After she had finished he still did not leave.

“He’s in a great deal of pain,” Gabriel said. “Don’t you have anything that would soothe it?”

“No,” Snake said. “But it wouldn’t hurt to get him drank.”

“Drunk? All right, I’ll try. But I don’t think it will help. I’ve never seen him unconscious from drink.”

“The anesthetic value is secondary. Alcohol helps the circulation.”

“Oh.”

After Gabriel had left, Snake drugged Sand to make an antitoxin for gangrene. The new venom would have its own mild local anesthetic, but that would not be much help until after Snake had drained the mayor’s wound and his circulation was not so seriously impeded. She was not glad she would have to hurt him, but she did not regret it as much as with other patients she had been forced to hurt in the course of a cure.

She took off the dusty desert clothes and her boots, which badly needed an airing. She had strapped her new pants and shirt to the bedroll. Whoever had brought it upstairs had laid them out. Getting back into the kind of clothes she was used to would be pleasant, but it would be a long time before they were worn as comfortable as what the crazy had destroyed.

The bathroom was softly lit with gas lamps. Most buildings as large as this one had their own methane generators. Whether private or communal, the generators used trash and garbage and human waste as a substrate for bacterial production of fuel. With a generator and the solar panels on the roof, the castle was probably at the very least self-sufficient in power. It might even have enough of a surplus to run a heat pump. If a summer came along that was hot enough to overwhelm the natural insulation of stone, the building could be cooled. The healers’ station had similar amenities, and Snake was not sorry to come upon them again. She ran the deep tub full of hot water and bathed luxuriously. Even perfumed soap was an improvement over black sand, but when she reached for a towel and discovered it smelled of peppermint, she simply laughed.

Three hours passed slowly while the drug worked on Sand. Snake was lying fully clothed but barefoot, wide-awake, on the bed when Gabriel tapped on the door. Snake sat up, held Sand gently behind the head and let him wrap himself around her wrist and arm. and let Gabriel in.

The young man looked at Sand warily, fascinated enough to overcome an obvious trepidation.

“I won’t let him strike,” Snake said.

“I just wondered what they feel like.”

Snake extended her arm toward him, and he reached out to stroke Sand’s smooth patterned scales. He drew back his hand without comment.

Back in the mayor’s bedchamber, Brian, looking not so downcast, was content to have his master under his care once more. The mayor was a lachrymose drunk. Moaning almost tunefully, he wept as Snake approached him, fat tears sliding down his cheeks. The moans ceased when the mayor saw Snake. She stopped at the foot of his bed. He watched her fearfully.

“How much has he drunk?”

“As much as he will,” Gabriel said.

“It would be better if he were unconscious,” Snake said, taking pity on him.

“I’ve seen him drink till dawn with the council members but I’ve never seen him unconscious.”

The mayor squinted at them blearily. “No more brandy,” he said. “No more.” The words were forceful despite a slight slurring. “If I’m awake you can’t cut off my leg.”

“That’s quite true,” Snake said. “Stay awake, then.”

His gaze fastened on Sand, the rattler’s unblinking stare and flicking tongue, and he began to tremble. “Some other way,” he said. “There must be another way—”

“You are trying my patience,” Snake said. She knew she would lose her temper in another moment, or, worse, she would begin to cry for Jesse again. She could only remember how much she had wished to help her, while she could heal this man so easily.

The mayor lay back in his bed. Snake could feel him still trembling, but at least he was silent. Gabriel and Brian stood one on either side of him. Snake pulled the blankets loose from the foot of the bed and let them lie in a visual barricade across the mayor’s knees.

“I want to see,” he whispered.

His leg was purple and swollen. “You do not,” Snake said. “Brian, please open the windows.” The old servant hurried to obey, pulling aside the curtains, swinging glass panels open to the darkness outside. Cool fresh air drifted across the room.

“When Sand strikes you,” Snake said, “you’ll feel a sharp pain. Then the area around the bite will go numb. That will be just above the wound. The numbness will spread slowly, because your circulation is almost cut off. But when it spreads far enough I’ll drain the wound. After that the antitoxin will work more effectively.”

The mayor’s flushed cheeks paled. He did not say anything, but Brian put a glass to his lips and the mayor drank deeply. The flush returned.

Well, Snake thought, some people you should tell, some people you shouldn’t.

Snake tossed Brian a clean cloth. “Pour some of the brandy on this and lay it across his nose and mouth. You and Gabriel can do the same thing for yourselves if you want. This won’t be pleasant. And both of you drink — one good gulp each. Then hold his shoulders easily. Don’t let him sit up abruptly; he’ll frighten the rattler.”

“Yes, healer,” Brian said.

Snake cleaned the skin above the deep wound in the mayor’s calf.

Lucky not to have tetanus as well, she thought, remembering Ao and the other collectors. Healers came through Mountainside occasionally, though they had come more frequently in the past. Perhaps the mayor had been vaccinated, once he knew he would not have to see a serpent.

Snake unwrapped Sand from her arm and held him behind the bulge of his jaw, letting him flick his tongue against the discolored skin. He arranged himself into a thick coil on the bed. When Snake was satisfied with his position, she released his head.

He struck.

The mayor cried out.

Sand bit only once, and quickly, so fast he was back in his coil before an observer could be sure he had moved. But the mayor was sure. He had begun trembling violently again. Dark blood and pus oozed from the two small puncture wounds.

The rest of Snake’s work was smelly and messy but routine. She opened the wound and let it drain. Snake hoped Gabriel had not eaten much dinner, for he looked ready to lose it, even with the brandy-soaked cloth over his face. Brian stood stoically by his master’s shoulder, soothing him, keeping him still.

By the time Snake had finished, the swelling in the mayor’s leg was already considerably reduced. He would be well in a few weeks.

“Brian, come here, would you?”

The old man obeyed her hesitantly, but he relaxed when he saw what she had done. “It looks better,” he said. “Already better than when he last let me look at it.”

“Good. It will keep draining, so it’s got to be kept clean.” She showed him how to dress the wound and bandage it. He called a young servant to take away the soiled cloths, and soon the stench of infection and dying flesh had dissipated. Gabriel was sitting on the bed, sponging his father’s forehead. Sometime earlier the brandy-soaked cloth had slipped from his face to the floor, and he had not bothered to replace it. He no longer looked so pale.

Snake gathered Sand up and let him slide across her shoulders.

“If the wound hurts him badly, or his temperature rises again — if there’s any change that isn’t an improvement — come get me. Otherwise I’ll see him in the morning.”

“Thank you, healer,” Brian said.

Snake hesitated as she passed Gabriel, but he did not look up. His father lay very still, breathing heavily, asleep or nearly so.

Snake shrugged and left the mayor’s tower, returned to her room and put Sand in his compartment, then wandered downstairs until she found the kitchen. Another of the mayor’s ubiquitous and innumerable servants made her some supper, and she went to bed.