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“Is everything all right, Ahlam? You haven’t seemed yourself today,” Danica asks without lifting her eyes from the potion she is making, just another healing poultice that won’t do enough.
The motions are practised enough now that Danica catches herself dreaming of blue mountain flowers in neat rows, of butterfly wings torn from the body, sabrecat eyes blank and sightless in their sockets like the corpses of the men she couldn’t save rotting in their graves. She isn’t much of an alchemist, but Arcadia was kind enough to pass along the recipe out of charity, averting her eyes from Danica’s hollow eyes and slumped shoulders.
It’s a moment’s work to grind the mixture together until it runs healing-red like lifesblood Danica swears she can feel flaking in rusty fragments under her nails, no matter how she scrubs. There is always another boy, too young for all of this, needing his flesh stitched together like a reckless child’s clothes, slipping out of himself with organs soft and pulsing against Danica’s hands, never steadier than when covered in blood. There is always another child with bones needing setting, fearful eyes and the plea they always make, the assurance that she can’t give – barely grown and already crippled.
Her hands shake too badly to cap the bottle, so she lets them rest, blinking until her dry eyes burn and sting in the purifying smoke scenting Kynareth’s temple.
It’s a slow enough day that she can afford such moments of indulgence, a rare enough day when no body casts hillocks among the shadows straining the temple floor in deepening pools, when no wounded soldier groans and begs for something Danica cannot give. Even her dedicated acolyte Jenssen is gone, making a house call to a farmer too ill to stir from his bed. Times when the two of them are alone within the temple walls are times to be savoured, melting the moment caught like winter’s first snowflake on the tongue.
“It’s nothing, I just...” Ahlam hesitates, but has the good grace to be embarrassed when Danica raises an eyebrow. “It’s Nazeem. How did we get to this point, Danica? Is there no love left between us?” Her query is bitter, and Kyne’s mercy, even with the blood of children on her hands it is still Ahlam’s pain that makes Danica’s heart crack and bleed with each beat.
“Oh, dearest,” Danica sighs, not without sympathy, wrestling a strained sort of smile that seems to come quicker with Ahlam’s eyes glittering in the light of the candles and weak sun. “Who cares? So your husband is a lout.”
Ahlam snorts a little at that, turning her head away, but Danica presses on, reaching involuntarily over the table to touch Ahlam’s palm with her fingertips, the smallest brush to gain her attention. Ahlam’s body cants towards her, though her eyes examine the window as if it holds the secrets of Kynareth herself.
“The work you do here, with me, is invaluable.” Danica fixes her stare on Ahlam, wills her to meet her eyes and read the truth there. She aims for humour, but her words come out quiet and sincere. “The people of Whiterun know your true worth.”
The moment wavers and stretches. For a brief second, Ahlam says nothing, only looks down at her hands, skin dark against the freshly washed bandages she is rolling up, at Danica’s stretched over the table, its stress-shake stilled by her proximity; only Ahlam can still the quivering, Ahlam and desperation. They are close enough that Ahlam could brush Danica’s hand with her smallest finger, if she chooses to.
Then it snaps. Danica remembers herself, withdraws, and Ahlam makes a swallowed noise that is possibly supposed to sound like a laugh.
“Oh, you are terrible,” she says, tilting her head and her smile seeming to brighten the rays of the sun itself, “You do know that, right?”
Danica smiles back. “Help me cap this, would you?” she asks, sliding the finished health potion across the table.
Perhaps it will save the next poor soul begging for Kyne’s mercy. Perhaps. Danica is so tired of uncertainties.
Danica makes another twelve potions before the light grows deep and crimson-orange through the stained glass windows of the temple. They pass the time, as they always do, sometimes talking, sometimes in silence, moving in that slow, practised way that those who are well familiar with one another do, until every silence feels like a deeper conversation passed between eye and hand, a communing of gestures. It is good work; when the front next sends soldiers scurrying home like leaves blown by the wind with holes torn all through their delicate skins, the ones who make it will have scrubbed pallets and washed bandages tight-rolled waiting for them. It will not save them all. Perhaps it will save some. Perhaps.
Sunset comes and Ahlam must go.
To her husband, to cook his dinner and warm his bed, she leaves with laughter at some parting quip on Danica’s part, but as the door closes the shadows sink their teeth in. Danica’s hands quiver and shake, juddering all the way up to the elbow as she fumbles to keep a hold on the broom. Its stiff bristles catch and jar on the smooth temple floor Danica once took such pride in keeping as brightly polished and sparkling as a pearl. Now it is closer to day-old milk forgotten in its churlish bucket. The broom’s bristles hiss, like the chittering demons from her dreams crouching in the skulls of those she failed, as she sweeps.
There is not enough time. There is never enough time. One day it will be enough.
Outside, the noise of Whiterun will be softening and crushing, drawing deep within itself for the long, slow night. Jorrvaskr’s fires will still be burning, the rough voices of Companions Danica can’t hear through thick stone walls but knows are there rising to the night sky like wolves howling to the moon. In the isolation of the temple’s thick walls and echoing silence, time is tangential, unchanged save for bigger pools of yellow wax at the bases of shorter candles.
As ever, Danica works until the stalwart candles are guttering at the end of their wick, greasy smoke dwindling to a thread of grey to be brushed out by tomorrow’s wind. When the light grows so dark that she cannot see by squinting, she surrenders to the call of the night, hanging up her tools and shuffling like a creature already dead to the bundle of furs rolled against the wall in her little alcove.
From there, it is simple, mechanical work to strip her robes and wash her body, patting at sore muscles that scream and protest as she bends and twists with stale washwater Jenssen would have remembered to change if he was here. The draughty temple is warm enough that Danica usually gets by in an undershift so long as she rolls up warm in the soft furs, but she never has felt the cold; Kyne’s breath is in the cold wind, every goosebump is her kiss.
No sooner has Danica closed her eyes gratefully then the temple door scrapes open. Slippered feet brush on the fresh-swept stone, and for a single selfish moment, Danica wars with her duty, every inch of her abused body crying out for a glimpse of rest. Her intruder’s breath hitches into a sob, and Danica sighs silently. As ever, her honour prevails, and Danica stiffly sits up, calling out to the intruder in a low, exhausted voice. Her work is never done. But she will work until it ends or she does.
“Who goes?”
“Oh – Danica, it’s me,” and Ahlam appears, her voice soft and hoarse and familiar, eyes shining wetly in the light of the moon silhouetting her from the skylight, “Don’t get up.”
Unwilling to argue much, Danica slumps back onto her elbows, tears of her own nearly raised at the pain in her back. She is barely aged and already too old for this. Too old when those dying in droves have only begun to live.
“I’m sorry,” Ahlam says, “I needed – to be with someone, and I couldn’t think of… but I can leave if I’ll disturb you.”
“Don’t be foolish, dearest,” Danica says, her voice much too warm in the dark, and Ahlam’s silver-struck form moves closer, shadowing Danica, kneeling beside her with her eyes like stars and hair bound for bed, just one curl escaping to tickle the curve of her cheek. Danica’s slow, tired mind wonders if it is as soft as it looks in this forgiving darkness. “What happened? Where is Nazeem?”
The questions push like stones from her chest, and even in the dark she can see Ahlam’s lips drawing thin, can hear the repressed anger and frustration in her voice.
“He didn’t deign to tell me where he plans to be and I’ve had enough of sleeping on my own,” Ahlam spits. She hesitates and at last Danica’s mind catches up and she realises what Ahlam is truly here for even as Ahlam reaches for Danica’s hand holding the furs to her chest. Her hand settles there, not pushing, fingers curling into the warm darkness beneath the furs, knuckles brushing skin that thunders with the pulse of Danica’s heart.
“May I?” Ahlam asks, nothing like venom in her now, something instead as whispery and unrestrainable as the wind itself.
“Of course,” Danica says immediately, because Ahlam has never needed to ask. “… Are you sure this is wise, Ahlam?”
“If the war comes to Whiterun we may be dead in a week,” Ahlam says, her voice barely above a murmur. “I don’t care about what’s wise.” She pauses, trying to study Danica’s face in the darkness. “Do you?”
Danica would have liked to pretend that she thinks it over, let possibilities and scenarios run through her mind, considerations from every angle. But in truth, Danica is tired of uncertainties, and simply whispers, “Come here.”
Ahlam slips under with her, and there is a moment of awkwardness as they shift jabbing elbows and bony knees around until they are settled, curled like matching spoons under the warmth of the furs.
Ahlam exhales a sigh as Danica’s arm tentatively rests over her ribs. The tension leaves her quickly, yielding quick to sleep as if there is nothing easier than sleeping in another’s arms. Despite her exhaustion, it is Danica who lies awake, nose pressed against the soft fabric covering Ahlam’s hair, each breath full of her. Yet when the dark finally reaches out to claim her, Danica sleeps without nightmares for the first time in months.