by Gwynn White
‘Search up there.’
Toxiv pretended to be offended. ‘What are you looking for, Captain?’
There was a glimmer of remorse in his eyes. ‘King’s orders. We need all healers healing.’
Her eyebrows raised. ‘Does he expect healer children to heal? They’re at home with their parents.’ Toxiv had ordered the parents to give up their healer girls the previous night so she could hide them from men who might see them as objects to be abused.
The captain didn’t answer.
‘How young then?’ Toxiv barked. ‘Ten, nine.’
‘Eight,’ replied the captain.
After a few moments, Hawrald returned. ‘No one up there.’
The captain met Toxiv’s eyes knowingly. ‘We’ll have to search the city then. By our records there’s at least thirty healer girls under the age of ten in this city.’
Toxiv bit her tongue. ‘I must return to my work.’ She raised her arm, pointing for the exit.
The captain leaned over and said, ‘Lock all attic doors. Heal as quickly as you can, or the king will make your situation worse.’
‘Out,’ she said coldly.
He nodded and said, ‘Hawrald, Abyslam, remain here. I expect full and regular reports.’
‘Yes, sir,’ they said.
When the captain was gone, Toxiv turned to Hawrald. ‘Thank you for not telling him.’
‘The captain already knew, High Priestess.’
Toxiv swallowed. At least there was some good in the captain. Healer girls started their training at thirteen, and already the king had been speaking of changing the minimum age to twelve. If the young girls wanted to, they could heal once a month, and only treated boys their age, or younger. She rubbed her face. This is all wrong.
Healers had never been forced to heal. All training healers chose the age at which they would help the first sick man. Healers could stop anytime and serve only as devout followers of the sun god, though she admitted they were encouraged to heal, and were rewarded for doing so.
By the next Death Plague would have spread throughout the city. Some would begin to die as the healers failed to keep up with the demands.
What then?
She trembled for the horror about to come.
25
Abyslam
After a day of retching at boils, vomiting, stinking fevers and death, Abyslam needed the devil’s drink. He considered how Hawrald checked the attic with the healers, and overlooked them at the captain’s instruction. Perhaps Hawrald was as sympathetic to the healers as he was.
The front temple courtyard square lit up with torches, drums of burning oil, and candles as healers continued their work through the night. Stars twinkled like precious gems, yet brought not one moment’s reassurance amongst the screams and cries of the dying.
‘Hawrald,’ Abyslam called out to the royal guard helping an old woman out of a cot. He’d stolen strong temple wine from the healers’ cellar, and two golden goblets from the temple treasure room.
‘Aye?’ Hawrald said, turning around.
Abyslam raised the bottle and cups.
Hawrald smiled gratefully. ‘Aye!’
They went to the back of the temple which backed against the eastern city wall. Stone chairs sat among vegetation and willows. After half the bottle was gone and they’d talked about life in the royal guard, Abyslam decided to pry into Hawrald’s personal views.
‘Was your father a soldier, Hawrald?’
‘Aye, for a while. Worked for Buckhorn ‘til he got stabbed by a thief.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Abyslam.
‘Don’t be. He died quick. Too quick for a healin’. Like ‘im, I ain’t one for brains. Never been one for brains,’ Hawrald said with a slight slur. ‘Only got brawn so I keep to soldierin’ work. Though this ain’t really work. We get better digs than Upper soldiers, eh?’ he elbowed Abyslam in the arm.
‘My room in the castle is much larger than my one at home,’ Abyslam agreed, chuckling.
Hawrald swirled the liquid in his cup. ‘Nasty business this healer stuff. Feel sorry for ‘em. I don’t like what the king’s done, but what else can he do, eh? This thing spreads like fire in the wind, and under a hot sun. Least we men will survive.’
Hawrald handed his empty cup to Abyslam who gave him two thirds more than himself.
‘Listen,’ said Abyslam. ‘Eventually this place will be overrun. Even the healer children won’t be safe. We can help.’
Hawrald stared at him, narrowing his eyes and Abyslam wondered if he’d read the soldier all wrong. ‘What do ya mean?’
Abyslam shrugged. ‘What will the king do once all the Lowers need healings? What are they to him?’
Hawrald’s eyebrows raised. ‘Can’t say I believe the king ‘as good intentions, but he is the king.’
‘The high priestess needs to get back to Lightend Sanctuary. All of Senya needs her leadership.’
Hawrald sniffed. ‘I admire your loyalty to the healers—we’re fortunate to have ‘em. You’re a good man, and I think of myself the same way. I could’ve died many times if not for the healings, but the king’ll hang us if we betray ‘im.’
‘Is that the only thing that stops you?’ asked Abyslam.
‘Aye, of course. Don’t death keep most men in line? It ain’t for us to have opinions, but I do ‘ave ‘em.’
Abyslam smiled, satisfied with Hawrald’s answers. When the time came, he was certain Hawrald would be sympathetic to the healers’ plight. The king would be forced to value his people over the suffering of the healers, of that he was certain.
A good man like Hawrald would never let that happen.
26
Prince Erageo
Prince Erageo galloped his horse through his father’s woodlands. Autumn had turned the leaves brilliant reds, oranges and golds. Eless, his healer sister—well more like his adopted sister since his mother could bear no more children—clutched his waist, laughing. She was raised as a playmate for him, and one day she’d serve his healing needs. Now fifteen, and having completed two years of healer training, she spent every day at his side.
Prince Erageo’s father and his mother presented her to him at court when he was only five years old. Her bed chamber was separated by a single door which his mother kept locked, but as they grew to be best friends he’d forged another key so they never had to be apart.
‘You go too fast, Erageo,’ she said, squealing behind him, hands digging into his sides. ‘Slow down!’
He laughed evilly and kicked his stallion hard, yelling, ‘Yargh! Yargh!’
The silky beast, fast as the wind, laid his ears back and snorted. They flew over a rotting log coated in furry moss to splash in a puddle of mud which sprayed up their legs. The horse slipped but quickly recovered.
‘Woo!’ Eless cried out. ‘By the gods I thought the horse would crush us!’
‘I know you’re not afraid, Mushy, stop pretending!’ he yelled. He’d nicknamed her Mushy after her perfectly nose which, as a child, he liked to poke and tease her about.
She gave a cheeky laugh in reply.
The horse darted between two orange trees overhanging a river. Eless snatched at a fruit the exact moment the horse sprung off its back legs over a wide creek. Eless toppled off the back, landing in the water with a splash; the orange fruit bobbed beside her thrashing arms.
‘I can’t swim, Erageo! I can’t swim!’
The prince yanked the horse’s reins to a stop. Shrugged out of his coat then dismounted, ran and dived into the cold water, gathering her cold body up in his arms. She held on tight, burying her face in his neck. The prince was a foot taller than her and quickly managed to find purchase in the underlying muck. He walked against the current.
They collapsed onto thick grass together on the side of the river bank. Eless lay on her side, coughing.
He stared at her mockingly.
‘What?’ she asked, annoyed. Her golden eyes shone. ‘Don’t look at me like that. Do you like water in your lungs?’<
br />
‘Healers can’t drown. Fires, you don’t even die from suffocation.’
‘I still need to breathe so I can move though,’ she snapped.
‘What a precious thing you are,’ he mocked.
She threw a stick at him. ‘What a spoilt rich boy you are.’
Prince Erageo put his hands over his heart. ‘Oh no, I’m rich, quick, insult me more.’
She broke out into laughter. ‘I’ll be in dark dungeons if we don’t get you back to the castle and into clean clothes.’
‘I’m not cold.’
She tilted her head, exasperated. ‘You can do no wrong, but the queen will surely blame me.’
Grinning he said, ‘She’s worried I’ll choose you for a wife.’
Eless screwed up her face. ‘Ugh, revolting.’
Prince Erageo went to his stallion, shrugged on his riding coat and swung up into the saddle. Eless took his hand, and clambered on behind him. He steered the horse around the river before kicking the horse into a canter.
Inside the prince’s castle room, on the top floor, Healer Eless and Prince Erageo warmed themselves by the enormous marble hearth fire while slurping down hot tea. The prince’s made drew a bath in the next room.
A door banged making them jump. The queen stood in front of the heart, hands on hips, glaring at Eless. ‘Swimming in this weather, you’ll catch your death.’
‘We weren’t swimming mother, Eless fell off Bolt mid-jump. Besides, we can’t catch our death. Eless can’t die, and she’d heal me before I did,’ said the prince.
His mother clipped him on the ear. ‘Don’t be rude.’
Every time the price’s father fancied a new healer girl, his mother’s moods swung to anger and unhappiness. The king’s perversion shamed the queen and so she grew mad at all healers, even Eless whose heart was softer that dove’s feathers.
‘It was my fault, Your Highness,’ said Eless, curtsying low to the floor. ‘Punish me if you must.’
The queen placed a hand over her forehead and in a softer voice said, ‘No no, get up. Forgive me.’
Prince Erageo felt a strange tingling take hold of his nerves. As he grew cold, tiny shocks, flared in his eyeballs. His innards felt as if they froze, and as he trembled he rose and drew close to the fire; he found no warmth.
‘Why do you still wear your wet pants?’ his mother asked.
The prince turned to her, but his tongue lay dead in its mouthy coffin. A strange taste of iron moved into his nose until his eyes watered. Pain crippled his lungs, seizing his ribs so he gasped for air. He clutched his chest.
The queen rushed to his side, catching him in her arms as he collapsed his knees.
‘Erageo?!’ she cried out in alarm.
‘Lightning strikes me,’ he whispered, drawing in to watch the black vortex tearing across his mind, consuming all his thoughts. Memories faded into whispers of a past while his vision blurred into rainbows of flying circles. They twisted, bulged, and then spun. Slow, then faster and soon his entire body convulsed to make him retch. Hard so blood and vomit flew across the room covering his prized bear rug.
Light dazzled in his eyes, and he raised his hand to block it out. Eless spoke from somewhere, but he felt her holding his hand to her chest, crying. His mother appeared with a bottle of green tonic which she forced down his throat. She cut off his pants, covered his face with a hood while Eless shouted, ‘I can’t. I can’t.’
The cold world slipped away.
27
Healer Eless
The prince with the carved face of a god, and a golden heart to match, lay helpless at the plague’s mercy. Red boils appeared on his once flawless skin and the queen took her hand, staring at her.
‘Eless,’ she said.
This was Eless’s moment to prove her friendship and devotion to her greatest love. Her twin soul. But in that frightening moment surfaced a memory she’d forgotten. In her mind, she stared up at the king of Senya, Prince Erageo’s father, choking her on a bed. She fought him off, scratching and spitting, but it only made him more violent. He struck her in the face until the world blackened. He tore the clothes from her body then violated her eleven-year-old body.
For a year after, she’d tried to forget but suffered in silence unable to tell anyone. If she told the prince, he’d turn on his father, and what right did she have to create such a devastating family divide? A rift in the royal family would be felt by all, and so she stayed silent only crying in the early hours of morning when ghouls ducked in and out of shadows.
‘Heal him!’ The queen shouted in her ear.
Eless trembled violently, huddling in on herself. ‘I-I’m sorry. I can’t.’
The queen ran from the room while Eless turned away from the prince, wailing amidst her failure. He would die and it would be her fault. She needed him to open his eyes, help her, reassure her that all would be well, and what if he didn’t want her to heal him. He’d never given his specific permission.
‘Please,’ Eless begged him while the queen was away. ‘Wake up, Erageo.’
The doors opened to the queen dragging in Sansi: the king’s new healer.
The queen pushed the new girl to the floor, pointing at her son. ‘Heal him, now!’
Sansi undid her robe, and Eless turned away in agony as Sansi did for her Erageo what she could not. Eless could hardly bear the shame she felt. I have failed him!
The prince stirred.
‘Oh,’ the queen gasped. ‘He’s alive. He lives.’ She rushed to his bed, yanking off a blanket and taking a pillow that she put under his head. Eless spread the blanket over him. His cheeks turned rosy, and the blue about his lips faded.
‘Leave,’ the queen shouted at Sansi, but not Eless.
The healer girl scuttled from the room. Eless watched the prince anxiously, remaining deeply horrified at her own incompetence.
‘I should throw you out too,’ the queen muttered.
‘It won’t happen again, my queen,’ Eless said. ‘Forgive me, please forgive me.’
The prince sniffed with amusement. ‘Are you two fighting again?’ he croaked.
‘No, my sweet boy,’ his mother cooed. ‘Eless has healed you this day.’
Eless stared at the queen, incredulously. They were to keep it a secret and she would have another chance to prove her usefulness.
The prince turned his head to stare into Eless’s eyes, smiling with satisfaction. ‘You are here. That is all I want for you are the best thing in my life.’ He took her hand. ‘I’m sorry I scared you.’
Eless sprawled herself across his trim body, crying and sobbing while he stroked her hair.
‘Hush now,’ he whispered. ‘I am well. See? I am well. You did your duty.’
But she hadn’t done her duty at all, and if she didn’t heal him next time, their friendship would be lost forever. Feeling his gentle fingers trailing through her long, golden hair, Eless knew if she didn’t tell Prince Erageo about her father, she would always feel alone.
He deserved to know about that, and how she’d failed him this day, but as she soaked up his love, decided she could wait a day or two.
28
Toxiv
Swollen pewter and charcoal clouds swooped in off the mountains at midday, bathing the lands in shadow. In the guts of the sky, lightning flashed. Boom! Thunder rumbled through the architecture, eliciting cries from people dwelling in the temple square, a half mile in length and breadth.
Stretchers and cots filled with the affirmed created such congestion that those in the centre could not escape. A cold downpour washed blood over stone paving, while families darted about in search of tarps to shelter their dying loved ones.
Thousands of wailing, shrieking, and shouting citizens blended with thunderous rumbles in an ungodly lamentation. The stench of death mingled with the aroma of disturbed human waste rising from the rotting city sewers.
Packs of mangy dogs feasted on the recently deceased lingering at the edge of the crowds. The soldiers c
hased them, blades waving, but the muts were brave in their bloodlust, and fearless in their pursuit of fresh meat. Soldiers cut and stabbed the hounds, and the animal’s dying shrieks frightened children clutching at their mother’s boil covered chests for comfort.
Each deafening clap of thunder alleviated the horrible city sounds. Toxiv prayed for the lightning to hit closer so she might lose her hearing altogether, but alas, she would heal again anyway.
The sounds inside the temple were just as miserable. The healers were unable to heal some of the men, and their families wailed as they said goodbye to their loved ones. Thirty or so soldiers paced the room. Some clutched daggers, staring menacingly at the line of afflicted least their desperation turn to rebellion.
One of the healers passed High Priestess Toxiv complaining about her workload.
‘These are your people,’ Toxiv snarled at her, ‘Where you do not work, they die. Is that what you want?!’
The young healer, about eighteen years, cowered before the high priestess. Although Toxiv disliked raising her voice, it irritated her when young healers wailed ungratefully about their terrible lives. The girl would live for two lifetimes, without sickness, fatigue, pain, suffering, or fear of death. To complain was selfish.
The supplies of men’s lustre, a medicine used to arouse a man’s appendage, dwindled. The green sap, while not rare, took days to brew into a digestible, medicinal solution.
Wives, daughters, and caretakers raised their voices as the healings slowed. Using the men’s lustre meant waiting an additional quarter hour for the concoction to works its way into the body’s system.
For every person they healed, ten more pushed their way into the temple. The city’s population of about twenty-five thousand would be impossible to heal in one or two nights, but the disease progressed so quickly they had to try.
Night settled and the rain continued its steady melodic pattering against the temple’s glass panes, pipes, and steel. Thick humid air amplified the smell of decay. Yet Toxiv gave more to the behaviour of those not afflicted. Their agitation put others on edge as they shifted and paced like a caged animal, anticipating the hour when the Death Plague came for them.