Free The Guided Journey (Book 6) by Jeffrey Quyle Page A

two stout tables from the inn spaced apart on the grass and dirt square.
    The males went back inside to finish their cooled meal, while the two nurses scrupulously set out their supplies and established their individual versions of orderliness. 
    Minutes later Kestrel and the two boys stepped out of the inn, their food consumed, and found two short lines of village residents forming by each nurse, as the residents curiously offered themselves up for treatment of their various ills and ailments.  Kestrel and the boys drifted back and forth between the two tables, listening and watching as the women proved to be surprisingly gentle and calm as they spoke to their patients, and offered a variety of treatments.
    There was a slight murmur in the crowd, and Kestrel turned to see that Amjay was walking slowly towards the tables, one hand on the shoulder of each of her sons.
    “She never brings them out,” Kestrel heard more than one observer murmur, and he hurried over to intercept her.
    “It’s good to see you,” Kestrel told her as he placed a hand on the shoulder of one of the boys, and slowed down to the same shuffling pace the family used.   “I hope the nurses don’t find any problems to make you think I’m a liar,” he said as they reached one of the tables.  “After spending so much time soaking in the spring water last night, there shouldn’t be any little aches or pains.”
    “I wanted the nurses to examine them,” she motioned to her sons, after she seated them at a table.  “I swear it feels this morning like there’s a bit of a bump coming out of their shoulders,” she cupped her hands where their arms should have protruded.
    “There is something there,” Jacquie agreed as she examined them as well.
    “See mom, I told you it felt different,” one of her boys exclaimed.
    “Bring the imps back! I want to tell them,” the other boy said.
    “They’ve been begging for the imps all morning,” Amjay said apologetically.
    “Dewberry,” Kestrel called.  “I’ll invite the queen of the imps for you,” he told the boys.  “Dewberry, Dewberry.”
    After a two second pause, his friend appeared, and the small crowd in the village square squealed in unison.
    “What makes you call me now, Kestrel-traitor, when you did not invite me to the party at the spring last night?  That was our place, I thought, where you first saw and fell madly in love with me!
    “What is that?” she interrupted herself and darted over to the table of the other nurse, Parisse, where she grabbed a mushroom cap that the nurse had been placing atop a small skin rash.
    “This is what you called me for?  You are the greatest of friends!  I will let you kiss me once again, my great Kestrel-gourmet friend!” the sprite was flying around in agitated circles, her eyes focused only on the mushroom cap, a creamy gray piece of soft fungus flesh, that she held up in her hands like a trophy.
    “This is the great one – the gray plate!  You’ve found the greatest delicacy in the imp culinary arts!  Wait until Jonson finds out that you’ve located one,” she rejoiced.
    “Can I have that back to finish my treatment?” Parisse asked in a disapproving tone.
    “Treatment?  You have healing water from the spring?” Dewberry indicated the water skins that were strewn about the scene, “You need nothing else for healing.  And this is too valuable for anything except the king’s own feast anyway!”
    “That old thing?” Jacquie asked scornfully.  “I could pick two dozen of those a day from the patch near our house.  We use them all the time for skin ailments.”
    “Dozens?” Dewberry hung motionless in the air, and seemed to visibly quiver.
    “Kestrel-friend dearest,” she flew over and hovered directly in front of him, one small hand stroking his cheek.  “What must we do to import these items of great value from your domain?  Shall we declare war and invade, or shall  we sign a trade treaty between the imps