Healers by Laurence Dahners Read Free Book Online Page B

hard-boiled eggs the caravaners could take with them to the market for lunch. They’d cooked a lot of bacon, and they chopped the leftovers into the spicy beans that had simmered overnight.
    Shortly before noon, their stall started selling beans with bacon and a warm slab of bread. Butter could be had on the side. Kazy tasted a sample of the beans and they were wonderful. She thought sales would be good.
    Word spread around the market and soon people crowded to the Hyllises’ stall for lunch. Caravaners formed a line early, eager to get some of the spicy black beans that had sold out so quickly the night before. The presence of the line told customers from Denton’s Crossing that the food at the booth was special. Once again they sold out of food long before they ran out of customers.
    When business slowed down, Eva and Daum went into town to look for equipment that would let them cook larger quantities so they could keep up with demand.
    Though the large number of customers resulted in a number of queries about healing, no one actually requested a diagnosis or a treatment. Daussie was the one horrified now. She turned to Tarc, “Are we just going to be cooks and distillers?!”
    Tarc frowned at her, “Sales are good! It looks like we’re going to be able to support ourselves! How can you find a bleak side to such good news?”
    Daussie’s expression drooped, “I want to be a healer… not a cook .”
    Kazy said, “Most people think of cooking as a more respectable profession than healing. I’d count the passing of your healing business as no big loss.”
    Quietly Daussie said, “That’s because most healers can’t actually heal anyone.”
    ***
    In the morning, they fried large quantities of bacon, frying chopped potatoes in the grease from it. Customers could have potatoes, potatoes and bacon, or potatoes and bacon with eggs scrambled into it. Slabs of warm buttered bread were available too and some of their customers just ate the bread. Again large quantities of leftover bacon went into beans which had simmered overnight. This time they had two large pots of beans and many more loaves of bread to sell for lunch at the market.
    Tarc had purchased a bag of small apples in the town, so Eva made caramel to dip them in. The caramel apples sold well all day and once again, the beans and bread were a huge hit for lunch.
    But, no one came for healing.

Chapter Three
    In the morning the Hyllises rose early to cook breakfast because Norton had decided the caravan would move on. They’d picked up a small number of fellow travelers who wished to accompany the caravan for protection against brigands. To hear Norton speak of it, they usually had a few fellow travelers because traveling the road in small groups could be fairly dangerous.
    The Hyllises’ collapsible stove had been set off to one side to cool and the girls were serving food off the little trailer while Tarc helped his parents pack up for the road. An older man appeared beside the trailer. He wasn’t in the food line, but Kazy turned to him and lifted an eyebrow anyhow.
    He said, “I hear tell the cook wagon in this caravan claims to have an honest healer woman with them. Is it you guys she’s with?”
    Kazy only nodded.
    “Where is she?”
    Kazy pointed over at Eva, industriously packing up their kitchen supplies. The man shuffled slowly that way. It seemed to Kazy the man walked as if it hurt to go faster. She wondered why he wasn’t using a crutch.
     
    When the man arrived at Eva’s side, he stopped and leaned against their wagon, looking as tired as if he’d walked a long way.
    “Yes?” Eva asked.
    “Lindy Jones thinks you’re an honest healer. Says you claim you can make leg pain better.”
    Eva nodded, “Some kinds of leg pain. It depends on what the cause is.”
    “Well, all I know is I can’t walk very far before my legs start killing me. It’s getting worse and worse.”
    Eva looked at him speculatively, “That might be something we