Ch. 269 The First Open Day

Chapter 269: The First Open Day

Ilyen opened the infirmary before breakfast.

This was not the plan.

The plan had involved breakfast.

It had also involved a brief gathering in the courtyard, a few words from Evelyn, and enough time for Mary to confirm that everyone responsible for a door possessed the correct key.

Instead, a woman arrived at dawn with a burned hand.

Ilyen took one look at her and declared the infirmary open.

Mary arrived eight minutes later carrying three keys and an objection.

“The opening was scheduled for the second bell.”

“The burn occurred before the second bell.”

“That does not alter the schedule.”

“It altered hers.”

Mary considered the woman seated beside the treatment table.

Then she opened her book.

“First patient arrived before formal opening,” she said.

Ilyen nodded.

“Excellent. Now fetch me the blue jar.”

The preserved district had changed in four days.

Not greatly.

The white stone remained pale beneath the morning light.

The old fountains still waited without water.

Most of the doors stayed closed, their rooms unexamined.

But the infirmary windows had been washed.

Fresh linen filled the shelves.

The cracked treatment benches had been replaced with tables from Greykeep’s stores, and Liora had placed bundles of drying herbs along the southern wall.

Eleanor had repaired the shutters.

Perrin had repaired one shutter twice after deciding his first attempt made an unacceptable sound.

I could not hear the difference.

He could.

That had been enough.

A board stood beside the entrance.

Ilyen had written the rules herself.

EXAMINATION BEFORE MIRACLES.

CONSENT BEFORE TOUCH.

MORTAL HEALERS REMAIN IN CHARGE OF MORTAL PATIENTS.

NO GOD MAY OVERRULE A PATIENT.

GOATS STAY OUTSIDE.

Mallow stood beneath the final rule, chewing its lower corner.

I pointed.

“Your authority appears to be under challenge.”

Ilyen looked at the goat.

“Mallow.”

Mallow continued.

Ilyen took the board away from her.

The goat stared at the empty space as if rules had never been worth respecting.

Liora arrived with two assistants from the chapel.

She wore the silver-and-gold cord Aurelia and Thesra had given her when they blessed her service.

It did not make her divine.

She had been very clear about that.

It did allow her to feel injury and illness more precisely when a patient welcomed her attention.

The distinction mattered.

It also meant Ilyen spent the first quarter hour testing her.

“What is wrong with my left wrist?” she asked.

Liora touched nothing.

She studied Ilyen’s face, then held out one hand.

“May I?”

“Yes.”

A faint warmth passed between them.

“You strained it lifting something badly.”

“Someone,” Ilyen corrected.

“A large someone?”

“A stubborn midwife who had fainted and refused to remain fainted conveniently.”

Liora smiled.

“Three weeks ago?”

“Nearly four.”

“Rest would help.”

Ilyen looked offended.

“Your blessing is accurate. Your advice is unrealistic.”

Evelyn came through the doorway carrying Carol.

Our daughter had insisted upon walking from the district entrance.

She had reached the first fountain, sat down, and refused to continue unless someone carried both her and the stone she had found.

The stone now occupied Evelyn’s pocket.

Garrick rode on my shoulders.

He had one hand in my hair.

My recent changes had made it easier for him to grip.

This was not among the benefits Aurethar had described.

“You’re late,” Ilyen said.

“We were delayed by geology,” Evelyn replied.

Carol patted the pocket containing her stone.

Ilyen accepted the explanation.

Aurelia entered behind us.

The air changed subtly when she crossed the threshold.

The district knew her.

Not as its ruler.

Not as its steward.

Something in the pale walls recognized the shape of healing within her and answered with a soft warmth.

The gold at Evelyn’s wrists brightened.

Liora’s cord gave a quiet pulse.

Ilyen watched all three.

“Do that again.”

Aurelia stopped.

“I only walked through the door.”

“Then leave and return.”

Aurelia glanced at me.

I looked away.

Experience suggested that amusement was safer when concealed.

The goddess of compassion stepped outside.

Then came back in.

The walls warmed again.

Ilyen nodded.

“Useful.”

Aurelia’s eyes narrowed slightly.

“You might have asked more politely.”

“You might have given me less interesting results.”

Io arrived before the second bell.

She came through the Concordia gate with two healers, four boxes of supplies, Ignatius, Seraphina, and Shadow.

Aurethar followed in human form, carrying the largest box beneath one arm.

His appearance still startled people who had first known him as a dragon.

His shoulders were broad, his hair dark with copper at the ends, and his eyes retained the deep brightness of banked fire.

Shadow rode upon his other shoulder.

The cat appeared far less impressed by the transformation than everyone else had been.

“Morning,” Io said.

She embraced Evelyn.

Then she turned toward Ilyen.

“We brought fever bark, clean bandages, glass tubes, and a healer who claims Concordia’s method of setting fingers is better than yours.”

One of the healers went pale.

“I said different.”

Io smiled.

“He said different.”

Ilyen looked interested.

“Good. We’ll compare.”

The healer looked as though he had expected diplomacy.

He had come to the wrong infirmary.

The four children discovered one another in the courtyard.

Ignatius and Garrick went immediately toward the empty fountain.

Seraphina gave Carol a folded strip of red cloth.

Carol gave her the stone from Evelyn’s pocket.

Both appeared satisfied with the exchange.

Aurethar lowered the supply box.

“Should we stop the boys?”

I looked at the fountain.

They were attempting to climb into it.

“Yes.”

Neither of us moved quickly enough.

By the time we reached them, Garrick had placed both hands against the dry basin.

A thin layer of frost spread beneath his fingers.

Ignatius laughed.

Heat followed from his palms.

Water formed between the two currents.

Not much.

A shallow silver pool.

Both boys stared at it.

Then at each other.

Aurethar closed his eyes.

“I believe we should have stopped them earlier.”

“That is usually when I reach the same conclusion.”

The water rose.

Only a hand’s breadth.

Enough for Seraphina to abandon the red cloth and join them.

Carol followed.

The girls touched the fountain’s edge.

The water began to turn in a slow circle.

Light moved beneath it.

Not one color.

Several.

Gold from Aurelia and Evelyn.

A pale blue from me.

Copper fire from Aurethar.

A thread of Io’s power, bright and patient.

Something green from one of the newly arrived gods who had passed the children in the hall two days before.

The wards around the district stirred.

Not defensively.

Recognition moved through them.

The twins had continued echoing divine domains despite every change the Castellan made.

Now Ignatius and Seraphina were learning to answer them.

Io crouched beside the fountain.

“Children.”

All four looked at her.

“Please stop improving ancient infrastructure without permission.”

The light went out.

The water remained.

Mary arrived while Eleanor was examining the fountain.

She took in the children’s wet sleeves.

The newly filled basin.

Mallow standing inside the infirmary doorway despite the board.

Shadow sitting on the examination desk.

Then she looked at me.

“I was gone for half an hour.”

“I did not cause any of this.”

“That is why I am concerned.”

The Castellan came through the arch behind her.

His golden eyes settled upon the fountain.

“The water system beneath this courtyard has resumed partial function.”

“Because of the children?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Is it safe?”

He considered.

“The water is clean.”

Mary wrote that down.

“Does it connect to the rest of Havenreach?”

“Not yet.”

“Could it?”

“Yes.”

Her pen moved faster.

I knew that expression.

A fountain had become a city project.

We left Ilyen to her patients and followed Mary into the old records room.

The Castellan spread the new city plans across a broad table.

The preserved district occupied the center now.

West of it stood Greykeep and the older settlement.

To the east, Mary had drawn three proposed neighborhoods.

One for those already living in temporary housing near the outer wall.

One for the families arriving through the restored roads.

The third remained mostly empty.

“What is that?” I asked.

“Space,” Mary said.

“For what?”

“For being wrong about how quickly the city grows.”

That seemed sensible.

It was also unlike most official plans I had known.

They usually treated uncertainty as something that happened to other people.

The new chapel stood between the preserved district and the main market.

Its foundations crossed the old white healing road.

Beyond it, the plans included a public bathhouse, two wells, a watch station, a school, storehouses, and a square large enough for assemblies.

The military yard had been moved farther from the houses.

A second barracks stood near the northern gate.

Eleanor had added workshops beside it.

Damar’s proposed road to the mines curved away from the farms and returned near the western storehouses.

“You’ve moved the outer wall,” I said.

“We have proposed moving the outer wall,” Mary corrected.

“Farther than last time.”

“More people have arrived since last time.”

The Castellan placed one metal finger upon the new boundary.

“The gods residing within Greykeep have asked again whether they may contribute to the expanded wards.”

“Can they?”

“Yes.”

“Safely?”

“With restrictions.”

Mary turned a page.

“We have eleven pages of restrictions.”

“Only eleven?”

“I have not finished.”

The first alarm reached us before we could discuss the northern watchtowers.

Not a bell.

My name.

Soft.

Distant.

A woman’s voice touched the edge of my hearing.

Not Othellos.

Not a divine summons.

Help.

I stood.

Cold moved across the table beneath my hands.

Mary’s plans fluttered.

The Castellan looked toward the eastern wall.

“What did you hear?” he asked.

Before I could answer, Evelyn came through the doorway.

Her face told me she had heard something too.

“A child crying,” she said. “Beyond the south road.”

Mary closed her book.

“How far?”

“I don’t know.”

The gold around Evelyn’s wrists brightened.

She pressed one hand against her chest.

“It came through the old healing path.”