The pub had a fireplace. It wasn’t lit at the time, because there was no bone-drenching monsoon to suk the life out of everyone. Similarly, the walls had plenty of pegs to hang cloaks and coats. They were simple and crude, carved from roots and fitted at roughly eye level so drenched fabrics could drip themselves dry amid a storm. During the damp season, the Misty Isles could never be said to be dry, the owner used the pegs to hang mugs. Many of the tankards had been dyed, lacquered, or painted with designs, messages, or crude graffiti. It made for a rather charming atmosphere of personal investment which made sailors more inclined to return and spend more money.

The minstrel troupe had dragged their singer back after he had discovered the other kind of establishment the Misty Isles had, and one which Lucius had not yet found. Had he rooted it out, had he imprisoned the kuku bud distributors, that singer perhaps would never have found the drug. If he hadn’t smoked it, he would not have touched upon the veil. Had he not done that, he would have kept his wits to himself. And if the decisions had been his entirely, he would not have, in all likelihood, stabbed Kajsa.

But, the world is filled with could-have-beens and speculating about such things is the realm of a fiction author. In my role here, I am a historian. I write the world that was, as can best be deduced from all written accounts, recollections, memoirs, and even more arcane methods. Sometimes the data conflicts, and it is my duty to determine the proper story, but in this event all agree.

Lucius took the singer, who had lost his mind without any foresight of the consequences, and smashed him into one of those pegs. He drove the wooden post through the man’s eye, punctured the skull and crushed his brain. The knife clattered to the floor as his body hung there like a piece of laundry, his front slowly turning red.

He turned, sweeping his cold gaze across the room. None moved. Even the dead man’s employer was too shocked to know whether to be outraged or to fall on his knees and beg forgiveness. Lucius looked at one person than the next, as quick as he could, burning to his mind any who seemed to smirk or smile; any who reveled in the harm done to Kajsa. He noted three, all too drunk to be certain they were with the demon and not merely amused by the retribution.

Kajsa was fumbling at her side, plucking at her dress to see where the wound was, how much it bled. The strength was already draining from her body and she fell to the ground. Pale of face, she looked up to Lucius and said, “Wasn’t… expecting… that.”

“You’ll be alright,” he said, bending down beside her. He took one look at the wound and clamped her hand onto it. “Press as hard as you can.”

“Can’t you?”

“I need to carry you to help.” With one arm under her legs and the other behind her back, he lifted her off the pub floor and turned to the door. Half a dozen people scrambled, yanking chairs and tables away from his path. He marched back to the street, sun already set. The stars twinkled above like a stadium of onlookers. The manor was a long trek uphill, but Sammy was there.

He turned the other way, to the dockside hospital. He didn’t trust the nurses in the slightest, but Sammy had spent weeks properly stocking the place. With the expectation of war and insurgency, Lucius had instructed him to prepare it for injured. He just had never expected the first would be Kajsa.

There was no guard posted outside, and the door was unlocked. “You’ll be alright,” he promised, his voice hushed as he shouldered through the door. Two nurses looked up, quietly carrying diminutive oil lamps between the beds of the sick. They squinted their eyes and recognized him just before chastising him for barging into a place of healing. “Get Sammy,” he ordered, his voice that of a military commander. A dozen sick patients lurched in their beds, ripped from sleep by his harsh voice. “And get me your tools. She’s been stabbed.”

“I’ll be fine,” Kajsa said. “You don’t have to be–”

“You,” Lucius barked when he spotted a man with a broken arm. The splint laid across his forearm to immobilize his wrist. He likely needed the rest, but I had taught Lucius the principles of infection and he knew better than to give her a disease ridden bed. “Move.”

The man with the broken arm scrambled out of the bed, bowing his head and almost fleeing from the island governor. Of the two nurses, one had done as commanded to get Sammy and the other brought a bundle of medical supplies. She whispered an apology to the injured man and promptly ignored him as Kajsa was laid onto her side. “Where is it?”

Lucius snatched the little workblade she had and sliced open Kajsa’s dress. He tore the fabric apart and used some to wipe the oozing blood. It was dark and viscous. “We need to close the wound.”

“We need to clean it first,” the nurse said, and ran to the small cookfire. She threw rags and kindling into the embers, working up a blaze to boil a pot of wine.

“Don’t,” Kajsa croaked out. She lifted a blood hand and beckoned. Her voice was as hollow as breath. “Bring it.”

“Do it,” Lucius ordered.

With a shake of her head, the nurse took the kettle off the blaze and brought it over. In her mind, she was surely thinking about all the patients who succumbed to sepsis because of improperly boiling the alcohol.

“Get a cup to pour it into,” the alchemist said, gesturing at the pot vaguely.

Lucius watched the nurse’s reaction, then grabbed her wrist. He forced the nurse to apply pressure to the wound and got the cup himself because he saw the woman barely spoke Vassish. He almost started pouring it for her to drink when Kajsa stopped him.

“Wait a moment.” She touched the kettle and he felt the pot vibrate. It almost wanted to rattle out of the handle he gripped it by. “Now pour it,” she said, letting her hand fall. “Slowly decant it.”

Lucius did as she said, gently pouring it into the cup to only skim the very top. What came out was perfectly clear and made his eyes water when he sniffed it. “How did you? You have a stigmata?”

“Useful, isn’t it?” she said with a grin. “Maybe, something to bite on though?”

Lucius found a gag bit in the bag of medical supplies and gave it to her. She chomped down on it before the alcohol was poured onto her wound. Immediately, her back arched and she whimpered in pain as purified ethyl alcohol burned her raw nerves. The nurse quickly wiped the wound clean and loomed over Kajsa’s back. Blood continued to ooze out of her, but no air bubbles, so the nurse pressed down with a clean rag.

“We need to stitch her up, or clot it or–”

“You need to step aside,” Sammy said as he bursat through the door. He didn’t even have a shirt on and sweat poured down his slim body. He took a moment to suck in breath, push his matted hair out of his face, and strolled over.

At last, Lucius was able to take a breath and step back, Kajsa’s blood still dripping from his hands. The actual physician took over, cleaning the wound once more and opening it up to look inside, then needle and thread were in his hands. While he started tying knots, he had the nurse pour in some medicinal powder that made Kajsa writhe in pain again. Lucius jerked forward, a knot gripping his throat, but whatever it was made the pain subside quickly. She didn’t even whimper again as he began to dig the metal through her skin to sew it shut.

She lost consciousness shortly after it was done and Sammy didn’t even slow his treatment. He rolled her face down, almost naked, and rubbed some manner of salve across her back. “She needs food,” he said, wiping his hands off.

“What kind?”

“Meat,” the doctor said. “And lots of broth.”

“Then let’s bring her back to the manor. Get her to her bed, to safety. I’ll wake the chef.”

Sammy nodded. “The guards will be here soon. They can carry her. Lucius, what happened?”

Worry transformed inside him and he had to force his jaw open so that he could speak. “War was declared.”

“What does that mean? From who?”

“The demon. The drug is still in this city. They stabbed Kajsa, maybe killed her! To threaten me. I think it knows that attacking me directly is pointless, so it’s coming after everyone else. It just showed that anyone in any place can be weaponized against me.”

Adam stuck his head into the hospital and rapped his knuckles against the door. When he made eye contact with Lucius, he strolled in with his thumbs stuck into his swordbelt. The man had no armor on, just night clothes along with his weapon. “M’lord,” he said with a nod as he peered at Kajsa from a distance.

“Good, the two of us can carry her,” Lucius said, looking for a stretcher.

“Aye, we can do that,” the soldier said, scratching his jaw. “Quite the… ah… demonstration you left there.”

Sammy frowned. “What’s that mean?”

Lucius shook his head and found himself wishing for some of that distilled alcohol. “I killed the man who stabbed Kajsa.”

Adam snorted. “He gave the whole town something to gossip about for a month, I wager.”

“They would have regardless. Come on,” Lucius said, spotting the stretcher at last.

“What did he do?” Sammy asked, addressing the soldier.

“He made a wall ornament out of the man.”

“He deserved it,” Lucius hissed, tossing the stretcher on the ground beside Kajsa’s bed. “She needs a blanket,” he added, looking at the exposed curves of her hips and ass.

“Don’t worry about it, m’lord. Up north that might have you marked as a savage, but you’ll be respected for it by the locals.”

“I wasn’t worried about it,” Lucius said, staring his subordinate down.

The soldier nodded and bowed back a half step as Sammy threw a clean blanket over his patient. The three of them eased her onto the stretcher. Lucius and Adam lifted her up, discovering just how light she was; as if she were no more than a child. They carried her back out of the hospital and to the street. When he set his eyes on the distant glow of his manor, Lucius growled out an oath.

“I’m going to slaughter that fucking demon.”