Trust

Llew helped Jonas back to the seat and rearranged the blankets over him, then tightened her blanket about herself again and opened the door a crack, peering through. Elka was coming along the hallway, accompanied by a woman, older, taller, and straighter than Elka, but otherwise identical. She had to be Elka’s mother. The doctor. The woman carried a leather bag, similar to the one wielded by the doctor on the boat from Aghacia to Phyos.

Llew opened the door to admit them.

“Hey.” Elka smiled wide and raised her arms to draw Llew’s attention to the pile of sheets and the cotton blanket she carried, then made her way to the bed, using Llew’s new path.

“Oh, wonderful. Wonderful,” Elka’s ma said, taking in the cleared floor space as Elka placed the sheets on the bed. “That would explain the noise then.”

Llew felt her cheeks flame and Jonas suddenly found a need to study the floor.

“Might want to keep it down in future,” Elka’s mother said. “Easier to keep a secret, that way.” Her eyes were quick, taking in every detail of the room and the state of their guests. “Yes, those wet clothes wouldn’t have been doing you any good. We’ll get you some dry ones.”

The woman placed her bag on the floor and came to Llew. She reached out towards one of Llew’s hands, hesitated. “I won’t get drained, will I?”

“No.”

The woman splayed one hand for a shake and Llew accepted. “This is—. Sorry.” She shook her head as she clasped Llew’s hand in both of her own. “Llew. Nice to meet you doesn’t do you justice. When Elka said Jonas needed our help, I thought we were blessed. Then she told me we had an Aenuk under our roof …” She shook her head again. She still had Llew’s hand in her grip.

“Mama,” Elka chastised.

“Yes. Yes. Sorry.” The woman released Llew. “Elka and I have discussed the virtues of Aenuks her entire life. We are honored, to say the least.”

“It’s not all it’s cracked up to be,” Llew muttered then put on her best smile. “And we are grateful for your help, Miss us ?”

“Ms. Flint. But you may call me Raena.” At Llew’s use of ‘we’, Raena looked past her to Jonas. Her expression sobered. “Time to get down to business,” Raena said, releasing Llew’s hand, picking up her bag, and making her way to Jonas.

If the room wasn’t already crowded, four people certainly made it so. Jonas made himself as small as possible.

“And you’re Jonas, the Great Syakaran of Quaver, protector of the weak, guardian of justice. What an unbridled privilege this is.”

Jonas gave a long blink, followed by wide-eyed surprise.

Llew could hardly believe she was hearing such awe spoken with regards to him this deep inside Turhmos. Even Merrid and Ard had been wary of him.

“There is quite a trade, both in novels and cartoons, featuring you here in Turhmos. Just don’t tell the authorities.” She gave Llew a wink, keeping the tone light-hearted, but Raena’s overall expression said clearly there would be consequences if word got out. Like Merrid and Ard, Llew doubted Raena was a stranger to crossing the line from legal to right.

Raena returned her attention to Jonas. “You— I hope you don’t mind me saying, you seem smaller in real life, but, I suppose, given the circumstances … Elka has adored you forever.”

“Mama.” Elka’s scowl soon turned into a grin. Not overly embarrassed, then.

Raena shrugged. “I suppose she never had a choice, since I started reading to her while she was still at the breast.”

“ Mama .”

“Ha ha. Right, yes, you’re not here for those tales. Still, tales of your father, and then you, allowed Elka to dream far beyond what her life offered.”

“None of them were true,” Jonas said.

“But you were,” Elka said, clearly not easily dissuaded.

Llew found herself smiling. While her future didn’t exactly sparkle, their present could have been truly bleak. Yet here, once again in the heart of Turhmos, were two generous and kind women willing to help strangers, one of whom should have been their enemy.

“So, my young Quaven, shall we see what we are dealing with here?” Raena pressed the backs of her fingers to Jonas’s forehead and then sat in the chair facing him. “Elka said you’re not in a good way. Your leg?” She leaned forward to scoop Jonas’s foot into her lap for closer inspection. “The fight in Duffirk was well publicized; meant to show us all Turhmos had the upper hand now, but few of us have any appetite left for fighting. We have enough to keep us busy day-to-day.” She ran fingers up Jonas’s leg, examining the discolored patches then, as Elka had done, traced the red line up his leg and tested his response to pressure in various places. As before, Jonas remained stoic, returning her gaze with only the occasional jaw flex or eye twitch giving his pain away.

“All that war and posturing nonsense is between the higher ups. None of our business. But it’s us who must wave our children off to join the fight and hope they make it home again.” Raena’s lips pressed tight as she continued her examination. “They said you’d been killed, and something about Quaver’s forces weakening. There are families even now sending their sons off to Brurun, just in case.”

Raena finished her examination, rested her hands over Jonas’s ankle and swung an apologetic look from Llew to Jonas. “There’s something dangerous happening, I believe, about here.” She circled a finger over an area above Jonas’s knee. "We could fill you up on medicines that would likely make you feel awful, and they might work, or they might not, then this gets worse and you die anyway. Or, we could try opening it up and treating it topically, which would hurt, likely make you feel awful, and there’s still a chance we fail – not to mention the added risk of introducing more infection – and you die.” She and Jonas stared at each other while Llew desperately tried to deny what she was about to hear. There had to be another option. She looked to Elka who was on the verge of tears.

Raena watched Jonas for a few moments before speaking again.

“I have confidence we can save your life if we move swiftly, decisively, and with no regrets; no ‘what if’s’,” Raena said. “I can make no such promises about saving your leg. Do you understand?”

Jonas nodded. Llew didn’t.

Raena met her gaze. “I’ve seen Aenuks do their magic at the border before, and it is quite the miracle to watch them work, but even with their help, we had to remove limbs to save lives. A broken bone must still be set properly before accelerating the healing process. We still lost soldiers to infection. We learned to be very careful about when to bring in the Aenuks to close some wounds. There’s little point draining life from your surroundings only to have your patient die painfully days later. It was often too dangerous to open them up again. We’re still learning the science of germs. As far as I know, that is a complication even beyond Aenuks when it comes to healing non-Aenuks. Of course, it’s not an issue for Aenuks themselves. But, in this case, he is Karan, so there’s nothing any Aenuk could do. Trust me when I tell you he’s in good hands here.”

Despite not needing to, Raena seemed to be waiting for Llew’s acceptance to move forward. Llew had no intention of stopping these women from saving Jonas’s life. No matter how desperately she wanted to find another option, Raena was right: they didn’t have time.

Raena went to Jonas’s side, offering her shoulder to support him to stand. “Please pull the bed out from the wall so we have room to work.”

The blanket fell from across Jonas’s shoulders – his dignity only maintained by a death grip on the one he held over his groin – exposing the bruises, cuts, and burns across his back, along with the mighty, sweeping lines of the gryphon tattoo that represented the strength of his blood; so at odds with his current truth.

Llew moved to comply, her mind shrieking at her: a complication even beyond Aenuks . But Llew was Sy aenuk. That had to mean something. She had to be able to do something to beat the bug robbing Jonas of his Syakaran powers. She just had to. Braph couldn’t win that way.