Smothering away her needling thoughts became overindulgence and then regret. After a night of fitful sleep, though she was certain her stomach held only bile and misery, her body fought to expel any drop of wine that lingered.

"They say that an evening touched by too many spirits borrows enjoyment from the next morning."

Lifting her head from the pot, Yalira glared at Rishi and the lilting cadence of her words. The queen perched at the edge of the bed, perfectly styled and at ease in Andar's chambers. Draped in colors of sea and silver, Rishi looked fresh as dawn. Yalira knew that she'd had just as much to drink at the party, and likely more in the privacy of her rooms, but where Rishi was flawlessly painted, Yalira was sour and sweating. She smeared a damp clump of straggling hair from her face. The injustice in their reactions filled her mouth with venom.

Or at least, more bile. The wit of her reply was lost in another bout of retching.

"And you're sure you want to go to the slums today?"

Yalira waited for the worst of the nausea to pass before nodding.

"I am meeting Theodis." Yalira rinsed her mouth with water and ginger. The latter of which had been given to one of her attendants by a sympathetic Edyt. Rishi had made a quiet quip that Edyt, of all the queens, would know all the best remedies for over imbibing. "He's not quite ready to see patients on his own, and I'd rather supervise him than have that odious man waving his knife around."

That odious man being the renown surgeon who'd attended Sasha's labor and left his eager student and protege, Theodis, to Yalira's deplorable teachings. It gave her petty pleasure each time Theodis wrote her with more questions, begged a moment of her time for another lesson.

Rishi was quick to drawl. "Escelpcius? I doubt he'd want anything to do with customers that cannot pay in gold."

In the forum, the surgeon had taken to countering each and every of her proposals with droning reference to tradition and citations to years of personal experience. He might have preferred patients who could afford his services, but Yalira knew the temptation of watching adversaries flounder was a reward of a unique value.

"Oh, he'd love an opportunity to bleed my patients half to death and pretend it was his knife and not my medicines that improved their symptoms." She attempted a sip of water against the roll and pitch of her insides.

Rishi groaned. "Healing talk. This is where I make my goodbyes, then." Her smile turned wicked as she stood. "Call on me this evening if you want more wine."

Yalira returned her head to the clay pot: the thought had soured her stomach.

Fortunately, her nausea passed with a few more pinches of ginger root and another small dose of time. Though her gut twisted as she and Theodis—and Gallus a horse-length behind—rode into the slums, Yalira's mind was clear. Fortunately, too, for Theodis had a list of questions he was determined to see answered. His mentor, it seemed, preferred to send him to seek his queries in the catalogs of ancient scrolls. A teacher willing to tolerate his endless curiosity sparked relentless enthusiasm.

"If the humors are to be in balance, should there not be internal vessels for each? We have found blood in the liver and yellow bile in the gallbladder, but I have yet to find an account for confirming the origin of black bile or phlegm."

"I'm afraid I do not know the answer," Yalira said after a moment. Her voice was soft. Apart from her own misgivings with the traditional view of bodily humors, Theodis's newest obsession revolved around topics in which she had no expertise. Vivisection. Though she was not unfamiliar with internal anatomy, and her healing knowledge had benefited from the practice, Yalira had no personal experience: Anatalis did not cut into the dying in search of answers. When life could not be saved, their emphasis centered on relieving suffering and easing that transition into Eheia's arms, the realm of the dead. The bloody insight gained at the edge of the blade left her stomach twisted and her nerves frayed. As the desecration of a corpse was punishable to the extremes of the law, post-mortem research was taboo, forbidden. But even with near-fatal doses of opium, she could not imagine the wisdom bought of torture was a just trade.

Heedless of her discomfort, Theodis continued, "Escelpcius says the spleen houses black bile, but we have yet to see it so in our sessions. He claims the pit-fighters must be of a particularly sanguine nature, for their blood dominates each organ—"

The crux of her dilemma. Pit-fighters—criminals and slaves—were the patients of vivisection, and their agreement to the surgeon's knife was implied via their sentencing. The consent of such practice seemed a feeble thing. Escelpcius and his ilk would likely scoff at her hesitation, but Yalira could not dampen those tendrils of disquiet. It returned to the argument she brought forth each forum session, each private discussion: weighing lives and their worth should not be left in mortal hands. She did not mention that it should be left out of the goddesses's hands as well. That perhaps there was no weighing that need to be done. For it should not matter, she reasoned. The embers of her spirit flared. That they are thieves and murderers.

"—a handful of stones in the gallbladder! Can you imagine? He must have been a choleric man to have such an imbalance as that!"

Theodis had not noticed her lack of participation. Wryness touched her lips. Or perhaps he has mistaken the furrow in my brow for thoughtful engagement.

"And has your knowledge affected how you approach your patients?" Yalira asked.

Theodis started, stuttered. His brief shock caught to his borrowed mount. The dusty gelding threw his head with a displeased grunt, prompting a judgmental huff from Shadow. Yalira patted his neck with a smile.

"Well, I suppose knowing is an important—"

"Knowledge is important," Yalira agreed. To her silent chagrin, she repeated one of her own lessons in a voice alarmingly reminiscent of her own mentors. The ghost of her humiliation, combined with the unfamiliar role of teaching, threatened to stain her cheeks. "But is it knowledge for knowledge's sake or knowledge for sake of your patient?"

She left off Elder Priestess Oira's grave, "and the distinction is essential," in place of a gentle tone.

Theodis paused in surprise. He was soft-faced, young, but for all the experience he lacked, his lack of arrogance made him worth three trained physicians in Yalira's eyes. He ran a hand against his cropped hair. "I suppose I have more to learn."

"As do I." Yalira smiled. "And knowing that will serve our patients well."

He returned the gesture as they approached the encampment. The people had taken great care to erect a healing tent, as the new altar was in too much disrepair for regular use. Yalira was grateful for the alternative: the memories that lingered there were too painful to face. Though the tent lacked an herb garden and infrastructure against the elements, its central location afforded the revolving physicians access to most of the population.

Adjacent stood the shelter Yalira had commissioned for upkeep of the roving band of orphans. Beds, breakfasts of barley bread, and a hot dinner costed more than Yalira had anticipated, but the proximity to the tent was an unexpected gain. The children were quick to help with messages and errands for dried figs or a handful of nuts. So where her healing equipment weighed down her satchel, Yalira stashed treats in any folds or spaces she could find on her person.

At the sound of approaching horses, they streamed from the tent with a wave of chirping greetings and laughter. Yalira dismounted to their begging for sweets and reaching hands at the pleats and twists of her skirts. Their eagerness allowed for quick examinations. Yalira counted two unfamiliar faces that bore honey-crusted rashes and noted that they'd need to replenish their stores of chaff flower oil.

Where the children rushed to greet her, the adults formed a solemn line that circled around the tent. Captive to the wait, the patients were easy targets for vendors carrying their wares. Mashed lentils in clay pots, watered wine, and toasted legumes made their rounds amongst the orderly crowd faster than she could deliver medicines and treatment. Where the scent of crisp herbs had dominated the healing altar, this haven reeked of garlic and spice.

"Another full day," Theodis called as he joined her, carrying their satchels under each arm. Though he did not share the young man's enthusiastic humor, Gallus grunted in agreement, his arms also laden with supplies. Yalira patted his shoulder consolingly.

With only a hint of mischief, she smiled at him. "Fret not, Gallus, I will not make you stay past moonrise. Theodis is a perfectly capable guardian."

"My queen, where you stay, I follow," he said, touched with teasing exasperation. From inside the tent, a crash rang out, followed by a cry from Theodis: Nothing is broken! He dropped his low voice to a whisper. "And we both know that boy needs a guardian of his own."

Though she would have sworn that her humor had dissolved into ashes, Yalira's laughter, bright and clear, sparked a chorus of smiles in the crowd, among the children shadowing her footsteps. It echoed as she took inventory of sickest in line, recording their names and complaints on parchment. In the habit of her routines, the people had already organized themselves in groups: those with the first signs of the purging sickness, those suffering from everyday ills, and those with the most severe symptoms.

Yalira noted the growing number with hollow cheeks, holding pots. New cases had been decreasing last week but, without discernible change, more and more now seemed touched by its grip. And the worst of them could not make their way to the tent: they'd be confined to weakness, trapped in their own filth. This illness frustrated her mind into knots. Her hands felt useless. Despite the remedies and treatments she trialed, her efforts only tempered the symptoms. Those who recovered did so of an unknown volition.

A familiar face interrupted her thoughts.

The urchin boy stood in the crowd of children, watching with dark eyes. In the weeks that had passed, he had appeared from time to time. Observing her actions or reminding her of leverage, Yalira did not know, but she nodded to acknowledge his presence with a small nod. She prayed Gallus would not note his persistent path toward her. She prayed he would ignore another lost child trapped in the masses that played in her shadow.

Today the urchin darted forth with a group of children eager for treats. But where the others reached for reward, he left more than dirty fingerprints at her skirt.

He slipped a square of soft parchment into her hand. She glanced down, expecting her name etched into its surface, but it was neither vellum nor papyrus that he'd left between her fingers.

A scrap of tarnished ivory. Its embroidered hem hauntingly familiar.

We'll speak again soon.

Yalira's eyes searched for his, for a message, for an answer, but he had disappeared into the mob of children and likely further into the shadowed alleys in return to the hooded woman who'd taken to haunting Yalira's nightmares. The threat wordless.

"Queen Yalira!"

Theodis waved urgently before returning into the tent. Beside its entrance waited Gallus, his gaze dark and mouth down-turned. Yalira forced a smile and slid the scrap of fabric into the sinus of her sleeve before making her path through the crowd towards him.

At the accusing stare Gallus gave her, Yalira tutted her tongue. "No time to waste," she said in her loftiest of priestess tones. She begged that casual authority would cull any suspicious thoughts he might repeat to Andar. If he could hear the steady thunder of her heart, Gallus showed no sign. She pushed the list of patients into his arms. And the anxious shadows from her mind. Locked away in careful partition, her worries could wait. She pulled her shoulders back against the tight pinch of foreboding that was growing and smiled stubbornly. "Looks like we'll be here until sunrise." 

A/N

Sorry for the short delay in posting. I'm on nights and lost track of the days!

 Are you a Theodis or a Rishi when it comes to these medical chapters?