“Phew!” Cira wiped the sweat off her forehead and leaned against a table made of salt, “I don’t usually let my dimnuts sit this long. I hope it turned out alright.”
After closing a tap at the bottom of the cauldron, Cira switched in another jug to fill. In her hands was a glass bottle about the size of her head. It was so thick it blocked the light. Unlike the light blue potion she’d made in the past, this was much darker and behaved like molasses when she tipped it.
“I’m sure that just means it’s potent,” she set it down again, “There’s still a clean separation in the barrel.”
Nanri peered through the odd-looking crystal cauldron too, so they could see when they’d drained all the oil out. The second jug was nearly full when Cira closed the tap. What remained was just mucky dimnut grime.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do with all this,” Cira was baffled. It was basically a lifetime supply, as one dose was usually a single spoonful. “And it smells terrible. I don’t want to drink this…”
“Do you think it went bad?” Nanri asked
“No, this is exactly how it should smell, just stronger maybe.” She got up and walked away, “But I don’t want to think about ghosts right now. Let’s solve the plague.”
They now approached a desk where Cira had placed her compound magnifier. Next to it lay five jars that each had a tiny red speck in them.
“Okay, but what do ghosts have to do with it?” Nanri caught up and stood beside her.
Cira gave her a sidelong stare, “We’ll need them… Not that I plan to spend any more time than I have to hunting ghosts. We will be very prepared this time…”
“This time…?” Nanri couldn’t be heard over the sorcerer’s intense concentration.
She stared at the largest red speck, trying to discern its nature. They gave off a faint amount of light, which was strange because it didn’t correspond with any mana she knew—it was more like a pale scarlet. Still, she detected a miniscule amount of mana within it. It may as well have not been there.
Carefully, she picked it up with telekinesis and put it on a small glass sheet, before flattening it out and placing another on top. When she molded it with geomancy, it felt like clay.
As she loaded it in the magnifier, her assistant asked, “What is that?”
“I haven’t the slightest clue,” Cira replied honestly, “But this is almost definitely the source of the plague. What’s more, I don’t even know where I would start searching in the archive.”
Nanri gasped, “Wait! That’s causing the plague?! You pulled that out of the water?!”
“Well, I can’t say with certainty, but it’s all that’s left. I found it in the soil as well. Nobody has plague lice so we’ve basically ruled out parasites and fungi just doesn’t fit the bill. Bad blood doesn’t check out with all these angry old men running around. If this isn’t it, then the island is doomed.” Cira shrugged, leaning into the lens.
All she saw was dim scarlet. Anything she’d put under this lens in the past had some kind of structure to it, but this was nothing. Just the color, ever so slightly giving off light.
“What do you see?”
“Nothing at all.” Cira stood back, “What a vexing mineral. Or could it be a metal?”
After a moment of pondering, Nanri looked confused, “And what did you expect to see—”
They were interrupted by a loud knock on the door. “Now who could that be?” Cira went to find out. The girls had spent a lot of time in the archive and taken a late lunch, so the day was wearing thin. She opened the door to find a familiar face that looked surprisingly well rested. “Lomp! Right on time. Come in, come in!”
She beckoned him in, and they all went back to the magnifier, “You seem to know everything about this island. Ever seen something like this?” Cira held up one of the jars.
“Uh… what is all this? You know I just got back, right?” He let out a long sigh.
“Oh, I guess you never came in. I had to set this place up for my work, though it seems there wasn’t much point. Anyway, this is what I’ve determined to be the most likely source of Fount Salt’s plague.”
The guard’s eyes shot open, and he stammered for a moment, “What do you mean? Didn’t you need the samples you had me carry? That’s it?! Wh—what is it?”
“I don’t know, that’s why I’m asking you.” Cira shrugged, “Turns out I had enough samples, so you can just set them down over there. I’ll double check my findings later.” Lomp awkwardly removed a backpack and set it on the table, “The stuff a mystery to me, but it contains mana and gives off a little bit of light. I found it in the soil and all the water except for the spring’s.”
“What…?” He furrowed his brow as he took the jar, holding it closely, “But that can’t be…”
Nudging him to the magnifier, “Just look into this lens. It works like a spyglass.”
Lomp peered in and wiggled his head around to get the view right. He stared into it silently for a few minutes, his face scrunching up all the while. Finally, he tore himself away from it and he had a crazy look in his eyes, “You’re saying you found this?! In… in everything?!”
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“Yeah, that’s the result of my research anyway.” She held a jar up, tipping it to roll the speck back and forth. “So, what is it?”
“But there’s no way it’s here…” Lomp was distraught, “There’s no way!”
“Lomp!” Cira gave him a light splash of water, “Pull yourself together! What is it?”
The look on his face was grave. “I haven’t seen it in a long time, but… if it contains mana like you said, then it has to be…”
The girls were on the edge of their seats, waiting for him to finish his sentence. Cira had to splash him again, “Come on!”
He looked up unphased, dripping wet with the same grave expression, “Deritium. Really… shouldn’t someone like you know what this is?”
The sorcerer didn’t appreciate being patronized in this way, “If you know what it is, shouldn’t you have figured this out years ago? Just tell me about it already.”
Deritium is a naturally occurring ‘stone’, as Lomp put it. While it holds mana, it’s dangerous to the touch. “Long ago, it was mined as a source of mana, but it caused… irreparable damage to those that collected it. Have you really never heard this? They say on old islands a second spring will attempt to form, but each can only have one, so it becomes deritium.”
“I’ll be honest with you, Lomp. That sounds like someone made it up, but the rest checks out. Tell me more about this, ‘irreparable damage’.” She curled her fingers into air quotes.
He stared deep into the ground with a look on his face like he was experiencing an unpleasant memory, “People would change… Their heads changed shape, mouths sealed up or grew extra teeth, arms fell off…” He shuddered.
“Enough,” Cira held up a hand, “I think that’s enough. You’re describing corporeal degradation. But the symptoms are so different from now… Did you say this island held deritium once before?”
After taking a deep breath he nodded, “I’ve never heard that term, but they found it fifty years ago. This was long before the Gandeux decided our island wasn’t part of the Boreal anymore. It’s always been forbidden for the danger it poses, and if an island finds some the whole port goes into a panic. They collect it in a hurry and use it to power their cities or contain the rest."
Nanri was confused and cut in with a question, “Why does everyone here have open wounds though? What you described sounds different. Except…”
“That’s right,” Cira said, “I don’t know if you saw the boy with the misshapen arms, but you remember the man in Uru. As for the symptoms, it seems digesting deritium instead of touching it causes a far less stable degradation, more like what the book described. Either those two got unlucky, or they somehow made contact with it.”
“Hang on a second!” Lomp waved his arms around, “The man in Uru… I should have realized it then! Dammit! And what boy with the misshapen arm?” He slammed a fist down on the table, rattling the jars.
“Relax, it could just be that the condition has progressed further.” Cira leaned back, “They could be the first two, save for a couple scattered around the rock. I’m starting to think the people of this island have been consuming deritium for a very long time. Who knows what eating plants grown with it does. It only shows effect once your soul has reached a certain tipping point, and with the variety of ways people have been coming into contact with it, it makes sense that the symptoms didn’t look the same to you.”
Despite her best efforts, the guard was still fuming, “But, it’s incurable… This is known well across the Gandeux Skies.”
“Lomp.” She gave him a deadpan stare, “Do you know what I am?”
He looked frustrated and pushed the words out through gritted teeth, “A… sorcerer?”
“Indeed!” Cira pushed a handwritten page in his face, “This is the cure. It’s the implementation that you need to worry about.”
The look of shock on his face was dazzling, “So you did it?! You really did it!” He fell to his knees.
“Get up, don’t forget there’s a mysterious source of deritium infecting the island’s entire water supply. Somewhere in the miles of salt under our feet” Cira pulled him up by the coat, “Everybody will need to be cured. I’ll complain about the implications of that later, but now is not the time to rest. How many people live on Fount Salt? Feel free to round up.”
“Uh, nearly twenty thousand if you count the whole rock. Plus or minus a few.”
“Well… that’s a lot of aetherium… Say, Lomp. Random question. How many ghosts do you think linger around the Last Step?" It wasn’t time to fill him in yet, lest he put his foot down too early.
“Um… A lot. Why?” He was blindsided out of his self-inflicted rage by the seemingly random question.
I need a teaspoon of Aetherium for one dose. Let’s say, the goal to save the island is sixty thousand teaspoons over the three years of treatment… Ridiculous. That’s barrels full, and hundreds of pounds. Each ghost should be good for multiple doses, but depending on how much Aetherium each one turns into, it could easily take a few thousand spirits. An absurd number and nothing I can do on my own, nor will I be able to stay to see it through.
The gears were turning in his head and Cira couldn’t let them continue yet, “I need numbers, Lomp. Are we dealing with hundreds? Thousands of lost souls? Come on.”
“Er, it’s hard to say since I’ve spent my life avoiding them, but this island is very old.” He put a hand to his chin, “I guess if you consider the Dark Stratum, which the Last Step spans… I don’t know. Easily hundreds. Thousands, who knows? Miners have been dying since this island came to be, I imagine.”
“Nobody mentioned a Dark Stratum…” Cira commented.
“It’s the three levels between Deep Falls and Nymphus. It only takes up the north side of the island, but Deep Falls is technically on the same level as Uru so that’s the usual path around. You can follow the river straight there so it’s not a difficult choice for any regular person to make.” He put pointed emphasis on that last bit.
“Wait, Uru’s water flows from Deep Falls?” Her brow creased as she fell into though, “Now it all makes sense—"
She was interrupted by more knocking at the door, “Ugh, who is it now?”
Cira again went to the door and was met with another familiar face, “Chip! Right on time. Come in, come in!”
“Huh? Wait a second.” He had Rosalie in tow wearing a beige sundress. “What’s going on?”
“Not a second to waste. I still need to locate and eradicate the source of the plague, but we’re working to develop a cure. You’re just the man for the job.” She patted him on the shoulder.
“What?! Hold on, you figured it out?! There… there’s really a cure?!” Tears welled up in his eyes.
Nanri helped Cira catch him up to speed in a reasonable fashion, and the man had a moment with his wife. Once everyone had settled, Chip collected himself and approached Cira again with an air of resolve that impressed her, “What do ya’ need me to do?”
“We’ll get to the details shortly, but the fate of this island will be resting on yours and Lomp’s shoulders for the foreseeable future. Let’s go back to Breeze Haven for now so we can begin preparations.”
Nanri had a smile that betrayed a hint of curiosity, and she trotted along as Cira led the group outside. After walking through the door, she looked back and forth curiously, “Lomp, what have you done with my boat?”
Lomp froze, and started looking nervous, “Uh, well, you see… I had to report to the overseer as soon as I returned, and, well…. Pappy had to confiscate it as evidence against the smugglers…”
Cira’s face became livid, “He would dare?!” She turned to the silo and pulled out her spyglass. There you are, you old bastard…
“Change of plans, everybody. I must first collect my stolen property from a foolish old man.”