gave the faintest shake of his head. “How did this happen?”
Killian cleared his throat. “We had the horses out for a run. She leapt a fence and landed in a ditch filled with blight. We got her out, but she was covered in it.”
The Grand Master knelt next to the horse, his hand resting on her neck, eyes unfocused and yet somehow intent. Then he pointed at her forelegs. “She was injured?”
Killian nodded. “Scraped up her forelegs getting out.” Then he looked at his own hands, which had been nicked and scraped in the same ordeal. “I’m fine.”
“You’re marked, Lord Calorian,” the Grand Master replied. “I think you are not a good test case.” Then his gaze shifted to Malahi. “What of you, my lady? You were there as well, yes?”
Killian’s chest tightened, but Malahi had a lifetime of experience hiding her mark. “I was wearing gloves. Everything I was wearing was burned. And I’ve no open wounds.”
“That might well be all that saved you from this fate.”
Killian’s stomach churned with nausea. Lydia had stepped in the blight on her way from the xenthier stem to the city, and her bare feet had been scraped bloody. But she’d also been marked less than two hours later. His palms turned to ice at the thought of what would’ve happened if she had not.
Quindor was still frowning at Malahi, assessing her in that strange way all healers did their patients. “I think it best if you refrain from leaving the palace grounds, my lady. For your own safety.”
“Never mind me.” Malahi’s voice was fierce. Angry. “What of my horse? The blight closes in on Mudaire with every passing day. We need to know how it infects and whether the effects can be counteracted by a healer.”
The Grand Master exhaled a long breath. “She’s near death. Even if I can reverse the damage, I’ll not save her. Not when there are lines of civilians in front of Hegeria’s temple in need of my strength.”
Pragmatic prick, Killian thought, despite having known Quindor would say as much.
Quindor moved his hands from the horse’s neck to her chest, pausing there. “Strange,” he muttered before shifting so his hands hovered over one of the pulsing veins of black running up the animal’s shoulder. “Dead.”
Malahi turned her head to meet Killian’s eyes. She’d said almost exactly the same thing when she’d tried and failed to drive the blight back.
“Utterly devoid of life.” The Grand Master’s hands flexed, still hovering above the blight. “I’ve never seen anything like it. Not from poison or infection. Not from frostbite or burns. This … this never lived.”
“Obviously that’s not the case,” Malahi pressed. “Can she be healed?”
Quindor didn’t answer, but his reluctance was palpable. Sweat broke out on Killian’s back, all of his instincts screaming a warning, but they had to know if the blight could be fought.
Taking a deep breath, the Grand Master of Hegeria’s temple pressed one hand against the flow of black.
Time seemed to freeze even as panic rose on the man’s face. Killian lunged, catching hold of the healer’s shoulders and jerking him away from the horse, the force of the motion sending them both sprawling.
Clambering upright, Quindor clutched his hand to his chest. “This is an abomination sent by the Seventh!”
“She’s just a sick horse!” Malahi said, resisting Killian’s attempts to move her a safe distance away.
“Not anymore.” The Grand Master eyed the dying animal like she was a venomous snake. “Kill it. Burn the body. The last thing we need is some fool thinking the meat can be salvaged.”
Killian extracted a knife, pushing Malahi out the door to the stall. “She’s my horse,” the Princess snapped. “It was my mistake that caused this, so I’ll put her down myself.”
“Admirable sentiment, my lady,” Quindor said. “But better that Lord Calorian do it. We don’t know for certain yet how the blight infects and we dare not risk your life. Not with a knife, Lord Calorian. It is in the horse’s blood, and the last thing we need is the entire stables contaminated.”
Killian waited until Quindor had led Malahi from the stall; then he moved to the horse’s head. The veins of blight had already risen up her neck, reaching like grasping fingers toward her head. The mare’s breath was coming in great ragged gasps, her brown eyes fixed on him.
He’d had to put animals down before when they were injured beyond hope of recovery, but it had never gotten easier for him. Just as he’d never gotten