Litany of Winter

Severin got his left foot back beneath the blanket before the nurse turned around.

She wrung out the cloth and changed the dressing over his stitches, telling him twice to stop trying to help. By the time she finished, his knee ached again from the few seconds he had kept it off the mattress.

Hans did not come back. Ten minutes passed, then another ten.

The constable remained outside with his chair angled toward the room, one boot hooked around a front leg as if he meant to stay there until Severin grew old. A porter went by pushing folded sheets. Somewhere farther along the ward, crockery broke and a woman cursed.

Severin watched the corridor without turning his head too often. When the first gray smear appeared near the ceiling, he thought somebody had opened a coal grate badly.

The nurse noticed it a few seconds later and stepped into the corridor, looking toward the far junction as she called to a porter. ”What’s burning?”

”I don’t know.”

The constable stood as smoke rolled around the corner, low enough now for Severin to see it against the whitewashed wall. It was too thick for a bad grate and moving too quickly. A door banged somewhere out of sight.

Then someone shouted, ”Smoke in the east passage!”

The ward changed at once. A nurse hurried past with a basin still in her hands while two orderlies came from the opposite direction pushing an empty wheeled bed. Farther away, a handbell began clanging as a man yelled for the porter at the service stairs. Severin pushed the blanket down.

The constable looked into the room. ”Stay where you are.”

He stepped into the corridor but did not leave the doorway.

That was when Hans appeared through the smoke.

He still wore the dark gray coat and smoked spectacles. The leather case hung from one hand, and a film of soot dulled one shoulder.

”What happened?” the constable asked.

Hans looked back toward the junction. ”Smoke coming up from the service side. They’re clearing these rooms.”

His careful Aethermerian was still there, but annoyance had roughened it enough to sound genuine.

The nurse came back at a run. ”We need him moved now.”

The constable pointed at Severin. ”Miss, he can’t walk properly.”

Hans set down the case. ”Excuse me. I examined him earlier. He can put some weight on the leg if someone supports him.”

The constable looked from Hans to the nurse as another shout came from the junction. Smoke had reached the doorway now, thin at first but carrying a bitter smell Severin did not recognize.

”Let’s move him, then,” the constable said. ”Where to?”

”The west passage,” the nurse answered. ”Take him through the courtyard side. They’re keeping it clear.”

Hans was already beside the bed, bending as though helping Severin with the blanket.

”Left foot first, sir,” he murmured.

Severin swung the good leg down, and the injured one followed more slowly.

Hans caught him under the left arm as he stood. Pain tightened across the stitches, deep enough to stop his breath for a moment, but his vision stayed clear. With his other hand, Hans took the leather case.

One pace, and the bad knee trembled.

On the second, his right hand found the wall. By six, the little finger had stopped closing properly, and sweat was starting along his back before he reached nine.

He reached the doorway on twelve.

The constable moved aside but stayed close enough to grab him if he tried anything stupid. Severin put his left shoulder against the frame and made the turn slowly, just as he had rehearsed.

A trolley blocked half the corridor.

Two orderlies were trying to turn it while another nurse pushed a wheeled bed from the opposite direction. Smoke drifted above them in dirty layers. Nobody seemed sure which side was supposed to give way.

Hans raised his voice. ”Can you clear that corner? We’ll have him on the floor otherwise.”

The constable looked at Severin’s shaking leg. ”Stay with him.”

”Don’t worry, sir. I have him.”

The man swore and pushed ahead. ”Move that damn trolley. Give us room.”

For three seconds his back was turned, and Hans changed direction.

”Here.”

A narrow door stood just before the junction, painted the same green as the wall. Severin had taken it for a cupboard.

Hans shoved it open with his shoulder and hauled him through.

Severin’s left leg nearly gave way as he stepped through. He caught the frame with his right hand, but the last two fingers opened instead of gripping. Hans let the case fall and took his weight before he went down.

The door shut behind them as Hans pulled a small wooden wedge from his coat pocket and drove it beneath the door with his heel.

A fist struck the other side almost at once. ”Hale!”

Severin stared at Hans. ”Shit. That was quick.”

Hans smiled. ”You asked for a better plan, didn’t you?”

The constable hit the door again.

Hans picked up the leather case. ”Let’s move.”

The service passage was narrower than the ward corridor, with bare brick on one side and pipes running overhead. Daylight showed at the far end through wired glass. The smoke was thinner here.

Severin limped after him with one hand along the wall. ”What did you set on fire this time?”

”Nothing.”

Another blow shook the door behind them.

Hans glanced back. ”Drain smoke rocket.”

”You filled the whole hospital with smoke?”

”No, I’m not stupid. Just the service passage.”

They reached the end of the passage and turned right.

Severin’s knee folded.

Hans caught him around the ribs before he struck the floor. The grip pulled the bandage across his abdomen hard enough to make him gag. He bent over, forehead nearly touching Hans’s shoulder, and waited for the stabbing under the stitches to ease.

Severin straightened by degrees as a hot sting spread beneath the bandage.

He pressed his left hand there and looked at the fingertips when he pulled them away. No blood.

”Good. Keep moving,” Hans said.

Footsteps pounded somewhere behind the wall. A voice called for a key.

Hans took Severin’s left arm over his shoulders this time and shortened his pace.

They passed a linen room, then a kitchen passage warm with steam. A young orderly came through a swinging door pushing a cart stacked with covered bowls and stopped when he saw them.

”What are you doing back here?”

Severin answered before Hans could. ”Copper sent us round. Smoke’s blocked the ward corridor.”

The orderly looked at Hans.

”Insurance,” Severin added. ”Don’t ask.”

Hans gave him a look over the smoked lenses, then glanced toward the sound of the bell. ”Rear yard’s that way. Past the laundry, then left.”

”Cheers.”

They kept moving, and once they were beyond the swinging door, Hans said, ”Insurance?”

”What did you expect me to say? You’re dressed like a clerk.”

Even that much talking cost Severin more breath than it should have.

His left leg dragged over the next few yards. He could still force it forward, but every step arrived later than the one before, and the right hand was worse too. When he tried to catch a rail beside the laundry door, his little finger missed completely.

Hans noticed but kept his mouth shut.

The laundry itself was loud enough to hide them for several seconds. Steam pressed through the doorway. Women in aprons were dragging baskets away from the wall while one of them argued that nobody had told her whether the smoke was coming from the boilers.

Hans guided Severin behind a row of hanging sheets instead of through the room.

At the far end stood another green door. Hans tried the handle twice, but it did not open. 𝘧𝓇ℯℴ𝓂

Severin leaned against the wall. ”Brilliant. I was starting to like this plan.”

Hans hit the door with his fist. ”It was fucking open earlier.”

With the case on the floor, Hans took out a flat metal tool no longer than his palm and worked it between the door and frame near the latch.

Severin looked back. Past the laundry, somebody had entered the service passage they had just crossed, and a man shouted something he could not make out.

”Hans.”

”I heard him.”

The tool slipped, and Hans muttered something in Vhaldrik before trying again.

Severin’s knee shook hard enough to knock against the wall. He pushed his right palm flat beside him. The fingers stayed there, mostly because they no longer had to close around anything.

”Hans.”

”I know. Give me a damn moment.”

The latch gave with a dull snap, and Hans caught the handle and pulled. Nothing happened.

Severin stared at Hans, who stared at the door for a second before looking down.

A floor bolt had been dropped into its socket, and for the first time since the smoke started, Hans looked genuinely annoyed.

”Move.”

”Where?”

”Not you. Your damn foot.”

Severin dragged his left foot aside as Hans crouched and shoved the flat tool beneath the lower edge, hooking the bolt. It lifted halfway before slipping back.

The shouting behind them grew clearer.

”Hale!”

Severin knew the constable’s voice now.

Hans reset the tool, and the bolt jumped free.

Cold air struck Severin across the face as the door opened onto a brick service yard, and he stepped through first, almost laughing when nothing stopped him.

The yard was boxed in by three hospital wings, with coal bins along one wall and a narrow iron gate at the far end. Beyond its bars came the rattle of wheels on the street.

Hans picked up the leather case and followed him through, pulling the door shut behind them.

Severin looked across the yard. Thirty yards, perhaps less, and his knee already felt ready to come apart after only twelve paces.

Hans took Severin’s arm again as the constable reached the laundry on the other side.

”Come on,” Hans said.

Severin put his weight on the good leg and started for the gate.