“Certain diseases and conditions are known to affect magical abilities. Alzheimer’s, Leukemia, Lupus, some viral infections, even pregnancy. Although the studies have been inconclusive, there is some evidence that disease of the magical system does exist, and might lead to poor outcomes in otherwise healthy patients.”

~ Bek Trent, M.A.S.O

Evening descended over Alti with the first roiling gray rain clouds Bek had seen since their arrival in the past. It was suitable weather, he decided. Hushed and strangely calm, as if even it awaited what was to come. It was the kind of weather that was bad for morale, because if it gave way to the inevitable rains of autumn, it made forest byways and unkempt roads nearly impassible. It was the kind of weather that forebode worse things to come. Always. And he was not one given to suspicions.

He sat once more in the stark interior of Illian’s home, his elbows rested on the dining table. The wood was a waxed variation of cedar, the plants that draped the ceiling overhead one of many species within the Strakelorian family, a name that persisted into the classical Latin naming system years in the future. They were known for their natural bio-luminescence and the striking beauty of their six-petaled flowers. There were times when he sat in this era and drank in the details of his surroundings just like this, recalling all of the minuscule details recorded in history books and journals some centuries in the future, many theoretical, many uncertain. Not one of them could help him now. The most vital pieces of information about the Ruveris Plague, about the course of Altian history, and about the war of the Great Divide, were those that had never been recorded.

Faei was asleep at the end of the table, having gone and returned not long after their arrival. Illian sat before Bek, his posture similar, his features set in the grim lines of a man who had called someone to him only to confirm what he already knew, and yet still would not accept the answer. Silver lay in the next room. She lay apparently sleeping, possibly in a coma…

And she was as good as dead.

Bek’s bronze eyes narrowed as they always did when he thought deeply. He had seen men and women, his subordinates, die before his eyes in the past. The truest wonder of magic remained that no matter how good one was, there was always someone better. There was always someone bent on breaking the law, and always someone to put them in their place…sometimes at the expense of their own life. It happened every day. It was easy for people outside his line of work to forget that - even in a world with cell phones, grocery stores, and multi-million-dollar hospitals - people died fighting for peace.

Every.

Day.

Not once had Bek ever promised to anyone that he would so much as remember their name after they were gone. He was not supposed to, as an agent of the MASO. If they lay dying before his eyes, he was supposed to thank them for their contribution, tell them that they had done well by their country and by the secret they died to protect. He was to guide them on their way as an instrument of those he worked for, not as a man. There were times he believed Jorik had forced him to act as the face of the MASO at dozens of funerals and ER visits, ceremonies and exhibitions, just to push that point home…but then, there were also times he could not remember whether he lived by the MASO’s rules or his own.

Times…if he closed his eyes, he could see them. Mistakes. Series after series of terrible mistakes. Moments of certainty followed by the realization that he had miscalculated…he remembered so clearly the funeral where had delivered the MASO’s condolences for one of his own subordinates.

A woman screaming at him after she watched her husband die, her son sobbing, barely five years old. Posted at a back door, that man should have been the safest of anyone. Bek had put him there to keep him out of the line of fire, not to get him killed. Everything that night should have been perfect, and yet everything had gone awry.

Standing in a hospital room, speaking calmly to a woman inflicted with a deadly curse. How she had looked at him…weary, resigned, a sad smile that pitied him from the bottom of her soul. Bek let her speak for a while, but he never responded, and she finally seemed to understand.

“Do you know what they call you?” she had asked him. Met with silence, she had looked away, out the window, one of the final joys left to her in the hours she had to live. “The MASO’s Reaper.”

Weiss, one of the few who might have cared, did not know. Bek had kept him carefully in the dark, though who knew if the engineer had found out himself. Even chasing the Zara had been a welcome reprieve from his usual work. Silver’s case had drawn him away from his duties. Maybe Jorik thought it was ironic to send his reaper after the Zara. Or maybe Silver’s case had been too big to let go to another department. Maybe Jorik was just lining him up for a moment like this, as he had been with every other dangerous, bizarre case.

The people who worked with Bek were a part of his world, but they were not supposed to be a necessary part. He fought to protect them, and he fought to forget that he did so. He earned their respect because he cared for them, and when they died, he let them go. They were a piece in the great, turning cogs of the world. One piece. Only one, small piece. And each and every one of them played their role. How could he ask for more?

As his thoughts turned darker, Bek’s scowl deepened. Less than a hundred feet from them, the wolf lay next to Silver, watching the work of a gray-haired woman that Illian had briefly introduced and Bek had quickly disregarded. She was capable. She was powerful. None of that changed the fact that she could do little more than confirm Silver had the plague that had already taken nearly fifteen thousand lives. There was not one reported case of a survivor.

For the first time since losing his father, he could grieve as himself, without the agency’s involvement; he found himself wishing otherwise.

Silver would die. Alone. She had not died for a cause. She had saved no one’s life, captured no villain, fought for nothing at all…after losing his father, Bek had believed it would never hurt him so much to lose anyone ever again.

He had been wrong.

Footsteps came to rest at the end of the table, stopping just short of Illian’s wolf, who fixed their owner with a golden-eyed glare.

“I’m sorry.”

Bek looked up at the doctor, her eyes averted wearily. How many cases like this had she seen in the past few weeks, he wondered? Did she wonder, every day, if she was next?

“I would give her a few days at most, Illian. If she wakes up, she’ll be in a great deal of pain. I believe…it would be most humane to let her go. I can prepare everything you would need. Otherwise, when the time comes…I’ll send an apprentice to collect the body. With the Ruveris Plague, there seems to be no danger in exposure, but there are not enough grave sites.”

“You can’t be burning them,” Illian half-stood, outraged.

“We have no choice,” the doctor explained softly. “I’m so sorry, Illian. She’s not the first. Nor the last. I’ll have to report the case to the MASO, regardless. Was she ranked?”

Illian closed his eyes for a moment, seeming to collect himself as he stood slowly. “Yes, of course. Rank five.”

The doctor’s eyes widened.

“I’ll call for you if we need anything,” Illian stated dismissively.

“Rank five, Illian?” the doctor repeated. They regarded each other in silence for a moment, the doctor looking strained, before she bowed her head and left. The door clacked behind her.

Silence greeted her passing. The wolf, Faei, rose shortly thereafter, and left in the same manner as the doctor. Bek merely watched them go, his eyes registering the increasing darkness outside. He could only tell when rain began to fall by the change in humidity. Altian houses were not nearly as well insulated as houses would be in the future.

“What will you do?” Illian finally asked him.

“What I’ve been doing all along,” Bek responded immediately.

“Even without—”

“Does it make a difference?” He fixed the man before him with a hard stare. “There’s nothing I can do this time. I promised I would teach her how to use her magic, and I’ve done that. Afterwards, we traveled together because our goals were the same, and that hasn’t changed.”

Illian nodded slowly. “Faei took word of my return to the council earlier. They will convene in the morning to hear what I encountered in the Issurak, and most likely to chastise me for being unable to find the princess. It seems the dragon said nothing about us, or someone is unwilling to share what he said. One or the other. I find it unlikely that many people other than the king know about his existence.”

“What exactly did they think you were doing in the forest?” Bek asked astutely. Illian smiled thinly.

“Looking for Cevora, of course. One of the lookouts saw her on the night of her escape, outside the castle gates, but they lost sight of her in the streets. Before the evacuation, they combed the port city thoroughly. I was with them, of course. The king is convinced she was spirited away by the beasts.”

Bek said nothing, glancing in the direction of Silver’s room.

“Faei will be here with you,” Illian observed, following the direction of his gaze. “He’ll inform me if anything goes awry. I had planned to spend a fortnight here, but I’m less certain now. Depending on how the council receives me tomorrow, it may be time…the king will act rashly with the plague on his doorstep, I have no doubt, and the MASO will inform him that the first rank five has been afflicted. This bodes ill for Alti.”

“You could have told them she was a lower rank.”

“The doctor was only confirming with me, Bek. She wanted me to tell her she was wrong,” he waved his hand dismissively. “If I had lied, it would have made her suspicious. We’ve been friends for years, but she is not ready to rebel. I would have enlisted her immediately if she were.”

Bek understood, but he held his silence. Tomorrow, they would see. If Silver still lived, they would see.