Carry On

by Celia Lake

  Elen nodded. “I have been given permission - Sister Florinda, two days ago - to reduce his evening potion. It’s a dull colour, sealed with purple wax, and it makes him lethargic. Muzzy-headed.” It seemed an imprecise word for an imprecise state of being, but it was also accurate. “For about twelve hours after he takes it, he is hard to rouse.”

  “And have you reduced it?”

  “The first time last night. This morning seemed a bit better, but it is hard to tell, given the variation day to day.”

  Rhoe nodded. “What else have you noticed?”

  Elen let out a breath, wondering how far to go with this. “From what I can tell, again, solely from observation, he was injured in an attack that had a magical component as well as the physical. I have only been here, and tending to him, for a month, but his physical injuries have largely healed. Some scarring, some areas of tightness or restriction, but nothing that should be so limiting.”

  “What makes you think there is an injury to the magic?”

  “Two things, ma’am.” Politeness couldn’t hurt. “First, that he is far more quickly exhausted than he should be. I am now permitted to take him out to the main garden, and we began yesterday beginning to rebuild his strength more deliberately, walking and resting, walking and resting.”

  “That is more your usual approach, then?”

  Elen nodded. “My background is in recovery from long illness, but of course, one does not improve by staying in bed once one can move around a bit.”

  Rhoe laughed at that. “Certainly not. What else?”

  This was the tricky part, then, but she’d known when she decided to arrange the pool for him, that it would come to this. She knew she’d need to explain at least some of it, with all the implications of poor care from others. “I feel there’s something tangled in his magic. Both that he is not recovering as you would expect but also the way he has reacted.”

  She hesitated. Many nurses, the ones who had a different approach to their chosen deity than she did, scoffed at this, but she thought perhaps Healer Rhoe would understand.

  Rhoe tilted her head, then gestured with one hand. Her magic nudged the door fully closed with a click, and a wave of her other hand lowered curtains from the top of the stained glass. The casual, easy use of that kind of magic made Elen realise there was a lot of power in this unassuming woman. “Something more confidential, then? I am a priestess before anything else, if that is a help.”

  It was and it wasn’t. It was good Elen knew where she stood. “Priestess to whom, ma’am?”

  The older woman laughed. “You are sharp. And careful. I approve. Belisama, the brightest one.” Her eyes twinkled, and Elen could have sworn that the charm lamps burned a little brighter. “You sound as if you need someone to talk to, that is not above you in the formal hierarchy.”

  When Elen hesitated, there was a little gesture. “An open offer. But I owe my duty to the waters, and to the light. I care about those in between, but I am not beholden to them.”

  Elen had no idea how one could live like that, without taking the people around you, especially their demands, into account. But here Rhoe was, apparently unheeding of the ways other people could fence her in. “You understand, ma’am, that that is quite unusual?” Daft, but Elen could scarcely say that.

  “I come from a good family, and they’ve backed me before, when it came to a power struggle. Probably will again.” There was the kind of supreme confidence of the aristocracy in that, and for a moment, it reminded her of how Roland looked at the world. “Probably will need to again, honestly, because I do tend to have opinions. But yes. Quite unusual. Might as well take advantage of it.”

  Elen was certain there was a catch here somewhere, but she couldn’t figure out what it was. And honestly, it was not as if she had many other options. She sucked in a breath and let it out. “I think something horrible happened to him, something he mostly doesn’t remember. It damaged his magic, and it is continuing to. I think they’ve been drugging him so far because he’s - damaged things with magic, in his sleep. Nightmares, maybe. I haven’t pressed him, but when I was at the Temple of Youth I saw similar things in the children.” It was accurate enough, and she had thought it a solid diversion from revealing what had happened.

  After taking a breath to resettle herself, she remembered to add, “When I first was introduced to him, his magic felt odd. You know how things are easier to see, the first time? It was like something was blocked up, a stagnant pond instead of a flowing stream.” Once she’d said that, she forced herself to look up and watch Healer Rhoe’s reaction.

  “Damaged things? Not people? Have you seen this yourself?” There was a great deal of sharpness there, as if a knife had come whistling across the room to land quivering beside Elen’s ear. Only it didn’t seem aimed at her. That kind of sharpness wouldn’t miss its target.

  “Once, ma’am.” Elen tried to figure out how to explain, now she’d been caught out. “It scared me, but it didn’t come near hurting me. He’d had a visitor, he’s supposed to be helping with recruiting efforts. Encouraging others to do their part. He’d fallen asleep. I stayed, later than usual, since he hadn’t had his potion for the evening yet.”

  “And?”

  “He crushed one of the metal pitchers, for the rooms, like it was crumpling a piece of paper up. To about this big.” She gestured with her hands, the shape of it, the size of a modest melon, perhaps. “And he split one of the wood chairs in half, like a lightning bolt hit it.”

  “Was there light?”

  “There were - marks on the wood, ma’am. A bit like scorching, but nothing like actual fire.” It felt better, much better, to say it. She was terrified that Healer Rhoe would turn, march her up to the Archiater, throw her out of the temple, but here, she felt, was finally a place she could speak the truth and be heard.

  “And what happened then?” Rhoe leaned forward, considering. Watching, certainly, every little movement Elen made. It felt different than with the administrators, as if she were actively seeking out hints to help. Certainly, there was no sign she was upset. At least not at Elen.

  “He woke up. I had, I had flung myself into the corner. He was fully aware when he woke, he apologised to me. We talked a little bit, he explained he’d done that before, he thought it was why the other nurses he’d had left. I wonder if it’s why there’s a nurse assigned to him, and just to him. Most of the time, he doesn’t need someone there.”

  “That’s most curious. I would like to do some research. I won’t ask anyone about him, not without your permission. Just books. Notes.” Rhoe leaned forward, as if eager to begin.

  Elen let out a long breath. “That would be all right, ma’am. I have been doing my best, but I don’t know what will help, or what will hurt. And if I go to the library, it would be rather obvious.”

  “What would you research if you could?” Rhoe’s voice was quiet, but with a particular intensity now.

  “These are new kinds of injuries. A new kind of war. But someone’s magic getting tangled, aren’t there cases of it from the Napoleonic wars? I half-remember reading something about cannon fire. It would take me time to track down, though, and people would make assumptions about him. I don’t think it’s that, precisely. But it might help find what helps with the healing.”

  Rhoe nodded, approvingly. “I was thinking along the same lines. Though care and kindness go a long way in those cases, we’re still learning a great deal about them. I was also thinking about some of the pattern magics, but those would require his healer’s permission.” She shrugged. “Better to have the information when we can use it. No one’s asked you about him having an outburst, then?”

  Elen shook her head. It felt good and terrifying in equal measure to admit it. “No one asked me anything about it. No one warned me about it, either. But I’m fairly sure that’s what happened to his other nurses.”

  “As a sensible nurse, you want to avoid what will hurt.” Rhoe tapped her fingers, but she offered a
warmer smile now. “You have excellent instincts, thank you.” Then she turned all business and focus, like an animal stalking prey.

  “I can see two directions, for a healing pool. One would be your own Sirona. You have a care for him, she is certainly suitable. But that would mean taking on a responsibility for him in that way, as well as your nursing. That is something no person should ask of you, it is something you might choose to offer.”

  Elen considered that. She agreed with that, that it had to be an offer. She had never done that before, though of course, the Temple of Youth had very different arrangements. “The other option, ma’am?”

  “We’ve bathing rooms set up dedicated to both Apollo Borvo and Apollo Grannus at the moment. Complementary to your own commitments, but not so entangled. However, I am not sure if that will entirely suit, neither of them are particularly directly related to illness of magic. I am wondering whether Nodens might be a better choice on that front.”

  That suddenly reminded Elen of Sister Pomona, earlier. There was a sharpness in her chest, like she was caught out, and she couldn’t begin to make sense of it, whether Apollo Grannus were the right choice, whether she should seek out Sister Pomona, why she hadn’t.

  After too long a pause, she asked about the last choice. “Nuada, in the Irish, the ... connections. What’s the word. Cognate. And Nudd, for my own people.” The way you sometimes couldn’t be sure if three names meant three gods with similar interests, or one god using different names in different places.

  Rhoe nodded. “Cognate, certainly. And Nuada is of interest, for an injury that destroyed sovereignty and rule, and yet was later reclaimed. I am thinking that might be particularly potent.”

  Elen was relieved that Rhoe hadn’t asked why she paused. Part of her wanted someone to ask, like ground during a drought wants rain. The rest of her was sure she would freeze or run or scream if someone asked her the wrong way.

  “And if that doesn’t help?” She didn’t say ‘work’. Healing wasn’t like lighting a lamp. It was a slow process, walking toward a goal with measured steps. Elen thought it rather like the trees going from bare branches to fully unfolded greenery in the spring, only not nearly as certain or regular in progress.

  “Then we will try something else.”

  Part of her wondered what her own Sirona would make of the problem, but she found herself saying, “Nodens, please. When would be convenient?”

  They worked out the details quickly enough. Elen found herself efficiently scheduled for a future conversation the following week. More than that, she was booked for a slot in Sirona’s bathing room for herself the day after Roland’s. Rhoe made it clear, with kind firmness, that she must be sure she tended her own needs as carefully as her patient’s.

  Elen found herself suspecting that this might be Rhoe’s response to the complexities underlying her own responses, the things she had been so very bad at concealing. Perhaps it was also something else. She didn’t argue, for all she wasn’t sure it would do much good.

  That done, Elen found herself gently escorted outside, into the garden, when Rhoe went to begin her research. She stood blinking at the sunlight and not at all sure what she had gotten herself into.

  Chapter 16

  Monday, April 19th, a small meeting room

  Far too soon, Roland was trotted out again. This time, he had to go without Nurse Morris, who had not been permitted to accompany him. He wondered if that was because she’d been so present, with the glass of water, last time, or whether it was simply that they ignored the work of the nurses.

  It had all been done in glances and two bare whispers. The last he’d seen of her, she had been standing at the doorway of his room. Her hands had been folded in front of her in the at-ease posture he had learned was as artificial to a nurse as it was to a fighting man.

  This time, rather than one of the large lecture halls, he was wheeled along to a small meeting room. It was on the ground floor of an administrative building, to one side of the main Temple. He’d still barely been in the Temple, he realised, and he wondered why. Religious fervour was decidedly out of fashion among many folk with magic, at least beyond the necessary familial magics to keep house and home together. Still, he knew that the healers themselves made a commitment. He might ask Elen about that. As a religious woman she might know something.

  Three minutes before the start of the meeting, half a dozen people trooped in, all senior officials. They chattered with each other, ignoring Roland entirely, until one more slipped in as a late arrival. That last was around Roland’s age, dark haired, and he nodded to the others, but didn’t even make an attempt to say anything.

  One man in his seventies, perhaps, still hale, but decidedly the senior among them, cleared his throat when the temple bells stopped ringing, and everyone fell silent. He nodded at Roland. “Gospatrick.” Again, the lack of any title. “We have some questions for you.”

  Not a presentation, then. It would be easier, not that anyone ever asked him, if they let him know in advance what kind of thing he was being asked to do. “Of course, sir, I will do my best.”

  There were no introductions, and they didn’t offer any of their own names. One of the others, a blonde man with the sort of attentive focus of a skilled aide, began. He led the lot of them through a tour of Roland’s experiences, his training, his postings, his battles. Roland had to force a pause for a moment to interject, because none of them had a clue how the cavalry units worked. Nor did they understand the implications for a supply train, and the need to care for the horses that overwhelmed everything else.

  These were, he thought, the sort of men who rode, yes. But the sort who went out for a ride, came home, and turned the horse over to a stablehand until next time it was needed. Roland did not approve, he had not approved even before the War. A good rider tended to his mount himself, or at least checked in later. Horses were not machines, like men were not machines. Care and attention brought out the best in them all.

  He listened to a series of questions, then had to stop to wrangle his mind and his words into something that would be remotely palatable. “Pardon, sir, but the difficulty on the battlefield is that the horses have a sense of self-preservation. They are loyal, and work hard, but even the best horse will falter if pressed into shooting, or a sea of mud. Even if they didn’t, they—”

  He swallowed, fighting down nausea at the memories. “They make very large targets. By the time I was injured, I was not at all sure a cavalry was any use in this war, at least in the battles we found ourselves in. Smaller sorties, outside the trenches, messenger duties, those things that require quick mobility away from roads or rail lines. For those things, the horses will serve, but not this new sort of battle.”

  They didn’t listen. Well, most of them didn’t. That one solitary man, the youngest, gave him a tiny nod, when everyone else was focused on Roland.

  It didn’t help, either. The questioning went on and on. They came around, as Roland had suspected they might, to his injuries, and he could only spread his hands. “My healers have not told me their particular theories. I only know that they do not have a current solution that might return me to duty. I’ve heard a few comments about different approaches to magic, experimental techniques, new munitions. How those are, naturally, much more difficult to undo or mend.”

  It frustrated his audience. Certainly, it frustrated Roland. The injuries themselves were bad enough. It was awful to be forever caught in the fuzziness of his thinking, the way everything in him responded too slowly, always a beat or two behind where he should be. As they kept asking, prying at him, he felt himself hardening against their questions. And not just against the questions, but against the small courtesies, another glass of water or a brief silence as they wrote down notes. He glanced down to find his hands clenching, nail digging into his palm, under the table.

  He did not convince them. He didn’t know how to. He did his best to do as he’d been trained from childhood, to give honest, forthright answer
s. To trust in the structure of the world. It didn’t help. And in that moment, he wasn’t sure if it had ever helped, ever been the right thing. He’d trusted those structures, the proper forms, to make things go well, and the War had made it clear they did no such thing. Too many people were already dead because of that trust, and there would be hordes more if nothing changed.

  As things began to wind down, Roland felt they had found his answers unsatisfying. One of them tapped the table, and asked, “What do you think happened to you?” There was a slight hiss, as if that was the forbidden question.

  It made Roland consider before he answered. “I don’t know, sir. I don’t remember the time in the field hospital. The potions they’ve had me on leave me foggy. And even when I was in school, my preference was for using magic. I was not one for the theory of how it worked, or why one might alter a charm or cantrip or what have you.”

  He was beginning to have theories, mind you, but he wouldn’t tell them that. He had standards. To know who he was talking to, at a bare minimum. It was an abysmally low standard, but he had to start somewhere.

  Eventually, they all stood, pushing back, all of them going out in a knot. He looked up, and was startled to find the younger man looking at him steadily. “Captain Deschamps. Thank you for your service, Major.” Then that brief hesitation, that even Roland in his current state could see coming. “May I ask a few more questions?”

  Roland inclined his head. The man had introduced himself, treated Roland like a fellow officer. That was better than it might be. “I’m glad to see what I can do.” They both knew it was non-committal. Then he repeated the name. “Deschamps.” He tried to place where he knew that from.

  “You were year mates with my older brother. He was a Boar.” There was a tiny hesitation and Roland feared he knew what was coming. “He was killed in action two months ago.”