Mirella's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Mirella pressed her palm against the forehead of the woman who lived on the east shore, feeling for the heat she knew how to pull away. The fever was there, but something else moved beneath it — something she had no name for, no touch that could reach it. Calypso sat on the wooden floor of the treatment tent, arms wrapped around her knees. A tarnished mirror lay face-down beside her, its frame water-stained and cracked. She wouldn't say what was wrong. She wouldn't describe the pain or point to where it hurt. She only said she needed help, then went silent. Mirella had treated wounds blind before, but those patients couldn't speak. This was different. This was a choice to hide. Mirella reached for the mortar and pestle, its stone stained green from years of grinding swamp plants. She could mix something broad. Willowbark for pain. Marsh root for inflammation. Feverfew for the heat she felt beneath her hand. But what if the real cause needed something else? What if she fed Calypso the wrong herb and worsened what she couldn't see? A proper healer would know. A proper healer would have been taught how to read a body's secrets without words. Mirella only had guesses and the memory of failures she hadn't made yet. She set the pestle down and met Calypso's eyes. "I can't help you if you won't tell me what's wrong," she said. Calypso looked away, fingers curling tighter around her knees. Then she stood, picked up the mirror, and walked out of the tent. Mirella watched her go. The gap between what she knew and what she needed to know had just proven itself again — not in death this time, but in silence. It was another kind of loss.