The Book of Maladies Boxset

by D. K. Holmberg

  “Mags. Bastan thought he should pay you a visit.”

  The woman—Mags—looked up. She had a long face and a hooked nose. Her eyes seemed to catch light that didn’t exist in the darkened room, almost as if they glowed. Dark hair stuck out in spikes, giving her a wild appearance. Despite that, there was something about her that Alec felt, almost a power that radiated from her.

  “Bastan.” She said his name with far more warmth than Alec would have expected out of her. “To what do I owe this visit?”

  “Last time I was here, you mentioned your son.”

  Mags approached, and Alec saw streaks of darkness on Mags’s arms and face. It took a moment for him to realize that it was blood. He tried not to think about what kind of blood it might be. Hopefully, it was only animal blood, but with the violence that he’d seen in the street below, he wouldn’t put it past someone in this section to use human blood.

  “I said that as part of our conversation, Bastan, but I didn’t expect you to bring me someone to paint with.”

  Bastan smiled, glancing over at Alec. “I’m afraid that you won’t be able to paint with this one, Mags.”

  “Is that right? I suppose you would put him under your protection.”

  Bastan studied him for a moment, almost as if trying to decide whether he would answer in the affirmative or not. Finally, he nodded. “This one is under my protection.”

  “Like the other.”

  Bastan nodded. “Like the other.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  “I thought you might want the services of a physicker.”

  Alec blinked and resisted the temptation to correct Bastan. He wasn’t a physicker. He was barely a student, having only been there for a short while. He might have been promoted to a senior student, but that didn’t mean he was anywhere near close to being a junior physicker.

  “Physicker? What do I need that for? You understand—”

  “I understand that your son needs help, Mags. You’ve clearly tried other things, or you wouldn’t still be here painting.”

  “What’s your point, Bastan?”

  “Let him help.”

  “Why would you do this?”

  “I’m a businessman, Mags. You understand that everything I do has a cost.”

  “Unfortunately, I am quite aware of the cost of your services.”

  “I’ve found another artist that I would like to experiment with.”

  Mags glared at him for a moment. “Another artist? You haven’t even allowed me the chance to show you what I can do.”

  “I have no doubt that you will create something breathtaking,” Bastan said. “But I do think I should have held on to a little bit of my parchment, if only to discover what this other artist might be able to do with it.”

  Mags stared at Bastan for a moment, and then she shifted her gaze to Alec. When she did, Alec could practically feel something crawling on his skin. No longer did he question whether there was power in the way she looked at him. He was certain of it.

  He hadn’t known of any magic before learning of what he and Sam could do, the Kaver and Scribe, though there were rumors of other magics in the city.

  “There’s nothing that can be done for him. It doesn’t make sense for you to even try,” Mags said.

  “You haven’t seen what he can offer.”

  “No. Because there is nothing he could offer that would be of any assistance.”

  “Ah, then I was mistaken. It’s probably for the best. I wouldn’t want you to think there is another artist that might be better than you.”

  “There are no better artists than me, not in the form that I use.”

  Bastan only shrugged.

  Mags glared at him. “Fine. Come with me.”

  She dropped the stick, and it clattered to the ground, causing Alec to jump.

  Mags glanced over and shook her head. “This one? This is the one you think might help Nashon?”

  “He’s not used to this section. He is a little less jumpy in other sections, and at other times of day.”

  They walked through the loft and into a small room, a single bed the only furniture. On the bed was a man of about thirty years of age. He was sickly, with arms and legs that had atrophied, and skin that had taken on a tightness, almost a sheen to it. He writhed in place, moaning, and his eyes darted from place to place.

  Alec touched Bastan’s arm, and the tall man leaned down to hear. “I don’t think I can help him,” Alec whispered.

  “You won’t know until you do an assessment, will you?”

  “I have seen illness like this before,” Alec said. “It is—”

  Bastan tapped him on the shoulder. “Physicker, perform your assessment and then tell me what you think.”

  Alec glanced from Mags to Bastan before finally sighing. What choice did he have?

  He began his assessment, starting with the heart, listening carefully. Nashon’s heartbeat was regular and steady, and there were no additional sounds, nothing that made him suspicious that something more significant was taking place. His breathing was regular, and though he fought as Alec attempted to listen, there was nothing there that suggested an underlying deficit.

  He moved on to examine his stomach, checking his abdomen, but not really expecting anything. From there, he moved to his skin, looking at the way it had withdrawn, the tightness to it. As he assessed the man, he didn’t expect he would be able to help. Perhaps with easar paper, but without it? This man was afflicted by something that had taken him too far from the possibility of recovery.

  He looked at his fingers and then his toes, working along to at least perform a thorough evaluation. Whether or not it mattered still remained to be seen. Alec glanced up at Bastan. “I’ll need more light,” he said.

  “Why?” Mags asked.

  “For me to complete my examination, I want to look into his mouth. I also need to be able to better see his skin than I can with the faint light in the room.”

  “There is nothing on his skin, and there’s nothing in his mouth.”

  “You’re probably right. But still, I’m here, and I’d like to take a closer look.”

  Bastan disappeared, leaving Alec alone with Mags and her son. Alec didn’t dare say anything, terrified by this woman in a way that he wasn’t terrified of even Bastan. It wasn’t so much that there was the sense of power around her, it was more the strangeness that he detected. Maybe it was all imagined, but maybe there was something to it. And if there was, he wanted to make certain he didn’t get drawn up into whatever blood painting she intended. He didn’t want to have any reason for her to be angry with him or think to pull him into her next creation.

  “How has Bastan managed to infiltrate the university?”

  Alec shook his head. “He hasn’t infiltrated the university.”

  “No? Then why are you with Bastan at this time of night? Obviously, you owe him something.”

  “I don’t owe him anything,” Alec said.

  “No? Then you are simply serving Bastan because you choose to? That is even more interesting.”

  “I’m not serving him at all,” Alec said.

  “You wouldn’t be with him if you weren’t serving him.” Mags took a step toward Alec, and she inhaled deeply. “There is something about you that I can almost smell. Something within your blood that I can almost feel. I don’t know what it is, but I—”

  Bastan returned, carrying a lantern. He lit it, and the room became much easier to see. In the light, Mags didn’t look quite as intimidating, though she watched him with a strange gleam in her wild eyes.

  Could she detect his Scribe blood? She was a blood artist, so he suspected it was possible, but what would there be for her to detect?

  He shivered to himself. He tried not to let those thoughts get to him. He tried not to allow himself to even think about what this woman might be capable of doing.

  “Hold the lantern up to his face,” Alec said.

  Bastan glanced over at him, and a h
alf-smile crossed his face. He did as Alec asked, and Alec opened the other man’s mouth, looking inside. His tongue was blackened, a strange discoloration. His teeth were blackened on the back side, also, but not the front.

  Alec frowned. He grabbed the lantern and pulled it closer, and then moved Nashon’s nostril, twisting it so that he could get a better view. As he did, he saw streaks of darkness in there, as well.

  “What is it?” Bastan asked.

  “How long has he had this discoloration?” he asked Mags.

  The woman pulled on Nashon’s mouth, prying it open and looking inside. “That? That has been there…”

  “It’s been there since the symptoms began, hasn’t it?” Alec asked.

  Mags nodded.

  “What is it?” Bastan asked. “Wait.” He turned to Mags. “If you want to know what has afflicted him, then I will require five sheets of the paper.”

  “Five? You only had a dozen for me to play with.”

  “Then you will keep more than half. I require five.”

  Mags glanced from Alec to Bastan. She frowned as she stared at Alec, almost as if trying to determine whether he actually knew anything or not. She disappeared from the room, leaving Alec and Bastan standing next to Nashon. Surprisingly, Henrik had left him alone ever since they had come up with Mags.

  “Do you really know what’s wrong with him?” Bastan asked. Alec nodded. He started to answer when Bastan shook his head. “Because if you say that you do, and you do not, and this treatment fails, she will come after both of us.”

  “Why do I have the sense that you’re not concerned about that?”

  “Oh, I would be concerned, but I also know exactly what I would be dealing with. You, on the other hand…”

  Alec stared at Nashon. It was a simple solution, though a complex treatment. “I know what this is,” he said.

  Mags returned, and she held five sheets of easar paper in her hand. Alec could tell what it was from where he stood. He longed to grab the paper, and smiled to himself, knowing that even if his treatment for Nashon was unsuccessful, he could simply use the easar paper to help him—that was, as long as Sam survived.

  “The paper,” Bastan said, holding his hand out.

  Mags gave the sheets to Bastan. He counted them before stuffing them into his pocket.

  The woman turned to Alec, waiting.

  “You said that he started having symptoms after you noticed discoloration of his tongue. It’s from the steam fields.”

  “The what?”

  “There are mushrooms in the steam fields. They grow along the underside of rocks and can cause this type of illness. It doesn’t happen often. Most of the time, people end up with something almost like hallucinations, a vividness to everything they see, but a certain percentage of people will suffer.” Alec thought about the person at the hospital ward, and the physicker who had been treating them.

  Mags stared at him. “Even if I were to admit that he’d been in the steam fields, and ingested these mushrooms you speak of, what treatment would there be for this? He hasn’t been there in years.”

  Years. She had kept him like this for a long time, longer than most at the university would have managed.

  “It’s not simply a withdrawal from the mushrooms. You need to scrape the inside of one of the steam vents. There is a yellowish deposit that grows there. It is foul smelling, but it will counteract the effects of the mushrooms. It needs to be administered five times a day for weeks, usually, but in this case, I would continue to administer it for as long as he will cooperate.”

  Mags stared at him. “And how long will it take before I know whether it’s working?”

  Alec shrugged. “Maybe a week. Maybe a little longer, considering how long he’s been sick. But soon.”

  Mags stroked her son’s hair. “You understand the price if this fails, Bastan?” she asked without looking up.

  “I understand.”

  “I will have your artwork to you soon.”

  “I look forward to it.”

  With that, Bastan guided Alec down the stairs and back out to the street. They hurried along, saying nothing. Alec didn’t relax until they reached the Caster section, where Bastan veered off, motioning for Alec to head to the tavern.

  “Go to Samara. I have something I need to do first,” he said, handing Alec the pages.

  “You risked yourself there, didn’t you?” Alec finally asked.

  “If you are wrong, and if your treatment for her son fails…”

  “I don’t think it will fail, but—”

  “Then it won’t. Go take care of Samara.”

  Bastan disappeared into the night, and Alec hurried back to the tavern, and to Sam, and hoped that they had enough time, and that the easar paper would be enough to help her. He hoped that he and Bastan hadn’t risked too much to get it back.

  32

  A Healing

  Alec took the pages of easar paper and spread them on the open section of the cot. These were blank pages, something he hadn’t had the luxury of using in quite some time. He needed to relax so he could focus. In order to help Sam, he needed to find just the right language. If he didn’t, he wasn’t sure he would be able to heal her.

  He was accustomed to being able to help people, of healing, and not having a way to help Sam pained him. He opened his satchel and withdrew the pages of easar paper that he’d used before, scanning them. None of them had any free space. He had written on both sides, writing in a tight script as he went, doing whatever necessary so they could continue to practice. They had been cautious with their paper, knowing they needed to conserve it, not wanting to run out before they had a chance to find more. And it still hadn’t mattered.

  He thought of all the times they had used the easar paper before. There’d been the time when he had tried to heal Marin, and all of the times they had placed augmentations. Those were much more common. He had small annotations indicating pages in his journal next to each attempt, a way to keep track of what they had tried and the different combinations of their blood as they blended the ink.

  What would it take this time?

  It would have to be just right so that whatever he did was enough to heal Sam. If he made a mistake, not only would she not benefit from it, but it was possible that using easar paper might make things worse. He needed to ensure that the ratio blood used in the ink as well as the language used to describe her injuries were perfect.

  His healings, even before he’d known what he was doing, seemed to work well, with no thought of blood ratios. The different ratios seemed to have the most impact when augmenting Sam for more power, speed, and the like. They’d had so few attempts that had worked well. He had to hope the simple mixture of their blood was what she needed to be healed.

  His gaze drifted across a page to the line he’d written that had turned her into a giant. He smiled to himself. He remembered how frustrated she had been, but his mind had been on his own situation—about not having the opportunity to go to the university and study. What had he been thinking then? Why had he been so fixated on what he wanted and less concerned about what the two of them needed—and could be?

  Had he been with her when this happened, he could have augmented her, and she wouldn’t have had these injuries.

  Then again, he couldn’t have augmented her, not without easar paper.

  “I’m so sorry, Sam,” Alec said softly.

  Sam’s eyes fluttered open. It was the first movement she had made since her tremor. “Don’t be foolish, Alec. The only person to blame for this is me. If I decided to track those men, I wouldn’t have been on the roof and wouldn’t have fallen.”

  “What did you see when you went after them?”

  “They moved quickly, and when I saw that they carried canal staffs, I thought I could figure out more about what we can do. I was just trying to find easar paper, trying to find a way that we can continue to practice. This is my fault.”

  Sam coughed, and a slight tremor worked throu
gh her. She didn’t lose consciousness this time, not as she had the first time.

  “I’m sorry. I should have listened to you. I didn’t mean to chase you off when you wanted to use the blood ink and the easar paper to help others. I’ve been selfish. I know that all you’ve ever wanted was to be a healer. I don’t want to take that from you. I don’t want to change the person that you are.”

  Alec squeezed her hand. “Maybe you have helped me find the person I’m supposed to be.”

  Sam leaned back and let out a heavy sigh. “Great.”

  “What?”

  “A few weeks at the university, and already you have become a philosopher. Maybe you should return.” She smiled and coughed again.

  Alec brushed her hair out of her face and continued stroking her cheek. It was the only part of her that she could likely feel, especially if her back was injured as badly as it seemed. With no ability to use her hands, it would have to be. Alec had studied enough of his father’s anatomy books, books he now knew must’ve come from the university, to know that the injury must be significant.

  “Where’s Bastan?”

  Alec shook his head. “I think he went to see what happened with Tray. He cares about you.”

  “Of course Tray cares about me. He’s my brother.”

  “That’s not who I meant.”

  “I’m not going to think about Bastan. Not right now.”

  Alec squeezed Sam’s hand. “What if this doesn’t work?”

  “If it doesn’t work, then maybe it would be better if you simply fed me to the eels.”

  “Sam—”

  “I can’t stay like this, Alec. If you can’t heal me—if the easar paper doesn’t work—I can’t stay like this.”

  Alec swallowed. His throat felt dry. “I don’t think I can live without you.”

  “You go back to the university, and you’ll be fine.”

  “Don’t talk like that. I’ll—”