Durþan obediently opens their mouth and sticks out their tongue. Their mouth, tongue, and throat look pretty normal.

:Sure,: Durþan agrees. They pull open their blanket, revealing that their stomach and lower chest are covered by a camphor compound. :It's this area,: they explain. :They started a bit lower, but then spread.: They shiver.

:When you urinate, does it hurt? What about your stool? Do you have trouble passing it?:

And then, to both Durþan and Gornet, :How much have they been urinating? What's the frequency and amount? And the frequency of bowel movements?:

:I've been urinating plenty. They keep giving me tea,: Durþan insists. :But it has been harder to defecate. Difficult to get anything to pass, and a little painful. But better than just letting my stomach get worse.:

:I think Durþan's been getting up to pee twice in a sixth of a day, when they're awake,: Gornet elaborates. :And defecating perhaps a third as often. Does that sound right?:

:Yeah, that's about right. Although maybe a bit more yesterday — I haven't eaten as much today, because ...: they send the general feeling of not wanting to eat as much.

To Gornet, :What do you put in the tea, aside from willow-bark or pine needles?:

And then, to both of them, :What do you feed the sick? What do healthy people here normally eat, at this season?: What season is it, actually? It feels a little cold. Back home, it was monsoon season.

:Are you eating different food this season than what you would normally eat?:

:Willow-bark for fever, pine needles for health and flavor, chamomile to soothe and for scent, rose-hips for taste,: Gornet rattles off. :We have the cook hall making simple sweet-bread*, because people keep it down better when sick. But there's vegetable meal in it, so it's filling. I've warned people off of cheese, in case it makes the constipation worse.

* Translator's note: actual bread that is sweet, not pancreas. It's made with honey.

:It's summer,: Durþan contributes. :But it's been a weirdly rainy summer, so it's a bit colder than usual. The gardens are doing fine, though, so I don't think we're eating very differently. Before the illness came, we had salads, cheese breads, fish soup, fruit, sometimes eggs.:

Seems fine. Hm.

Actually, he wants to take a step back. Gornet said earlier that they've been doing quarantine, but that it hasn't meaningfully stopped the spread of the disease. So there are several possible hypotheses.

1. They were infected a while back, and the disease has a long incubation period.
2. Someone or some people are breaking quarantine protocol.
3. The disease is not transmitted via contact with the diseased, and has some other vector.

To Durþan, :The cook hall, does everyone eat there? Do people cook their food separately or together? Are there any people who don't eat from there?:

:Well, everyone eats there during the summer, yeah,: Durþan agrees. :During the winter, families eat alone. And of course the outlying farmers mostly don't come to the village for meals, unless they have an errand.:

:Only one of the farmers has come down with anything,: Gornet adds. :But we've naturally instructed the others to stay away.:

Partial evidence for the tainted food hypothesis. Either the disease vector was the food itself, tainted with poison or parasites, or one of the cooks got sick and spread it to everyone through the food.

To Gornet only, :How have you been preventing the healthy people from entering or the sick from leaving? Is there a watch rota to watch over the sick houses?:

He blinks.

:... we just warned people?: he responds. :Why would you need a watch? Nobody wants to get sick or get others sick. And of course if anyone were sneaking out, or anything like that, they'd have to pay a fine.:

:I just wanted to make sure. In other places you have situations where say, the lover of a patient really wants to see them, or a parent their child, or something like that. Or someone who insists they're 'just fine' and that it's minor, and so gets out. I'm glad that isn't the case here.: He's still kind of suspicious though. In any case, it's already policy to have someone always keep watch through the night, in case one of the patients takes a turn for the worse.

He wants to do a more thorough examination, but that can wait until the others arrive with the equipment and supplies.

:I think we can stop the examination for now. Do you want me to cast Nullify Pain and Normalize Body Temperature on you? I can cast them separately. It only lasts a few hours, so I or someone from my caravan will have to recast it. It doesn't cost anything. Both in terms of money, and in terms of — if you get it, it won't mean someone else has to go without. You can have them separately, and you can ask us not to do the next casting even if you agree now, and it's possible to start again even after you've told us not to cast it anymore.: He's well practiced with being Very Explicit and being patient and laying everything out for people when it comes to situations like this.

Hm. They do have an Open practitioner with them now. So...

No, it doesn't seem worth it to pay or persuade Kanuwa to take on the risk of being with sick people, and to have him cast Open Orifice or Smooth Passage to relieve constipation. If he even knows the workings.

Durþan thinks for a moment. Probably a bit longer than they normally would, now that they're being asked to make a non-obvious decision, instead of just go along with things.

:Could you start with Normalize Body Temperature?: they request. :I don't like being feverish. But I'm kinda worried that if I couldn't feel pain, I'd hurt myself and not know.:

:I can do that. I will have to touch you briefly to do it. Any part of the body will do. Is this okay?

My formulation of Nullify Pain turns pain into discomfort. So if something became too uncomfortable, then you know that would have been painful, were the effect not on you. In my experience, I haven't had my patients hurt themselves because they couldn't feel pain. Oh, it also doesn't deaden sensation, I'm Controlling enough for that. It is always possible to request it later, if you want to wait for how other people here take it.: Telepathic context implies that a lot of other casters of it nullify sensation more broadly, not just pain, and that it's typically too strong such that discomfort also can't be felt.

Durþan gives Feya their hand. The idea of magic that is non-exact, and possible to screw up, is both reassuringly realistic for what Gornet assured them was not a fever dream, and makes them more wary of having it used to take away one of their more important senses.

:I ... will hold off on Nullify Pain for now, thank you.:

:Of course.: Understanding and warmth are evident in Feya's mindvoice. :I'll stop asking, since it can be annoying, but do remember that you can always ask for it.:

Feya will touch Durþan's hand for a moment, and they'll experience the same hot-and-cold sensation that Đani felt.

They give a full-body shiver, and unwrap their blanket a bit. :Thanks,: they say.

They put a hand on Gornet's elbow, and say something without bothering to telepathize it.

:Of course.: 

Gornet helps them up — they seem a bit unsteady — and walks them over to one corner of the barn where there's a partially filled chamberpot.

:I am glad to have provided solace to you.: Feya is Very Proud. :I, or someone from my caravan, will come back to cast the same spell in six hours. If you are sleeping, do you want us to just cast it on you without waking you up, or to wake you up for it?:

To Gornet, :How many people are sick in total, and how many does each house have?: He's planning on delegating many of the repetitive castings.

Actually, while Nullify Pain might be problematic, Normalize Body Temperature doesn't seem so. With this many people sick, it might be more efficient for him to try to create a ritual formulation to target everyone in the house at once. He'll have to look through the ritual books if something like this has been done before.

Speaking of which, :Marina, is it possible for you to cast Great Minds Think Together? Do you know it?:

:Yeah, with ritual assistants. I can cover the four houses and the barn, though after that, you might have to have Kanuwa do Telepathy interpretation for a day while I recover my energy.

The issue is that...Great Minds Think Together links everyone completely. As in, a complete graph of connections.:

Ah. He would not want the sick people transmitting pain and discomfort to each other and amplifying it. It sounds like a nightmare.

:I'm just worried about the fact that communication will be difficult. Do you think you can try teaching Telepathy to...Sene? He has good Control, I think he could pick it up. I promise to pay you once we're reconnected with the rest of the Society.: