Across a Star-Swept Sea

“The lower level?” said Persis, sounding skeptical. Her mouth made a perfect, rose-colored O. “Surely there can be no cause to drag my poor Justen out of all this glorious sunlight simply to look in on a few silly patients.”

Noemi cast Persis a weary look and Persis glared at her.

Justen laid a hand on her arm. “Persis, please. This is my job.” He looked at her face to find her eyes blazing with . . . was that anger? That he couldn’t run off and join her for a sail at the drop of a hat? The girl needed to find some sort of occupation. Her only commitments might be keeping up with her wardrobe and pretending to be in love with him, but Justen had serious work to do. The elder Blakes seemed like intelligent, hardworking people. It mystified him that they’d produced such a shallow daughter.

“Lady Blake, I am sorry to disagree with you,” Noemi said, “but whatever your priorities are, I am a medic, and my highest duty is to my patients. I’ve come to the conclusion that Medic Helo here is in a unique position to help them, and so I’m going to ask for his help, whether you approve or not.”

Justen wanted to laugh out loud as the medic scolded the aristo like a child. He wondered if anyone had ever been so strict with Persis in all her life. Of course, Persis had said that she and Noemi were old acquaintances. Maybe that’s why his new boss felt so free with the aristo.

As he watched, Persis’s forehead smoothed out, and she slipped them both a dazzling smile. “Well, I guess we have no choice but to delay our outing.”

Justen and Persis followed Noemi into the building and down a hall to a reinforced door she unlocked with her palmport. As she ushered them inside and down a long staircase punctuated by several other locked doors, she explained.

“This is a very sensitive situation, Medic Helo, and I’m sure you understand why I require your absolute silence on what I’m about to show you.”

Justen frowned. So much security. Was there some sort of unknown plague going on in Albion? What had he agreed to? And why was Noemi letting Persis tag along? Surely if something was supposed to be a secret, you didn’t take the biggest gossip at court to see it. Then again, he supposed Noemi knew how well Persis had kept the secret of her mother’s illness. She probably trusted the aristo to do the same here.

Finally, they passed through the last door and into a large chamber. It had clearly been meant as storage when the sanitarium was first built, but Justen saw that someone had put an effort into making it comfortable. There were many cots in the room, and curtains had been erected to separate sleeping and living areas and to give the occupants more privacy. There were touches of decor, too, colorful cushions and vases of flowers, plants and geothermal lights to make up for the lack of windows. There were more than a dozen patients, all ages, all sexes, some lying on their cots; some being entertained by therapeutic oblets or other games; and some stumbling around, talking to walls or swaying in place. That part was normal enough. DAR patients often passed through these phases. But why the young people? Why were there children in a sanitarium? It was impossible that they could be affected so young. And then, he took notice of something even stranger—every one of these people had natural hair. He hadn’t noted it at first, since he was used to seeing such things in Galatea.

And then it struck him and he reeled back in horror as the full weight of his crimes smacked him in the face.

These were Galateans. They didn’t have DAR.

They were Reduced.

PERSIS HAD BEEN TRYING to get Noemi’s attention for several minutes, but the medic was studiously ignoring her as she showed Justen around the facility and introduced him to the patients. The older woman must be getting desperate for assistance in solving the problems that plagued the Galatean refugees.

That could be the only reason she’d brought Justen into the fold this quickly. Surely Noemi didn’t think this whole campaign Isla dreamed up meant that Persis trusted the Galatean revolutionary with all her secrets. He definitely disapproved of the revolutionaries’ tactics, but he had no love for the displaced aristos. That much Justen had made abundantly clear when he’d met the Seris.

Still, he was a medic, and Persis supposed that, just like Noemi, he subscribed to all those old oaths by which medics swore to put aside all personal feelings and treat sick patients to the best of their abilities. Justen, thanks to his training, might be able to sew up the mortal wounds of his worst enemy.

Persis, if she happened upon a bleeding Citizen Aldred, would be hard-pressed not to kick him around a bit more. Well, as long as she could make sure he wouldn’t survive to tell the tale and wreck her cover.

“The problems with detoxification have been twofold,” Noemi was explaining as she activated an oblet on the nearest tabletop. It sparked to life, emitting a holographic replica of the human brain, colored to indicate areas of damage. “The first is that the younger aristo victims, especially those who were subjected to the drug for long periods of time, have been sluggish in their recovery.” She went on to describe the symptoms and difficulties that the children had been experiencing, and Justen listened, his expression somber and impassive. He nodded from time to time as she spoke, and asked Noemi for details about particular cases. But when Persis lowered her gaze to his broad, skilled medic’s hands, she saw the way he clenched and unclenched them into fists and the stiffness with which he held his arms slightly out from his sides, as if filled with a tension he dare not let loose.

He looked like he wanted to punch something.

“The bigger problem we have recently discovered lies with the reg victims.” She poked at the glowing controls floating before her, and the oblet’s display switched to a new brain model.

The tension migrated up to Justen’s face. “What do you mean?” he asked softly.

Persis moved closer as well. She was no scientist, but she’d accepted responsibility for the refugees long after the Poppy had seen them safely to Albion.

“We’ve only recently received victims of reg origins,” Noemi explained. “While your government began by torturing only aristos, they’ve apparently expanded their reign of terror.”

“Yes,” Justen whispered. “I heard rumors . . .”

“And the regs—they aren’t recovering from the drug.”

Persis’s jaw dropped. In the muffled, blurry distance, she saw Justen nod again, heard him ask indistinct questions of Noemi, heard the older medic’s equally indistinct answers. She barely realized she was backing up until she felt the warm, geoheated wall of the room against her bare spine.

They weren’t recovering. They weren’t detoxing. She was saving them from Galatea, but it was too late— the damage had been done.

“While there appears to be some increase in brain and motor function after a week of detox, they show no signs of regaining their language, motor control, or memories. It’s not just that they seem slower to recover, as the aristo children do. The detoxification is having no effect at all.”

Those poor people. Those poor, poor regs who’d done nothing worse than speak out against the current regime’s cruel methods, only to have that very cruelty foisted upon them in an infinitely worse way. Brain damage. Permanent brain damage.

As bad as Darkening.

And the revolutionaries were doing it to everyone. Adults, children. For crimes and disagreements and even petty revenge plots. If any of her spies were captured, it’s what would happen to them. To her. Persis had thought the Poppy could save them. She’d been wrong.

Persis took several deep breaths and schooled her features into her signature vapidity. Panicking wouldn’t help anything now. She joined Justen and Noemi as they discussed the lab results, keeping her mouth shut and her ears open.

Noemi slid the first brain model up beside the second. “We’ve postulated that the Reduction drug hinders neural pathway functioning and development in the aristo brain, but if you look here”—she pointed at the other —“you can see that the response in the reg’s brain shows a marked difference. Here there is a chemical binding of nerve endings. It seals off neural pathways permanently.”

Justen was simply nodding as if this all made perfect sense. Perhaps to a medic, it did. “What does that mean?” Persis asked. For once, she didn’t have to play stupid. She really did feel out of the loop.

Noemi looked at her, and from the question in the older woman’s eyes, Persis could tell Noemi was wondering how much of Persis’s behavior was just for show. The medic had never had much patience with the subterfuge aspects of the Wild Poppy, but then again, Noemi knew from firsthand experience how difficult it could be for a woman to get things done on this island. Though she was obviously the most talented medic at the sanitarium, she was kept in the role of administrative official while a man was given the chief title. Noemi held a