“Kiva,” he whispered again. “There’s something I need to—” He broke off suddenly, his body tensing against hers. “Did you hear that?”

Kiva’s eyes fluttered back open. Dazedly, she asked, “Hear what?”

But then she heard it, a low, moaning sound.

Jaren pointed deeper into the garden, the gabbergrass obscuring their view. “It came from over there.”

“Maybe it’s Boots?” Kiva offered. She’d been doing her best to keep the cat out of the infirmary and away from the rats, and the little beast was moodier than normal because of it. But even so, she’d never heard Boots make such a noise before.

“Maybe,” Jaren said, though he didn’t sound convinced.

The moan came again, and something about it struck Kiva as familiar.

Too familiar.

Ice flooded her veins, and without thinking, she took off into the darkness, hearing  Jaren’s footsteps right behind hers.

The garden was only small, so she barely had to round one bend before she skidded to a halt, finding the small body curled on the ground beside the overgrown thistlewort bush, pale and shivering in the moonlight.

It was Tipp.

And he was sick.

Chapter Twenty-Four

The night that followed was one of the worst Kiva had ever experienced.

After Jaren sprinted back into the infirmary with Tipp in his arms, Kiva helped lay him on the bed opposite Tilda, ignoring all quarantine procedures in favor of keeping him within reach at all times. His fever was off the charts, with him clutching his stomach and moaning, but otherwise unable to communicate anything to Kiva about what he was feeling.

She forced remedy after remedy down his throat, half of which he vomited up, so in an act of desperation, she cut open his forearm and shoved a small, hollowed tube into his vein, funneling medicine directly into his bloodstream. She’d attempted it with some of the other ill patients without success, but this was Tipp. He had to survive. He had to.

Three hours passed.

Six hours.

Twelve.

Jaren and Naari stayed with Kiva, fetching her fresh water and clean linens, preparing medicines, removing buckets of sick. When the time came for Jaren to begin working in the tunnels, he didn’t leave, and Naari didn’t make him. The three of them remained with Tipp, watching the young boy, waiting for any sign of improvement—or deterioration.

Kiva couldn’t stop berating herself for leaving the boy so alone, distracted as she’d been by her research and the Ordeals. If only he’d gone with her to collect her samples yesterday, then maybe . . .