Dr. Matthias Corvus's Arc

Chapter 7 of 8

Matthias corked the last empty vial. Forty patients dosed. Guards at the gate with his name in their mouths. He could not stay, and he could not leave. A quarter dose was a guess. If it failed, patients would seize inside the hour. Mercy could not adjust what she had never mixed. "How long before you know?" Mercy asked. "Two hours. Fever should drop by then. If it climbs instead, they need water with salt and a cool cloth. Not the vial. Never a second dose." "I can do that." "You can do that for one bed. Not forty." She looked down the ward. She did not argue. The front door rattled. A fist, not a knock. A voice called for the plague doctor by name. Matthias looked at the supply cart. He looked at the rafters. He looked at the small door at the back of the ward, the one the linen men used. He had two hours to watch forty people and no room to stand in. "The back linen room," Mercy said. "Slat in the wall. You can see bed one through bed twenty from the crack. I'll walk the second row past the slat every quarter hour and say the number and the fever. You listen. You tell me what to do through the wood." "They'll search the ward." "They'll search the beds. Not a shelf of sheets." He hesitated. The fist hit the door again. "Go," she said. "I brought bread. If they smell honey they think nurse, not doctor." He went. The linen room was narrow and smelled of lye. He crouched behind stacked sheets and found the slat. He could see the first row. He set his watch by the ward's small clock on the far wall, its painted face still catching lamplight. The front door opened. Boots. Three sets. Mercy's voice, flat and small, offering bread. A guard cursed the smell of the ward and moved down the row fast. Matthias held his breath at bed nine, where the boy's chest rose shallow. The guard did not stop. They passed through and out the back yard door. Mercy came to the slat. "Bed four. Fever down. Bed seven. Down. Bed twelve. Still climbing." "Cool cloth. Salt water. Not the vial." "Yes." She walked. She came back. She walked again. Two hours. The climbers cooled. No seizures. No deaths. At the third round she pressed a folded paper through the slat. A message, dropped at the ward door by a boy who ran. Matthias unfolded it. Silas's hand, short and clipped as his voice. Council named you. Warrant posted. Come to the shop by the back lane. I have the poisoner's name. Matthias folded the paper. The quarter doses held. Mercy could carry the ward now. He had bought a day for forty beds and lost his own name in the trade.