Against The World

Chapter 95: A Prayer of His Own

The first healer to answer our invitation arrived carrying a duck.

Mary looked at the bird.

Then at the woman holding it.

“Is that yours?”

“For the moment.”

The duck attempted to leave.

Its owner tightened her arm.

“It belonged to a patient who couldn’t pay.”

“We aren’t charging you to enter.”

“Oh, good. I’ve become fond of her.”

Her name was Arwen.

She had practiced in a market town on Halvane’s western road for twenty-six years. She had never possessed healing magic, had little patience for people who assumed that meant she knew nothing, and wanted to know where we kept our clean water.

Nessa liked her immediately.

The chicken was placed in the care of the kitchens under very specific instructions.

Beatrice listened to those instructions.

Then wrote the bird’s name on a scrap of paper and fixed it to the coop.

“Otherwise someone will make soup.”

Over the next four days, eleven more people arrived.

Three healers.

Two apprentices.

The rest were family.

They came separately, following different roads. Some had been dismissed. Others had left before anyone could decide whether to dismiss them.

One still wore Avar’s sun beneath his coat.

He touched it when Mary asked his profession, as though expecting the answer to cause trouble.

“Healer.”

She wrote it down.

“Will your wife be seeking work too?”

His hand slowly fell away from the pendant.

“Yes. She keeps bees.”

Mary reached for another sheet.

By evening, Helena had found rooms for them near the lower garden.

Garrick arranged a wagon for the possessions they had left with a cousin in Stoneford.

I attended a meeting about blankets and discovered that promising to make room involved a considerable number of blankets.

Beatrice brought the figures.

I read them.

Then signed.

News of the missing infirmary keeper came from Sabine.

His name was Brother Cael.

He was alive.

That was the first line of her letter.

I appreciated her judgment.

He had been confined in a temple residence pending examination of his conduct. The infirmary he had managed remained open under a replacement keeper.

Two attendants had been allowed to leave.

Sabine’s people had spoken with one of them.

There had been no public charge.

No date given for a hearing.

Evelyn read the letter beside me.

“Can she reach him?”

“She’s asking.”

“And Halvane’s court?”

“Has been informed.”

My wife set the page down.

For a while, we could hear Carol protesting in the adjoining room.

Helena answered her with the calm of someone who had already survived one determined daughter.

“We should ask for permission to visit him,” Evelyn said.

“Permission?”

“A named visitor. A written request. Make someone decide whether to refuse it.”

I looked at the letter again.

Sabine had already found the residence.

We had a name.

A place.

Something more useful than imagining doors I could break.

“Maelin might know who he would want.”

Evelyn nodded.

We sent for her.

That evening, I found Soren in the chapel.

He sat near the back.

The candles had burned low, and the basin reflected a narrow strip of light from the open door.

I stopped beside his bench.

“May I?”

He moved over.

For a while, we listened to the small sounds of the castle beyond the chapel walls.

A cart.

Footsteps.

Someone calling for a missing broom.

“Mara walked to the window today,” he said.

“That’s good.”

“She complained about the view.”

“That sounds better.”

He smiled.

Then looked toward Aurelia’s unfinished image.

“I’ve been trying to work out what to say.”

“To her?”

“Yes.”

“What have you tried?”

“Nothing aloud.”

I rested my forearms on my knees.

“I didn’t begin very elegantly either.”

“What did you say?”

“I’ve asked her quite a lot of questions.”

“Did she answer?”

“Some.”

He nodded slowly.

His hands lay open in his lap.

“I don’t want to say I believe something because I’m frightened of what happens if I don’t.”

I looked at those empty hands.

“Then don’t.”

He let out a breath.

I stayed with him until the last daylight left the high window.

When I rose, he remained seated.

Aurelia came that night.

I knew before opening my eyes.

The air smelled faintly of roses, and the armchair beside the hearth was no longer ours.

It was the broad garden chair from the old recording.

She sat in it with Carol asleep against her shoulder.

Evelyn stood beside me, holding Garrick.

For a moment, I simply watched.

Aurelia looked up.

“You can come closer.”

“I was wondering whether she had complained.”

“Only about being moved.”

“That’s familiar.”

Her smile lingered.

Then she glanced at Evelyn.

“Happy birthday, my dear. A little late.”

My wife smiled.

“Thank you.”

“Did he manage the cake?”

“He delegated wisely.”

“I’m learning,” I said.

“So I see.”

There was warmth in the room.

Enough that I almost postponed the questions.

Aurelia saw something change in my face.

“Tell me.”

I told her about Soren.

The infirmary.

Mara’s rose.

The order and its exceptions.

As I spoke, Aurelia’s hand rested protectively over Carol’s back.

By the time I finished, her expression had grown very quiet.

“Can you tell whether Avar took his blessing?” I asked.

“If Soren permits me to reach him, I can examine what remains of it.”

“You don’t already know?”

“No, Uriah. I hear those who call to me. I see what I can reach. There is a great deal beyond both.”

I thought about all the times I had imagined her watching us.

Every corridor.

Every difficult night.

Perhaps she had heard more silence than I understood.

“He wants to heal again.”

“I know that much. He came to my chapel.”

“Can you help him?”

“Yes.”

The answer came easily.

I had been preparing myself for something harder.

Aurelia looked down at Carol.

“But I would speak to him first.”

Evelyn sat on the edge of the bed.

Garrick shifted against her arm.

“Would he have to become one of your priests?”

“No.”

“Or swear an oath?”

“If he wishes to make a promise, it should be one he understands.”

I looked at Aurelia.

“Could you take it away afterward?”

She met my eyes.

“Yes.”

The room seemed quieter.

“I won’t lie to you about that.”

I was glad she had answered.

I still disliked the answer.

She watched me struggle with it.

“A blessing is power I continue to give. It is different from what grows within you.”

“And if he disagrees with you?”

“He may.”

“If he becomes angry?”

“He may do that too.”

She shifted Carol a little higher.

“If he uses what I give him to hurt someone deliberately, I would stop lending him the means.”

Evelyn ran one finger over Garrick’s sleeve.

“He will need to hear that from you.”

“Yes,” Aurelia said. “He will.”

I sat beside my wife.

“What about the others?”

“The healers coming here?”

I nodded.

“Some may wish to speak with me. Some may not.”

“Can you bless all of them?”

Aurelia was quiet for a moment.

“Not all at once. Not without cost.”

I looked at her more closely.

She seemed solid tonight.

Her gown had weight. The chair creaked when she moved.

But near the far wall, where the dream touched the darkness beyond the hearth, golden threads shivered and vanished.

“You’re still being held.”

“Partly.”

“And we keep asking you for things.”

“You are allowed to ask.”

Carol stirred.

Aurelia looked down and gently touched her cheek.

“I would rather hear you than have you decide I cannot bear it.”

I swallowed.

Beside me, Evelyn reached for my hand.

Before the dream ended, Aurelia asked about the healing house.

I told her about Hester.

The records.

The roof.

The goat.

At that, she closed her eyes briefly.

“There was a goat when I visited.”

“Surely not the same one.”

“No. Though I am beginning to suspect the position is hereditary.”

Evelyn laughed.

I told Aurelia about the line in the dedication.

Those received need give no account of their worthiness.

She listened without smiling.

“I remember the argument over that.”

“What argument?”

“Several donors wanted the keeper to distinguish between misfortune and poor judgment.”

“What did you say?”

“That I had required care after both.”

I looked at her.

She lifted one shoulder.

“I was young once.”

Then she kissed Carol’s forehead and passed her back to me.

Her hand lingered against mine.

“Tell Soren he may ask for me by name. He needn’t decide everything before we speak.”

I found him the following morning carrying a tray.

He put it down when he saw my face.

“Did she—”

“Yes.”

His fingers tightened on the edge.

I told him what Aurelia had said.

All of it.

The offer.

The limits.

The fact that a gift sustained by her could be withdrawn.

He listened without interruption.

When I finished, he looked through the infirmary door.

Mara sat by the window with a blanket over her knees.

Arwen was telling her something that required several firm gestures.

Soren watched them for a moment.

“She would speak with me?”

“Yes.”

“What do I have to do?”

“Ask.”

He looked doubtful.

“I asked Avar for years.”

“I know.”

“And he never spoke.”

I had no answer that would make that hurt less.

Soren picked up the tray again.

“I should finish the morning round.”

“All right.”

He carried it inside.

I went to council.

He did not go to the chapel that morning.

Or that afternoon.

I saw him twice.

Once helping an apprentice examine a swollen wrist.

Once sitting beside Yara while she explained where she had put the medicine records.

By supper, I had begun wondering whether I should find him.

Evelyn noticed.

“You’ve looked at the door four times.”

“Have I?”

“Yes.”

I told her.

She listened while cutting a piece of bread.

“You said he could decide.”

“I know.”

“Then let him.”

I leaned back.

On the rug beside us, Garrick lay awake beneath Helena’s watchful eye, considering his own sleeve.

I envied the simplicity of the problem.

Evelyn offered me the bread.

I took it.

We finished supper.

The following day, Soren asked whether I would walk with him to the chapel.

We went after the afternoon bell.

At the door, he stopped.

“Would you wait here?”

“Yes.”

He nodded.

Then entered alone.

I sat on the step where Garrick had once found me.

The stone was cold.

People passed through the courtyard carrying the work of the day.

After a while, someone placed a folded cloak beside me.

Alistair.

He said nothing.

I put it beneath me.

Neither of us went inside.

Soren came out before the candles needed trimming.

His eyes were red.

He stopped in the doorway, looking slightly surprised to find the courtyard still there.

I stood.

“Are you all right?”

“I think so.”

We moved aside to let an elderly woman enter.

Soren watched her go.

Then he looked at me.

“She knew Mara’s name.”

I waited.

“I asked about the blessing. Whether she would give it to me.”

“What did she say?”

“That she would. If I wanted it after we had spoken.”

He rubbed a hand over his face.

“We spoke for a long time.”

“What about?”

His mouth moved into a small, uncertain smile.

“Some of it was private.”

“Yes,” I said. “Of course.”

We began walking back toward the infirmary.

Halfway across the courtyard, he stopped again.

“She asked what I would do if she told me to turn someone away.”

I looked at him.

“What did you say?”

“That I hoped I would refuse her too.”

“And?”

His breath trembled.

“She said she hoped so.”

There was light in his hands when Ilyen examined him.

A pale gold.

Soren stared at it as though looking too directly might make it disappear.

Ilyen asked him to lift one finger.

Then another.

To let the light fade.

To call it back.

It answered slowly.

Differently from what he remembered.

“I’ll have to learn it,” he said.

“Yes,” Ilyen replied.

He laughed then.

A short, unsteady sound.

“I can do that.”

Evelyn stood beside me.

She looked at the gold gathered around his fingers, then down at her own hands.

“Tomorrow morning?” she asked Ilyen.

The midwife nodded.

Soren looked between them.

“You wouldn’t mind?”

My wife smiled.

“I’d be pleased to have someone else make mistakes with me.”

He bowed his head.

This time, when he looked up, he was smiling too.

Mary received two letters that evening.

One confirmed that a visitor had been permitted to see Brother Cael.

He remained confined, but he knew that people outside the temple were asking after him.

The second was addressed to me under Halvane’s royal seal.

It accused Greykeep of encouraging the abandonment of lawful religious duties.

It asked that Soren and the other temple-trained healers be returned for examination.

Mary read it aloud.

Evelyn sat very still.

Garrick held out his hand for the letter when she finished.

He read it once.

“An examination with no stated end.”

“And no stated charge,” Evelyn added.

I looked toward the infirmary windows.

Light shone behind them.

“Tell them everyone who has come here is free to leave,” I said. “And everyone who wishes to remain has our protection.”

Mary reached for her pen.

“They won’t like that.”

“No.”

I took the letter from Garrick and set it on the table.

“They have heard my warning already.”

The next morning, I passed the infirmary on my way to the workshop.

Through the open door, I saw Soren and Evelyn sitting opposite each other at a small table.

A silver-rimmed bowl stood between them.

Ilyen watched as two threads of gold touched the water.

Soren’s flickered.

Evelyn’s held.

Then hers flickered too.

He said something.

She laughed.

I continued toward the workshop before either of them noticed me.

Behind me, Ilyen told them to begin again.

And they did.

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