Page 32 of I Married Amreth

I smiled in a reassuring fashion. “Ciara already did a great job of explaining to me what prions are.”

“Oh, excellent!” he exclaimed. “So we found the prions in the brain cells of the four current patients here. Two of them only started showing symptoms yesterday. We knew for sure that it was a prion disease because of the initial spongy plaque formation in their brain tissue seen in scans. As Ciara likely told you, prions must be ingested. We’ve scanned every food in the village as well as their water sources. Everything is clean. We must find what they are eating that’s causing it, and that’s a total Hail Mary.”

I didn’t know the formal meaning of that expression, but in the context, I suspected it meant that it would be an extremely difficult task to achieve.

“The important thing is that since this is happening in other villages, we know that the problem isn’t restricted to one herd or one farm. There is something out there infecting these people,” Ernst said.

“Can you cure it?” I asked.

All three of them shook their heads.

“There are no known cures for prion diseases. Normally, we can only make the human patients as comfortable as possible while the illness progresses until their passing,” Ciara said with a troubled expression. “But it is behaving differently with the Kreelars.”

“How so?” I asked with genuine curiosity.

“The symptoms appear faster where with most other species it can take many weeks to months to manifest. But more importantly, some of the Kreelars survive whereas humans die within two years. Sora was the first case, and she’s still alive. She’s Aku’s sister and the wet nurse who attacked the doctors by the river. Not only does she have antibodies, but her brain tissue also mutated to grant her psionic powers.”

“Do the others, like Aku, have the same antibodies?” I asked, fascinated.

Ciara hesitated, seeming unsure how to respond.

“The antibodies are fairly similar but not the same,” Mehreen said. “We believe the prions shared the same origin but that the source of contamination was different, and the variant Sora consumed through that doctor’s blood was a mutated version of the one that has been infecting the others.”

“We’re still trying to figure out why females are more likely to die,” Ciara said.

“I would have assumed it was a hormonal factor,” I said carefully.

“That’s what we suspect as well, but what specifically? How is it interacting with the prions to precipitate the catastrophic failures that killed them?” she said pensively.

“At least, we can now detect who is infected, even if they are not yet showing symptoms,” Ernst said. “We must test everyone and provide them with test kits to ensure infected mothers and wet nurses aren’t passing anything to their children.”

“I’m assuming they have many villages spread over a vast territory. Do they have quick communication systems?” I asked, trying to assess how many villages we could reach in the shortest time possible.

“Yes and no,” Ciara replied. “They have the equivalent of old CBs, which basically only require an antenna and a receiver to catch the radio frequencies. They can talk over them, but there is no vidcom. So we can’t show them virtually what to do. It at least allows Aku to give them a heads up of what’s going on and that we will start visiting them as of tomorrow with test kits and medicine.”

“Medicine?” I echoed with a frown. “I thought you said there was no cure?”

“We’ve prepared something derived from Sora’s antibodies with synthetic immunoglobulins that will help prevent normal prions from turning abnormal. This should significantly slow the progress of the disease and give the patient’s body a chance to fight back and mutate instead of dying. So far, it has been working well for our first two patients.”

A sudden thought struck me. “Is there any chance that they are in fact consuming whatever this is on purpose? Is there a possibility that the Kreelarswantto undergo this mutation? After all, it has given them the type of offensive psionic powers that many hunters would love to have.”

To my surprise, they all simultaneously shook their heads.

“Definitely not,” Ciara said with certainty. “They were happy the way they were. But they will take the mutation over death. They just fear what other changes may occur in the future and would love confirmation that this mutation is the final result of their exposure to the prions.”

“Fair enough. So what’s the plan?” I asked.

“We travel to nearby villages with a couple of Kreelar escorts in the morning,” Ernst said. “With your wings, you could take Ciara to one of the more distant ones.”

I nodded. “We were discussing it before the hunters returned with their catch. My shuttle would be a lot more efficient though. Hopefully, things will go well tomorrow enough that their people will feel more comfortable with our advanced technology. It would allow you and Mehreen to travel farther while I fly my mate.”

I flinched inwardly when I caught myself using that term of endearment. It was the second time I had done it. I cast a nervous glance at Ciara but was relieved to find her smiling with approval. I doubted it was because I had claimed her. But I welcomed the fact that it didn’t seem to trouble or displease her.

“Sounds like a plan!” Ciara said.

We finished our ‘bird’ food meal in an amiable atmosphere. Afterwards, Ernst and Mehreen went back to making more medicine while Ciara taught me how to administer the test so that I could help her in the morning.

In a way I couldn’t explain, it felt good.

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