I have a poultice

Writers: Paula, Suzee
Date Posted: 10th June 2011

Characters: U'das, Y'gel
Description: Zackariath needs some attention and the Master has an idea
Location: River Bluff Weyr
Date: month 2, day 1 of Turn 6
Notes: Mentions: Mardria

Y'gel

"Hi, Y'gel!" U'das greeted and walked in to the dragon infirmary.
"Could you take a look of Zack's wing? It's bothering him.. again. He
pretends it's nothing, but I know it's sore," he asked.

"U'das!" He greeted the bronzerider with a friendly grin. "Of course,"
he crossed the cavern to where the big bronze blocked the sun. "Well
met Zack," he said. "Can you show me the part that isn't feeling quite
right?" He was very familiar with the injuries that had taken the pair
out of action for so long.

** Open your wing, please" U'das asked and Zack spread his wing. "This
joint," U'das put his hand over the sore wing-joint.

"Yeah that's back to the joint that he injured isn't it. Well let's
have a look then." Y'gel felt around on the joint with experienced
fingers. He could feel the changes in the bone underneath his fingers.
He went to the other side to feel the same joint as comparison.
"Hmmm, has he complained at all about stiffness?"

"No, but that doesn't mean anything. He tries to keep those things
from me," U'das replied. Which the bronze obviously couldn't do,
thank's to the bond between them. "He doesn't complain until the pain
gets unbearable."

Y'gel didn't like the turn this was taking. This kind of stiffness and
pain in a previously injured can cause arthritis or joint inflammation
in people. In dragons the effect could be similar. "I'm going to
make up some salve for you, but you're going to have to get him
talking about it."

"He doesn't want to admit he's not a hatching anymore. Something we
all have to face. This one started after the last green flight," U'das
said. He rubbed affectionately the bronze's eyeridge.

"Yes, I can see how that is. Most of them are that way." He walked up
to the big bronze who had contributed so much to the Weyr. "You must
tell him when you're stiff so he can put the poultice on you, it will
help."

"Walk with me U'das," he said and went toward his office.

The bald bronzerider nodded and followed the Weyrdragonhealer.

Y'gel pulled out a bottle of whiskey from his cabinet and set it on
the desk along with a pair of glasses.

"Zack has some fairly bad swelling in his joint," he said before
pulling the stopper and pouring two fingers into each glass. "The
thing is... it's not limited to his injury site."

"And?" U'das asked. He didn't like to sound of that.

He heard the wariness in U'das' voice and didn't blame him in the
least. "It looks like arthritis does in humans. The normal treatment
is a course of numbweed when he complains but you've told me yourself
he doesn't until he's almost crippled."

Y'gel took a sip from his glass and set it down. A finger circled the
rim as he thought. He didn't necessarily want to tell a former
Weyrleader they were going to experiment on his llifemate but that was
_exactly_ what they were about to do.

"I'd like to try out a new poultice we've developed. We've had some
success with a recent limited trial on a very senior dragon and she
obtained significant relief both from swelling and pain. Do you think
you'd want to try? It's still experimental."

"I'll try anything, even experimental stuff," U'das said. He had
listed silently and only shook his head sadly.

"Ok then," said Y'gel. "First I'd like to control his pain as much as
we can. Luckily we live in a nice warm climate so some of the effects
of regular weather will be mitigated when he's on the ground but the
cold of between will effect him. So, lets make sure we get the
poultice applied throughly the night before a Threadfall day." He
thought through further. "I'd like you to keep some records of how
he's feeling both before and after." Then he stopped for a moment.
"This is only the beginning so we really want to keep you two flying
as long as we can!"

If only he and Aughashyth had had some way of dealing with his own
injuries when they were young. His life would have turned out
completely different.

U'das listened carefully and nodded. "All right," he said. "Oh, he'll
love that!"

"Good, we'll get started right away. Oh, and you can thank Mardria for
the majority of this. Soravath's been feeling the effects of her age
and her rider has been testing this on her. It's her invention," he
added with a grin.

"Really?" U'das was surprised. Although he probably shouldn't.

Y'gel shook his head. "You wouldn't believe it but she was a
dragonhealer apprentice before either of us were born. I allowed her
to apprentice again when she asked and with her lifetime of knowledge
added to the years she studied. I'm going to have her walk the tables.
If her treatment does for Zakariath what its done for Soravath. She
deserves even more than that."

"Well, that just proves that you're never too old," U'das said.

Last updated on the June 13th 2011

Welcome to Triad Weyrs!

I have a poultice