Rose unrolled a parchment on her lap. “This is a list of names I’ve compiled of everyone who has succumbed to the sickness in Hemkirk. I can’t find any kind of pattern as to why these were affected and not others. There’s no pattern in age, gender, or anything else that I can see. Sicknesses like these are normally contagious but there are numerous times in this case where one or two members of the same family have fallen ill but the rest haven’t. Sicknesses also usually take the very young and the very old first, but again, the youngsters and the oldsters seem to have gotten away unscathed. I can’t make sense of it. I was hoping you might see something that I can’t.”
She held out the parchment to Agnes who took it with a shaking hand. She glanced at names then back at Rose. “Could ye read it to me? I canna read.”
Rose looked a little taken aback but recovered quickly. “Of course.” She pulled her chair over beside Agnes’s and began reading the names on the list one by one. It was a long list for a village so small and listening to it, Cailean couldn’t blame Agnes or her people for their loss of hope. Perhaps they were right. Perhaps itwasa punishment from God. What else could explain why so many here had been taken?
Agnes listened in silence as Rose read out all the names. “Is there anything that stands out to you?” she asked Agnes finally. “Anything that they all have in common?”
Agnes sat very still, her brow furrowed in concentration. “I dinna…” She began to shake her head and then stopped. Her eyes narrowed. “Wait… it canna be, can it?” She looked up Cailean and then at Rose. “I didnae see it before.”
Cailean took a step closer, towering over the two seated women. “What?” he demanded. “What did ye not see before?”
“Those names ye gave me. Theydohave something in common.”She glanced at Rose and then back at Cailean. “They all make their living out at sea. I dinna meanfromthe sea—we all do that, be that mending nets or gutting the catch when it comes in. I mean the ones who actually go out on the boats. Every single name on that list is a member of a boat crew.” She wiped a shaking hand across her forehead. “That’s why the children and the old havenae been affected.”
“Because they dinna go out on the boats,” Cailean breathed.
“And why family members haven’t caught it off each other,” Rose added. “Because it’s not contracted from people. It’s contracted from the sea.”
Cailean felt something cold settle in his belly. The sickness came from the sea? The thing that they relied on for so much was slowly killing them?
He shook his head. “How can this be?”
“I… I don’t know,” Rose replied, looking a little shaken in turn. “But people need to be told. They have to stay away from the water. In fact, it would be best if everyone moved inland until this is over.”
“Move inland?” Agnes said. “Stay away from the water? How can we do that? We rely on the sea for our livelihood.”
“She’s right,” Cailean said, feeling the words like weights on his tongue. “Such a restriction would never work. Too many people depend on the sea and its bounty to put food on the table.”
“Even if it’s killing them?” Rose snapped.
Cailean shrugged. “Even then. I dinna think they would ever be able to believe that the sea is the source of our woes. They would rather live in ignorance.”
Rose pressed her lips into a flat line, clearly unhappy with this.
Cailean turned to Agnes. “But I want ye and yer people to leave here,” he said. “Come to Dun Mallach. Ye will be housed and fed there until this is over. Ye have already lost too much. I willnae lose anyone else here to this sickness.”
But Agnes only shook her head. “I thank ye for the offer, my laird, but my people willnae come. This is their home, all they’ve ever known. They willnae leave it and neither will I.”
Cailean could force them if needed. He could have a contingent of warriors here in hours and have the people forcibly marched back to Dun Mallach for their own safety. But he knew he wouldn’t. That would only turn them against him and besides, he understood all too well the ties a place could wrap around a person’s heart.
He ran a hand through his hair and let out a long, slow breath. “All right. But if ye change yer mind, ye will have a place at Dun Mallach.”
Agnes gave him a small smile, then climbed wearily to her feet and patted Cailean’s hand. “Ye are a good man, my laird. I know ye will do everything ye can to see us safely through this. I knew yer father in my youth, and he would be proud of the man ye’ve become.”
Cailean didn’t know how to respond to that. He coughed. “Aye, well. We’d better be going.” He placed his hand over Agnes’s. It felt as frail as a bird’s wing in his big paw. “But ye think on what I said. I mean it, Agnes. I dinna wish to lose any more of ye.”
“I know. And I will. Ye have my word.”
He squeezed her hand then pulled the door open, holding it open for Rose to proceed him.
Outside, the villagers were still gathered, but Cailean led Rose through them without a word. They mounted their horses and rode off, leaving Hemkirk and its beleaguered people behind them.
Chapter Ten
Rose pinched thebridge of her nose and leaned back on the stool after checking on her latest patient. She had a headache forming behind her left eye and no pills to help take it off. Perhaps she’d ask Maggie or Beatrice what they used for headaches in this time. Willow bark? Feverfew?
Ifshe got the time, that was. Since they’d returned from Hemkirk, it seemed she hadn’t had a moment to herself.
Seven more patients had arrived at the infirmary while she and Cailean had been away. All with the sickness. All with exactly the same symptoms as the others. And she’d been able to help exactly none of them. Like Drew, all she’d been able to do was put them into that comatose state that at least arrested the sickness.
