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Dance of the Blood Moon

Ferris Argensis

Chapter 2

The coming days proved me to be a very shy person; though I was in love with the Lady Alexis I found myself at a dualistic stance between being magnetized with twitterpation and repelled in shyness. I faced myself leaning against my vanity and felt like a common pervert standing before a woman's home in the night, watching her through her window in the front yard, and walking away before she knew that I am there. The silver in my vanity was pure and clear for which I could measure and determine my own beauty - for I did my best to be the most beautiful of creatures in the world - and yet my thoughts are strangled by images of Alexis and her sunset-red fur twitching in the wind. Her eyes were blue and mine were green, but mine were purer green and so hers rightfully compliment them.

It's strange, moreso, that unlike all the others I have looked upon, my feelings were like that of a wench adopting a stray cat. She was beautiful and exotic, yet I couldn't bring myself to dare pervert her in my mind with erotic fantasies, unlike the ones my many concubines occupied already - that isn't to say I don't seek sexual intimacy with her at some points. I wished to keep her pure in my mind, for I couldn't dare curse her name.

There was a heavy knock on the great red doors to my room. The captain of my guard calls through from the hallway, "My lord! I have urgent news! It's about Shen Rah!"

"You may enter," I called loud enough so the guards on the other side heard me. It took a strong rhino to open one of the doors.

Holume, the Otter of Esqaatch squeezed through while ducking under the guard's enormous arm. He hurriedly strides towards me and begins talking. "My lord Ferris, a raven has just come in from the town of Shen Rah." He revealed a scroll small enough to fit on a bird's leg and presented it to me.

"Go on," I urge him with a toss of my wrist.

He read from the bottom half of it. "This is a plea of warning to the other towns of the Terran Loah provinces and the honorable and independent Ferris Argensin of Ferristead. Death walks in our city and kills all whom it looks upon. As of now our healers seek a cure to this disease, which we will inform you of when we discover it. With honor and regality - " Holume mumbled the rest and put it away in his bag. He said to me, "I became panicked and ordered for all travelers to be quarantined temporarily, and for a patrol to circle the border of the city until further notice."

"What if our merchants return here," I questioned him. "What about our own locals returning from a journey?" They may have to be set apart for a few days to see if they have the plague, I thought.

"I've ordered that a quarantine camp be established inside the city gates for a few days until we're certain that they're not contaminated."

"Nobody's going to like that one bit, especially the merchants who rely on time."

Holume was experienced in matters of public protection, whom had also been present to assist in outbreaks of disease and sickness, so I knew that his reaction wasn't out of reason. In light of this new disease of death that crawled through our land, to make a person wait seven days before continuing was only going to hurt my city's reputation.

I asked Holume, "Surely there must be an alternative to this; can you send for doctors to investigate the signs? All illnesses have their cure. I will send my own doctors in addition."

The captain of the royal guard put his hand out to me as though rebuking a cow (as goes the habit of his native culture) and said to me, "The doctors in addition must be quarantined as well."

I shook my head in disagreement. "They cannot be forced to wait. I'll have them wear respirators while they attend victims. Afterwards, they'll burn their clothes and wash with bluebed."

The captain of the guard agreed and so we sent for doctors to study visitors at the camps. The plan was for them to remain at watch for the next two weeks, studying the many dozens who would enter into our gates from foreign lands. However, as the days passed and I received tri-hourly updates on the secrets of the plague, I quickly learned that travel throughout these lands - in response to the outbreak of plague - has ceased almost altogether. Thus our first group of detainees will be our last group for quite a while.

As soon as nightfall set in and I affirmed myself that this would be the last day in which we'd be receiving travelers from afar or returning, I ordered that the gates of my city to be shut and barred until the plague had washed over. I was aware that there are farmers in my land who must function beyond the gates, just as much I have been additionally affirmed by Holume that not even our farmers will risk walking the same roads that the doomed walk.

Three nights passed by and on the third day I was awoken by Holume once more with panicked knocking and exclamations behind my massive bedroom doors. I welcomed his presence so early before the dawn, for since the last three nights I have been unable to rest; I needed something worthwhile to bring me out of my feather bed.

"Let him in!" I shouted to the guards beyond while I put on my red silk robe.

"My Lord, they're all dying or dead!" Holume hollers between the doors before they can be opened.

I sprinted to meet him as the doors opened. If people are dying in my camps then we must do something immediately to prevent contamination; their corpses may have to be catapulted over the walls of Ferristead - the catapults afterwards burned, if necessary.

"When did this happen?" I inquired with a swelling dread in my throat. I met his brown eyes and saw a similar dread.

He answered: "About fifteen minutes ago. I started on my way here as soon as I received the report myself."

"Take me there at once," I ordered him.

We took a carriage to the quarantine camps on the extreme side of my city. Holume chose this side of the city because of how rural it was. The area was an open field that was widely untouched, save for where my city's stone walls towered high nearby. The domain was so remote that not even livestock grazed there.

Upon arriving I'm revealed to an array of white tents, surrounded in all by a single wooden fence. Guards equipped with stilted boots and hooked poles hauled the recently deceased into a pile for eventual cremation. Nearby, a pyro stacked logs that stank of lamp oil. Along the way I was told that four of the twenty-five that lived were being kept in a tent in the back for treatment, but all were sick and showing symptoms.

When myself and Holume stepped out of the carriage he told me: "You can tell they're about to die when their eyes turn red, like peppers." He then added for my understanding: "The doctors say that it's the blood vessels in their eyes popping all at once from the pressure that builds up before they begin vomiting. That's when they die. We don't know much else about what's happening inside. The doctors don't want much to do with the bodies, my lord."

"I understand," I responded. What a monstrous fate...

A doctor in a white respirator and coat hastened to our presence. Before speaking he greeted me with a swift bow, then saluted Holume. "Captain, one of the infected has escaped the camp."

Holume stiffened like a plank as he received that news; he must believe I'm reevaluating his rank in my services right now. I saw his jaws clench for saliva to wet his lips before demanding of the doctor: "Have you sent trackers?"

The doctor nodded stiffly. When he spoke, he ascended steadily into a hush. "We're tracking for footprints, sir."

Holume barked at him, "Haven't you sent out bloodhounds?"

He shook his head - his eyes jumped between myself and Holume. "Sir - I didn't want to risk contaminating them."

A fight nearly broke out of Holume in response to the doctor's confession - he shifted into a combative position with fist raised to strike the beaver's muzzle. As soon as he braced to leap he froze, then relaxed with his arms to his side. He turned and ran to the carriage while shouting behind himself, "Get the bloodhounds! We're following his trail!"

Holume inquired of the doctor about the missing patient's departure time, so as to predict where he could be now. They knew enough that the fennec was a foreign merchant that had never visited Ferristead before, thus the canine would be wandering almost aimlessly. The two - Holume and the doctor - joined with several of my guards to mount horses for the hunt.

I approached Holume on his steed, requesting to leave with him. He denied and apologized, explaining further: "I can't risk you catching the plague, my lord." He set off.

In retaliation I schemed that after they galloped from my sight I would acquire a horse from one of the subordinates here and follow on my own. However, before even Holume could kick the hind of his steed, two other guards galloped for us with urgent news.

"Captain!" said the first of the guards to Holume, "The plague victim's holding a woman east from here hostage!"

"Where?" Holume demanded of him.

The guard explained to him, which I listened intently on. The missing merchant had made his way through the forest beyond this field and come out to the other side, where he found a cottage on the edge of a villa. The villa was on the precipice of the rest of my estate's civilization, such that should his plague spread further it would be unstoppable. Holume, the doctor, and his subordinates all galloped on horseback for the cottage.

In the rush to leave I acquired my own horse and attempted to follow as well; it'd been a long time since I'd ridden horseback and had a difficulty mounting the steed at all. I followed them from a distance at the back of our stampede.

We broke through the woods to the cottage at the edge of the villa. The infected merchant was discovered at a chopping-stump, holding a doe maiden close to himself with a hatchet to her throat. The fur around her throat was red from how the blade had cut the skin underneath. As for the merchant, the plague has already robbed him of many patches of fur along his head, shoulders, and chest. One of his eyes has turned red from the pressure building within.

Holume and his guards surround the merchant on their steeds. The guards draw their bows, while Holume drew his sword to signify his authority.

"Let her go," ordered Holume with a sharp fury. The edge of his sword - Dawn - shimmered in the early-morning sun.

"Let me go home!" he demanded as his maws frothed, "and she can go free!" Again, he demanded: "Let me go home to Jjima so I can die there! Not here!"

"You will release her or you'll die where you stand!" answered Holume. "These arrows are faster than you and will not miss."

The merchant shook his head, from which bloody froth fell from his chin onto the maiden doe's open shoulder. The doe cringed to the slick touch. She started chanting something comforting to herself as she came to grips with her imminent death. The blood from her neck dripped off the hatchet's chipped edge.

Then the merchant's wild gaze shifted from beyond Holume's burning eyes and rested on me peeking out of the forest line. A merchant knows merchants, of which I am the most famous, hence he recognized me immediately and calls out my name. "Ferris Argensis, Lord of Ferristead!" he cried, "I want to die in my hometown! Let me go out there!" His hands trembled as he spoke. "I'm not going to last 'til midnight..." His eyes glaze over before he started weeping.

Holume and his archers look behind themselves. Holume's expression contorts in brimming-terror as he saw me. He must've been worried sick for my safety then.

At the merchant's plea for a last travel, I take pity for him. This fennec was young, perhaps no older than 18, for despite what the plague has done to his form, his figure is still that of a pup. Most merchants forgot the comforts of home after a few years on the road, but this one must've only been traveling for but a few months. I called to the fennec merchant and inquired him his name.

"They call me Dry Wind," he responded.

"No," I rebuttled, "Your birth name."

He quieted for a moment; the tension in his visage settled, the hatchet in his grasp steadily lowers from the doe's throat. Then he answered: "Coley, of Hackenwood Shire."

There was whisper of understanding amongst Holume and the others; Hackenwood Shire was only ten miles from the gates of Ferristead. If he left now, he could return home well before sundown.

Holume barked at Coley the Infected, "You may not leave this city!" He held his sword steadfastly at him. "You're well infected with the plague and as far as it goes you've taken this innocent woman with you." Then, on the top of his nerves, added, "And your shire is already consumed with the plague as it is. I've been keeping notes. They're all dead."

The hatchet in his hand fell to the ground with a thump. He released the maiden - who immediately sprinted for her cottage - and fell to his knees. He cried out defeatedly: "Then I'm finished!" He concluded softly, "Just destroy me..."

The archers let loose their arrows into the merchant's skull at the same time. He toppled sideways to the grass and laid there.

I wished I had closed my eyes as I witnessed his death. I wished I'd thought of a better way to resolve this. Perhaps that instead of killing the merchant, he could've lived out his last few hours in a nice home with a well-stoked fire and a warm meal in his belly. But I took sympathy for the fennec - whose name was Coley of Hackenwood - for food and comforts meant nothing to a man without family to enjoy them with. Coley would never see his home, nor would he be buried there, but instead burned in a heap with the other nameless victims.

I broke from the thought when I noticed Holume in my peripheral. The otter placed his furred hand on my shoulder. His expression contorted in a somber way. He said, "I wish you didn't have to see that."

"I wish there was another way," I lamented.

"He couldn't have left the city without spreading the infection further," he added, "and he wouldn't have a home to return to anyways." He shrugged then confessed, "He would've just gone back to the camp if he didn't choose to die here."

There was nothing else to say to Holume about the late Coley of Hackenwood. My thoughts shifted towards the doe maiden. "This whole area's going to need to be burned," I somberly suggested. "Where did the girl go?"

Holume pointed towards the cottage. "She went inside."

"She's going to die, isn't she?" I didn't expect to be told otherwise.

Holume shook his head. "She only has a week at this point."

"Can we still try?"

There was a distance in his voice. "Of course, my lord."

We stood outside on the grass, a measured 10ft from the porch where the maiden would've crossed to enter inside. The doe's father, a bristled old stag with whiting face, answered the door. He had an unnerved look in his eyes, and the way he craned his neck to look over us was intimidating; he'd probably fight us to protect his family's privacy at this point.

"Can I help you," he said at Holume.

Holume made his case: the stag's daughter is going to have to be decontaminated with bluebed and incense, while everything she has already touched inside may have to be burned. The father wouldn't tolerate it, and then the mother and her two fawns appeared and shouted at us. Holume and his company knew they couldn't touch the infected, and even if they were to burn the whole house down (with or without them inside) the word would spread throughout the villa, to the towns adjacent, and would only make it harder for Holume and his men to function. At last I stepped forward and pleaded with them: "If you don't work with us then you'll all die in a week!"

There was a long, hard pause from the family members. The mother, a woman with an ample waist and wearing an apron, answered me: "We aren't losing our home nor are we losing our comforts!" The father asked us, "How contagious is this disease?"

Holume put it bluntly: the infection-rate was 100% from physical contact unless immediately washed with bluebed; clothing worn or tools used must be destroyed or burned.

"So my whole household has it at this point?" asked the father.

"Yes," Holume responded flatly. The whole family - excluding the daughter - had been huddled up in the front door to this point, but were now self-conscious for their lives and split apart.

The wife and children left the father to go back inside. The father leaned against the doorframe to his home with a growing look of woe. After a moment of trading glances between our party, he asked to us: "Will bluebed hurt?"

Holume answered: "It irritates the skin, and it'll make fur fall out, but it kills the germs."

"And my house," asked the father, "Must it be burned?"

"Everything."

I raised my voice, "We will provide a new place for your family to stay, and we'll build you a new one, no charge."

The father once again paused, furled his brows, and thought deeply on this. Watching him made me realize the burden the man of a household has to weigh these decisions; how does one know what is truly right, even with counsel?

"Alright," said the father nodding his head. "I'll go tell the folks. Where will we be staying until this is over?"

The family would later receive a tent to stay in, which would be spacious and of high-grade fabric to keep the heat inside. As for now, Holume escorted the family down the road and prepared them for a bluebed scrubbing. Curtains were set up for them to privately undress and scrub; the clothes were thrown over the curtains, where subordinates with hooked poles dragged the wears to a pyre. Others under Holume's authority underwent razing the family's house with everything inside. Around that time I listened into the curtains and heard crying, praying, and mutual consolations. "It'll be alright," the father told the others, "We'll get a new one, and it'll be better than ever before."

*

Later that night, as I was finishing my dinner in the dining hall, one of my palace staff members approached me with news that there was a riot forming outside of the city gates. I quickly threw on a night-robe and was escorted outside where a buggy was waiting for me. The driver had received orders from Holume - whom was already at the city gates managing the situation - to take me directly to his presence.

There was an enormous number of guards present at the city gates. The gates themselves were barred-up and daring to crash down in sudden throbs while guards fortified it with rams and wooden crates.

Holume noticed me from atop the wall's catwalk and called me up to him. "My lord! I have terrible news!" I took the side-stairs to join beside him. "I know," I responded hustling up the stairs, "It's a riot." He shook his head in grave terror. "More than that," he said.

There was an enormous crowd of fennec villagers shoving into the city gates. They had pitchforks, ropes, and torches. In the light of their torches I saw the ruby-shimmer of their eyes, their horrible, discolored eyes.

"I was wrong about Hackenwood," confessed Holume. "I knew they'd gotten it, but I wasn't sure about when."

"How long do they have? I asked.

"I can't say... Some of them wander away and drop dead - you can see litter in the distance. They're scattered all along the road."

"What am I supposed to do about this?"

Holume lowered his torch from the air and looked me gravely in the eyes. "I don't have the authority to decide what happens next."

Then the villagers' mumbled outcry unified into a single wild chant: "Give us the cure! We want temmir!"

"What on earth is 'temmir'?" I demanded of Holume.

A guard from my blindside answered me: "It's an herb used in stews."

"Are they hosting a feast?" I remarked, "what do they want with our herbs?"

Holume informed me: "They said earlier that it's supposed to cure you when ingested."

I'd never heard of such an herb having such properties as to cure plague. "Can it really do such a thing?" I asked him.

Holume answered for his guard: "I doubt it. It's probably just superstition, like how acai berries can cure cancer of the breast."

The villagers ceased their chanting at once to begin ramming themselves into my wall's doors. They took steps back as a single organism and then threw themselves against the walls beneath us like a wave crashing against the rocks. I looked over my shoulder and saw the guards struggling to fortify the doors with whatever they had. I couldn't believe that they - the dying - still had the strength to fight when the plague had deprived them so terribly.

I put my hands to my mouth and began shouting down at the crowd: "We'll get you what you need! You can have temmir!" They were listening, and all at once they stopped when they heard my promising of the special herb. I turned around to Holume and commanded him in a frantic hush, "Find as much temmir as possible, now!"

Holume saluted me and rushed down the stairs. I last saw him giving orders to his subordinates, and then see the subordinates give orders to their own, and everyone split off in a different direction.

Standing on the wall by myself was a fearful experience. I felt the collective stare of the many below me on the other side. The plague was turning them into monsters. They stood huddled against the wall - I could smell them as I was directly above them all; they smelled of the same grotesque odor of fecal matter found in the first victim along the fork in the road weeks before. They were watching me with empty expressions, but their eyes seemed to glow like embers in the cool dark.

Some began demanding in shouts for the herb temmir, in which the other Hackenwood villagers joined in. Someone threw a rock up at the balcony. I'm sent on to my rear after being hit on the chest, to which guards cover me as I'm escorted down the stairs to the ground.

Holume returned after what felt like an eternity. They'd had only handfuls, jars and boxes of the legendary temmir. I don't know how they politely got it, but I can imagine all the doors they had to kick down to get it. "Just give it to them!" I demanded while pointing over the gate.

They surmounted the walk above the gates, and while the crowds erupted to the boxes and jars of spice, they divided them into the crowds. I could hear them cheering, to which I felt the tension of the last week melting off my shoulders. Holume looked over his shoulder to smile at me and give a thumbs-up. I did the same. The villagers that had kept their distance this entire time looked relieved as well. Some started applauding.

The crowd outside steadily went silent, then a voice from among them shouted: "Where's more?" The rest erupted into a wild fit of yelling and demands. "We need more!"

"How much will they need?" I shouted at Holume from the ground.

Holume was aghast. He shrugged his shoulders and responded, "Hardly any of it went around! Each one took a jar, but we only had twelve of them!"

I don't recall who figured out that there wasn't any more temmir to go around, but when the villagers figured out they flew into a frenzy. They beat on the city gates with their curled fists and the butts of farming instruments. I could see through the cracks in the wood from my side that some were putting the flames of torches to the wood to ignite it.

"Make them stop!" I shouted for Holume. The fortifications around the gates were sliding away in the mud. I saw smoke rising through the cracks.

"We're out of time! Make the call or they'll storm the city and we'll all die!"

He wanted me to order all of their deaths. I saw the guards on the walls around me reach to their bows in preparation. The citizens that were applauding only moments ago were running for their homes or for far away from here. I wasn't ready for this kind of responsibility - I couldn't possibly order another creature to death. This was my home, but these invaders were out of their minds, knowing less-so better than children. Yet in them they carried a death that killed all without mercy, and if temmir were the cure, it was inconceivable that there would be enough to go around - my city would perish regardless.

My knees trembled as I gave the order: "Put them out of their misery!"

The archers let loose their arrows and I heard their panicked cries break out beyond the wall. They reached into their quivers to unleash volley after volley into the crowd. I covered my ears to drown out the villagers' bloody shrieks while turning away so I couldn't catch even a glimpse of their horrified red eyes through the cracks in the gate. The sounds of their deaths penetrated into my fur and my skin, reverberating through every orifice in my body until I was swollen like a sponge with guilt and terror. I fell to my knees, shut my eyes and begged their forgiveness: "I'm sorry!" But I don't think even their departing spirits heard me while I kneeled there in the mud.

Minutes later, Holume came to my side to help me up. "It's over," he told me. There was a scarred chill in his expression. "We're taking care of the stragglers right now."

I wiped tears from my cheeks. "No," I moaned hoarsely, "Let the stragglers go. No more."

He nodded. "As you wish," then signaled the guards on the wall to stop. "We'll start a pyre outside the walls this time."

"No," I answered again. "Burn them where they are. Transplant our villagers to a new homes. This whole district is cut off."

"How long?" he asked.

"Until there's nothing left to burn."

That night I stood at the topmost balcony in my palace and watched the flames at the main gates rise high into the sky. The flames burned hard and unnaturally low with the bodies of several hundred Hackenwood villagers. Civil servants dressed in leather suits and masks stood closeby with hooked poles in their hands and watched. At one point I thought I saw the spirits of the deceased crawl towards my city from the shadows my men cast standing before that fire. Surely, those writhing spirits who lived in the shadows would wonder where I dwelt at night, and would haunt me until the day I joined them in a pyre of my own.

When I returned to my bedroom I constructed an effigy in my likeness from pillows, a robe, and an ornamental chandelier (for the antlers). I recalled from the Lady Taiga's teachings that the spirits would mistake the effigy for myself and haunt it instead. Before I left, I ordered for a servant to bring a tray of cakes and lemon pies to my room to be set on the bed by the effigy, and that a note should be written and placed on the tray that read: "Forgive me."

With a candle in hand I headed downstairs to the floor below mine and knocked on the door labeled: "Clarice of Daggerpeak." Of all my concubines, I favored her personally. Being from the mountains, she had a resolution and chill that made her irresistible.

I knocked on her door three times. When I didn't get an answer, I tried calling between the slits in the doors. Before I could finish my call, one of the doors opened and Clarice stood apart from me with a lit candle of her own. She was a white-furred wolf from the northern lands, which gave her a strong accent and eyes that were luminously blue."Ferris, quietly, please... Arthur is sleeping."

"Claire," I began, "I'd like to apologize about these hours, but would you have me for bed company tonight?"

"I'm really not in the mood, Ferris - " she answered hesitantly.

"Neither am I," I pardoned, "It's just for the bed."

She tugged-tight the rope of her white nightgown. "Would you like to go to your room?" she suggest of us both.

"No," I answered in a slight shudder. "It might be haunted."

She cocked an eyebrow in queer discernment; she probably thought I'd become superstitious, or that I was losing my mind from lack of sleep. She stepped aside from the doorway and bid me to enter. "Would you like some wine? For your nerves," she offered while I passed by.

"Yes," I answered.

Minutes later, when the doors to her room were shut and locked, instead of sleeping by her side I sat on the bed and wept as I explained my turmoil. She leaned against the wall with a crystal glass of wine in her palm, watching it swirl around as she turned her wrist. I found it comforting to see how her ears twitched in my direction while I gabbed. I took my hands from my face and saw in her the glimmer of sympathy in her eyes.

When I was done she joined me in her bed and pulled the covers over us both. "It's early," she explained, "Let's get some sleep."

*

The next morning I awoke and Clarice insisted that I owed her and Arthur time together. Arthur - one of my many offspring - had been missing his me as of late. I tried to rebuttal her with declarations that my city needed me, but she returned: if my guards needed me they could find me as always. To continue arguing any further would've been discourteous, and so I gave in. She got Arthur out of his crib in the next room and we ventured to the courtyard out-back.

The courtyard was half-garden and half lawn with cobblestone paths crossing through the center. Butterflies and bees lofted to-and-fro amongst the flowers that lined the paths, and the grass was freshly cut, but still cool from the morning dew. It was brunch-time, and so servants brought us tea and tarts to enjoy while I played with Arthur in the grass. Clarice sat at a table in the grass nearby.

I knelt in the grass and helped little Arthur build a wall out of wooden blocks. The pup was two years old, having the same white fur as his mother, but with eyes like mine. She spoke so highly of him on our way to the courtyard, bragging how he could speak in full sentences already. Then she added as a side-note how Arthur would be such a brat at times as response to the lack of a father figure in his life. I explained my absence was for fact that I had much to do now in dealing with the plague - but she stopped me in the passageways and glared coldly at me. "Where were you before the plague then?" she asked harshly, "What great tasks must you fulfill when you won't have to work ever again?"

Arthur double-took me and the block-wall that'd been building between us. He kicked it over and took wonky steps towards me until he tumbled into my chest and I took him in my hands. He giggled at my touch, then squealed: "Daddy!" My heart melted. I'd tried to form a proper response but failed and sat there looking into his luminous eyes with my jaw agape.

"He really missed you," said his mother before biting into an apple tart. She was pleased with us.

"I've been a poor father, haven't I?" I asked.

"Terrible, even," she immediately answered. "If this city of yours fails for any reason it'll be because your heir was an ass that never knew his father. It always happens with kings - dozens of wives and hundreds of children but all of them turn out to be psychotic brats that send the kingdom into flames because you were never there to teach them right."

Lord Arthur Argensis of Ferristead. The title resonated with me. The wolf-pup reached well above his own head and grabbed my antlers at the bases, trying to jerk them about; he seemed awestruck with whatever I was. If he understood me as father, might he ever ponder what bits of myself resided within him?

"Oh," groaned Clarice, "Here come the others..."

Ten of my concubines from around the palace (and their palaces on my hill-property) drew into the courtyard like a flood at the news of my father-like presence today. It was like a holiday to them that I should find time to pay attention and play with their children - my blood. The events of last night had put a new light into my perspective of the fragility of life, and thus for the sake of my conscience, I obliged to give them the time I owed them.

Now I must also remember their names... I start with the one calf on the right.

Hours into the afternoon I found myself exhausted on the brink of collapse - yet not in no way emotionally drained for I was surrounded by children who loved and looked up to me; they all called me Daddy, Father, and Papa. Standing by at the table where Clarice sat were their mothers, of whom, like her, were delighted to watch.

Soon they - my children - start clinging onto my arms either for me to twirl in circles, or to drag me to the ground and dogpile me. My robes were stained green all around the knees and buttox, but was serene regardless.

As the strength in my legs gave in I caught glimpse of a guard approaching me. I squirmed-out from beneath the pile of children - many of whom still clung to the legs of my robes and demanded my affection - and I approached the guard. He was grinning delightedly for some reason.

He said: "My lord, I have excellent news from our researchers."

"What is it?" I inquired.

"Guard Captain Holume believes we've discovered the secrets to identifying plague victims before their symptoms can manifest."

Before he could say anything more I demanded he escort me to Holume so that I could see his research. On the way out of the courtyard I stopped and turned around to bid my concubines goodbye. Clarice - who proved herself the sternest out of all of them - merely raised her teacup in my honor and smirked approvingly.

As I left the courtyard I could hear the collective sighs of my children wanting another hour with their father. I told myself I would come in later tonight to perhaps play ball with them; today was one of their birthdays, I recalled, so perhaps I could hire an illusionist to perform for us.

Holume in his time had been given many subordinates to command and direct in his efforts to keep peace over my city. One of these subordinates was komodo dragon with one blind eye. The lizard had been given a laboratory for research and development. Oatmeal (so they called him) was really the one who discovered the plague's secret; it was Holume by principle who received the honors. The guard who received me from the courtyard brought me to an out-of-view fortress on the east-most side of my hilltop. From there I was escorted through its courtyard, up spiraling stone staircases, and into a circular room that smelled of mildew and decayed rodent skins. Wooden tables cluttered the room's walk-space, where upon them lay dozens of cages filled of feral rodents, and on other tables were found ferals of the same brood now cut-open and dissected for observation. A green komodo dragon with shedding scales was awaiting our arrival with an unopened bottle of Lewleaf Brandy, pipeweed, and an enormous satisfied grin on his enormous face. Holume stood nearby the dragon, while swatting flies off his face. The lizard greeted us as we approached him.

"Good morning, my lord Ferris," the dragon said to us. He swiftly bowed while Holume introduced Oatmeal.

"His real name is Everett," said Holume. "He's the one who discovered the way to find early symptoms in a victim.

"Indeed," said the komodo dragon as he rose from his rocking-chair. "Would you like to hear about it, or do you just want this?" He took pliers and grasped a small sliver of silver with a speckle of blood on its face and offered it in my direction. "See what happened to the blood?"

I jerked back away from the silver. "What's that black crust on top?" I asked him.

"I think that's the plague itself," said the dragon, "I've concluded that it's the silver metal that does this. Only pure silver will do it."

"Silver metal makes it crust like this? And that crust is the plague? Get it out here!"

He sat it back on the table, smiled and said to me, "There's no worry of the plague hurting you as it is. What you see on top is the same that happens to fish when they die - they float to the surface belly-up. I think it's the silver itself that is making the plague do this. Everyone stores their milk in silver jars to extend its drinkability, but why is that? Perhaps the purity of the silver kills whatever crawls its way into the milk when left out for too long - and that is perhaps what kills the plague."

My eyes lit up and I ducked in close to glare at him. "Are you saying you can stop the plague?"

Holume answered for him, "I already asked that, and no, my lord, it can't stop the plague, but it can help us predict who already has it before the symptoms show."

Everett added: "Which can allow us to isolate the plague before it spreads further, hopefully. Victims already contaminated by another victim's body oils can spread it further, but they won't become a source of contamination until they start to exhibit the symptoms themselves."

"Fur loss," I answered.

"Or scales," returned Everett. "Even higher reptiles are susceptible to the plague."

"And the ferals, too?" I asked.

"I'm afraid so," he said, "It kills even creatures of all covers, walks, and orders."

"There has to be a way to stop this..."

Holume consoled me: "We're looking on our own time for a cure."

"Turns out the herb temmir," said Everett, "Is no better for curing yourself of plague than drinking ale can make your parents love each other again."

"Just an opiate?" I asked.

"Just an opiate," he confirmed, "but opiates can't make your fur stay in, or keep your eyes from turning red, or keep your mind in tact for when the disease does its job and kills you."

I then proposed that everyone in my city - man, woman; elder, child; furred, scaled, and feathered - be tested for symptoms once a week until we've isolated everyone with the disease and stopped the symptoms from spreading further. I promised Everett that he would have whatever funding he required - which he insisted needles of silver would be sufficient. Holume's men would be tasked to escort the doctors (under Everett's supervision) to every household and lodging in the city for free family-wide testing. Camps would be re-established for isolating the sick, and this time higher walls would be erected and better treatment of the dying would be given. I would do whatever it took to stop this plague dead in its tracks and save my city. Of this I was adamant.

While I gave this speech I could sense the rising concern in Holume's expression; his brown eyes glistened. He asked of me, "And what if someone should refuse to be pricked for blood? Shall we force them?"

"Nobody would like that," suggested Everett.

"But it's necessary," argued Holume.

"Tell them that they can be compensated for any discomforts. I'll pay. If they refuse still" - I paused to consider - "then isolate the prisoner at a camp for others like them for at-most four days in a private room to see if there were any infection in them at all, then return them to their homes."

I left the tower with Everett and Holume in my shadow. As soon as I set foot out the fortress gates the two of them split off for their business. At that same time I felt a cold rush of wind against me, and noticed how the cloudfront was coming in from the west. Winter from Alexis's valley was finally reaching us, or was it the ghosts of the deceased clawing at my cheeks?

Within the hour I was informed that the silvermasons were hard at work producing mass-orders of needles for distribution to Everett's underlings, where they would later join in escort with Holume's underlings and be themselves circuited throughout my city.

I returned to my bedroom later that afternoon and found that my bed had been cleaned off and perfectly remade. I asked a servant about the state of this room from the morning, and I'm told that it was found undisturbed from the night before - except for some feral rats that'd found their way to the lemon cakes. My bed, remade, smelled again of lavender. I left again to go find Clarice, and this time for more sensual reasons. Before leaving my room, I ordered a bottle of white wine be brought up to hers, with two glasses as well.

Clarice was happy to see me, and this time was even drawn to me. "I'd rather see you playing with your children than in those diamond robes any day," she told me before kissing my lips. Then we helped each other undress.

I could only hide from reports for so long before the servants figured out where I was, and soon Clarice had visitors knocking at her door. There was nothing but bad news from Holume and other subordinates working in the city. Folks did not like having the city-guard appear at their doors in the mid-afternoon asking to draw blood. Compensation was given where it would be taken, and only a little bit of coercion was used, so I'm told (faithfully by Holume, but Everett can be doubted). Camps were established and more are being established as I read these letters. Word got out to the rest of the city that the guard was coming for their blood, and so riots broke out at various sectors of the city, but were broken up within due time. I smiled at Clarice as I read aloud this part: No deaths reported. Best of all, the silver-needles were doing their job and had already found 31 infected citizens - the majority of which are centered from the east-side of the city where the first camp was. For a moment I felt the weight of the weekend falling off my shoulders and I told Clarice I could finally relax.

She hugged me from behind and nuzzled my neck, and I felt her cool champagne breath rolling down my chest. "They won't find us in the gardens," she suggested. The seclusion of the gardens tickled a fancy inside me. We redressed in our robes, took the wine (skipped the glasses) and dashed hand-in-hand giggling all the way to the garden gates to throw our naked selves amidst the hedges.

The rest of the day was relaxed. I had the complaints taken away to be burned or used for scraps. In the evening I returned to the balcony of my room and watched the city. Before today, I hadn't truly grasped just how expansive my city was until I saw the fires rising up from the rooftops and the pillars of smoke piercing into the sky. When the plague was over I promised myself I would repair my city and pay back everything that had been lost. I slept alone that night, however. While I lay restless in my sheet, curling into them against the prevailing winds of winter drafting through my palace, I could but only think of Alexis sitting at a fire in her cabin and having somebody read stories to her.

End of Chapter 2