Step on out ...
Coherent thought gradually returned, bringing sensations with it like trailing roots behind a plow. Savn lay very still and let the mists of his confused dreams gradually fade away, to be replaced by the vapors of true memory. He looked to see if Master Wag was really there; when he saw him, he squeezed his eyes tightly shut, as if he could shut out the sympathetic pain. Then he looked around, staring at anything and everything that wasn’t his Master and wasn’t so terribly hurt.
The room was about ten feet on a side, and smelled slightly dank, but not horribly so. He listened for the sounds of scurrying rodents and was relieved not to hear any. There was a chamber pot in a far corner; judging from the lack of odor, it had not been used. Things could, Savn decided, be much worse.
The light hadn’t changed; he could still see Master Wag huddled against a wall; the Master was breathing, and his eyes were open. Both of his arms seemed to be broken or dislocated, and probably his left leg, too. There were red marks on his face, as from slaps, but no bruises; he hadn’t been in a fight, he had been tortured.
On seeing that Savn was looking at him, the Master spoke, his voice only the barest whisper, as Vlad’s had been after the first fever had broken, but he spoke very clearly, as if he was taking great care with each word. “Have you any dreamgrass?”
Savn had to think for a moment before replying. “Yes, Master. It’s in my pouch.”
“Fetch some out. We have no food, but they’ve left us water and a mug, over in the corner. I haven’t been able to move to get it.”
Savn got the mug of water and brought it back to the Master. He gave him a drink of plain water first, then mixed the dreamgrass into it as best he could without a mortar and pestle. “That’s good enough,” whispered the Master. “I’ll swallow it whole. You’ll have to help me, though. My arms—”
“Yes, Master.” Savn helped him to drink again and to swallow the dreamgrass.
The Master nodded, took a deep breath, and shuddered with his whole body. He said, “You’re going to have to straighten out my legs and arms. Can you do it?”
“What’s broken, Master?”
“Both legs, both arms. My left arm both above and below the elbow. Can you straighten them?”
“I remember the Nine Bracings, Master, but what can we splint them with?”
“Never mind that, just get them straightened. One thing at a time. I don’t wish to go through life a cripple. Am I feverish?”
Savn felt his forehead. “No.”
“Good. When the pain dulls a bit, you can begin.”
“I ... very well, Master. I can do it, I think.”
“You think?”
“Have some more water, Master. How does the room look? Does your face feel heavy?”
The Master snorted and whispered, “I know how to tell when the dreamgrass takes effect. For one thing, there will be less pain. Oh, and have you any eddiberries?”
Savn looked in his pouch, but had none and said so.
“Very well, I’ll get by without them. Now ... hmmm. I’m starting to feel distant. Good. The pain is receding. Are you certain you know what to do?”
“Yes, Master,” said Savn. “Who did this to you?” His eyes flickered, and he spoke even more softly. “His Lordship had it done by a couple of his warriors, with help from ... There is a Jhereg here—”
“I saw him.”
“Yes. They tied me into a chair and ... they wanted me to tell them where the Easterner was.”
“Oh. Did you tell them?”
The Master’s eyes squeezed tightly shut. “Eventually,” he said.
“Oh,” said Savn. The importance of this sank in gradually. He imagined Vlad, lying quietly in the cave with no way of knowing he’d been betrayed. “I wish there was some way to warn him.”
“There isn’t.”
“I know.” But the Easterner had means of receiving a warning. Maybe he’d escape after all. But he’d think that Savn, who had vanished, had been the betrayer. Savn shook his head. It was petty of him to worry about that when Vlad’s life was in danger, and pointless to worry about Vlad’s life when Master Wag was in pain that Savn could do something about. “Can we get more light in here?”
“No.”
“All right.” Savn took a deep breath. “I’m going to undress you now.”
“Of course. Be careful.”
“Then I will—”
“I know what you’re going to do.”
“Do you need more dreamgrass?”
“No.” The Master’s voice was almost inaudible now. He said, “Carry on, Savn.”
“Yes. It is true and it is not true that once there was a village that grew up at a place where two rivers came together. Now, one river was wide, so that one—”
“Shallow and wide.”
“Oh, yes. Sorry. Shallow and wide, so that one could walk across the entire length and still be dry from the knees up. The—”
Master Wag winced.
“—other was very fast, and full—I mean, fast and deep, and full of foamy rapids, whirlpools, rocks, and twisting currents, so that it wasn’t safe even to boat on. After the rivers came togeth—”
The Master gasped.
“—er, the river, which they called Bigriver, became large, deep, fast, but tame, which allowed them to travel down it to their neighbors, then back up, by means of—”
The Master began moaning steadily.
“—clever poles devised for this purpose. And they could also travel up and down the wide, slow river. But no one could travel on the fast, dangerous river. So, as time went on—”
The moans abruptly turned to screams.
“—the people of the village began to wonder what lay along that length, and talk about—”
The screams grew louder.
“—how they might find a way to travel up the river in spite of the dangerous rapids and the swiftness of the current. Some spoke of using the wind, but ...”
Soon Savn no longer heard either his own voice or the Master’s cries, except as a distant drone. His attention was concentrated on straightening the bones, and remembering everything his Master had taught him about using firm, consistent pressure and an even grip with his hands, being certain that no finger pressed against the bone harder or softer than it should, which would cause the patient unnecessary pain. His fingers felt the bones grinding against one another, and he could hear the sounds they made, even through the drone of his own voice, and his eyes showed him the Master turn grey with the pain, in spite of the dreamgrass, but he neither stopped nor slowed in his work. He thought the Master—the real Master, not this wrecked and broken old man he was physicking—would be proud of him.
The story told itself, and he worked against its rhythm, so that the rise in his voice and the most exciting parts of the story came when his hands were busiest, and the patient most needed to be distracted. Master Wag turned out to be a good patient, which was fortunate, because there was no way to render him immobile.
But it seemed to take a very long time.
Savn looked at his Master, who lay back moaning, his ankles cross-bound with strips of his own clothing and his face covered with sweat. Savn’s own face felt as damp as the Master’s looked. Savn started to take a drink of water, saw how much was left, and offered it to the Master along with more dreamgrass. Master Wag accepted wordlessly.
As Savn helped the Master eat and drink, he noticed that his own hands were shaking. Well, better now than while he’d been working. He hoped he’d done an adequate job. The Master opened his eyes and said, “They were about to start on my fingers. I couldn’t let them—”
“I understand, Master. I think I would have told them right away.”
“I doubt that very much,” said the Master, and closed his eyes. Savn moved back against the wall to relax, and, when he tried to lean against it, found that there was something digging into his back. He felt around behind himself, and discovered a bundle jammed into the back of his pants. It took him a moment to recognize it as the good kitchen knife, all wrapped up in a towel.