The Power and the Glory

Book 3 Chapter XII: Plague

"You can say what you like, Reepicheep. There are some things no man can face."
"It is, then, my good fortune not to be a man," replied Reepicheep with a very stiff bow.
-- C. S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

The death of one prince was a tragedy. The death of two, so close together and of the same plague, was nothing short of a calamity. Especially when no one else had caught the plague and none of the doctors could agree on what it was. For the second time in as many months the palace was plunged into mourning. Everyone went around -- in public at least -- with an air of deep grief. But there was worse still to come.

Within hours of the Second Prince's death being confirmed, the Fifth and Eighth Princes came down with fevers. On their chests were the same blotchy patches that had been found on their dead brothers' bodies.

The king took action. "All of the princes will be confined in their manors for at least a month. I want every doctor in the kingdom to examine the Second Prince's body. Anyone who can cure it will be rewarded with a noble title and lands."

General mayhem reigned through the imperial doctors' quarters. Harried-looking servants rushed back and forth carrying messages to different apothecaries all over Tiansheng, Gengxin's capital city, and even beyond. Magicians specialising in preservation spells were brought in to prevent the Second Prince's body decaying too much. A veritable flood of doctors, both real and pretend, swept into the palace. There were so many of them that the court physicians ran out of room in their laboratories. The kitchen staff complained loudly about having to feed so many extra people.

Mirio looked at the unfolding chaos and decided it was time to move further away from the main palace. He couldn't get a minute's peace with all this activity.

The Ninth Prince's Manor was the only one of the princes' palaces not off-limits to the rest of the palace. Zi Yao rarely left his home and even more rarely received visitors, so there was little chance of him taking ill. Mirio had not had any contact with the ill princes, so it was judged safe enough for him to temporarily move into the Ninth Prince's Manor and leave the Guest Palace for the doctors to convert into a miniature hospital.

I would have had more peace if I stayed home, he thought as his servants bustled around his new rooms and grumbled about the lack of space for all his clothes.

Zi Yao at least was happy about the new state of affairs. He dragged Mirio into his playroom and showed him all of his drawings.

"Look!" he exclaimed, holding up a sheet of paper covered with black and yellow stripes.

Mirio took a wild guess. "A bee?"

He must have guessed right because Zi Yao beamed. Next he picked up a sheet covered with orange and dots of black. Mirio studied it and couldn't make heads or tails of it.

"How nice," he said. "What is it?"

"Tiger!" Zi Yao made it sound as if Mirio was very silly for not knowing this.

After Zi Yao went to have his nap Mirio remarked, partly to himself, "I wish I knew how to deal with children."

For the past hour Lian sat in the corner of the playroom, apparently absorbed in a novel. It was very easy to forget he was there until he spoke. "You deal with him better than his tutors. They have no patience with him at all."

Once again Lian was wearing much nicer clothes than doctors normally wore -- a dark blue round-collared robe patterned with stars. Mirio had seen marquises attend court wearing less expensive materials. Just how much was his uncle paying Lian?

It seemed rude to ask, especially when Lian at least had the good taste to wear clothes that were expensive but not tacky. That showed he had better sense than many of the king's ministers, who turned up to social events looking like the victims of a tailor's practical joke.