Daylight brings a measure of relief. When I stumble to the mirror after a restless night, the markings are gone. I wash my face again, trace where the lines crawl. The possibility of Emi infecting me seems ridiculous. Or does it? I have begun to doubt my own sense of reality. What is possible versus what isn’t. Some days, I fear I’m heading into madness.

My thoughts are fuzzy. The markings are gone but they could appear again. I know some people have episodes while others are stuck with them forever. Permanent scars. But in all my frantic research, I’ve found no cases of contagion. Only active shape-shifters have been affected so far. Is it possible I imagined the whole thing?

Still I visit the neighborhood doctor who can be counted on to be discrete, mainly because he forgets patients when they leave his clinic.

Matty is in his garden, dressed in a beige overall, grey hair in a loose pony-tail. He listens to me while on his knees, tending to basil. Around him, the wild abandon of parsley, thyme and chocolate mint, releases its sweet ganache smell. Rosemary sticks up, sprightly. Varieties of sage, oregano, dill, curry leaves. Cilantro dies in great sheaves.

After I explain, Matty straightens, moves his deft hands through the air. “It could mean a new stage of energy. Something you haven’t discovered yet.”

We go inside to his clinic where on a green velvet sofa, medical books and journals compete with a snoozing cat. “And you have not taken this potion?” he asks while examining me. “They’ve left nothing behind, whatever they were. Are you sure you’re not imagining them?”

“No.”

“Then you must have taken it at some party, by mistake. Maybe someone put it in your drink.”

I tamp down my irritation. “I’m sure that hasn’t happened.”

Matty speaks as if every word requires a great deal of thought. A woodpecker taps away at a palm tree outside the window. “Maybe you are sad? Are you sure that’s not the real issue? Plain old sadness. It can make mountains under our skin, erupt like volcanoes in some inner space.”

“I’m not sad,” I snap. “Maybe I just need stronger suppressants.”

“It’s impossible to tell what the mind does with unprocessed energy. A new manifestation of power. An old complaint. Maybe you should see a Healer.”

“I don’t like strangers touching me.”

“It could help you.”

“It’s a bore. To explain myself, over and over again.” I want to sleep for many years instead of talking to one of the Healers. With their masked faces and hollow eyes, they creep me out. We are told only the most evolved beings qualify to be Healers. Why that must come with the fashion sense of an expired mummy costume, I’m not sure.

Matty pulls at his hair and fixes his pony tail. “Some of the healing lies in the explaining.”

Despite my pleas, he refuses to give me the pills. He is afraid of prescribing anything the HQ hasn’t and I’m not in a position to go tell them about this. They’re still investigating the collision. I want to stay out of their way until they clear me.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

The next time the markings appear, I am outside. Walking past a store window, I notice my reflection with horror. The tendrils have formed a chiaroscuro down my cheeks and around my mouth, the pattern almost beautiful. I take to wearing a hooded cape when I go out. The markings come and go with no predictability but always disappear in a few hours. It’s not too much trouble. They are never permanent and people are used to those who look different—after all, alternate species and Kild have been around for a long time.

I ache to tell Pali but she hasn’t called since the wedding. I wonder if it’s safe to call, then wonder why I thought of the word safe. Osiris is just a man.

Researching the potion and its possible cures leads me to blackmarket shops and bootleggers. I hang out at traffic junctions where men in masks ply illegal herbs. I scour shops selling potions and incense in Kala Bazaar. At one of these, somebody recommends Dr Miro’s Apothecary and I go looking for it in the Selgrid Caves one afternoon.

It is damp in there and cold at all times of the year but some species like living in those conditions: certain Kild, newer squam who want to move in from the outskirts and have the money, some migrants. Fronds of staghorn fern hang over the entrance, a live curtain. I tramps past shops selling electronic devices, Kild equipment, pills. Above the shops, people live in tiny dwellings lined with raccoon hide on the inside. The walls of the cave ascend to a ceiling overgrown with ferns and moss. Thousands of selgrid hang upside down, round heads wobbling, red eyes casting light over the walls and floor of the cave. Their wispy bodies and monkey-like faces make me uneasy. In the glimmer of lanterns, the shops seem to grow closer together. A child’s face appears in a dwelling above, curious and resigned.

Dr Miro’s apothecary is announced by a nameplate embossed with gold letters. The murky glass door whispers shut. My eyes adjust to the light and I see a stooping man with a mustache, two rd sideburns that jut out on either side of his face like horns. He sets down a glass of water before me. It looks suspiciously earthy. I hand him a note, which he reads without expression, then disappears into the back. It is safer, I’ve heard, to not speak around here so I take in the shop. Cabinets line the walls, each of them containing tomes on ancient symbols. The tinted glass-paned counter holds mysterious equipment, vials of serum, de-addiction microchips. I leaf through a book and something catches my eye.

Birds were first caged in ancient Ravensland. For their beauty. The motivation for caging has not changed through the time-spills. It is about what they contribute to our lives. Their needs are unimportant. Caged birds sometimes exhibit destructive abnormal behaviors such as feather plucking, excessive vocalization, fear and aggression. This should not be attributed to suffering. They may be prescribed certain drugs to control the behaviors.

When the doctor comes out of the room with an envelop and hands it to me, I take the plunge and ask. “Can someone get the markings without taking the potion?”

“You haven’t touched the water. There’s nothing wrong with it.”

He seems offended so I take a sip of the brackish liquid. A bit of seaweed catches on my tongue. “The markings, you’ve seen them?”

“Sometimes.” He rings up my purchase, squinting at me through the shadows. “I’ll tell you this. Between two Kild, anything can be happening, hasn’t been studied enough, that kind of energy exchange. I’m sure they are doing research at the big labs but where they be releasing such things to us? We have to figure it out on our own.”

As I make my way out, the selgrid seem to have come lower down the walls. The shops are a claustrophobic mess, angles jutting out oddly. A spasm at my neck. I touch the tell-tale indentation of tendrils on one cheek and shudder.

At home, I mix the herbs with water, drink the bitter concoction, say a small prayer, moving my mouth over the forbidden syllables I read once in a book. I am so lost in my thoughts that I almost miss the message that comes in. Some is interested in renting my extra room. I had forgotten all about the ad I put up at the store. The timing couldn’t be worse but I need the extra money. I agree to meet the girl the next day.