by S. L. Viehl
He sat straight up and gave me an outraged look. “You will request no such thing.”
I had no desire to challenge his authority. At the same time, I could not work for the man if he could not accept who I was. It was difficult to know what to say. “Senior Healer, I know there are nuances to customs and practices among you ensleg, but obviously I do not know them. I am not a telepath, as my husband is. If I am in need of remedial instruction or special guidance, I ask that you provide it so that I may better serve.” There, that sounded almost humble.
“You were never like this,” he muttered. “Never. You were brilliant and headstrong and so quick to act I thought you might someday drive me insane.” At my blank look, he added, “Forgive me. I speak of your former self. In all the years that I knew her, I followed her lead. She taught me. Now …”
“You might repay her by providing some guidance for me,” I suggested.
He seemed surprised, and then nodded slowly. “In the future, if Dapvea or any patient expresses a desire to self-terminate, please do not note it on the chart, but relay it to me privately. It is an old Jorenian custom, one that we are obliged to honor, but I wish to discourage it. I know this is a confusing request, but life is a finite resource. We cannot squander it.”
I did not have to understand the reasons he had for giving me an order. I only had to know precisely that which he wanted me to do. “It will be as you wish.”
“Excellent.” He picked up a medical scanner and came from behind the desk. Due to their singular lower limb, Omorr hopped rather than walked, but he had a very graceful bounce. “We shall conduct rounds together this morning, and then convince Dapvea Adan that wearing prostheses is more desirable than killing himself.”
TWO
Rounds in the Sunlace’s Medical Bay were not very different from those I had performed in the battlefield hospitals on Akkabarr. It was true that the patients were kept much cleaner, and their surroundings even more so. Ensleg technology and medicines proved much better than what we had been able to salvage from the wreck stores, and the nursing staff worked without fear of male retribution. No one on the ship suffered from malnutrition, snowbite, or fleshrot, as so many of my people had during the rebellion. Still, the sick and injured here were not healed by any magic means. Here as on Akkabarr they needed constant monitoring and evaluation of their conditions, which required Squilyp and me to examine them daily.
Our inpatient ward held four patients, and we went to evaluate the youngest first.
“Knofki Adan,” I read from his chart before I looked at his smiling face. “How do you feel this morning?”
“I am well, Healer Cherijo.” Like Marel’s teacher Thalia, Knofki was not a Torin, but one of House-Clan Adan, which had sent several of its people to serve as crew for the Sunlace. The Adan were allying themselves with the Torin for some reason too complicated and Jorenian for me to fathom.
The boy fidgeted too much for my liking. “Why do you squirm like that?”
Knofki went still and grimaced. “My new toes itch.”
Our youngest patient had been involved in an engineering accident that had also injured our other three patients. The young male had been visiting his father, one of the ship’s senior engineers, to watch him at work. This was some sort of thing the Jorenians did to expose their young ones to various occupations. A work crew had been refitting the shell on a large piece of equipment and had not judged the weight correctly. The hoisting equipment had failed, causing the shell to fall atop those observing from the deck.
The edge of the shell hitting the deck had neatly amputated five of the six toes on Knofki’s right foot, which had been directly under it. Fortunately the boy’s sire had jerked him back at the last moment, or he might have been cut in two.
“Nurse, please remove the dressing,” Squilyp said to the Jorenian female attending to the boy. I gave the Senior Healer the chart and took Knofki’s vitals, which were at acceptable levels. “Have you tried to move your toes, ClanSon Adan?”
Knofki nodded. “That makes the itching stop.”
I examined the foot when the nurse clipped away the last of the gauze strips covering it. The boy’s severed toes had been crushed by the falling shell, too badly to consider reattachment and regeneration therapy. Instead, we had used bone, nerve, ligament, muscle, and dermal grafts grown from Knofki’s own cells to fashion him five new toes. I had offered to perform the delicate surgery to attach the new toes, but the Senior Healer had elected to do it himself. I had the impression that he didn’t yet trust me enough to let me use the equipment in the surgical suite.
“Have you felt any pain or lack of sensation?” Squilyp asked the boy as he inspected the foot.
“No, Senior Healer.” Knofki tried to remain still. “It only itches.”
“Bring some dermal emollient,” I told the nurse. I took the boy’s foot in my hand and tested each toe. “He heals well. We should splint the foot and permit him to try walking on it.” I noted the boy’s delighted grin. More was itching than his foot, I imagined. Had I been ten years old, I would not have wished to spend every waking hour in a berth and endure being prodded and poked by healers and nurses.
“I disagree,” the Omorr said. “It has only been two weeks since the attachment surgery. Too much weight on the foot could cause the internal tissues to tear.”
“Not if it is properly bandaged and supported,” I said. “His circulation will not further improve without proper exercise.”
Squilyp appeared ready to argue the point, and then he looked down at the boy. “If I permit you to walk about, will you promise to restrain your exuberance and follow instructions on how you are to distribute your weight and use the walking supports?”
Knofki’s grin only widened. “Yes, I vow I will, Senior Healer.”
“Very well, then.” He patted the child’s shoulder. “We will have you up and about after your morning meal.”
The next two patients had also improved; one enough to be discharged and returned to limited duty. Squilyp hopped over to Dapvea Adan’s empty berth and glared back at me. “You provided the means for him to self-terminate? Without my permission?”
“I relocated his berth.” I indicated a room, which was generally used for those requiring very close monitoring. “I had thought he might need the space and time to be private and make peace with his deity.” Dævena knew these people never gave anyone much solitude.
“Has a nurse been monitoring him?” Squilyp hopped past me and quickly entered the room. I followed, and found him hovering next to Dapvea Adan’s berth, checking his vitals.
“Greetings, ClanSon Adan,” I said.
The Jorenian opened his white eyes and nodded. “Has my Speaker arrived?”
I still did not know what a Speaker was, but no one new was present in Medical, so I assumed not and shook my head.
“It is time,” he said, closing his eyes. “Summon her.”
“I must first compose the signal to send to your HouseClan on Joren,” Squilyp said. “It is difficult to find words to describe your condition. Were I to call you a coward, they might declare me ClanKill on the spot.”
ClanKill? These ensleg actually killed something other than the taste of food? I looked at the Omorr with new interest.
“My Speaker shall inform my ClanUncle of my decision,” Dapvea told him. “I am not a coward.”
“Surely no,” I said, stepping up to the other side of the berth. “It takes great courage to face one’s death. I should know. I am told that I have died at least four or five times.”
Squilyp glared at me. “Your sixth may arrive sooner than you think.”
I thought of flashing a dagger. “Death never forgets a promise.” I glanced down at Dapvea, who watched us with an appalled fascination. “Jorenian, if you wish to end your life, so be it. As you have no mate—”
“I have a bondmate. She is on Joren,” he said, his expression turning sad. “My Speaker will relay my wishes to her.”
/> “I see. Well, then, it is not as if you have children—” I stopped when I saw his black eyebrows draw together in the center. “Forgive me. You also have children?”
“Five.” He gestured toward the empty half of the berth. “I will not have my ClanSons and ClanDaughters seeing me reduced to this—this half of what I was.”
“Ah, so you wish to die rather than shame your children and mate,” I said, nodding. “I did not know of their existence, or that they held you in such low regard. You should have said so, Jorenian. My sympathies.”
“My embrace of the stars will be celebrated,” Dapvea snapped. “They honor me.”
“But they would wish you to live only if you have four limbs? A strange sort of honor you people have for each other. I was told your kind were most affectionate, particularly toward kin. Ah, well.” I sighed and made a notation on his chart. “Senior Healer, under the circumstances, perhaps we should persuade Knofki Adan to self-terminate as well.”
Squilyp caught my eye and nodded. “Yes, I see the wisdom in that, Doctor.”
“Knofki is a child who lost some toes,” the Jorenian shouted. “I have no legs.”
“Toes, arms, legs—does it matter?” I shrugged. “A flaw is a flaw. One does not wish the boy to suffer the pain and humiliation of being outcast on the homeworld when we could have attended to his proper disposal here.” I gazed at Squilyp. “How, exactly, do you help boy children take their lives? This custom is strange to me.”
“I know what you are doing,” Dapvea said, and fell back against the pillows to stare at the ceiling. “I would not have them see me a cripple. I have always been the strongest of my ClanFather’s children.”
“To lose two legs, learn to use prosthetics, and walk again requires great strength of body and will. I saw much of that during the rebellion.” I measured him with a glance. “You reminded me of those fighters, until this talk of death. To die is to lose. Everything.”
Dapvea fell silent, and the Omorr and I used the interval to examine his stumps and update his chart. It was difficult not to say more, but I sensed that to do so would push the Jorenian too far. The Senior Healer seemed also aware of this.
At last he struggled to sit up and gestured to the berth linens. “I want to see them.”
Squilyp appeared ready to refuse, but I pulled away the sheet and showed him the neatly bandaged stumps.
“Your thighs are mostly intact,” I told him, speaking quickly as the skin of his face turned a chalky color. “The prosthetic limbs can be fitted to the stumps when they heal, and work off the nerve and muscle tissue we were able to salvage. In time, you will walk and perhaps even run, as any strong man does.”
“Or woman,” Squilyp said briskly. “ClanLeader Sajora Kalea lost most of her leg during the siege of Reytalon. Do you know of her?”
“Know? I celebrated her return to the home-world, when she and the Blade Dancers were made ClanJoren and named the House Kalea.” Dapvea reached down to gingerly touch one of the dressings. “Do you know that she had one of her kin weld her shattered leg together before it was removed, so that she could fight to avenge herself and her Chosen?”
I would have to ask Reever about her. “She sounds like a brave woman.”
His white eyes lifted to mine. “Indeed.” He took one last look at his stumps before he reclined. “I revoke my request for my Speaker. I would know more about these prosthetics, and how it will be for me.”
Squilyp summoned the resident responsible for fitting amputees with artificial limbs, and we left him discussing the details with Dapvea. I walked out into the ward and looked down the row of berths. A nurse was clearing Knofki’s morning meal, which he had apparently wolfed down, while another was measuring him for support braces. He was trying very hard not to squirm. I would have to keep a close eye on the boy, or he would be racing through the corridors on them.
“We have time to perform a halo-stim,” the Senior Healer said as he joined me.
I stiffened. “I had one only yesterday.”
“The stimulation is necessary if we are to make any progress with recovering your memories.”
“Her memories,” I said, wishing an emergency appendectomy would walk in at that very moment. “Not mine.”
“When we achieve a successful recovery,” the Omorr said with the deliberation of a tested patience, “they will be yours. Come now.”
I did not wish to go with him into the neurological treatment room, but Reever had directed me to allow the Omorr to continue his attempts to revive my former self’s memories. Thus I went, although slowly and without a great deal of enthusiasm, and sat in the padded patient’s seat.
The room contained the latest technology being used to treat patients with brain injury, disorder, or disease. A long bank of consoles measured brain activity, performed continuous neurological scans, and applied finely controlled doses of medications, sonics, energy, and other stimulants to the patients.
“Try not to wriggle this time,” Squilyp said as he lowered a bowl-shaped web of alloy bands studded with stim ports and sensor pads over the top of my head.
The feel of the cold metal on my skin made my nose wrinkle. “Would you sit still if you felt as if lice were crawling in and out of your ears?”
“If I knew the lice were going to give me back my life, yes.” The Senior Healer hopped over to the console and initiated the treatment program. “Sit back, close your eyes, and relax.”
Relax, when my life might be eradicated in favor of hers. Impossible. Only his past failures reassured me enough to do as he told me. “When will I have had enough treatment?”
“When I see some positive results from the stim,” Squilyp said, and switched on something that made the short hairs on my neck rise. “Cognitive impairment from trauma-induced amnesia is not always permanent. A substantial amount of memory loss is to be expected, but over time that should reduce until your memories are intact up to the time of your injury.”
No sensation of lice in my ear canals, but I resisted a sudden, terrible urge to squash what felt like invisible worms inching under my hair. “Which time? When the prisoner shuttle crashed, or when Daneeb shot Cherijo in the head?”
“Don’t fidget,” the Omorr said. “When the native woman shot you, obviously. The crash landing only fractured your skull.”
“I reviewed the last set of brain scans you performed,” I said over the faint buzzing in my ears. I did not like it any more than the lice-infested sensation. “You noted that the bilateral lesions to the hippocampus were severe.”
He nodded in an absent fashion. “They should be. You were shot twice at point-blank range. That it did not destroy your hippocampus is a miracle.”
“You agree that such would be enough to inflict irreversible retrograde amnesia,” I suggested, cringing a little as I felt the energy of the first round of stim come through the bands. I opened my eyes and saw white spots. “As would damage to the entorhinal, perirhinal, and parahippocampal nodes. Judging by the age of the tissue in those cortical areas, all three were virtually destroyed by the head injuries Daneeb inflicted.”
“I disagree.” The Omorr left the console and came over to adjust the halo device. “Your semantic memory is largely intact. You recalled words spoken to you just before the head injury. You even remember specific medical skills and how to function as an adult in society, limited as yours was.”
“After two years of wandering about and behaving like a mute madwoman,” I reminded him. The outrage in his eyes made my heart constrict. “Senior Healer, I do not mean to offend, or show disrespect, but all you do with this”—I tapped the halo—“is disrupt my brain waves, make my skin crawl, and give me a headache.”
The door panel opened abruptly, and Xonea Torin, captain of the Sunlace, strode in.
I waited in silence for Cherijo’s adopted brother to speak to Squilyp. He was almost as tall as Teuton had been, but much broader through the shoulders and chest. When I had first come on board the ship,
the crew’s blue skin, black hair, and white eyes reminded me so much of the Raktar that it had been a comfort. Only in time did I learn how different the Torins were, collectively as friendly as children who had never left their shelter.
They were nothing like Teulon.
These people might all have eyes the color of new snow, but the subtlety of emotion in them ran the spectrum from soft powder to sharp ice. Xonea’s gaze most often relayed the cool, watchful attention of a battle-seasoned warrior, but presently something much fiercer blazed in his eyes. Xonea turned his attention, but he did not smile, and he did not bother to address the Senior Healer at all.
“Cherijo,” he said. “You are to come with me to the command center at once.”
After the damage inflicted on the Sunlace during the Jado Massacre, the ensleg had retrofitted the vessel, and constructed not one but two command centers within the ship. The first was located in the customary position, near the primary helm and navigational array, where most of the ship’s flight officers performed their duties.
That was not the command center to which Xonea Torin escorted me.
In the heavily shielded and reinforced engineering section, located in the heart of the vessel, a second command center had been added. From this secondary flight deck, the Sunlace‘s crew could perform the same functions that they would on the primary with far more protection and safety Reever had told me that the second command center was only used while the ship was under attack or engaging in the field of battle.
We were doing neither, so I was somewhat confused as to why I had been brought here. Still, the captain was the highest-ranking male on the ship, the equivalent of a rasakt among the Iisleg, and a female did not speak to such a man unless commanded by him to do so.
Xonea and I submitted to a DNA test before we were permitted access to the command center. He led me past the consoles and equipment, which were not in use, and into a room with a large table, many chairs, and a sophisticated computer array with multiple terminals and access consoles. Waiting for us were Reever and eleven Jorenian officers who supervised various operations on board the ship.