The Kingdom of Copper (The Daevabad Trilogy #2) - S. A. Chakraborty Page 0,116

asked eagerly.

Nahri thought back to the carved pictograms she’d noticed when she first found the hospital. “Yes. Why? What are they?”

“The old tribal sigils,” Ali explained. “They were used before we had a shared written language. The great scholar Grumbates once said—”

“Can we not have a history lesson right now? Another one?” Subha clarified, in a tone that made Nahri suspect the walk to the hospital in the company of the chatty prince had been a long one. Her gaze darted around the courtyard like she expected some sort of magical beast to leap out and attack. “Well … it certainly looks like this place has been abandoned for fourteen centuries.”

“Nothing we can’t fix.” Nahri plastered a grin on her face. She was determined to win over the other healer today. “Would you like some refreshments before we take a tour? Tea?”

“I’m fine,” Subha replied, her expression displeased. “Let’s just get this over with.”

The blunt refusal of her hospitality ruffled something very deep in the Egyptian part of her heart, but Nahri stayed polite. “Certainly.”

Ali stepped in. “I tracked down the hospital’s old plans and had a Daeva architect at the Royal Library go through them with me to draw up notes for us to follow.”

Nahri was taken aback. “That was a good idea.”

“Yes. It is almost as if history lessons are useful,” he sniffed, plucking out one of his scrolls and spreading it before them. “This was always a courtyard. The architect said there were notes about it containing a garden.”

Nahri nodded. “I’d like to keep it that way. I know my patients in the infirmary enjoy the occasional chance to walk around my gardens now. It lifts their spirits.” She glanced at Subha. “Does that seem correct to you?”

The doctor narrowed her eyes. “You did see where I worked, yes? Do you imagine us getting some air near the local uncollected trash piles?”

Nahri flushed. She was itching to find a commonality with this fellow female healer, a physician who, in the brief time Nahri had watched her, seemed to have an abundance of the professional confidence Nahri was still pretending at. She doubted Subha shook like a leaf before new procedures, or desperately prayed she didn’t kill someone every time she performed surgery.

Ali was peering at his notes. “According to this … that domed chamber there was used for humoral disorders of air. It says that tethers were set in the floor to prevent people from injuring themselves while floating …”

“And that?” Nahri prompted, pointing to a line of crumbling columns. She suspected Subha was not ready to discuss rooms designed to enclose flying djinn. “It looks like a corridor.”

“It is. It leads to a surgical wing.”

That sounded more promising. “Let’s start there.”

The three of them headed down the twisting path. The dirt was soft underfoot, the sun shining in bright swaths through the overgrown trees. The air smelled of old stone and fresh rain. It was humid, and Nahri fanned herself with an edge of her linen chador.

The silence between them was heavy. Awkward. And try as she might, Nahri couldn’t forget that the last time Daevas, Geziris, and shafit had been together in this place, they had all been brutally killing one another.

“I’ve been discussing funding options with the Treasury,” Ali said, an oddly pleased smile playing across his mouth. “And after a visit from my companion Aqisa, I find the Ayaanle trade envoy suddenly far more eager to offer financial assistance.”

Subha shook her head, glancing about in dismay. “I cannot imagine turning this into a functioning hospital in six months. With several miracles, perhaps you could do it in six years.”

A golden-brown monkey chose that particular moment to leap over their heads with a screech, jumping from the trees to land upon a broken pillar. It glared at them as it munched a mushy apricot.

“We’ll, ah, have the monkeys cleared out right away,” Nahri said, mortified.

The corridor came to an abrupt stop. The surgical wing was enclosed by thick brass walls that towered overhead, and the one in front of them was covered in scorch marks, the brass melted into an impenetrable barrier.

Nahri touched one of the marks. “I don’t think we’ll be getting in there.”

Ali stepped back, shading his eyes. “It looks as though part of the roof has collapsed. I can climb up and see.”

“You’re not going to be able to—” But Ali was gone before the words left her mouth, his fingers hooking around handholds she couldn’t see.

Subha watched him scale the