Work Text:
Shane
In the twilight, Oswin watched the man in the bed breathe, slow and not always steady. He would have been a good-looking fellow without that ragged beard, and the shadows under his eyes. One of the paladins of the Dreaming God who had brought him in had identified him as Shane, paladin of the Saint of Steel.
The door to the little room opened, and Brother Francis entered. "How is he?"
"His breathing isn't always good, and his color is terrible. You're not going to dose him again, are you?"
"No, I think not. It was a foolish thing to have tried in the first place. I let Brother Mullen know that, in no uncertain terms. And pointless, in the end: Bishop Beartongue has been questioning the paladins who are conscious, and she has concluded that they are not a menace to us. So we will let him wake."
"He's showing signs of it now, I think," said Oswin.
It was true. The man in the bed was stirring, his breathing both stronger and less even. Brother Francis lit the standing lamp, the strong light gleaming on his bald spot, and came to the bed. "Paladin Shane," he said, loudly and clearly. "Can you hear me?"
The patient's lips moved soundlessly, and his features took on a more normal degree of tension. Then his eyes clenched, and his jaw. He groaned, and sweat broke out on his forehead.
"Are you in pain?" asked Brother Francis.
"My head," rasped the man in the bed.
"I bet he needs water," said Oswin. "Look how sunk his eyes are."
"You can try it," said Brother Francis. "But bring over that basin, too."
Oswin did so, and then held the invalid's cup to the paladin's dry lips. Shane sipped, then gulped. "No, slowly," warned Francis, but it was too late: the man was retching painfully. Oswin managed to get most of it in the basin, though. He'd been an orderly for more than a dozen years and knew all the tricks.
The paladin whimpered and opened his eyes, only to close them almost at once again the light. Brother Francis rotated the shade on the lamp so the light wasn't shining directly on him. Oswin fetched damp, clean cloths and wiped the paladin's face and neck, then let him rinse out his mouth. "Is that better?" Oswin asked.
Shane's face relaxed for a moment, and then knotted up again. his lips working as though he wished to speak and couldn't. "The god is dead," he managed at last, the words sticking and choking him. For all his size, he sounded like a child in the grip of a nightmare.
Brother Francis raised his eyebrows. "Oswin, fetch plain biscuit and ginger tea. I will sit with him in the meantime."
Oswin cleared away the mess and went to the kitchen to fetch the simple meal. When he returned, Shane's face was still a mask of misery, but most of it seemed to be sadness rather than pain. Brother Francis was chanting prayers quietly, a soft melodic murmur. Oswin set the tray down and went to help their patient sit up.
"Come," he said. "Try a bit of this."
Shane sipped the warm drink tentatively. "That's nice," he mumbled.
"Slowly, though," said Oswin. Brother Francis nodded approval and slipped out of the room. Shane managed a biscuit, bite by bite, and the entire beaker of sweetened ginger tea. Then he slumped down and closed his eyes.
"That's good," said Oswin. "How's your stomach?"
"Does it matter? Our god is dead."
There was nothing Oswin could do about that, so he simply sat with the paladin in the dim room, hours drifting by, until Shane's breathing settled into sleep.
Marcus
Brother Amparo opened the door to the room. "Paladin Marcus?"
Ismery peered past her teacher's massive shoulder. The man in the bed was looking toward them, haggard, eyes sunken, cheeks hollowed. It was hard to see in him the sword-swinging warrior who had struck her 13 days ago. Some part of her did seem to recognize him, though: her arm twinged beneath its bindings.
"Bishop Beartongue has ordered that you be released from your restraints," said Amparo, brusquely. He crossed the room, a tall, heavy man whose strength was an important part of his ability to treat serious injuries, wrestling bones into place and holding them while others splinted or plastered the limbs or wrapped the ribs. Ismery had been studying with him, until she abruptly became his patient instead.
The paladin Marcus watched with a sort of weary disinterest as Amparo undid the cuffs of tough leather at wrist and ankle. Freed, he managed to sit up and turn so that he was sitting on the edge of his bed. "Not bad," said Amparo, gruffly. "Can you cooperate with Ismery, here, while she changes your bandages?"
Marcus looked over at her and blinked at the sight of her sling, the arm wrapped and splinted. "Can…can she manage with one hand?"
Amparo gave him a humorless grin. "She'd have two if it wasn't for you. But she insists that she wants to work with you. Even though she might lose that arm entirely, below the elbow. You shattered both bones."
The paladin looked even more haggard. "I don't remember," he said, voice hoarse.
Ismery stepped forward. "Can you take off your nightshirt?"
Marcus managed, though he insisted on holding it over his lap. She started picked at the knots of the bandages over his ribs. It took her a quarter of an hour, and she was red-faced and teary-eyed by the time the wrapping came loose.
"You can't do it," said Amparo, softly. "Taking the bandages off is one thing. Putting them back on?"
Ismery shook her head. "Yes. You were right. Of course."
Amparo caught Marcus' gaze with his own. "She was my apprentice. You understand my anger, I hope." He briskly continued Marcus' treatment himself. "I'll send one of the orderlies to remake your bed and serve you a meal," he said at last. "Ismery, come along."
"No," she said. "I want to talk with him."
"Ismery."
"You just said I'm not your apprentice anymore. That I 'was' your apprentice. So I don't have to take your orders now."
Amparo shook his head and left. Ismery turned her attention to Marcus. "The others have told us that your god is dead. That formerly he stopped your battle-rage when the need was done, and because he was no longer there, that's why you ran mad."
He was looking at his hands, knotted into raw, battered fists on his knees. "Yes. I think so."
"What was that like? I want to understand. I deserve to know."
"You do indeed," he said. He sounded as though the words were choking him. "It might make…more sense if I could make you understand what it was like before. That the god was like the air we breathed, and when we had to kill, he was a golden wind that lifted us up and moved us forward. We fought as easily as a bird flies, and then he let us down again gently."
"And at Hallowbind?"
He was silent again. At last: "Have you ever watched someone who was choking? Or drowning? How they fight mindlessly for the breath they need, striking out at anyone who comes near? It was like that. It still is, even now. I don't understand why I am alive."
They sat together, their breathing the only sound. The sound that is always there, for everyone, until life departs. Ismery laid her only hand on one of his two. "That sounds even worse than losing an arm."
Marcus raised his eyes to stare at her, and then his face softened. "Thank you," he said.
Wren
Minnica took a calming breath before she entered her next patient's room. The paladins had been at the temple for nearly ten days, and none had yet woken to this world. Today would likely be no different, and she prayed for a moment that she would face facts bravely. Then she gently pushed the door open with one shoulder, her hands full of the necessities of caring for an unconscious patient.
"Good morning," said the woman in the bed.
"Oh! You're awake!" Minnica put her burdens down on little dresser: a pitcher of warm wash water, clean towels and wash rags worn soft with age and use, warm milk and honey in a spouted drinking cup, and so on. "Thank the Rat!"
"Oh, I'm with the Rat, am I? I should be in good hands, then. Especially if there's a lawsuit or an unjust eviction!"
"Yes. I'm Minnica, a hospital attendant. You're Wren, aren't you, ma'am? Do you want to try using the chamber pot?"
"Oh gods, yes. How long…oh dear. Long enough, I see. I guess you need to change the bed. I leaked!" Her patient laughed, her face rueful and pink behind the bruises.
"I'm afraid so. But please, don't be embarrassed. You've been asleep nearly ten days, so it's only to be expected." Minnica was a little surprised at how lively and talkative Wren was. She'd taken a blow to the head, and there were other bruises all over. Like the other paladins, she had tried to attack everyone around her, and it had taken six strong men to hold her down. Eventually they'd had to knock her out; she'd wounded three of them in the process, one badly. When Minnica helped her out of bed, she found that although her patient was no taller than Minnica, she must weigh half again as much.
"I'm an armful, aren't I? At least I'm not in my armor!" said Wren. "I suppose someone collected my armor? My sword? Well, I won't worry. You lot are very organized, aren't you? I'm sure it's been filed somewhere… ."
Wren chattered on as Minnica got her to the pot and then the hand basin. Even after more than a week of inaction, her muscles were still impressive. The bruises on her face and elsewhere were turning all colors; perhaps that's why Minnica didn't notice, at first, that her patient's eyes were a little too bright. But small tremors were shaking the arm that Minnica held. "Are you cold?" she asked. "You don't have any sort of fever. Here, have seat on this chair."
"Some more clothes might be useful," said Wren, still smiling. "Although I certainly see why that was a problem while I was asleep for days."
"Of course," said Minnica. She draped a blanket around Wren, then quickly pulled the bed apart and remade it. There was a warm bed gown in the dresser, and soon Wren was tucked up again, sponged clean and with the extra blanket atop the other bedding. But she was still trembling, even after she gulped down the rapidly cooling milk. "I wonder whether I ought to have Brother Francis look you over," said Minnica. "He might want to give you a dose. Are you in pain? How's your head?"
"I'm fine. We paladins don't use that kind of thing," Wren said, blithe and cheery, but Minnica hadn't missed how her patient had twitched at the word "pain."
"Francis has nepenthe. Pain is a warning, ma'am, a warning from your body. You won't heal well if you're in too much pain."
"I don't care to be drugged," said Wren. Her smile was falling apart now, but she was trying to maintain it. It hurt to watch.
"That's for your doctor to decide," said Minnica. She sat down on the edge of the bed and held Wren's wrist, counting the pulse beats. Much too fast, she thought.
Suddenly her own wrist was grasped in a grip of steel. "If I'm drugged, I can't control myself. I might run mad again," said Wren, and she wasn't smiling at all.
"You're hurting me," said Minnica. She managed to keep her voice low and steady.
"Oh, I'm sorry! Oh god, oh god!" Wren released Minnica and started to claw at her own face instead. Minnica grabbed for her wrists, knowing that she would be unable to hold the paladin against her will but unable to stop the impulse to restrain her patient.
But Wren let her do it, or maybe she was just exhausted already. She fell back against the pillow, tears leaking from her tight-closed eyes. "He's not there. No one's there. The god is dead!"
Minnica took the unstoppable warrior, the broken creature, in her own thin arms, murmuring gentle nonsense until Wren fell asleep.
Istvhan
Bishop Beartongue was looking at the huge man in the bed with the focus she usually reserved for opposing counsel in court cases. Gramm wiped his hands on his work apron again and scowled at himself: he'd been doing it often enough these last few days to recognize that it had become a nervous tic. Their patient was lying quite still, although he was breathing and his eyelids twitched from time to time.
"He's wasting away," the Bishop said. Gramm couldn't tell whether she was angry or just very worried.
"He's refusing food and only taking sips of water," said Gramm. "He rouses a bit when we hold sustenance to his mouth, and then closes his lips very tightly."
"What are you trying to feed him?"
"Gruel, milk, or broth," answered Gramm.
"I wouldn't be interested either," said the Bishop, voice tart, and then as Gramm sputtered, "No, I'm sorry, Gramm. I know it's more than that. Let's leave him for the moment. Come with me."
Gramm followed her to her study. She sat behind her deck and waved him to a chair. "At a guess, he has his wits about him and is basically willing himself to die, would you say?"
"He's certainly not conscious all the time. But yes, they are all despairing and showing little will to live, he no less than his brothers and sisters of the order."
She sighed and rubbed her chin. "I wonder…perhaps you might be able to tempt him before he could assert his will if he were offered something tasty from his early days, far back in his memory."
"I'm not sure what that would be," said Gramm. "He's not from our area. Out past Charlock, I heard."
"Well, see what you can find out. Something must be done."
The next day, Brother Francis stuck his head into the kitchen and frowned. "What is that smell?"
"Not my fault," said Annot the chief cook.
"Something that I hope will get that giant Istvhan to eat," said Gramm, stirring carefully. It still looked like slushy snow with gravel in it. Maybe it looked better when the lamb was in chunks, but Gramm didn't want to choke his semi-conscious patient. "I'm not sure what I'm doing, but it's better than doing nothing."
Francis produced a wintery little smile. "Too true. Carry on." He left, closing the door behind him.
Gramm dished some of the stuff into a large mug, then placed it on the tray he'd prepared, next to a small pitcher, a spouted invalid's cup, and a soft, fresh bread roll. He hoisted the tray, and Annot opened the the door for him. "Good luck," she said.
When Gramm brought the food into Isvhan's small room, the rich, spicy smell coming from the mug was overwhelming. Istvhan stirred on the bed and frowned. Gramm got the tray settled, then took the mug and a spoon to the bedside. With care, he held a half-spoonful to the paladin's mouth.
The frown deepened. Istvhan ran the tip of his tongue over his dry lips, and Gramm quickly got a drop of the creamy broth into him. The Paladin's nostrils flared, and he opened his mouth.
Gramm got half the mugful into his patient, and then Istvhan's eyes opened. "Who…?" he rasped.
"Gramm Sallow."
"No, I meant who made this shukhria? It's terrible." The man's voice was a husky, painfully dry whisper.
Gramm snorted, torn between amusement and offense. "That would be me as well. What did I do wrong?"
"Everything. No, you didn't curdle the lavna. But…more flavor. Twice as much garlic. More spices. Or fresher." He drew a breath and coughed. Gramm put the mug back on the tray, filled the spouted cup, and held it for Istvhan After a few sips, he took the cup from Gramm's hand. Gramm watched with some anxiety until the cup was empty. At last, Istvhan sighed and rested the cup on his chest. "Mint tea. Thank you. That was fine, if too cool."
"I don't usually give semi-conscious patients hot drinks. If you've decided to join the living, I can make some fresh for you."
Istvhan's near-smile disappeared, and he closed his eyes. Gramm held his breath.
"I'm hungry," said the paladin at last, and sighed. "Dead men typically are not. And I need to get well enough to teach you how to make proper shukhria."
Judith
The private chapel for the priests of the White Rat was a simple room, with rows of plain wooden benches nominally softened with cushions covered in undyed woolen cloth. At the far end was a reader's lectern, lit by a tall window with panes of clear glass in the center and edge panels of stained glass showing rats and ears of grain.
Judith sat there, three benches from the front, eyes and heart empty. No god spoke in her mind, which was a dull fog of daily chores required to exist, broken only by disturbing visions of her arm, her sword, and civilian bodies. Why? Why eat, sleep, breathe?
Footsteps sounded behind her. She turned and saw a neat, slender figure in the robes of the chapel's clergy. A lawyer, she thought, although she didn't recall anything else about this person.
"Might I sit?" asked the priest.
Judith remembered manners, and getting along with people. The White Rat wasn't dead; his folk still had a reason to exist. She couldn't bring herself to resent that. "The place is yours," she said, getting up to leave.
"No, please stay. You are Judith, yes?"
"I am. I'm sorry, I don't recall your name. You're one of the Rat's lawyers?"
"Yes. I'm Zale. I was wondering whether you had any interest in some work?"
She didn't, in fact, have any interest in work, or anything else. But being busy was better than not. She'd helped her brothers and sister set up the arms salle a few days ago, and for a while, her mind had been occupied. It was better than what had happened so far today, which was nothing. "I'm not really good at anything but killing people with a sword," she said.
"I'd rather not have any actual killing. But could you just look like you might do that, at any minute?"
"I suppose so. Why, though?" She was surprised to find that she actually cared about the answer.
"Oh, various reasons. Today, for example, we heard about an eviction of the family of a clerk who had fallen on hard times. His employer's shop had failed. By the time we got to the house with funds for the rent and a guardsman to guard it, the family's goods were all out on the street, and various miscreants had already made off with most of the useful items. But if we'd had you to go right over and stand there looking impressive while we got the money together and convinced the guard to lend us legitimacy, things would have come to a much better end. You'd be a great help to us in other situations too, I think."
Being useful. Preventing injustice. Having comrades. Forgotten feelings stirred in the miasma in Judith's head, a little sunlight penetrating the fog. Although the mindscape was still forbidding, there was a feeling of better weather to come, even though the bright days of summer were still only memory.
"Well, I guess I can manage that much," she said.
Emonis
The earliest light of dawn let Minnica pick out the features of the person in the bed: an ordinary face, worn to bare flesh hardly covering bone after weeks of lying unconscious. Minnica held the bony wrist, the strong sinews of life fined down day by day to slender cords. The pulse still beat, faint and slow, but the shallow breathing could barely be heard over the birdsong chorus greeting the dawn.
This poor thing was Emonis, once a paladin of the Saint of Steel.
The door opened, revealing Bishop Beartongue in plain robes, no sign of her office to be seen. "How goes it, my sister?"
"I don't think they have more than an hour. I haven't been able to get anything into them since noon yesterday."
The bishop nodded, her face grave, "I'll sit with you."
The light grew, as did the cacophony of birdcalls. Soon the sounds of the waking city could be heard: cartwheels on cobbles, the tramp of feet variously shod, vendors starting to call wares. Faintly, they heard Annot the cook singing as she kneaded the morning's bread dough, a sly song with more than one meaning in each line. Minnica looked at their patient, and to her surprise, saw a small smile on the thin lips. And then the paladin's face went slack, and there was no one there.
The bishop placed her hand over Emonis' heart and then shook her head. "Gone. Minnica, please go see whether any of their brothers or sisters are about yet, and bring one back."
Minnica found Istvhan, the big fellow, sipping tea in the refectory. She was glad to see that he was putting on some flesh. "What is it, sister?" he asked, when she called his name.
"The bishop needs you."
When they arrived at Emonis' room, he took in the situation with one sharp glance. Without hesitation, he walked forward and laid one big hand gently on his sibling's head. "Sleep well, old friend," he said. Then he turned and nodded to the bishop. "And now we are seven," he said.
"Would you like me to tell the rest, when they are all gathered?" asked Beartongue.
He shook his head. "It will come best from me," he said.
"I wish I could help."
That made him smile faintly, much like Emonis a few minutes past, thought Minnica. "You do help," he said. "Every day we are here, you help."
And then he left.