Rosemarked

by Livia Blackburne

  His breath warms my face, sending a heat through my limbs and thawing me out. His lips are soft, and his arms are wonderfully solid. I marvel at how long it’s been since I’ve touched someone with any tenderness at all, and I’m parched for it. I lean into him, burying my hands in his hair. And though I know I should stop this, it would be as futile as ceasing to breathe.

  I’m not sure when I start crying. At some point, even as I’m lost in the scent and feel of him, a tear escapes, and then another. And in the end, it’s Dineas who pulls away. Who looks into my eyes and then at my grief-moistened cheeks. And the look he turns on me is both a plea and a question.

  “Dineas,” I whisper. “Please.”

  His face twists briefly, but he gathers himself and steps away. His gaze lingers on my eyes. “Promise me you’ll think about what I said, at least.”

  I can’t answer. I don’t know how.

  Mehtap finds me a short while after Dineas leaves, as I stare at a wall of trimmed cedars without really seeing them. My first instinct when I hear her coming is to dry my eyes, but I resist the urge and simply hope that the darkness is enough.

  “Zivah?” she asks cautiously. “What are you doing?”

  I force a smile. “I’m just lost in my thoughts. How do you feel? Did you rest well?”

  “I did,” she says. “It’s good to have some time alone, once in a while.” She smiles, and I wonder if she saw more than she’s letting on.

  Arxa drops by later that night and sits a while with his daughter. The celebration winds down. The crowd clears from the garden, until only scattered clusters of guests remain. Their chatter carries crisply over the garden’s numerous pools.

  Finally, long past midnight, Mehtap and I climb back into the palanquin to be carried home. Mehtap lies back on a pillow, smiling dreamily. “It’s like being alive again, isn’t it?”

  She closes her eyes, and her breathing becomes slow and steady. I lie awake for a while longer, and once we’re out of the city I open the curtains to take in the sights and sounds of the desert.

  It was indeed like being alive again, the heady illusion of possibility and hope. My only regret is that such a thing could never last.

  After the feast, life continues as normal, though normal has a duller cast to it after the bright colors of the celebration. In some ways, I’m glad to numb myself in the routines of the hospital.

  A letter arrives from Leora two days after the festival. It’s a godsend to hear from her now, and I eagerly take the letter to my room. Leora’s steady handwriting easily conjures her rich voice, and I soak in her words.

  She’s married now. The wedding took place on a sunny morning, with much of the village in attendance. Alia carried the incense, and Mother and Father gave their blessing. She and Gil have moved into a cottage a short distance away from my family. Leora describes both the festivities and her new home in great detail—the sun shining through the bamboo groves, the goat that wandered into the wedding dancing. I know she’s doing her best to include me, and I am grateful.

  I find it fascinating to hear about your mystery patient, she writes. How strange it would be, to be wiped blank. I do see, as a new bride, how much our past can affect who we are. Gil gets terribly moody on rainy days. He lost his younger brother to a flood during a hard rain, and every time the skies darken, the memory comes back to him. It’s hard for me to see him like this, but I suppose life leaves its imprint on all of us, good or bad.

  I do think, though, that there are parts of us that would be the same, no matter what our lives are like. You, my dear sister, would be compassionate, hardworking, and intelligent, whether you were a healer, a seamstress, or a goatherd. I’m sure of it. Perhaps, with your Dineas, you get to see a version of him that is unmarred by time. Be good to him, for his sake. Not all of us get the chance to start our lives anew.

  I wonder what Leora would think if she knew the whole story. That not only do I have the new Dineas, but I also have the old Dineas with me, and that they hardly ever agree. That I’ve become too close to one, and soon I’ll have to face the other. He’ll be angry with me, and rightly so. I’ve broken his trust, and I’ll have to answer for it.

  But it’s more than his anger that I fear. I revealed too much in that garden, thoughts and fears that I hadn’t even quite acknowledged to myself. It was hard enough to share them with the Dineas who loves me. For the other to know as well…I don’t know how I will bear it.

  A few nights after the feast, a messenger comes for me from Utana. “His Excellency is in great pain and requests your help.”

  “Headaches?” I ask.

  “Yes, Healer.”

  Worsening headaches over time are a common symptom of the fever’s return. There’s not much that can be done, except to numb the pain when it happens. I grab a few supplies and head to his house. I find the old man sitting on his bed, drenched in sweat.

  I rush to his side. “Is it bad?”

  He nods, squeezing his eyes shut. “It normally comes and goes, but it’s been bad today.”

  “I have some herbs bundled I can burn for you. It takes away pain, but it also puts you in a trance. You’ll be awake, but more trusting and obedient to others. You’ll remember your time being treated, but it will have the quality of a dream. Would you like me to burn it for you?”

  He nods, rocking back and forth with the pain.

  I move quickly, requesting a plate from the servant and then sending him outside. I tie a damp cloth over my nose and mouth, then hold a flame to the herb packet until it starts to smolder and a thin stream of smoke snakes up toward the ceiling. Carefully, I help Utana lie down on his bed. After a few moments, he lets out a deep sigh.

  “Better?” I ask.

  “Very much.”

  I sit with him for a while. He closes his eyes, but I can tell by his breathing that he’s not yet fallen asleep. After a short time, he speaks again, and his voice has a dreamy quality. “The fever usually doesn’t return so soon, does it, Zivah?”

  Typically it would be hard to answer a question like this, but there’s a freedom in talking to someone in this state. “Not usually,” I say.

  He breathes in deep through his nose and then lets it out. “I know why it has,” he says. “I know why.”

  The shadow in his words stirs a feeling of foreboding in me. “Why is that?”

  “Guilt.”

  My breath catches. I have an opportunity here, one I should not take. The Goddess’s commands are very clear. Herbal knowledge is for healing. The tools we’re given are not meant to be used for our own agendas.

  But it would be so easy.

  “Why do you feel guilty?”

  “A minister of health is supposed to protect the people. But I didn’t say anything. I stayed silent, and Hefana punishes me now.”

  There’s a tingling at the base of my neck. Whatever lingering doubts I have, I smother them. “What did you see, Utana?”

  He tosses back and forth on his bed. “Baruva. Kiran. The soldiers. It wasn’t right to turn the plague against their own people.”

  Kiran? “What do you mean?”

  “Just the right amount of weak vinegar…to sicken the troops…”

  Weak vinegar…Baruva’s method of strengthening the rose plague essence. “What troops?”

  “Troops for Monyar. It was just what Kiran needed to start a war….”

  My heart knocks against my rib cage. “It’s Kiran who wants the attacks?”

  “The emperor was happy to rest, but the son wanted more….But it wasn’t supposed to be his mentor’s battalion. It wasn’t supposed to happen so soon.”

  The smoke in the room suddenly feels impossibly thick. I have trouble breathing, and I feel an overwhelming compulsion to get out. “Rest, Utana.” I don’t wait for a reply before I leave the room.

  The servant waits outside.

  “He should be fine to sleep with no danger,” I tell him. “If you need to enter for some reason, cover your face with a d
amp cloth and open the windows to disperse the smoke.”

  My mind spins as I make my way home. It was the prince, all along, who’d sickened the troops, and he meant for our people to take the blame. My stomach rolls as I think of everyone back in Dara, of Leora and her new husband starting a life together, of young Alia, of my parents—all of them unaware of the machinations against them, of the punishment heading toward them for a crime they knew nothing about. I need to tell Dineas. We need to tell Gatha.

  But first thing I do when I return to my room is take off my healer’s sash. I run my fingers over Leora’s embroidery, remembering the day I received it. The test and the feast all feel like they happened years ago, though it’s only been months.

  I hold the sash to my temple, conjuring up images of the day I took my vows. Then I put it down and take out my knife. The sash makes a horrible rending sound as it tears, and I let it fall into two ragged pieces on the floor. I stare at them, barely able to breathe, and wonder if I’ve made a grave mistake. But I know in my bones that I haven’t. The sashes are for those worthy of the Goddess’s trust, and after tonight I no longer count as one of their number.

  The next morning, I fashion myself a new sash made of plain brown fabric. Mehtap notices right away, and I tell her I’d caught the other on a nail and will have to take time to mend it. All day at the hospital I think about Utana. Does he remember that he confessed his secrets to me? Will he tell me more, or will he hate me for betraying his trust? What would Kiran do to us if he knew?

  That evening I send a messenger to Utana’s residence, requesting an audience. I don’t know what I’ll say to him, whether I should ask his forgiveness or ask to know more. Either way, I need to see him again.

  The reply comes a few hours later, via the servant that had tended Utana the night before. He looks shaken, and he stumbles a few times on his words.

  “I’m sorry, Healer. It was very unexpected for all of us.”

  I take one look at him, and I know what’s happened. Even though it’s far too soon, I still know. “What is it?”

  “His Excellency was feeling better after you left yesterday, but this afternoon he took a turn for the worse.” He takes a deep breath and swallows.

  “What is it?” I ask again.

  “He died, Healer Zivah. His Excellency has passed away.”

  Zivah is bent over a patient when I step through the hospital door. She lays one hand on the old man’s arm, her eyes soft with compassion as she speaks to him. She’s back in her everyday clothes now, a long plain dress and an apron stuffed with herbs. But I can still see hints of the radiant woman at the equinox festival—the ribbons braided through her hair, the soft silk of her gown hinting at subtle curves in the wind. Either way, she’s beautiful.

  Finally, she stands up. Her eyes scan past the door and settle on me. It’s a moment before either of us does anything.

  “I’m glad to see you, Dineas,” she says. There’s some strain around her eyes when she speaks.

  “And I, you.”

  She leads me wordlessly down the hall to the back room. A cloud of silence surrounds us, thick enough to touch. There are things I could say, but the cloud muffles it all.

  We know what to do by now. I fetch a pallet for myself while she mixes her herbs. As I put everything into place, I’m aware of every one of her movements, the grind of her mortar and pestle, the clink of the bowls.

  She seems to take extra care as she carries the bowl to me—the water inside doesn’t sway at all. For a brief moment, we’re both holding the bowl, though our fingers don’t touch. And I know she’s already put up a wall between us.

  “I would still like to be friends,” I say. “If we can.”

  “I would like that,” she says.

  Her words bring some relief, but the tension she carries doesn’t go away. I don’t understand, but over the past months, there’s been many things I don’t understand. I take the bowl from her and drink.

  There’s no pain, but it still feels like a splitting headache. The images chisel at my brain, and my world expands. The night of the festival still sits foremost in my mind—I can feel Zivah’s lips, smell the scent of herbs in her hair. But now, other details come back, filling out the picture and making it so much more than the simple kiss it had been before. She’s not who I think she is. I’m not who I thought I was. I understand now, why she pushed me away.

  More memories come flooding back—an argument, a promise that she would keep her distance. I look up at her, see the guilt written on her face, and I’m angry.

  “I’m sorry,” she says.

  The torrent doesn’t stop. I see her again, her eyes as she broke away from our embrace, the hunger in them. And I understand the flicker of loneliness, and the desperation that haunts her. I see her life through her eyes—being cut off from her family, gaining the chance to heal again, to matter again, but paying a grievous price for it.

  “I should have listened to you,” Zivah says. Her back is rigid, her shoulders tight. She expects me to explode. “I shouldn’t have gone to the festival. Forgive me.”

  I still want to be angry, but the anger feels hollow now. The words on my tongue drain away. Anything I say would be like twisting a knife that has already gone too deep. I stir on the pallet, lift my head like a man stepping out of a quagmire. “What’s done is done. Let’s not dwell on it.”

  And now she stares at me. She doesn’t understand my reaction, and neither do I. The silence stretches between us. The sound of a delirious patient’s screams drift through the door.

  I clear my throat. “I had a chance to see the emperor’s guard.” I speak deliberately, willfully putting the events of the festival behind us. “There’s five of them with him, plus the crowd of courtiers and officials following him around. He keeps to the palace most of the time. I don’t know how I could get to him.”

  Another long silence, and finally she follows my lead. “Don’t go after the emperor, then. It’s not him that’s the problem.”

  What follows drives thoughts of the festival out of my mind completely. Zivah tells me how Kiran was the main force behind the empire’s plan for expansion. And she tells me what she’s learned about the sickened troops at Dara. I start to shake my head as she speaks. It doesn’t make sense. Kiran, the warrior prince, raising his hand against his own troops?

  “I can’t believe Kiran would do this.”

  Yet is it really that hard to believe? He’s always been enthusiastic about expanding the empire. Not many in his position would have taken it upon himself to scout out Monyar Peninsula. But his friendship with Arxa seems real. “Kiran wouldn’t poison Arxa on purpose.”

  “Utana mentioned something about a mistake. That it wasn’t meant to be Arxa’s troops.”

  A last-minute change of assignments? Or a reshuffling of supplies? As I continue to think about it, my anger builds. I think of Arxa, with his unwavering loyalty to the empire, and Walgash, who could well have died from that plague. They may be Amparans, but no soldier deserves such depth of betrayal from his superiors. And then to throw that blame to my kinsmen…

  “If Arxa knew…” I say. “Or if the army knew…”

  “But we have no proof,” says Zivah. “No one would believe us, and we don’t know the specifics.”

  “We must tell Gatha and Tal, at least.”

  Zivah hands me a parchment. “There’s something else you should know. Gatha sent us a reply about Tus.”

  Gatha’s message is short, but clear. Tus knows who I am, but she doesn’t think he’ll reveal it under torture. If it is too risky to go in after him, I’m to leave him there as I wait for a better opportunity. It’s a weight off my chest not to have to kill him, but my relief only means that Tus will suffer more. Once again, he carries the brunt of my failings.

  A knock sounds on the door. Panic flickers across Zivah’s face, and she gestures for me to lie down.

  Her soft footsteps pad across the room. The door creaks open.


  “I’m with Dineas,” she says softly. “He shouldn’t be disturbed.”

  “You need to hear this.” I recognize Jesmin’s voice. “It’s important.”

  “What is it?”

  I fight the urge to fidget, breathe as silently as I can.

  “News has come in from Sehmar City,” says Jesmin. “The emperor is ill with rose plague.”

  It’s as if the air becomes thicker at Jesmin’s words. I step out of the room and close the door behind me. “What happened?”

  “He manifested spots yesterday morning. Fever set in that afternoon.”

  Though I know that the emperor is as mortal as the rest of us, it feels irreverent to be talking about his illness with the same terms we use to discuss our other patients. “Thank you. You were right to interrupt us.”

  I turn back to the door, but Jesmin speaks again. “Zivah.”

  The urgency in his voice gives me pause.

  “He manifested spots yesterday,” he says again.

  And finally, I understand. Yesterday was eleven days after the equinox festival. Rose plague takes ten days to show itself.

  My head swims, and I grab the doorknob for support. We weren’t even near the emperor. But if Jesmin has suspicions, others will undoubtedly come to the same conclusion.

  “Jesmin. You must believe me. I would never—”

  He raises two fingers to stop me. “You are a consummate healer, Zivah. You’ve taken vows to guard all life, and I don’t believe you would turn your arts against another living being, even the ruler who has conquered your people.”

  If Jesmin’s earlier talk seemed irreverent, this feels downright dangerous. We’ve never spoken of politics before, and now of all times, I do not want attention drawn to my origins.

  Jesmin lays a hand on my arm. “Settle your patients here, and go back home and rest for the day.”

  “Thank you,” I say again, and then retreat back into the room.

  Dineas is lying on the mat with his eyes closed. I’m not sure if he’s still awake, or still himself for that matter.