Casket of Souls

street,” the priest explained. “Only the Maker knows how much time they have.”
    “Or how many don’t get brought to us,” the woman added sadly.
    Valerius examined the little child and the old woman closely, then grasped his staff, muttered some spell, and laid his hand on the old woman’s chest. She didn’t stir. “Have you tried sparis root and rabbit vetch?” he asked the priest in charge.
    “Yes, Brother, and lania bark with spleen water, bitter saw grass, and Zengati salts. As you can see, nothing has any effect.”
    “What do you think?” Alec asked when Valerius stood up again.
    “I’ve seen other maladies that leave the stricken ones catatonic like this.” Valerius scratched under his unruly beard. “It’s closest to some form of Kalian falling sickness but there’s no sign of jaundice. And even if it was, one of those remedies should have helped them.”
    “Thero wondered about epilepsy,” Alec told him.
    “But you can’t catch epilepsy, can you?” asked Seregil.
    “Not that we know of, but we also don’t know what causes it,” Valerius told him. “And the salts should have brought them around.”
    “It could be some form of plague that causes epilepsy,” Alec suggested. “But Seregil and I haven’t caught it yet, and we’ve been close to it. Same for the drysians who tend to them.”
    “Often, there’s no rhyme or reason to who catches plague,” Valerius told him. “Sometimes it takes the old and sick. Sometimes it takes the young and healthy, and it’s never all of one and none of the other. This one seems to strike children the most often, but you have a few of the old and ill.”
    “What about Nais, though?” Alec pointed out. “He was young, and healthy as far as I know. And he doesn’t look like he’s been sick.”
    Valerius arched a bushy black brow. “And you can tell that by looking at him, can you, Brother Alec?”
    “No, I didn’t mean to—”
    “Don’t jump down his throat, Valerius. He’s concerned,” Seregil warned.
    Valerius gazed around the room, expression softening a little. “It’s most certainly some new disease, and given where it’s been observed, I’d say it’s something brought in by sailors, as usual, or some trader. I’ve seen stranger things. As it is, though, I have no choice but to tell Prince Korathan.” He mopped his brow. “I can’t say I’m looking forward to it, though.”
    “Well, he is a good deal easier to deal with than his sister,” Seregil pointed out with a smile. “But the Rhíminee merchants and the nobles who back them won’t like losingcustom to smaller ports up the coast, or beyond the Cirna Canal if he decides to close the Lower City, especially on account of an illness that strikes down only those in the most wretched wards.”
    “Which is why the vicegerent relies on me and not them to judge such things.”
    “Maybe whatever it is will pass when the heat breaks,” said Alec.
    “Perhaps,” said Valerius, but he didn’t sound particularly hopeful. “I think it might be best if you two come with me to speak with Korathan, since you’ve seen more of it than I.” He cast a baleful look in the direction of the priest. “I should send him, so he can explain why he kept all this secret, but I see no point in wasting the prince’s time.”
    The prince’s formal audience hours had not yet begun in the great hall. A servant led them instead through the royal household to the queen’s garden, where Korathan was taking breakfast alone and reading a tall stack of correspondence as he did so. Seregil hid a smile at the prince’s look of surprise as he and the others bowed.
    Korathan rose and took Valerius’s hand, then raised an eyebrow at Seregil and Alec. “You two again? This is unexpected.”
    “Please forgive the early intrusion, but we bring word of a matter of the utmost importance,” the drysian replied. “A new sickness has appeared in the Lower City and over a hundred people have died.”
    The prince’s pale eyes narrowed dangerously at that. “And this is the first I’m hearing of it?”
    “I only heard of it this morning, and from these two,” Valerius explained.
    Korathan glanced at Seregil. “You certainly are busy fellows.”
    The drysian went on. “The priests and healers down there have been trying to study it and manage it themselves, but it continues to spread. Last night Alec found a man in the Upper City, who’d apparently come up through the Harbor