Chapter Thirty-One
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I closed my eyes and reached out to Taiz’lin. The dragon couldn’t tell me where either Ike or Lucas were. Taiz’lin didn’t seem concerned, but it irritated me. Maybe it’s exhaustion. I looked over at Delia on her fur on the other side of the hearth. She seemed asleep still. She’d been so exhausted after tryin’ to reach our last patient she couldn’t even speak.
Could the process harm us permanently? Hadn’t considered that worry before. Not likely, but if it could, would I stop? Less likely. Was there a limit to how much power, over a particular period of time, we should pull from the ethereal?
For a long moment I watched the man dabbin’ the damp cloth on his mate’s, his wife’s, forehead. He didn’t care about power or the ethereal. He just wanted her well. Hopefully later in the mornin’ Delia and I could better help the settler hen—woman. I listened to the voices of the older human children outside finishin’ chores. The two younger tots slept near their parents’ cot. They should have already been taken to the Hamlet. But now that the ghoul’s in the house, takin’ any of them to the Hamlet prolly isn’t wise.
But what difference? The ghoul’s already in the Hamlet.
I took a slow breath. A few more, even slower ones. Maybe my fears seemed to fade. Prolly forced, hopeful emotions I don’t deserve.
The sound of the door openin’ made me reopen my eyes. The glare of a brightenin’ sky peeked in. The fire was well stoked. The man still sat by his mate—wife. Rested one arm across her, head lyin’ on the edge of the pallet.
I nodded at the young bull and hen—boy and girl, who entered. Their faces seemed older than their years. Think it was the pool about the eyes. I felt a weight upon my chest. Three days. The woman had already been ill for three days before the family managed to catch the attention of a dragon flyin’ overhead.
I struggled to rise. The boy came to my aid. Made me feel like an ancient village elder to be helped up like that. The comparison didn’t bring a lick of humor. I looked over at the face of the boy’s mother. Her flesh sank into her bones. There was no color. I strode to her and felt her face. There was no fever. No life.
I groaned.
The boy gasped. The girl cried. The two younger ones went to the sister and the three grabbed at each other, the faces of the little ones plunged into the elder’s smock. The man woke and looked at me first. I shook my head, not wantin’ to know, but knowin’. The man jerked his attention back to the cot. He cupped his hand along her face. Remained motionless for a painfully-long moment, disregardin’ the weepin’ behind him. Perhaps he was sayin’ his good bye. Had a lot to say. Maybe apologize for.
If only we’d gotten here sooner.
It wouldn’t have mattered. The thought entered my mind as though it was another’s. But it wasn’t clear, like when I speak with one of the dragons. I turned. Delia looked at me unblinkin’.
“Why the power wouldn’t come,” she whispered. “Not because we were tired.”
“Ya don’t know that.”
“You don’t know it isn’t true.”
I shrugged. Never would know the truth. Only that there was another grave to dig. I clenched my hand, felt the piercin’ burn in my palm, yet healed from the pick, and my first grave diggin’. I wanted to escape. Why am I here? To impress a human that would move to the other side of the Range soon? And between healin’s, worry about a war?
My world had been simple two weeks ago. It was turned on edge, like a mug spillin’ its tea across the table. Makes no sense. Would I wake and find I’d been in a bad dream? Hopefully quickly. I tired of the plot.
I trudged to the meager fire, took the kettle, and added water into the side basin. I replaced the kettle, stooped to wash my face. The water was still icy cold. I splashed it into my face anyway, dabbed at it with the stained cloth hangin’ on the wall from a rusty nail. I felt no more awake. My palm burned the more, my fingers numbed by the frigid water. That is my life. Currently.
I waited by the door as the man finished consolin’ the children. The man was as eager to flee the emotion inside as I was. Outside, I breathed in deeply of the crisp air. The human shivered, and pushed his hands deeper into the pockets of his old coat. Stomped his feet a moment. A toenail poked out the top of his ragged boot. Its soles were prolly in worse shape. To say the family struggled was a gross understatement. There would be no new boots for the man anytime soon. No. The Hamlet needed to reach out, as they did for Delia. They would, if they were aware of the need.
I studied the dragon snugglin’ into a rolled ball near the trees, avoidin’ the mornin’ frost.
“I’ll spread the word,” he said.
I thanked him as I followed the human to the barn. There was no dairy cow for this family. Where one belonged, a chicken coop sat, to give the birds extra protection from the mountain’s many night prowlers. The human shivered again as he pulled two shovels and a pick from the wall.
Why’s it so cold? It should still be summer. I thought of the elevation this stake had to sit. Didn’t these folk have any common sense, tryin’ to live so high in the mountains? It was insane. The man had to have hoped to mine for gold in his spare time. But survivin’ took every minute of one’s time in the highlands, when the weather even permitted outdoor work.
I considered suggestin’ it, but discarded the idea. Everyone deserved their own dreams, and beliefs. I just hoped it didn’t kill the four younglings before the man decided it was time for a move.
The older boy joined us, takin’ one of the shovels. I knelt where the man indicated and swung the short-handled pick with one hand. The topsoil was nothing much more than a layer of pine needles. The three of us struggled through rock from then on, the two scoopin’ out what I loosened for them with the pick, after every dozen swings.
Another mornin’ spent digging a grave. Another palm peeled of its skin.
I experienced a pre-sight that startled me. I glared at the rough face of the man. If—more when—Delia and I took the children to the Hamlet, the man would run away, leave the children to whatever fate the community imparted.
I cleared my throat to keep from sobbin’. Perhaps it would be best for the four. The man looked incapable of carin’ for them alone. Another dilemma. Plague. War. A human woman sharin’ my cabin. A social conscience I’m not suited for. Ike would take the four on, or find them homes. They would likely be split up. I thought of how my own life changed, ostracized by my clan. It wasn’t necessarily for the worst. Made out well enough on my own. Maybe easier for a bull ogre, than these weakly, bone-thin human children.
Two stinkin’ hours it took to get a hole a mere four feet deep—like droppin’ a mine shaft through solid granite. We collected the body from the shanty home solemnly. I helped the man ease his wife’s body into the too-shallow grave. The children wept. The man collapsed upon the ground in grief. He had lost more than a mate. She had prolly been all that kept the family together.
When the grave was covered, I set my soiled hand on the man’s equally stained shoulder. “Until the plague is past, we’ll keep yar four in the Hamlet so we can deal more quickly with the ghoul, if it grasps them. The babes are hit the hardest.”
The man looked up through glassy eyes, swimmin’ with tears. The two littler ones’ cries grew louder. The elder girl hugged them tightly. The boy stepped up to his father, but the man didn’t embrace him. I placed my other hand on the lad’s shoulder, and the boy plowed his face into my chest. The tears ran freely for a full minute.
A tinglin’ sensation jolted me.
Remembered the phenomenon from years earlier.
The boy held a connection to the ethereal. Why hadn’t I noticed it earlier? Too many other distractions, watchin’ a soul shrivel up, a family crumble.
A curse or a blessin’—the lad’s connection? I still don’t know.
The farewell was brief. None of us found much to say. The four younglings with all their personal belongin’s, there weren’t many, crammed behind me and Delia, and the dragon launched. The screams turned into constant cries from the younger two.
I sensed the Hamlet wasn’t right for the four, and told Taiz’lin we needed to take them to the lair. They needed a carin’ shoulder for the moment. Gladys could provide that. Not that there aren’t other good folk in the growin’ village.
“I have a local errand,” Taiz’lin told me. “Better to get Iza for that flight.”
We met the queen in an open dell well south of the Hamlet. Irritated as usual, Iza complained about bein’ treated like a delivery mule. I didn’t engage her in conversation. Taiz’lin nuzzled her the whole time we were on the ground. Dragon bulls can be enormous suck ups. Which is a good thin’, considerin’.
His panderin’ prolly the only thin’ that kept her from threatenin’ to kill me. She does that a lot.
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