The Apothecary Diaries Book 8

Harassment

It was a cool autumn morning, and Maomao was just about to head to the medical office for work when she was stopped by a delivery. She would have been perfectly happy with a gift, but that's not what this was. At least, it wasn't the kind of gift she wanted.

"Is somebody harassing you? You know you can tell me, right?" Yao said, giving her a rare look of pity. The look was coming from a safe distance, though—Yao had backed up, frowning intensely.

"Not as such, no..." Maomao said, but she couldn't blame Yao for wondering, for inside the basket she'd received was something brown—a mass of dead bugs.

Grasshoppers, specifically.

Normally, it would have been a challenge to collect so many of them, but here they were—meaning they'd come from somewhere where the collecting wasn't so challenging.

"I left that there because it came from the higher-ups, but I'd be very happy if you would get it the hell out of here," Dr. Liu said, thoroughly unimpressed. He was older, the highest-ranking man in the medical office, which meant there were very few people to whom he felt the need to be deferential.

And take it where? Maomao thought. She didn't want a basket full of dead bugs in her room. She had a good idea who had sent it, but that only left her more puzzled about what to do.

Dr. Liu seemed to sense that she was between a rock and a hard place. He beckoned her over. "Use the empty room in the next building over," he said. "It wouldn't normally be mine to give you, but...hrm...just round up a few people with time to kill and do what you have to do. Quickly." He seemed to consider the matter to take priority over doing chores at the medical office. Very well then...

"Say, uh, what was all that about?" Yao asked, tugging on Maomao's sleeve. Her lovely features were marred by a look of distress.

Maomao grinned and decided to enlist the cowering Yao to help her with the bugs.

Yao put another insect on the scale, her pallor deathly. En'en observed her with a flush in her cheeks. For her part, Maomao was silent as she measured the grasshoppers' legs and wings.

"Um, h-how many more...bugs...do you need?" Yao asked, picking up a grasshopper with chopsticks and no small degree of loathing. She did not love bugs. They'd put ten of them on the scale, one by one; they would take the average of their weight.

"I don't suppose we need to weigh all of them," Maomao said. "But certainly the more the better." As she took her measurements, she put any specimens with unusual coloration into a separate pile.

"If you find you can't stand it, milady, I'll take over for you," En'en offered.

Yao, though, said, "N-No, I can do it. It's p-p-part of the job..." The question could only make her more determined not to be second best—as En'en had known perfectly well. That was why she'd said it.

"Young mistress..." En'en said; the flush was growing deeper, her heart beating harder, and goosebumps standing on her skin as she watched Yao work with the bugs.

Twisted, twisted, twisted, Maomao thought, giving them both something of a scowl. But she didn't stop working.

They'd gotten through about a third of the pile when a visitor arrived—a small man with round spectacles, tousled hair, and, today, a grin. "Well, hullo." It was, needless to say, Lahan. Maomao didn't stop working, but now she looked angry. Lahan appeared unconcerned as he scanned her numbers. "Hmm. Maomao, think you could be so kind as to explain this figure here to your older brother?" She pointedly ignored him—so he whispered in her ear, "I brought your reward from last time. The one I mentioned? I guess maybe you forgot about it."