Page 9 of Malady

“Good Lord—” I grab at him, fists bunching in his collar as I stare down at the suddenly distant road. “This is like sitting astride the church steeple.”

“Do you not come across tall men often?”

“I know tall men,” I inform him as he shifts me higher. “Gideon is tall. Matthias can reach the upper shelves without standing on a stool. I’ve simply never had occasion to ride either of them through the countryside.”

It takes me all of half a second to realise what I’ve just said, and another half to press my lips together tightly.

Right. Perhaps I shall stop talking now.

Thankfully, Iscairn offers no comment, and I’m still deciding whether silence might preserve what remains of my dignity when a strange, syrupy warmth begins beneath my palms and works its way slowly through me, easing the cold from my fingers before slipping into my wrists, my arms, deeper...

After that, the rest of the journey seems to matter less and less. The cold no longer bothers me, nor the mud, nor the hours still ahead. Somewhere along the next mile, my attention settles instead on the steady sway of Iscairn beneath me, the fall of his boots against the earth, and the rather pleasant fact that for once, none of the walking is my problem.

“There’s an oak at the parish boundary,” I mumble, my cheek pressing into his shoulder. “Split down the middle by lightning. When we reach it, you may put me down, and neither of us will ever speak of this again.”

“As you wish.”

“Wake up, Ophelia Harrow. We have reached your oak.”

I groan into his collar and force my eyes open. For one soft, muddled moment I have no idea where I am. There’s only darkness, and the strange, syrup-thick absence of pain. I can’t remember the last time my body felt this quiet.

Then I blink, and reality returns with all the delicacy of a bucket of pig swill over the head.

My cheek is pressed against the shoulder of a man I met this morning in a village full of corpses. My arms are looped around his neck, my mouth has apparently been hanging open against his collar for an unknowable length of time, and there’s a damp patch that I can only hope is rain.

“Oh, God’s wounds.” I recoil so fast my head spins. “Put me down.”

When he sets me on my feet, I busy myself with yanking at my mud-caked skirts and shoving tangled hair out of my eyes. There’s very little dignity left to salvage after hours of wind, but I try anyway, right up until I spot the damp patch darkening his collar and my cheeks flush with heat. I snap my head away, dragging my mask up over my nose.

“That was already there,” I mumble, turning towards the old split oak at the fork in the road, its trunk cleaved almost cleanly in two between the path to Beswick and the track towards the lavender fields.

When I was seven, Gideon convinced me that three witches had been buried beneath its roots, and I spent most of that summer leaving saucers of milk in exchange for curses on everyone who had wronged me. Not one of them suffered so much as a troublesome rash for years. But the pestilence has since taken four of them, which means either the witches were remarkably patient or they just required far more milk than I provided.

As we step out from beneath the sprawling branches, Beswick’s roofs rise before us, smoke drifting from their chimneys into the dusk.

We’ve barely crossed into the parish when Thomas Bell rounds the bend ahead with an armful of kindling. He stops dead, and the bundle slips from his grasp, clattering across the road. His eyes travel slowly from my muddied self to the wide-brimmed hat and bone-pale mask.

Then he wheels around and runs.

“She's alive!” he bellows towards the first row of cottages. “Miss Ophelia's come back, and she's fetched one with her!”

By the time we turn into the main lane, Thomas has already spread the news with all the discretion of a town crier. Doors stand open along the road. People lean from windows or gather beneath their lintels in hastily thrown shawls, every face turning towards me with the same startled relief.

Then, Iscairn steps around the bend behind me. A ripple of hushed voices trails in our wake, catching and passing from doorway to doorway like a spark to kindling.

“The Lord's heard us.” “Brother Gideon's prayers have been answered.” “God's sent us a physician.”

The church doors fling open as we reach the square. Gideon hurries out, pulling up short on the top step the moment he spots us. Brother Matthias and Brother Leon hover pale-faced at his shoulder. For a heartbeat, Gideon just stares. Then he crosses the cobblestones in a few long strides and reaches for me.

I plant my hands against his chest to shove him back. “Gideon, have you lost your mind? The pestilence⁠—”

But he ignores the warning. Pushing past my hands, he pulls me into a desperate, crushing embrace—something he hasn’t done since our mother’s burial.

“You are filthy,” he breathes into my hair.

“I am aware.”

He holds me at arm’s length, his fingers clutching at my sleeves. “The mule came back hours ago. She trotted into the churchyard covered in mud, dragging a snapped rein with your bags still on her back, and I thought you were dead. I’ve had every standing soul in this parish on their knees in the nave, praying for your return. The Lord has brought you home, Ophelia. Do you understand what has been asked and answered here today?”