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“I’m not going there,” Tomus said, and I could tell he was putting words to thoughts most of the other students had. “It’s not worth it. Just get us internships at the Governor’s Hospital.”

The Governor’s Hospital treated the sick just like any other hospital. But the difference was in the types of patients. The Governor’s Hospital catered to the rich: old women with colds who decided they needed round-the-clock care; children of wealthy families who were overprotective and needed assurances that the sniffles weren’t the plague; men who attempted gardening as a gentleman’s pursuit and needed blisters lanced.

“Here’re the schedules for the quarantine hospital,” Master Ostrum said, ignoring Tomus. “Anyone who works a shift need not attend any lectures that day.”

Then he left.

For a moment, everyone waited. We were used to lessons with Master Ostrum in the morning, directives on what to focus our studies on. Not this abruptness. Master Ostrum hadn’t even given the class information on the day’s lectures.

Tomus was the first to stand. He made a show of loudly picking up his bag, clomping over the hardwood floors to Master Ostrum’s desk, selecting a timetable, and crushing it in his fist. He let the wadded paper fall into the wastebasket by Master Ostrum’s chair and left the room. The others started moving as if they awoke from a trance, but while they didn’t make a show of rejecting the quarantine hospital’s schedule as much as Tomus had, none of them picked up a paper for themselves either.

Grey stood, and I found that my breath had caught as I waited to see what would happen next.

He went to Master Ostrum’s desk and picked up a timetable.

I let out a sigh of relief before I crossed the room and did the same.

Grey was waiting for me outside the classroom. “If we hurry,” I said, “we can catch the first ferry.”

His eyes were on the paper. “I...” His voice trailed off. “I think I’ll go after midterms. I have to finish my essay.”

I couldn’t hide my disappointment.

“I will,” Grey insisted. “I promise.”

“Yeah.” I shouldered my bag and headed toward the gate. “Okay.”

•••

When I arrived at the hospital, a potion maker gave me a quick tour of the different wings.

“You can start with elderly care,” he said, pausing in the corridor that led to the east wing.

“I’m only here for the Wasting Death,” I said. “I’m not volunteering for anything else.”

The potion maker looked down his nose at me.

“I was sent by Master Ostrum,” I added, “and I came prepared.” I showed the potion maker my golden crucible in my bag, the one I’d made myself, etching in the runes with my own hands under Master’s Ostrum’s guidance.

“Your funeral,” the potion maker said, dumping me in the west wing.

The alchemists and potion makers of the communicable disease wing were more harried than anywhere else. New patients arrived with every ferry, and already they were pulling beds from other parts of the hospital to double and triple occupy the rooms. There was talk of evacuating the mental illness ward to make room, and anyone who didn’t have the Wasting Death upon arrival was sent away to one of the other hospitals.

I approached the check-in desk. Two potion makers were talking with the receptionist, their heads bent over a news sheet.

“Hi,” I said.

“Be with you in a minute,” the receptionist replied, not taking his eyes off the paper.

“‘In an unprecedented move, the governor has declared a state of emergency,’” one of the potion makers read aloud. “‘The Emperor has made no comment, yet continues his residency in the palace.’”

“Bit odd, that,” the other potion maker said. “If I were him, I’d hightail it back to the mainland.”

“This is going to be trouble for us,” the first one said. “The more people hear about this sickness, the more they’ll come here when they have nothing but a cold.”

“I can help with that,” I said.

They finally looked at me.