Misery Enjoys Company [Iago’s Chambers; Azazel; Plague Era]

*Stephen’s Chambers, One Hour Earlier*

Stephen lay in his bed, utterly miserable with fever. Sweat seemed to almost pour off him as though he had taken a swim and hadn’t bothered to dry himself. The red tunic he wore to bed was no longer its bright crimson but rather a dark burgundy where the moisture had accumulated. Tiredly he blinked to glance around his lavish chambers. There was much to do but Stephen didn’t feel as though he had the energy to do it. He scratched at the blood encrusted bandages covering rashes upon his wrists. Scratching took some of the pain out, but the knots were too tight for him to undo.

Agitated at being far too hot and itchy to even think about sleeping this illness off, Stephen went against the physician’s orders and threw off his bedcovers. The sudden cold made him shiver delightedly. Sadly it didn’t last long and once again it seemed as though the mortician had been cast headfirst into a furnace. With a grunt he stood. Next second later Stephen became incredibly nauseous and dizzy, and found himself sprawled on the floor. Taking a mental inventory, several body parts that hadn’t ached before now felt as painful as a toothache. Particularly a knock to the side of his head: Stephen could feel a slight bump that hadn’t been there before the fall. With a growl of determination and a vague recollection starring Arianna he got back up, put on the rest of his clothes, and headed out for the palace grounds.


*Iago’s Chambers, Present*

Stephen shivered as he made his way to Iago’s chambers. The mortician had buried himself in the snow for a good several minutes until the fever broke, and was only just now returning indoors. His shivers delighted him: how good it felt to feel cold again! However, something he’d been hearing more and more about was enough to disturb even his twisted mind.

From what it seemed, a plague was going through Alrania. He had many of the symptoms that were being babbled about, and more than once his physician noted a rather unhealthy look about him. Stephen at first just thought the man ignorant of Carakleinian physiology. He had also hoped that his illness would pass with time. But if this was the plague... Being an individual that surrounds himself with the dead, Stephen was well aware this disease was claiming lives. The amount of Azazel women it had claimed was a pity: it would not be wise to bring a diseased corpse into the palace. Such a pity, indeed...

This plague needed to end. Several physicians and sorcerers seemed to agree for it was almost all they worked on when not tending to patients. Stephen did not know and therefore did not trust many of them. The only one he did trust was Iago of Danothos. It didn’t take him long to see the love which burned for this one man in his cousin’s eyes. And surely if Elektra held such regard for the sorcerer, the man must be good at his trade. In the mortician’s opinion Elektra was an excellent judge of character.

Ergo, after knocking on the necromancer’s door Stephen sat a foot or so beyond the entryway. He curled up not only to not get trampled on but also to rest until Iago saw fit to see him. If he was as busy as the others, Stephen knew it could take a while.


Iago sat at a desk, working diligently on a cure for the plague. He was afflicted, as well as many others. It would be his worst fear if Lyra and Elektra also picked up the disease. The quicker the necromancer found a cure, the safer they would all be.

An onyx eye glared at the door when a knock was issued. “Lyra, would you please get the door?” Iago asked hoarsely, casting a tired glance about for the little girl. “Only admit Duchess Elektra or Count Fersen.” He had not at all thought about Elektra’s odd cousin who had arrived some time back via the lunatic chain gang, or the girl who had been released along with him.

Lyra was sitting not far a way, it worried her that Iago was working so hard dispite being sick. He refused to rest until a cure of the illness was found.

The little girl had yet to get the illness full blown anyway, but even she knew it was just a matter of time. Her time with the baron did little for her health, she already had a headache and was tired, though that could be apart to her insiting on assiting Iago when ever he needed. But if she did get it, she tried to prepare herself.. and not be scared, Iago was already worried and ill enough as it was.

"Yes Sir" she said with a nod and scapmered over to the door and cracked it opened an inch. she saw none other then Stephen, Duchess Elektra's cousin, and he didn't look to well shivring and curled up on the palace floor.

"Can I help you Sir? Master Iago is Busy right now" She said following her instuctions and not letting the man in. Though if Stephen wished he could easily push her out of the way, but that was bed idea in its self concidering.. Likly had something to do with the fact Iago would harm anyone who harmed her.. For some reason that knowledge comforted her.

A single black-stained lid concealing a blue-gray eye opened to regard the tiny voice. "H-has y-your master f-f-found a cure?" Stephen asked, his shivers causing violent twitches in body and voice. He cursed himself like sounding like the blasted inventor back in Carpatus that Arianna seemed so smitten with.

If he were feeling like his old self he could and would have pushed passed the child and burst in on the necromancer. Consequences didn't readily come to Stephen's mind, but he knew that hurting the child or mistreating her would lead to poor care from her Master. It didn't take a learned man to figure that one out.

"I m-must speak with him... or another with c-comparable skill," Stephen elaborated. Slowly, he unwrapped the yards of fabric tied around one wrist. Lifting the sleeve cuff revealed a gruesome sight: the red-raw rash had been clawed, cut, scraped, and rubbed into a furious infection. There had been an attempt to heal by way of applying sweet-smelling flowers to the wounds evidenced by the shredded petals scattered across the angered flesh. Instead, however, it seemed that Stephen was allergic to at least one of the blooms.

Lyra pressed her lips as Stephen presented the infected rash of the illness, whatever Elektra's cousin had done it seemed to make the illness worse. She looked up at Stephen her expression rather hard to read.. as she was confused. Infection came with poor living area, she saw it commonly when living with the Baron. However Stephen wasn't a servant, was the duchess's Cousin for goodness sake. Why did he give himself an infection?

"I can see if there is anything for the infection... Master Iago has no cure yet, he is still working" she said softly taking a glance behind her for a moment.

"Wait here, Sir" she said going over Iago.

"Sir? Duchess Elekra's cousin is at the door.... a rash on his wrist is infected" she said still finding it perplexing that a higher ranked man would allow himself to be infected like that. Even she knew with it infected it only made the already deadly symptoms worse. She rubbed her own wrist absently, when she got the full blown illness she was not looking forward that part espiecially it looked very painful.

A scowl had etched itself into Stephen's face, and it did not soften at all when the little girl looked at him. The expression reminded him so thoroughly of Arianna despite the different colorings that, if he didn't know any better, Stephen could've almost sworn he was back in Carpatus again. He opened his mouth to speak mere seconds before the girl spoke.

"Yes, well... although I enjoy keeping busy at my father's trade, it would be well of your Master to make haste. You'd think with all of that hocus pocus he would have found something already!" Stephen snapped in complaint. The mortician rolled his eyes at the request to wait. He wasn't going anywhere until one of his discomforts waned.


Iago turned his head when Lyra returned, making certain the child was not made a victim of the hordes in desperate search for a cure. Her errand had seemed swift... until she revealed the identity of the visitor. "By the gods..." Iago growled - not at Lyra but at the fact Stephen had gone and caused his rash to become infected. "Were he not the Duchess's cousin, I'd deem him the village fool." Iago forced himself away from his work desk and beckoned Lyra to follow.

"Were this any other time, I would send him to the proper physician or see to him myself. However, would you be willing to treat this man by yourself?" the sorcerer asked, retrieving a bottle and a jar - one substance to cleanse, and the other to treat. He also gathered fresh scraps of cloth for re-bandaging and a basin, into which water cascaded from a nearby pitcher.