Page 42 of Offering Herself to Darkness

“Take another exposure—I want to see a real-time image on this one,” Dr. Liv ordered the tech.

“Yes, Doctor.” The tech positioned the imager again and pressed the button.

“Look at this!” Dr. Liv was even more excited. “Look—you can actually see the growths shrinking!”

Nora watched the live image on the screen and saw that it was true. The PC “trees” were getting smaller and smaller with every breath that Anna took of the Bloom’s healing fragrance. It almost looked like they were melting away, right before their eyes!

“That’s…amazing,” she whispered faintly.

“If it keeps on like this, the PC will be gone completely.” Dr. Liv was still watching the screen. “She just needs to keep breathing in the fragrance.”

“Just keep breathing in the flower’s smell, honey,” Nora said to Anna, who was holding the massive blossom tightly in two small hands.

“Yes, Mommy—I will!” And Anna pushed her whole little face into the center of the Bloom and breathed even deeper—which caused the PC “trees” to melt even faster.

As she watched her little girl getting healed, Nora felt like the tightness in her chest, which had been there ever since they’d first gotten the dreaded diagnosis of Pulmonary Crystalosis, was finally loosening. It was the most wonderful feeling.

“Mom—come over here,” she said to her mother who was looking at them with wet, wondering eyes. “Come look—Anna’s getting better!”

Her mom came over and looked and started crying again. Nora shed some tears herself and even Dr. Liv had red eyes. Clearly she felt deeply for her patients and she was almost as happy and relieved as Nora felt.

But there was someone missing—someone who had become very important to her in the last few days.

Xarex was nowhere to be seen.

Nora wondered where he had gotten to. Was he still doing something on the long-range shuttle? Was there some kind of docking procedure he had to run through before he could come to find them at the Med Center?

That must be it, she thought uneasily. But as time went on, and Anna got better and better, she became less sure. And then she began to feel hurt. Why would the big Kindred abandon her like this? He knew how upset and worried she was about Anna—why wouldn’t he be here with her to support her? He was her husband, after all!

But then again, they hadn’t been married for long—not even three days yet. And their Joining had been a marriage of convenience. Maybe he considered that his job was done now that he’d helped her get the Flower of Healing.

On paper, it sounded reasonable, but Nora just couldn’t believe it. She couldn’t help remembering how he’d held her when she cried and then later, how he had cradled her against his big body as she drifted off to sleep. And of course, there was the incredibly intense sex they’d shared on Primus Nine. How could any man just walk away from all that?

Well, Steve walked away, didn’t he? whispered a little voice in her head. The minute you took Anna, he was ready to go. Maybe it’s the same for Xarex—he got what he wanted—the chance to breed you. Maybe he doesn’t care anymore now that he’s had you. Some men are like that—they only want one thing and once they get it, they don’t bother hanging around.

But Xarex didn’t seem to be that type of guy. He’d talked about wanting her, fantasizing about her, thinking about her constantly from the moment he first met her. Could any man really turn off such intense emotions, just like that?

Nora didn’t know. She did her best to shove these negative thoughts to the back of her mind and stayed by Anna’s bedside. She didn’t even leave to go change. She asked her mother to bring her a change of clothes and slipped them on in the bathroom in Anna’s room.

Anna kept breathing in the fragrance of the Bloom and Dr. Liv kept ordering more chest images. The roots of the PC trees had dug themselves into the bases of Anna’s lungs. They were stubborn and at first Liv and Nora were afraid they weren’t going to melt. But finally, after hours of Anna breathing in the healing fragrance steadily, the last little bits of the dreadful disease were finally eliminated.

“Well, now…” Dr. Liv blew out a satisfied sigh and nodded at Nora as they looked at the screen. “I’d still like to keep her for observation and a few more tests, but it looks to me like the Pulmonary Crystalosis is completely eradicated.”

“It’s a good thing too—the Bloom has almost faded,” Nora murmured. The brilliant light the Flower of Healing had been emitting had been slowly dimming as the hours went on and its fragrance had been growing less intense at the same time. Now it was barely glowing at all and the huge blossom was drooping.

“Oh Mommy—the pretty big rose is dying!” Anna exclaimed, having noticed the wilting of the flower herself.

“I know, honey—it just had enough power to heal your lungs. Now that it did its job, I think it’s going to go,” Nora told her. “But don’t cry—it made you better,” she added. “And I’ll get your crayons and paper so you can draw a picture of it. That way you’ll never forget it.”

This seemed to make Anna feel better because she nodded and took one last sniff from the rapidly fading flower.

“Thank you for helping my lungs,” she told it, stroking the drooping petals gently. “You’re the best flower in the whole world! I’ll miss you.”

At that point, the Flower of Healing seemed to give up the ghost entirely. Its thick stalk was bent nearly double and the hand-sized petals began to loosen and drift down onto Anna’s lap.

“Well, I think that’s it,” Nora remarked, looking at the growing pile of dead petals.

“That’s it but it was enough,” Dr. Liv said firmly. “Do you mind if I take a few of the petals to analyze? If we could isolate the healing compounds, we might be able to make some new medicine out of them.”

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