“I only found a handful of insects and spiders within the zone you mentioned.” Meli told me after she explored the area the boy had directed me to search.
“Which is the secondary source of the illness.” I explained having finally understood what was truly happening. “It’s a single disease mutated by the venom of the spiders or other insects.” I continued slowly. “One form that shows in the ulcerations of flesh, another in the lung damage causing coughing fits with blood phlegm, and finally the unnoticed version that is more purely venomous in nature.” I simplified it for her. I was still weak but my mind had fully returned to use. “It would easily slip into the provisions of this village slowly eating away upon the villagers.” I concluded with a calm smile.
“This does explain why the listing of symptoms varied.” she remarked pensively. “I did notice a few plants in the area that can be used as an anti-venom, anti-bacterial, and a few anti-viral we can use.” she reported slowly as she planned ahead.
“Mix them in together in equal portions with a fever reducing plant to start a baseline treatment.” I suggested to lead her thoughts in the proper pathway. “It should work on the ones before they arrive in the terminal stage.” I added to clarify the only line she should not cross.
“Can anything be done once they are in that final stage of illness.” she asked hopefully and annoyed. I shock my head but also raised a hand palm out to her trying to prevent her continuing. “But you..” she began but halted looking at me pleadingly.
“Not even their deities can save them once they reach that point from what I’ve seen.” I told her softly and quietly.
“What about your people and your deities?” she retorted anger creeping into her voice. “Can they not help you save the others?” she added bluntly. As a healer, she wanted desperately to save every patient that was placed in her care. I understood this was the source of her frustration and anger but I could not give her false hope.
“They are not those I called upon to save the child.” I answered not hiding my annoyance in my voice. “No deities that have ever ruled upon these lands have the power to save even a single child.” I admitted to her in a low whisper. “We are here to assist since they cannot interfere directly nor do anything to save the majority of them.” I continued with a half confession. The so-called deities here always interfered but were impotent in truly helping these people. The only lie was that did not have the right or power to force us to be here. Our presence here was only a coincidence of the path I had selected to avoid annoyance which still came to us.
“So we become the hands of deities because their hands are bound?” she asked with a huff. “Is that not our typical role as Atlantians within these foreign lands?” she added with a derisive snort of laughter.
“The outer world needs to feel both free and secure to have hope for a future if they will progress forward properly.” I explained. I did not which to admit that this was my brothers’, sisters’, and my own duty in this world of the last race. “We save the ones we can, give comfort to those we cannot save, and give all hope for them to move forward.” I continued looking at her. Meli grumbled an agreement with a grim nod before slowly walking away to collect the herbs to create a possible cure. I sat there knowing I would suggest treating the terminal patients as well as those that could be saved. It might save one or two of those too far gone if they were strong enough to fight the illness but those survivors would be looked upon differently. A guard came to assist me in my still weakened state back to the healing tents we had at the center of the village.
Once returned to our medical base of operations, I requested that all the mortars and pestles that could be found in the village brought to the center of the village. I assured that each of the dozen grinding tools were manned by skilled hands waiting for Meli’s return with the mix of herb bundles. Meli would be free to administer the mixture while the herbs were grounded together in the proper mix that I could oversee even in my weakened state. It would still take an hour or more before the first mixture of ground herbs mixed with boiled water could be administered to our patients as a medicinal draft. I insisted that while we waited to see if this worked, we grinded the remaining herbs which luckily came in from the elder women of the villagers. The older women had looked at the plants and rushed off wanting to help us. Two bushels of the three main ingredients arrive shortly leaving only the fever reduction agent missing. Only a half bushel arrived with a plea for forgiveness in her inability to find more about an hour after the other bushels. I assured them that this was more than enough for now, and warned them to not gather anymore at this time. I set aside a place to dry the herbs that had arrived in preparation for grinding and mixing.
“It is slowing down the progress but not removing the symptoms.” Meli informed me that night in Atlantian.
“It gives us a chance to customize the cure for the three variants of this illness.” I replied with an encouraging smile. Meli did not smile back at my words. I knew she still worried about those we will be loosing. “We have the tools and the knowledge to defeat this disease, dear Meli.” I added softly.
“But do we have the time to save enough of them to make it worth our efforts?” she retorted bluntly.
“Better to save a handful and prevent other from getting ill, than loose all the populous of this village.” I returned calmly. “A single life is worth our efforts since we have done our best.” I continued with a half smile. “Back to work with a variant to directly target each version of the illness we’ve noted so far.” I concluded pointing to a written list. The name and quickly drawn image of each plant was shown on three sheets of Atlantian paper with the alterations for each form of the sickness.
“As you command, Lord Mêkëa.” she replied with a soft giggle. She gave me a quick bow before focusing on the pages I had written for her. “Always perfectly organized, sir.” she added in a whisper I was not meant to hear. Meli began setting the driest herbs into sets to be ground by our six helpers. Two grinders worked on the mix assigned to them by Meli while I watched and noted if anything else could be done at this time. Meli did select a combination of the three main herbs aside grinding them in her own device.
“A hunch or instinct?” I asked her with a raised eyebrow.
“Only a very few of them have developed fevers which means the extra herb might not be needed in their case.” she explained slowly. I could see her pensive bodily signs as she planned a different base for our treatment ideas. “We can add either herb to this balanced mixture for each specific patients prior to administrating it to them.” she concluded before looking towards me. The healer’s glow shined in her eyes showing she was fully into her role of an Atlantian healer.
“Sound like a good starting point for a basic potion that could slow the progress of the disease until we can discern which mutation they are suffering.” I agreed with a nod. “Have any of these mixtures been tested on the terminal patients?” I asked gaining a shocked look from her.
“If this will not save them, why try it on them?” she returned confused.
“Their reaction to the possible cure both mentally and physically might help us tailor one that works more efficiently on the newly infected no matter their variation of the illness.” I explained slowly. I saw the gleam in her eyes as she considered this might be my way to figure a way of healing even those in a supposedly terminal state. “Plus it gives them peace of mind that we have not already given up on them even if our actions are mostly in vain.” I continued in the same calm slow voice. “It gives hope.” I added in Atlantian to her. It took a moment of deep thought before she nodded back to me. She understood that this wasn’t an attempt to save them but give them respect in their last moment. I knew this would be done in the future when humans would be kept alive solely to give them a peaceful death without regret.
It was nearly a week before Sert returned to the village’s guarded border. In that time, as he reported, he investigated the three other villages finding them clean of illnesses and no signs of causing this plague to attack the village. He found many of the villagers back on their feet and the disease fully under control by Meli’s advice and my daily checks. We were tired but happily keeping up our work to protect and heal the village. A perfected mixture had been developed by Meli that could allow the villagers’ body to naturally fight off all three variants of this disease linked to spider venom.
Those spiders and most of the insects had been removed from the fields as plants were used to force them to leave. We had avoided killing them even if the villagers thought it a wise protective ideal. Nature worked well to safeguard the village and fields without disturbing the natural order of life. Only the infected livestock were unfortunately needed to be destroyed since none of our mixtures seemed to have any effects on their spiral towards death. Black smoke drifted up from the pyres on the farmlands where the animal corpses were being burned to ashes. It was only a minor problem for the village having lost more than half of their animals to this plague. It was the moment Meli and myself could agree that the plague had ran it’s course and we only waited for the few that were still sick could recover fully.
“It is time for us to return to our journey.” I told them still weary from both the work and my use of my true powers. Part of me wished to simply return to Atlantis, but duty prevented this action. A week and a half had passed while we healed this village and Meli agreed with my words with a tired nod.
“They have been taught and shown everything to fight this disease if it returns.” Meli informed us. “And they will have a better chance to face other illnesses that come to this village.” she added with a half smile.
“One more night for us to recover or we will require an ox pulled cart to carry us to our meeting, sir.” Sert countered quickly. I could see he was tired but not as badly exhausted as Meli. I would resist my deeply ingrained fatigue, weakness, and mental fog if they decided to leave but easily accepted this final night of actual rest. We all accepted to this last night even if it delayed our arrival to our targeted city. “And I want both of you resting undisturbed this last night here.” he added looking sternly at both of us.
“Did they enjoy ‘naked time’?” Meli asked before collapsing in uncontrollable laughter. A dark glare from Sert had me groaning, knowing he had decided to create one of his questionable diversions. We helped her to her feet to drop her gently upon a sleeping cot while she still giggled. I took my cot without any resistance feeling centuries of life weighing down upon my shoulders. Calling upon the Ley’ä’Luna had drained me in ways that I did not realize were possible. My physical strength had mostly returned but my spiritual and mental energies had barely increased from that moment.
The high pitched buzzing of the combined voices from the pillar of light assaulted my ears as sleep took me into it’s embrace. I could not resist the pull dragging my weakened mental self into the chamber at the center of all that exists. My ephemeral form crashed to the floor before the pillar of light unable to even stand against the constant battering noise of their voices. What usually was a whisper was now a screaming cacophony beating upon my essence directly. I fought to understand the mixed conversations pouring over me barely able to make any head way at first. I knew this was congratulatory and thankful words but it was like a hammer pounding me into the ground. It felt to me that many days if not weeks had passed as I lay barely conscious being thanked for my actions toward a nameless village in the middle of nowhere.
I awoke to see the shocked face of Meli and Sert looking at me. I saw my amber raptor eyes with twin sparks rolling around the edge of my now black orbs. My words to them were squawks, hisses, and growling mumbles without a hint of coherence available for them. I was forcibly sat up as a draft was poured down my throat. I learned later that it was a double strength mix of our cure with a large dose of the fever reduction herbs. I half choked it down as Meli (I believe) emptied the mug into my mouth before slumber pulled me back into darkness. While I lay trapped in the barrage of gratuitous words from the Ley’ä’Luna, I would catch shards of words from the real world where my body lay in a fevered fitful sleep. It took another week, that felt like a lifetime to me, before I finally awoke feeling mostly healthy.
My spirit was still only at half strength, but my mind and body had recovered to full strength. I knew that a very old wound had been reopened deeply in my spirit because of the thing within the Heartstone shard I had linked with. My actions to save a lone child had become a beacon alerting my oldest and most hated enemy of my location. It had also shown me where that ancient evil sat infecting the world with it’s dark delusional beliefs. I had noted the warping in the general world of the human but now I was adding the same things happening within Atlantis itself to the list. I could feel the deep internal spirit room oozing out my essence in slow spiral to what could only be death. I blocked away all the undamaged sections into a secured copy to place within my squire when I selected one, eventually.
Annianka was infected which showed itself in her madness behavior. The plots against Atlantis both from within and without were all signs of the infection sitting without the Heartstone Of Atlantis. Everything evil in this world returned to Atlantis’ infected network of power. Destroying it would not truly stop the spread of Her evil delusion, but it may slow it down until my kindred brothers and sisters could finally defeat it. The vision of the stone being destroyed releasing a black cloud to infect the world now made sense. Atlantis needed to disappear from here but could not be destroyed if the world could be saved. A new Brother Order needed to be found since I know that as corrupted as I now was, it was not my place anymore. My focus was to find a squire and finding a way to remove Atlantis from this world even if it’s also the only chance humanity has to become their true selves.
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