Laecie leaned upon the unpainted drywall hidden at the very end of the hospital wing, satellite phone pinned against her shoulder. She lifted her watch, the silicone band a shimmering yellow that the sixth sense within her could prod—soft and pliable as mist, but biting like electricity.
She shifted the phone to her hand and winced, the sores along her arms throbbing.
“Are you alright?” The line crackled with her mother’s voice, coming from halfway across the world.
“I’m fine.” She glanced down the hall at the sound of voices. “But I’m going to have to let you go. It’s the end of my break.”
“Alright.” Her mother’s concern disappeared as quickly as it came. “Don’t forget to send the money.”
Laecie’s eyes fell shut. She let her head rest against the wall. “I won’t.”
“I’m just worried we won’t be able to make ends meet,” her mother droned on. “Things are so tight already.”
“I know, Mom. I’ll send it tomorrow. But I have to go now, okay?” The voice dropped low, like a child told to come back later.
“Okay.”
“I love you.”
Laecie ended the call, tucking the phone back into the pocket of her long, yellow coat. Her upper arms and shoulders throbbed. She bared her teeth, pushing up the shimmering sleeves, revealing the grayish skin that grew dark at the elbows. She pulled the sleeve higher and grimaced at the rotten smell. The skin cracked and flaked, the pattern shattered like glass, revealing deep black sores where the life had left the body.
It is getting worse, she thought, making a mental list of the remedies she’d have to pick up on her way out of work today. They wouldn’t heal of course, but they’d at least help. Anything to keep the hospital’s prized healer in action.
She let the sleeve drop back into place.
Like a goblin from the old ghost stories, Laecie hobbled down the hall of the hospital. The walls framed her in the dull grays, blues, and blacks that made up her world, making every spritz of gold pop—magical or not. She wobbled on her left leg. It had grown stiff this last week, but the sores hadn’t begun hurting—not yet at least. It could be a month, maybe a year, but it would happen eventually.
She turned the corner, nearly running into one of the white-coated doctors—an older man with dark skin and sunken cheeks. “Ah, Laecie. I was just coming to look for you. We’ve got a case for you down in room four.”
Laecie nodded, trying to force a smile. The doctor walked off and Laecie continued down the hall, passing ugly abstract paintings of mustardy yellow that glistened like someone had glued specks of glitter on top.
Her mind drifted back to where she’d left things with her mother. Health and finances. Was that all her life had come to? Certainly it was all she thought about these days. A cynical outlook on life for one who literally saw magic in everything. Everything yellow, at least.
She paused outside of the door, a gold number four that did not glitter had been tacked onto the whitewashed frame.
Laecie wrenched the knob and walked into the little ten-by-ten examination room that currently had nothing more than two chairs and a window. A few white boards sat in the corner that would eventually be assembled into a cabinet, but the hospital seemed in no rush.
A young woman, perhaps in her early twenties, sat upon the white-papered chair, staring at her hands. Her skin appeared light gray—like an overcast sky with the sun behind it, maybe a single shade short of shimmering, which was a shame. Her hair was pulled back neatly into a ponytail and she wore cargo shorts with a blue T-shirt. The girl was missing an arm.
Laecie cocked her head.
She knew her. Yes…one of the healer trainees. The hospital took a few each year, assuming there were applicants. The village was small in itself, but there were several others in walking distance. People with the gift of healing came from all over to learn, provided they could be spared. Some children had to wait several years because their families needed them for financial support or as hands on a farm.
This girl had shown up a few weeks ago, which Laecie typically wouldn’t have noticed—just another face to appear in the ever-revolving door. However, healers with illnesses or deformities were hard to overlook, even if everyone pretended otherwise. Such was the unspoken courtesy of her profession.
Now, what was this girl’s name again? “Dahlia?”
The girl looked up, giving what seemed to be a reluctant smile. Now to Laecie, her dull-amber lips shimmered slightly, like most yellow walls in the examination rooms, like the dusty, raggedy tennis shoes on Dahlia’s feet, like the lemons in the bowl in the lunchroom.
“Surprised to see me, eh?” asked Dahlia.
“No, no.” Laecie tugged her coat sleeves down even further, curling her fingers into the cuffs. With a knuckle, she scraped some loose black hair across her cheek, tucking the strands behind her ear. No need to risk nicking herself with the edge of a fingernail.
Most healers like Dahlia—like Laecie—had a reason to refuse magical healing. Really one reason Laecie knew of. The touch of a healer couldn’t target a single part of the body. It was complete healing, or nothing.
Laecie cleared her throat, curiosity urging her to ask the forbidden question, why? Instead, she asked, “Why now?”
A rhythmic rap came at the door and the doctor peaked his head inside. “Laecie, we’ve got another case for you in room ten.”
“I’ll get right on it.”
The door closed and Laecie pressed all questions conveniently out of her head. She turned, walking over to the window and drawing the shades open. The room faced the edge of the rainforest, a place known in more developed societies as a low-draw zone—which was a term healers used to refer to a location containing very little yellow. She could pull magic from the color of something in the room, but she’d made that mistake in the past. Using objects available to the other healers never pleased her boss.
Laecie stared at the looming trees, the vines and leaves so thick you could scarce see twenty meters into the forest, like nature knew the greed that lay outside and had fortified itself against the world of men. A giant wall of yellow, shimmering moss, yellow vines, yellow leaves. In the field between the hospital and the forest, the grass was a glistening yellow.
She picked a particular branch and drew in a breath. The color leached from every leaf on the branch, as if by brushstroke. The subtle sparkling quality was lost, left to build up again over time. Laecie felt the well of magic filling what she could only describe as her lungs—more magic than any regular healer would ever need.
She turned to Dahlia. “Are you ready?”
The girl nodded stiffly. The paper covering on the seat crinkled as she shifted her legs. With a deep breath, Dahlia gripped the rubbery edge of the chair and shut her eyes tight as if she were bracing herself for pain. A conditioned response after performing healings herself.
Laecie laid a hand on her shoulder and let the well spill out. She felt a surge through her legs and shoulders that cut deep, tearing at the damaged skin as a piece of life left her.
She looked down at the swirling glow as Dahlia’s arm prepared to reknit itself. Dahlia gasped, open-mouthed, which made Laecie grin. It was rare that her patients actually saw what she did, for it was said only healers could see the magic.
It started with the bones, thin white strips floating in the center of the magic, the cords of the nervous system webbing around them. The bones thickened and red layers of muscle grew on top, twisting together, weaving under and between bones. Veins snaked out of Dahlia’s shoulder, burrowing into the arm like worms in the dirt, coiling around muscles and attaching down into the skeletal hand. And then the various layers of skin, rolling down the arm like someone had let down a curtain, each hiding a little more of the workings beneath. The glow faded, ending in a perfectly constructed hand.
The sound of sniffling caused Laecie to lift her head. Tears streamed down Dahlia’s face as she wiggled her fingers. She gasped, covering her face with her other hand as her shoulders started to shake. Laecie had seen this before. Hysterical crying wasn’t an uncommon reaction.
Suddenly Dahlia dropped her hand. Eyes alight, she began to laugh. “Thank you.”
Laecie gave a stiff nod. It was all she could muster these days without smiling. And she couldn’t smile, because smiling was always somber when she knew it would be years before she’d be allowed to smile for herself.
“Well,” she cleared her throat from the sob that was building up. She blinked. “I’ll leave you to it.”
She turned for the door, reaching it with quick strides and placing it firmly between herself and Dahlia. An ugly faded landscape stared back at her from upon the hallway wall, framed in yellow that wasn’t yellow.
She blinked. She wouldn’t cry tears here. Resting her back against the solid frame, she closed her eyes tight, trying to remind herself that this was good. It was.
She sniffed, quickly dragging a trembling hand across her eyes.
She was happy for Dahlia, as she was happy for any patient. But the longer she went on like this, the deeper her wounds festered.
She sucked in a sob and blew out a steady breath. Her hands curled into fists.
Another ten or fifteen years, she thought to herself. Then she would have maximized her healings. People paid good money for healers who could work effectively in low-draw zones, and her family needed that money. She’d have retained this job long enough that her family would never want for anything.
Her mind drifted to the conversation she’d had with her mother—always the same: Yes, darling, I am doing well. Jobs are still scarce in the city, but I’m sure I’ll find something soon. Winter was hard this year and your sister is in desperate need of a new coat. Your brother has run up gambling debts again and I’m so scared for him if he can’t pay them off. If there is anything you can do to help, I’d be ever so grateful. So proud of you.
For as long as she could remember, her mother had lived well outside of her means, but it had all worsened once Laecie started work. The pay of someone with her skill set was enough to set a healer up for life over just a few years. She’d tried having conversations about it, but the stress it would put on her mother always sent the woman into a spiral until things were worse than before. It just wasn’t worth it.
Her hands ran over her sores.
The moment you heal, it all ends, she thought.
Would it all have been better if she’d never known her potential? If she could go back to the beginning and fix her mistake? To think it all began with a stupid toy.
She’d been six years old at the time, fighting with her brother, shoving one another around in a tree of all things. Laecie had fallen and shattered her leg. A normal person in such circumstances would have taken her to a plain old doctor, but of course her mother would have nothing less than the perfect healing of magic. They’d taken X-rays anyways, as the hospital needed to justify any time they used a healer, and those took extra time to process. That’s how Laecie had found herself crying in an exam room while they waited for the healer.
The exam table took up the majority of the room, the seat twice Laecie’s length even sitting there with her broken leg extended. Her mother had taken the plastic waiting chair, reading quietly to herself while she leaned against the little desk in the corner. Beside the lifeless computer monitor, a polka dot mug had been emptied of its pens. While her mother drowned in paged fantasies, Laecie doodled her agony away in bright flowers stretching all across the exam table paper and then some.
She shifted a lollipop to the other side of her mouth as another tear broke free, splatting onto the edge of her drawing and running the ink down towards her propped-up leg. The landscape she’d slaved over had turned to watercolor at this point, the splotches and run marks clouding the sunny sky.
The door popped open and the nurse stepped inside, an old man with silvery hair.
Laecie kept her head down as her mother rapid-fired a thousand complaints. Dragging the pen across the edge of the final flower petal, she let it drop and wiped a hand across her eyes. She looked up at the nurse.
“They should have an opening soon.” He held out another sticker to Laecie. A smiley face with an icepack on its head this time. She smiled and stuck it onto her T-shirt with the dozen others he’d brought her during their wait.
“We’ve been here for hours,” her mother spat.
Laecie started to curl in on herself before remembering she shouldn’t move her leg. She winced, hugging herself, wishing for something warm and comforting.
“Our healers work in critical care. They get to minor cases as soon as they can.” The man held his clipboard before him. “I’ve submitted the X-rays, so we’re ready to go as soon as they get the chance to come over here.”
Her mother rolled her eyes. “What if I just took her there?”
“Mommy,” Laecie interjected, pointing to the bag of stuffed animals her mother had packed, currently stuffed under the plastic seat. “Can I have the red one?”
The nurse shook his head. “They won’t take her, and if they did, it would be just as long of a wait.”
“So I’m just supposed to sit here while my daughter suffers?” “Mommy, the red one,” she wiped a tear from her eye. “Mommy!”
At last her mother reached for the bag, grabbing out a little stuffed crab and holding it out as she argued with the nurse.
Laecie pushed the crab away. “No, the red one!” She pointed to the bag again.
Her mother blushed, reaching as she explained to the nurse. “We’re still working on colors. She doesn’t seem to have the head for them.”
Her mother scooped up the bag and held it open. “Here, which one do you want?”
Laecie picked out the crocodile with the big toothy smile. She held it to her chest, squeezing it to the point that its eyes bulged.
“Does that happen often?” the nurse asked.
“What?” Her mother stuffed the bag underneath the chair. “That she confuses red and green.”
“She gets other colors,” her mother scoffed. “She knows blue and white and black.” The nurse reached for the door. “Give me just a moment.”
“What? Excuse me, but—”
The door slammed.
Her mother threw her hands into the air. “What great service they’ve got here.”
A few minutes later, the nurse appeared again with a booklet under his arm. Kneeling down beside Laecie, he opened it. “Laecie, can you read numbers?”
She nodded, sniffling to clear her tears. “Yes.”
He flipped open the book to the first page, displaying a circle made of little dots. “Do you see any numbers here?”
“I see twelve.”
He pointed to the next page. “How about here?”
“Three.”
He turned the book, flipping a few pages in and turning it back around. “Do you see any numbers on the left?”
She squinted, looking very hard. She shook her head. “Nothing.” He gave her a reassuring smile. “How about on the right?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing at all?”
She shook her head again.
He glanced at her mother. “She tested positive for healing potential?”
“Yes,” her mother snapped. “She has the magic. What of it?”
“Ma’am, I would take your daughter to an optometrist before considering any healings. Based off what I’m seeing, she could be red-green deficient.”
“So?”
“So, to your daughter—your healer daughter—red and green appear in some degree as yellow. It’s not unheard of for color-deficient individuals to be capable of drawing magic from other colors. People will pay big money for a talent like that.”
Her mother tilted her head.
“Healers can’t target one point of the body. If you heal her leg with magic,” the man went on, “it would heal her eyes too. It’s something to consider.”
Laecie looked up, glassy-eyed, at her mother, hugging her crocodile as she tried to make sense of what all that meant. But she would learn quickly after that. It would set her apart at school, force her into an early career. And now here she was, her aching bones hiking down an overgrown forest path in a low-draw zone after her twelve-hour shift. Probably a dumb move, but she couldn’t get Dahlia’s healing out of her mind. After all, if Dahlia was like her, the girl had given up a fortune. She needed to know what drove her to it. And if she was going to get answers, it wouldn’t be while they were in the hospital.
The thick, dark vines grew thin around her, the trees spacing out so that pockets of sunshine shimmered gently upon the foliage. The edge of the forest gleamed ahead, like the end of a tunnel. Laecie followed the beaten dirt path out into the light and paused, eyes asquint as she waited for them to adjust.
Orchards thrived on either side of the path—enormous trees. The apples on the branches were nothing like the type Laecie had known back home. They grew close together, almost as if someone had uncapped oversized acorns and hung them in bunches. She’d been told they were good. The hospital recommended only eating the fruit they flew in, since the local food could carry diseases if not cooked properly. Most of the staff ignored this, since they could easily receive healing if it did create any problems.
The sun beat against her skin, sweat beading on her brow as she hobbled along, her left foot scraping in the dirt. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d walked this far for anything.
Her cheeks grew crispy under the sun. The shade of one of the nearby apple trees seemed mighty tempting about now. She veered into the grass and narrowly avoided dragging her foot through a patch of mushy, fallen fruit. Insects wriggled through the juicy flesh, wings buzzing. She grimaced, sitting with her back against the trunk, and breathed deep, closing her eyes.
Just a moment to rest. Her head felt heavy. “Laecie?”
She jerked awake. The shadows had shifted around her, cast upon the ground at the dull slant of sunset. How long had she been sitting here? It felt like seconds, but the muted ache of her limbs attested it had been longer.
She looked towards the voice, spotting a girl in cargo shorts and blue T-shirt. “Dahlia.”
The girl crept under the low branches, lifting the leaves aside with one hand. The new arm hung idly at her side. “What are you doing here?”
Laecie opened her mouth, then closed it again. She couldn’t ask this. It just wasn’t spoken of.
The girl plopped down, crisscross on the ground beside her. A short, thick curl fell across her nose. With a thin smile, she seemed to meet Laecie mind to mind. “It’s alright.”
Laecie licked her lips. From what she could tell, Dahlia wasn’t colorblind. But surely there would be other reasons for a healer to turn down their own healing. She forced the words out for the second time that day. “Why now?”
Dahlia reached into the grass, plucking one of the yellow tufts and tearing each blade in two with a single hand. Old habits die hard. “There was never a reason to turn down healing. I just…didn’t want it.”
Didn’t want it? Laecie stuffed the protest down before she really crossed a line, insulting Dahlia’s confession. She furrowed her brow, blinking in the direction of the forest. Surely there would be a good reason…but none fit the framework weaving in her head. The curiosity bubbled over like a pot left on the stove too long, demanding more. She leaned forward. “How could you not—”
“Oh, I told myself I did sometimes.” Dahlia lifted a shoulder, her eyes focused on the grass. The freckles blotched across her cheeks became her defining feature at this angle. “Never acted on it. See, over the years, before they set up the hospital, I’d grown so used to my circumstances. It was my crutch, my reason, the way people identified me. And I couldn’t let go of that. This missing arm…” She raised the brand-new limb, stiff as a robot, like she still wasn’t used to it. “It was who I was.”
Laecie pressed her hands into the grass, scooting away from the base of the tree. “What changed?”
“Time, I guess. Perspective. My mind for sure. I had to believe that I was more than my problem. Choose that it didn’t define me.” She lifted thick eyebrows. “Because that is a choice.”
Laecie clenched her fists. Sure, it was. Choose to endure. Choose to continue in what needed to be done. Payments and healings and give, give, give until her body broke down one day.
She took a deep breath, lowering her pulse.
“I don’t know your story, Laecie,” Dahlia ventured, her voice small like the croak of a frog caught by the wind on the edge of a lake. “But I see how you work yourself ragged, how the burden in your eyes only seems to get heavier. You’re more than an asset, more than a healer. You need healing just like anybody else.”
Tears sprang to Laecie’s eyes, so many so suddenly there was no chance of hiding them. She drew up her legs, burying her face so Dahlia would at least be spared something. Her shoulders shook.
“Are you ready to admit why you’re really here?” Dahlia asked.
A chill rolled down Laecie’s back. There was something else she’d come for, wasn’t there? Something she hadn’t dared to hope for.
She lifted her head, nodding through blurred vision. “Would you do it? I’m…” she faltered, brushing her hair behind her ear. “I’m ready.”
Dahlia sat forward on her knees, scanning about the orchard. Every leaf sparkled, but of course that wouldn’t be the case for Dahlia. Eventually she seemed to settle on something above their heads. Dahlia breathed in, and Laecie watched the shimmer draw out of the lighter side of an underripe apple. Laecie shut her eyes tight, gritting her teeth as she prepared for the tear of flesh.
The magic washed over her like the gentle lap of a wave, soothing her body with a cool, refreshing energy. It dwelled on her sores like ice, spread wide at first, but slowly sinking deep and shrinking until the sensation left. Then it hit her eyes, and she gritted her teeth. The frosty impression burned in the back of them, like ice left on the skin too long—no, like her brain was trying to pull her eyes into the back of her skull—no, like a nerve had been severed, pulsing all through her head. Tears spilled over and she cried out…just as the pain vanished and Dahlia removed her hand.
Laecie sucked in a breath, heaving in and out, eyes clenched tight. Her fingers slipped along her wrists, seeking the dark, flaky blemishes. She froze.
That movement normally would have sent her arms aching, but she felt fine.
She stroked the skin, seeking out the cracks and blisters. Smooth. Entirely smooth, like a newborn child.
A sob built in her throat, and she wiped a hand across her eyes. “Thank you.” She opened her eyes. “I—”
The tree they sat under, the grass, the path, Dahlia herself, had exploded with color. No shimmer, just color. This…Was this what everyone saw? Always?
Her hands stroked the blades of grass, each featherlight prick bringing new awe, like she was petting something completely foreign. The leaves above sheltered her with a coolness that soothed the soul, apples peeking out in some seductive shade she’d never known. And Dahlia’s face? No longer gray, but suddenly as bright as the expectant gleam in her eye, her lips smiling vibrantly, and her black tangles of hair popping against the trees.
Laecie sprang to her feet and nearly fell over because of how effortless it was to rise. Stooping under the branches, she ran out onto the path, kicking up the dirt. She lifted her eyes to the setting sun. New, warmer shades of blue faded across the sky into something bright and bold, and that color eventually turned yellow—as if the golden lens that had overlaid her world was now rolled up and tucked into that one tiny portion of the sky. The rows of beautiful clouds fanned out like rolling waves between her and that golden glimmer. Her first taste of a low-draw zone.
And she smiled.
This story was written by J. Hulse White, an apprentice at The Company!
Click here to learn more about The Company’s writing programs.
Cover art by Levi Matthews
Connect on Instagram @levimatthews.artist or on his website, LeviMatthewsArtist.com.
So much underlying meaning. I was fascinated throughout this story. Great job!
Thanks Melissa. I’m so glad you enjoyed it!
Such a cool story Jenna! What a thought-provoking concept.
Loved this concept! So cool, and so well written. It really painted a picture for me, and felt so grounded in reality despite the fantasy elements.
That was gorgeous!