Page 38 of Son of a Witch (The Wicked Years 2)

Liir put it together at last. What a dolt am I! “Are you sleeping with your patients?” he blurted out. “I mean—you know—”

“Patients,” mused Chyde. “Nice touch.”

“I am seeing to their needs,” said Shell, without apology or shame. He patted the satchel. “The comfort I supply is greatly appreciated. And of course they want to show their gratitude. What else does a lady in chains have to offer? She couldn’t accept charity. It isn’t done in polite circles. So she pays as she can. I’m not so cold as to deny them the chance to show their appreciation. It seems a fair exchange to me.”

I’m not sticking with him even if he is my maybe-uncle. Forget it. New plan needed. I’ll improvise. “You’re disgusting,” said Liir. “I mean, really. That’s disgusting. You’re disgusting. I can’t believe it. It’s—it’s monstrous.”

“Oh, I’d need to be a good sight more ambitious to make it to monstrous.” Shell laughed. “Chyde? Sometime this week would be nice.”

“Might as well leave him.” Chyde turned to another volume. “Nothing is coming to light. Are you sure she’s here?”

“I’m not sure of anything, but this is the natural first place to start, I suppose,” said Shell. He stood and smoothed down his clothes, and offered his hand to Liir. “So we take our parting now, comrade. I hope the rest of your day is as amusing.”

Liir thought about biting the hand, but Shell would only make another joke. So the boy tucked his own hands high up in his armpits. “We’ll meet again,” said Shell. “Likely it’ll be down here, since it isn’t easy to obtain an exit visa. Sweet dreams, Liir-boy.”

He spun on his heel and disappeared almost at a run.

“Oh, the energy of the young,” said Chyde, sighing and continuing to flip pages. “You know, I’m not coming up with anything so far. What did you say her name was again?”

7

IN THE WESTERN DISAPPOINTMENTS, on the last evening of this jackal moon, the Scrow herders sent their dogs out to round up the sheep earlier than usual. Other workers erected a double row of pliant, bindweed fencing around the far edge of the fold’s perimeter. Unless cloud cover prevented it, the celestial beast would brighten the night more brilliantly than at any other time in a generation. It would make a good night for scavengers.

Sister Doctor and Sister Apothecaire had done what they could. They had provided comfort to the old Princess that her own staff could not. She was happier, though the mood in her tent, when she was asleep, was ugly. The Scrow were a proud people—well, what people weren’t?—and they were suspicious of foreign clinical practices.

The interpreter put it to the women as gently as he could.

“You should move on,” said Lord Shem Ottokos. “We have told you what you came to learn—that we know nothing of the scrapings of those colleagues of yours. If your profession is the extension of charity, you have performed your mission. You’ve benefited Princess Nastoya mightily. There is no reason to linger, and danger to you if you do.”

“We’re told you are hospitable to strangers,” Sister Doctor reminded him.

“Strangers, yes; that is the way of the Scrow,” said Ottokos. “After several days, you are less strange than you once were. You become familiar, and therefore, like family, less agreeable. I’ll be happy to provide you with a supply of food, but I recommend that you start home this very evening and take advantage of this unusually bright night.”

Sister Doctor said, “In the question of scrapings, we haven’t convinced you that the Yunamata are blameless. So why would you send us into danger?”

“You’ve been so good; we’ll provide what we can manage by way of an escort,” said Lord Ottokos, and left.

“The nerve!” said Sister Apothecaire. “We’re being disinvited. I believe I’m offended.”

“Are you going native?” Sister Doctor asked her Munchkin colleague. The tone verged on the cruel.

“They’re adorable heathen,” said Sister Apothecaire, somewhat wildly.

“Yes. Well, they’ll seem less adorable if they conquer their aversion to scraping the faces of their visitors. After all, when you were a child you were an adorable heathen, too, but you got over it.”

“I don’t appreciate your wit, Sister Doctor.”

It began to seem for a short while as if the maunts might disobey the instructions of their superior and split up. However, the Princess Nastoya requested a final interview with them, and she felt well enough to sit up on her pallet.

“Have you taken the full measure of my ailment?” she said, through Shem Ottokos. “To avoid the pogroms of the Wizard against the Animals, I went deeply underground many years ago, accepting a witch’s charm as a way to hide myself. I am an Elephant, and want to go to my death as an Elephant, but I am cursed to remain in this human body. I used to be able to change for a brief time, but infirmity and age have eroded those talents, and now I am trapped. I fear the Elephant within me has been dying for some time, and may be in part dead already; but I would join it, if I could only have help. Ten years ago I asked the Witch’s boy for help, but he disappeared. Now through your exotic skills you have helped me rally, and so I must press this request. Please return to your hive and collect the boy, the man, Liir. Bring him here or send him here; get him here safely. He may not be able to help me, but even the most blessed of witchcraft has gone underground in these trying times, and he is the only one I know who might be able to help.”

“Do you really think he is Elphaba’s son?” asked Sister Doctor.

“He had her cape, he had her broom,” said Princess Nastoya. “Maybe he wasn’t her son, but he cared about her life, and he may have learned something anyway. What other course can I take?”

“We’ve never even seen him awake,” admitted Sister Apothecaire. “It would be hard to promise we could persuade him when we don’t know what he’s really like. Yet.”

“In return for his help, I’d promised him something in exchange.” She began to wheeze a bit, and Ottokos collected her phrases haltingly. “I want—to tell him what I’ve heard—about—the word on the street in the Emerald City.”

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