to see if I was selling false hope?” Kasca guessed.
Jeran shrugged. “It was a fear,” he said. “Thankfully an unjustified one. We received reports and indeed tested the remedy on our own inflicted in the capitol and were happy to report it was effective.”
“It was why we asked for the shipments sent to the physics to be increased,” the Magistrate told her. “Many of those were shipped to other places in need.”
Kasca nodded.
