The Plague Diaries

by Ronlyn Domingue

  Nikolas and I followed Vasi down the village’s main road. Once I had my bearings, we returned to Tasha’s, where a group began to gather with food and drinks. They had come to welcome me, Katya’s granddaughter, Vasi said. Regardless of the smile I showed them, I was numb inside and wanted nothing more than to be alone.

  The night was freezing by the time the guests left and Vasi returned to her family. Tasha showed us to a room with a bed piled with quilts and where logs blazed in the hearth. I wondered if the generous fire was a sacrifice of her own warmth later in the winter. I reached for her hands in gratitude. She kissed my temple and left us.

  “Take the bed. You look exhausted,” Nikolas said.

  “You take it. I doubt I’ll sleep.”

  He paused as if he were about to argue but didn’t. He helped me make a pallet on the floor. I sat with my back to the fire as he covered himself with a layer of quilts.

  “I want to tell you what they said.” So I did, what Tasha revealed about the child my mother had been, how her parents and people of the village treated her, and what happened between her and my grandmother at the end of the visit long ago.

  He looked at me with sympathy. “I’m sorry, Secret. She suffered terribly, and it must hurt to know this now.”

  I nodded, because that was the easiest response to give.

  In time, I drowsed and found myself

  hidden in the corner of a cluttered room, peering under the legs of a chair at the feet of an ogress. She smacked her leathery lips and sniffed as if she detected a scent. There was a smell, a hideous feral stink, a reek worse than death because this belonged to something alive, lurking, lying in wait, and when her matted arm reached for me in the dark—

  I gasped awake. The ogress. It had been years since she loped through my nightmares with that stench, familiar, elusive, terrifying.

  I put on my cloak and went outside to breathe the frigid air. I walked to my grandmother’s house and entered without a lamp or candle. I didn’t want to see. I wanted to feel. In each room, my hands stretched out to find the edges of nothing. The furniture was gone. My thoughts filled in the blankness—a cupboard against that wall, a table in the center of this room, a mirror near that doorway. I crawled on the floor, my hands in the dust, searching for a button, a bead, a strand of hair, something that belonged to her. All there was, was dust.

  In the silence, I searched myself for a memory of the argument between my mother and grandmother, but nothing came. Instead, I heard my mother’s voice, months before she died, the nights she paced, repeating, I’ve been robbed, I’ve been robbed, I’ve been robbed.22

  And she was. She was born as gifted as Wei, Aoife’s daughter. What the Guardians treasured and nurtured in children like them, the rest of the world feared and suppressed.

  There—a reason, an explanation, a key that unlocked what I’d long buried. My body began to shake as the truth surfaced, tearing through my guts to my heart and throat as I returned to Tasha’s house and saw Nikolas fast asleep.

  I sat near the bed and hovered my hand near his, but I couldn’t make myself touch him. I wanted comfort but the very thought of reaching for it made me recoil with humiliation. When a wail rushed into my chest, I trapped it with a held breath.

  Nikolas stirred. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. Go back to sleep.”

  “You’re sitting here on the floor.” His hand fell on my shoulder. “You’re cold as if you’ve been outside. What is it?”

  I shook my head and fought to freeze the trembling in my hips. I knew if I started to cry, I wouldn’t stop. When his palm cupped the back of my neck, I remained still, afraid of what would happen if I leaned toward or away from him.

  “Tell me,” he said, so gently that I did.

  “She killed herself,” I whispered.

  “Who?”

  “My mother.”

  “Why would you say this? How do you know?”

  “Because I do. I’ve always known, but I could never admit it because a part of me wanted to believe it was an accident, even someone murdered her, but no, she planned it.”

  “But—why would she do that?” he asked.

  “Something happened she couldn’t live with any longer. Something she knew became too much. She had horrible nightmares before she—she died. I remember Father trying to console her, telling her she was home, she was safe. This was the same time I believe she read all of Aoife’s manuscript. She had to know about the Voices by then. I think what she found out shattered her. What might have happened to her in another place, in another time? Who might she have been?”

  Nikolas kept his hand on my neck. “I’m sorry. So sorry.”

  My teeth clenched against a sob, not from grief but rage, as I wondered who I might have been without a cold, distant, broken mother who hated my strangeness, too.

  My memories clawed to the surface, but I didn’t tell him any of this, not then.

  That after seven mute years, I spoke words to her for the first time in my life, and she asked, “Why now?” “Aren’t you pleased?” I asked, and she said, “I was accustomed to my silent child.” She didn’t inquire what happened, showed no sign of emotion—not confusion, surprise, joy, nothing—and returned to preparing our dinner.

  When I revealed I could speak to creatures and plants, I chose a day her spirits were bright, a rare good mother day. The stories I told entertained her, but she turned on me, saying she once thought she could hear things, too, and suffered for this mistake. Her advice was to ignore the thoughts. Her final words about what I shared: “I don’t believe you.”

  Days after the fever, when I awoke speaking the ancient language, she had no explanation for how that happened. I tried to tell her of the dreams and ruptures I’d had since I was a child, of things I couldn’t possibly know, that I believed something uncanny was at hand. But she dismissed it all, without a word or gesture of kindness, sympathy, or understanding.

  Sitting there on Tasha’s floor, as those moments and so many other secret, silent ones knotted within me, I wished I’d never been born. Better if I hadn’t, I said to myself, then jolted as a shock streaked through my navel.

  Nikolas stroked the top of my head. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “You don’t have to say anything. I don’t want to talk about it anyway,” I said. I covered him to his chin, went to my pallet, and curled into a ball, shallowing my breath until I was beyond thought and feeling, disembodied.

  THE NEXT MORNING, I PLACED a few coins on the bed, avoiding a protest from Tasha for the gift. When we left the room, we found Tasha and Vasi preparing breakfast and two bundles of food. They kissed our cheeks as we thanked them. As we walked from the village, they and several others waved.

  Once we were out of their sight, the silver wolf emerged, although I didn’t require her guidance. A sense beyond sight and sound compelled me to step into the trees.

  “We’re close,” I said.

  “To what?” Nikolas asked.

  “What you’ve traveled so far to find,” I said.

  “So soon?”

  “That is relative, isn’t it?”

  Nikolas kept up with my rapid steps under the bare branches, across a wide glade, and into the trees again.

  The wolf kept to my side as we approached the petrified tree. Around it, bees swirled. When I was a child, the hollow had been open on one side. Now the wood within its trunk was rotted full away. The dead tree stood as if on two legs, straddling realms.

  I touched the edge of the tree’s dark twisted scar. My palm was moist. When I drew it away, the ancient wound wept. I thought of the little girl tied to that tree, her life taken there in Leit’s witness. I thought of myself, hiding in the dark from my clawing mother. There were terrified others, I was certain, with whom the tree had suffered.

  My forehead pounded with the rhythm of my heart. “This is where the queen stung me,” I said.

  The bees’ hum rose as we stepped into the hollow. As they str
eamed back and forth, in and out, we paused. We looked up to see wattles of new comb—a store of gold.

  Quietly within, I focused on the object of the quest. I imagined a resplendent red dragon. It flew, breathing fire and light. Egnis, she who first saw All.

  I touched Nikolas’s chest. When he glanced at me, I gestured for him to follow.

  THREE STEPS—AND WE ENTERED the realm.

  Although the forest looked like an ordinary forest, we were in no ordinary place. The air crackled without a sound, ignited without a spark.

  We soon came upon the foot of a mountain. I touched its side and peered along its rocky face. Above its summit, the sky spread wide and blue. Nikolas stepped along its base until he came to the opening of a cave.

  Within were treasures heaped upon treasures. The hoard.

  Objects for every human use lay in the heaping piles. Cauldrons, kettles, pots, cups, goblets, knives, spoons, bracelets, buckles, necklaces, rings, brooches, swords, shields, armor, daggers, spearheads, axes, saws, picks, shovels, wheels. Jewels and metals reflected shards of the sun.

  The sun.

  “Look. The spiral stair Aoife mentioned,” Nikolas said.

  At the top of the passageway, the lintel bore the circles of gold and silver and their amethyst union. I remembered the myths Old Woman had told, my fever dream of the image, and Aoife’s description of the same sight.

  Soft light at the entry invited approach.

  We climbed the steps. Gems and crystals gleamed in the corridor, but the source and extent of the light defied explanation.

  We emerged through a circle of blue sky. The air was cool and thin. As Aoife’s tale described, there was an unlikely orchard of trees, in fruit and bloom. I plucked a fig the size of my thumb. The stem leaked white. I tasted the tender ripeness and remembered my old friend Fig Tree who grew in the courtyard of my childhood home.

  I crept to the edge of the zenith. The world turned between my ears, its oceans and deserts and valleys and forests. All at once, there it was—I could see it—contained by the same sky and covering the same sphere.

  I glanced over my shoulder to find Nikolas. I called his name and followed his answer. In the widest, deepest, softest nest I’d ever seen, Nikolas lay on his back.

  “What bird built this?” he asked.

  “One large enough to mistake you for a worm.”

  Hungry, we pulled fruit from the trees. Figs, pomegranates, apples, oranges, plums, cherries. When we were full, we returned to the cave. Outside the hollow of the mountain, we saw a human shape.

  He was the color of gold from head to toe, from his triangular cap to his thick beard to his heavy little boots. His eyes sparkled bright. A scorched leather vest covered his chest. He twirled a pickax on his shoulder.

  “I am called Ingot,” he said.

  The Gold Dwarf of the myths.23

  Ingot shook our hands with his own—small, blunt, callused, scarred, and strong.

  A shimmer drifted next to him. The vapor assumed a form, its garments loose, its hair flowing. She opened her mouth and released the song of birds and babble of brooks and rustle of leaves. Yet, within the matrix of sound, we understood words.

  “I am called Incant,” she said.

  The White Wisp of the myths.

  Incant gave us with light kisses.

  “Where is the dragon?” Nikolas asked.

  The dwarf laughed. “You’ll get your proof, good prince. Now, come with us.”

  The dwarf and the woman-wisp led us back into the cave farther than Nikolas and I had explored. Ingot uncovered a wooden chest that reached his waist. He opened the lid. Three manuscripts lay stacked in a neat row, and there seemed to be more underneath. I recognized Aoife’s handwriting.

  “You have the missing one,” he said.

  “How could you—” Impossible, I thought.

  “Messengers assured us it was safe with her. Isn’t that so, my sister?” Ingot said.

  “Yes, my brother,” Incant replied.

  I held my satchel. “Please, no. I want to keep it awhile longer.”

  “Other texts await your attention, upon the first’s return,” Ingot said with a smile.

  The dwarf shut the chest. The woman-wisp led us from the cave to the forest’s edge.

  Nikolas and I followed them to a cottage decorated with tile mosaics. The panels of the door were carved with frolicking beasts. Inside, the furniture was crafted by adept hands and scaled for giants.

  “This dwelling and its contents are gifts from Azul’s children, as are the treasures you’ve seen,” Ingot said.

  On a round table, four crystal goblets circled a painted clay decanter. Fruit, cheese, and nuts filled a shallow bowl. Slices of meat covered a silver platter. Two gold plates, each flanked by a knife, fork, spoon, and napkin, were set before two high-backed chairs.

  “Eat,” Ingot said. Nikolas and I ate with ravenous delight.

  “Drink,” Incant said. We four sipped a maroon wine. “Listen,” the dwarf and the woman-wisp said together.

  Hear us.

  A nexus of time and circumstance has come again.

  Through many cycles, a pestilence has survived and strengthened at every turn. Its manifestations seek to divide and conquer, to use and deplete, and to banish and ignore. It takes many forms and guises, but its essence is unchanged. It is a Lie.

  You are called to usher in a release. The wait has been long for you, but the onus is not yours alone. Among you are helpers, many who do not yet know who they are. Among you is a child, whom the mystery of All That Is has provided to guide the way.

  For the release to begin, three tasks must be completed within one moon month.

  The first vial marked with the circle must be drunk by the child.

  The second marked with the triangle must be left in a bowl in the sun.

  The third marked with a square must be poured into flowing water.

  At essence, what is within them contains its own cure.

  Understand, none will be spared a role in what is to come, and some will die. This is inevitable. Know, too, that you can refuse this summons, as others have before you. This choice is yours to make, but its burden, as well as its consequences, are shared by all, past, present, future.

  Whatever you choose, your world will never be the same again.

  When I glanced at Nikolas, he shrugged at a loss for what to think or say next.

  “We have comforts for your rest,” Incant said.

  She led us to a stream. On opposite ends of a bend, we bathed in warm waters and dressed in soft nightshirts and thick robes.

  When we returned, the cottage was candlelit. Ingot stoked a tremendous fire. I settled on a cushion with my back to the hearth. Nikolas sat across from me. Incant served sweet hot milk in heavy mugs.

  “The nights are cold here,” the dwarf said.

  “The sun has been swallowed. Sleep,” the woman-wisp said.

  The door closed. We looked at each other but didn’t speak. After my hair was dry and the milk was gone, we went to the huge bed, Nikolas to the right, I to the left. I burrowed under quilts, sunk into the mattress, and fell into a deep dreamless sleep.

  The next morning, we awoke, dressed, and breakfasted. We packed our belongings. The satchel which held Aoife’s manuscript was heavier with the three vials I was given the night before.

  Dawn muted the sky in pink and violet.

  “We can’t leave until I get the scale,” he said.

  We walked around the mountain and found a green valley.

  Nikolas stood with his hands on his hips. “Show yourself, dragon!” He walked farther into the valley, scanning the cloudless sky.

  Egnis, I whispered. Come.

  A shadow cast upon the ground. As we looked up, the darkness took form and landed.

  Red, so red, scarlet crimson ruby.

  A lithe tail undulated around her body. Wings flared bold and ready, the vessels pulsing under pressure. She reached her neck down and release
d two plumes of smoke from her nostrils. She was myth and story, nightmare and reverie.

  She was.

  Nikolas squared his shoulders.

  I crept forward and touched a loop of the dragon’s tail.

  Elegant, Egnis uncoiled. She thrust her upper body vertical. A plate of metal armor covered her chest. Her thick forelegs were bent at the joints, her fierce black claws almost touching. She blinked her ancient impossible eyes.

  “You know why I stand before you,” Nikolas said at last.

  I felt Egnis smile.

  The dragon rolled her spine, fluid as water, and slipped the armor over her neck and head. When she arose, she revealed the scars from old wounds. The long scales which spanned her chest were nicked and broken. She didn’t stir until Nikolas met her eye. With a deft pinch, she ripped a scale from the side of her body. Blood trickled from her skin. She placed the transparent object into his palm and lowered her face to his. An intense silent communication flowed between them as he held the tip of her nose. As Nikolas stood taller, his bearing shifted from strong to powerful. He bowed to her, and she to him.

  Slowly the dragon extended her left claw to me. She relaxed the muscular toes. In her palm was a single white flower with a yellow center. I stared at the blossom.

  Your proof, Egnis said beyond words.

  I accepted the gift and the message it carried. Behold: Beauty.

  She unrolled her black forked tongue. At one tip was a jeweled brooch. The symbol itself—the configuration of the circle, triangle, square, and flame—was engraved in the gold, surrounded by gems. On the other tip was a gold coin embossed with the symbol strung on a leather cord.

  His proof. The child’s amulet, she said.

  I hung the amulet around my neck and placed the flower and brooch in my satchel.

  Egnis brushed my cheek with her chin and leveled one eye with mine. I stared into her pupil—the shape of the symbol’s center—into a black void that held everything and nothing. Through the darkness in the light, I saw myself reflected in my entirety. All I was, all I had been, all I was to be; all I had known, all I was forced to forget. In that moment, I was infinite.