6.2. A truth, a lie and a serpent in-between

They carried Agnus to the healer's house on a stretcher of wool blankets and wooden handles. Each step sent fresh waves of pain, but Agnus bit down on his screams.

When they arrived at the healers' lounge, the healer named Emilia met them at her door. The healer's face was tight with concern as she directed them to lay the patient on the examination table. The room smelled of dried herbs and woodsmoke, walls lined with clay jars and hanging bundles of plants.

Emilia commanded. "Yuri, I need hot water and clean cloth. The rest of you, go. You're in my way." Yuri worked as the assistant to the healer, so he was the only one who was allowed to stay.

Even while in pain, Agnus caught a glimpse of Heron's face in the doorway. It was pale, streaked with tears.

Martina, who also arrived at the scene, pulled their son back.

"Let Emilia work," she said softly, though her voice trembled.

The door closed, and Agnus remained with Emilia and Yuri.

Emilia cut away what remained of his shirt, exposing the wound fully to the lamplight.

“This looks bad. What kinda of creature was this Yuri?”

“It was a larger serpent. I’d say nothing unusual about it, but then I haven’t seen such an effect from a byte. Must be a new species.”

"You are right, I also never saw such an effect from a byte," she said quietly, leaning closer. The two puncture marks wept that black blood, and the black veins had spread across his ribs, reaching toward his heart.

"This isn't normal," Emilia finished. She'd seen enough wounds in her cycles of practice to recognize when something was off.

She moved quickly, pulling jars from shelves with practiced efficiency. First, she cleaned the wound with water so hot it made Agnus hiss, washing away the dark blood. But more welled up to replace it, thick and sluggish.

"Hold still," she murmured, applying a paste that smelled of garlic and mountain herbs. The application stopped the blood from pouring out.

Next came bandages as she worked in silence, wrapping his torso with sure hands, muttering prayers under her breath to the Creators.

Then she pulled out a small vial.

"We need to make him drink this," she said, turning over to Yuri. “You force open his mouth, so I can pour the liquid. Let’s pray he can swallow it.”

Yuri moved to Agnus's head, his strong hands gripping Agnus's jaw with surprising gentleness. "I'm sorry, friend," he muttered, then forced Agnus's mouth open.

Emilia tilted the vial, and bitter liquid flooded Agnus's tongue. He tried to gag, to spit it out, but Yuri held firm, tilting his head back.

"Swallow," Emilia commanded. "Fight me and you'll choke."

Agnus swallowed. The liquid burned all the way down, coating his throat with the taste of earth and rot.

Yuri released him, and Agnus gasped for air.

“What was that?” Yuri asked.

"Everything I have for poison and pain," Emilia said, watching him closely. "Valerian to dull the nerves, willow bark for fever, bloomshards in careful measure to slow the spread."

Agnus was starting to breathe normally.

"It's working," Yuri said, relief evident in his voice.

Emilia said nothing, but her expression remained guarded as she checked his pulse, examined the wound again. "Let’s not celebrate just yet."

“Maybe let his family in? He seems to have been stabilized.”

“Fine, but instruct them not to agitate the patient. Any movement now may make the condition deteriorate.”

They let Martina and Heron in. Martina took Agnus's hand, squeezing it with desperate hope. Heron stood at the foot of the table. "Papa?" The boy's voice was small, uncertain.

"I'll be fine, just a bit of rest," Agnus managed, forcing a weak smile.

Heron nodded, but didn't move, didn't speak again. He just stood there, watching, knowing that making his father talk would bring him more pain.

Agnus drifted in and out of consciousness as evening darkened to night. Martina refused to leave. Heron dozed in a chair someone had brought, curled up with his head on his arms. The healer's house was quiet except for the crackling of the fire and Agnus's labored breathing.

Then, in the deep hours of night, the pain returned.

It hit like a thunderbolt. Agnus's scream tore from his throat before he could stop it, his body arching off the table.

"AGNUS!" Martina was at his side instantly. Heron jerked awake, eyes wide with terror.

Emilia rushed from the back room where she'd been resting, Yuri close behind. She tore away the bandages with shaking hands.

The wound had darkened to almost black. The flesh around it had turned gray, the edges necrotic. And the veins surged forward while he slept, spreading across his chest like roots, reaching up his neck and down toward his belly.

"No," Emilia breathed. "No, no, no."

"More medicine," Martina said desperately. "Please give him something."

"I can't." Emilia's voice cracked. "I already gave him the maximum dose. Any more and the cure will kill him faster than the poison. This isn't a normal venom. This is something else. Something wrong."

Emilia had no answers. No remedies. No hope. He was dying, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.

Emilia stepped back from the table, her hands trembling as she looked down at Agnus. The silence in the room was suffocating.

"Emilia?" Martina's voice was barely a whisper as she pleaded with the healer. "There must be something else. Another remedy. Something we haven't tried."

The healer shook her head slowly. "That vile is the most powerful cure we have at our disposal.” She met Martina's eyes, and tears streaked down her weathered face. “I don’t think we have the knowledge to heal him.”

"How long?" Martina asked, though part of her didn't want to know.

Emilia glanced at Agnus, at the black veins that had spread like a web across his chest and up his neck. "I may only prolong his life for two or three days at the best. But it would be wasting the remaining medicine. I'm sorry."

The words hung in the air like a death sentence. Heron made a small, broken sound from his chair, pressing his fists against his mouth.

"No," Martina said, but there was no strength behind it. Just the empty denial of someone watching their world crumble. She looked down at Agnus's face. It was pale and slack. The man she loved was slipping away with each shallow breath.

Then, through the fog of despair, a thought emerged.

Haran.

There was a chance he’d be able to help them. He had access to most modern technologies. Even though the village was against it, in her mind, she didn’t care. She wanted to save her love. Even if it meant using cursed contraptions of the cities.

She looked up at Yuri, who stood silent near the door, his face drawn with grief. "Yuri," she said, her voice steadier now. "How fast can you reach Jamtara?"

Yuri blinked, surprised. "On horseback? A day and a half, maybe less if I push hard. Why?"

"I need you to go there. Find the city guard. Tell them..." She swallowed hard, the words feeling like stones in her throat. "Tell them to summon Haran Baratti. Tell him Agnus is dying from a serpent's bite and we need his help."

"Martina—" Emilia started.

"No." Martina's voice was firm now, cutting through any objection. "I don't care what the village thinks. I don't care if city magic is wrong or if asking for help makes us weak."

She looked down at Agnus, tears streaming freely now. "I love this man. He saved our son, Haran's son. If there's even a chance the city has knowledge or medicine that can save him, I'll beg for it on my knees."

Yuri straightened, his warrior's discipline taking over. "I'll leave immediately. I'll ride through the night if I have to."

"Thank you," Martina whispered.

Yuri nodded once, then was gone, his footsteps echoing away into the night.

Martina sank back into her chair. Across from her, Heron had stood up, his small face streaked with tears.

"Will he come?" Heron asked quietly. "My... will Father Haran come?"

Martina looked at her son and couldn't lie to him. "I don't know, sweetling. I don't know if Yuri will find him, or if he'll be able to help even if he does. But we have to try."

Heron nodded and returned to his chair. He will come, I know he will. He kept thinking of all he heard of Haran, and to him this stranger had at least that one quality. He has been there when the village needed him.

Outside, hoofbeats faded into the distance as Yuri rode hard toward Jamtara, carrying their desperate plea into the night.

The second day since Yuri's departure had worn on Martina like years. She sat beside Agnus, her hand wrapped around his, feeling the heat radiating from his skin. The fever had worsened overnight despite Emilia's efforts. The black veins had spread further in the past two days, creeping up his neck toward his jaw, down past his navel. He wasn’t conscious anymore, and there were now fears that, even if help arrives, it may be too late.

Heron had barely moved from his chair. He no longer cries, and his face is now blank with exhaustion and fear. Both he and Martina are being brought food, with which they struggle and have to force themselves to eat.

Emilia was working over the clock, checking Agnus’ pulse, changing bandages that quickly soaked through with that black blood, administering doses of medicine that seemed to do nothing but keep him breathing a few hours longer. She started to administer blood from the village rations to keep him from dying from blood loss.

"His heart is weakening," Emilia said quietly to Martina during one such check. "At this point, I don’t think he’ll recover."

The door burst open. One of the gate guards stood there, breathless from running. "There's someone at the gate. Says they were urgently summoned. They're in some kind of machine, a big one. I don't have permission to let something like that into the village."

"Let them in!" Martina was on her feet instantly.

"But the machine—"

"Let them in!" Emilia's voice joined Martina's, sharp with command. "We'll handle everything later. Now go!"

The guard took a deep breath before turning and running back toward the gate.

Minutes later, there was loud knocking.

"Enter,” Emilia yelled.

Haran entered first, and Martina barely recognized him. His face was drawn, his eyes shadowed with exhaustion. Behind him came another man, older, carrying a pristine leather case.

"Everyone," Haran said, his voice rough. "This is Dr. Adys Remmus. He's agreed to examine Agnus."

The doctor moved forward without ceremony, setting his case on a nearby stool. He was perhaps fifty star-cycles old, with gray-streaked hair pulled back in a tail and hands marked with old scars. His clothes were city-made, fine wool and cotton, already looking out of place among the dried herbs and rough-hewn furniture.

"How long since the bite?" Remmus asked, not looking up as he opened his case.

"Two days," Emilia answered, her voice tight. She watched the doctor with obvious wariness as he pulled strange instruments from the case.

"What treatments have you administered?"

Emilia listed them: the paste, the valerian, the willow bark, the measured bloomshards. Remmus listened while his hands moved, assembling something from his case. It looked like a small lantern, but instead of a flame, a soft pink glow emanated from its center.

"And his condition?"

"Deteriorating. The venom is spreading despite everything. His heart is failing."

Remmus nodded, unsurprised. He lifted the pink-glowing device and held it over Agnus's torso, moving it slowly from the wound upward. Through the device's casing, the pink light pulsed and shifted, growing brighter near the blackened veins.

"Interesting," he murmured.

"What is that thing?" Emilia asked, unable to keep the suspicion from her voice.

"A diagnostic tool. The pink crystal inside resonates with living tissue. It shows me the density and health of flesh, helps me see what's happening beneath the skin." He moved the device lower, across Agnus's abdomen. "The venom has damaged the blood vessels extensively. There's necrosis in the surrounding tissue." He looked up at Emilia. "You did well to keep him alive this long with what you have."

The acknowledgment seemed to soften Emilia's stance slightly, though she still watched his every move.

Remmus returned to his case and pulled out a cylindrical object, perhaps the length of a forearm. One end tapered to a needle point, the other held what looked like a small vial filled with pale green liquid. But set into the cylinder's body was a vivid purple crystal, pulsing with faint glow.

"I need to step outside for a minute to the ambulance vehicle. I have some anti-venomous potions that I will try to test out.”

Without waiting for any approval, he just stepped outside.

“I apologize for providing no notice. The doctor is discreet, and I paid him enough not to mention anything about our visit to the village.” Haran said to Martina.
“I can’t believe that is what you are worried about, Haran,” Martina sobbingly said. “I am just glad you decided to come and help us, all things considered.”

“How could I not? I owe both of you so much. So don’t be ridiculous.” Haran replied.

But the conversation was cut short as the doctor returned to the room. He was carrying a box with several vials. He then took out one with a dark green liquid and poured a little bit of it into the cylinder. He then turned to Agnus, pushing the instrument into the wound.

"What is that?" Heron spoke for the first time in hours, his voice small.

"A purification syringe," Remmus said, not unkindly. "The purple crystal inside can separate substances in blood, isolate toxins so they can be removed or neutralized. The green solution is an anti-venom I've prepared—broad-spectrum, enhanced with extract from crystal-treated herbs."

He looked at Martina and Haran. "I need to tell you honestly: I don't know if this will work. He has no consciousness, so the venom may have already caused damage to the brain."

"Please, just try," Martina pleaded.

The doctor pressed something on the cylinder's side, and the purple crystal began to glow.

For a moment, nothing happened. Then Agnus's body went rigid.

His eyes flew open, whites showing all around the pupils. A sound tore from his throat. It didn’t sound quite a scream, more like the keening of an animal in a trap.