Through The Door

Suspicion

Annora, Maia, and William left the room.

“Who is she?” Maia asked, turning to William.

“Another friend of ours, from about ten years back… I haven’t seen here in a while, and we just bumped into each other on the road. As you have seen already, she is a healer.”

“Oh, that’s good. One more to our list of allies.”

Some time later, Hazel joined Will and the two girls.

Maia looked up. “How is he?”

“He’s alseep now. He should be fine tomorrow. How long was it since he was poisoned?”

Maia thought. They had travelled for two days… “Three days.”

“Did you give him anything?”

“Only what Marcus told us to,” Will said. “A leaf of… a certain plant a day with water.”

Hazel frowned. “That’s unusual,” she said to herself. “He should know better. That kind of treatment for Kirian’s case… it would never work. It just made it worse.” She paused and turned to the others. “Marcus was the at the top of the class and highly favoured by our professor when I was still in training.”

Maia’s eyes widened as her mind worked. “Wait, wait, wait. Marcus treated Rionen too, didn’t he? Then maybe-”

Will stood up, shocked. “Marcus wouldn’t do that! He would never!”

“We don’t know what’s in his mind. We may as well check,” Hazel said.

Annora invited Hazel for the midday meal after she had finished checking on Rionen.

“That would be wonderful, thank you. I’m not doing much around here anyway,” Hazel replied. The four went to the sitting room to talk.

Hazel sat down. “Rionen’s case wasn’t as bad as I expected. Only a few things needed to be fixed.”

“A bit of hope gets its way into our dark days,” Annora smiled a bit.

Maia nodded. “I hope that things only get better from here.”

“We all share that hope,” William said darkly. “But I don’t think things will start getting better yet. I fear that we’ve only reached the beginning.” He walked over to the window and watched the falling snow.

The snow lay thickly on the ground, about three feet deep. The six friends sat in front of the fireplace in the sitting room. Hazel had been staying with them since it had been too cold and snowy to go back to her home. This winter was no doubt one of the harshest in Girimar.

“How is everyone this morning?” Annora asked cheerfully.

“Cold,” Maia said, shivering. “I’ve never experienced a winter like this before.”

William laughed. “Then that means you should never, ever go to Taridius. You would freeze there, if you call this cold. Extra cloak, anyone? I honestly don’t need mine.”

Kirian grinned. “You’re crazy,” he said, shaking his head. He reached for it anyway.

Suddenly, they heard a knock at the door.

“Door, anyone? I still can’t take it,” Rionen said.

Maia put her hands up. “Too cold, not me.”

“Oh, fine.” William left the room and went to the door. A blast of cold air entered the house.

Rionen heard Will speaking with someone, and then footsteps.

“Come inside.”

He frowned. William entered the room, helping a messenger. Rionen opened his mouth to interrogate William, but he stopped. ‘He needs our help,’ was the message clearly transmitted through his friend’s eyes.

“Have a seat,” Will said, leading the messenger to his own chair. After a closer look, Rionen saw that the guest was wounded.

Rionen put his injured leg down to make a space for Will beside him. The messenger seemed to be waiting for a signal to speak, so William nodded.

“The king told us to send a message to all the nobles we could find, but we were too late,” he said, shaking his head.

William’s back straightened, and his brow was furrowed. “Too late? How? Why? What was the message?”