Bambi and the Duke

Leonard smiled for her to be catching up quickly, "Do you think he's the black witch?" she asked him curiosity peeking to its height. 

"What do you think?" he questioned her question with his own.

Vivian gave it some thought. It was obvious by looking at the man's hand that they didn't look human. They gave a look of rotten look and if a person was sick or had hurt his hands, nothing could make it look like the way it was looking now. 

But witches never got caught. No so easily and in an available manner to the councilmen. Frankly, she didn't know what to make of it as it seemed tricky. 

Leonard then spoke, "The dead man we found had similar nails. It is possible that something went down here. The plague which the magistrate was talking about."

"But why would humans be affected to have their nails turn out similar to the witches?" she asked him. Leonard had tied an innocent man who had fallen sick but he wouldn't treat a sick man like that. 

Not unless, she thought to herself before answering, "Are they turning to black witches?" she asked surprise evident in her voice. 

"There have been speculations of witches trying to turn the humans into one of them. Similar to how the vampires try to turn humans to half vampires," Leonard's gaze retreated to fall on to Vivian, "It's whispers of words that reach in the black market. The man you met at the Isle Valley, Damien. He looks through the black market to get delicate information. But then most of the witches experiments are failed one. They use humans as a test subject before doing their trial and error until it only concludes to a failure. Just like this one here," he jerked his head towards the man sitting next to him. 

"Does that mean they can't return back to their actual form?" she felt bad for the man and his mother who had previously screamed to give her son back to her. 

"Transitions aren't as easy as most of them come to show it. There is ninety per cent of failure and ten per cent of the success in it. And we don't know how the witch who resides in there right now that is if she or he is still there has tried to convert them. While vampires make use of fangs, witches will probably use their potion-making skills and they are made of who knows what ingredients which are inhuman," she stared at the man, feeling sorry as she knew well as to what his future fate might turn out to be. There was only the tunnel of death to walk into. Leonard then continued, "His transition has already begun and it might take minutes or hours before he turns to a complete false black witch or dies to the failure similar to what you saw back there."

"Can't the doctors in the council help him?" Now that Vivian was on a case, she didn't want the man to die without helping him. She could try using her ability but her husband would rage, thinking that in her mind she heard him reply,

"That is why we are taking him. If the doctors can fix him. If not, he will die in a quick execution similar to how a black witch would be killed," Vivian knew that. To kill a black witch or a white witch, one had to draw their blood out and set them on fire until their bones turned to dust.

Leonard glanced at Vivian who now had turned her face to look outside the little window as trees passed them one after another haphazardly. He didn't need to know what was going in that mind of hers. 

Knowing the loss of pain which they had both felt, he said, "I will put in an extra word to help him as much as the people can," her head turned and she smiled.

"I know," she whispered, a small smile coming up her lips. 

She knew from her heart that Leonard would put in his effort in helping the man out. With the way he spoke, there was a chance of the witch to not be there anymore with the thought of being caught but there was also a faint chance that the black witch was still there. 

By the looks of the way the dead body had sat, it seemed as if he was tired before his life had left his body. The witch must have left the man out of his sight for the man to come out of his house. Leonard had not asked her to touch the body as it would be further inspected by another team in the evening before taking in the reports. Touching a body especially like that one that looked delicate, one had to make sure not to move to close as it looked as if one blow of strong breeze was enough to wither the body in the wind.

Going back to see the tied man, she saw his complexion to have changed from being pale to darken. Was he really transitioning to a black witch? She had never seen a human transform into a half-vampire but to think that a black witch was trying to create his or her own people she continued to look at him curiously. 

Reaching the council, the guards came to pick the body and take it to another building which wasn't the main building but the one which held the cells where the prisoners were kept. Vivian wanting to see the man until his cell went along with Leonard trailing behind the guards and entering the cell building which wasn't as well maintained as the main one. It could be considered that it was actually maintained worse as it didn't matter how and where the prisoners were kept locked up. 

Walking through the carved big stones, Vivian came to see some of the men and two-three woman who had been locked up here. Some stood too close to the bar while some sat in the corner. She was already here once and knowing the feeling reminded her of Paul when she had come to visit him and his family. 

Leonard turned over his shoulder to see if she was doing alright and then turned front as they approached an empty room which was again another open grilled cell room. There was a table like a platform which had straps at the sides of it. There were some tools next to it, tools that didn't look decent making one wary as it contained a saw, hammer, and objects as such.

A man stood in the room, a headband around his forehead which had a metal and a round glass fixed at the side. His eye were red, fangs that protruded out of his mouth as he stood there waiting for them with a fixed smile. 

"Duke Leonard, what have you bought me?" the man asked eagerness coating every word of his as he eyed the man who was put on the table. He looked like a doctor. The councilman doctor looked at Vivian, his head cocking to the side with a smile up his face, "Who is this?" he asked in the same eagerness. 

"My wife," gave the short reply which washed away the smile on the doctor's face, "Check him now. Tell me what you see."

"Now?" asked the doctor raising his brows. Usually, when a subject was brought in they were given a time of at four to five days but right now seemed too soon to tell. Before he could ask for more days of time, Leonard pulled out a pouch which didn't jingle as he threw it towards the doctor for the man to catch it. Vivian noticed that the pouch when caught didn't jingle which meant it wasn't money in there. The doctor opened the pouch to see what was in there and his eyes widened along with a wide smile, "You know your audience well, Duke Leonard. Let me see the man."

Leonard took the wall which was closer to the man who was being strapped on the table. 

Vivian being new to this room stood at the entrance near the bars where she could see the doctor as well as the man who was going to be checked for varying anomalies of what was causing his changes. She saw the doctor open the man's eyes and mouth, checking his cavity before going to check his pulse. As it was an inspection the man's clothes were removed and Vivian found wondered if she should go and stand on the other side to avoid looking what was being done yet her curious mind wanted to see what the doctor was going to do to him and what was going to be concluded. 

They already knew that it was the witch's doing and she came to realize that Leonard never gave out the details of what was found. If he gave out the information of what he knew, maybe it would be easier as well as faster for the doctor to give out the report. 

"Darkened nails which look rotten," said the vampire doctor by picking up the man's hand and inspecting it while running his thumb over the nails before a nail clipped out as if he had put force, "Such fragile creatures humans are. But why does it look like this hmm," the man took the nail towards his desk, placing the nail under a device to look at it. 

"What do you see, Murk?" Leonard asked from where he stood with his back which was leaned against the wall with one of his feet laying flat on the surface of the wall. 

"They look very dirty. I must say a very unhygienic man but then it looks rotten just like a black witch's nail. Ah," the doctor said lifting up his head from the device and looking at the Duke for confirmation as he said, "He is under a witch's transformation," there was a glint of excitement in the man's eyes as if he had won a prize which had come in the form of a test subject. 

Vivian didn't feel it be safe to leave the human they had brought from the village here to be placed under this vampire doctor. The man gave out looks that showed how eccentric he was when it came to his work. She had heard from Leonard on their way back that it was a rumor that the witch could or was trying to turn humans into one of them but now that it was out here, she could notice that the vampire doctor couldn't wait to dissect the man to see what he was made of and how he was turning out to be. 

For the doctor to confirm he must be used to working with Leo's methods, thought Vivian to herself. 

"Yes, he is under transformation," at Leo's reply the doctor looked at the man who had turned darker than what he had last seen. The natural skin of a black witch was flaky, made of dark scales which looked dry. 

The doctor said, "I shall cut him and see," this was what Vivian was worried about. 

"No," replied Leonard to have the doctor snap his head with a frown, "I need you to fix him, not break him, Murk," Murk looked unhappy about it but he nodded his head. 

"Alright," the doctor answered before beginning his work on the man. A lot needles were put into the man's body until the point where Vivian could see only long needles being stuck to the man's chest which had previously been dipped in a dark green liquid. 

As the operation took place, Vivian had taken another side of the wall where the doctor had been kind enough to ask his assistant to bring a stool for the lady. If she weren't Leo's wife, Vivian knew she wouldn't have got such treatment o nicety. 

She watched the man being tested out with different liquids which reminded her of witchcraft. No, it wasn't the witchcraft though, said Vivian to herself. The bottles which he used were very much similar to what she had come to see in the church room of Sister Isabelle. They were little bottles that were lined in a box similar to how a thread with various color was kept when it came to stitching a cloth. 

The bottles were unique because of their shapes, some with colored bottles and some that had different colored liquids in colorless bottles. After her visit to the church, she had tried to find those little bottles but they were nowhere to be found also that each of the bottles was designed in such a way that one could read it's description written outside. 

As the operation proceeded, the man began to convulse again this time his body moving up and down on the table and the assistants had to restrict back the man's movements. 

Leonard pushed himself from the wall and came to stand next to the doctor, "What's happening?"

"Ah. I think one of the bottles triggered his transformation," the doctor answered, with a deep frown he looked down but Leonard who had not taken away his eyes from the human even for a moment asked, 

"What did you give him?" asked Leonard.

"It is a holy grail from the old witches. They are made of white witches bones," Vivian who was there saw the bottle Murk held in his hand which had a white liquid that looked quite similar to milk in texture. 

She heard Leo say, "It didn't trigger him. It's trying to reverse it back," and he was right. As dark as the skin had turned, with the formation of scaly surface, it had started to reduce until where the man had turned back pale in color. This also changed the color of his nails before the nail which the doctor had pulled out from his finger started to bleed. 

Seeing the blood drop on the floor, the assistant quickly came to the side and wrapped his finger with a bandage around it. 

Murk, the doctor didn't look happy as it seemed that he was hoping for the man's condition to turn worse so that he could learn about the witch's transformation. But under Leonard's watchful eye and with the pouch he had been offered, the doctor had to oblige and perform his work 'ethically'.