So, Misha...will you find the answer?
“No good. It won’t do anything like this,” Misha moaned, crumpling the paper she was writing a recipe on before flopping down on her desk. The dullness in her head was a clear sign she had spent too long reading and not enough time sleeping. She didn’t even have the energy to wipe away the tears welling up at her disappointment in herself.
The poison that had inspired her idea was a kind of mineral that melted when heated, then evaporated. If one breathed those vapors in, the poison would build up in their system over time until they eventually died. It was something that had been discovered while searching for other kinds of ore. Explosions used to break apart large boulders would melt the toxic mineral, then workers would unknowingly breathe it in, leading to multiple unexplained deaths. The strange illness only ever appeared in miners, so researchers had eventually been able to narrow down the cause. Apparently Nel had been involved in that research when he was younger. Misha had been quite surprised when he’d begun recounting the story.
With a heavy sigh, she closed her eyes.
What am I doing wrong?
She figured that if she wanted to deliver medicine to the lungs, it would be best to have it breathed in like that poison, but she couldn’t find a way to get the medicinal properties of the herb into a gaseous form. Her first thought had of course been to just boil the herbs, but the medicinal effects remained in the water, not in the vapors. Not wanting to waste what she had produced, she mixed it with sugar to create an easier to drink medicine, one the children suffering from the Red Eye plague had been overjoyed to receive.
Her next attempt had been to change the way she prepared the herbs, searching for a recipe that would produce something that could more easily be turned into a vapor, but she wasn’t getting results. Her best result so far had been something about half as effective as just drinking it.
At this rate, there barely seemed a point to her efforts. On top of that, having such limited access to the herbs meant that most of her efforts were focused on thinking through theories on paper. If one seemed promising, only then would she follow up with small-scale experiments. This process meant it took a great deal of time to make any sort of progress.
At this point, I’d be more helpful wiping sweat off the patients’ foreheads, she started to complain internally.
It had been quite a while since Nel had put in a request for the shipment of medicinal herbs. The political situation in the countries between Redford and the far north wasn’t exactly stable, so transporting goods that far took a considerable amount of time, but they were expecting it to arrive any day now.
Misha finally gave in, venting her frustration in a loud shout as she violently swept the papers off her desk. She swung her arms with such force that even the books on the desk were sent flying through the air, the assorted documents falling in a disordered mess to the floor beside her. The action kicked a surprising amount of dust into the air.
No matter how busy they were, the medicine room was obviously kept in pristine condition, but Misha had specifically refused anyone else entry into her private room. She didn’t want to risk the cleaners moving some book or document she might consult later.
In reality, that should have left Misha to do the cleaning herself, but she was too pressed by her current project to keep on top of it. Any time she thought of picking up a broom, she’d decide she would rather be diving back into the books. As a result, the room had become incredibly dusty.
Lost in her tantrum, Misha ended up taking a big gulp of air thick with freshly disturbed dust. Sucking in that much dust immediately brought on a choking sensation, followed by a coughing fit violent enough to bring tears to her eyes. The episode cut off her train of thought, and in the space left over something new started to glimmer.
Wait, wait! Coughing...why? I was choking on dust.
Dust...?
Miranda came running into the room in shock. Being in the medicine room next door, she’d heard Misha’s sudden shouting and the sound of her things being thrown off her desk. “Misha, what’s wrong?”
She was greeted with the sight of Misha’s things scattered across the floor. The tiny apothecary herself was hunched over her desk, wracked by coughing. Miranda knew those books and papers had been neatly piled on Misha’s desk the last time she saw her, and once she saw the clouds of fresh dust hanging in the air, it wasn’t hard for her to guess what had happened.
Looks like she’s hit her limit, Miranda thought. Misha had barely been eating or sleeping these past few days. Add to that her failure to produce any results, and it was easy to see why she would lose her temper. Leyas used to be like this too, didn’t she?
She sighed. Despite herself, Miranda couldn’t help but find the sight a bit nostalgic. “Are you okay?” she asked, covering her mouth with a handkerchief as she stepped through the room’s dust clouds to open a window, which immediately let in a warm, humid breeze, clearing most of the dust from the air. Miranda then stepped over to Misha, rubbing her on the back as the girl’s coughing fit finally started to subside.
She’s lost a lot of weight... We’ll have to start forcing her to eat better, Miranda decided. Misha had lost a lot of the softness one would expect from a girl her age.
Finally free from her coughing, Misha jumped to her feet and grabbed Miranda’s arms. “Mi...randa...! Please...!” Still out of breath from all the coughing, Misha started desperately trying to say something between gasps for air. Her unexpected intensity pushed Miranda back a step.
“Okay, okay, calm down. I can’t understand you,” Miranda replied, patting Misha on the shoulder in an attempt to calm her down.
Misha stopped, taking a few deep breaths of clean summer air. “I’ve got a new idea! Please let me test it!” Misha shouted, her eyes still moist as she stared up at Miranda.
Once others from the People of the Forest were in attendance, Misha announced, “If we can’t get the medicinal components into the air, they can just breathe the medicine in directly!”
Nel and Ryne were both stunned.
Misha continued, looking between all of the faces gathered. “Of course, we can’t give it to them how it is now. We need to clean the impurities out of it, then make it as small and fine as possible. Ideally even finer than flour. I also need to think of how they’ll breathe it in... Maybe we can fill a small tube with the medicine, and make them breathe it all in at once. Anyway, I’ll start testing with some other herbs we have.”
“What a bizarre idea. How did you come up with it?” Nel asked, bewildered.
Misha averted her eyes. The idea had come to her only because she had choked on dust. When the dust got into her airways, she’d started coughing in an attempt to clear it out. The fact she could breathe in enough dust to choke on meant the dust was being carried by the air through her airways. She had remembered a similar experience breathing in flour when making bread when she was younger.
In that case, if they could grind the ingredients fine enough, it should be possible to breathe it in directly.
“We’ll need a way to stop them from coughing it up immediately after breathing it in, but I think it’s a promising idea,” Miranda helped change the subject, having seen the moment of inspiration herself and realizing Misha probably would be too embarrassed to bring it up. It was no surprise Misha didn’t want to share that she had been working in an incredibly dusty room that she had neglected to clean.
“Fair enough. Breathing in fine dust without realizing it can cause damage to the lungs as well. There is probably a way to administer a small amount of medicine in the same way without triggering a coughing fit,” Nel murmured as he sank into thought.
A fierce knocking rapped at the door.
“What is it? It sounds urgent.” Ryne frowned as he opened the door, finding a city guard standing on the other side.
“A critical message has arrived for Sir Nel.” The guard handed over a small message tube, which Ryne passed to Nel, who carefully unrolled the message within to avoid damaging it.
Nel’s face slowly fell into a scowl.
“What’s wrong, old man? Bad news?”
After Nel handed the message back to Ryne, he turned to the room of uneasy expressions focused on him. “It’s a message from the one bringing the herbs. It appears war has broken out to the north, making travel by land impossible. He is instead coming by sea from Torans.”
“That means...”
Everyone was soon making similarly bitter expressions—except for Misha, who was still entirely in the dark.
“What’s wrong with coming by boat?” Misha asked, thinking of her own ocean voyage to Redford. It was much faster than traveling by land, and it had been quite comfortable.
“That part of the sea often has intense summer storms. Ships traveling a long distance tend to be rather large and keep to the open sea instead of close to shore. That makes it much more difficult to retreat to a safe harbor when storms hit. The journey will be much more dangerous,” Miranda explained so that Misha, someone with no knowledge of the sea, could understand. “There will still be a few merchant ships traveling this time of year, but there are many fewer than usual. I’m impressed he was able to find a ship that could fit his cargo.”
Nel simply shrugged. “He didn’t have the space to share the details, but apparently he couldn’t find a merchant ship. Instead, he’s hitched a ride with some traveling fishermen. A young boy he happened to encounter while sitting in the port unsure of what to do helped him make the deal.”
“A young boy? And a fishing boat is helping him transport goods?”
While the others stood confused, Ryne turned a small smile on Misha. “Sounds like they have a debt to the People of the Forest. What did you do this time, Misha?”
“A debt? Fishermen? A young boy?” Misha could only dumbly repeat what they had said. She remembered a girl and her beautiful dance, but...
Her family were fishermen, but...what young boy?
“In any case, fishing boats can be quite fast. We will probably see them in four or five days. We can clear everything up then. I suppose you have some work to do on your medicine before the new batch arrives, don’t you, Misha?”
She jumped at that.
“Refine your new medicine as best you can before the new batch arrives,” Nel finished with a grin, getting a nod from Misha.