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stopped near the empty fireplace. He reached into his trous pocket and pulled out a gold coin, rolled it across his knuckles, made it disappear. “You know that?”
    â€œSleight of hand!” the Turquoise House said delightedly. “More!”
    â€œWant to learn more secrets?” Primross shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not.” He left the impression he’d established dominance in the relationship. Artemisia could only envy how quickly and easily he’d done that.
    Ura Heather had stayed near the door. Did the older Healer wonder what her own ancient Residence might have said about her to the Turquoise House?
    Even if Artemisia’s home blabbed of her, it would have been complimentary. It loved her more than anyone else who lived in it, which had also kept her close.
    Staring at the slick-looking walls, Heather said, “You have instituted sanitation, decontamination, and sterilization procedures, I see. Well done.”
    â€œThank you,” the Turquoise House said with an edge of irony. “It is very important that the human populace of Celta declines no further. If I can help in that endeavor, if I can save lives, I am well rewarded.” There was a drop in the air pressure in the room as if the House gave a soft sigh. “Unlike any of the HealingHalls, I can monitor all the organisms within me, understand the slightest changes in my walls and beings.”
    â€œResidences are uniquely suited to do that,” Lark Holly soothed. “Only one had the sickness within.”
    â€œT’Hawthorn Residence,” Primross said. He leaned an elbow on the mantel as if he were already at home within the spare and sterile walls.
    The emptiness would take Artemisia some getting used to. Her home was the most comfortable place she’d ever lived, including the Family estate they’d lost when she was a teen.
    â€œYes, T’Hawthorn Residence had a death,” Lark said.
    â€œI have spoken at length with T’Hawthorn Residence,” said the House. “I need all records of the sickness from the Healers and HealingHalls transmitted to my Library.”
    Heather gasped. “We don’t share confidential—”
    â€œYou want me for an experiment.” Turquoise House’s tone was harder. Artemisia was amazed at its range of expression. “I will not accept this project without sufficient data. Change the venue to a HealingHall, or your father’s home, T’Heather Residence. Your Residence is interested in the sickness. We all are. Or use the starship
Nuada’s Sword
. I know it has laboratories, sick bays, and sterile rooms.”
    â€œNot the starship,” Artemisia said. “I don’t work well there, not where Flair is diminished or suppressed.” She couldn’t offer her own home, BalmHeal Residence, the original HealingHall of the colonists, now a hidden sanctuary for the desperate of Celta.
    Not many of those suffering from the sickness had made it to the old BalmHeal estate in time. She and her mother had had only two cases during the epidemic. Both casualties were buried in one of the sacred groves. Artemisia was sure the Turquoise House knew everything that BalmHeal Residence did. Their Residence had taken the deaths very hard.
    â€œI’ll transfer the information,” Lark Holly said.
    Ura Heather walked out.
    â€œThank you both.” Lark Holly curtsied to them and swept from the room, leaving Artemisia with a man who still hadn’t met her eyes. Awkward.
    If she’d had regular clothes on, she’d have tucked her hands in the wide opposite sleeves, but she was wearing a work tunic with tight cuffs. She stood by the open door, but he didn’t move.
    â€œYou aren’t going to refuse our request?” she asked him.
    â€œIt’s mostly the Heathers’ request, isn’t it? FirstLevel Healer Ura Heather and Lark Holly, whose mother was a Heather.”
    â€œThe Heathers have