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The dynamic between us had become so complicated that sometimes I didn’t know what I wanted. The unspoken weight of all that had happened hung in the air making it hard to breathe. I wanted to look at him and see nothing but Nik, but I couldn’t stop myself from reliving that horrible moment in the party room—followed, as always, by the spear of guilt for my mistake.
The horror of that moment, and the resultant tangle of our relationship, filled my thoughts even now when something far more serious should have been at the forefront of my mind. Which was yet another reason why I’d been avoiding him while I tried to sort out the confusing administration of the island. It was already hard enough to keep my thoughts straight.
“One of the servants said Ida left a message for me—that I was needed down here?”
His deep voice sparked a visceral response that I immediately tried to tamp down.
He took a step toward me, concern flaring in his eyes. “Is something wrong?”
I let his words remind me of what was most important in the moment.
“I’m afraid there is.” I pitched my voice low, trying not to disturb the patients in the two bedrooms. “This whole family is ill with an infectious condition I haven’t seen before. And unfortunately it’s already progressed significantly. I’m afraid…”
“The empty streets,” he said quickly, obviously having noticed the same thing I had.
Hearing him reach the same horrifying conclusion should have made me even more afraid, but instead his words had the opposite effect. They steadied me, relief trickling in to counter the panic. I wasn’t alone in this. Nik was here too.
“We need to find out what we’re dealing with,” I said. “I’ll check the houses on either side, but can you and Ida spread further through the town? We don’t have time to check every house, but I need to know the rough extent of this.”
Given how sick this family already was, I suspected this area would be the epicenter of the spread, but I needed to know for sure.
“Of course.” Nik looked at Ida who had entered the main room behind me. “You head toward the harbor, and I’ll go back toward the manor?”
She agreed, the two of them murmuring several more clarifications about the routes they would each take. I had already tuned them out, though, hurrying toward the door to start my examination of the neighbors.
In the doorway, I paused to make a final comment.
“We’ll meet back here as soon as possible.” If things were less dire than I feared and this family was the worst hit, then I would be able to use my power to heal the three adults in this family at least.
Nik and Ida both nodded agreement, and I strode out into the street.
My optimism didn’t last two houses. By the time I’d made it down one side of the street and back up the other, I felt as if I was carrying a pack filled with heavy rocks.
I had expected some of the families to show animosity toward an unfamiliar healer turning up unannounced on their doorstep, but no one had rejected me. And it was tragically easy to see why.
Every single household had someone in at least the first stage of the illness—like the young boy from Ida’s host family—and some had members even worse off than the host grandmother.
From my questions, I had managed to track the rough course of the symptoms. In the first week, most patients had symptoms similar to the first boy I examined. After progressing to the second week, the symptoms increased in line with those I had seen in the boy’s parents. Only a small handful of people had made it as far as the beginning of the third week, and most of them were even more sick than the first grandmother.
Those whose weakened bodies had succumbed to pneumonia or who had inflammation of the heart or brain were in a severe enough condition that I couldn’t just walk away. I had tried to keep my healing to the minimal amount necessary to ensure the patient’s survival, but there had been enough of them that even doing that much had drained me to a frightening degree. I didn’t dare do anything to ease the suffering of those who were earlier in the illness, lest I end up collapsing like I had in Eldrida.
I tried to cling to some vestige of hope as I waited outside Ida’s home. Those who reported being sick the longest had first come down with symptoms just before the Constantines’ untimely demise. They must have only just missed having the Constantines heal them in the early stages.
I had thought this street might be the epicenter of the disease, but perhaps it was the opposite. If these families had been the last to get sick, the rest of the town might have already been healed before their illness could progress. If that was the case, and these were my only patients, then I could carefully stagger my healings, relying on power rather than knowledge or finesse to push through, and starting with those who were the most sick.
But the prospect still felt overwhelming, optimistic as it might be. Even Phoenix’s appearance did nothing to lift my mood.
Nik returned before Ida, appearing at the end of the street and quickly covering the distance with his long stride. But even before he reached me, my desperate hope had died. One look at his face was enough to read the terrible truth.
When he stopped in front of me, he hesitated, apparently not wanting to put what he had seen into words.
“It’s bad, isn’t it?” I said softly.
He nodded slowly.
“Every house on this street has at least one person sick, and in some cases it’s everyone,” I continued.
Nik reached for me, as if he wanted to take my hands, or perhaps pull me close, but he stopped himself, letting his arms fall back to his sides.
