The Plague Diaries

by Ronlyn Domingue

  “What’s that?”

  “The dragon.”

  At last, the fragments revealed their pattern. My meeting with him when I was an apprentice, the menagerie on his office wall, his comment about hanging a top hat on a dragon’s head. In his library, the books on dracology. The after-dinner visit to his trophy room, among the dead, the waiting plaque. Our discussion in the map room when he spoke of the elusive hoard. The direct question whether I’d seen the great beast when I found the treasure.

  I stepped near the door. “Leave. Now.”

  “Don’t lie to me,” he said.

  I willed Harmyn to keep away as I silently called upon the animals for protection. Fewmany flinched as if injured as he came forward.

  I walked backward through the doorway. A hum hovered at my ear.

  He followed me. “What happened to you when you were away? The girl who left was not the woman who returned. I know you spoke to the Council of your preternatural knowledge, but was it that? No. No—because what you knew was not beyond Nature, but of it. Your command of the beasts—’tis but a parlor trick, isn’t it, compared to the powers you possess.”

  “You’ve gone mad.”

  “Lead me to the dragon. Hold it in thrall so I can slay it and mount its head. End its reign. Remember how you felt when you took the deer. This—imagine this. Come with me.”

  No matter my will, a fiery helix whirled through my body. Within the plea was his offer, spoken in the summoning voice I had so often heeded, wanted to heed.

  A buzzing blur crossed my eyes. “I will not.”

  “Come. Let us see what you’re truly made of. What dominion can you hold? With who else but me? Who rightly sensed your gifts? Who tested you for mettle and found the strength of iron? Who understands you?”

  I ran then, away from the truth and the knife he grasped.

  Through the dark, across the glade, into the woods, my feet battered the ground. He chased me, his pursuit dogged although he limped and panted. A full moon illuminated our steps.

  Among the trees I knew so well, I wove round and round, and hunter that he was, he embodied instinct, anticipating my every turn.

  He means to take me, not kill me, I thought, but I couldn’t be sure as I felt him gain closer, closer.

  Memory returned Egnis’s whisper: His proof. If I took him to her, what would he do? What would she? She, who first saw All. She, of the myths who said to her orphan child Azul, if she were to die, “All would dry in endless light or all would rot in endless dark.”

  Running for my own life and yours—do you believe me, descendants and survivors?—I fled with the world at stake. To betray her would lead to darkness; to betray him would reveal so much light, in time.

  My side seized with a cramp. My breath failed to sustain me. My strength waned. I was prey, bested by the rapacious pursuit, and I fell. To the animals, I called but none came, not a wolf, boar, fox, or bear—but bees, a line of them merging into a cloud, their orbits spiraling.

  “Why did you run?” he asked as he collapsed with his hands against his knees.

  “To get away.”

  “What are you worth to me, dead?” He laughed—maniacal and beautiful—both, yes—as the rage engulfed me and the bees gave voice to it with their drone.

  One of you, sting him, I said.

  He cried out in surprise. They swarmed him. He flung his hands around his face.

  “Oh, they rarely sting unless provoked,” I said. “Breathe slowly and don’t move.”

  Another, give your life, I said.

  He slapped his temple, which agitated the bees near his head. He barked in pain as more came to defend one another against the threat.

  He lunged—I dodged aside—the knife slashed across my left hand—he ran forward in a dance of panic. The blade fell to the ground as he flailed, abandoned to instinct as the bees heeded theirs. The more who died, the more who stung.

  I grabbed the knife. Two images flashed in my mind’s eye. The scissors on the table near my drawing of the symbol. The dagger in my hand beside the dying doe. My urge, in each moment, to take the blade and kill him. I clenched the bone handle. My body remembered how to slit a clean cut.

  He cowered, shielding his head with his arms, then crawled to a leafless hollow tree.

  I did not avert my eyes as the bees surrounded him.

  “Please!” he screamed. “Have pity!”

  “Poor Fewmany,” I said with mocking contempt as I walked to him. I leaned into the swarm to look at his face. In my next breath, my fury burned away to sadness and gave way to horror. The wound under his chin left a putrid smear on his shirt. The bruise under his eye I’d noticed weeks before now consumed that side of his face. His flesh swelled with the poison throbbing from the barbed sacs. He flinched when another pierced him.

  To their own deaths, the bees heeded my will to do harm, but in their frenzy, I didn’t know if they would honor my command to stop.

  “Come,” I said aloud to the wrathful sisters, calling them with an image of a hive, heavy with brood and honey. They returned to me.

  One crawled to the center of my forehead where the queen’s venom once anointed me.

  We know who he is and what must be done. There is no way without us, the bee said.

  As the bees rushed away, I knelt in front of him. His amber eyes sought mine the colors of night and day. Never had I felt so much love and hate at once. I set the knife aside and grabbed his left arm to help him sit against the tree. A viscous ooze covered the sleeve. Under the cloth, the brand wept blood, thick as sap. My own blood dripped into the stain.

  “Why did you stop them?” he asked.

  “That you must ask reveals the difference between us,” I said.

  A scuffle made me look up.

  Fewmany turned as a brown rabbit crept from the tree’s base. He pulled himself toward her, half of his back against the dead bark, the other half to the open space within. She inched near his offered hand.

  The tree was hollow, but not hollow through. I understood then why the animals had not come when I called and why we were here, now.

  I wasn’t meant to kill, but to deliver him.

  “Remember what the old woman told you?” I asked. “Follow the symbol, for it will lead to the riches you desire. And watch for rabbits.”

  The little creature stood on her haunches, out of reach. Fewmany inched closer, balanced on his hip, hand out.

  I took up the knife, raised to my feet, and kissed his forehead. He stared at me, the blade.

  “Follow her,” I said.

  The rabbit leapt into the darkness.

  I kicked him into the hollow.

  His arms reached out.

  And he was gone.

  BLOOD AND TEARS STREAKED MY face when I uncurled and sat back on my heels. Harmyn lowered to the ground across from me.

  “Give me your hand,” she said, her palms open.

  “Did you see what happened?” I asked.

  She clutched my injured hand between hers. “Yes.”

  “Did you know he was coming?”

  “No. I’m not as aware of everything as you think I am.” She hummed two tones, low, high, low, high. A vibration coursed through my skin. The wound became painfully hot, then as quickly cooled.

  When she released me, I touched the thin ridge of a scar. An owl hooted. Another answered.

  “That was a summons. Nikolas will be here soon. We should go home,” I said.

  I stood on weak legs. Harmyn ducked under my arm to help me walk.

  “That weight crushing your heart? You can lift it off,” she said. “Tell Nikolas everything—what happened at the manor, up to tonight.”

  When Nikolas arrived, Harmyn excused herself for a long walk. He sat down at the table. I served him tea, and I said, “I must tell you what happened between Fewmany and me.” Then I did, from beginning to end. The time for secrets was over.

  20 JUNE /38

  THE DAWN BEFORE THE SUMMER solstice, the day
before the Plague of Silences sickened us, the sky released a relentless gray drizzle. From the room’s window, I looked out to a flower garden, roses in full bloom; beyond it, the castle’s outer wall. Harmyn didn’t rouse for breakfast, so I ate alone, then went to Nikolas’s office. He’d left a stack of letters for me to translate, a job I volunteered to assist with because I wanted something to do which required mental effort. During the prior weeks, Nikolas had corresponded with kingdoms near and far. Most appreciated the forthrightness of his warning and offered to aid how they could. Nikolas believed the goodwill visits he and his forefathers had taken had achieved their ends. As dire as our circumstances were to be, he took their kindness as a sign of hope.

  By afternoon, the rain worsened, but Harmyn and I left the castle to visit my neighbors in Warrick, then my father. The street drains filled quickly and threatened to flood. The sidewalks were covered with water. People grumbled under their umbrellas, scurrying through their day as if the next one would be exactly the same. They turned to look at the light-haired child behind me who splashed with pleasure. Some of the people softened their faces and some hardened them. Everyone could see Harmyn at last.

  When I entered the walk-up, several children were on the stairwell playing. Julia waved for Harmyn to join them. Lucas, who had a fading bruise on his cheek, jostled with two boys over a spinning top. Jane and Dora were on their way out, but we spoke long enough for me to learn Dora still had her job, but Jane was furloughed from Fewmany Incorporated. Jane planned to do her service in the ward garden, which would be built nearby. When we visited the Misses Acutt, I learned Mr. Elgin received confirmation he’d have work repairing the town’s streets and buildings. He was one of the hundreds of men the town and kingdom had jointly hired because so many had been furloughed, and the repairs were critical. The Misses didn’t seem too afraid about becoming sick, but they worried about feeding Sir Pounce. Even if they gave him their meat rations, it might not be enough and they’d have to get more somehow. Before I left, I emptied my pockets of silver and placed it in a teacup.

  Once at Father’s, he served tea and butter cookies. We sat together as he asked Harmyn questions about her gifts. What she could do, what she could not. His interest delighted her; her candor charmed him. I sensed him seeking beyond her, however, trying to understand the other Voice he lost. I said nothing of what happened to Fewmany; I wasn’t ready to tell him. Before we left, Harmyn hugged my father, which made him smile. He kissed my cheek as I squeezed his hand. I came away with a hint of my mother’s perfume, which made me wince.

  We were soaked to the skin by the time we crossed through the castle’s gatehouse. Harmyn spent a long time in the deep tub in our shared water closet, a luxury she’d never had, until I banged on the door for my turn. A chambermaid informed us Nikolas had been kept in a meeting and a tray would be brought for us. Our dinner was simple—boiled eggs, a loaf of bread, and a bowl of cherries. The rationing, declared three weeks prior, was under effect for everyone.

  In her room, Harmyn played a music box with changeable discs. The melodies wafted in the background while I wrote to my friends. From recent letters, I knew Charlotte was happy with her new husband, Barnaby Frigget, and stepdaughter, Liddy, and Muriel was visiting with relatives near the coast. Neither had been in Rothwyke for the initial infection, but I was nearly certain, in time, they, too, would be stricken.

  Harmyn was already in bed when I went to wish her good night. The last twinkling notes slowed to silence. My skin prickled into gooseflesh. “Do you remember the old bronze cogwheel you gave me some years ago?” I asked.

  “What you want to know is if I knew, about it and you.” She rubbed the amulet at her neck. “I couldn’t say so then. I didn’t understand what was happening to me, or why you were the one who had to have it. The cogwheel was a piece of the Wheels, which Aoife saw when she warned the Guardians they might be invaded.”

  “She watched the children sing along with the music. I had a rupture about that two years ago.” I sat on her mattress. In the manuscript, Aoife described the settlement’s center, where there was a silver-roofed well and gear-powered musical Wheels. “Well, then. The ward’s name. Old Wheel. A name so old, no one remembered the reason it was called that.”

  “That’s one of many things which will be remembered soon,” she said.

  “What did you notice among the shadows today?” I asked.

  “They’re ready to come out.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “You’ll see. Don’t be afraid. I’m here,” she said with a reassuring smile.

  I smoothed the sheet at her side and almost, almost kissed her forehead, an impulsive maternal gesture which surprised me. My heart lilted, then pounded once, twice, full of blood but empty, lonely.

  In my own bed, I drifted off to sleep. When I awoke again, the clock read nearly half past ten. I hadn’t seen Nikolas all day. That I wouldn’t be able to hear his voice for weeks, possibly months, distressed me. I stepped into slippers and put a robe over my linen gown.

  As I walked from the guest wing through the parlors to the stair which led to the second floor, I heard laughter and muffled conversations. Servants, guards, and several advisers, whose duty kept them away from their own homes, gathered in corners and doorways. I assumed they didn’t want to squander those last hours with sleep.

  The hall which led to Nikolas’s new room was lamplit, but there was no guard at its entrance or his door. A pendulum clock ticked nearby. No light shone under the threshold, but I knocked anyway.

  Nikolas grinned when he saw me at his door. He wore trousers but no shirt. The last time I’d seen him dressed that way, he was a boy exploring the woods. Since then, on the quest, by accident, I’d glimpsed him change quickly. That was autumn, winter. Cold. This night was warm. “It was dark and quiet in your wing when I checked an hour ago,” he said.

  “You could have waked me. You’re without a guard at the moment,” I said.

  He peeked into the corridor. “Hugh’s on post tonight. He must be in the water closet. That weak bladder of his.” Nikolas gestured for me to come in and left the door open.

  “Isn’t someone supposed to take his place?” I asked.

  “I’m too tired to chastise anyone now.” He walked across the room. The chamber had once been his father’s, now his as the new king. Nikolas’s furniture and belongings had been moved.

  With furtive volition, I closed the door then joined him at an open window. The rain fell on his outstretched hands.

  “How’s Harmyn?” he asked.

  “Exhausted but in good spirits. How was the meeting with the mayor and ward leaders?”

  “Tense but productive. They’re as prepared as they can be. At least they’re trying to work together, unlike a few on the Council who are skeptical, even hostile, about our plans. Some advisers told me I’ve been too caught up in the minutiae. I should have my mind on the trouble with Haaud, especially since we learned Emmok’s alliance agreement with them. This complicates matters because of our accord with Emmok, Charming’s marriage sealing that. Yes, I admit, I might be too involved, but I care how we manage in Rothwyke. What we learn here will affect what’s done once the plague spreads. And then, this I heard from an adviser I trust, there are Council members who believe I lack ruthlessness, that what’s coming will reveal me as weak and my subjects will resent me even as they laud my goodness.”

  “What do you think?”

  “I’m worried, despite my best efforts, I will fail my people, even though I understand much is beyond my control. I’m afraid what fear will bring out of us.”

  “So am I.” I paused. “I saw my father today. He and Harmyn are forming quite the friendship. I worry how he’ll fare, though. Unable to speak, unable to hear, and he’s so accustomed to being around people, talking. He wants me home again, even with Harmyn.”

  “Will you go?”

  “No.”

  I reached my fingers to the raindrops. They were c
ool and cleansing, so different from tears, which I suddenly felt streaming down my cheeks.

  “Why are you crying?” he asked. Nikolas touched the inside of my arm and slipped his wet fingers through mine.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “The only word in my thoughts is why, but I don’t know to what or whom I’m asking it. I’m afraid, too. Afraid we shouldn’t have gone on the quest or accepted the vials or agreed to release them. Afraid what the plague will do to you, and me, and Harmyn, my father, everyone. I don’t know how I’ll tolerate the silence. I remember what it was like when I was a child, unable to speak, even when I wanted to.”

  “I’m afraid, too. But I’m glad we’ll be afraid together instead of apart. I can’t imagine enduring this without you.” He kissed the center of the queen’s sting. He’d done that once before, the day he visited me at my father’s house and I told him about the manuscript. That kiss held me together with the force of unconditional love.

  This one possessed the same power, but it made me shatter. All that had been guarded, sealed, walled fell away.

  I gripped the back of his neck, drew him close, the kiss voracious.

  What I believed was fixed became a new thing—a new love conjoined with desire; volatile, quick, fire and air; heavy, fluid, earth and water. Transmutation, I thought.

  When he eased away to catch his breath, he looked toward the bedroom door.

  “No one knows I’m here,” I said. “Keep it closed.”

  His quiet laugh was seductive, wicked. The light in his eyes paralyzed me. His fingers twisted into my silver hair’s loose braid. I swept my hands against his skin, muscles, bones. I kicked away my slippers and wriggled out of my robe. My bare feet arched on the marble floor as he loosened the tie of my gown’s bodice. I swayed where I stood, afraid I would fall.

  I led him toward the bed. We stretched across the mattress. I sighed when his mouth left mine, then breathed in with a start as he opened the top of my gown and set flame to my flesh. I clutched his gold hair and traced the cords of his neck. I wasn’t sure when to stop, how to stop, if.