Episode 1: For the Thief's Chalice, chapter 4

Ezekiel Jones stepped through the door and sighed with relief. It no longer felt weird to think of the Library office as home, and he was certainly glad to be home. He would still have to head back to Sweden and supervise the dig he had set in progress, of course, but for now he was home. He deposited the chalice on the central desk and handed the vial to a patiently waiting figure by the globe.

"What's this?" Jenkins asked, looking down at the plain, stoneware receptacle.

"It was sitting beside the chalice, in the alcove the thief had carved for it," he replied, dropping down into a chair and stretching his legs out before him. He looked up at the old man turning the vial over and over in his hands, completely engrossed in this new curiosity. "I found them not long after the thief herself showed up and I had to stab her and turn her into rapidly disintegrating human dust to avoid being killed myself. A little warning might have been nice."

Jenkins blinked and looked up. "The thief was a woman?"

"Seriously!" Ezekiel's eyebrows rose. "Someone who was supposed to die over a thousand years ago just attacked me in a dark, underground, almost underwater death trap and all you can say is 'she was a woman'?"

"I wasn't there! How was I supposed to know 'she' had a potion with her? I wasn't even sure they'd left her in the cave!"

"And yet it surprises you more that she was a woman," Ezekiel persisted. "I wonder just what Colonel Baird would make of that?"

"Women were different then," Jenkins replied hastily, raising placating hands towards the young man. "They were still intelligent, strong, brave, and all the other adjectives one might choose to apply to them, but they were also limited. A rich woman, a noblewoman, had more freedom sometimes, certainly, but not always. A poor woman, but a free one, probably had the most freedom. An enslaved woman? No, they didn't have much freedom at all. There are only two reasons her master would have sent that woman to retrieve the chalice. Either he had no other option, or she had some ability that made her the best choice. This vial would suggest the latter."

"What is it?" Ezekiel nodded at the vial but didn't get up.

Jenkins eased the stopper up, its leather thong crackling with age. He sniffed. "I'm not sure," he frowned. "There are many potions that will... that will prolong life. Especially with the chalice to amplify them. This though..." Jenkins held the vial at arms length and glared at it as though it had uttered the most stinging insult. "It doesn't smell of any potion I've come across. All I smell is... is apples."

"Apples?" Ezekiel frowned.

"Yes, apples," the old man nodded, replacing the stopper and sitting the vial on his own desk for further perusal. "It's quite distinct."

"Any particular kind?"

"Not that distinct."

"So what do we know about magic apples, then," sing-songed Jones as if addressing a class of fourteen-year-olds. "Eve had an apple. Was it magical?"

"Not in any way that would help us," winced Jenkins. "The apple of Eden brought knowledge, but also brought death. It wouldn't be of any use in prolonging life." A thoughtful look passed across his face. "The apple of Idunn though..."

"But you just said..." Jones waved a confused hand.

"That was the apple of Eden. E, D, E, N," said Jenkins, waggling a finger at him. "I'm talking about the apple of Idunn, I, D, although originally it would have been the Norse character eth, U, N, N. Norse goddess of spring and rejuvenation. She was given charge of the golden apples that maintained the youth of the Norse gods, both the Aesir and the Vanir. Every god and goddess would collect from her one apple a week, and would eat it to stay young. Once, the god of fire, Loki, aided a giant in the capture of Idunn and her apples, and all the gods aged remarkably, including Loki, so that he was forced to steal her back again. It sounds as if your thieving friend stole more than just the chalice. If this liquid is the juice of Idunn's apples, it makes sense that, once their magic was broken by a fatal blow, the centuries would reclaim their due. I will ensure it is stored away carefully. Certain deities do tend to view the Library as an extension of their own personal vault, therefore it should be safe from retaliation here, so long as we never use it. Am I boring you?"

Ezekiel sat up with a start. "No, sir!"

Jenkins frowned and walked over to the boy. He was still blinking and trying to focus when the old man reached him. Jenkins lifted Ezekiel's chin and looked at him. He turned the thief's head to scrutinise the scratch on his cheek.

"How did you get this?" Jenkins demanded.

"Fight," muttered Ezekiel. "Don't do punchy."

"The thief gave you this scratch?"

"Yep."

"With her nails?"

"Yep."

Jenkins pressed a hand to the boy's forehead. He drew back almost as fast, cursing in a language Ezekiel had never heard before. Cursing in any language is easy enough to recognise, if done with enough enthusiasm, with the possible exception of German. Jenkins was definitely cursing. Ezekiel was vaguely aware of being lifted up, and the world started to blur around him. He passed out.

XXXX

Jenkins laid Ezekiel down on the bed in the first aid room. Magical injuries could produce very physical symptoms, so the room was well stocked, even down to the surgical level. It wasn't something any of them ever wanted to have to do, but if it was needed it was there. Colonel Baird had already had more than one set of sutures to sew, and one bullet to remove.

Jenkins clipped a pulse monitor on Ezekiel's finger and began setting up a saline drip. There was no telling what millennium old virus was currently attacking the boy's modern day immune system. It had had hours to incubate and spread, now it was starting to take its toll. He had seen many pandemics and epidemics in his long life, some that lay dormant for days, others that took over almost immediately, but if this one got out it would be a plague. Nobody had the antibodies to fight it. Not now.

A movement from the bed brought his eyes down from the drip to the recumbent form there. The influx of fluids was already working its way through Ezekiel's system, counteracting at least one effect of the fever. The young man's eyes fluttered and a hand flailed towards the drip line. Jenkins grabbed it.

"No, that stays where it is," he said firmly. "You need that."

"Dun like needles," slurred Ezekiel.

"Everyone's a critic," sighed Jenkins. "Lie still, Mr Jones. Everything is under control."

"Tired."

"I know," murmured the old man. "You caught a bug. You need to give yourself time to fight it. Sleep now, I'll be here when you wake."

"Yessir," came the semiconscious response as sleep overtook him once more.

Jenkins leant over and checked the boy's breathing and heart rate, then grabbed cleaning fluids and hurried back to the main office. The chalice was easiest to clean, the vial only slightly trickier. He locked both away in airtight glass cases in the Library just to be on the safe side. Everything that Ezekiel had touched had to be scrubbed. One fit, healthy young man might survive whatever this was. He certainly had a better chance than four exhausted adults. He checked in on Ezekiel when he was done, returning the cleaning equipment to it's cupboard, then hurried off to his own rooms to shower and change. It was unlikely that he, in his semi-immortal state, would catch anything, but he could still be a carrier. He left the washing machine on its hottest wash and hurried back to his patient.

Ezekiel's temperature had risen, although with blue medical gloves on it was difficult to tell by how much. He took a reading with a digital thermometer and recorded it. He was torn between letting the fever burn itself out, and the virus with it, and trying to bring the boy's temperature down. He had no frame of reference here. He had been in Sweden somewhere around about the time in question, but not for long. There hadn't been any recent pestilence reported to him while he was there. If there had been any after he left, he would never have heard. That was assuming the disease was entirely medical, of course. A millennium in a dragon's lair, hosted by a probably magically empowered thief prolonging her life with the nectar of the gods, literally, drunk from an enchanted chalice could cause any number of magical mutations in an organism as small as a virus. And it only took one.

He heard the doors of the office swing open and walked over to lock the first aid room door. He should have made a sign, or left a note, but he couldn't risk passing on any infection through the paper. He grimaced. He had Ezekiel's cell phone. He could call them on that if need be.

Jenkins looked down at the young Librarian's satchel, sitting in a forlorn heap below the bed. He would have to do something about that. It would be a carrier too, possibly. He wondered about the car and the dive gear that the boy had used to retrieve the chalice and vial. He had been back here before he had shown any symptoms. Did that mean they were in the clear? He searched his memory. Was a virus infectious while the host remained asymptomatic? It could be. He thought of Mary Mallon and all the suffering she had caused. Granted there had been some magical interference there too but...

The handle of the door rattled.

"Jenkins!" Flynn's voice shouted to the Library in general. "Jenkins! The first aid room's locked!"

"I locked it, Mr Carson," Jenkins called though, relieved to see Ezekiel wince at the sudden noise. "The first aid room is out of bounds for the moment."

"Are you in there?" Flynn's voice rose in pitch. "What's going on?"

"What do you need, Librarian?" Jenkins asked. "If it is serious, I suggest a hospital."

"How exactly do we explain a magically invoked chemical burn acquired two minutes ago in Nepal to an ER in America?" Flynn appealed to the locked door.

"Training exercise," returned Jenkins. "I suggest you use the Colonel's NATO credentials again."

"Oh, right," the Librarian had the decency to sound sheepish. "I should have thought of that."

"Give Colonel Baird my best."

"How...?"

"You were right," Jenkins explained. "You should have thought of that."

"Of course."

Hurrying feet began to disappear down the corridor, then halted and returned.

"Why are you in there, Jenkins?" Flynn inquired, curiosity overcoming haste.

"Time enough for that on your return," countered Jenkins smoothly.

"Of course."

The hurrying feet faded.

"'Sthat Flynn?" Ezekiel's voice murmured, breaking the silence.

"He's fine," Jenkins reassured him, lifting the boy's head to let him take a sip of water. "Nothing he can't handle."

"Flynn's awesome," agreed the wavering voice. "Dun tell 'im said so."

"I believe I can safely promise that," quipped Jenkins. "How are you feeling?"

"Cold," came the definite reply. "Really cold."

Jenkins nodded. That much was par for the course. "Anything else?"

"Sore," Ezekiel groaned. "Everywhere's bruised."

"It just feels that way," Jenkins assured him. "Headache?"

"Splitting," he answered, wincing at his own attempt to nod. "Light hurts."

Jenkins got up and switched the main lights off. He returned to his chair in pitch darkness and sat down, flicking the switch on the desk lamp beside him and turning it away from the bed. He looked over to the patient. Ezekiel had drifted back into a dream, his lips forming soundless words and his eyes moving behind his eyelids. Jenkins leant over to take another temperature reading. There would be a lot of explaining to do once Flynn and the others returned, and they would definitely be returning as soon as they had been released from whichever emergency room the door had taken them to. He looked down at the liquid crystal numbers on the thermometer and his frown deepened.

"I sincerely hope we can explain it to him together."