Ruelle
The modified compound is dark gray in the vessel, Magnelle’s carrier combined with my sulfur chelation agents, mixed through the night while she told me the truth about Perin and the truth about the doors I thought were locked against me.
My eyes are swollen from the crying. My hands are steady.
“Turn around,” I tell him. “This is going to take hours.”
He pulls the vest off and turns. The position is familiar now: him cross-legged on the stone, me behind him, the long channel of his gland line exposed from nape to waist. I spread the compound along my palms and press them to his back.
He goes rigid. “Cold.”
“The carrier activating. Give it a minute.”
The minute passes, and the cold becomes heat, deep and pulling, the compound drawing the contamination out through the channels.
I work for an hour. The compound darkens on my palms as it pulls contamination from the outer gland tissue, the color shifting from gray to a muddy black, and his breathing steadies, the tension in his back easing.
“The tremor,” he says. His hands are in front of him. “It’s less.”
His is better. Mine isn’t. My left hand shakes against his back and I don’t mention it. But he’s right; the constant vibration has dropped to something barely visible.
I wipe my hands and pick up the assay stone, take the pipette, draw a drop of blood from the edge of the treated area on his back, press it to the crystal surface. Red blooms. Gold blooms. The dark trace at the edges is fainter than I’ve ever seen it.
“It’s working.” My voice catches and I don’t care. “The outer tissue is clearing.”
I mix more compound and apply it again. Another hour. The color comes back in front of me, pushing into areas that have been ash-gray for months, and by the third hour the outer gland tissue is clean, the dark trace gone from the surface readings entirely.
His production rate drops; I feel it through my palms, the gland line calming, the overproduction easing into something steadier.
“How do you feel?”
“Like someone rebuilt me from the inside.” He turns to look at me, clear, present. “Is it done?”
I press deeper, into the dense tissue at the core of the gland channels. The compound hits the deep channels and slows. Not stops. Slows.
I press harder, more compound, a different angle. It goes further than anything I’ve tried, but the deepest contamination holds.
I try three more times. Each attempt reaches a fraction deeper, and each attempt plateaus at the same boundary.
I sit back and wipe my hands on my trousers. “Eighty percent,” I say. “Maybe eighty-five. The outer tissue is clean. The deep channels won’t clear. The contamination is too embedded for the compound to reach.”
He’s quiet.
“Your production rate is down significantly. The surface damage is reversing. The tremor is better. I can keep you alive for years like this. The salve, the bites, the partial repair. It’s a managed condition. You’re not dying.”
“But.”
“But the deep contamination will keep driving overproduction in the bonding fraction. Slower. Manageable. Not gone.”
I put the stone down, and he turns to face me. He puts his hand on the back of my neck, his fingers resting against my hair.
“So what now?” he says.
“Now we manage it. You’re stable. You’re not dying.”
“And your tolerances?”
“Still declining. Slower, with the repair. But still.”
He’s quiet, his thumb moving against the side of my neck.
“We’ll figure it out,” I say. “One problem at a time. The soldiers first.”