46
Michaela crept from the woods to where Astolpho’s tent and her own sat alone at the edge of the camp. She had waited for some time, watching for any sort of movement.
None. Not near the tents, not on the path down to the stream, nowhere that she could see, even in the distance.
But she did see smoke rising from far away and spreading in the wind across the camp.
The smoke smelled of death.
Michaela wasn’t certain how long she could stay.
Not even with two separate strips of cloth now tied around her face, one smelling of Rune, the other of Telko. Those strips could only protect her from a light dose of the stench. She didn’t know what she would do if she had to walk among the bodies she imagined now filled the camp.
She knew how rapidly this disease spread. She had watched it bef
