Credits: Thanks to BlueTrillium, who beta-reads for this story and others, and puzzled out a decent title for this chapter.
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Chapter 15: Purge
When Ashre woke, it was to semi-darkness, a moist velvet tongue on her face, and persistent whining. Unease quickly replaced exasperation, because Ronan was right—something was wrong.
She took inventory, trying to characterize the wrongness. Her head—no, her whole body—felt heavy, as if the hours she'd slept had passed as minutes. It was a little difficult to think. Her throat felt raw, and it took her a while to muster enough saliva to swallow. One moment found her entertaining the idea of pushing off her covers, the next she felt the urge to huddle further under them. She could not tell if she was hot, or cold, and the ends of her fingers seemed to buzz faintly.
Several curses sprang to mind, but remained in thought only. Glocia and one of the Twins—probably Zena, but she couldn't see which side of her mouth the mole was on—were still asleep.
She decided to go to the kitchen for water, and to warn Gaya that she was about to have an invalid on her hands. A fever this early in the morning was a bad sign.
Gaya was not surprised by Ashre's news—based on her muttering and tutting, she'd been expecting it since the morning before. While Ronan ate and did his business in the garden, the Gray Bird woman provided Ashre with tea and bread, which did not stay down, then a weak broth, which did. After rousting her sister and Glocia from the master bedroom, Gaya checked the Kilahb girl's limbs and torso for rashes, then bundled her back into bed with another blanket and an assortment of cushions stuffed behind her back, swearing they would help with the pressure building behind her cheekbones.
She got up twice during the day to use the chamber pot, blow her nose, and swallow some water. Ronan curled up beside her or stretched out at her feet. She had to suppose the fact that he wasn't asking for anything meant someone had provided it while she slept.
The second time, she came back to consciousness from a hazy memory. What was it? The heaviness in her skull had bloomed into an ache, so now thinking wasn't just hard—it hurt.
"Our Serber protected our barks* from storms and brigands—"
"But the sea clans only have one bark each!"
"Hushshhh!"
"…The ones that stop in Tazasina have one bark each, Ash-i-re. A few of the more southern clans—their Serbers are powerful enough to guard two, three, maybe even four ships at once. Our Serber guarded three—from storms, attack, and disease too. The Plague would never have hurt our clan so badly if we still had him. None of ours drowned, because our Serber warned us if anyone fell overboard, and would slow the barks down to keep from leaving them behind. Even the shallowest rocks did not scratch our hulls—that's what my great-grandmother told me…"
Before returning to her cot, Ashre dug into the bottom of her knapsack and finally came out with a disc-like, six-sided pendant on a chain. She turned it this way and that, watching the familiar blue-to-green play of light in the dark triangular stone set into its center. She'd worn it most of her life, but hadn't missed it since she chose to put it away with her Clan clothes. It wasn't as if the amulet had ever protected her—she wouldn't have believed that their Serber ever existed if not for the feeling she got when the sea clans came visiting.
She put the chain around her neck and crawled into bed. It couldn't help, but couldn't hurt either. The patterns of the lacquer-filled etchings on the setting were familiar under her fingertips as she drifted back to sleep.
XVXVXVXVXVXV
Market District Guard Station
Jul Hirza Aevin didn't know whether he wanted to laugh or howl. He settled, as usual, for grumbling loudly. Grumbling didn't have to be happy or sad, angry or pleased—it could be a mix, like silver linings and backhanded compliments.
Three of his guards were ill—the Kilahb Girl was bedridden. This meant that Jul was short one regular baton, soon to be two. It also meant he didn't have to deal with his sensibilities over putting the female infant in harm's way.
Not a single one of his regular guards had faced the intolerable levels of harassment and danger they had before Izark and company stepped in. In three days he'd have another batch of recruits to torture—er, train, and he was interested to see how the 'travelling warrior's' recent activities affected the demographics of the next trial. However—
There was a message on his desk. Among accounts of several fairly disturbing crimes that had taken place yesterday—which he had already directed to their proper recipients—there were a few lines informing him that one of the thief lords had likely hired a poisoner. If they didn't catch the man quickly, the coming trial might very well end in tragedy.
"Sergeant, either start talking in a way I can understand or quiet down," Sigurad demanded, filing some maps into their drawer. "I feel like I'm in the room with one of those giant swordcats you hear about from the west."
Jul sat back with a huff. "How would you go about apprehending a poisoner?"
"What?"
"Yesterday, Wei met a poisoner at the Roc's Egg. Izark, Katarina and he have been searching for him, but they think he has some kind of sorcery that helps him hide, and the seer that corroborated Wei's account is now out of commission—her Sight tends to run away with her." The old soldier shifted irritably. Sitting, standing—it made no difference. His leg hurt. "In Gilenee, there were few enough people on the fief that we could keep track of faces. There was a professional taster, for all the good he did—most of the house staff liked the family, and did not tolerate suspicious people meddling in the supplies—"
"I'm not surprised. Everyone hates poisoners."
"My point," Jul growled, "is that I know how to catch someone trying to slip pit-acid into the wine or fissure briar onto the fire. I can stop a poisoned blade or needle. I don't know how to catch someone who could fill, say, a city square with toxic powder and then scurry off."
"Tell everyone."
"Eh?"
Sigurad crossed the room and sat down across from Jul, unceremoniously dragging a piece of parchment paper from a stack and grabbing for the inkwell. "Tell everyone. Do we have a name for this poisoner? A face? And you said he has magic…" He drew a rough rectangle in the top three-quarters of the paper. In the bottom quarter, he drew a slashing, jagged mark with small fine slashes crossing it, then a four pointed star with intersecting lines, like two diamonds overlaying each other. Pictograms—older than the Torakhan system by millennia, and nearly universal to the Western Continent. Running from Gilenee, Jul had seen the first carved into rock or wood to warn of bad water—fissure briar, poison. The second was hung over the shops and stalls of fortunetellers and other self-employed sorcerers—magic.
"Wei got a name—Radiak—and he gave a description to Mulis," the Sergeant named one of the artists the District employed for portraits. He hesitated, then asked, "Do we need to fund a reward?"
"No," the senior guard replied, busily scratching what passed for a name into the space next to the symbols. "Have one of the seers look for him—I'd recommend Veraki—but otherwise just get Izark off the streets for a day or two. I'm telling you, everybody hates poisoners. Anyone who hires poisoners is considered about as trustworthy as a triple-edged dirk**. We put these up everywhere—Market, Cerise, even up the hill…" He indicated the pictogram for poison. "Anybody sees this, they'll find someone who can read the name for them. Even if they just know the guy from the picture, they'll take it to anyone they think needs to know. If someone knows who hired him, they'll raise the alarm that the employer can't be trusted, either. The thief lord who bought this Radiak in the first place will have to cut him loose if he wants to save face—otherwise, even his closest flunkies will abandon him. Maybe we can't arrest the poisoner, but we can make it impossible for him to turn a profit in Selena Guzena."
"…Get those scratch marks to Mulis for the sketches and some better drafts, then get those to anyone else who can make decent copies. You know the city better than I do—have them placed where the people that spread information will see them."
Sigurad grinned, and started for the door. The Guard Sergeant called after him, "And we need to get you pen lessons! If you want my job, the secretaries have to be able to read what you write!"
Backhanded insults had their place, too.
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"Aaand I think—yes, here's the last of them!" Rottenina proclaimed with relief, brandishing a fusty clay bottle she'd just clawed out of the back of a small wall cabinet in Zena's workroom. They had finished cleaning the mirrors and other tools a few days ago—now, it was time to remove the ruined supplies and furniture.
Seeing that the wax seal on the little jug was still intact, Barago offered the square basket reserved for salvaged potions to Rottenina, who slotted the jug in beside its brethren. "Take them down to the—"
"Kitchen. Empty the ones with busted seals and clean all of 'em off, right? Here Agol, gimme the other one," the burly man said, plucking the basket full of broken-sealed bottles away from his brother-in-arms before sauntering out the doorway.
Rottenina took a breath of clean-ish air, stepped of the stool she'd been using, and looked around. Hands now free, the Rienkan ex-mercenary went to wipe them on his breeches, looked at the amount and consistency of grunge that would come off, grimaced, and reached for a cloth instead. Across the room, somewhere in the depths under the main work-counter, Noriko sneezed. Meanwhile, Yuri Ta—or rather, Tachiki Yuri was perched on a high stool, industriously scrubbing caked-on grime off a shelf that had a moment ago been inhabited by more than its fair share of leaky potions.
At a small table—the top of which, at least, was clean—Geena and little Akane were occupied with a bar of mottled brown mineral balanced on a conical fulcrum. "Geena, how is it coming?"
One hand on her medium, the 10-year-old frowned in Rottenina's direction. "I think Auntie could use it, but the energy's all scrambled up—it draws in and pushes out in all different directions. It should flow in a loop, and this end should point south unless another strong force pulls it away." She explained for Akane's benefit.
"So it is a [magnet]!" Akane declared triumphantly.
"Maybe—we call it a power compass. Geena, do you think you could get it back in order?" Rottenina asked.
Geena shook her head. "I can sense things, but I can't move them."
"I understand. It's the same for me." The black-haired seer scrubbed at the edge of the kerchief covering her head, trying to push it back off her forehead as she reflected. "We'll give it to Miss Zena before she leaves—there's a man in charge of adjusting the instruments up there. He'll know how to fix it."
The blind child looked equally thoughtful for a moment, then smiled beatifically. "Yes, you're right."
Huh. I wish my Sight did that. So far, all Rottenina's gift of 'prophecy' did was drag her through the current life of every creature within a ten-mile radius, spreading her awareness so thin that it would take days to recollect it…
Behind her eyes, a flash of bright orange feathers—each filament and barbule—warned her to drop that line of thought, now.
"Plegh!" Noriko popped out from under the counter, hair and clothing turned ashy with dust. "That cupboard's done. What's next?"
"This one." Rottenina patted the cabinet she'd just finished emptying.
Noriko grimaced, tallying her fifth excursion into dark recesses. She was already covered in dust, anyway. "Okay—and after that?"
"Another sweep, then preparations for painting."
Agol glanced up from working something oily-brown and apparently quite sticky out from between his fingers. "Those aren't four-person tasks, and Barago will be back to help move the furniture out. I can handle the sweeping, and wash the walls." He grinned at the children. "Anyone interested in holding the dustpan for me?"
Geena expression twisted into something that was at once a pout and a smile. She was reaching that age, Rottenina realized with mild shock. Funny how easy it was to forget that 'little Geena Haas' was subject to the same growth and development as the next child—was not, in fact, an enlightened blind crone in an adolescent body.
Akane, however, looked inordinately pleased at the invitation.
"I will wash the shelves and the cupboards," Yuri volunteered from her perch. Noriko's mother had yet to relax the peculiarly correct speech of someone still too unfamiliar with the language to use contractions, or dispense with articles. Yuri still occasionally changed words around and dropped articles (ones she wasn't supposed to), but several days' worth of tips and corrections from Noriko and Clairgeeta had improved the measure of both Yuri and Chiyako's speech, and added a bit of a lilt to Yuri's. Daisuke's grammar was—well, still broken, but coming together.
Noriko was already standing on the stool Rottenina had occupied in front of the wall cabinet, waist-deep in the lowest shelf. Cheerful incredulity filled her voice when she called, "There are cobwebs on the cobwebs back here!"
Rottenina huffed a laugh through the chagrin. "We ah—we didn't finish spring cleaning that year. Vandalism and—you know."
"Mmm. But it sounds like you can start painting tomorrow, right? I'll help cover what can't be removed after I shake out these clothes—then, I'd like to visit Ashre. I think—"
Whatever came after that was lost to Rottenina as the second item she was resolved not to think about reasserted itself in her mind. Disease illness sick Plague infection pestilence Immigrants Death contagion Quarantines graves upon the graves—
"Don't."
She realized later that her voice hadn't echoed strangely on the word, but that Agol had spoken it at almost the same moment, in almost the same tone of urgency.
Startled, Noriko hauled herself out of the cupboard and looked down at the white knuckled hand fisted into her skirt. "Um…?"
The black-haired seer made a conscious effort to loosen her grip. "I—I think it's better if you don't, um, visit Ashre. Just-let her rest. Miss Gaya won't neglect her." She paused, thinking fast. "I need to go to Market for plaster, and paint—and I might as well pick up some groceries while I'm down there. C-could you come with me and—um, help carry? And—before that, could you work on the de Gilenee's bed clothes for me? That way, they'll have all of tomorrow to dry. I can ask Miss Gaya if she needs anything for Ashre, and we'll pass the Guard Station on the way back—you did say you were curious about it, I remember…Oh, maybe your brother would like to come too—" Grasping at straws, Rottenina began a literal and figurative laundry list of chores that needed doing, pointedly ignoring the puzzlement on Yuri's face, and Akane's. She did see a muscle jump in Agol's jaw, the slump of Geena's shoulders, and the quiet, tired understanding that came into Noriko's face as she scoured her memory for anything the Islanders could do that didn't involve bedside visits.
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The Next Day, a few hours before dawn
Ashre jolted awake with a chilly hand leaching heat away from her forehead and a smell like twenty kinds of medicine fumigating her poor clogged sinuses and no Ronan. Disoriented, she flinched back into the pillows.
Calmly, the hand withdrew, and after the moment it took her eyes to adjust to flickering of the lamp, Ashre relaxed too.
Actually, between the two of them she suspected that Izark looked the more agitated. The days she'd spent watching the people in Zena's hospitality had taught her a few tells for each and all. Izark's eyes glittered like obsidian chips in the dim light, and there was a careful blankness about his mouth and brows that she'd seen him level at angry drunks, cutthroats, and future in-laws.
That, and he was moving too cautiously, like Ronan's wilder cousins the clans sometimes encountered on the road. The feral canines tended to watch them pass, torn between the temptation of the herds and the threat of the shepherds—instincts hackling at the territorially intrusion while years of conditioning argued for tolerance.
The black-haired warrior was like that—balanced perfectly between attack and retreat.
She risked a look around. At some point, her little corner of the master bedroom had been poled over and draped with sheets—the ones from the master bed, unless she was mistaken. Outside the makeshift tent, the sharp silhouette of her dog had its nose to the floor and was occupied with—something. She couldn't see it, or smell anything besides whatever was steaming out of the bowl near her pillow.
"Oil of Coz," Izark supplied in response to the skeptical glance she turned on the bowl. "To help with your breathing." He held out a tray laden with another steaming bowl, this one containing a collection of weeds swimming in a murky broth. "Your fever's come down some. Drink."
The warning stare he directed at her was unnecessary—one simply did not repay the level of care she'd received from these people with spoiled child antics. Ashre drank the broth, which was surprisingly palatable underneath the incongruous scents that assaulted her nose. She even tried to choke down the green bits, but Izark took the tray away after the first half-hearted, squelchy nibble.
"Just try to keep the broth down. Everyone I've ever spoken to about it agrees it's the water that's most important."
"You've studied healing?" Serber, but her voice sounded like shale on a washboard.
"More than some."
"So that's why you're here now? What time is it, anyway?"
"Early."
As opposed to late? The Clan girl was fittingly miffed, but also a little apprehensive. Somehow the warrior's non-answers were even more brusque than usual, and the lack of implied snark was—ominous. "Is it that bad?" she asked.
"You mean the fever?" There was a long, loaded pause before Izark sighed. "No, probably not. Gaya couldn't find any rashes on you. A couple officers are having similar complaints, so it's more likely something you picked up here and not something you brought. You were worn out and underfed, so it's almost expected that you would get sick."
Ashre nodded. No rashes meant no Plague—which, for all its misery, was easily identified, even in the earliest stage. Something local—well, it meant that they had some idea of how to treat it, at least. The sore throat and rapid fever could indicate that her body knew what it was dealing with, so—
Wait.
The Islanders. Ashre looked at Izark, and now she saw his brooding quiet for what it was—frustration; a directionless, helpless anger that he was visibly working against lashing her with.
The Kilahb girl wasn't in serious danger, nor any of the Mainlanders. But the Islanders—there were so many horrible stories about entire families decimated; shiploads of immigrants reduced to single individuals by blistering fevers, racking coughs, and maiming boils that the peoples they contracted them from experienced as a passing chill, the sniffles, perhaps a sprinkling of telling scars.
Of its own accord, her hand crept back to her amulet.
"What are you doing in here?" She rasped out. "Get out. If you get sick, then Noriko—" The rest devolved into strangled coughing. Anxiously, she thrust an arm over her mouth.
"I won't get sick."
Cue the cracking and grating, but Ashre managed to retort, "Said every Plague victim ever."
"No—I have never caught an illness, or had a diseased wound."
"I had an uncle who was never ill—then he turned forty-three and started shitting blood."
"…I worked in a Quarantine when I was your age. Bloody shit was one of the safer things I came in contact with."
"…That's a bad joke."
"…Which part?"
"Why were you in a Quarantine if you never caught the Plague?"
"…Why do some people throw themselves off high places?"
The young Clanswoman felt a little dizzy. To think—seven days ago, she'd had no idea how right she'd been when she called him mad.
Probably reading her expression, Izark nodded. "It was a low point, and in my defense, no one would have really mourned. I'm well past self-martyrdom these days." To prove it, he skewered her with a look. "I'm acting as go-between here so that you will touch nothing and no one that they might come in contact with." That includes Gaya and everyone else. If something happens and you have to be around the others, tie a cloth around your face. You've got this room to yourself, so do what you need to get well as fast as you can. There's a bell," he indicated a brass rattle in the plethora of cloths and vessels that had somehow collected beside her cot while she was unconscious, "if you need something, and I'll check in on you before I leave tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?"
"Jul gave me the day off—also, you're on jail duty after you get better." Izark stood, and turned toward the opening in the little makeshift tent.
"Wait."
The warrior looked back over his shoulder and raised an eyebrow.
"What did you mean, I have this room to myself?"
He tilted his head—a neutral acknowledgement. "You were dead to the world yesterday afternoon, but Jeida's family moved up to the Palace. Since she has quarters there, Zena went with them to try and ease the negotiations along. Gaya's using the guestroom they left. What—" Izark started back toward the cot, horrified and flabbergasted, because tears were spilling down the young Kilahb's face. "Alright, what's wrong?"
Dimly Ashre was aware that the warrior sounded very close to panic. She pulled the covers over her head. "I'm fine—just…Just leave me alone. Please." One long moment later, she heard the tent flap rustle, the splash of a washbasin, then the clunk of the door closing.
Another moment passed which held nothing but the noise of Ronan thoroughly cleaning the bowl he'd been given and Ashre's own unsteady breaths. Folding back the covers, she let out a quiet, quavering whistle.
Then Ronan was through the tent flap and nosing at her cheeks, wagging his tail and expressing his joy that she was awake and wanting his company in about ten other ways. The girl wrapped her arms around her partner's neck, buried her face in his thick oily ruff, and sobbed.
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Author's Note: This started as a 'what happens when physically overworked person gets mentally stressed and depressed while in a new place with its own set of local bugs and colds'—and I realized that Noriko and family could potentially contract and die from something totally commonplace (well, actually I was already thinking that disease was one of the dangers that Izark feels obligated to protect Noriko from—we see this a couple times in the manga). Contrariwise, Noriko's family could have transmitted a superbug. Thus I spent way too much time rifling the internet for info on infectious diseases, herd immunity, early forms of vaccination (called variolation or inoculation), epidemics, pandemics, and so-called 'uncontacted tribes'. Fascinating—if gruesome and horribly tragic—stuff that makes one appreciate vaccination and antibiotics, since it was often the secondary bacterial infections that killed small-pox victims if the virus didn't.
Yes, the last (and impractically virulent) manifestation of the Blue Scar Plague hit the Western Continent about 8 years ago—it killed Rottenina's and Anita's families, destroyed or destabilized a huge swath of Islander and Mainland societies, then subsided almost completely due to being rather too quick at killing its victims (between the virus and the complications thereof, very few people actually survived to carry the notorious 'blue scars'). A couple years prior, it did for the majority of Agol's family and Geena's vision. Suffice to say that everybody who lived through that is justifiably paranoid where infectious diseases are concerned.
*Bark—no, not like a dog's bark, though I realized the pun shortly after choosing the word. In this case, a bark or barque is a kind of sailing ship with three or more masts and a distinct rigging plan that I don't fully understand so won't get into. Alternatively, the ancient Egyptian barque is the word assigned to ceremonial and practical artifacts and depictions of the type of sailing vessel that seems to have been absolutely crucial to religion and transport throughout the civilization's history.
**There are legends about certain types of weapons being unofficially banned during the World Wars—mainly barbed, serrated and multi-edged close quarters weapons. Soldiers that were caught with them by their enemies could expect a brutal death. While barbed and serrated weapons create particularly painful and traumatic injuries, knives with more than two edges make gaping wounds that bleed profusely and healed very slowly—they were a choice stealth weapon because they could allow one to kill quickly and quietly, with the emphasis on kill. The unspoken punishment for carrying such a weapon was partly in accordance with the 'superfluous injury or unnecessary suffering' clause of the Geneva Convention, partly the fact that carrying a weapon like a triangular bayonet marked you as a stealth killer, and too dangerous to live (get them before they get you).
About the 'Power Compass'-I was thinking about a world where magic is science and science is magic—and realized that all those power fields and pocket dimensions and whatnot have the potential to annihilate magnetic navigation as we know it. Therefore, people might be aware of magnetic compasses, but couldn't use them the way we do.
Gaya and Zena, who are supposedly identical twins, are fairly easy to tell apart in the manga based on the text, since everyone is always addressing each other by name anyway (a narrative technique, especially in graphic novels with ensemble casts. In the written word, you can just state whom is addressing whom.), so I never paid all that much attention to their character designs. Recently, though, I realized that Hakawa-sensei drew an obvious indicator to tell the twins apart without the text—the moles on their upper lips. While Gaya has her mole on the left side, Zena has *hers* on the right side. Obvious, yes, but only if you're paying attention.
There are a number of possibly canon and/or fanon conclusions to be drawn from this. Genetically speaking, it can be assumed that Gaya and Zena are 'mirror twins'. Mirror twins are a subset of identical twins who, probably due to the later timing of the splitting of the single original embryo, exhibit *reversed asymmetry*—that is, they are opposite handed, have the same dental structure but on the opposite side, etc. One twin may even have the position of their internal organs reversed from the usual (yes, this is a real thing, and not just in twins). Personality wise, it is often *perceived* by outside observers that mirror twins are also opposite in this way—one twin will be outgoing and adventurous, the other introverted and a homebody, and on, and on. This probably has more to do with the identity balancing act that twins growing up together are forced to play, but I can personally attest that my second cousins who are mirror twins really do have this 'oppositeness' thing going on—not in interests and abilities, per se, but in social interaction, handedness, lead-taking, etc.—outside their temperaments, it was really hard to tell them apart until Paul grew a beard—or is it Jack who—? XD
In divination, moles on the face are said to reveal points of one's character, health, and fate. These predictions differ *wildly* depending on the website you reference, but a nice one which addresses the upper lip mole on either side says:
"This mole predicts a good future, full of food and drinks. Also, it symbolizes fame and recognition."
Which matches up fairly well with Gaya and Zena, respectively.
Maculomancy or Moleomancy is said to have originated with Hippocrates, while there is a separate school of Chinese Face Reading that also deals with facial marks.
Finally, the French Rococo practice of wearing a mouche (meaning fly), a black fabric paste-on patch, is first recorded in Ancient Rome, when people used patches made of leather to disguise pockmarks and scars as "olives of the body"- yep, beauty marks (though since flawless skin was the ideal, this was a last resort kind of thing). When smallpox was rampant in Europe and people were wearing thick white lead-based makeup to either achieve that wealthy and housebound look or *fill in the scars* (Another theory suggests that TB was so common that looking waiflike became fashionable) they also started using fabric patches—silk, velvet, taffeta…to cover blemishes. These became high fashion in the 18th century, and like many things developed a symbolic language—the shape and placement of beauty marks both real and fake said something (often intentionally) about one's character, politics, or relationship status.
Despite their appearances often being called 'scary' (read 'ugly') Gaya and Zena both wear jewelry and fairly fashionable clothing—this indicates a self-worth and appreciation for fashion that might prompt makeup usage, with the beauty mark side choice as a kind of inside identity distinction.
In my own personal head-cannon, though, the moles are genetic, and their oppositeness is due to mirror twinning. If Hikawa-sensei was saying anything about Gaya and Zena through the moles, it was probably in line with the Chinese school, which sometimes refers to a mole on either side of the upper lip as an Eating God Mole and promises good food and good times to anyone who has one—often at little to no expense!