Chapter 16: The Fever Breaks?

So that was his plan? To use his own body as a furnace to keep me warm? It was a simple, primitive solution, but it had worked. The thought was strangely touching. If he hadn't held me last night, I have no doubt the nightmare would have continued its assault, tormenting my spirit until it shattered. And perhaps the simple human warmth had helped fight the sickness.

But why was I having those nightmares in the first place? Was it simply the terror of this new, brutal, gaslit world? Or was it the lingering, psychic scar left by that great, cosmic fly—a stain upon my very soul? And stranger still, why had the whispers fallen silent, why had that suffocating, all-seeing gaze retreated the moment Jared held me? Was it because his simple, human presence gave me a sense of security? Was it all just in my mind, a psychological trick against a horror that defied all logic? I didn't know. I couldn't understand it. There were too many questions, and the events were too bizarre, too labyrinthine, for me to form any logical conclusion. But one thing was certain: Jared was truly, profoundly good to the girl he thought was Parula.

Evidence of his quiet, tireless care was all around me. Laid over the blanket I clutched was another layer: the dead man's quilt. The very same one I had refused so vehemently, with such revulsion. While I slept, lost to the world, he had gently covered me with it, adding its meager warmth to my own, prioritizing my life over my strange sensibilities. And in the pot beside me, the water he'd used for cooling the rags was nearly gone. I had asked him to change the cloth on my forehead from time to time, to keep it cool and damp against the raging fever, and he had done so, diligently, throughout the long, dark night. The price of his vigil was clear on his face. Even now, fully awake, he looked exhausted, his movements sluggish, his young face pale in the morning light. He must have been busy all night, tending to me, his own sleep fitful at best. But there was not a trace of impatience in his expression, only a deep, unwavering concern. "Parula," he asked, his voice soft, afraid to wake me too suddenly. "How are you feeling? Is the sickness any better?"

"Ah!" The realization struck me with the force of a physical blow. "I think… I think I'm much better!" My mind, which for the past day had been a thick, feverish fog, was now startlingly, unnervingly clear. The leaden weakness in my limbs had lessened. And most importantly… I touched my forehead. The raging heat that had felt like it was boiling my brain was gone. The fever had broken.

This made no sense. It wasn't scientific. It wasn't natural. Yesterday, I had been so gravely ill I was certain I wouldn't live to see the morning. How could I have recovered so quickly? The speed of it was wrong. I knew my own body—or at least, I knew how human bodies worked. My condition last night was not something one simply recovers from in a single night's sleep. I had been prepared for days, perhaps even weeks, of bedridden, delirious convalescence. Now, while I wasn't fully restored to health, I felt… functional. The worst of the illness, the part that had been dragging me down into the grave, had passed, leaving only a lingering weakness, an echo of its power. I could move. I tentatively sat up, stretching my stiff, frail limbs. It was the first time since my arrival in this world that I had moved on my own volition. Parula's body was so terribly soft and weak. I didn't know if it was from her chronic malnutrition or the aftermath of the severe illness, but even making a fist, clenching my fingers tight, felt like a monumental effort.

I wracked my brain, trying to understand, trying to apply the logic of my old world to the madness of this one. What had happened yesterday? Why had I recovered so quickly? Three unusual, unnatural things came to mind. First, the sudden, monstrous appetite, where I had devoured an impossible amount of spoiled food. Second, the nightmare, the whispers in my sleep, and the feeling of being watched. And third, being forced to drink the polluted, corpse-tainted water from the canal.

The first possibility seemed unlikely. Yes, the hunger was unnatural, but all I had done was eat a large quantity of rancid food. My stomach didn't even hurt, which was a mystery in itself, but I'd never heard of any disease being cured by eating. Quite the opposite. The nightmare was profoundly disturbing, and Jared's tales of whisper-taught physicians were a chilling coincidence, but as a person with a modern, scientific education, I couldn't bring myself to believe that a few cryptic murmurs could cure a raging fever. That wasn't medicine; that was madness.

Which left only the third option. As impossible, as utterly insane as it seemed, after eliminating the other two, it was the only one that remained. My gaze fell upon the canal, its dark, murky water flowing sluggishly past our hovel, carrying the filth and secrets of the city out to some unknown sea. Could it be? Was it because I had drunk the water? Was the poison… also the cure?