Give the Dark My Love(27)

“How is it?” I asked. She had adapted well to her amputation, better than many who were younger than her. I suspected all her grief—both over the deaths in her family and at the loss of her limb—were being held at bay by the little rises and falls of her young son’s chest, regardless of whether his eyes opened or not.

“I’m adjusting,” she said. “There are worse things to lose than a leg.”

Mrs. Rodham stopped outside of a door just as one of the potion makers exited a room. “You the alchemist?” the potion maker said.

“Nedra.” I held out my hand. “Student, but I can do alchemy.”

“Good.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “I’m Fadow. They’re . . . they need someone. They had a rough trip.”

“Trip?”

“Came from one of the villages to the north. We’re getting more of them lately.”

“That’s why I thought to get you, dear,” Mrs. Rodham said. We’d talked often of our homes over lunch or quick breaks; most of the potion makers and alchemists were from the city, but we were both from the north.

I walked into the room, my stomach twisting in knots.

“See, someone’s here,” a man said. He had a low, soothing voice that was cracked through the middle with panic.

Two of the beds were occupied, one with a woman, one with a school-age boy. Along with the man was another boy, maybe a few years older than the first.

“Has Alchemist Frue been here?” I asked, scanning the patient.

The man rushed forward, his hat twisting in his hand. “No,” he said, and I could almost feel his frustration. “They shoved us in a room, and they’ve just given us water and told us to wait, and wait, and wait.” He spat the last word out. “Can you help us?”

“The hospital is overcrowded,” I said, “and we’re short on alchemists. But I can help.”

“Thank you,” the man said. “My name’s Dannix. My wife and son are sick.” He gestured to them, then moved to the wall with his other son, giving me room to work.

I checked the child first, at the mother’s insistence. Both legs were covered in blackness, his feet so twisted he could no longer keep shoes on them. The inky stain of the disease was well past his knees, and the analytical medical student in me knew that if he survived, it would be a miracle.

The woman seemed better off—at first.

“It’s here,” she said, pulling her shirt down. Darkness bled over her heart. I kept my face schooled, but I was close enough to the woman that I was certain she saw her own doom written in my eyes. There was nothing I could do to help her; she would either live or not, and only one in a hundred survived the Wasting Death when it infected the heart. Her fate fell to the gods and whether or not her body was strong enough to push the infected blood to a disposable limb.

I forced a cheerful smile on my face. “At least you don’t have any film over your eyes,” I said, lifting her eyelids to check. “If you did, that would mean the disease was in your brain. No cure then.”

The man sagged with relief. “See, you’ll be fine!” he told his wife, running to her side and clutching her hand.

Her eyes didn’t leave mine. I saw the question there, unasked as her husband knelt, his head over their clasped fingers, muttering a quick prayer. She wanted—needed—honesty. She would hold on if there was hope. But I didn’t know what to tell her.

The boy in the other bed moaned, and his mother flicked her fingers toward him. “Take care of my son,” she said.

I nodded, swallowing down the lump in my throat. The older boy, the patient’s brother, moved closer. “Are you going to do the magic?” he asked.

I smiled at him, and somehow I was able to pretend like this was a normal smile, a normal conversation. “It’s not magic,” I said. “It’s science. But it does feel like magic.” In the hospital, I carried my crucible on a leather strap, looped to hold the golden vase. I also had a shoulder bag made of cloth-covered metal with a latched wooden door on the front. I set the bag down, opening the door and withdrawing a rat. The brother leaned over, fascinated, as I dropped the creature into my golden crucible.

“What’s your name?” I asked my patient.

“Jax.” His voice was barely audible. “Are you going to cut my legs off?”

There was no point in lying. The flesh had long since withered and died, the skin black and crackling, dark blood oozing in spots.

“Not me personally,” I said. “But amputation is likely.”

The boy breathed as if this news was a relief. His brother looked more upset by the possibility of it than him. Behind us, I heard their father start to cry.

“And who are you?” I asked his brother as I adjusted the crucible on a nearby table.

“Ronan,” the boy said in a small voice.

“Mrs. Rodham told me that you were all from a village to the north. I am, too. Which one are you from?”

“The daffodil gate.”

Mentally, I said a quick prayer of thanks. The villages behind the daffodil gate were on the other side of Hart, in the cliffs, about as far away from my village as it was possible to be.

“Jax,” I said, turning to my patient, “this isn’t going to hurt a bit. In fact, it’s going to make everything better.”