by L M R Clarke
Raising a hand, the medicine-rel smiled. “If he was ill or injured, he’s in this camp,” she said. “All shipbait comes here.”
“Shipbait?” Emmy asked.
“Those brought here from other lands,” the medicine-rel said. “The Althemerians take many folks from the seas. Their ships prowl the waters, attacking their enemies. Anyone they save, they bring back to their lands. Hutukeshu is the largest of the encampments, where those who owe life-debts are taken.” She folded her arms. Her short sleeve pulled upward, revealing the edge of something strange on her upper arm. “You’ll be treated well enough here,” the medicine-rel continued. “The Althemerians are not cruel, but they enforce their laws strictly. You won’t be beaten, but you will also not be allowed to leave.”
Emmy’s mouth was, once more, dry. The air felt close, and the stench of illness hung over her like a dark cloud. She couldn’t move, feeling more like a statue than a living thing.
“Emmy,” the medicine-rel said.
She placed a hand on Emmy’s shoulder again. There was another flash of cold. Emmy snapped from her trance. The Belfoni healer smiled, though it was a smile of sympathy. “I know how you’re feeling,” she said. “I know what it’s like to be taken by the Althemerians.”
She pulled up the short sleeve of her tunic, revealing a wiry forearm. Part of her green armor was scarred with two entwined serpents and a number beneath. Emmy winced, and her breathing grew shallow.
It was a brand.
“They mark your flesh,” she said, pointing at the scar. “The serpents, to show who owns you. The date below shows when you were taken. That’s how they know how long you’ve served them and when they can let you go.” The healer let her sleeve fall and looked at Emmy in half-apology. “I’m afraid I’ll have to take you to be branded as well.”
Emmy blanched, her hand leaping to her arm. The imaginary brand burned under her fingertips. Armored skin was tough, but intense heat could penetrate it easily.
“I’m sorry,” the medicine-rel said. “I don’t agree with the practice, but the Althemerians say it must be so.”
Emmy let her hand drop again and both her arms hung uselessly at her sides. She didn’t know what do to or what to say. Her mind reeled, and her thoughts kept returning to her friends. Zecha was somewhere, his condition unknown. Would he live or would he die? Would Charo’s words of warning be as true for life with the Althemerians as with the Masvams?
Maybe...Maybe Zecha’s better off dead.
Emmy swallowed and shook her head, the movement slight. It wasn’t just Zecha she was parted from. It was Charo, too. Her fate was entirely unknown. Was she taken as a maid for some wealthy Althemerian? Or was she taken into the army? Emmy suppressed a shudder. She wished for the former, for then Charo would be safe, or at least safer. How the Althemerians treated their servants, Emmy didn’t know. But if Charo was taken as a soldier, there was a chance they might see each other again in the camp. The sharp tang of that selfish thought burned her. If Charo was taken as a soldier, there was more than a chance she would be killed.
The medicine-rel’s voice pulled Emmy from her thoughts.
“Come,” she said. “You need to wash, and then we must get to work. Medicine-yarim!”
At her call, one of two other black-tunics scurried towards them. The Linvarran female clasped her hands behind her back and nodded attentively. However, when she took in Emmy’s appearance for the first time, her face crumpled with disgust. The female healer didn’t need to say anything, for Emmy knew her thoughts. She’d seen that look on so many faces, so many times.
Moon Rogue!
The medicine-rel clicked her talons to get her subordinate’s attention again. “Fetch warm water, a cloth, and a clean uniform,” she said. “Finally, we have another tsimi.”
The medicine-yarim nodded, but her attention flew from the medicine-rel and back to Emmy. She scowled, her dark eyes narrow. “Yes, Medicine-Rel.”
She disappeared for a moment, returning with clothing slung over her arm and an ewer of water with a rag draped on its rim. Emmy accepted the items with a grateful nod, but the healer didn’t nod back. She stepped away, still scowling.
“Back to work, Medicine-Yarim,” the medicine-rel said.
Emmy blinked at that. Medicine-Yarim, Medicine-Rel... Realization dawned.
“Your name is Rel,” she said. “The scribe, he didn’t call you medicine-rel. He said Medicine-Rel.”
Rel tilted her head to the side.
“Was that not clear?” she asked. “Your language is like the Althemerian tongue. I thought it was the same, in fact.” She chuckled. “‘Medicine’ is what all healers are called—tsimi, in my language. You will be Medicine-Emmy.”
“Oh,” Emmy said, feeling foolish.
Rel placed a hand on the small of Emmy’s back and urged her towards a set of screens, canvas stretched over wooden frames.
“You’ll fall into the way of things, Medicine-Emmy,” she said. “Now, wash and change, and then you can get to work.”
Safely tucked behind the screens, away from prying eyes, Emmy did as she was told.
Her tattered garments fell on the ground in a pool. Emmy was glad to shed them for more than just their filth. The mella was a reminder of the happiness of Middlemerish, when she had friends at her side and was free from Krodge’s heavy yoke for one blissful day. Emmy stopped. Her hands trembled. A twinge of guilt pulled at her as the Masvam sailor’s words returned.
Finished her off, I did.
Trying not to think about that, or Zecha or Charo or Uloni, Emmy scrubbed herself with the cloth and lukewarm water. Why should she feel sorrow for someone who made her life a misery? Krodge wasn’t worth grieving for. Neither was Bose. She was free from them for good.
Emmy stilled her hands. It would be a cycle before she was truly free. Unless she died, of course. She snorted. Some freedom.
As clean as she could get, Emmy pulled on the uniform. The black tunic was too large, and was made of soft leather that didn’t pinch and constrict. The red heart-in-eye settled on her chest. She traced the outline with her talons. She was Medicine-Emmy now, an Althemerian healer. How swiftly life changes, she thought.
Wringing out the cloth, she gathered her belongings and slipped out from behind the screen. Rel was attending a patient again, as were Yarim and the other healer Emmy had not yet met. Emmy went to Rel’s side.
Watching the Belfoni healer work was like watching herself. Her hands moved the way Emmy’s would. The pouches at her belt were full of the same ingredients Emmy used—bindlewart, juice of the arra fruit, a cornucopia of herbs. Rel moved with compassion, pressing a comforting hand to the forehead of the ill or gently grasping their hands. Her rank may have been higher than that of the other healers, but she did the same work in the same way. Everything was painted with warmth and kindness.
Rel rose from her patient and beckoned for Emmy to follow. They crossed the room, winding through rows of the sick.
“You look the part now,” Rel said, “but can you act it, too? How much does this apothecary know about healing?”
“I know enough,” Emmy said, tugging on the hem of her tunic. “I’ve dealt with the Lurking Death before.”
“Oh?” Rel asked. “What is the best treatment?”
Emmy licked her lips and shook her head. It was a silly question. “There is no treatment,” she said. “All we can do is make the ill comfortable and try to ease their symptoms. But there’s nothing I know of that will extract the poison.”
“It’s no poison,” Rel said, “but you’re right. That’s what makes it so deadly. The sickness jumps from body to body, and we cannot stop it.”
She reached for her belt, laden with bags of ingredients, and unbuckled it. She held it out to Emmy, who accepted it with reluctant claws.
“Use your knowledge, and we’ll see what we can do,” Rel said. “It may be that the Metakalans know more than the Althemerians when it comes to illness.”
; “Yes, Medicine-Rel,” Emmy said, buckling the belt around her waist.
“If you need anything else, ask myself or Yarim—whom you met—or Asri, the male healer.” For a moment, Rel’s eyes grew dark. “Work well, Medicine-Emmy,” she said. “The Althemerians aren’t in the habit of feeding useless shipbait. If you do not perform your function, you will not retain it.”
Emmy’s whole body tightened. Her tongue grew bold. “What will happen then?” she asked.
“You’ll have a life of hard labor building the queen’s roads or toiling in the fields,” Rel said. Her face darkened. “That is, if you’re lucky. If you’re unlucky you’ll be sent to the military, whether you can fight or not.” Rel placed a hand on Emmy’s shoulder once more. Again, there was a flash of cold. “Work well, Medicine-Emmy,” she said. “We need good tsimi.”
With that she turned, wound her way back through the rows of beds, and disappeared into a side room, behind a canvas curtain.
Emmy stared down at her new belt. She plucked at the bags that hung there. When she did, her breathing settled and her chest didn’t feel as tight. But a looming sadness fell upon her, dark as if the sun and the moons had withdrawn their light. This wasn’t the life she’d wished for, in secret, on the day of Middlemerish. Her wish hadn’t even been a huge one. She hadn’t wished for wealth, or power, or glory. All she’d wished for was a free life with her friends at her side.
Now she had neither of those things.
She snorted and crossed to the first pallid face she saw, a Selaman lying prone on her bed.
Wishing was for fools. She knelt by her first patient’s side and pressed her hand to the Selaman’s forehead. Too hot, typical of the Lurking Death. Emmy opened the bags at her waist, running through the list of Krodge’s palliative potions in her head, checking off what ingredients she had and what she needed.
The Selaman half-opened her eyes, then turned in her bed. Her head jerked over the side, and she vomited onto the rushes on the floor.
Wishing is for fools, Emmy thought as she brought her hand to the Selaman female’s back, rubbing circles as she voided her stomach. And if these last few days have taught me anything, it’s that the gods aren’t real.
The Selaman slumped, exhausted, and Emmy gently laid her back onto the bed. She glanced around, saw a cloth and water by the bed, and began to clean her patient’s face.
“There now,” Emmy said. “Rest.”
She wiped the last of the vomit from the female’s mouth and sat back on her heels. No. The gods definitely weren’t real.
For the rest of the day, Emmy worked her way through the jumble of patients. For hours, she cleaned vomit and wiped sweaty brows. She made what she could, concoctions to bring down fever and soothe upset stomachs. She held bodies as they convulsed, racked by the Death. Her black tunic was so splattered with detritus she dared not look at it. Don’t think about it, she thought. Just do your job.
Several times, Emmy caught Rel looking at her. She was favored with a smile and a nod, but Emmy didn’t smile back. There wasn’t much to smile about.
That was, until she moved on from one patient to another. It took a moment for her to realize what she saw. The Metakalan colors she recognized straight away, but there was something more.
Something familiar.
Her heart stuttered. “Zecha!”
There he was, hiding amongst the ill and injured all this time. Emmy grasped one of his hands, pressed the talons of her other hand to his forehead, and laced them around his horn crest. “Zecha, you’re alive!”
He didn’t respond, lying silent and clammy on the bed. A lump formed in Emmy’s throat. She pulled his blankets down and hitched his shift up, revealing the raw wound in his stomach. It was stitched—not as well as Emmy would have done it—and, while swollen, didn’t appear putrid, as she’d imagined it would.
A thought invaded her mind and she jerked backwards, releasing him.
Lay your hands on him. You’ve done it before. Stop the bleeding. Save him.
The strange voice. She hadn’t thought of those words since the boat.
She shook herself. It meant nothing. She hadn’t helped save Zecha’s life. It was whoever the healer was who’d cleaned and stitched his wound. Not Emmy, not with some kind of coldness from her fingertips.
“Have you found your friend?”
Emmy startled at Rel’s voice. She looked up. Rel was smiling softly. She knelt and inspected the patient’s wound.
“Yes,” Emmy said. “This is Zecha.”
“Zecha here has received a terrible wound,” Rel said. She ghosted her talons over his stitches, but didn’t touch them. “I’m very surprised to see he’s alive.” She glanced sidelong at Emmy. “Were you with him when it happened?”
Emmy nodded, the events on the ship playing back in her head. “I was,” she said. “It was a Masvam. He stabbed Zecha in the stomach as a punishment, because Zecha managed to get free.”
“Did you help him?” Rel asked.
Frowning, Emmy leaned back. What kind of question was that to ask? “I tried to,” she said, her tone tinged with defense. “I was locked up. I tried to get free. Eventually I got free and went to him, but there was nothing I could do.”
Except lay her hands on him and feel the cold power. But that wasn’t real, just a figment.
Rel tugged Zecha’s shift down and pulled the blankets back up to cover him.
“Keep a close watch on him,” she said. “Wounds to the stomach are often deadly, though it seems young Zecha here has been unusually lucky. Most with a wound like that would already be dead.”
Emmy nodded. Rel stood and rested her hand on Emmy’s shoulder as she did so. Once more, there was a coldness to her touch.
Cold power from Emmy’s hands. A coldness to Rel’s touch...
Emmy shook her head hard. It was nothing. There was nothing happening. Instead of dwelling on it, she placed her hand on Zecha’s chest and whispered, “Come back to me, Zecha. I need you.”
Her friend didn’t reply.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Mantos
The palace flooded with bad news. Flocks of leathery gargons swooped from all directions. Mantos sat on the window seat, stuck in his chamber in a dusty tower, watching the creatures arrive and depart. I wonder what the letters say, he thought. Information about my brother and his schemes, no doubt.
Mantos pressed his back to one of the cold stones wall of the deep window and set his feet on the other. He toyed with his lightning-strike pendant as he watched from his perch. He and his mother had been spirited to their respective towers, hidden from prying eyes. As the day waned, Mantos counted the stones in the courtyard below, listened to the idle splash of the grand fountain in its middle, and wondered why he was alive.
What use am I to Queen Valentia? he thought. I know nothing of my brother’s plans. The thought plagued him as he stared at the folk crossing the courtyard. The Althemerians had no intention of bowing under the might of the Masvams. That was no secret, for they never had. Once, when Mantos was an ungendered youngling, the two nations had held an uneasy peace. Now they were enemies, the battle lines drawn in Queen Valentia’s ink. She would never marry a Masvam, nor marry her offspring to Masvams. Braslen, furious, had spent the last cycle and a half of his life working towards Valentia’s punishment: crushing the Althemerians under his boot heel.
Mantos turned from the window and closed his eyes, his brow furrowing. He knew of Braslen’s plans. He knew the strengths of the army, how many soldiers and ships they had. He knew how Braslen’s conquest was to unfold, for he’d been implicit in its planning. Mantos, the heir, at the heart of the fighting, pushing their borders forward. He had pressed through Selama and killed their queen. Next were Metakala and King Eron.
But, Mantos thought as his head lolled to the side, those were Braslen’s plans. He opened his eyes again and focused on the window. He tracked the ripples in the glass. Bandim was not Braslen, and there was no guarantee he�
��d do the same thing. What information Mantos had might not be of help to Queen Valentia, and she must have known that. Mantos thought back to all the things Braslen had said about Valentia. She was strong, intelligent, as good a ruler as a female could be. She was canny and brave, and commanded the respect of her folk.
Valentia was no fool, Mantos knew. So why bother to bring him back to life if he had no real use to her? Unless...
A thought struck him, hard as a hammer blow. Mantos let his legs drop, turned, and sat on the edge of the window seat.
The true emperor of the Masvams was in her debt. What better conquest was there than controlling the Masvam Empire?
None. That’s why I’m alive.
The door opened. A set of light feet entered, but Mantos didn’t look up. Instead, he stared at the rushes scattered on the floor. The feet approached, and a voice broke the silence.
“It will only be a matter of time before the queen calls you.”
It was his mother.
Mantos still didn’t look up. He began counting the rushes.
“Mantos,” his mother said. “Please.”
With a sigh, he finally looked up. “I know,” he said.
Phen’s footfalls were soft as she approached. Mantos took in the image of his mother, dressed in clothing more befitting of his father. Nothing was stranger than seeing her alive and well, though her face was pained.
“What will you tell her?” Phen asked.
Mantos shrugged one shoulder, a slow up-and-down movement. “It depends on what she asks me,” he said petulantly.
Annoyance flitted across Phen’s face. Mantos held up a placating hand.
“I shouldn’t be so flippant, I know,” he said. “The reality is that I’m in her debt. I know it’s only my rank that keeps Queen Valentia from clapping irons around my wrists.”
“We are in her debt,” Phen corrected. “She saved my life as well.”
Mantos gave a small nod and slid off the window seat. Phen touched his arm and tried to smile. “The Althemerians are our only allies now,” she said. “We have no one else.”