[Bêthberry]

Well might it be said, 'Healer, heal thyself,' for Daliyeh was herself wrapped in strange chills and had been since she had fled from the Lady Habiba's home. The woman had been beyond all care when the healer had arrived to see her. All Daliyeh had been called to do were the final acts of comfort to ease those who are passing to the well at the end of the world: annointing the woman with the scent of apples and placing pips under her tongue. Thankfully, that act had been completed before the bestial chaos arrived at the Lord Korak's home. Daliyeh had barely escaped, for with the arrival of the orcs came the same suffocating shadow which had nearly overwhelmed her at the palace hall when she had sought to stop He-who-had-been-king and his foul Westerling associates.

Somehow she had stumbled through the streets to her home. So chilled was she her ribs felt they would break if she dared move them to breath, like icicles falling from the trees on the mountaintops during Pashtian winters and splintering into shards. It was old Jarult who had nursed a small fire secretively at her side. At first it did nothing to warm the healer. Then in painfully whispered tones she advised Jarult to throw into the cauldron hazel nuts and a salmon as a last resort. The fat of the fish spattered and burnt both Jarult and she, yet both found themselves liberated from their fears of the Men of the West. Jarult then fed Daliyeh small sips of the broth and slowly the chill withdrew from her body.

"It is the old wisdom, is it not?" Jarult had asked her.

She nodded. So it was that both were of strong will and able body when the messenger arrived with the summons to the palace. Come ill or well, they marched resolutely through the streets, dismayed at the destruction of the orcs no less than of the tremours of the earth.

~ ~ ~

At the palace the healer was directed quickly to attend to the Lady Arshalous, whose chilled flesh spoke also of her near touch with undeath. Daliyeh build a large fire of scented leaves and laurel bush and set a cauldron to boil, filling it with white berries and hazels and salmon. Then making a poultice of the fruit and flesh, she held it to the burn on the lady's neck. It sizzled the flesh and smoked but Arshalous opened her eyes. Yet it was a long night that the two women passed before Arshalous was recovered.

And when the morning sun washed over the sky and inked into the cold rooms of the palace, the body of the Princess was brought before the healer. It was a fate too mournful for Daliyeh and she wept openly over the corpse of the daughter, as broken as had been that of her mother.

And when she was done with her observances for Gjeela, with the oils and apple scents, Daliyeh went out amongst the homes of the people, for there too were many others awaiting the dark folds of her arts on their journey to the world beyond.