Beyond the Boundary Stones (The Chronicles of Tevenar Book 3) (58 page)

The insulin had worked better than he’d dared dream. Dozens of people who would have died, who even the Mother’s power had been unable to save, were alive and healthy thanks to his efforts. All right, Gevan and especially Nalini had done a lot of it, but it had been his hands that had administered the healing elixir. He was the one Seshone had embraced and thanked effusively through streaming tears. He was the one whose shoulder Elkan had gripped painfully tight as he murmured, “Well done.”

He swallowed as he remembered that moment. His master had praised him many times before, but this was different. This time Josiah had accomplished something Elkan couldn’t. The world had been fundamentally transformed. No longer was healing limited by how many familiars the Mother could touch without causing disasters. Now there was new hope for all of Ravanetha, and Tevenar, too. Surely insulin was only the first discovery of many that would multiply the good wizards could do.

Maybe it didn’t exactly make up for the death of Elkan’s niece Bethiav—nothing could, really. But it helped. No one else would have to die the way she had, once insulin was available to all.

Josiah groaned at the thought of all the work that would entail. Making enough insulin to sustain their new Marvannan patients on top of the Ramunnan ones was going to strain Nalini’s abilities. She’d talked to a few Ramunnan apothecaries about learning how to extract it, but their skills hadn’t impressed her. They’d have to learn, though. Experiments with Thanna had shown that the diabetic patients would need several doses of insulin each day to keep their disease under control.

He piled his plate full of food and dug in, mind buzzing with plans. Elkan had mentioned turning over one room of the Hall to Nalini and her assistants. Luckily the old warehouse was huge. This afternoon they’d be moving the Marvannan patients into rooms upstairs, as soon as permission came from the Matriarch for them to disembark. They couldn’t go home until they’d amassed enough stores of insulin to last them the voyage and someone trained in manufacturing it could go with them. Seshone had volunteered to learn, but Josiah thought the younger of his two companions was a better prospect. The man was quiet, but his hands were deft and he’d seemed quick to grasp Josiah’s explanation of the distilling process.

One by one the other wizards and helpers joined Josiah at the table. Borlen looked exhausted. Back in Tevenar no newly bonded apprentice would be given so much independent responsibility so soon. Technically masters were supposed to oversee everything an apprentice did, although Elkan had never been strict about that.

Kevessa was looking happier than she had in days. She must be relieved to finally have her secret out in the open. Maybe she’d talk to him again. Maybe she’d welcome his attentions.

Josiah grimaced and stared at his plate. He missed Nirel. It was still hard to believe she’d been a traitor all along. She’d been such a good helper. He didn’t even resent her relationship with Vigorre anymore. Although apparently that had never been real, either. She’d only been using him.

He glanced at Vigorre. The young Keeper was sunk deep in his own thoughts. He stared at nothing, barely seeming to notice what he ate.

Josiah was about to speak to him when the door of the dining hall opened and one of the Matriarch’s guards strode in. He raked them all with an arrogant glance. “The wizard Elkan is summoned to the Matriarch’s presence,” he announced.

Josiah realized everyone was looking at him. He reluctantly put down his fork. “Elkan’s with a patient right now,” he said, waving toward the door to the main Hall. “When he’s done, he’ll need to eat before he can go to the palace.” Elkan had been pushing himself and Tobi harder than usual since they’d arrived back at the hall. Josiah didn’t see the point, since they’d never make up for the time they’d lost. Besides, they’d helped more patients on the ship in an hour than they usually did in three.

The guard looked down his nose at Josiah and swept past the table to slam the Hall door open. Josiah jumped up and followed him.
Sar, get over here. There may be trouble.

Sar abandoned his hay with an annoyed flip of an ear.
Wonderful. More bribes and threats. Just what I wanted after spending half the morning idle while you were busy healing people without me.

Josiah looked at him, startled, as they passed through the door into the Hall.
Did that bother you?

Not really.
Sar’s tone was half disgruntled, half apologetic.
Healing is the Mother’s work, no matter how it’s done. But I disliked being unable to participate.

I’ll keep that in mind, next time. Though I don’t suppose we’ll find many more diabetic patients at the bottom of ladders. I could have used your help to monitor the doses and—

He froze as the guard drew his sword and stepped between Elkan and his patient, directly into the path of the golden light. “You will immediately cease all other activities and report to the Matriarch.”

Elkan pulled back and the light winked out. He rose, his hand still on Tobi’s head. His voice was mild, but Josiah could read the anger in his stance. “Unless some grave emergency has arisen, we will finish with this patient and refresh ourselves first.” Tobi snarled in menacing counterpoint.

The guard’s eyes narrowed. “A grave emergency
has
arisen. The Matriarch is losing her child.”

Josiah gasped. Elkan froze for a moment, then inclined his head. “We’ll attend her at once.” He stepped around the guard to quietly address his patient.

The elderly man waved him away. “Go on. My hip will wait. Make sure that baby sticks. Last thing I want is to see those blasted Purifiers take over.”

Elkan’s lips thinned, but he nodded. “Lie still until one of the other wizards can see to you. The break isn’t stable yet.” He turned. “Josiah, you and Sar come with me.”

Josiah fell in beside him. “Why? There’s still a lot to be done here, and you don’t need anyone to help with a miscarriage.” Sometimes a miscarriage could be halted, but usually the child was already dead and all they could do was make sure everything was expelled cleanly and the bleeding stopped.

Elkan didn’t lower his voice. “I think it wise to always have another wizard with me when I attend the Matriarch. The Mother’s eyes are everywhere, but wizards have been falsely accused of impropriety before when alone with a patient. Better to never let the situation arise.”

“Oh.” The Matriarch certainly wouldn’t hesitate to make that sort of accusation if she thought it would be to her advantage. Josiah didn’t see how it could be, but he agreed that it was better not to give her the chance.

The guard led them through the halls of the palace to the Matriarch’s bedchamber. The large room was hung with ornate tapestries and carpeted with lush rugs. A fire roared in a fireplace that took up most of the far wall, driving away the late winter chill. A huge canopied bed dominated one side of the room. Elkan needn’t have worried about being left alone with the Matriarch, for servants and guards were everywhere, just like always. Josiah made a face. Was the Matriarch ever truly alone? She probably didn’t even send her attendants away when Lord Renarre visited her.

The Matriarch lay in the bed, covers pulled up to her chin. A woman sat in a chair beside her, holding her hand and murmuring to her. She looked familiar. After a moment of searching his memory Josiah placed her. The Matriarch’s wise woman, which seemed to be the Ramunnan term for midwife. They’d met her during their first session with the Matriarch. What was her name? Oh, yes, Yerenna.

She rose and came to meet them. “I’m afraid you’re too late. Verinna passed the child some time ago.” She gestured to a bowl covered with a cloth on a nearby table. “It appeared complete to me, but you might want to check for yourself.”

Elkan’s face was set in grim lines. “I trust your judgement. We need to check her womb anyway to make sure it’s clamping down properly. If anything remains that could cause infection, we’ll sense it.” He dropped his hand to Tobi’s head and moved to the bedside. “Your majesty, may we examine you? Your body would probably recover perfectly well without the Mother’s power, but we can speed the process.”

The Matriarch pushed herself up to a seated position. Several servant women arranged pillows behind her back. She scowled at Elkan. “Of course. I want you to prepare my body to conceive again as soon as possible. Tonight, if you can.”

“We can.” Light poured from Elkan’s hand and surrounded her abdomen. After a few moments of concentration, he said, “We detect nothing in your womb. That’s not surprising; generally fragments only break off when the child has been dead for several days and decay has begun.” His fingers on Tobi’s head tightened. “And we know your child was alive yesterday.”

Josiah wasn’t sure why Elkan seemed so bothered. It was sad that the baby had died, of course, but miscarriages happened all the time. He hadn’t seen his master react this way with other women they’d attended, even when they’d been closely monitoring the pregnancy the way they’d been doing with this one.

Elkan took a deep breath. “Relax for a few minutes, your majesty.” He closed his eyes and his face took on its familiar look of concentration. The Matriarch leaned back against her pillows with a sigh and closed her eyes as well.

Josiah scratched the base of Sar’s ears and shot a curious glance at the covered bowl. Always before when they’d been called to help a woman after a miscarriage the midwife had already taken the remains away. In Tevenar it was traditional to bury a lost child in a garden or beneath a tree, in the family’s yard if they had one or in a park if they didn’t. He’d never had the chance to look at one. The idea of sneaking a peak was both unsettling and fascinating. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t been around dead bodies before. And he needed to learn what a complete set of remains looked and felt like, so he’d be able to recognize when one wasn’t, the way Elkan had said sometimes happened and could cause an infection. Didn’t he?

It wasn’t a very good excuse, but probably Elkan would accept it, if he even noticed what Josiah was doing. He casually wandered over to the table.
Sar, come give me a look at this.

There won’t be anything to sense. Only death.
The donkey flipped his ears back, but followed and positioned himself under Josiah’s hand.

I know.
Josiah held his breath and folded the cloth back.

There were some bloody cloths in the bottom of the bowl, but the midwife must have rinsed off the remains to examine them, because they were fairly clean. Josiah wasn’t sure what he’d expected, but somehow the pitiful scrap of flesh shocked him, even though it looked very much like what they’d been viewing through windows for days. The translucent sac around the child was intact, still enclosing a bubble of fluid. Within, the limp body of the child floated, pale and gray. On one side of the sac the tiny placenta leaked blood where it had torn away from the uterus wall.

Josiah gulped. He was almost sorry he’d looked, but he still wanted to get the complete picture.
Sar?

The donkey sent the Mother’s power into the bowl. No matter how many times Josiah felt the cold, heavy, smothering sensation of death, it always disturbed him. A fresh corpse wasn’t blank like an inanimate object, because residual life lingered in the tissues. But the central life of the organism was gone, returned to the Mother, leaving only a bitter taste in the back of his mouth, a fading hiss, and sparkles where the minuscule creatures responsible for decay were beginning to multiply. Josiah wondered what they’d look like under the expanding glass. Maybe they could find an animal corpse that wasn’t too nasty—

Elkan’s hard, matter-of-fact voice broke into his thoughts. “So, Yerenna, what did you use? I think I recognize the effects of pennyroyal. Sometimes women of the Cleaners’ Guild don’t realize they’re pregnant in time to stop using it to wash wool.”

Yerenna’s voice was cool. “That, and other things. Ginger, black and blue cohosh, primrose.”

Josiah swallowed and took his hand off Sar to fold the cloth back over the bowl.

Elkan’s voice took on an edge. “You’re lucky you didn’t cause her to bleed out of control.”

“I know my business.” Yerenna eyed him hostilely. “I’ve been helping women for many years. Longer than you’ve been flashing your lights around, I expect.”

The Matriarch glared at Elkan. “Don’t you dare criticize her.
She
did exactly what I asked.”

Josiah moved to stand behind Elkan. He felt sick to his stomach. They’d done it on purpose. When Elkan had refused to end the Matriarch’s pregnancy with the Mother’s power, she’d found another way.

Elkan removed his hand from Tobi’s back, cutting off the flow of the Mother’s power. His spoke in a flat tone that revealed no emotion. “We’ve taken your womb through approximately two weeks’ worth of healing to its normal non-pregnant state. You remain healthy and fertile. Without further intervention from us you’ll probably conceive again in due time. Since this pregnancy was unaffected by rejection, chances are good any future children you have with Lord Renarre will also be healthy without our aid.”

The Matriarch narrowed her eyes and fixed him with a calculating stare. “Are you saying you won’t help me any further?”

Elkan clenched his fists. “I’m saying I won’t be a part of helping you conceive a child you intend to discard if it doesn’t satisfy you. I won’t continue to spend time and energy that could go to people who are sick and suffering and dying catering to the whims of a healthy, powerful woman with no regard for the Mother’s Law.”

She flung back the covers and rose, glowering at him. Servants rushed to drape a heavy silk dressing gown over her flowing white nightdress. “I
am
powerful,” she said in a low, threatening voice. “I can take away everything I’ve given you. I can banish you and every other wizard from Ramunna.”

Elkan inclined his head stiffly. “If that’s what you want, we’ll return to Tevenar as soon as we can arrange passage on a ship.”

She tilted her head, her expression turning quizzical. “You’d really give up so easily? I know how much it means to you to bring wizardry to Ravanetha. People like you who truly care for the less fortunate are rare, but I’ve dealt with the type before. In only two weeks you’ve transformed the lives of thousands in Ramunna. With my help you can do the same for vast multitudes more. It’s obvious you crave that like most men crave gold. And yet you’d throw away your chance to help millions for the sake of a life or two ended before they begin?”