Footsteps nearby. Voices. I wanted to hide, to crawl away from sight like a wounded animal until the attack passed.

A trickle of air like a thread of spider’s silk whistled through me, too little to stop the shuddering spasms, only to be forced back out as my lungs tried to extricate the blight. I was running a race with nothing but a pinhole to breathe through.

I can run, I told myself, I can always run. I don’t have to win the race – only finish.

Udoro faded around me. I stopped noticing the damp of the earth beneath me, the itch of the grass, the gentle tapping of rain. I lost track of where Elani crouched, watching – had she ever been so helpless?

Other people spoke in concerned, urgent voices, but their words were distant and incomprehensible. Silver kavi swam through my vision.

I yanked at that thread of spider’s silk breath again, yanked at it like a lifeline pulling me from a savage tide, like a weird kavi I couldn’t let the world see.

I unclenched a fist from my mouth and signed I’m okay. I’m okay. I’m okay. Breathe in – one, two, three, four, maybe forty – cough out. I’m okay.

The blight gave out all at once like a cork from a bottle of effervescent mead. I sucked up a lungful of air and tasted the earth. I coughed hoarsely, deeply, grateful for every successive gulp of air that followed.

A large, thick hand fell on my shoulder.

“Blightlung?” asked a man’s voice.

I ignored it for now. “A waste of breath” felt more true now than ever. The hand was for me, but the question seemed directed at someone else. Elani could answer.

I uncurled and eased myself upright, and more hands jumped to my arms, tenderly offering their strength. Another pair steadied me by the shoulders.

I’m okay, I said, and dropped my hands. I let my head hang and squinted through fluttering lashes at the flattened grass.

Red specks dotted the green blades, along with something white and viscous.

The man’s voice spoke again. “Just stay there a moment, lad. Someone’s running to get you water. No rush to stand up. Just breathe.”

I raised my head to look at the gathered people.

“Careful,” someone cautioned.

“—getting some water from the barrels.”

“How long have they been sick?”

I didn’t have a script for whatever was supposed to happen next, but embarrassment or concern was far from my mind. I just focused on breathing and letting strength trickle back into my limbs.

“Here, here comes the water now,” said the man’s voice. It wavered just enough for me to recognize it belonged to an elder. The hand on my shoulder was his, cool and soft, gentle without feebleness.

Elani crouched down in front of me, careful to avoid the blood on the grass. “Here,” she said, offering a shallow cup. “Drink.”

I nodded, accepting the water and taking a grateful sip from the cup. I wondered what happened to our water skin, then I coughed again. It was a good, hard cough, not the wheezing, shallow ones I feared. It hurt.

“I’m sorry,” was all I could figure to say. I wasn’t sure what for.

“No need, no need,” said the old man. He squeezed my shoulder reassuringly.

“Ren,” Elani said, her words coming out as carefully as a jungle kaija stalking prey. “How do you feel?”

“Better. But I think we’re going to need an Exterminator.” I chuckled humorlessly and pointed at the small splatter of white slime I’d ejected onto the grass.

A few of the gathered Udorans sucked in their breath. Someone took a step backwards, but the old man and Elani both stayed near me.

“We’ll worry about that as soon as we take care of you,” the old man said. A few bystanders murmured their agreement.

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“I don’t suppose you have any bluemoth elixir laying around?” I asked.

I looked up at the old man at last. His hair was the faded grey of age rather than the silver of birth, and a braided beard of the same color fell over a long, pale blue shawl.

He shook his head. “No, I don’t, but – “

“We need to be going, then,” I interrupted. “I’m okay,” I told the bystanders. There were four, not including the old man. The Enling woman with the garden, and two of the builders from before. The other workers watched from afar.

Elani stood up and helped me to my feet, and the old man’s hand slid from my shoulder.

“Now, slow down, lad,” the old man laughed. “If you came to Udoro for bluemoth medicine, maybe you were luckier than you think.

“I’ve got a boat just beyond town where the road intersects the Omi River. I go home that way, to Duku Village. I know the potion-seller there; she would have some saved away for sure. She’s a hoarder, you know, not so good for a merchant of course, but she always seems to have what one needs.

“Anyway, anyway,” he said, flapping his hand, “I could take you there. Two days coasting on the river, easy as sitting!”

I hesitated. We hadn’t known about the potion-seller in Duku Village when we had decided to risk the journey to Forest’s End.

“Ren…” Elani said, her voice low. She signed low in her lap, where the man couldn’t see. We do not know him. Big risk, little time.

“No, think about it, Elani!” I said aloud, excited. “What if this is a sign? Duku Village would be a much easier trek if we go by boat – it would be so much safer!”

Elani glanced at the old man and I was reminded of a week ago when she had looked at me the same way, laying on a bench and talking with Boro. “We don’t know for sure the town has any. It’s better to go where they make the medicine.”

I cocked a thumb back at the old man. “He knows they have it in Duku Village! He lives there!”

Elani pulled me to my feet and out of the man’s earshot. “You’re not listening. What if that merchant’s inventory depleted since that Enling’s been gone? And, how do we know he’s not just trying to get access to your kavi?”

“We don’t know he saw it. And even if he wanted it, what’s one elderly man going to do? I have you! As long as I don’t put the spirit in a bottle, he can’t touch it.”

“You should, though! It’s been days – your body has been absorbing spellplague at a trickle ever since you caught that spirit. Keeping kavi in your body too long is poisonous, Ren. Magic is poisonous. You’re probably making the blightlung worse!”

“You’re not even going to entertain the possibility that this is a safer bet than Forest’s End? If it’s manufactured there, they would be the first place to run dry in a supply drought,” I argued.

“Ren, I promised you I’d help you get the medicine. So far, I’ve done a spitting good job at keeping you alive. You’d throw that away now, when we’re closer than ever?”

“If we travel by boat to Duku, we lose time but we conserve strength! We could even backtrack from Duku to Forest’s End with as little energy spent as if we’d gone straight there.”

Elani gnashed her teeth in frustration. “Listen, my father works with spirits and I have caught dozens — hundreds — for him my whole life, so I know how dangerous spellplague can be, you idiot!

“It’s bad enough you have blight in your chest, but you’ve also kept that spirited tethered to you for days! Days, Ren, when most people don’t even go an hour without precautions! You don’t have time to lose because it doesn’t conserve your strength at all – it saps more of it!”

Later, I would not remember who raised their voice first, but I knew I wanted to shout now. “I might not make the trip to Forest’s End, not after fighting for our lives against an actual monster just a few hours ago! I’m already coughing up blood. We didn’t anticipate the kro’daka, and now we have to adapt. I need rest – I don’t even feel anything from the spellplague yet, while the blight has nearly killed me twice.”

“Ren,” Elani pleaded, “what rest can you possibly get that will justify the risk of walking the whole way back to Forest’s End anyway?”

“Then we split up!” I tried. “You check for medicine in Forest’s End and meet me in Duku, where I can continue to rest if the medicine isn’t there.”

“I can’t make it to Forest’s End and back in less than five days, and we both know you don’t have that long. Even if I did find the elixir in time, would it even still work? What then?” Elani said, her eyes rimmed red.

“Well, what if I just give you the spirit now? Then the spellplague isn’t a problem, either, and –”

“You don’t get it, do you? We don’t have time to check every town in the island, and I don’t want to be there when you realize it’s too late. Don’t you understand? If you make it to Duku and there’s nothing there for you, that’s it. Whether I find it in Forest’s End or not.”

“It’s going to be okay,” I said. “Please, just trust me.”

“You don’t get it.” The pleading sadness in her eyes burned away. She drew herself up to her full height, her jaw set. “Well, when you find out it’s too late and that spirit vanishes along with you, then so be it. The island will remember you for that and nothing more.” She spat near her feet and shot one last glare at me, then turned and left.

I watched her go, fists clenched, then rounded on the old man. “Where is your boat?”