The physicker's hand grasped Bram's calf, stopping him on the ladder. "He has a great thirst?"

Bram nodded. The physicker's expression worried him more.

"Kill him," Herus whispered. "It'll be merciful compared to what I have witnessed with the others."

Bram was so shocked by the pronouncement that he nearly dropped the bucket of water. "What have you seen? Tell me what you know about this sickness."

"It is always the same/' sighed Herus. "First they have the fever, the next day they shed skin, then on the third day-"

Herus was interrupted by Nahamkin howling again for water. Jumping as if burned, Bram readjusted the bucket in his hand and took another anxious step up the ladder.

"You can't help him," Herus said softly behind him. "The sickness is caused by magic more powerful than any of your herbs."

Bram paused but did not turn around, his heart hammering. "How do you know that?"

The physicker visibly paled. "Just take my advice, young man," he said. "Kill him before he slakes his thirst and the real pain starts, or he will die a hideous death at sunset."

Fury at Herus's callousness drove away Bram's exhaustion. "Get out," the nobleman hissed. "I'd sooner kill you, you fraud." Bram gave a humorless laugh before continuing up the ladder, slopping water. "And to think I was worried about not being a real physicker." Herus muttered something a bit profane before stomping out the door. Bram dimly heard it, but didn't care.

Nahamkin saw Bram's head cresting the floor of the loft. "I thought you'd never come with that water," he panted. "Who was at the door?"

Bram was thankful Nahamkin showed no sign of having heard Herus's words. "Just someone asking me to give aid at their house," he said. The lie came out easily enough, though the hand that poured water into a mug shook.

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Nahamkin gulped greedily, water spraying from his mouth in his haste. "You should go to them, Bram. You've stayed with me long enough."

Bram's dark head shook as he refilled the heavy mug. "There is no one I care about as much as you, Nahamkin," he said honestly, his voice breaking. "I'll stay with you until you're well again." The words stuck in his throat past Nahamkin's seventh mug of water.

Bram sat stiffly while the old farmer tried to quench his thirst. Every muscle was tensed with dread. The pewter mug fell from Nahamkin's aged hands midway through his ninth drink. It fell to the floor with a dull ting that sounded like a bell of doom in Bram's head. He fingered one of a handful of small flour sacks he'd fetched to mop up the water Nahamkin had spilled while he drank. Bram twisted the sack so tightly the flesh of his palms began to burn.

Nahamkin's body abruptly shuddered, and his arm began to twitch. The raw flesh of his forearm undulated with hideous, unnatural spasms. Nahamkin groaned, a small, dry sound in the back of his throat that abruptly changed to a full-fledged shriek. Both men watched in horror as the thrashing arm began to bend and twist in ways no human arm was ever meant to. Bram struggled to grab the limb and pin it to the bedding, but his effort netted him a punch in the nose that left him dazed and bloody. As his eyes refocused, he saw the arm, thrashing left and right like a whip being played across the ground. The first and second fingers closed together and fused into one mass of flesh, then the third and fourth did the same. The thumb folded back on itself, becoming shorter and thicker.

Bram covered his mouth as the arm began splitting open between the newly formed digits. No sooner did the flesh split apart than it resealed itself, forming three distinct appendages all the way up Nahamkin's forearm to his elbow. Like three eyeless worms, the limbs writhed across Nahamkin's pallet. Quickly the color and texture changed from pale, fleshy white to green- brown scales with a pattern of red and yellow stripes. Two bulges appeared near the end of each appendage and popped open, revealing pure black orbs. Three fully formed snakes writhed from the stump of Nahamkin's arm, their forked tongues flicking in and out as they scanned their new world with unblinking eyes.

Wiping his bloody nose on his sleeve, Bram stared in transfixed horror at the creatures that Nahamkin's arm had become. He was relieved to see that Nahamkin was unconscious. But the old man's eyes slowly opened under Bram's scrutiny. Dazed, Nahamkin searched for the cause of the pain in his arm. When he saw the snakes resting in a coil there, Nahamkin's screams shook the rotted thatch above their heads. The snakes jumped from their slumber and rose up to hiss into the frightened man's face.

Bram did the only thing that came to mind. Ignoring his own horror, he snatched up one of the sacks near Nahamkin's pallet and slid it over the transformed limb, then cinched it tightly above the elbow.

"I'm dying," the old man said hoarsely.

"I should have warned you!" moaned Bram. "Herus told me, but I already suspected-"

Nahamkin touched his good hand to Bram's face. "It wouldn't have mattered. It's probably best I didn't have time to ponder it too much."

I should have been able to help you in some way!"

You have."

Nahamkin," Bram whispered, so softly it was like a reluctant confession. He could not meet the old man's eves. "Do you want me to… I mean, I could spare

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"No."

Bram's eyes shot away from the tangled bedclothes.

"How could I face Chislev in the grand forest Zhan," Nahamkin asked, his eyes strangely serene, "knowing that I hadn't patience or strength enough to abide by her will?"

"Who's Chislev?" Bram asked.

Nahamkin closed his eyes to gather strength against the forces that were fighting within him. "My goddess. I know most people don't believe in the old gods any longer, but I have tilled the soil and planted seeds in her honor for nearly four score years."

"Why have I never heard of her?"

Nahamkin's rheumy eyes took on a faraway look. "I suspect you have not heard her name because she has been called one of the old gods since the Cataclysm. Most people think she abandoned her followers then, but I have only to look at the beauty of the land to know better. You have seen her with every passing season and just not known it," he said. "It is said that her fear brings the fall, her despair the winter, her hope the spring, and her joy the summer. Every blade of grass, every creature in the field, turns toward her as toward the sun."

He smiled at some distant vision. "They say she appears to her followers as a beautiful woman whose hair glows like golden sunlight, and her clothes are made from living plants. I will see for myself soon enough."

"How can you revere something that would allow this sickness to happen to you?" Bram asked.

"It is Chislev's plan for me." He gave Bram a look of masculine pity. 1 have long suspected your spiritual side has been neglected, Bram." It was said kindly enough. "Life is a series of tests. Death is simply the final one. The difficulty of each is a measure of a person's faith. Chislev must have great faith in me to have handed me my most difficult test now. I will not fail by avoiding it, Bram." He bit his lip against the pain. "I can endure this. You'll find, my friend, that there are times when you simply have no alternative but to have faith."

Nahamkin's face contorted as his left leg began the transformation. He didn't scream this time, but tears rolled down his wrinkled cheeks and across his clenched jaw. The limb thrashed wildly before settling into a calm undulation. Using his horror and the last of his strength as tools, Bram slipped the second cloth bag over the limb, hoping to calm the three snakes that sprouted from the knee.

When Nahamkin recovered his breath, he said, "1 would be happier if I could go with you at my side, but 1 will understand if you leave."