Romano ran as fast as his legs could carry him, with a preacher not far behind. Luckily, it was a young one, so he could keep up.
They ran, dodging people as they past. They finally made it to the house, with Romano running right into the house, as a nation cannot catch the illness, while the preacher stopped outside to talk to the doctor.
Romano panted for a second before catching his breath. When he heard of the illness that had already hit a few of his people, he rushed as soon as he could. He wanted to see for himself how bad it was and what he had to tell his brother when Romano visited him in Venice next week.
What sight met him was not what he expected. The young girl, only a few years older than he looked, looked sickly in the bed. She was covered in swellings, which were a dark purple color. He could tell she had a very high fever and around her mouth was dried blood.
The preacher came in and starting asking questions to the girl's family.
"I know you already told the doctor this and the doctor just told me but I need to hear it from you. What happened to her," he gestured to the girl, "In the last few days?"
Romano didn't even look to see which one answered.
"It started with a headache. Then chills and fever, which left her exhausted. She experienced nausea, some back pain, soreness in her arms and legs." It sounded like the father. "Yesterday, the swellings appeared. Last night they turned purple, they were red first. She felt she needed to sleep all day yesterday, so we let her. Now we cannot wake her."
There was a pause, Romano guessed the preacher nodded, and the preacher began to speak again.
"I'm sorry but your daughter is most likely die," The mother cried out and muffled her cries against the father shoulder. Or, at least, that's what it sounded like. "I will pr-"
He was cut off by the girl coughing violently. Romano's eyes widened. She was coughing up blood and a lot of it. The dry blood around her mouth was covered with the fresher blood in seconds.
As the mother and, what he guessed, sister were trying to wipe off the blood, he ran out of the house and to the nearest inn as fast as he could. He ran to the room that he and the preacher, he had traveled with the preacher from Rome, shared and hid his face in the pillow. He did not want to remember the sight of that girl so sickly or the swellings on her body or the amount of blood that came out of her mouth. He just wanted to forget all of it!
He soon calmed down enough to fall asleep.
..…..
The next morning, he was shook awake by the preacher. Romano slowly opened his eyes, not wanting to get up, and faced a grim-faced preacher.
"Get up. I need to hold a few funerals then we need to go to the next town."
Romano closed his eyes and buried his head back into the pillow. When will this end?
"What about..." He started to say but the preacher cut him off.
"I can't understand you if your in the pillow."
He sat up and scowled. But it was shorted lived. "What about… the girl?"
The preacher looked at him sadly and shook his head.
This story has been in my mind for the past few days so I wrote it! YAY!
I'll continue it when I get some reviews!
Fun fact about the plague…
It came from China( or, at least, that's what most people think) and even though I didn't show it in the last chapter, it hit China pretty hard. It then came from the trade routes to South Italy where it soon spread to Venice in the north and France and Spain through trading routes.