Anya Valois, earth fae, 254 years old.
Hails from the Eastern Region.
Diagnosis: late-stage Stillness.
She read the last line out loud, her voice cracking on the final word.
The Stillness was a rare, devastating disease that seemingly picked its victims indiscriminately. Earth, fire, water, and air fae were all fair game when it came to the Stillness. No matter who contracted the illness, the outcome was always the same: death.
River had spent hundreds of hours studying the Stillness at the University of Balance, and everything she read said the same thing: The disease was an incurable, unstoppable beast.
A silent, merciless killer, it ate away at its victim’s body, slowly stealing their ability to move, talk, and eventually, breathe. By all accounts, it was an awful way to die.
River understood this illness better than most. Almost twenty years ago, Cyrus Waterborn, her father, had contracted the Stillness. Even with the best medicine money could buy, he had been dying for most of River’s life.
Most of her memories of her father weren’t really memories at all, but stories her brother had told her. Instead ofbedtime stories, he used to regale her with tales of his own childhood. She cherished every single one.
These days, Cyrus was rarely alert. It had been nearly two years since she’d last heard her father’s voice.
“That’s correct, she has the Stillness.” Cynthia’s eyes shone with sympathy as they swept over River. “Is this going to be a problem for you, Doctor Waterborn? I know your father…”
“No, I’ll be fine.” River took in a deep breath, forcing herself to be calm. She couldn’t leave, not when she was already walking on thin ice with her boss. “It won’t be a problem,” she said, trying to reassure herself as much as the other doctor.
After all, it was just one night. How bad could it be?
It was bad.
The patients themselves weren’t the problem. No, the problem was River’s, and River’s alone.
Doctor Hudson got an urgent call, leaving River alone to read her patient files. Anya Valois’s file was robust, her family having included more information than normal because they wanted everyone to see their loved one as a person, not a patient.
It worked. By the time she was finished reading, River felt like she had known the earth fae for her entire life.
A mother of one, which was normal for fae since their kind struggled to conceive, Anya had been a librarian before she contracted the Stillness four and a half decades ago. Her husband had taken care of her for as long as he could, but eventually, the Stillness had advanced, and she’d been moved into a care facility.
A week ago, she’d been transferred to the ICU because of an infection in her lungs.
And now…
Now she looked like she was moments away from Fading.
River stood in the doorway of Mrs. Valois’s room, her heart splitting in two. The scent of cleaners was strong, but nothing could mask the aroma of illness and death.
This waswrong.
Fae were supposed to be strong and powerful. Beautiful in a way that made people look at them twice. Theirs wasn’t the too-beautiful-to-be-real look that vampires like Brynleigh, River’s sister-in-law, had.
No, a fae’s beauty was in the way they remained untouched by age for centuries after their Maturation. It was in the perfect lines of their face, sharp, pointed ears, and clear skin. They aged incredibly slowly before eventually Fading a thousand years or so after birth.
It had always been that way, since the dawn of fae history. Or at least, that’s how it had been before the Great Migration.
The Stillness only started plaguing the fae after they moved from the Obsidian Coast across the Indigo Ocean to the land formerly known as the Four Kingdoms. A dark monster, the Stillness devoured beauty, leaving death in its wake.
The photo in Anya’s file showed her as young, healthy, and full of life. She was smiling, laughing at something off camera.
That woman was gone, and a sickly fae was in her place. Her olive skin was pulled gaunt over her thin frame. Clay colored eyes stared blankly at the ceiling. Waves of once-luscious chocolate hair hung limply around her face. Bony hands were crossed over her stomach, her skin papery and translucent.
“Good evening, Mrs. Valois,” River said softly from thefoot of her patient’s bed, gripping her tablet like a life raft. “How are you feeling tonight?”