Reide stared at Omula Sabar's closed door without really seeing it at all, caught in shock and still attempting to dispel the spiritist's outburst from ringing in his ears. Several paces away, Andreya was frozen much the same, but with very different fears swirling in her mind.

When the two souls broke from their respective reveries to speak to one another, their startled hearts collided and clashed.

"Your wounds can heal themselves?" said Reide.

"You didn't believe me?" Andreya shot back.

"There's so much about yourself you never mentioned!"

"It was none of your concern!"

"None of my concern? My mistake for thinking the issue I've been helping you with for the past several days was any concern of mine!"

"I never asked for your help! I chose to trust you because I thought you knew what you were talking about, but I see now that trust was sorely misplaced." Andreya clutched her bloodied handkerchief to her bodice, hands still shaking. "You said the spiritist would have my answers."

"Omula Sabar is not the only spiritist in the country." In truth, Reide could not explain Sabar's sudden rage, nor the acute sting of Andreya's words. Heart thrumming, he swept his arm toward the alley's exit. "We should try another one."

"Why should we?" Andreya scoffed. "Why should I? Just to be called a curse again? Who's to say Sabar's not right about me?"

"I am!" Reide patted his own chest. "You're anything but a curse, Andreya, trust me at least on that."

"I doubt I can trust you on anything," she snapped, and in a twirl of fabric stalked past him down the alleyway.

He swiveled after her. "Andreya!"

She shrugged off his touch like she always did, this time with a deliberate aggressiveness, and before he could stop her, she swept out into the street and vanished among the passersby.

Partially stunned, his hand lingered for only a fraction of a second in the space she had just occupied.

Then the first thing that gripped him was panic—something he thought he had outgrown long ago—followed by worry that pounded blood in his ears and made his fingertips numb. He scanned the wide street, darting out between dense, chaotic groups and calling her name several times. Any normal woman might get angry and run off and be able to take care of herself, but he had a feeling Andreya was not the same—especially given her goal in coming here. Not only might she get lost among Feledir's crowded buildings and labyrinthine paths, she had designs of "speaking with Death," which could mean any number of things.

For all he knew, Reide might find her with a sword through her stomach, and her continued resurrection was not a certainty he wished to test.

"Miss Dreya Lenestrie! Miss Andreya!" He paused as a horse clopped past and several people cast him concerned glances. He clenched his hands and darted across the street. "Andreya, come back! I need to speak with you!"

"Quiet down!" someone shouted back and Reide flinched. "Go get a drink, lad, your girl's gone."

Reide slowed to a stop in front of a bakery, out of breath and still glancing about with a dwindling hope that he might see her. People, people, people, and not Andreya. He puffed a sigh and leaned his head back, closing his eyes.

When he opened them, he tore a hand through his hair and started for the nearest tavern.

──── ❉ ❉ ❉ ────

Andreya sucked in a breath and opened her eyes on the exhale, a poor attempt to slow her pounding heart. She had no idea where she was or where to go next.

But Reide had stopped calling for her, which was good sign number one.

The next good sign was dangling directly above her: a literal sign reading "Apothecary" with the odd slant typical of all writing in Isantad. The smaller lettering below it told Andreya it was owned by a Mister Jaketu Doni, and without better plans or judgment the same, she looked to either side and slipped inside the door...

... and recoiled immediately at the many strong scents vying for dominance over her senses.

Andreya sputtered and coughed, blinking profusely to make out the shelves of bottles lining the walls and the wooden counter in the back of the shop. The small room was completely vacant of shoppers for obvious reason, the only human life being a bearded man sitting behind the counter in a stained apron and heavy glasses, giving great attention to straining the liquid from his mortar and pestle. Various herbs were scattered across the countertop and Andreya approached it with wary steps.

"How can I help you?" The man's eyes didn't stray from his work. Andreya peered at his filtering process with watering eyes. An idea dawned upon her as she did.

"Mister Jaketu Doni?" she asked. "Do you know of any herbal poisons?"

He paused for only a moment, still focused on the herbal mixture, which he now scooped from the mortar and pestle onto a dish before returning to the vial into which he'd filtered the liquid. He swirled it a few times before finally looking at Andreya. "Interesting question for a little lady like yourself. What do you want it for?"

"What would anyone want poisons for?" Andreya shrugged, her half-truths flowing as naturally as the full ones. "I'm merely curious as to what there is. I've taken an interest in herbalism recently, a stem from my childhood dream of being a gardener, I suppose, though heaven knows I've not the time for such things with my family around."

"Hm." He swiped his hand under his nose and resumed his mixing. Most never suspected a thing from her untruths. "In that case, you've come to the right place for such inquiries. What poisons do you want to know about?"

Andreya flashed a convincing smile he wasn't looking to see. "All of them." Only the ones best for painless deaths, really. Mainly hers. "Forgive me, I forgot my journal, but my memory will make do."

"Well, first thing I think of when you mention poisons is pesticides. The sap from gertres trees is good for smaller plants, and bigger plants should be pulled out and sprayed at the soil with a two-to-three mixture of jakalroot and sidionis..."

It took Andreya several minutes of attentive listening for him to reach what she was actually interested in.

"... Then there's the poisons that work on people, but those are a rather sensitive topic, so—"

"No, no, be thorough, by all means." Andreya must have looked terribly young and naive in her frail, lanky body, asking about poisons as if simply to learn them. "It irks me terribly when people omit things."

He glanced one gray eye up at her above his spectacles, then continued as if it were an everyday topic. With his occupation, perhaps it was. "Well, there are lots of poisons that don't kill, like amice and kertle berries—much too much to list, really, all plants and herbs that weaken and make ill. I suppose if you want to know about poisons, though, the most interesting are the deadly ones." He pursed his lips and scrunched his face, pausing from his work as if to recall them. "Ibrok and yemak will kill a man, in large enough amounts, and there's hanbria, of course. Faerse, mollonba, anset... but I don't see why memorizing those would be too useful unless you collect wild herbs or you suspect an attempt on your life. Unless you are planning on using it, which I'm sure you are not..."

"Do you have any here I could buy from you? So I can study them more closely."

For the first time, the man's gaze slid over and he really looked at her. Being farther from the border, she had been able to convince Reide she no longer needed her beaded hair scarf, so her dark locks were unconcealed, her long braid trailing down her back in the simple style common here. The man's gaze caught on her matching dark eyes and bloodless skin, the distinct curvature of her lips and cheeks that could not have come from anywhere but Nasavte. The ruddiness drained from his face.

"You are Nasavtean?" His couldn't have made it sound more a crime.

Andreya was quick with her tongue, her expression hardly showing her panic as she shook her head. "My grandparents were from there—I live in the Mixed District, you see, so—"

Her lie came to a sputter when the apothecary rose to his feet, much taller than she had been expecting and now with a mean edge to his mouth.

"You are not an herbalist, are you?" His voice had grown sharp as steel.

She squeaked a laugh. "Of course I am, sir, what are you implying?"

"I am implying you are not supposed to be here. What is your name?"

When he stepped forward, Andreya stepped back, rigid. "My name—why do you want to know?"

"Prove to me you are not a Nasavtean spy."

Andreya sucked in a breath.

She could have described more about her fictitious life in the Mixed District, how she might have traveled here to live with her uncle in the summers and taken on her aunt's garden after her death, how her interest in herbalism had grown from there and she'd thought to ask about poisons to observe their intriguing effects. What made them poisonous? Perhaps she could identify some on walks or use them to prevent weeds or try little combinations out of pure curiosity.

But when Andreya became too focused on her pulse and the adrenaline building in her stomach, she had a way of forgetting her cleverer ideas and remembering only the not-so-clever ones.

So she pivoted on her boot heel and ran.

Though she made it through the door, somewhere in her mind she had to have known the apothecary had much longer legs and much stronger arms than her. She also knew that when the shopkeeper grabbed her from behind, her foreign features ensured she appeared much more a criminal than a victim to all who saw her.

And the guardsmen who responded to the commotion, clad in proud Isantadi green, seemed to think the same.

──── xxx ────

Allô, amigos (I'm running out of ideas for this alliteration ;v;)! Ten chapters and 16k words and TDCS passed round one of the ONC, woop woop! Any thoughts, suggestions, predictions, critiques? Let me know in the comments, and don't forget to vote if you enjoyed this chapter! (And congrats to the round one winners! Yay!)