Page 61 of Heart of Winter
Oliver sat and surveyed the room – the surgery – while his host puttered about reordering items on a high, wide desk. There were dozens of shelves, each loaded with jars, and pots, and bottles. In one, Oliver recognized what looked like a fetal pig, preserved in clear liquid; in another, a human heart. There were shelves of books, too, heavy tomes, lines in the dust revealing which had been most-often consulted.
The room seemed to be split into two separate areas: one, the one in which he sat, obviously a study, a lab, a place to do research and fiddle with projects. But the other half boasted three long, scrubbed-white tables, unlit candelabrum stationed at the corners of each. A long, stone trough along one wall held basins and clean towels and linens. Three small, wheeled tables sat along one wall, lidded boxes on top. It wasn’t too dissimilar from the setup in Drakewell: the operating theater.
“Now, then.” Olaf came to stand in front of him, a large magnifying glass held in one hand. “Let’s have a look at you.” He pulled up Oliver’s eyelids and peered at his sclera; checked his throat by sight, and by feel, wizened fingers palpating at the glands there. Implemented a basic reasoning test to see that Oliver’s mind was functioning as it should.
After, he stood back, one hand on his hip, the other stroking at his beard as he looked at Oliver shrewdly. “How’s the head?”
“Fine. A little tender, still, but it’s always like that after a flare-up.”
“Mmhm. And your stomach? Breakfast going to stay down?”
“I think so.”
“Tired?”
“A little.” When that earned a look, he said, “More than a little.”
Olaf pinched the skin of neck between two fingers.
“Hey–”
“You’re still a bit dehydrated, but that’s to be expected, I suppose. Rest for the afternoon, don’t tax yourself, and drink plenty of water and tea.”
Oliver nodded, and made to stand – but a hand on his shoulder pressed him back down.
“Did you dream last night?”
“No. I slept like the dead – which I coincidently did not do when I felt as if I actually was dying.”
Olaf’s gaze narrowed. “You’re sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure,” Oliver said, growing impatient, and then realized what this was about. “The ice rose.”
“Aye.”
“Does it have any lasting effects?”
“Not usually. You only had the one dose, and a small one at that.” He tipped his head, gaze still shrunk to mere slits. “Do you remember anything from that night? After I gave it to you?”
Oliver resisted the urge to squirm. Olaf was a physician, and his inquiry was likely academic. But when Oliver thought of that night’s unreal, pulsing blue awareness, he remembered the gentle heaviness of Erik’s hands on his skin. That softshh, shh, it’s all right. He remembered gripping one of his braids, and pulling him down, and wishing he’d been in control of his body so he could have coordinated a kiss. He couldn’t remember exactly what he’d said, only that he’d said something, and that it had been too revealing, and inappropriate besides.
He couldn’t speak about that.
But Olaf was staring at him, so he blurted, “I was in a cave. There was all this ice, it was blue – the light was blue, I think, but maybe the ice was, too? There was a roaring sound. Like – like an earthquake. Or maybe some…some sort of animal.” Not like any animal he’d ever heard, though. There were foxes in Drakewell, their laughter ringing out across the lakes and streams on crisp autumn nights. He’d heard a puma, once, that dying-woman scream undercut with low harmonics.
“Blue ice?” Olaf asked; he sounded far more interested than anyone should have been in a weed-enhanced fever dream.
“Or blue light. There was ice, too. It’s all very indistinct.” Save for the memory of Erik’s hands; when he closed his eyes, he swore he could feel them still, smoothing across his collarbones.
“Hm.” Olaf stroked his beard, expression serious. “And this animal sound. That of a predator?”
“It was a sort of growling – not a puma, I know what that sounds like.”
“A bear?”
“I’ve never heard a bear.” But there had been that voice, in the back of his mind, not his, and not Erik’s:That is no bear. A familiar voice, but not one he could place just as yet.
“Hm.”
