The doctor was nodding to my words. He pursed his mouth, seemed on the verge of saying something, hesitated and then said, ‘I think it’s for the best that you do go home for a time. Travelling by ship?’
‘Part of the way. Then I’ll do the rest by horseback. I’ll go more swiftly by road than on a vessel fighting the spring floods. I’ve my own horse in the Academy stables. Sirlofty didn’t get much exercise over the winter. This journey will put both of us back into condition.’
He smiled wearily as he settled into his desk chair. ‘Well. Let’s pray that it does. You can go, Nevare. But check back with me next week, if you’re still here. Don’t make me remind you.’
‘Yes, sir.’ I dared a question. ‘How is your research progressing?’
‘Slowly.’ He scowled. ‘I am at odds with my fellow physicians. Most of them persist in looking for a cure. I tell them, we must find out what triggers the disease and prevent that. Once the plague has struck, people begin to die quickly. Preventing its spread will save more lives than trying to cure it once it has a foothold in the population.’ He sighed, and I knew his memories haunted him. He cleared his throat and went on, ‘I looked into what you suggested about dust. I simply cannot see it being the cause of the disease.’ He seemed to forget that I was merely a cadet and, leaning back in his chair, spoke to me as if I were a colleague. ‘You know that I believe the onset of the plague and the swiftness of its spread mean that sexual contact cannot be the sole method of contracting it. I still believe that the most virulent cases stem from sexual contact …’
He paused, offering me yet another opportunity to admit I’d had carnal knowledge of a Speck. I remained silent. I hadn’t, at least not physically. If cavalla soldiers could contract venereal disease from what we dreamed, none of us would live to graduate from the Academy.
He finally continued, ‘Your theory that something in the dust that the Specks fling during their Dust Dance could be a trigger appealed to me. Unfortunately, while I did my best to gather data from the sickened cadets before they became too ill to respond, the disease took many of them before they could be questioned. So we shall never know exactly how many of them may have witnessed a Dust Dance and breathed in dust. However, there are several flaws in your theory. The first is that at least one cadet, Corporal Rory Hart, witnessed the Dust Dance and had absolutely no symptoms of plague. He’s an unusual fellow; he also admitted to, er, more than casual contact with the Specks themselves, with no ill effect. But even if we set Rory aside as an individual with exceptionally robust health, there are still other problems with your theory. One is that the Specks would be exposing themselves to the illness every time they danced the dance. You have told me you believed that the Speck deliberately sowed this illness among us. Would they do it at risk to themselves? I think not. And before you interrupt—’ he held up a warning hand as I took breath to speak, ‘— keep in mind that this is not the first outbreak of Speck plague that I’ve witnessed. As you might be pleased to know, the other outbreak I witnessed was close to the Barrier Mountains, and yes, the Specks had performed a Dust Dance before the outbreak. But many of their own children were among those stricken that summer. I can scarcely believe that even primitive people would deliberately infect their own children with a deadly disease simply to exact revenge on us. Of course, I suppose it’s possible that the dust does spread the disease, but the Specks are unaware of it. Simple, natural peoples like the Specks are often unaware that all diseases have a cause and hence are preventable.’
‘Maybe they face the disease willingly. Maybe they think that the disease is more like a, uh, like a magical culling. That the children who survive it are meant to go on, and that those who die go on to a different life.’
Dr Amicas sighed deeply. ‘Nevare, Nevare. I am a doctor. We cannot go about imagining wild things to try to make a pet theory make sense. We have to fit the theory to the facts, not manufacture facts to support the theory.’
I took a breath to speak, and then once more decided to give it up. I had only dreamed that the dust caused the disease. I had dreamed that it was so and my ‘Speckself’ believed it. But perhaps in my dreams, my Speck half believed a superstition, rather than knowing the real truth. I gave my head a slight shake. My circling thoughts reminded me of a dog chasing its own tail. ‘May I be dismissed, sir?’
‘Certainly. And thank you for coming.’ He was tamping more tobacco into his pipe as I departed. ‘Nevare!’ His call stopped me at the door.
‘Sir?’
He pointed the stem of his pipe at me. ‘Are you still troubled by nightmares?’
I fervently wished I’d never told him of that issue. ‘Only sometimes, sir,’ I hedged. ‘Other than that, I sleep well.’
‘Good. That’s good. I’ll see you next week, then.’
‘Yes, sir.’ I left hastily before he could call me back.
The spring afternoon had faded and evening was coming on. Birds were settling in the trees for the night, and lights were beginning to show in the dormitories. The wind had turned colder. I hurried on my way. The shadow of one of the majestic oaks that graced the campus stretched across my path. I walked into it, and in that instant, felt a shiver up my spine, as if someone had strolled over my grave. I blinked, and for a moment, a remnant of my other self looked out through my eyes at the precisely groomed landscape, and found it very strange indeed. The straight paths and careful greens suddenly looked stripped and barren to me, the few remaining trees a sad remnant of a forest that had been. The landscape was devoid of the true randomness of natural life. In true freedom, life sprawled. This vista was as lifeless and as unlovely as a glass-eyed animal stuffed for a display case. I was suddenly acutely homesick for the forest.
In the weeks following my recovery, I had dreamed of the Tree Woman, and in my dreams I was my other self, and she was beautiful. We strolled in the dappling light that fell through the leafy shade of her immense trees. We scrambled over fallen logs and pushed our way through curtains of vines. Fallen leaves and forest detritus were thick and soft beneath our bare feet. In the stray beams of sunlight that touched us, we both had speckled skin. She walked with the ponderous grace of a heavy woman long accustomed to managing her weight. She did not seem awkward, but majestic in her studied progress. Just as an antlered deer turns his head to manoeuvre a narrow path, so did she sidle past a network of spider webs that barred our way. The untidy, unmastered, lovely sprawl of the forest put her in context. Here, she was large, lush, and beautiful as the luxuriant life that surrounded us.
In my first vision of her, when the plainsman Dewara had told me she was my enemy, I had perceived her as very old and repulsively fat. But in the dreams I’d had following my recovery from the Speck plague, she seemed ageless, and the pillowed roundness of her flesh was abundant and inviting.
I had told Dr Amicas about the occasional vivid nightmares I had. I had not mentioned to him that my erotic dreams of the forest goddess far outnumbered the horrid ones. I always awoke from those dreams flushed with arousal that quickly became shame. It was not just that I lustfully dreamed of a Speck woman, and one of voluptuous fleshiness, but that I knew that some part of me had consorted with her, in passion and even love. I felt guilt for that bestial coupling, even if it had occurred in a dream world and was without my consent. It was treasonous as well as unnatural to mate outside my race. She had made me her lover and tried to turn me against my own people. A dark and twisted magic had been used to convert me to her uses. The threads of it still clung to my thoughts, and that was what pulled my soul down to those dark places where I still desired her flesh.
In my dreams of her, she often cautioned me that the magic now owned me. ‘It will use you as it sees fit. Do not resist it. Put nothing you care about between you and the magic’s calling, for like a flood, it will sweep