JULIAN'S CRIME

“They were going to die, anyway,” Julian Hernandez muttered to himself as he walked along the streets of Ioso. People were all over, speaking animatedly to each other without taking notice of the rough looking man in dirty clothes.

He had been with them until their smell became unbearable for him. The smell of rot and death and the absence of life that brought worms. And the reactions of the governor and his retinue that came to see them reinforced the thought in his mind. He was not like them. His leg was the only affected thing. The rest had bites from head to toe.

Again, he went into an alley and hid, pulling up the oversized trouser that covered where his bandage had been, but had since been lost. The grey was there, glaring back at him, and smelling. It had spread far beyond where the frog had bitten, the colour almost the length of his hand.

He had no inclination in his heart to want to touch it, but he felt the need to, and felt no pain when he did. All that happened was that