Chapter 21

I regretted incinerating my relationship once I had time to think about it, and I paced my small dormitory that whole night. I felt hollow and ugly when dawn finally came, a familiar, post-call feeling. In marked contrast to my grim mood, it was one of those fall days where the color is so precise that it seems like the refraction of the world has been turned up. I sat for a while on the terrace outside the university library, drinking tea and feeling totally stuck. From a purely pragmatic perspective, there was now no one to protect me from Martein if he started asking me questions again. Other than Mesmen, there was no one that I could turn to, and with each passing day I grew more convinced that I would never see Dilandau again.

As I stared across the common area feeling hopeless, I saw a huge figure come out of a building across the green and begin walking towards the new construction by the menagerie. There was no mistaking the dog man from the day that I lost Dilandau. His fur was the color of sand and honey, his long muzzle probably three inches across, long whiskers in three rows on either side. His garb was the pale blue of an orderly, and he was walking arm and arm with a woman who was obviously sick. She was tall and walked with a gait that made me immediately think that she had an issue with her nervous system. She jerkily brought her knees up too high, beating the whole of her long narrow foot on the ground with each step instead of rolling from heel to toe. She tottered stiffly from side to side, uncertain of her balance. Her hair was a short, ashy blonde, thin tendrils curling around her ears.

I stood up so quickly that I bumped the table, causing my mug of tea to fall to the tiled patio with a startling crash. Some of the sorcerers sitting around me turned to stare as I rushed across the green. The dog-man's attention was so fixed on the girl that I slowed some distance away, aware that interrupting them would be most unwelcome. He walked with exaggerated patience, encouraging her, holding her hand carefully in his own massive paws. He saw only her, and stared at her with round, adoring eyes the color of chocolate. They moved between two buildings and entered a small courtyard garden where the beast man set her carefully down on a stone bench, where she pointed and cooed wordlessly. Their contentment at enjoying this beautiful fall day together was so complete that I didn't have it in me to ruin it by badgering him about Dilandau, charging into their peaceful retreat unwanted.

I watched the building where I had seen the dog man and the girl obsessively over the next week. I had almost given up hope and was cursing myself for not interrupting him, when I saw the dog-man again. This time, I would find out what happened to Dilandau; I sprinted across the green towards him. "Hey!" I gasped, running to catch up with him. I grabbed his arm and he finally turned to look down at me. His face was huge in size and completely impassive. He said nothing, only looked down at me, like I should be so impertinent to touch him. After seeing how tender he had been with the girl last week, I was surprised that he was so cold.

"Dilandau. You know where he is," I said, still catching my breath.

"Yes."

"I've been looking for him. I'm Sarah, I was on the Vione with him."

"So, it was your decision to bring him back here," he growled, sounding sad and disappointed.

"Well, um, yes. He was having a psychotic episode. I didn't know how to fix him." He said nothing and continued walking. The complete lack of facial clues made our short conversation even more disorienting. Did he want me to follow him? He had a long, stiff stride and keeping up with his was difficult. The dog man never paused to see if I was following. He seemed to steel himself before we entered the building; I saw his haunches quiver and his tail twitch towards his legs. I opened my mouth to say something, but he glared at me, so I shut up again.

We wound our way downstairs, going at least 2 floors below ground. It was cold and dark, the hallways without ornament. There were hospital beds, boxes of old lights, and IV poles pushed against the walls of the corridors. The dog man pushed through a pair of double doors, into a larger hallway with three doors on each side. Four sorcerers were clustered around a window built into the wall. The window was reinforced with chicken wire. My guide's fur on the back of his neck rose and he pulled his ears back, lifting his lips into a slight snarl, his eyes so wide that the white showed all the way around the deep brown irises. A few of the sorcerers backed away to give us space in front of the window.

"Are you sure that you can handle it this time Jajuka? You can wait outside," one of the sorcerers said to us.

"I will be fine," Jajuka said.

Dilandau was strapped down to a table, with leather bands buckled around his bare chest, his abdomen, and binding each arm and leg to the metal table. He had an IV in his left antecubital fossa and some sort of tan cap fitted over his head. Wires attached the cap to a machine on the wall. There was one sorcerer in the room with him, adjusting the levers and knobs on the machine. Dilandau's face was gaunt and slicked with sweat. His eyes were tightly shut, his face wrinkled in a grimace. He thrashed against the straps once, but they didn't move.

"They say that this should be his last treatment," the beast man said in a low, gruff voice.

"What are they doing to him?" I asked, my voice wavering a little bit.

"You shall see."

"Are you ready?" one of the sorcerers on my side of the glass asked into a telephone attached to a wall. The young sorcerer in the room made two more adjustments and left the room.

"I tried a slightly different setting. If I don't blow his memory it should do the trick." Jajuka growled at the young sorcerer's words, who scowled back at him.

"Charging." Now that Dilandau was alone in the room, he began to squirm on the table, tightening all of his muscles and showing his teeth.

"Charged."

"Deliver the charge."

"Charge delivering."

Dilandau immediately began to have a seizure. His eyes flew open, unseeing, and his head rotated to the right. His muscles then began to move in fine, tight jerks. One of the sorcerers placed her hand on the door, in her other a loaded syringe. The sorcerer behind her had an intubation blade and bag. After about thirty seconds, Dilandau's movements stilled and he began to breath deeply. The sorcerer relaxed her grip on the door and slowly pulled it open. Instead of injecting him, they loosened the leather straps. Jajuka went in and I followed. Jajuka grabbed a towel from a tray beside the bed and wiped Dilandau's face.

"Jajuka," Dilandau whispered thickly. He spat blood on the floor of the exam room.

"I am here."

"Good. What happened to me?"

"They gave you another treatment, sir."

"MMhmm." Dilandau surveyed the room like a drunk, slowly and without comprehension. Confusion is common after seizures. He would clear soon.

Jajuka tried to help Dilandau put on a soft grey shirt but Dilandau slapped his paw away. Dilandau jumped off the table and swayed for just a moment, regaining his equilibrium without Jajuka's outstretched paw. He fumbled through the door, throwing it open with enough force to send it banging against the other wall. The sorcerers flinched. He stumbled down the hall with Jajuka just behind and me trailing even further back. He stopped with his hands braced on a window frame, his head lolling. He threw up, pink spit stringing like a spider web from his mouth. He wiped his mouth on the back of his shirt sleeve and stood up. He looked at Jajuka and when his eyes took me in they scanned the full length of my body dumbly, without a trace of recognition.

"You remember this woman from before," Jajuka prompted quietly.

"Yeah." Dilandau nodded, though he seemed unsure. Jajuka narrowed his gaze at me to put as fine a point as he could on the fact that Dilandau did not know me anymore. It shouldn't have been a big deal, but even though I kept reminding myself that he was post-ictal, it bothered me tremendously that Dilandau didn't seem to remember me. He stumbled between Jajuka and myself, occasionally stopping at windows or looking down hallways. The huge relief that I had felt on seeing him alive was diminishing, Dilandau was alive, but at what cost? There was no evidence of his grace and frenetic intellect; he seemed lobotomized and I quickly became nauseated when I realized that these pseudo-medical, bloodless researchers may have done just that. I had been completely erased from his mind. I had arrived too late; Dilandau was gone. I had just made up my mind to mourn him, to add him to my mental roster of the dead when he leaned close to my ear and whispered, "Witch."