Location:Obsidian Academy — Medical Quarter
Date/Time:Early Ashbloom, 9941 AZI
Realm:Lower Realm — Doha
The boy's arm smelled like rotting sweetgrass.
Eden catalogued the scent before she'd finished pulling back the dressing. Anaerobic infection, possibly a Verdant-corrupted wound site where the healer's initial treatment had sealed bacteria inside the tissue rather than clearing it. On any Federation station, she'd have ordered a broad-spectrum antibiotic drip, debrided under local anesthesia, and scheduled a follow-up culture in forty-eight hours. Here, she had clean linen, a bowl of boiled yarrow water, and whatever she could coax out of her own Verdant essence without breaking cover.
It was enough. It had to be.
"Hold still." She kept her voice soft. The boy — fourteen, maybe fifteen, face gray with pain and the particular rigid pride of someone who'd waited too long before asking for help — locked his jaw and looked at the far wall.
