Without questioning, Cara and Raina thrust hands under Richard’s arms and started to pull him up. Richard jerked away from their grip.
“What’s going on?” he demanded. “What’s the matter?”
Drefan wiped a hand across his mouth. He glanced over his shoulder at the mother and Yonick. His gaze took in the rest of them before settling on Richard. He leaned closer.
“This boy has the plague.”
Richard stared at him.
“What do we have to do to cure him?”
Drefan lifted an eyebrow. He turned back to the boy, elevating a little hand. “Look at his fingers.” The fingertips were black. He pulled the bedcover aside. “Look at his toes.” His toes were black. He opened the boy’s trousers. “Look at his penis.” The tip of it was black, too.
“That’s gangrene. It rots the extremities. This is why they call it the black death.”
Richard cleared his throat. “What can we do for him?”
Drefan’s voice lowered even more with incredulity. “Richard, did you hear what I said? Black death. People sometimes recover from the plague, but not when it’s this advanced.”
“If we would have gotten to him sooner…” Nadine’s imputation trailed off.
Kahlan grip on Richard’s forearm tightened painfully. He heard her stifle a cry.
Richard glared at Nadine. She looked away.
“And do you know how to cure the plague, herb woman?” Drefan sneered.
“Well, I—” Nadine blushed and fell silent.
The boy’s eyes fluttered open. His head rolled toward them.
“Lord… Rahl,” he said with a shallow breath.
Richard put a hand on his shoulder. “Yes, Kip. I came to see you. I’m here.”
Kip nodded the slightest bit. “I waited.” His chest rested longer between each breath.
“What can you do to help?” came a tearful question from the doorway. “How soon will he be well again?”
Drefan opened the collar of his white, ruffled shirt as he leaned close to Richard. “Say something comforting to the boy—that’s all we can do. He won’t last long. I’ll go talk to the mother. It’s part of the job of healer.”
Drefan stood, pulling Nadine away with him. Kahlan was leaning against Richard’s shoulder. He feared looking at her, lest she break down in tears. Lest he break down in tears.
“Kip, you’ll be up and playing Ja’La soon. You’ll be getting over this any day now. I’d like to come watch another of your Ja’La games. I promise to come, just as soon as you’re better.”
A faint smile passed over the boy’s face. His eyelids closed partway. His ribs sank as breath abandoned his lungs.
Richard crouched, feeling his heart pounding, as he waited for the boy’s lungs to fill again. They didn’t.
Silence settled into the room, patiently waiting for darkness to return.
Richard could hear the wheels of a handcart outside squeaking, and the distant, raucous cry of ravens. The music of children’s laughter drifted in the air.
This child would never laugh again.
Kahlan’s head fell against his shoulder. Soft sobs claimed her as she clutched his sleeve.
Richard reached over to pull the sheet over the body.
The boy’s hand rose slowly off his stomach. Richard froze.
The hand floated purposefully to Richard’s throat. The black fingers curled, gathering Richard’s shirt in a death grip.
Kahlan had fallen silent.
They both knew that the boy had died.
The boy’s hand drew Richard closer. The long-silent lungs filled once more with a breath.
Richard, the hair at the base of his neck stiffening, put his ear close.
“The winds,” the dead boy whispered, “hunt you.”
29
Richard stared in a daze as Drefan wrapped the dead boy in the sheet. Only Richard and Kahlan had seen what had happened—had heard what the dead boy had said. Behind him, in the outer room, the mother wailed in anguish.
Drefan leaned close to him. “Richard.” Drefan touched his arm. “Richard.”
Richard started. “What?”
“What do you want to do?”
“Do? What do you mean?”
Drefan glanced over his shoulder at the rest of them back by the door. “What do you want to tell people about this? I mean, he died of the plague. Do you want to try to keep it a secret?”
Richard couldn’t seem to make his mind work.
Kahlan leaned past Richard. “A secret? Why would we want to do that?”
Drefan took a deep breath. “Well, word of a plague might cause a panic. If we let people know, believe me, word of it will beat us back to the palace.”
“Do you think others have it?” she asked.
Drefan shrugged. “I doubt there would be only one isolated case. We have to bury or burn the body at once. His bedcovers, bed, and anything else he touched should be burned. The room should be treated with smoke.”
“Won’t people want to know why that’s being done?” Richard asked. “Won’t they guess the reason?”
“Probably.”
“Then how could it be kept a secret?”
“You’re the Lord Rahl. Your word is law. You would have to suppress any information. Arrest the family. Accuse them of a crime. Have them held until this is over. Have the soldiers carry off all their possessions to be burned and shut up their home.”
Richard closed his eyes and pressed his fingertips to them. He was the Seeker of Truth, not the suppressor of it.
“We can’t do that to a family who just lost a boy. I won’t do that. Besides, wouldn’t it be better if people knew? Don’t people have a right to know of the danger they’re in?”
Drefan nodded. “If it were my decisio
n, I would want people to know. I’ve seen the plague before, in small places. Some have tried to suppress the knowledge of it to prevent panic, but when more people started dying, it couldn’t be kept a secret.”
Richard felt as though the sky had fallen on him. He struggled to make his mind work, but the dead boy’s words kept echoing around in his head. The winds hunt you.
“If we try to lie to people, they won’t believe anything we say. We have to tell them the truth. They’ve a right to know.”
“I agree with Richard,” Kahlan said. “We shouldn’t try to deceive people, especially about something that could endanger their lives.”
Drefan nodded his concurrence. “We’re fortunate, at least, with the time of year. Plague is worst in the heat of summer. It could run rampant if this were summer. In the colder weather of the spring it shouldn’t be able to get a good foothold. With luck, the outbreak of plague will be weak and soon over.”
“Luck,” Richard muttered. “Luck is for dreamers; I only have nightmares. We have to warn people.”
Drefan’s blue eyes looked to each in turn. “I understand, and I agree with your reasoning. The problem is, there’s not much to be done, other than burying the dead quickly and burning their things. There are remedies, but I fear they are of limited value.
“I just want to warn you: news of plague will spread like a firestorm.”
Richard’s flesh prickled with goose flesh.
On the red moon will come the firestorm.
“Dear spirits spare us,” Kahlan whispered. She was thinking the same as he.
Richard sprang up. “Yonick.” He crossed the room, rather than make the boy come to his dead brother.
“Yes, Lord Rahl?” His brow creased as he struggled to hold back his tears.
Richard put one knee to the floor and held the boy’s shoulders.
“Yonick, I’m so sorry. But your brother isn’t suffering any longer. He’s with the good spirits now. He’s at peace, and hoping we will remember the good times with him, and not be too sad. The good spirits will watch over him.”
Yonick brushed his blond hair aside. “But… I…”
“I don’t want you to blame yourself. Nothing could have been done. Nothing. Sometimes people get sick, and none of us has the power to make them well. No one could have done anything. Even if you had brought me right at the first, we couldn’t have done anything.”