“Ok, do you need to use your mana in the checkup? Because I think that is too risky,” said Daniel, who was lying half naked on a much cleaner bed. They had gotten the mayor’s permission to move him to their apartment.

Mostly because then he would infect fewer people, if the tree bark returned. The children had asked him many times if he was a tree spirit and, no matter how much he denied it, they insisted that he was one.

Even Rael, who was on board with becoming a professional dragon nest cleaner with his brothers, bothered him about being a tree spirit. If even his apprentice was going to be a little ankle biter, what could he expect from the child’s brothers?

“I am not infusing my mana in your flesh and just using it to nudge your mana around your liver. Which, I have to say, has some scarring. You will need a transplant, or you will die,” said Edwin as he removed his hand from Daniel’s chest.

“What next, puppy? Is my heart broken too?” Snapped Daniel then. The word charlatan was at the tip of his tongue. But, as he was not paying the healer and the man was risking his health to help him, he held himself back.

“Harry, did you cheat on Dany while you were separated?” Asked Edwin with a smirk. Daniel cursed him, silently. He turned to look at Hadrian, who had the gall to be considering the question.

“Well, I consider myself a free spirit that requires an entire harem to keep from being lonely. Dany, I regret to say it, but Eddy is the first wife of the harem,” had the nerve to say Hadrian.

Daniel showed him the middle finger as Edwin barked a laugh.

“Cut it off, both of you!” Said Daniel when the two were reduced to giggles.

That didn’t help one bit. He bowed his head down and then decided to use his trump card.

“Think what the children would say if they hear you two stooges talk like that,” said Daniel, hopeful that at least Edwin will stop laughing.

“They teased me so much about that, that I no longer pay attention to it,” said Edwin. Daniel imagined three boys trying to hook up their parent figures and shuddered. The children were just as much devils as they were cherubs.

“But if you feel chest pain or shortness of breath, I suppose I can check your heart too. But, well, there is a limit to how many transplants one can have per year,” said Edwin. It wasn’t something he agreed with. To force people to choose between their failing organs as if it was a gamble. But he supposed it kept some organs in circulation and readily available for the masses.

“There is always the black market,” said Daniel as he felt his mana being nudged around his heart. He was a wreck, even he knew it. The deal he made with Yima all those years ago came to haunt him. But he had paid the price gladly.

“Nothing wrong with your heart,” said Edwin as he removed his hand again. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t start eating healthier foods,”

“Feed me rabbit fodder, puppy, and I will bite your hand off,” said Daniel, showing a row of white, healthy, teeth.

“Harry, if he makes one more threat, friend of yours or not, we are dumping him on the side of the road,” said Edwin. He had endured Daniel’s behavior in silence, but the pigheaded man finally flayed his nerves.

He turned his back on his patient and went to check on the children. Mundane tasks always helped him cool his head.

“Did you have to come off as an ass?” Asked Hadrian. For once, he was not smiling.

“That sheltered…”

“Eddy is not sheltered,” replied Hadrian in a dangerously cold voice. “He is not full of himself, and I am working on him becoming less of a stick in the mud. He jokes freely now. You will not undo my progress,” said Hadrian, and he too left.

Daniel stared at the door and then looked at the glass bottles with pills by his bedside. They must have cost Harry quite a lot. There was a limit to how much medication one could buy, too, and this was well over it.

The warrior disliked Boliary on principle. They brought plagues and pushed people around. And those who didn’t agree got at the business end of a horde of undead horrors.

For a vampire, a normal one, not Harry, a Boliarin would be a natural ally. With a moral compass so broken, the vampire would look like a saint next to him. And necromancer blood was a delicacy for vampires, or so Daniel has heard.

But Harry seemed to stay with the healer for more than some blood occasionally. Which was strange because Hadrian Deranges was well known for being a nomad and a loner, despite his easy-going personality.

So, they had a partnership going on. A blood bond, not that Hadrian had told Edwin that. What would be the reaction of the healer once he found out that sneaky Harry had used yesterday as an excuse to make a blood bond with him?

When Daniel had entered the blood bond, he had been dying. A bonded mortal to a vampire got a grace period of a year. During that period, their wounds healed slowly, drinking from the vitality of the vampire they had been bonded to.

In exchange, the vampire got a new ghoul. A servant, despite Hadrian never acting towards Daniel as if he was such. He had never asked him for anything. But if he did, Daniel would be compelled to go along with whatever Hadrian needed help with.

But that was better than death. And Hadrian didn’t seem to be in any rush to issue orders. Would it hurt Daniel to be nicer, if for no other reason than to repay the vampire?

No, not really. He sighed and got up. Then he exited the room to see Hadrian teaching Edwin and the children how to juggle with balls. Edwin’s ball kept falling on the floor, but he was concentrated, and he kept picking it up. Daniel could admire someone who gave their all in all things. And could trust his health in their hands.