When Comes the Fire Read online

  His grip tightened on his sword. A warrior he may be, but he hoped there would be no need for it.

  Darwe's feet quietly sifted through the sand as he neared the top of the hill, the grains whispering around his cloth boots. As he stepped to the top of the dune, his eyes locked with the calm yellow gaze of a hound.

  The hound stayed stock-still, its body rigid and hackles raised as it stared Darwe down. It sat poised protectively over the unconscious body of a young girl. At least, he thought it was a young girl. The left side of her body was burned almost beyond recognition, and the rest of her was covered in blood and scratches and bruises. He hoped that not all of the blood she was covered in was her own, or she was already past saving. He could feel his adrenaline spike as he slipped down the hill towards the odd pair, his heart pounding as he realized this was a life-or-death situation, the kind his master talked about quite often. He needed to act fast, or the girl would likely die. When he was a few steps away, the hound stepped over her body, baring its teeth at Darwe and snarling. Darwe stopped, lifting his hands up to show he meant no harm.

  "Calm, hound. I only want to help," he said, feeling frustrated that the hound was keeping him from doing what needed to be done. "If you don't let me help, this girl will die. She's already lost too much blood. Let me help," he said insistently, hoping that his eyes and body language would help convey the message to the beast. After what felt like a lifetime, the hound finally stepped back, offering a guttural sound and pressing its ears back against its skull to show its disapproval as Darwe carefully scooped the girl up into his arms. She was heavier than he thought she would be, and he grunted from the weight of her as he stood back up, his feet automatically heading in the direction of his master's estate. He studied her battered face as he moved, concerned that she made no sound of discomfort despite the jarring motion of his feet against the sand. She had the typical dark brown skin of any Solan, with reddish-brown braids that had been matted with blood. Her left arm was burnt beyond repair, and lay against her body at an awkward angle; definitely broken. The burns traveled up the left side of her neck and face, and down her left leg. He doubted they would ever heal properly.

  The hound stalked along next to him, its tongue hanging out as it panted in the morning heat, its large pointed ears drooping miserably. When it caught Darwe's gaze, it glared, baring its teeth. Darwe scoffed, knowing that the hound would do nothing to harm him while he held its master in his arms. Hounds were well-known for choosing their own masters, unlike other domesticated animals.

  The sweat trailed down his face and neck in tiny rivulets as he finally cleared the hill that revealed his master's sprawling estate. Being in the middle of the harshest part of the desert, it was rare that they ever got any intruders—or visitors—around these parts. Nevertheless, one could never be too careful, what with the war that had been declared between the Queen and her former consort. Darwe's master had never had much interest in politics, and he outright refused to choose a side in the budding war, having informed the Queen as much before he moved to this secluded place. Darwe was glad that he had. Despite having been trained in the ways of the warrior, Darwe had never felt as though he had the heart to be one. The only reason he had been raised and trained by his master was because his family had been too poor to afford another child, so they had given him up to be an apprentice. These days, Darwe found himself wishing they had given him to a healer, instead. At least then he felt like he might be able to make a difference in the war. Violence, he felt, solved nothing, and would only lead the country further into chaos.

  Hardly anyone seemed to realize that, though. Either that or they just didn't care.

  Darwe didn't bother changing out his boots for house slippers as he sprinted the last few feet to the main building of the sprawling complex and kicked in the door, not having his hands free to open it like a normal person would.

  "By the Ancients, boy, what do you think you're—" his master's lecture died off when he turned to see the bloody and broken girl lying in his apprentice's arms. His mouth drew into a thin line and he motioned to the chaise across the room. "Well, what are you waiting for? Set her down and fetch Kilish!"

  Darwe scrambled to do what he had been told. If there was one word he would describe Master Dorozi as, it was commanding. And by the Ancients, you had better do what you were told when you were told to do it, because the man was strict and impatient, and he was not afraid to dole out punishments if his expectations were not met. Having lived with the man for the last twelve years, having come to him when he was only five summers, he had been privy to the man's soft side, but he also understood that its appearances were few and far between.

  Darwe's feet pounded along the flagstones as he followed the growing earthen scent to the middle of the complex, the looming building that held both the rain stores and their crops of food. When he stumbled through the doors, breathing hard, the two people inside paused, staring at him blankly. The gruff-looking female with a dark head of short, thick curls had stopped with her hand midair, about to chuck a pebble at the disgruntled male across the table from her, who was busy inspecting the leaves of one of the plants to assess its health. If it were any other time, Darwe would have laughed at the predictability of it all. He could always count on Kilish to be in here, antagonizing Momal, their resident botanist. The poor man had no idea of what he was getting into when they had scooped him up into their employ from beneath the nose of the monarchy. Botany was a profession that was rarely called for in this desert country, but because of that almost no one went into the profession, and the few who did were in high demand for the positions that needed to be filled. Unfortunately, Kilish, Master Dorozi's niece who had come to join them at the complex following her widower father's death at the hands of the war, had found a particular joy in bothering the poor man at all hours of the day.

  "And just what in the blazes do you think you're doing, Dar?" Kilish asked, raising an eyebrow at him as she hopped off the table Momal worked at (or tried to, at least) and placed her hands on her hips. He could tell from the way she stared him down that she was upset at him for ruining her fun, but at the moment, he couldn't afford to care what punishment she might rain down on him for doing so.

  "We have an emergency," Darwe blurted out, his eyes darting back and forth between the two workers as his mind raced to think whether Master Dorozi would accept his telling Momal of what was going on just yet. Deciding to play it safe for now, he simply said, "Master Dorozi asked me to fetch you now."

  Kilish's eyes widened at the urgency in his voice and she straightened, setting off at a sprint past him. He barely had time to register her speed before he was scrambling to keep up with her. Her eyes had hardened, her expression entirely business-like as they ran towards the main building.

  "What kind of emergency are we talking?" she snapped the moment they were out of hearing range from Momal, regulating her breathing between words. It was no wonder she could still best him in endurance despite his years of training. She had been schooled just as well as he had by her uncle, and having twelve years of experience on him made her the obvious victor in a lot of the little contests they often had. They both had a very competitive spirit, after all.

  "A girl," Darwe huffed, his breathing ragged from all of the running he had been doing in the last hour or so. He could only regulate his breathing for so long before his lungs started to burn and his side cramped, and he could feel his lungs starting to complain now. "I found her in the desert, with a—hound of all things—looking like someone had stuck her on a roasting spit but forgot to—turn her, so her entire left side is covered in terrible burns and—"

  "Darwe," Kilish cut him off with an annoyed glare. "You know you ramble when you panic."

  "Not...panicked," Darwe grumbled around his harsh breathing. Kilish snorted at him in amusement, not bothered in the least by his responding glare.

  When they skidded into the foyer of the main building, Master Dorozi was already spre
ading healing salve in thick layers over some of the lesser burns on the girl's body. He didn't glance up from his work as the two approached him, crouched over the girl's prone body, his brow furrowed in concentration. The girl's chest rose and fell slightly with her shallow breaths, and the stench of burnt flesh emanated from her, causing Darwe to cringe. He hadn't noticed it so much when he was running for the complex, despite her being so close to him, the adrenaline pumping through his system at the time having overwhelmed his senses. The only indication that the girl was feeling any pain at all in her sleep was the permanent crease in her forehead.

  "Kilish. I hope you're feeling well rested," Master Dorozi said stiffly as he unfurled from his crouch to tower over the two, both former apprentice and current. Kilish snapped to attention, and Darwe knew at once what he was asking of her. Kilish stepped forward to kneel beside the girl, taking a deep breath before she placed her hands over the worst of the damage; her left arm. Her fingers hovered just a breath above the girl's ruined skin, and Darwe could feel the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end as the air was suddenly filled with an electric charge, the telltale sign of Kilish's magick. The hound, standing crouched in the dark corner of the room, uttered a low growl, its hackles raised. When Darwe looked over at it, it flattened its ears back against its skull, but inched further back into the corner, apparently unwilling to near the source of the magick. It made him wonder if all hounds disliked magick, or if it was just this one.

  Kilish's eyes were closed as she focused on the task at hand, and her brow creased much like the girl's was as she suddenly dropped her hands, the sudden vanishing of the magick in the air making Darwe feel almost...disappointed? He frowned, shaking his head as if to clear the thought from his mind as Kilish turned her head to look at him and Master Dorozi with a grim look.

  "The arm is beyond my ability to save," she said bluntly, "but I can save the rest of her. She will have a lot of scars, but...she will live." Kilish had a determined glint in her eye, and Darwe knew he could believe her. Kilish didn't promise things she didn't believe she could follow through on. "I will need you to fetch me some more salve, and some medicine from Momal for the pain, as well as fever. Preferably liquid, so that we won't have to wake her to take it before I start my work."

  Darwe could feel a twisting in his gut as he asked, "But what about her arm, then? If you can't save it, what are we supposed to do?" He had a feeling he didn't want to know the answer.

  Kilish gave him a blank look. "We need to amputate it."

  Fate, how he hated it when he was right. He grimaced at her answer.

  Kilish ignored his look, turning back to the task at hand as she began to rip the girl's clothing to better access the wounds. "If we don't amputate it, it will rot and fester, and whatever infection it gets will eventually go into the blood and spread to the rest of her body. If that happens, she will die. So yes, Darwe, before you ask, there is no other way to go about it. We need to amputate her arm."

  Darwe could feel the blood drain from his face when she said that, but he clenched his jaw and nodded, determined to help somehow. He could never be a healer if he cracked under pressure or fainted during a life-saving amputation. Even if he could never actually become a healer, he wanted to help Kilish do her job. He was the one that had brought the girl here in the first place, after all.

  "I'll fetch the medicine," he said, even though it was so far to go get it and he had just barely recovered from his last sprint. Taking a deep breath, he whirled on his heel and ran for the greenhouse once more.

  Momal gave Darwe an odd look at his strange request, but said nothing as he pinched plant leaves and ground roots with a few drops of rainwater to make a liquid form of one of the painkillers he had created during his time at the complex, mixing in ingredients that would help bring her fever down. Darwe found Momal's work fascinating, but also highly confusing. He didn't pretend to understand how Momal knew what ingredients had what properties, and Momal was always evasive with his answers whenever Darwe asked too many questions about the research process. After a while, he had all but given up on ever finding out how the man knew what he did.

  "Here," Momal said, handing him a small vial with a stopper in it that held a thin amber liquid. Darwe eyed it curiously before grasping it carefully, cradling it in both hands.

  "Thank you, Momal," he murmured before he was running again; he missed the way Momal's mouth pursed, his brow drawing down in disapproval as he grabbed a stub of charcoal and began to scribble in his notebook in a foreign hand.

  o—O—o

  "Wash your hands before you touch anything," Kilish snapped as Darwe went to kneel next to her. Frowning, he placed the medicine he'd procured next to her as she prodded the wounds with her healing magick, trying to carefully kill off the infection that had already started to set in. The hound had lain down in its corner, its eyes still transfixed on the girl's still form as Kilish worked, its yellow eyes large and pleading. Darwe stepped over to the basin of rainwater on the desk next to the opposite wall of the foyer, scrubbing his hands with the lye soap until they were red. He didn't bother drying them as he moved back to kneel next to Kilish.

  "Tell me what to do," he said, hesitating. Ancients forbid, he didn't want to do something wrong and end up making things worse. His hands hovered next to the girl's burnt side, unsure.

  "Take the medicine and pour it down her throat. Slowly," Kilish said, flicking him a glance as he grabbed the medicine and moved to Kilish's other side so that he wouldn't be reaching around her to do as she'd asked. "You may have to massage her throat a bit in order to get her to swallow."

  Darwe nodded before doing as she said, slowly tipping the vial until its contents trickled between the girl's chapped lips. The crease in her forehead deepened a little and she began to cough, but Darwe massaged her throat and she swallowed twice before settling into her pained slumber once more. Darwe figured that at this point, her deep sleep probably had less to do with her body rendering her unconscious to try and heal itself, and more to do with the fact that Kilish wanted her unconscious, and was adept enough in magick to make that happen.

  "Good," Kilish said, her praise brief, but Darwe struggled to hide the grin that threatened to form when she gave it. Kilish was very slow to give out praise, so any indication of approval from her was worth its weight in gold. "Now, I'll need you to hold her shoulders down. Uncle, I'll need you to hold her legs. This is going to be...unpleasant."

  The grim look on Kilish's face was all that he needed to know that what was coming would be more than just 'unpleasant'. He grimaced as he got into place, kneeling on the chaise by her head to hold down her shoulders without impeding Kilish's work. Master Dorozi moved to the opposite end of the chaise to pin her legs just below the knees, careful to avoid the thick burns that traveled down her left thigh.

  Kilish took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a moment, whispering a prayer to Fate for strength before she opened them again, eyes shining with determination. She placed the flat sides of both hands against the broken skin of the girl's left arm, just below the shoulder joint, the sides of her pinky fingers extending to touch one another where they marked the middle of the appendage. She began to murmur under her breath words of power, and as she did, her hands emitted the faintest golden glow.

  That's when the screaming started.

  Kilish's magick seared through the girl's broken skin, cauterizing as it cut through flesh and bone, moving as quickly as Kilish was able without making a mistake. The hound in the corner was back on its feet, barking and whining at its master's pain but somehow having the foresight to know that it should not intervene. If Darwe hadn't been so focused on his task, he would have marvelled at the beast's intelligence. As it was, he was fixated on the sickening sight of the girl's arm slowly being removed. He had to focus on his breathing to make sure he wouldn't pass out at the sight of the flesh gaping as the bone slowly split. He winced as the cut was completed, and the dead arm fell to the ground w
ith a sickening, dull thud. The girl stopped screaming, but he could see tear tracks had cut a swath through the dirt and grime on her cheeks, trickling back into her hairline. The hound let out one last, long whine before cautiously stepping forward, its head and tail down as it gave a slow wag, pricking its large ears forward as it gave Darwe a questioning look with its large yellow eyes.

  "She should be fine now," he murmured, before flicking his gaze to Kilish. "...Right?"

  Kilish raised an eyebrow at him before her hands hovered over the cauterized stump, her magick filling the air once more as she assessed the girl's condition much like she had when she'd first arrived. She gave a terse nod.

  "Given we keep the infection from setting back in, yes," she said. "We should know by the end of the week if she'll make it. If she's been strong enough to make it this far, though, I have high hopes...her resolve is just as much a factor in her recovery as our care is, at this point."

  Darwe sighed, offering the worried hound a wan smile. It gave a little huff and circled back to its corner, curling up in a ball with its snout pointed at its master, eyes transfixed on her once more still form, shining with a worried gleam.

  "So what do we do now?" Darwe asked as he unfurled from his crouch next to the girl's head, surprised at how stiff and tense he was from the ordeal when in reality, it had only lasted a few minutes.