“What do you mean he’s dying?” Kylara asked. She looked at Multhamurra, who was still lying sprawled on the ground. He gave her a little wave.

“Well,” Yalmay said, “that is what he said.”

“He’s dying,” Joontah repeated, stepping back. He looked at Multhamurra incredulously. The magsman eagerly bobbed his head up and down and waved at him as well. Kylara thought it was an awfully glib gesture to make for a man who was supposedly dying.

“Yes,” Yalmay said.

“Like, eventually?” Kylara asked. For all she knew the magsman was making some sort of existential metaphor and Yalmay was translating it too literally.

Yalmay cocked her head. “What do you mean?” she asked.

“Is he eventually dying or is he doing it right now? When exactly does he think he will be dead?”

“Oh,” Yalmay said, looking back at Multhamurra. “No, he means right now.”

Multhamurra gave her a thumbs up.

Joontah seemed to be having trouble wrapping his head around the situation. “Sorry, why is he dying again?” Joontah asked. “Did I miss something? What exactly happened to him?”

“Er,” Yalmay hesitated, “not sure… let me ask.”

Turning to the magsman, she relayed the question.

Multhamurra listened with the familiar intensity Kylara was beginning to expect from him. After a brief pause, he said something short, sounding rather bitter. He ended the sentence with a brief roll of his eyes.

“He says he got poisoned by a giant caterpillar,” Yalmay said. She frowned. “Sounds like it hurt too. Wait, hold on–let me ask him how he is doing.” She switched back to whatever language the two of them were speaking and said a few words.

Multhamurra responded quickly and briefly.

“What did he say?” Joontah asked after a second when he realised Yalmay was not going to translate.

“Er,” Yalmay twiddled with her thumbs. “I asked him if he was okay and he said not really, no. He’s poisoned and dying.”

Joontah raised an eyebrow. “Yeah, but…poisoned by a caterpillar? That's his story?”

He looked at Kylara for support. Kylara said nothing, just staring at the magsman, studying him. She didn’t know what to think. It was true that Multhamurra was acting more manic than usual, but he hadn’t yet been proven wrong. And he was clearly hurt.

“And it was a… let me get this right–it was because of a giant caterpillar?” Joontah asked.

“Yeah,” Yalmay shrugged.

Joontah scratched his head. He looked defeated. “I didn't even know caterpillars could be deadly. I thought they were just... I don't know. Fuzzy.”

“You should always assume everything is out to kill you,” Kylara said. “Even in the Down Under. But yeah, I think there are some bad varieties of caterpillar. Does he know what kind of caterpillar it was? Maybe Imla has some sort of cure. I doubt there are many fatal ones. He might be mistaken–not dying, just sick.”

Yalmay quickly translated for Multhamurra.

“He says it was a big one,” she said at his response.

“Yes,” Kylara said, “but the species. Ask him the species.”

Yalmay nodded and spoke a word to him.

“Gondo gondo,” Multhamurra said emphatically, holding out his arms as wide as he could.

“He says the species is big species.”

“Yeah, I got that that,” Kylara said dryly.

“Really narrows it down too,” Joontah added dryly. “Big species. I’m sure Imla will have some sort of cure for that.”

“Ask him if he can describe it,” Kylara said.

Yalmay turned back to Multhamurra and spoke a few words. Multhamurra scratched his head and started listing out words quickly. He sounded rather descriptive. Kylara carefully watched Yalmay and she listened, nodding along. Her expression turned to confusion a few times and Kylara wondered briefly if she really hadn’t been lying about only understanding some of the language. Whatever Multhamurra was saying right now, it seemed to be giving her some trouble.

As Multhamurra spoke, he got more animated sentence by sentence. He spoke for almost a full minute without stopping. At the end, he seemed to realise he had been getting louder and paused, took a deep breath, and asked Yalmay what sounded like a question, miming a pen and paper.

“He says the caterpillar was long,” Yalmay recited. “Very long. And colourful. Many glossy colours. I think it was rainbow? But it had these big, black bristles. I think they were bristles? Could be spines or maybe hairs–I don’t know the exact translation there. And it had short fat legs but was quite fast, apparently. Yeah… it was really fast. He mentioned that a lot. Also, it had spurs on the back of its… head, I think.” Yalmay shook her head and gulped. “And last–and this is about where he lost me–he says it has eyebrows and a forehead. Or two foreheads. One, er, inside the other? He said the first head did this thing where it liquified and sort of fell off and then another reformed out of the neck.” Yalmay made gestures as she spoke, as if that would help her be understood.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

Kylara exchanged a skeptical look with Joontah.

“Are we sure he wasn't just seeing things?” he said “Maybe he's delirious from the poison.”

“He says he can draw you a picture,” Yalmay added helpfully. “Something about being downstream means he can. No idea what that means.”

“Sorry,” Joontah said. “Downstream? This is an aquatic caterpillar?”

He looked at Kylara for clarification.

“I believe him,” Kylara said.

“Wait,” Joontah said. “Really?”

“Downstream,” Kylara said. “He means here. Upstream is the warrens, downstream is the regular world. The warblers usually call it the Up Over and the Down Under. And that description seems pretty typical for a warren monster.”

“Really?” Yalmay said. “It didn’t sound like how you described them.”

Kylara never really talked much about about her warding expeditions to Yalmay. She always felt uncomfortable living out Yalmay’s dream of travelling when Yalmay was stuck in Kookaburra Creek. She never wanted Yalmay to be jealous of her, especially when the expeditions were usually nothing to write home about.

They tended to be short–always less than a day–heavily monitored, stressful, and exhausting. The warblers would whisk her away somewhere and give Kylara a pre-made list of warding questions. Kylara would then create the proper wards. She rarely even knew what the wards would be used for. Presumably the town or city or whoever was paying needed a stronger defensive wall or a dam or some sort of thing like that. Whatever they needed, their requests were collected and the maths already done by the time Kylara got there. She was just there to do the last step–the ward’s creation–and get payed. Every ward had a price tag, which was collected by officials in Warrung. They contracted Kylara and provided transportation. In exchange, Kylara (and Kookaburra Creek’s Council) got a significant portion of the revenue. The town depended on it.

The whole process was not something Kylara missed.

“Well, every warren is different,” Kylara explained. “Like, the warren above Saltsbury is salt based, so the monsters tended to look a bit crystalline.” Also, cannibalistic for some reason.

“Also, the warblers took me on established routes for the most part. Most of the time we barely even passed though the warrens,” Kylara said. “I didn’t see many monsters. I assume he got injured in the caterpillar warren?” She nodded towards Multhamurra.

That would explain at least some of his story. Why he had suddenly lost the ability to speak Koulan was still a mystery. It wasn’t something Kylara thought the caterpillar warren would be able to do, but sometimes the warrens had strange side effects. They were a bit like entads in that respect.

Yalmay said a few words to Multhamurra, who pushed himself upright, opened his mouth and closed it again. He asked something of Yalmay, who responded with a solemn tone. Multhamurra nodded slowly, incredulously. He looked genuinely taken aback. He said a few more words to Yalmay, who responded again. Then Multhamurra started laughing.

“He says he got hurt in this warren,” Yalmay said. “The moth and butterfly warren.”

“The moth and butterfly warren,” Joontah said, “… which has caterpillars?”

Yalmay relayed this to Multhamurra who had stopped laughing for a brief taste of air. Then he went on what sounded like a rather animated tirade to Kylara.

“He says yes,” Yalmay translated. “He thinks its hilarious you don’t know butterflies and caterpillars are related.”

“They’re related?” Kylara asked. She frowned. It felt like the kind of elitism she was worried Yalmay would face at the University if she ever attended. Butterflies and caterpillars looked nothing alike. Assuming everyone knew they were related was the kind of snobbery that only the rich and educated did. Multhamurra had mostly avoided giving off that attitude so far. He blended in so well it was easy to think of him as being one of them, but Kylara reminded herself that he was from Warrung, the wealthiest city in the world. He had attended the most elite university that had ever existed. He had even become a worldhopper, part of a small group which controlled entire economies and well, most everything else too. As much as it hurt to think, Multhamurra was not one of them. He was privileged and elite. The small things, like assuming everyone knew about moths and caterpillars, were there to remind her.

“Ask him how far he can walk,” Kylara said. She surveyed his frame. The magsman was tall and suprisingly muscular for his age. She was not sure how far they could carry him.

Yalmay nodded as she conveyed the question to the still laughing magsman. The magsman spoke for a while. Kylara waited for the translation.

“Er,” Yalmay said awkwardly. “He’s still not over the whole caterpillar thing.”

Kylara rolled her eyes. “Ask him how long he thinks he has,” she said.

Yalmay translated again, then shook her head. “Er,” she said. Her eyes flicked back and forth between the magsman and her friends. “He didn’t answer. He wants to know where you think butterflies come from instead.”

“The ground,” Joontah stated flatly. “They just appear. Everyone knows that.”

Yalmay turned back to Multhamurra and said a few words to him. Multhamurra nodded then worked his jaw back and forth as he seemed to debate something. He spoke slowly.

“He says he is sorry for making fun,” Yalmay said. “He also says believing in spontaneous generation makes sense for us, all things considering.”

It still felt a bit patronising to Kylara, but Yalmay did not seem to think the same. She was smiling, grinning harder than Kylara had seen her in a long time.

“He says Imla will not have the right medicine to fix him, but he might know a way.” Yalmay was nearly jumping up and down now. Kylara gave her sister a pointed look. It was a bit inappropriate considering Multhamurra was still, well… dying.

“He wants to go back up to the warren,” Yalmay said. “And he wants to do it now.”

Multhamurra sat up higher on his elbows and waited until Yalmay had finished speaking.

He pointed at Kylara, “I want you,” he said in a completely different voice than he had had before. He had a strong accent now and slightly slurred the sounds to be more like ‘ee wont you.’ It sounded like he had never spoken Koulan before and he was still feeling out the sounds.

He pointed at Yalmay next. “I want you.”

Then he point up. “Up Over,” he said.

“He wants to translate to the warren,” Yalmay said. “And he wants to bring me as a translator and you as protection. He says it’s the only way to save his life.”

Yalmay nearly squealed in delight. “I can’t believe this is actually happening,” she said. “What do you think Kya?”

Kylara stared at Multhamurra, who just shrugged and pointed to his wrist. Kylara wasn’t sure what the gesture meant.

Protection?

Did that mean what Kylara thought it meant?

“Okay, let’s go,” she agreed.