The laundry room was deep in Brunnhold, and it was not the most pleasant of places. Large, stinking vats of harsh detergents and boiling water, filled with uniforms, underwear, socks and anything else that the students and staff sent down to be laundered. The gollies wore the clothes, but it was passive hands that blistered and cracked and bled to keep them clean and fresh. Staying too long down there was one of the worst jobs many of the women could be stuck with. Hot, clammy work it was, and it wore down the soul just as surely as it wore down the muscles.

It was a job that Aurelie Steerpike consummately hated. Actively avoided, even, but when a matron says "go" there is nothing to be done about it. Some sickness had gone around the regular laundry girls and they had started dropping like flies, too ill for even matronly threats to rouse them. They'd pulled in replacements from all over the campus, and Aurelie had been unlucky enough to be on the bad side of one of the women in charge of the gathering that week. It was a small comfort that Triston was stuck with every horrible job that became available, so she was down there as well. Her heart ached for her friend, to be treated so poorly, but there was nothing Aurelie could do about it.

The caustic smell of dye hung heavy in the air as well that day. In addition to regular laundering, today was also the day a new batch of clothes were being dyed blue from whatever color they were before. It was, if this was possible, even more unpleasant than regular laundry duty.

So it all just got better when the hot water pipes threatened to explode.

It was not just the laundry girls who had been put out of action by the mystery ailment, and it figured that the one day they had decided to go ahead and fire up the laundry boilers without a mechanic around to supervise was the one day that something would go wrong. Jessyd had been the nearest servant with the relevant knowledge when runners had been sent, and he entered the laundry room at pace with a large canvas bag of tools slung over his shoulder.

As usual, the explanation of the situation that he had received was vague and garbled, but as he came close enough to see the pressure gague on the boiler he knew that the cause of the problem was irrelevant; in the time it had taken for the runner to find him and bring him here, the needle had slipped so far into the red that the whole boiler was in danger of exploding at the seams.

"Sweet ten!" he hissed through his teeth. Why hadn't the safety valve opened? It was designed to prevent exactly this from happening! No, too late, no time to wonder about that now. Had to get a valve open somewhere, and preferably one that would let out steam instead of gushing boiling water into the crowded room. Still, he pointed to a wheel on the side of a large exit pipe and shouted to the runner. "If I tell you, turn that wheel to the left, as fast as you can!"

He prayed fervently that it would not come to that, since the water in that boiler was easily hot enough to leave some horrible burns. He did not have a great deal of time to give those prayers the proper solemnity as he began climbing the access ladder to get to the release wheel on top of the structure. The heat was intense this close to the metal side and the ladder was uncomfortably warm beneath his hands, but a few seconds of scrambling brought him to the top. Pulling his sleeves down over his hands, he took hold of the manual release wheel and tried to turn it.

The runner, she saw, had just kept on running. "Oi! Hey come back here!" she shouted after the passive, but he was just 14 and more legs than sense. He wouldn't be coming back. Aurelie flipped around, catching sight of Jess. "Jessyd!" (Now, she decided, was not the time for the little bit of color that rose to her ears and cheeks.) "Your helper-- he-- what should I do?" The expression on Jessyd's face did not lend to levity. Exploding boilers, she knew, would not be a pleasant event for anyone. Lightly, nervously, she fingered the buttons of her blouse. No, boiling liquids didn't go well for anybody.

Oh no. Oh, no no no. Aurelie should not be there now. Jessyd was not equiped to deal with that. What she should do was run and run fast with all of the other passives while some sort of indestructible metal man who couldn't be burned opened the valves so that no one would get hurt. Unfortunately, they didn't have an indestructible metal man, just a lot of squishy little passives.

Though they might all be disposable as far as many galdori were concerned, Jessyd could not bring himself to put Aurelie in harm's way: he couldn't tell her to stand by the valve and get ready to open it and flood the room with boiling water. Still, opening that valve might be the only way to stop the boiler exploding and filling the room with not only boiling water and vicious steam but also metal shrapnel, and he knew he couldn't send away the only person who seemed willing to help him avoid that outcome.

He said nothing. If he could just – TUG – get this wheel – TUG – to budge – TUG – then it would all be okay. Feeling the heat searing through his sleeves and smelling burning, though he didn't know the source, Jessyd threw all of his weight into trying to pull the wheel to open the steam outlet valve. It did not want to move but he was unwilling to accept what that might mean, and between willpower and adrenaline the wheel finally shifted to the side.

Finally unblocked, it turned freely, racing through his hands as the steam forced its way out of the boiler with a violence that Jessyd couldn't hope to withstand. He threw up an arm to guard his face and was flung backwards from the valve. He hit the ladder once and then managed to grab onto it momentarily to slow his fall, somehow landing on his feet even though he couldn't stay on them. He rolled out away from the boiler and the spray of steam, and lifted his head cautiously with one arm up over his forehead just in case.

The valve was at least managing to keep the hot water contained and all that was escaping was steam. The temperature in the room had gone up several degrees and it had become incredibly humid, but the steam was rising as steam tended to do and the worst that should fall onto the passives would be an unpleasantly warm rain.

Relieved, Jessyd allowed himself to flop back to the floor and wonder where all the pain he could feel was coming from.

Relief was written in every line of her body when it seemed she wasn't needed, after all. Jessyd, she thought, had everything under control. As panicked as he seemed, surely, surely he could fix it. After all, he was clever. That this was less a problem of cleverness and more one of brute force didn't really cross her mind until she noticed that it seemed like the other passive was actually struggling quite a lot. Tremulous fear passed through her, along with visions of exploding boilers, all hot metal and steam and...

Ah! But he'd gotten the wheel unstuck, the violence of the steam making her heart stop for just a moment. Aurelie was rooted to the spot, mind racing with all sorts of absurd things. Had that fixed the problem, or was it still broken after all--? The steam rose, the water stayed. All was well, and her feet became unglued from the floor.

Batting at hair that had started to curl and stick to her face in the heat and humidity of the room, Aurelie crossed over to where Jess had sprawled himself out on the floor. She half-crouched somewhere next to him, not quite knowing what to say. That could have been disasterous, and it wasn't. That she, personally, had probably put herself in more danger than was necessary by hanging around the boiler like an idiot trying to help only made her more grateful he'd managed to fix everything.

"I always seem to see you when something is horribly wrong," she joked, then realized that really wasn't very funny. Her eyes drifted from the boiler to Jess, and her brow creased with worry. "You aren't-- are you alright?" He had been in the direct path of the escaping steam, not to mention had gotten knocked around quite a bit. The question was silly, really. Of course he hadn't gotten out of that unscathed! Idiot, idiot girl. He fixes a boiler near to exploding and you ask if he's 'alright'? "I mean, you weren't hurt too badly I hope...?"

At the sound of a voice, Jessyd blinked his eyes open again. Aurelie was there. That was good. She had been close to the boiler, but she was okay. That was very good. He smiled wanly.

Ow.

The movement hurt, and he could feel the stiff redness of burnt skin on his right cheek and jaw. He couldn't tell how bad it was, but he knew he must have been in contact with the steam for less than a second before it pushed him backwards. He shifted himself so he was leaning up on his elbows and though he felt protests from his battered limbs nothing seemed to be broken.

"I think I'm still in one piece." The words became mumbled at the end as he discovered that speaking wasn't the most comfortable experience with half of his face stiff and sore and he tried to talk without moving his mouth too much. "'nyone else hurt?"

From where Aurelie was sitting, the burn looked bad enough. It was unlikely to cause any deep, lasting scarring but it was most certainly a sight to behold. The right half of Jess's face was thick with blistering, the color of candied apples and shining wetly in the dim laundry room lighting. Skin had peeled back, here and there, bleeding a little where it did so. Familiar with scalding and burns as she was, working in a kitchen, the sight still turned her stomach a little.

"No, no one I can see. Only you, it seems." It was true-- the other passives, while even more hot and sticky than before, were by and large completely unharmed. "You-- maybe you should cool that down." She'd been told, once or twice, that the best thing to do for a burn was to return it to body temperature as soon as possible, but she wasn't sure that applied to something quite so... blister-y. "You're really okay, otherwise?" Her hovering was probably unnecessary and unwelcome, but she couldn't help it. "I have to get back to work in a moment but... Really, you're not-- nothing is broken? Your arm is okay?" She remembered seeing him throw it up in front of his face. "Are you sure?"

Nanette Bonnet was on her way to do laundry.

The laundry room was in the heart of Brunnhold -- and the only way to get there was down a long set of stairs. The old passive had been putting off doing the kitchen laundry for too long. This was due largely to the fact that Nanette's hips complained when she went down stairs (going up stairs was fine, it was the down part that was difficult). The liver-spotted lady shifted a basket of dirty kitchen linens in her thin arms. Oven mitts with crusts caked on them, dishrags that smelled to high heaven, and aprons with globules of sauce clinging to them were piled high in the basket. It almost obscured her little snow-white head.

Each step Nan took down the stairs was tentative -- borne of a desire not to fall magnificently on her face and roll the rest of the way down the steps.

"Huzzah!" she crowed, taking the final step into the room. "Hoo-whee, there's life in these limbs yet!"

Nan was significantly more vocal than many of Brunnhold's passives. This was because, quite simply, she was so ancient that she knew how much talking she could get away with. Years of experience honed Nan's ability to push the envelope. Anyone who would listen; galdori, human, or wick (although she hadn't met a wick in person before) would fall victim to Nan's talkativeness.

The old woman set down the laundry basket. Taking a breather, she huffed and puffed a little and scanned the room, snapping blue eyes darting cleverly behind her smudged spectacles. Like usual, the laundry room was busy. Stinky and humid, the unpleasant stench of the strong dye used to make more clothing for passives filled the air. The working passives looked disheartened and tired. You could always tell a passive who had been at work in the laundry. Their hands were red as beets from the hot water!

After a moment, the old woman spotted a young passive slumped on the ground, and a concerned girl hovering by the boiler. Curious by nature, Nanette hobbled over to check things out. The kitchen laundry could wait a few minutes -- she needed a breather, anyway. When Nan was close enough to properly see both Aurelie and Jessyd, the state of the young man's face surprised her initial greeting right out of her mouth.

"There now, those are some candied-apple blisters!" she exclaimed.

Nanette's greeting pulled a wry wince from Jessyd's lips, or it would have done if half his face wasn't protesting at the very idea of being asked to move. It ended up as half a wry wince which quickly lost the wry part.

"'s it really look that bad?" he mumbled with his lips slightly parted and moving only a little, like a rather poor ventrilloquist. It was intended to sound like a joke, but under the circumstances the falseness of his bravado was somewhat clearer than he would have liked. He could not quite manage to be the flippant hero.

Still, he was reaping some of the rewards even without being able to play the part he thought would be most appropriate for the situation; Aurelie's concerned fussing somehow made it easier to forget his injuries. Except, of course, that she was asking about them. He supposed that it did make sense to check everything over properly, so he heaved himself up into a full sitting position and pulled his arms out in front of himself one at at time. Both protested stiffly but both moved normally, and when he tried to bend and then stretch his legs he got the same result. His torso was fine, too. He knew what a broken rib felt like, and right now neither of his sides was exploding with hot, stabby pain.

"Just bruises, I think," he told Aurelie, offering her half a smile of thanks.

Nanette's arrival startled Aurelie into falling off of her awkward perch on the back of her heels. The floor was not particularly forgiving today. Not to mention a good deal more damp and sticky than it had been before, and she wasn't particularly happy to become more intimately acquainted with it.

She was significantly more cheered to hear that Jess was in for nothing more dire than being severely uncomfortable-- aside from his face. "That's good," she said, smiling though she had to twist around a little awkwardly. Fingers twitched at her side wanting to reach out and try and help and be useful. She restrained herself; she didn't actually know very much about first aid, especially for scalding quite so extensive. She'd probably just horribly maim him.

Now that she was reassured Jess hadn't severely injured himself she could get a proper look at the bitty old woman who'd approached them both. Aurelie thought she recognized her-- from the kitchens, perhaps? "I should probably get back to work," she mumbled. The presence of older passives always put her in mind of the matrons, reminding her she was slacking. Her expression betrayed her willingness to do so.

Nan reached out her gnarled old hands to hold Jessyd's poor scalded cheek.

Nan tilted Jessyd's head expertly, pursing her lips and examining the damage closely. The old woman smelled faintly of molasses and sweet syrups. Her fingertips were cool and callused. The old passive had seen many a burn in her time, and the most practical thing for a passive to do in this situation was --

"Potatoes and honey," she announced. "I suggest you go up to the kitchen, young sir, and ask for some thin slices of fresh potato. Put them on those blisters -- potatoes will soak up that nasty heat, don't you know? Then come on back later if it's still bothering you, and I'll set you up with a honey patch. It'll get you cleared up in no time."

What Nanette was suggesting wasn't just an old-fashioned home remedy for burns. Passives didn't have access to the expensive, effective treatments that a galdor student might. So scrappy knowledge borne of experience was passed down through the grapevine. It helped that the old woman had almost fully memorized her illegal, worn-out copy of Dr. Weisenhower's Proper Methods for Preparing a Wound for Surgery.

Straightening up with an audible creak, her snapping blue eyes settled on Aurelie. Deep, indented crow's feet puckered at the corners of her eyes when she smiled. Aurelie's sudden (indubitably false) desire to get back to work reminded Nan of when she was that age.

"'"Passives stay laborious, Brunnhold will stay glorious' -- or some rubbish of that ilk. Never bothered to memorize it myself. Heeheehee!" Nan suddenly went rather quiet, checking to make sure a matron wasn't stalking past like some hunting vulture.

Jessyd knew a little first aid himself, but he would never have though of a treatment for burns that was quite so edible. He looked up towards the older passive and gave a nod, but his eyes betrayed his bafflement at what she had said, and how she acted, and quite a lot about her, really. Her stubborn refusal to be downtrodden was rather appealing.

Feeling stiffness in all of his limbs and the occasional stab of pain as he accidentally bashed his bruises against one another, he adjusted his position again to favour his slightly less bruised left hand side. Usually diligent in his duties, if only because he found his work on the more technical aspects of Brunnhold's operations at least mildly stimulating, right now he had no intentions of doing anything other than sitting for a while.

"Well, I won't tell on you if you don't go right to work," he said, his words directed to both of them in a display of passive solidarity, and to Aurelie with an added ulterior motive. He was a genius of subtlety.

((Sorry for short post, I'm on my lunch break!))

The kitchens? She could have kissed the old woman for the chance to leave the laundry room sooner than anticipated. After all, one shouldn't wait too long on something like that, should one? "I'll take you!" She winced at the eagerness in her voice. Maybe it would just sound like she was very enthusiastic about first aid involving potatoes.

With both Jessyd and the old woman having evidently agreed to being co-conspirators in her slacking, Aurelie decided to arrange herself more comfortably on the floor. It would take a while for her absence to be noted upon, she reasoned, why not make the most of it? The laundry wasn't going anywhere. Maybe if she waited long enough it would seem like time to get going with the potato-face interaction that had been previously suggested and she could get out of laundry duty entirely. It was unlikely, really, but hope springs eternal.

Silence settled awkwardly over her shoulders as she realized she didn't have much to say. "I'm Aurelie," she offered with a small nod in Nanette's direction, as if knowing her name made any difference to the much older woman. "Oh! And, uhm, thank you." This was directed at both of the others-- for not tattling, for the help on treating the burn, for stopping the room from flooding with boiling water.

The old woman chuckled, leaning one bony hand on an equally unfortunate hip.

Nanette was amused by Jessyd and Aurelie's timidity. It was hammered into them from the beginning, and the old passive was not immune, but age had dulled her fear and sharpened her wits.

"Just call me 'Nan'," Nanette said. She couldn't remember how old she was when people began to call her 'Ms Bonnet', but it was a long time ago. Nanette saw no purpose to this feeble attempt at formality. She was a passive, regardless of her age. At any moment a gentle "Ms Bonnet" could be replaced with a muttered, "old scrap", anyway.

Nan shifted, smoothing an imaginary wrinkle in her powder-blue dress. She still had an apron on, a great smear of fresh molasses dribbled down the front. Nan stuck her finger into the syrup and slurped it nonchalantly off of her callused finger. Huh, it needed to be boiled a little longer.

"To the kitchens we go, then! It's an emergency," she added importantly, waggling her fuzzy white eyebrows at Aurelie and Jessyd.

(( Thanks for being so patient with me, guys! ))

The walk to the kitchen was uneventful enough, though something in the air felt odd along the way. It was between meals and the kitchen staff was down to a minimum, skeleton crew of cleaners and prep workers for the next round of food creation. No one seemed to notice the arrival of three other passives, but it became clear that the strange sensation that breathed across the backs of their necks was not from any lingering odor of burnt food or from any chill in the air. It was something else ... but what?