Not On Our Watch

Jonas’s hollering had Llew on her feet in an instant.

The blanket tented as his stump rose, both his hands reaching to clasp at it. They overshot, clutched air and blanket where only a day before his knee would have been. He bellowed again, the grunt of pain joined by a wail of surprise and anguish, and he turned horrified eyes on her. Or was that plain, unbridled fear?

“It hurts,” he said, his voice pitched high. “It’s not there, and it hurts!”

Llew didn’t know what to say. All she could do was grasp the bottle Raena had given her.

“Maybe this will help.”

The laudanum had certainly helped Llew after Aris’s attack. The drug had also provided a distance between the event and her having to deal with the emotional scars. She squeezed the rubber top, filling the glass tube.

After thumping his stump down on the bed repeatedly, Jonas managed to hold himself steady to accept the measure of laudanum, his hands gripping the sides of the bed, his breathing rapid and ragged. Growling through gritted teeth, he continued to writhe restlessly, slapping his stump down, or drawing it up and reaching to clasp hands over a knee that wasn’t there anymore. Every time that happened, he flailed and looked to Llew, distressed. “How does it hurt so much when it’s not even there?”

“I don’t know.” Llew wished she could offer more, but she had nothing. She wished she could do more. All she could do was be with him, offering a light touch in an attempt to give support, bear witness to his pain. Why couldn’t she heal him with a touch? She wished more than anything she could’ve done so before his leg became septic. They could’ve been most of the way to Quaver by now. If only …

After some time, Jonas ceased thrashing and lay back, seemingly calm. His breathing was shallow and slow and his head lolled.

Llew sat back down, heart still pounding, wishing things were different.

Footsteps on the stairs raised her heart rate further. Who in the house wouldn’t have heard Jonas’s wailing? Their vulnerability in this home settled heavily.

The hallway floorboards creaked. The door handle squeaked, the latch clicked, and Raena stepped through carrying a tray with a rack of toast, a bowl of eggs, and grapefruit halves. From the crook of her other arm hung her bag.

“He woke?” she asked as she crossed to the table by the window and placed the food tray on a clear corner.

Llew nodded. “He said it hurt. The bit that’s not there.”

“Yes. That happens. Here. I thought you might like to see one.” Raena held out a book, the cover soft with wear and well cracked, the pages yellowed and curled at the corners. In bold text at the top of the cover it read:

JONAS

The Great Syakaran of Quaver

A thickly muscled man, long hair floating in the wind, strode confidently across the cover, his bare chest puffed out clearly showing his tattoo of a gryphon that didn’t quite match reality, while someone else cowered below him, and arm extended up protectively.

A snigger escaped Llew. Everything about the man on the cover was bigger than real life, except the tattoo, which merely sat upon his pectoral muscle, rather than sweeping around his ribcage. His jaw was large and square, his biceps round, his thighs straining his trousers. It wasn’t the Jonas she knew. Well, the hair and the beard growth matched pretty well, actually. That would be how Elka recognized him. Llew snorted again.

“I thought you might appreciate that. I suppose you don’t need to look strong when you simply are. Syakaran strength doesn’t seem to be worn the same way a regular strongman might. Please, eat.” Raena indicated the food and Llew didn’t hesitate – she was starving. She placed the book on top of a stack of others, hesitated, lifted it again, and the book beneath and swapped their places. She suspected Jonas wouldn’t appreciate seeing it there.

“We’ll try to get food into him, too, but going by his reaction to the ether, he may not keep much down for a day or two.” Raena fit herself between the wall and Jonas’s bed, so she still faced Llew, and pulled a stethoscope from her bag, fitting it to her ears and warming the chest-piece by rubbing it in one palm “I’ll send Elka up with some water, soon, and we will have a bath drawn for you in the room across the hall; allow you a few minutes to relax.”

Llew balanced one egg in an egg cup and tapped around its crown with a teaspoon, scooped the top off the egg and filled her mouth with the liquid gold that held far more value that any pure metal in that moment. Raena listened to Jonas’s heart for a few seconds, folded and put away the stethoscope, placed the back of a hand to Jonas’s forehead, ran the back of her knuckles down his face. He was still coated in his feverish sheen. Raena pulled a cloth from her bag and brushed it across his skin. “I’ll send Elka up with water for that. No doubt he would appreciate being cleaned up, too.” She stood from her ministrations, watching Llew. Llew paused in her indulgence, looking back.

“Thank you for landing on our doorstep. You have no idea how lucky we feel to meet you, and to have been able to help him.” She pressed her lips together in some regret. “I am sorry for the intervention required.”

“It’s alright—” Llew began.

“But we can offer some help, yet.” Raena’s demeanor lightened. “My son, Rowan. He’s a cobbler by trade. He’s good with his hands, and his mind, well …” Raena glanced around the walls of the room. “We should brighten up these walls with some of his artworks, shouldn’t we?” She smiled again, though Llew wasn’t sure if she truly sought a response.

Llew focused on her egg. She had no intention of staying long enough for art on the walls to matter.

“He built the frame for Elka’s leg that allows her to get around short distances without a crutch or wheeled-chair, and he’s made some basic prosthetics for some of my patients over the years. He adores his sister and has never been anything but supportive of her love for the Jonas stories. I believe he will be safe to bring in to help if you agree.”

Again, Llew wasn’t sure what to say. They’d had no choice but to stop here for help, but the fact they remained in the heart of Turhmos couldn’t be ignored. Still, this woman had performed surgery on Jonas, and he still lived.

“Of course, your friend is going to need several weeks to heal before he can make use of a prosthetic, but Rowan could start working on it now so it will be ready when Jonas is. I’m sure he will be keen to get back on his … foot as soon as possible.”

Llew watched Raena closely as she talked and found she had no reason not to take the woman at her word. Besides, surely, if she wished Jonas harm, that would’ve happened by now. She glanced through the narrow gap between the curtains where the building across the street was visible. This home could never compare to the freedom offered by Merrid and Ard’s farm, but at least they were safe here for now. That much was clear. She turned back to Raena.

“Thank you. Any help would be appreciated. You’ll understand the danger Jonas is in while he remains in Turhmos, especially now.”

“We do.” Raena nodded.

“I, uhm …” Llew took a deep breath, cleared her throat. “I can help him heal faster, but we need to be careful. No one else can learn we’re here, and … I can’t touch anyone after, and we can’t afford to leave dead vegetation behind.”

“Ha. Of course. You’re Aenuk.” Raena shook her head in wonder. “We’re just not used to thinking like that. And I’m sorry you need to hide. That is a tragedy for our nation. But he is Karan. Isn’t there something that stops Aenuks from healing Kara?”

“The Aenuk-Karan barrier.” Llew nodded. “But we’ve learned it’s possible for Kara to use Aenuk blood to heal themselves. We just need to get it into him, with syringes. But then I become a danger to anyone I touch until I’ve replaced the blood.”

Raena listened. “Which is a natural process, but how much does he need?”

Everything I have, possibly more. To Raena, Llew shrugged again and said, “I don’t think very much to close a surface wound, but …” She glanced at Jonas and his newly shortened leg, visible only by the soft folds of his blanket rounding off and lying flat on the bed where they should have rested over knee, shin, and foot.

“That’s all it is now,” Raena said. “And the sooner you did so, the less likely it is he would acquire an infection. But there’s not much vegetation around here …” She nodded to herself, biting her lip, then looked up at Llew again. “How much damage would it do, really, for a person to carry that injury? I mean, he has a nasty wound that anyone can heal from given time. I’ve seen them heal from vegetation. What kind of damage does the Aenuk touch do to flesh for a wound like that?”

“It burns.” Llew wasn’t sure how she felt about where this conversation was going. She wanted to heal Jonas, of course, and part of her was elated to be so close to doing so, but wounding someone else on purpose? “You saw the ones from the fight.”

“Yes.” Raena glanced at Jonas again. “So, if you were to accelerate his healing, we could just pick a place on my body for you to place your hand and you two would be free to continue on in your journey?”

Llew didn’t know what to say.

“I can manage a minor burn. You could put it on my upper arm, or thigh. That might be better. Easy enough to keep covered under a dress, and unlikely to get rubbed raw in my line of work. And it would be gone in a matter of weeks, by which time you could be safely home.” Raena gripped Llew’s arm. “Let us help you.”

A sincere request Llew wanted to accept, but her mind filled with an image of the girl she’d never seen, playing in the grass south of Osurno, the life drained from her as she played when Llew healed Cassidy; her father’s face in rictus, hand reaching, still curved to fit Llew’s arm. If it really had been just a surface wound, Llew wouldn’t object, but there was bone damage, and the microorganism ravaging his body. She couldn’t guess how that would affect Jonas’s healing, how much blood he would need, or what that would do to Raena.

“I’m sorry, I can’t let you.” She continued before Raena could protest. “There’s no way to guess how bad your injury might be. I’m not willing to risk it, and Jonas won’t be, either.”

Raena looked disappointed. “Well, the offer is there for you to consider.”

“Thank you.”

“No. Thank you for this opportunity.” Raena brushed her hands down the front of her, glanced at Jonas again and gathered her bag. “We will see you clean, fed, and well before we part ways.” She rested a hand on Llew’s arm. “Elka mentioned you had Ajnai trees. What you and he represent … We are truly on the cusp of something amazing. We won’t let that die here. Not on our watch.”

***

Jonas slipped in and out of sleep for the rest of the day.

Newly drugged, he slept deeply for a time, growing suddenly restless before waking with a start.

Llew went to him, smoothed his hair, and tried to soothe him with words and shushes.

“Raena says this is normal for people who’ve …” She couldn’t say it. She licked her lips, but she still couldn’t say it. Jonas, Quaver’s hero, had had a limb removed. It had been the right thing to do, she was sure of that, it just wasn’t something she would be used to for a while.

She hoped she was doing as good a job at being there for him as he had been for her, offering a hand to hold, a calming word, and more oblivion. Raena recommended frequent doses of this last to give his leg a strong start in its healing process. Jonas needed to be as healthy as possible for travel.

Llew spent the hours alone sorting and tidying the clutter of the room. While she had never considered her childhood lacking while her parents were around, she had never been surrounded by so much stuff. She shifted piles of books against a wall, satisfying herself that they would be less likely to topple. Blankets she folded and piled along an edge of the table. Funny, really, how these domestic tendencies set in. She hadn’t lived in a real house for years, hadn’t had to do much laundry, certainly didn’t need to fold and store. Then again, she hadn’t needed to fill her time in a single room before, either.

Elka or Raena called in occasionally during the day to check on Jonas, empty the chamber pot, bring a meal – toast, fruit, and small cakes for Llew, soups for Jonas, which he managed to keep down. The consensus was that he was doing well. They had removed his local infection and avoided introducing another. Jonas tried solid food in the evening, which also stayed down, and remained awake for over an hour without the laudanum. His face pinched a few times, but he didn’t give voice to any pains. The sooner he could do without the drug, the sooner they could move on.

As the days wore on, he refused the laudanum to help him sleep, and instead he and Llew discussed their plans to get out of Turhmos. They would stop in at Merrid and Ard’s and complete his healing from this surgery so they could more easily continue on to Quaver. Llew couldn’t wait to experience another Merrid hug.