The Rot of Awapu

In the walled city of Awapu, divided by a fragile truce between two rival factions, a rot is spreading. It starts as a subtle contamination, turning its victims savage from the inside out, eating away memories before consuming morality. Inti-qa is a street healer who moves across the city's bitter dividing line. She knows how to keep her head down and her mouth shut—a survival skill she honed the night she purposely let a murderous patient bleed out in an alley.

When Inti-qa is coerced into treating an infected soldier from the powerful Upper City ward, she crosses paths with Runa-uay, the ruthless enforcer enforcing the quarantine. Runa-uay doesn't just want a cure; he wants control of the contagion, and he believes Inti-qa holds the key. Brought into his brutal world as a reluctant captive, Inti-qa has to use every ounce of her cunning to survive both the spreading disease and his obsessive oversight. But as the internal rot threatens to destroy Awapu, the real danger might be what happens when Inti-qa decides to stop running and start fighting back.