Page 44 of The Thirteenth Child
“For years we waited for you to be concerned for Hazel.” Papa laughed, and his eyes looked glassy and crazed and I could practically see the waves of heat radiating from him.
They were feverish, both of them, nearly deliriously so, and Iwondered when they’d last had anything other than spirits in their systems.
“I’m going to get you some water,” I decided aloud. “Water and soup. And good fresh bread.”
Papa snorted out another little burst of mad laughter. “Good luck finding any of that here.”
He wasn’t wrong.
There was nothing in the larder save for a few potatoes that were more eyes than flesh, and the bread box held only the skeletons of unlucky mice.
My eyes darted around for anything I might have missed, but I kept coming up short. I couldn’t understand how it had gotten like this. Where was Remy? Where were my other brothers and sisters? Didn’t they visit? Why had they left our parents in such a state of rot and decay?
“I can at least get water.”
I grabbed the little red pail hanging by the back door and headed outside to the creek. I was embarrassed to admit what a relief it was to be momentarily free of the house and all its smells.
Taking deep breaths of air, I cleaned and filled the pail, and wondered at the best way to begin treating my parents. I felt Merrick’s approach but remained on my knees, facing the water. I didn’t want to look at him. I wasn’t sure how to process any one of my multitude of emotions, but if I met his gaze, I’d only start crying.
“Did you know it was going to be like this?”
Those people lying in that bed, in that house, they were not good. They were not kind. They’d never treated me the way parents ought to treat their children…but they were my parents all the same, and it shamed me to see them reduced to such a state.
“I did,” Merrick said, and his admittance surprised me. I’d thoughthe would feign ignorance and pretend to be as surprised as I was. I’d thought he’d lie.
“Hazel—” Merrick began, but stopped.
“I’ll heal them,” I finally said.
I didn’t understand why we were here, with them, today of all days, but I would pass this test. I’d pass it as I had every other test he’d given me. When I offered a smile, it felt thin and forced.
He helped me to my feet and trailed after me as I made my way to the cabin. Just before I ducked back inside, he called out, stopping me on the lip of the threshold.
“Hazel?”
I turned to meet his gaze.
“I’m here for you. For…whatever you might need.”
It was an odd thing to say, an odd thing to offer, when he knew all I needed to do was find the cure. But I nodded as if his words reassured me.
After my reprieve in the fresh air, the smell was worse, a fetid, meaty funk, as though parts of my parents were already starting to spoil. It spurred me into action. I poured water into the cleanest glasses I could find and hurried them to the bed.
“Drink this,” I instructed my parents, foisting the glasses into their hands.
Even that simple weight proved too much for Papa, and the glass slipped between his fingers, spilling the water all over the bedding. He didn’t seem to notice and raised a phantom mug to his lips.
I helped bring Mama’s glass to hers, making noises of encouragement as she took a small swallow, then two. She shook her head after that, unable to stomach more.
“I’m going to get you feeling much better,” I promised her. “How did all this start? Was there a fever, or…”
She blinked, struggling to remember. “At first there was…my headaches. My head. Ache. Headache,” she repeated. She blinked heavily before trying the sentence again.
I wanted to be patient; I wanted to listen and hear the details, but she stopped short as a burst of coughs seized her. They filled the room with a terrible odor, hinting at an infection somewhere deep within her.
Patience be damned, I needed to know how to help her now.
Without hesitation, I brought my hands up and cupped herface.
