:Yes, no, no. If someone doesn't think it through right, then the ritual can fail and cause side effects. Like cancer.: She returns to her earlier thought, of her concern that the energy not enter their bodies, and then to another thought, explaining cancer as a disease characterized by tumors or growth around the body that can obstruct organs and vessels. There's a brief thought that gives context: the Way of Flowers is the Way of growth, so improperly applied, it will cause growths on the body.

:Sorry, the other people with the supplies are about to arrive. I'll be busy for...I'm not sure how long this will take. But it will probably be several hours. I recommend you go back and rest.:

Marina has resigned herself to her fate as Telepathy node operator, and is willing to sacrifice herself upon this altar for the good of Southern Fishing Village.

Two pairs will arrive carrying large boxes of supplies and medical paraphernalia, which they'll put on an open spot near the door.

They start taking out large slates with holes in the corners, through which rope has been threaded through. They start putting them beside each person, or hanging them on a bedpost, if the patient is on a raised bed.

Feya turns to Gornet. :This is going to be a little awkward because we don't share a language. But our practice is to record information about each patient so nothing gets forgotten. Could you help me with filling them out? My aim is to have someone with Telepathy available here at all times, so that both your team and mine can update and query each record.:

He uses the old logographs in charting — they are traditional, and also shorter. He'll ask about age, diet, last meal, last urination and defecation, and amount and quality of both, symptoms, pain areas, pulse, medications and when they were administered (which also includes ecclesiastic effects), and time since admission. He'll record the current ones and ask Gornet of his memory about the past information, if he can remember it. 

The slates have already been scored with lines so that recording is easier. Feya fills out the column titles with the speed of long practice.

Gornet blinks.

:I ... suppose it frees me up from having to tell everyone things repeatedly,: he allows. :Is it really worth teaching everyone to read, just for that?:

He recites vital facts and figures for the various patients, incidentally demonstrating a grasp on mnemonics most people only develop in a society where only a handful of people can take notes.

:Do most people in the village not know how to read?: He thought that like, Gornet had dyslexia or something. :Does your spoken language have a written version?:

:We used to use mnemonics too, along with memory boosting workings, in the past. But now they've been supplanted with writing.:

Feya will record the vital facts and figures! He writes small enough and with enough logographic abbreviation that it manages to fit on the slates. It would be better to use paper and clipboards, but it would get expensive to use paper constantly for this purpose.

:No, of course not. Penþa does, and a few others in case something happens to them,: Gornet explains. :But it's generally not worth the time to have everyone learn. Penþa handles all the outside correspondence and so on anyhow.:

It doesn't particularly occur to Gornet to note that their language has both a written-on-paper and a written-with-knots form, and that more people can read and write the latter than the former.

:I'm surprised this is the case. Writing is really useful.: The Archival Society would definitely want to organize literacy programs for this place, and others like it. :Anyway, this is not very relevant to our Society's mission.:

He will coordinate with the other Tranquil practitioners that have arrived to cast Normalize Body Temperature and Nullify Pain on everyone for whom it's indicated, asking for consent for each one, then recording which people have received it (or were offered and declined, if any).

:Do you want me to teach you the logographs we use for charting, or do you prefer to just tell one of us when something happens so we can record it?:

Gornet considers for a moment, stroking his beard.

:I don't object to learning the logographs,: he replies. :Is it likely to take much time and attention away from our patients?:

:No, I have a reference booklet for the ones we use...which are written in phonetic script. I can have Sene copy them out and draw pictures for each one. He's good at drawing. Will that work for you?:

:Certainly,: he agrees. :I'm well accustomed to working from pictures, for herbological purposes.:

One of the patients towards the far end of the barn gives a terrible hacking cough.

In that case, Sene will take out paper and charcoal from the box and start doing that. He's memorized the symbols already, so there's no need to consult the booklet. He's wearing the same striped robes as Feya and the other people who are formally part of the caravan.

There's about six dozen symbols there, some of which combine. The parts of the body are easiest to draw, and he can just draw a body and annotate them. The less concrete symbols, like "too high", are...harder to draw...and instead he draws a figure of a person trying to reach something on a shelf too high up before giving up.

"I don't know how well this will work."

Sorry Sene, Feya is now going to attend to Terrible Hacking Cough Person. Language barrier crossing medical picture charades can wait.

He's glad they've put on the enchanted masks.

:There's a spell I can cast to suppress coughing, but recent studies suggest that that isn't better for patient outcomes. It does reduce pain and discomfort, though. What do you think?: he asks Gornet.

Then, to Bardamma, :Can you tell me how long the coughing has been ongoing? Has it gotten worse, better, or about the same over time?: He'll also listen as to whether the cough is wet or dry. If wet, he'll ask Bardamma to cough on a rag to see the color of the sputum.

:Well, I have hardly had the chance to study the effects of magically suppressing coughing,: Gornet points out dryly. :But only a handful of the sick have had coughs; usually the older people.:

:We began coughing ... about three days ago,: Bardamma explains. Her mental voice is tired, with long pauses between concepts. :A little before the ... headache.:

She starts coughing again. From close-up, it's clear that her neck is stiff, and she's having trouble turning her head to cough. The cough is fairly dry.

Huh. 'We'. He can sense the plurality in the meaning Bardamma is sending. So Marina might be right, but also, it's not really relevant to the question of whether or not to treat them.

Coughing isn't a main symptom then. 

To Gornet, :That makes sense. And the studies I've read only talk about wet coughs. I'll ask them if they want me to cast Nullify Coughing.:

Feya will ask so.

She is tired and sick and now people are asking her to consent to some strange magic — the kind she hasn't seen since arriving from the other place. Maybe she's already dead, and this is how she finds out that she's gone back. Maybe they sent the sickness, so that they could profit from stopping it. Maybe this is cover for some other work of magic. She wasn't expecting magic, and doesn't know what it can do. Maybe they're genuinely helping. Maybe they're only asking for consent because the magic requires it somehow.

She would quite like the coughing to stop. It makes everything hurt worse, and her head is pounding.

The others are asleep.

:Only if you could ... cast it on me without consent, would I like you to,: she replies. :But if you could, please do.:

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To Gornet, :She's saying that she only wants me to cast the spell on her if I can do it without her consent. Which...I theoretically could, but like. What does this mean.:

Gornet gains a look of fond exasperation.

:Bardamma led a rough life, before she came to us. I suspect she doesn't trust you, and wants to avoid agreeing to anything. But if you could overpower her, there's nothing she could do about it in her current state, so she might as well have it,: he explains. :You get used to her, after a while. Oskeli would really make a better first impression, but I don't think I've seen him or Lhatis for ... probably six days or so.:

Why is Gornet talking about these other people? How is this relevant.

Ah. It has to do with being Married, right. He's not going to inquire further about that.

:So I can overpower her, but we aren't in the business of forcefully providing medical care to people. We don't want to do things which are contrary to people's stated desires. But if this is a...cultural thing...if I choose to cast Nullify Coughing on her without her explicitly agreeing, would this upset people? Would it be illegal?: Is this some sort of modesty norm? But like, why would they have modesty norms about workings if they didn't have workings in the past.

:Uh. It depends on what she said.:

Gornet exchanges a few words with her, and then signals one of his helpers to bring a cup of tea when she has trouble speaking in anything but a rasp.

:No, it would not upset anyone. I don't think it would be illegal either, although you could check with Penþa to be sure — she gave you conditional permission. It's like if I said "You may cast it on me if that pot is full". If you could hypothetically cast it without her consent, then you have it. It doesn't matter whether you actually do cast it without her consent or not. Does that make sense?:

Feya has to think about the logic of it for several moments before agreeing.

:Alright. I'm going to cast Nullify Coughing on you now.: He briefly touches their throat, and now the urge to cough is almost completely gone.

He updates the chart to make note of it, and also puts down two symbols marking the effect to be refreshed every 6 hours. He asks Sene to record it on another slate that has been hung up near the door, which has all of the recurrent actions listed and when they're due, along with the patient number — each slate attached to each person having one.

He'll also have the other people go around and cast the same spell on the other coughing people if they want it.

To Gornet, :I'm thinking about the possibility of quarantining the people who are coughing. They might have a different illness from the rest. Is there space for that?:

Gornet does a quick tally.

:... yes, we could. The house across the street is in use for sickbeds as well, and should be the right size to hold everyone who has a cough,: he agrees. :But the ones with coughs are the least able to move, so it will take a little bit to reorganize everyone.:

He calls to one of the people brewing tea to go and let the people in the house know.

He and the other three people that arrived with him can help with that! Marina will not be helping because all her energy (secular and ecclesiastic) is being spent interpreting for everyone.

They have simple two-pole stretchers in the bag which can be carried by two people. That way, the patients can simply be put on them and carried, rather than having them walk to the house. 

That does make things run more smoothly. They can have the patients reshuffled in short order, although the drizzle makes the process more tedious than it has to be, and the street is churned to mud.