Yellowed Fingertips

The dawn bell had barely finished tolling across the salt-crusted rocks of Tash-Bashi when Arslanbek set his copper basin on the stone wash-trough, determined to catch the man who had tried to break into his locked apothecary chest before the morning watch rotated. If the poisoner cleaned his nails with sea brine before the first work detail assembled, the yellow evidence from midnight would wash away into the tide. Beside the basin, Arslanbek laid out a horn spatula, a pot of vinegar steeped with crushed oak gall, and a dry linen towel.

Warden Timur-bek stood three paces back against the damp limestone wall of the inner courtyard, clutching his sheepskin ledger to his ribs. The cold morning wind whipped off the gray sea below the cliffs, snapping the hem of the administrator's wool cloak against his boots.

"The orderlies are already muttering about the overturned kettle from last night, Arslanbek," Timur-bek said, his breath fogging in the frigid air. "If I line them up for an unscheduled pustule inspection before breakfast, they will think the sweating sickness has broken quarantine among the staff."

"Let them think the plague is in their marrow," Arslanbek said without looking up, stirring the astringent oak gall mixture with his spatula until the liquid turned the color of bruised iron. "Fear keeps a man still while another looks at his hands. If you tell them we are hunting a lock-breaker who steals monkshood, our butcher will hide his sleeves in the latrine pit."

Timur-bek swallowed hard, nodded, and struck his brass hand-bell twice.

The cloister's five orderlies and lay attendants filed into the narrow courtyard from the refectory corridor, shivering in their coarse tunics. They formed an uneven line between the stone wall and the open drainage channel. Some wore greasy sheepskin vests; others wrapped ragged gray cloaks over their shoulders against the sea draft.

"Hands out, palms up," Arslanbek ordered, stepping up to the first man in line. "Turn your wrists. Spread the fingers. The imperial quarantine decree requires every caretaker on this crag to show clean skin after each night watch."

The first attendant was Old Kurban, whose knuckles were swollen with gout. Arslanbek gripped the old man's wrists, turning the calloused hands under the harsh morning light. He ran the flat of his horn spatula across the nail beds. The skin was rough and coated in coal soot from the lower braziers, but the gray wool cuffs were frayed evenly and the cuticles showed no trace of yellow brimstone dust.

"Clear," Arslanbek said. "Next."

The second man, a broad-shouldered grave-digger named Murad, held out hands scarred by chisel slips and limestone chips. Arslanbek inspected the fingernails, sniffing the skin. Nothing except the sour stench of damp earth and lye soap.

Brother Oghuz stepped forward third. The stout scullery keeper held his soft, doughy hands out with an air of wounded grievance, his dark eyes fixed on Arslanbek's chest.

"I have served the lazaretto for nine winters, herbalist," Oghuz murmured, his voice thick with indignation. "I do not carry the sores of convicts."

"You carry lard under your nails and tallow on your apron," Arslanbek replied, clamping Oghuz's right wrist in a firm grip. He turned the attendant's hand toward the eastern sky, where the cold sun broke over the water. He scraped the horn blade under Oghuz's thumbnail. A curl of yellow swine fat came away on the horn. Arslanbek rubbed it between his thumb and forefinger, bringing it to his nose. It smelled of stale mutton grease and dried onion, not brimstone.

Arslanbek dropped the scullery keeper's wrist. "Wash your grease off before you touch the noon broth, Brother. Next."

Oghuz sneered and moved aside, joining the cleared men near the chapel arch.

The fourth attendant, a quiet laborer who tended the cliff beacons, passed under Arslanbek's inspection without incident. He smelled of bitter pitch and hearth soot, but his cuticles were clear of sulfur and his brown wool sleeves were whole.

Only Selim-oglu remained at the tail of the line, his shoulders hunched inside an oversized gray mantle. His arms were tucked deep into his sleeves, his hands hidden from view. He shifted his weight from boot to boot on the wet flagstones, his gaze darting toward the arched staircase that led down to the subterranean cistern chambers.

"Step up, Selim," Timur-bek commanded, tapping his ink quill against the ledger board. "Master Arslanbek does not have all morning to wait on your modesty."

Selim-oglu took two hesitant steps forward. He kept his head lowered, the collar of his mantle pulled high around his chin. Slowly, he extended his hands over the copper basin.

Arslanbek did not touch the orderly immediately. He looked first at the man's sleeves.

The left cuff was intact, stitched with dark thread at the hem. The right cuff was ragged. Three warp threads hung loose from a fresh, triangular tear in the gray weave, exactly where the brass hasp of the dispensary cabinet had caught the cloth at midnight.

"Turn your palms over," Arslanbek said quietly.

Selim-oglu hesitated, his fingers trembling against the chill. He rotated his wrists.

Arslanbek caught Selim-oglu's right hand by the base of the thumb, holding the limb rigid under the direct glare of the morning sun. With his left hand, Arslanbek dipped the linen towel into the oak gall solution and wiped the man's index finger and thumb.

The dark tannin wash reacted instantly with the hidden residue. Where grease and sulfur dust were packed into the grooves of the skin, the pale yellow brimstone turned into a dark, mottled crust around the cuticle. Deep under the edge of the thumbnail, sheltered from hasty morning washing, bright yellow sulfur powder clung fast to the dried tallow base.

"You should have used vinegar to clean your nails before dawn," Arslanbek said, his grip tightening around the orderly's thin wrist until the bone pressed against bone. "Tallow does not wash away with cold well water, Selim."

Selim-oglu's breath hitched. His eyes widened in naked terror as he looked from his discolored fingernails to Arslanbek's grim face.

"I... I only carried the oil," Selim-oglu stammered, his voice rising into a cracked shriek. "I did not brew the draught! They said it was medicine for the prince!"

"Who gave you the vial?" Arslanbek demanded, stepping closer to pin the orderly against the stone trough. "Tell me who paid you to spike the evening kettle."

Timur-bek stepped forward, dropping his ledger onto the wet flagstones. "Selim? You stole the wolfsbane extract?"

Selim-oglu did not answer the warden. Instead, his left hand shot out from beneath his gray mantle, not to strike, but to shove Timur-bek with all his frantic weight. The heavy administrator collided with the copper basin, sending iron-tinted gall water splashing across the courtyard as both men crashed into the wash-trough.

In the confusion, Selim-oglu wrenched his right wrist free from Arslanbek's grasp.

Before Arslanbek could tackle him, the orderly spun on his heel and bolted through the courtyard archway. In his left fist, clutched tight against his chest, glinted a small, stoppered glass phial of dark amber extract.

"Stop him!" Timur-bek sputtered, clawing his way out of the spilled basin. "The stairs!"

"He is heading for the cistern!" Arslanbek shouted, kicking aside the dropped ledger board as he lunged through the arch into the dark stairwell.

Below them lay the great stone reservoir holding Tash-Bashi's only supply of fresh drinking water. If Selim-oglu uncorked the monkshood into the deep pool, eighty men would die of thirst or poison before the sun reached midday.