The healer refused to begin with the patients’ names.
Lyra set down her pencil.
“I asked which loads need continuous supply.”
“Good,” Dena Quill said. “Because the first request I received asked which patients deserved priority.”
She pushed that request across the clinic table. Someone had left a generous space for titles.
Lyra drew a line through it.
She had spent the previous day on an ordinary packet from Ashford, reading Felix’s test results while the vessel worked its way toward the academy. The courier had found her at the landing before departure. His questions looked simple until she tried to answer them for people she couldn’t see.
Here, beyond the service-room door, somebody was coughing. A kettle rattled in a staff kitchen. The clinic’s work continued while a committee attempted to describe it.
