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“Everything else in here is rare or beautiful or expensive.”

Mordaunt covered the ears of the terrier and told it, “Don’t listen to her.” He turned to Aurienne. “What’s wrong with you? Theyareexpensive, anyway; have you any idea what it costs to bring the vet in for eight dogs?”

Aurienne gave up on understanding his logic; it didn’t appear that there was any at play. “Right. Turn around. Let’s see what’s going on.”

She rubbed the froth of the hlutoform off her palms and fell into that pre-flow state of calm curiosity, of pleasant problem-solving anticipation. As a Haelan, these moments of discovery were what she lived for—the patient being a Fyren notwithstanding. One could, she supposed, get used to anything.

Mordaunt was anxious. His shield of glibness slipped; his eyes were a clouded, worried grey. The hollows under his cheekbones deepened with the clench of his jaw. The scar across his lips whitened. He half tore his collar as he removed it. He had undone his buttons, but forgotten to take off his braces, which got in the way of removing his shirt. He pushed the straps off his shoulders with jerky hands. He made no eye contact with Aurienne, favouring the unlit chandelier above, as a doomed man might eye the sun one last time, waiting to be hanged.

“I’d be surprised if it was the rot,” said Aurienne. “The fact that you can still make your tacn flicker makes me think it’s something else.”

Mordaunt did not answer. Now shirtless, he continued his gallows stare upwards.

“Right,” said Aurienne. “I’ve had a long day and I didn’t conserve my seith. I didn’t expect to need any more before bed. I may be slow.”

Mordaunt gave her a tense nod.

Aurienne pressed her palm to the spot under his clavicle and activated her tacn. As expected, instead of bursting out of her, as it did in the freshness of the morning, her seith verged on the sluggish. She flowed into Mordaunt.

Most of their previous healing sessions had him facing away from her. This time, she could see his face. His mouth, normally broad with insufferable smiles, was pressed into an unhappy line. Inch by exploratory inch, Aurienne trickled her way through his decaying seith channels.

“Am I done for?” asked Mordaunt.

“Be quiet,” said Aurienne.

Mordaunt fell into silence. Aurienne’s focus was on her seith, but she could feel him watching her. His breathing was slow and deliberate, but his pulse told the truth and skittered along anxiously under her palm.

In this moment, Mordaunt was devoid of the one thing that gave him power—that made him untouchable—that made him a Fyren.

In this moment, he was mortal.

Aurienne ought to have found his vulnerability enjoyable. She wished she did. She found it merely pathetic.

Seith degeneration could cause excess deposition of extracellular matrix proteins in seith channels. In Mordaunt’s left forearm, Aurienne found exactly that: an obstruction where his decayed lines met the healthy. A lovely, juicy textbook seith embolus, impeding the flow to his tacn.

Aurienne withdrew her hand from his chest.

“And?” he asked in a half whisper. He took a twitchy step towards her, then backed off.

Aurienne wasn’t cruel. She did not keep him suspended in his agonies. “You’ll be all right. A cluster of dead cells has caked up one of your seith channels.”

Mordaunt let out a sigh of relief. He clutched at Aurienne’s wrists, released them immediately, as though burned, and took quick steps around the room. He swung his arms about, hooked them behind his head, and stared at the ceiling.

These vigours expended, he approached Aurienne again. “Like a clot?”

“Exactly like a clot.” Aurienne nodded. “A seith embolus.”

“What do we do?” asked Mordaunt.

“Wedon’t do anything,” said Aurienne. “I clear it.”

“Thank the gods for you,” said Mordaunt.

“Me in particular, yes. This would normally require an embolectomy—an unpleasant procedure with high risk of permanent damage.”

Aurienne waited to be told that she was arrogant. The comment did not come. Instead, Mordaunt observed her with a conflicted expression of unwilling regard, of reluctant appreciation.

“So you can fix it?” he asked. “Now?”