The vendor inspected his other ruff. "Beg," he suggested. "What else?"
Heldar left the room and stood blinking in the glare of the sun. It seemed to cover most of the sky with the glowing fury of its disk, but that was an optical illusion. It was big, but not that big. If it had been Scar would long ago have shattered into a ring of debris.
He coughed again. The chest pain was getting worse as it grew hotter and there was still more heat to come. Heldar reached back to where his hat hung from his neck on a thong and drew it over his eyes. Beg, Craden had advised. But from whom? The monks had nothing but the barest essentials. The factor couldn't give what he didn't have, and neither he or anyone else would make what would have to be an outright gift of money.
He stared over the field, seeing the ships waiting to carry their passengers home and others discharging people in order to get away. They were commercial, and, if they carried a physician at all, he would be exactly the same as the one in Hightown. There was only one chance, the small, private vessel with the peculiar insignia. It carried royalty and would be certain to have a physician. Maybe, if I'm humble and pile it on? He coughed again and spat a mouthful of blood; there would be no need for pretense.
* * *
"Sit down," said the doctor. "Relax. Throw your head back until it touches the rest. Farther. That's right. Now just relax."
Gratefully Heldar did as ordered. He felt euphoric, still unable to believe his luck. Coincidence, he told himself. I just managed to see the right man at the right time, the boss man himself. I hit the right button and he did the rest.
He heard metallic tinklings behind him and resisted the desire to turn. The doctor's voice was flat and indifferent.
"Do you wish to stay, my lord?"
"Will you be long?"
"For the examination? No, my lord."
"Then I will stay," said Jocelyn. He looked down at the patient's face. "You have nothing to worry about," he soothed. "Just do as Erlan tells you to do."
Erlan, thought Heldar, the physician. And the one who just spoke is the boss man, the ruler of Jest. But where were the courtiers? The guards? He felt the desire to cough; then something entered his mouth and sent a spray down his throat, killing the desire. He tensed.
"Relax," said the doctor sharply. "Constriction of the muscles does not ease my task."
Something followed what had contained the spray. Seemingly huge, it slid down his throat, probing past the back of the throat, the tonsils and penetrating into the windpipe. There was a soft hissing, and abruptly he lost the sense of feeling from his mouth to his lungs. Wider tubes followed; he could tell by the mechanical dilation of his mouth.
"I have expanded the path to the lungs, my lord," said Erlan, as if commenting to a colleague. "Now we pass down the light, so, and swivel, so." He drew in his breath. "A classic case," he murmured. "Extreme erosion of the junction together with scarification of the trachea and widespread seepage." His voice faded as he manipulated more instruments. Metal scraped on crystal. Heldar felt something tickle deep in his chest, then the tube was withdrawn from his throat and another spray returned feeling to the numb areas. Automatically, he coughed.
"Some wine?" Jocelyn extended a glass filled with amber glintings. "Sip," he advised, "your throat is probably a little tender."
"Thank you, my lord." Heldar sat upright and turned his head. Erlan sat at a microscope studying a slide. As he watched he changed it for another and increased the magnification.
"Well?" said Jocelyn.
"There is no doubt, my lord." Erlan straightened from his instrument and casually threw both slides into an incinerator. A flash of blue flame converted them both to ash. "The man is suffering from a fungous infection, obviously parasitic and of some duration. It could have been caused by a single spore which has increased by geometrical progression. Both lungs are affected, the left almost hopelessly so, and the inevitable result, unless there is surgery, is death."
Heldar gulped his wine, oblivious of the sting to his throat.
Jocelyn was gentle. "Therapy?"
"The infection is aerobic. It would be possible to seal and collapse one lung and coat the area infected of the other with inhibiting compounds. The capability of respiration would be greatly reduced; the patient would have to rest with the minimum of effort for at least a year."
"The alternative?"
"Complete transplants, my lord, either from an organ bank or from new organs grown from the patient's cells. The former would be quicker, the latter more to be preferred, but in both cases a major operation coupled with extensive therapy is unavoidable."
"But he would live?"
Erlan sounded a little impatient. "Certainly, my lord, the operation would be a matter of routine."
"Thank you," said Jocelyn. "You may leave us." He turned and poured Heldar more wine. "You heard?"
"Yes, my lord."
"And understood?" Jocelyn was insistent. "I mean really understood?"
"Unless I receive an operation I shall inevitably die," said Heldar, and then added, "my lord."
Jocelyn sighed. "Exactly. I wanted to be sure you fully comprehended the situation. I can, of course, arrange for you to have the necessary treatment but there are conditions."
"Anything," blurted Heldar, "anything at all, my lord."
"You would come with me to Jest under restrictive indenture?"
Heldar nodded. What had he to lose? "When?" he asked. "The treatment, my lord, when would it be given?"
"That," said Jocelyn softly, "depends entirely on yourself; not as to when, of course, but whether or not it will be given at all." He reached behind him to where the wine stood on a table. A coin rested beside the bottle. He picked it up and tossed it to Heldar. "Look at it," he invited. "It will decide your fate."
"My lord?"
"On one side you will see the head of a man. I have scratched a line across his cheek, a scar. The other side bears the arms of Jest. Spin the coin. Should it fall with that side uppermost you will receive your needed treatment, but if the other side should be uppermost, the scar, then you belong to this world and I will not help you."
Heldar looked at the coin, then raised his eyes. "My life to depend on the spin of a coin? My lord, surely you jest?"
"No," said Jocelyn, "I do not jest." His voice hardened. "Spin!"
The coin rose, glinting, a blur as it climbed to hesitate and fall ringing to the deck. Jocelyn glanced at it, his face expressionless. Unbidden, Heldar rose, crossed to where it lay and looked down at the shining disk. He felt the sudden constriction of his stomach.
"Luck is against you," said Jocelyn quietly. "It seems that you are fated to die."
* * *
The interior of the shed was cool with a brisk crispness which stung like a shower of ice, refreshing as it hurt, waking senses dulled with seemingly endless heat. Kel Zopolis paused, enjoying the coolness, and then, remembering the cost, walked quickly down the shed.
"Wandara!"
"Here, Boss." The overseer came from behind a machine, wiping his hands on a scrap of waste, his white teeth flashing against the ebon of his skin. "The cooling plant is switched off," he said before the agent could raise the matter. "I was just testing the machines to make sure they'll work when we want them."
"And?"
"Fully operational," said the overseer, "hoppers, slicers, balers, everything." He walked beside Zopolis down the length of the shed and opened a door, waiting for the agent to pass through before following him and closing the panel.
Beyond lay a second shed filled with equipment. A line of rafts, each with a thousand cubic feet of loading capacity, rested against one wall. Suits, boots, masks and sprays hung neatly on hooks. A heap of wide-bladed machetes rested on a bench beside a grinding wheel. They were thirty inches from pommel to point, the blades slightly curved and four inches across at the widest part. Zopolis lifted one and swung it, enjoying the heft and balance of the well-designed tool.