“Yes, well, we’ve come on a bit since Avicenna,” Andrews said with a dismissive wave. “He was good enough for his time, I suppose, but after seven hundred years anyone would be a trifle… hmm… outdated?”
“O doctor,” the genie replied in that same, even tone, “wrote Ibn Sina, seven hundred years ago, in the Al-Qanun fi al-Tibb, that the disease afflicting you can go to others—but maybe the physicians of England forget, as I see you do not keep away from the healthy.”
Andrews went from patronizing to affronted with remarkable speed. “Contagion? Balderdash; that’s as great a piece of nonsense as the innkeeper who thought it was caused by faeries. They have assured me it is not so.”
Once Galen belatedly found his tongue, the words poured out. “My apologies to you both; I fear the misunderstanding here is entirely of my doing. Dr. Andrews, Lord Abd ar-Rashid is a travelling scholar, who spent the last several years among the academies of Paris. He asked me to provide him with an introduction to the scholars of the Royal Society, and given his… nature, I thought it best to begin with you. I do beg your pardon for giving the wrong impression, but he wishes to exchange ideas. I have no doubt that English and Arabic physicians both have learned many useful things over the years, which each of you could benefit from—and surely, gentlemen, you share more than you differ. The four humors, for example—”
They shared something indeed, turning on him. “We physicians of learning are finished with that idea,” Abd ar-Rashid said, his accented reply interweaving with Andrews’s heated, “Only quacks and unlettered country doctors still follow that notion.” Then they both stopped, each eyeing the other like a pair of wary tomcats.
“Paracelsus,” Dr. Andrews said, as if testing something.
The genie nodded. “Iatrochimie—I do not know it in English—though little was the understanding of chemistry to guide him, and he went wrong often.”
Which was perfectly incomprehensible to Galen, but Andrews nodded grudgingly in return. Though the two embracing each other as brothers in medicine seemed unlikely, at least Andrews was no longer regarding the Arab as he might a precocious child. “A different perspective might be refreshing, I suppose,” the doctor allowed. “I would be interested to hear what you learned in Paris, sir. My correspondence with gentlemen there has fallen sadly by the wayside during my illness.”
Which left the genie, who had recovered a kind of blankness that Galen suspected meant his thoughts were not fit to be shared. “Lord Abd ar-Rashid,” Galen said, “if you would consent to work with Dr. Andrews, addressing a certain philosophical problem we face, then her Grace and I would be most grateful. We could offer you lodgings within the Onyx Hall, and the protection of mortal bread, should you need it.”
The genie thawed a bit at the offer of hospitality—or perhaps it was the philosophical problem. If he was half so curious as reports made him out to be, then that would be like the scent of game to a bloodhound. And he’d made some acquaintances among the fae of the Onyx Hall; if he didn’t already know of the comet, he would soon. Galen had judged, and Lune agreed, that there wasn’t much to be gained in trying to keep that secret from the foreigner. Much better to offer him honesty, and see if they could gain his help.
“O Prince,” Abd ar-Rashid said at last, “the lodgings and the bread I need not. But I appreciate the offer. If Dr. Andrews agrees, so, too, do I.”
It was the best he was likely to get. Galen could only hope this partnership would grow less thorny over time. Abd ar-Rashid might make a valuable addition to their scholarly circle. He had, after all, studied in foreign lands, where many strange things were known.
“Good,” Galen said, with heartier cheer than he felt. “Then I shall leave you to your conversation, gentlemen, and see about fetching you a salamander.”
Irrith held the pole at arm’s length, walking with slow care to ensure the brass box swinging from the wood didn’t accidentally brush into her. Even with that precaution, she could feel the heat radiating from the metal. The salamander had been most unhappy when she slammed the lid shut on its head.
She had to bang the end of the pole into the door in lieu of a knock. Podder opened it, and shied back when he saw her burden. Edging past the nervous hob, Irrith came into Dr. Andrews’s laboratory.
The mortal man was waiting for her, along with Galen and a dark foreigner she’d seen around the Onyx Hall. He must be the Arabic genie Segraine had mentioned, Abdar-something. “Ah, my dear, very good,” the doctor said, waving her forward, toward a contraption Irrith recognised as being one of Niklas von das Ticken’s discarded Dragon-cages. It stood well above the bare floor, on a slab of stone, with a bucket of water waiting at each corner. “In here, if you would.”
She dropped the brass box inside and slid the pole free. “He’s been burning since I grabbed him,” she said by way of explanation. “Can’t touch the latch, but if you have something long enough to reach through…”
Their servant Podder fetched a thin-bladed knife and handed it to Galen, who approached the cage warily. After some fumbling, he succeeded in lifting the latch, and the salamander immediately poured free of its prison. The creature hissed and spat sparks when it discovered the new confinement of the cage.
“Take good care of that one,” Irrith said, leaning on her pole. “It was a right bastard to catch; I don’t fancy going after another.”
Dr. Andrews was peering through the bars, drawing closer and closer; he leapt back when a lick of flame almost singed his nose. Rubbing his hands with undisguised eagerness, he said, “I fear we may need several, my dear. The chances of our correctly extracting pure phlogiston on the first attempt are dubious at best.”
“Pure what?”
“Phlogiston.” Galen smiled at her. He looked happy, she realised; he truly enjoyed this sort of thing, poking and prodding at creatures to learn what made them go. Far more than he enjoyed politics, and she could understand that very well. “Fire—in its pure form.”
Irrith grinned back. “I can spare you the effort, then. Here’s your flodgy-thing.” She prodded the salamander with the end of her pole. It attacked the wood with astonishing speed; fast as she drew back, she didn’t save the tip from catching fire. “See?”
With two delicate fingers, Galen guided the burning end down into a bucket, where it died in a hiss of steam. “We know the nature of the salamander, Irrith; that’s why we asked you to catch one. But we need to separate the fire from the creature.”
“But the fire is the creature,” Irrith told him. Clearly he did not understand, whatever he claimed. “That’s what a salamander is: elemental fire.”
“That is an outdated theory, my dear,” Andrews said. She was beginning to grit her teeth every time he called her that. Irrith didn’t need her title, but she would have appreciated the simple courtesy of her name—especially coming from someone whose entire span, cradle to grave, was scarcely a flicker of her own. “Robert Boyle showed the insufficiency of the classical elements as a means of describing the world, so that now we think there are many more elements, though so far the definition of them has proved beyond us. Phlogiston may be one of them, but it is not elemental fire, and this creature cannot be composed of it.”
Irrith had forgotten the Arab, standing silent watch over this exchange; she jumped when he spoke. “The lady is correct. Created were my kind out of smokeless fire. This salamander is the same, perhaps.”