The rest of their journey was made in near silence as they slunk across the fields--now harvested in preparation for the coming winter. Only a few barren pumpkins and various squash plants remained.

Skystead’s hospital was a modest building near the center of the city. Close to the residential district, it was possible to mistake it with a regular home with its brick facade and pitched roof. Through the glass panes in the door, Nestor could make out a friendly looking young man seated behind a desk where a mother and her baby waited.

He frowned. He had been hoping for a crowd to vanish into. Sneaking past people with little to do would be harder.

“What are you planning?” Sylvie asked, a little too eagerly for his tastes. The both of them were walking down the street, posing as a couple on a late afternoon stroll.

He risked a nonchalant glance around them. The only other person within earshot was a woman working in her front garden.

“I just need to get upstairs and sneak one out,” he said softly.

“They'll catch on before you have a chance to find it,” Sylvie said, her tone conversational.

“Do you have a better idea?”

“Yes, actually.” Sylvie tripped suddenly catching herself on the wrought iron fence they were walking beside with a squeak of pain.

“Syl--” Nestor cut himself off. “Are you alright?”

She slowly stood, keeping her hand tightly pinned to her side. Even with it partially obscured by her cloak, he could make out the dark stain spreading across her white glove. “Ugh, that hurts,” she hissed. Tiny droplets of blood began to hit the cobblestones beneath them.

“You didn’t,” Nestor said under his breath. He couldn’t see Sylvie’s face through her mask, but it was as though the leopard was grinning at him.

“Miss!” the woman in the garden was rushing toward them. “Miss, are you alright?”

“I think so.” Sylvie’s voice changed as she faced the woman, gaining a slight tremor. “I just slipped and…ow!” She drew back the sleeve of her cloak, revealing a white glove, now stained crimson. A ragged gash had been cut through the fabric, letting Nestor see just a glimpse of her wounded hand.

“It’s this darned fence!” the woman said, glaring at the fence in question. “I just knew I should’ve gotten it replaced. Come, come, the hospital is just across from here. They’ll get you fixed up.”

“It’s really not that bad,” Sylvie protested as she hid her hand once more in the folds of her cloak.

“Not that bad?” The woman demanded. “Miss, you’re standing in a right puddle of your blood!” She pointed at Nestor. “You, tell her that she needs to go to the hospital! I won’t have her bleeding out in my front yard!”

Sylvie turned toward him. “It’s really not that bad,” she said again. “We can get it cleaned at home.”

Nestor stared at her and slowly shook his head. “We’re already here. We might as well take advantage.”

The woman glared at him. “Young man! You should know better than to ever treat a wound like that at home when we have a perfectly functional hospital. Now please take your lady there before it gets infected. The old bugger is a bit rusted and I would hate for her to get sick from it.”

Nestor raised his hands in a gesture of peace, suddenly very glad his mask covered his features. “I’ll take her ma’am, don’t worry.” He turned with Sylvie and they started over to the hospital.

“A bit of haste wouldn’t kill you!” the woman shouted after them.

Nestor wrapped his arm around Sylvie’s shoulders, moving as though he were trying to get a better look at her hand. “A fence? She’s not wrong, it’s rusted,” he muttered into her ear.

“Sounds like the kind of thing they’ll need a catalyst to heal,” she hissed back. “And the kind of thing you can pocket. Admit it, it’s a good plan.”

“A better one, maybe,” Nestor relented. They stepped into the lobby and a bell tied to the door jingled with the movement. That could be an issue if they had to sneak back in or out.

“Ah, hello,” the man at the desk said warmly. “How can I help you?”

“I…well, it’s silly really,” Sylvie gave a nervous laugh that sounded so out of place to Nestor’s ears that he had to resist one of his own. “I had a bit of a fall.”

“No problem, miss, we’ll get you checked out,” the man said. He started rummaging for some paperwork. That. That was going to be a problem. The last thing they needed was a paper trail. They hadn’t even decided on fake names.

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“Oh, well, I’m afraid he’ll have to sign me in,” Sylvie said. She was swaying slightly.

“Why’s that?” the man stopped and looked at them curiously. His eyes widened when he found the small, but growing puddle of blood that was forming under Sylvie’s cloak sleave.

“Well, I may have injured my writing hand.” Sylvie laughed again, the sound a little bit too shrill. She pulled back her cloak sleeve, revealing her mangled glove.

The man stood and shoved the papers back into his desk drawer. “I see. Let me find one of the healers for you, it won’t be a minute. If you please would just…just sit down, miss.” He disappeared down a narrow hallway and Sylvie slumped into the nearest chair, careful to keep her injured hand off it.

“Not bad with the acting,” Nestor murmured. They were alone in the lobby, the woman and the baby he had seen earlier apparently already seeing one of the healers.

“It’s not entirely acting,” Sylvie said softly. She peeled back her glove and Nestor felt his eyes grow wide. He had assumed she had just sliced one of the fleshy pads of the hand that bled a lot for even a shallow wound. Instead he found himself looking at a jagged, deep wound that seeped blood. Now without the glove to help absorb it, it flowed freely.

“Oh,” Sylvie said, sounding mildly surprised. “That’s bad.”

Nestor stared, his eyes drawn to something whitish that peaked through the wound. “Is that?” he squeaked.

A switch seemed to go off in Sylvie and she reached for googles she wasn’t wearing. “It’s probably not bone,” she decided. “Maybe a tendon?” she reached out with her good hand to touch it and Nestor grabbed her wrist.

“Don’t touch it! Skies, Sylvie, do you want to make it worse?”

She scoffed at him. “They’re about to heal it, it’s fine.” She flexed her hand and froze up with a slight whimper.

“Sylvie…”

“It doesn’t hurt as much as it looks like it would,” she tried. She turned toward him with what he was sure was a smile, but it was impossible to tell through her mask.

“Hello,” a soft yet steady voice rang out. A rather plump woman with her hair pinned in a neat bun stepped into the room, followed closely from the man before. “I hear we’ve had a mishap.” Her gaze found Sylvie’s hand and she stepped closer, clicking her tongue.

“My, my. How did you manage this one, dear?”

“I just slipped,” Sylvie said as the woman knelt down beside them. “I’m so clumsy sometimes.”

“Clumsy indeed,” the woman said. “This is quite the cut you’ve got yourself.”

“Can you fix it?” the tremble was back in Sylvie’s voice.

“Of course we can, now just lean back.” The woman pulled a silvery metal device that held a gleaming emerald. “This might feel funny,” she warned as she gently pressed it just below her wound.

The emerald began to glow gently and Slyvie sighed as her skin began to knit back together. As it continued, the glow of the emerald began to fade and flicker slightly.

The healer frowned. “Come on,” she muttered. “I just need a little more from you.”

“That’s much better,” Sylvie said as the glow went out. She flexed her hand experimentally. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me yet,” the healer said, glaring down at her catalyst. “This thing is half a healing away from shattering. Let me try and find a fresh one for you.”

“No, no,” Sylvie said. “This is fine, really.” Nestor suppressed his urge to elbow her. He still didn’t know where they kept the catalysts.

“I’ve been thinking, Victoria,” the man at the front desk said. “What if you took up the alchemical guild on their offer.”

Nestor froze.

The woman shook her head adamantly. “Please, John, alchemy guilds have no respect for the delicate art of healing. I’m not about to use one of their twisted catalysts on my patients.”

“But they last longer,” John said excitedly. “It’s been so difficult getting replacements when they shatter.”

The woman tucked the first catalyst into her apron pocket. “Those things haven’t been tested by anyone outside of the guild. I don’t trust it, where are they getting the energy if not from the gemstones themselves? It’s unnatural.” She turned back to Sylvie. “Let me see that hand, dear.”

Sylvie held it out and flexed each of her fingers as the woman asked. “I suppose that’s good enough,” the healer said after Sylvie had balled her hand into a fist a couple of times. “We’ll let your body handle any of the finer damage the catalyst missed. Just be sure not to do anything too strenuous with it for the next couple of days.”

“I will ma’am, thank you,” Sylvie said.

The healer nodded in satisfaction and turned to leave. “I’m going for my lunch,” she announced to the man at the desk. “See if you can do anything about this blood, it will scare away the patients if they see it.”

“Yes ma’am,” the man said, a little bit glumly. Nestor couldn’t blame him, the edges of the blood puddle had begun to dry to the stone floor and a thin trail marked exactly the path they had taken getting into the building.

The woman turned to leave and he shook himself. She still had the catalyst--the catalyst that he had no idea where it was kept.

“Wait!” Nestor cried out. He rose to his feet and wrapped his arms around the woman in a hug. “Thank you so much, I was so worried,” he said in a horrible approximation of a sob.

“That’s um…that’s quite alright, dear,” the woman said as she awkwardly patted him on the back. “She’s all fixed up now.”

“I’m just so bad with blood, and I didn’t know what to do,” Nestor continued to ramble. He could feel Sylvie’s eyes burning into his back and wanted nothing more than to bolt out of there himself.

“It’s only natural,” the woman said. She detangled herself from Nestor and quickly retreated into the back. Nestor watched her go, careful to keep his back to the man at the front desk as he tucked something into his pocket.

“Let’s go, dear,” Sylvie said, her voice a bit strained.

Nestor nodded and followed her out. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the front desk clerk trying to hide a smirk.

“Afraid of blood?” Sylvie asked as they neared the tree they used to slip outside of Skystead’s walls. “What was that about? You looked ridiculous”

Heat rose to Nestor’s cheeks and he found himself once again grateful for his mask. “I had to get close,” he said softly enough that only Sylvie would have been able to hear. “Pickpocketing is hard without a crowd. I had to come up with some sort of distraction.”

“You got it?”

Nestor nodded as they jumped into the tree. “Barely. Skies help me if I ever have to show my mask in this neighborhood again.”