It was dark when Emilie awoke. She blinked a few times before remembering she was blind.

“Hello?” her voice croaked as she tried to call out and she was made painfully aware of just how dry her mouth and throat were.

“Miss Emilie, you’re awake,” a relieved voice spoke from not very far away. “How are you feeling?”

“Thirsty,” she replied at once.

“Of course, let me help you sit up a little. Ketty Pordis did say you’d be thirsty from all the potions she’s been giving you.”

“Ketty’s here?”

“Not currently,” answered the healer as Emilie heard them pouring her a cup of water. “She comes by in the afternoon with your regiment of potions and antidotes.”

A cup was pressed into her hand and she drank it down eagerly. The healer refilled her cup without needing to be asked and Emilie drank a total of four cups before she was sated. Only then did she realize she had no memory of what all had happened. She’d gone to bed, blind, and was drifting off when…what? Had someone shouted something?

“Besides the thirst, how else are you feeling?” the healer asked.

Emilie did a quick check of herself. There were a few dull pains here and there in her chest and head but for the most part she didn’t feel anything. In fact, most of her lower body felt numb.

“I can’t really feel much,” Emilie admitted. “Is Ketty giving me something to numb me?”

“No, she isn’t,” the healer said and now there was a hint of concern in their voice. “Can you feel this?”

“Feel what?”

As far as Emilie could tell, the healer hadn’t touched or done anything to her.

“What about this?”

“What are you doing?”

“So you can’t feel it?”

“…no…”

“How about this?”

This time there was a slight pressure on her abdomen.

“Yes, I feel that.”

“Describe what you feel.”

Emilie did so.

“And how about this.”

A sharp prod into her arm made Emilie pull back.

“Ouch.”

“Can you wiggle your toes for me?”

Emilie tried but wasn’t sure if she was successful or not.

“Bend your ankles…now your knees…now your hips.”

Emilie obeyed, each time finding it difficult to tell whether or not she’d actually moved the referenced joints.

“Lift your arms.”

Emilie complied, this time finding it easier to tell that she’d succeeded.

“Wiggle your fingers.”

Emilie did so and the healer began to flex her wrists back and forth, asking how that felt before moving up to her spine and neck.

“Well, the poison does seem to be gone, at least.”

“Poison? What poison?”

“Do you remember anything that happened?”

She told him all that she could, up until going to bed and possibly hearing someone shout. The healer then explained what the others had told about the wyvern attack and the injuries she’d sustained. With terrible clarity, the numbness suddenly made perfect sense. The poison had damaged too much of her body before they could get her the antidote. Without some legendary magics, she’d never recover the full use of her body again. Besides being blind, she was now also paralyzed.

“How’s the rest of them?” she asked.

“They made it back with you and Zeter just fine. Carried you on tower shields. I believe Zeter’s ribs are mostly healed now.”

“How long has it been?”

“You’ve been here for a week now. Would you like for me to send for your companions?”

“Sure.”

The healer gave her hand a squeeze before walking away and Emilie was left to lie there listening to the faint sounds of people shuffling around, breathing, and whispering. It was almost claustrophobic, not knowing how close she was to anything, being startled by someone turning over in a bed not far from her own.

While she waited, she placed her hands on her legs and then tried to move her legs without success. She couldn’t feel her hands there, and none of her leg muscles would even twitch when she strained to get them to move. Gradually, as she moved her hands higher up, she had more feeling and more muscle control. Her lower abdomen was barely functional but by the time she reached her chest she could feel and move more or less normally. A strange course for the poison to have taken, since the initial wound was so high on her chest, but she wouldn’t complain about still having her hands and arms to use.

After some time, she noticed a group of people were walking over to her and she pushed herself back up into a sitting position on her bed.

“It’s a relief to see you awake,” Damarys said.

Emilie held out her hands and felt one calloused, one artificial hand, take her own.

“We were beginning to worry,” Kasyn said, adding one of his own hands to Damarys’.

“The Sages, in particular, have been eager to hear about your recovery,” Zeter said and she caught the hidden meaning in his words.

It was likely most of the addicted Sages were out of Sages Brew and would be entering withdrawals. Well, blind as she was she wouldn’t be making any more for them and she still was determined not to teach the recipe to anyone else.

To her surprise, yet another voice spoke from the the opposite side of her bed.

“I’m sorry this last mission cost you so much,” Jelvaic said. “How are you?”

What a terrible question to ask her, Emilie thought. Had the healer not told them?

“I can’t feel or move my legs,” she explained. “I get more feeling and function the higher up my body I go. I’m sorry to say I don’t think I’ll be of much use going forward.”

There was an awkward pause and some shuffling feet that made Emilie even more uncomfortable.

“What is it?” she asked.

“I…there is something to say, to tell you, but I don’t think now is the time.” Jelvaic said.

“Well now I’m just going to worry about whatever it is so just tell me.”

“I want you to understand that there is no pressure on you for this,” Jelvaic began, “but we agreed that you should at least know. The wood you brought back is what we need and the new gate has been made, but it’s not finished yet. It needs…something, like the main gates did.”

“They need a soul?” Emilie asked. It made sense as she thought about it.

“They do.”

“I’m guessing there hasn’t exactly been a huge group of Shinrai monks lining up to volunteer.”

“Not this time, no.”

“Well, I figure it’s the least I can do,” Emilie said as she made up her mind far more quickly than even she had expected.

“What? No, we’re just letting you know that the gate isn’t repaired fully yet.” Damarys stated at once. “No one’s suggesting you be the one to –

“Nonsense,” Emilie interrupted. “I’m useless as I am. I don’t want to live like this and if there’s something I can still do, I’d rather do that than sit forever in the dark.”

“You’ve done too much for the city for us to just abandon you to sit alone in the dark,” Jelvaic said firmly.

“I’m alone in the dark right now,” Emilie said. “And there’s nothing any of us can do about that. Besides, this will put my mind at ease on a number of other things as well. Let me do this for Yomichi, please.”

None of them responded so she took her hands back from Damarys and Kasyn and slapped her legs as hard as she could.

“I am useless now! I can’t see, so casting magic is out. So is alchemy. I won’t be carried around everywhere I go, taken care of like some invalid when I could do something that would benefit everyone else.”

“You aren’t useless,” Damarys insisted. “I’m sure there’s other things you could do, new skills you could acquire.”

“There’s other reasons, too, why it should be me. The Sages won’t let me just fade into the background. I’m…afraid of what they might do to get a hold of me. Please. Let me do this thing for the city.”

Again there was a heavy silence that she had to break herself yet again.

“The sooner the better,” she said, “before Ketty or any of the Sages learn that I’m awake. Please, Jelvaic.”

“I’ll get a message sent to Tomodachi,” he grunted. “He’ll meet us at the gate.”

“No! Jelvaic, how could –

“She’s made her choice,” Jelvaic cut both Damarys and Kasyn off. “I’ve seen some troubling things coming from the Sages camp recently and if Emilie is worried about them coming for her then this might be the more merciful course.”

His heavy footsteps pounded across the floor and out of the building, with Damarys and Kasyn following after him, still trying to convince him against this.

“Thank you, Zeter,” Emilie said, suspecting he was still there.

“For what?”

“For not arguing with me about this. For warning me about the Sages. For not stealing my alchemy journals.”

“I figure it’s your decision, you ought to be well informed, and I tried but only halfheartedly. I figured what the Sages wanted wasn’t in there to begin with.”

That made her chuckle. Good old Zeter. She’d heard of him, of course, before coming to Yomichi. The Sages little spy and courier. An odd sort of mercenary that the Sages used from time to time so they could still honestly say that no Sages were committing crimes, or could claim plausible deniability if Zeter were ever caught.

“Do you think I’m doing the wrong thing?” she asked as the fear of her decision began to settle onto her.

“I think only someone in your situation could know the answer to that,” he replied. “I might suggest waiting a day or two to make sure this is what you want, but I’m certain you’re right about Ketty and the rest of the Sages. They’d storm the city if they thought they had a chance of getting you, and they might. I was in the camp a couple days ago and…it’s getting bad. I don’t know the details of what all’s going on but people are losing their minds, frothing at the mouth and casting wild magic sporadically. Ketty’s got it mostly under control but from the looks of things there’s more and more of them who are about to lose it. The minute they learn you’re awake they’ll demand you make…whatever it is you make for them.”

“I”m never brewing again,” Emilie stated with an iron resolve. “You’re right. If I don’t do this now, they’ll get to me or die trying, and maybe kill some innocent people in the process. This is for the best.”

“And it’s not like you’ll be dying or anything,” Zeter said with a somewhat hopeful voice. “Tomodachi did say that the people in the doors have an awareness of their surroundings. Remember how the Shinrai monk gets read to by the other monk now?”

“Will you come and read to me?” Emilie asked, unable to cry but knowing she would be if she still had eyes.

“Of course, and I’ll keep you up to date on all that’s going on.”

He placed a hand on hers and she gripped it tightly. For all their shared connection with the Sages of the Mercurial Robe, she’d never spent much time with Zeter. She regretted that now.

A short while later, Jelvaic returned, along with Damarys, Kasyn, and Tomodachi.

“Are you sure about your decision?” Tomodachi asked.

“I am.”

“Then let us go.”

That was all anybody said. She felt herself lift up, off of the bed and begin moving through the air, suspended by magic until they reached a cart. Everyone made sure she was comfortable, providing her with pillows and a blanket against the chill in the air.

“What time is it?” Emilie asked, realizing for the first time that she had no idea whether it was night or day.

“It’s just before sunrise,” Zeter told her.

The ride was uneventful and without any conversation. Whatever arguments Damarys and Kasyn had against this, they kept them to themselves now. She felt the warmth on her face increase, signifying the rising of the sun and she turned to face it fully. Almost she could imagine the view in her mind, with the sun cresting over the walls of Autay Wa, illuminating the fields and farm houses, chasing away the last shadows of night.

When the cart came to a stop, her heart began to race but she didn’t dare tell them to wait or that she’d changed her mind. Instead, she let Tomodachi carry her into place and lay her down on the wooden gate. It felt warm and surprisingly comfortable to her. Tomodachi was saying something, but Emilie was too nervous, too anxious to pay attention. It was probably the incantation for the spell, anyway, so it didn’t matter that she wasn’t paying attention. The spell didn’t need her to listen to it or it to work.

Her aches and pains began to diminish and the wood felt soft beneath her body, welcoming her into it. Her sight did not return but she began to become aware of her surroundings in a whole new way, as if she could see in all directions at once. There was Tomodachi, chanting as the gate absorbed her into itself. Jelvaic stood off to one side, arms folded, with his usual stoic expression. Damarys, Kasyn, and Zeter were on her other side, watching and crying a little.

“It’s alright,” she tried to tell them and didn’t know if they’d heard her or not.

The gate lifted up and into place and the hinges fused to the masonry of the wall guarding Ichiba Wa.