As Erika worked, she noticed that the room suddenly seemed larger than before?... Oh, Helga and Sigurn had left, why? Now there was only Kara and Ammeris were still with her in the impromptu healer’s hut which Erika didn’t much like what with cultists lurking around, she’d much prefer the local silver ranked Aesir Chosen stay near her at all times.

“Where’d Sigurn go?” Erika asked as she moved onto the second delver, a male sagaborn with curved antlers who had somehow managed to get a double dose of the divine poison, it swirled and gnawed away inside his guts and lungs, his skin blackening almost like charred meat.

“She’s gone to help calm things down, get a headcount and check all the food for poison.” Kara murmured her hand rested on Erikas shoulder.

Pushing flesh aside and scooping blood out onto the floor hadn't been that hard last time but this? How could she heal this? He didn’t have a single untainted organ left and she was circles below being able to play mix and match with people’s organs, maybe if she drained much of the cursed venom his soul might be able to fix the rest … or he’d die anyway, either or.

“Just the food?” Erika asked.

Ammeris sighed. “The waters are still being cleaned by the runes; Aesir runes would burn and shatter if exposed to enough of the taint of the twilight bringers.”

“I meant how do we know the cultist isn't just running around poisoning people?” Erika muttered, concentrating on her work.

Kara scoffed loudly. “Lady Erika is right to worry, whoever set all those fires is probably in league with the cultists, they might not have bothered going for the stockpile, just poisoning meals directly or even using a needle, I… oh?” Kara stopped speaking as she noticed Ammeris get more and more red, it didn’t seem to Erika like an angry red though, her shifty gaze and distant manner instead spoke of deep embarrassment.

“Ammeris?”

“Look I thought it was an attack!” The alchemist exploded gesturing wildly. “A man in front of me exploded in a cloud of blood! How was I supposed to know those guys I’d never seen before were coming to help him?”

“… you have a dagger with a fire rune, don’t you?” Erika asked in a sweetly fanged tone.

“Yes.” Ammeris muttered.

“So, we weren’t attacked, you thought we were and started a load of fires when the poison killed a guy… why did the fire spread so far though?”

“That I was not responsible for, I have no idea, just three or four big sparks and half of Losthope was ablaze, its like someone dumped oil all over the place but nobody smelt or saw anything like it.”

All three women paused for a moment before Kara said what they were all thinking. “Loki cultist?”

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

“It’s… possible but not everything is that monster’s fault, I could just have been a very dry day.”

Kara shrugged and Ammeris grunted in a vague sort of half acknowledgement as Erika finished up with the last wounded man, shoving the flesh back into place and mopping up the tainted blood as well as she could.

“Well… that aside, I’ve done all I can here…” Erika noticed Sigurn slip back into the shelter and smiled at her. “Ah Sigurn I'm done with these three, any of the other groups have infected? And if they do, should I help them? Like for favours or silver or whatever.”

Sigurn nodded and her permanent smile became a bit more real for a moment before fading again, grabbing her huge axe one handed and hefting a thunderarm six-shot in her other hand she lead Erika away and into the street, not a real street of course just a roughly straight line where their group had put the biggest wagons so as not to get in the way, droogs were fed and watered off to one side and were looking out at the excitement around them with the slightly sardonic expression of domesticated animals watching their domesticator run themselves ragged.

The fires were put out and people seemed much more organised, the smell of smoke was heavy in the air and distant sobbing could be heard from the clustered tents along with the drumming of feet and creaking of timber as charred wood was pulled off injured delvers.

Moving away from the Silvermane encampment Sigurn strode towards the centre of the shanty town Erika running to keep up and Kara clattering along at her heels, Erika saw ahead of them the rough town square that had been crudely marked out with braziers and boxes, it sat in the centre of Losthope of course but it wasn't alone, the first two groups to shelter here enveloped it on both sides, Ragvald merchant caravan now slightly looted for its food and the so called Jarls camp, the gathering of refuges and second sons lead by Hakon the spearman.

As they entered the shabby square a miniature cacophony erupted, it seemed some of the poisoned had been brough they’re from the camps that didn’t have their own healers but there were far too few to account for every casualty, Erika put it down to the incredible disorganised nature of the shanty town, most of the people brought here had probably just been dumped to die with the actually valuable ones given whatever medicine could be gathered back at their own camps.

Sigurn however had apparently decided to bring her here so presumable she would soon be extracting more poisoned blood, Erika bit down a sigh and pulsed her Well, letting it ripple soothingly as she tried to measure its depth, she probably had… six left in her? Maybe eight or nine if she didn’t try as hard.

Sigurn gestured a few of the older of better dressed bystanders over and began to murmur to them which they quickly responded to, their voices starting at a whisper but quickly growing louder and louder until they were howling in each other’s faces.

“You expect me to believe you have that much hacksilver here?”

“Forty dredge of it! And what do you have?”

Erika wasn't surprised, her mother had told her just how valuable a healer was in a crisis, Erika was just an apprentice and not specialised enough to be a real healer but against a twilight divines art? Well people would take whatever they could get.

“Look lady Stelasdottir”

“How dare you be so casual with the Silverblossom!”

“You won’t be able to boot lick your way into healing Harjal!”

“Neither will you!”

Kara moved half in front of Erika as one of the most richly dressed delvers took a step towards her whilst still gesturing wildly at Sigurn, the man grumbled but too ka step back when Kara tapped the handle of her hammer, Erika tried not to swoon at how dashing her lover looked.