CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

It was two days before the gate was due to open and Gantalla’s mind was a riot of thoughts. It had been so easy to get comfortable here, somehow believing that the steady rhythm of the days was the norm. But this was only half of the city’s reality. The other half was weeks at a time spent tending to wounded warriors and listening to frantic rumours about some demon or other that had made it through the gate. Today, the hospital was in a flurry, with everyone rushing around making sure they had enough supplies of bandages and tonics to treat the wounded.

“Gantalla, go and relax!” Henrietta scolded her, when she found Gantalla sorting bandages in the storage room. “You have a half-day off. I know it’s a madhouse around here, but that doesn’t mean you have to stay.”

“I know,” Gantalla said, setting down the latest package of dressings that had arrived. “It’s just… the gate’s about to open. And I’ve never been around here when the warriors were all out at the gate. It just seems…” Her distress was easily disguised as concern about the safety of the men and fears of attacks from the demons, for all that her true fears came from a far different place. How was she going to treat patients who were spending their days slaughtering her people? What about the people from Chalandros trying to enter the human world? Should she be trying to help them? But how was that even possible? There was no chance she’d be able to get anywhere near the gate with so many warriors out on the battlefield. And how was she going to keep pretending to be a human, to take delight in the reports of how many demons had been killed, without giving herself away? Perhaps staying in Minia had been a mistake after all. She should have left for Palashran, getting herself far away from here and anything to do with the gate.

“Your first cycle will be a tough one,” Henrietta said sympathetically. “Some of the wounds we see are quite severe. And no one would think less of you if you need to take a break from it all now and then. We all remember what it’s like to be a trainee.”

Gantalla nodded, trying to put on a brave face. “I’m just not sure what I should be expecting. And with the gate open… It’s hard to imagine what might be coming through.” Or not so much what, but who. People she might know. More unicorns, to be slaughtered like dumb animals. And maybe Mintesh, the witch, with her son. More hadathmet from her own city. The list was endless.

“Go and take a break,” Henrietta told her, turning her around and steering her towards the door. “We’ve got everything here covered for now. Just relax and enjoy the afternoon. There’ll be plenty of time to help with preparations tomorrow.”

Not knowing what else to do, Gantalla headed for the town square. It was a bustling place this time of the afternoon, with women meandering about visiting the shops, traders and messengers racing around to deliver goods, and a few stalls where eager merchants were hawking their wares.

She wandered past a stall selling pots and pans, then another selling miniature pies. She paused in front of a woman selling necklaces and bracelets – nothing as fancy as she’d had in Chalandros, but pretty enough, with coloured feathers and inexpensive gems woven into leather straps. She thought about buying one, having sorely missed the jewellery she’d been forced to trade on her way to the gate.

But then a voice calling her name got her attention and she turned to see Captain Leefe marching across the square towards her.

“Gantalla! I was hoping to run into you at some point.” He beamed at her. “I just wanted to thank you for your help with Liatra’s case. I’ve been told that you were the one who came up with the idea to search June’s room. It’s a terrible situation, of course, but it’s a relief to know we caught the person responsible.”

“I’m glad I was able to help,” Gantalla said. But she still felt a wave of pity for the poor young woman. Her actions had been unacceptable, but Gantalla understood her motives, with the convoluted customs between the serving women and the warriors. “May I ask what happened to June?”

“She’s been discharged from the serving women and she’s to spend the next month in jail. After that, it’s likely she’ll have to leave town. I wouldn’t be surprised if her parents refuse to take her back in. She’d be a slight on the family name. But all’s well that ends well. If we hadn’t caught her, she might well have tried to kill Liatra again. So that’s two lives you’ve saved now.”

“Two? Who else…?”

“That young boy, several weeks ago. I’ve heard all about that heart restarter trick you did. He would have surely died if not for you.”

That, at least, made Gantalla smile. “I was glad to be able to help. And it was so good that all the doctors wanted to learn it as well. They have a wonderful team at the hospital.”

Leefe beamed at her. “Clever and modest at the same time. Well, I have more news for you that might make your day. It seems I’m not the only one who appreciates the way you’ve been helping our town. A couple of days ago, Hallix decided to buy a house. He didn’t say anything specific at the time, but when a warrior does that, it usually means he’s thinking of marriage. No woman wants to live in the barracks when she has a husband and children.

“And just this morning, my suspicions were confirmed. Congratulations, my dear. Hallix has decided he’d like to marry you.”

Gantalla’s jaw dropped. She’d seen Hallix even less in the last few weeks than she’d seen Nalyx, and the man had never once mentioned the idea of marriage. “I… Um… I… What?”

“Isn’t it a marvellous surprise?”

“It’s definitely a surprise,” she managed to say. “I had no idea he felt that way.” That Hallix would think her amenable to marriage without even asking her was insulting. But more than that, she was grossly offended that Hallix would send his proposal by way of a messenger rather than coming to speak to her himself. Back in Chalandros, if a man had wanted to propose to a princess, he would have come to the palace bearing gifts. He would have sat with Gantalla and her father, spending hours detailing his skills and qualities and taken the time to answer any questions they might have had. And then he would have given her a tour of his estate, allowed her to sample the crops he produced, and introduced her to his family. Hallix’s actions were presumptuous to the extreme.

“We have two more nights until the gate opens,” Leefe went on, sounding altogether pleased. “So tomorrow night we’ll have a wedding in the town square. A high note to end on before the gate opens again.”

A wedding? But Gantalla hadn’t even said yes yet. But then she realised that her reply was probably a moot point. From the comments around the town, a proposal from a warrior was considered the greatest of compliments, and what woman in her right mind wouldn’t say yes?

“I don’t think I can marry Hallix,” she said, a sick feeling in her gut. Marry that insufferable oaf? Where the hell had he got that idea from?

But from the look of sudden horror on Leefe’s face, she knew she’d just made a serious blunder. “You would turn him down? One of the finest warriors in my army?”

“No!” Gantalla said, frantically trying to think of a way around this. “What I mean is, I can’t marry him now. The gate’s just about to open and he’ll be away for weeks, so we won’t have a chance to enjoy being married. We should wait until the gate closes, then get married then. It will give me time to have a dress made,” she rambled on, desperate to stall things, even if only for a few weeks. “And just think how pleased the town would be to have a wedding to celebrate at the same time as celebrating the closing of the gate. I think it would be a far better plan to wait until the gate closes again.”

“Ah, I knew you were a clever woman,” Leefe said, sounding much happier now. “It’s a good idea. Very well. I’ll let Hallix know. It’ll give him something to look forward to while he’s dealing with all the demons at the gate.”

Gantalla nodded and forced a smile that she hoped looked genuine. “Excellent. Well, um… I suppose I should go and talk to a seamstress about getting a dress, then. What very exciting news.”

Still beaming, Leefe headed back across the square, leaving Gantalla with her mind in turmoil. Why the hell would Hallix think she wanted to marry him, when she’d done nothing but brush him off?

But the answer came to her a moment later. This was nothing at all to do with him actually liking her – and possibly not even to do with her actions in saving Liatra’s life. It was far more likely that his proposal was motivated by jealousy. He wanted what he couldn’t have, and more to the point, he wanted to stick a knife in Nalyx’s back. Marrying Gantalla would prove once and for all that he was the ‘better’ man, that he’d taken something from Nalyx and won this petty squabble between the two men.

Gods above, this entire town was stark raving mad. And suddenly, the idea of leaving the city was sounding like an excellent plan.

But she didn’t have to go just yet. With the wedding delayed, she had a few more weeks to save up some more money and learn everything she could from the hospital. And then, when she arrived in Palashran, she’d have some skills to land herself a job. Nalyx had said that there was a small hospital in Palashran. Surely they could be persuaded to take her on as an extra nurse?

Mind made up, Gantalla headed swiftly back to the hospital. She could borrow some books from the office and spend the afternoon reading, learning everything she could before she was finally forced to leave.

◊          ◊          ◊

The following morning, Gantalla buried herself in her work. She was tailing Gosta today, the woman back to her usual curt tone as she led Gantalla through the process of bandaging wounds, removing stitches and treating burns. Gantalla made sure to ask plenty of questions and paid attention to every little snippet of information that Gosta tossed her way.

The queue of patients slowed down around lunchtime, and she wolfed down a bread roll and an apple while reading a book on herbal remedies, then it was back to work. She saw a child with a rash, then an elderly woman with an open sore on her arm, and then she spotted a familiar face as she headed back to the reception room to fetch their next patient.

“Afternoon,” Nalyx greeted her, as she saw that he was the next appointment on the list. “How’s it been going?”

“Busy,” Gantalla said, smiling at him. “Everyone’s getting ready for the gate to open. We’re trying to clear as many civilian patients as possible before the warriors head back into battle.” Nalyx, too, was due to go back to the gate tomorrow, and Gantalla couldn’t quite decide how she felt about that. Knowing that he was going to be killing people made her resentful, but at the same time, she found herself dreading the idea of him being hurt. “But what brings you back here?”

“Captain Leefe wanted me to get my shoulder looked at one last time before the gate opens. Just to make sure everything’s healed up properly. I told him it was a waste of time, but he insisted.”

“Well, better safe than sorry,” Gantalla said. “Come through and I’ll have a look for you.” Gosta was still busy preparing a herbal remedy for their last patient, but she’d told Gantalla to get started on the next case and that she would join them in a few minutes, so she led Nalyx through into the consult room. “If you could just take your shirt off, I’ll see how it’s going. Take a seat.”

She gestured to a chair and Nalyx sat down. But now that they were alone, his earlier good mood faded. “Well?” he said, giving her an expectant look as he unbuttoned his shirt.

Gantalla raised an eyebrow. “Well, what? You haven’t even taken your shirt off yet.”

“No, I mean… What about June?”

“What about June?” she asked, feeling baffled.

Nalyx paused, looking at her quizzically. “You’ve got nothing to say about that?”

“What would I have to say? The captain found the mushrooms. The mayor found her guilty. It’s nothing to do with me anymore.”

Nalyx sighed, his hands stilling on his shirt. “You said weeks ago that spending time with two different women could cause problems. So it turns out you were right.”

Gantalla’s brow furrowed as she caught onto his meaning. “And you’re expecting me to want to gloat about that? Are you serious?”

Nalyx shrugged, looking down. “Most women would.”

Gantalla scowled at him. “This town has some really messed up standards for what’s acceptable behaviour. Liatra nearly died and June’s been kicked out of the serving women, she’s disgraced her family and she’s spending the next month in jail. There’s nothing to gloat about.”

“Nothing to gloat about? June tried to accuse you of poisoning Liatra instead, and now you’re just forgetting about it like it never happened?”

“What am I supposed to be doing? Shouting my own praises from the top of the town hall?”

Nalyx shook his head, frowning. “For the first few days you were in town, you did everything for me. Feeding me, bathing me, cleaning my armour. And you never asked for anything in return, not so much as a simple bracelet. If Liatra had been the one to do all that work, she would have been begging jewels from me, left, right and centre. And now you were instrumental in finding the identity of a would-be murderer, but you haven’t asked Captain Leefe for any kind of reward. You make no sense, Gantalla. Why do you never want anything for yourself?”

“There’s plenty of things I want for myself. I want respect. I want to do something useful with my life. I want a home and friends and to know that I won’t have to fight for my life the next time raiders attack my town. But none of that comes about by begging gifts from the warriors or gloating about other people’s misfortune.” She shook her head in exasperation. “Where I come from, a job well done is reward enough by itself. Now, let me look at your shoulder.”

He slipped the shirt off and Gantalla leaned closer to look at the wound. The skin around it had stopped peeling, but it still looked more pink and fragile than a well-healed wound should. “How’s it been feeling?” she asked Nalyx, not sure whether he would be honest about his reply.

“Fine,” he said. “Good as new.”

“And you’ve been training again?”

He nodded. “Of course.” That was interesting. The last few days, she hadn’t seen him in the square with the other men. And she found she couldn’t remember a time when she’d actually seen him handling a sword.

“Lift up your right arm.”

“What?”

“Right above your head. I want to see what your range of motion is like.” He lifted the arm, and Gantalla caught a slight tightening of his jaw as he did so. “What about out to the side?” He did so, but held his arm there for barely a second or two before he was lowering it again. “Any lingering pain? Stiffness in the morning?”

“No, I told you, it’s fine.” He was lying. She was sure of it this time. She looked around, wondering how she could prove it. “Stand up,” she said, waiting while he did so, then she said, “Lift the chair above your head.”

“What? Why?”

“To prove that you can.”

“Of course I can. This is ridiculous.”

She shrugged. “So you say. But it’s just a chair. It shouldn’t be a problem for someone as strong as you.” If she couldn’t gain his cooperation through solid reasoning then poking at his pride might well do the job.

Nalyx muttered a grumble, but picked up the chair. It was sturdy, made of hard wood, and it would have weighed a reasonable amount. He lifted it to shoulder-height without a problem, but the instant he tried to lift it above his head, he winced, his right arm failing, and the chair clattered to the floor.

Gantalla nodded, her suspicions confirmed. “The wound isn’t fully healed. On the surface it looks fine, but underneath, there’s clearly still some damage.” She sighed, knowing he wasn’t going to like what she said next. “You can’t fight with it in that state. You won’t be able to lift your sword above your head.”

“I’m fine!”

“What you are is a liability, both to yourself and to the other warriors you’re fighting with. If you can’t defend yourself, you or someone else is going to end up getting seriously hurt. I’m sorry, Nalyx, but you’re not ready to go back into battle.”

“I am a warrior,” he snarled, glaring at her. “Defending the gate is my only purpose. You can’t just take that away from me. I’m going back into battle tomorrow.”

“Don’t be stubborn. One more week and it should be healed enough to fight. Just wait a few more days, and then-”

“I’m done with this,” Nalyx snapped, grabbing his shirt and pulling it on. “I’m going back to the gate. And there’s nothing you can do to stop me.” He stalked out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

Gantalla sighed, rubbing her eyes in frustration. Terrific. She’d made a diagnosis without waiting for a fully qualified nurse, and in the process, she’d not only insulted a warrior, but also lost her patient. She was going to have a rather awkward report to make to Gosta when her tutor returned.