Before “Master Dorian is sick,” the house elf reported, looking up at Jean-Loup suspiciously. “I must take his visitors to mistress instead.”
“Yes, of course,” Jean-Loup agreed politely. He had known Dorian was sick, after all, and that he might not be up to receiving company. Still, it was with a degree of trepidation that he followed the elf into Mrs. Montoir’s study instead.
The room looked like it might have directly been lifted from China. The light filtered in through a round window, overlaid with an ornate wooden frame, broken up into interlocking squares. The cool neutral colours of the walls were enlivened with scrolls on which the light, fluttering touches of a brush had evoked mountains and plants in the fewest strokes possible. Even the smells emanating from some of the herbs she was slicing were unfamiliar, though there was a strong hint of mint.
“Pardon me for interrupting,” Jean-Loup stated, offering a polite bow after the elf had announced him. “I heard from Émilie that Dorian was unwell. I thought I would come see whether he was up to having company. It can be so dull being ill,” he stated, hoping his intention seemed honest. In all fairness, it was. He wasn’t exactly expecting Dorian to feel like getting frisky right now, and really had come to see if he wanted company. It was just the background guilt of trying to look Mrs. Montoir in the eyes, knowing that she doubtless wouldn’t approve of what he was doing with her son.
“I’m sure he’d benefit from that,” she smiled. “I was just making something for his fever. If you don’t mind waiting a moment, you can take it up to him. Can I ask the elf to fetch you anything?”
“A coffee would be lovely, thank you,” he accepted politely. His eyes roamed curiously over the bench of unfamiliar ingredients, “May I ask what it is you’re using?” he ventured tentatively.
“Traditional Chinese remedies,” was her only answer, as she bent her head over the pestle and mortar, and Jean-Loup watched, still curious, but unsure whether his enquiries were really welcome.
“Are they a closely guarded family secret?” he tried again, with a soft smile. This caught her attention, and he noted the surprise with which she surveyed him as she looked up.
“No, they’re common knowledge in most of China,” she answered, watching him for a moment, “You’re genuinely interested?” she asked, and he realised he had been brushed off not because she was busy or because she didn’t wish to share the information but because she had assumed he was merely making polite small talk.
“I wish to study medicine,” he reminded her. And know how to take care of Dorian, he added privately, imagining that his future work was being demonstrated in more than one sense right now.
“I would assume you’d be studying Western ways of doing things,” she answered.
“Probably. Predominantly. But I think it’s interesting to know the alternatives. After all, if you’re trying to improve something but not making any progress, why not see if any of the other paths available go further?”
“Very open-minded of you,” she noted, and he thought there was something new in her voice as she said it. Approval, perhaps? At the very least, a certain softness. He had said something that pleased her. “I’ve never understood the use of Pepper-Up Potion,” she continued, “In Chinese medicine, there are different types of colds - the kind caused by heat and the kind caused by coldness. You must balance the body back out with the opposing force. Just throwing something hot at someone, regardless of whether they have hot or cold symptoms doesn’t make sense to me. And all that steam from the ears looks uncomfortable.”
“I never liked it much,” Jean-Loup admitted. “So, what’s wrong with Dorian?”
“He has a hot cold - fever, possibly a chest-infection. So, he needs cooling things. Some solutions are just eating naturally occuring cooler foods - citruses, spinach. Avoiding spice. But we also take some of those and make remedies. This one has peppermint, forsythia and chrysanthemum as its main active ingredients.” Her ingredient preparation finished, she placed them into a small mesh nest, settling it into the neck of a teapot, and muttered an unfamiliar incantation, pouring steaming water over the ingredients, before turning over a small sand timer. “Two minutes,” she smiled.
“The remedy is tea,” Jean-Loup stated, finding that he wasn’t particularly surprised by this. “That is why you make it fresh every time?” he added. He had learnt enough to know that reheating tea, or even merely suggesting it, was enough to make Dorian look as appalled as if he had just confessed to murder.
“In this case, yes. I always find it is advisable to make potions fresh anyway. A few lose their power if they’re left too long, but there’s quite a few in Chinese medicine that get more potent. The potions they use to numb pains or put people to sleep were actually discovered from cold remedies which had matured and altered - there’s a particular type of pepper from Szechuan which causes numbness. Like most spices, it gets stronger the longer you leave it in something.”
“That’s fascinating,” Jean-Loup acknowledged.
“You’re a good audience,” she smiled appreciatively. “I always imagine explaining all this to Dorian’s future wife,” she said with a slight sigh, and Jean-Loup froze for a moment, wondering what to read into that remark - whether she was implying that she knew. He didn’t dare speak. “I hope he finds someone who takes an interest in that part of him. Still, in the meantime, at least he has a nice friend,” she added, turning back to him with a smile so cheerful and unoccupied that he knew her comments pertained to two utterly different people. There was the future person that she saw Dorian marrying. And there was him - a good friend. “You’ve been a good influence on him,” she smiled.
“Good influence?” he checked, his tone questioning the second word slightly. He could take that he was good friend, but that implied something else.
“On his mood,” she smiled, as the timer jumped up and down to call her attention to it. She fished the wire strainer out of the teapot. “He used to miss his friends so much when he was back for the holidays,” she summarised, deciding to leave out the part where that had hurt her, feeling like he didn’t want to be home any more, or the part where she’d started to really worry - that he seemed to be sad and anxious, retreating in on himself so much that she was sure it was something more than that. “He’s just a lot happier with you around.”
And Jean-Loup was very pleased that she needed a moment to mutter one final incantation over the pot, and to arrange the cups and the teapot on the tray along with his coffee, because he needed a moment to swallow the lump in his throat and steady his hands before he reached out to accept it, and to make his way up the stairs to see Dorian. He did not imagine them telling Madame Montoir any time soon about their relationship. He wasn’t sure if or when that was on the cards, only that Dorian did seem to believe in some happy future where this got to be real. It felt like a start to think that Dorian’s mother liked him, and could see that he had a positive effect on her son… He was not optimistic that she would continue to think that if she ever found out about them. But he could hope.