“It started a few days ago,” he said. “He says he’s cold but sweats through any blanket I put on him. He’s a widower—when we heard he was ill, my mother sent me to look after him.”
“Body aches?” I guessed, finding the bag.Focus, Hazel, focus.I began checking the stock inside, listening to him as I worked.
“Terrible ones. I thought it was just a summer cold, but then…it’s been getting worse. And today…” He swallowed, turning pale.
“Hazel,” Merrick interrupted, suddenly filling the doorway. “I do believe you’ll want to dispense with such niceties and get to this man. With haste.”
I dared a glance back to Kieron, but he was only staring at me, watching me, completely unaware of the Dreaded End now peering down at him curiously.
Though I offered him my brightest smile, I could feel it quiver. “Take me to your uncle?”
Chapter 14
By the time we arrivedat the farmhouse, Reynard LeCompte was careening toward madness.
Kieron ushered us into the home but paused, lingering on the threshold as a volley of shouts rose from a bedroom deeper within. “He’s in his room….”
“Make it stop, make it stop, make it stop!” cried a voice stretched hoarse and painfully raw.
“Will you introduce me?” I asked uncertainly, glancing between him, Merrick, and the dark hallway leading to the back of the house.
“I don’t…” Kieron cleared his throat. “If it’s all the same to you…I’d rather not see him like that again.” He frowned. “I suppose that makes me a coward, but I…I just can’t…” He sighed.
The shouts morphed into a feral howl, ripping the house apart in its agony. Kieron winced.
“Send him away,” Merrick advised. “You need to focus, and with that queasy constitution he’ll be of no help at all.”
My mind raced. “Camphor!” I blurted out.
Kieron raised his eyebrows.
“I just realized I don’t have any camphor oil with me. Would the…perhaps the market in town might have some?”
Kieron paused and I began to worry my request was absurd. I wasn’t even sure how far from town we were, wasn’t sure there was a market large enough to have an apothecary shop. But then he nodded.
“I can take his horse,” he volunteered. “I should be back in an hour or so. Two at the most.”
“That would be so helpful, thank you,” I said, my words nearly lost in the jumble of his uncle’s babbling.
Kieron’s gaze darted from mine to the room at the end of the house. “I’ll be as quick as I can.” Then he turned and fled.
Merrick watched him go, his gaze unreadable, before he gestured to the bedroom. “Shall we?”
Relief spread through my chest like a warm balm. “You’re coming with me?”
“Of course,” Merrick said, stooping to poke his head through the bedroom’s doorframe. The farmer caught sight of him and howled.
“I thought you said no one could see you!” I fretted, whirling around.
Merrick waved his hand as if it was of no concern. “I said the boy wouldn’t. But the farmer would, of course. He’s close to death. If you do your work well, he won’t remember anything about this moment.” His skeletal fingers cupped the small of my back and guided me over the threshold. “In you go.”
My leather valise was stuffed near to bursting with powders and elixirs, bandages and surgical tools. I’d nervously overpacked, not wanting to be underprepared. I set the bag on the bedside dresser with a loudthunkthat made me wince, but Kieron’s uncle didn’t even notice.
He writhed across his pallet, bed linens soaked and stinking of sweat, urine, and loosened bowels. His skin had a dreadful pallor, somewhere between yellow and gray, and was covered with dark sores.
I immediately understood why Kieron did not want to return to this bedside. I didn’t want to be here either. I did not want to be here, in this room that smelled of things worse than death, but Merrick prodded me forward.
“Sir?” I began, my voice breaking with a crack. “My name is Hazel.” I twisted my fingers together, feeling stupid and small and wishing I could flee. “And I’m…I’m here to look after you.”
