Under the Weather

Gwynevere's face was carefully neutral and calm as she worked, falling into her usual state of focus and professionalism, but even that was broken when Zee informed her that there had been seven pups in total in her litter. She had seen some of the pups around the castle, but with her typical reclusive ways she hadn't seen them all. She knew her own litter had been large, of course, and Briar's had been as well, but five was still the most she had seen at one time. Seven pups—and fairly large ones at that from what she could tell from the children she had seen so far—would have definitely taken some kind of toil on her body, especially with her smaller frame. Gwyn blinked with surprise at that news, her brows lifting a bit. At least the surprise that crossed her face helped hide the concern she felt as she felt across Zee's abdomen, noticing the spike in her pain as she gently pressed on certain areas, and what she felt there. She wished she had some magic that would let her simply see into her patients so she could really tell what was going on, but alas she lacked such powers and could only make her most educated of guesses. The information she was given about her children and their disabilities that manifested in the form of crystal encasing parts of their bodies made her head tilt slightly with thought, theories and worries worsening as she went.

With her exam finished she glanced over and her marbled gaze caught Zee's, some of her more genuine concern peeking through her bedside manner. Even though she didn't know Zee all that well, this was still her brother's mother in law. This was still Briar's mother. She knew that her own mother had been close with her at least at one point in their lives. Even if Zee wasn't an important figure in her own life, she was still a very important figure in the lives of wolves she cared about and this made it even more difficult than it would have been otherwise. "Zee..." she began, trailing off a bit as she glanced down at her paws, trying to decide how much she should say or how she wanted to address what she thought was going on. "There is certainly an infection of some kind, of that I have no doubt," she told her after a moment, managing to bring her gaze to Zee's again. "There's... There's a strong possibility that the litter being so large did more damage than perhaps even presented itself right after their brith and it's likely just worsened more and more in the weeks since. With the crystal formations you mentioned... I... I do worry that maybe there was something wrong from the start, but it's really hard to say." That much was just speculation so she didn't want to dwell on that too much.

"There's treatments we can do and of course I'll give you medications for the pain," she added, her ears flicking uncertainly. "I just... I can't make false promises or swear you'll be fine. The last time I did that..." Her voice trailed off again as she thought of Resin fading away, trying and failing to come up with anything to even try to help her mother that their lead healer at the time hadn't already tried. She had been too young to fully comprehend what was happening then or how to process the fact that sometimes healers didn't always succeed. She had a better grasp on that now, but that didn't make it any easier. "I can't lie to you, Zee. It feels really bad. With as severe as your symptoms are and the fact that this isn't the first time it's happened... We will try everything we can to make this right, but I want you to know that it might not work."

"Gwynevere Carpathius"