tissue surrounding it. Altogether he took the parahippocampal gyrus, the entorhinal and perirhinal cortexes, and the amygdala—a mass of brain the size of a fist. Scoville even left a few metal clips behind inside H.M.'s brain—so he could show other doctors where he'd cut—and then sewed his patient up again."
Jane grimaced, and touched a hand to the side of her head. No ... she was touching her ear, running a finger along the rounded top of it as if feeling for stitches. Had she really done what I suspected: used plastic surgery to remove the pointed tips of what would otherwise be eleven ears? Was she actually an elf, masquerading as a human? If so, why?
Sandra plunged on with the story of the horrifying medical experimentation of a previous century. Her anger was clear; this case really wound her crank. "After his operation, poor H.M. couldn't hold a thought for more than twenty seconds at a time. He still had the same personality as before and knew who he was, but he suffered from severe amnesia. A nurse could leave the room and return five minutes later, and H.M. would forget that he'd ever met her before."
I looked at Jane, then at Sandra. "Jane seems to be having the same problem," I said. "She keeps forgetting who I am." She also kept forgetting who the elf named Galdenistal was, but that didn't bother me nearly so much.
"From what Romulus has told me, Jane, you're able to retain a short-term memory for several hours at a time."
Jane nodded.
Sandra continued: "So it's not your hippocampus that's damaged. If it were, you wouldn't be able to form new short-term memories at all. You would only be able to hold onto a piece of information for five to fifteen minutes, maximum, and then only by continually concentrating on that data.
"No, it's the ability to form and access long-term memories that you've lost. That would suggest that the storage sites themselves are damaged. And unfortunately, memory is not localized; it's spread all over the brain."
I was still thinking about the possibility that Jane might be an elf. Like me, she might not be as human as she seemed. The fact that she was fluent in Sperethiel seemed to confirm this. And it had been an elf—one with connections to the Tír government— who had tried to kidnap her, to take her back to Tír Taimgire. The thought jogged something in my memory.
"What about lae s?" I asked suddenly.
I was referring to a drug that was rumored to be in use by Tír Taimgire's Peace Force. An injection of laes was said to produce retrograde amnesia. I figured that Sandra, given her profession, would have heard about the drug, and I wondered why she hadn't mentioned it yet.
" Laes only works on memories that have been laid down immediately prior to the injection," Sandra answered. "Fifty micrograms of laes will wipe the two to twelve hours that immediately preceded the administration of the drug. Laes physically changes the potential gradients of various chemicals in the neurons, erasing those memories. It doesn't cause the type of damage Jane has.
"If a drug were involved, my guess would be colchicine. In experiments done on mice in the late 1900s, it prevented newly acquired memories from becoming permanent memories by preventing the stable molecular configurations of tubulin in the cell membrane."
"So somebody drugged Jane?" I asked.
Sandra gave a slight shrug. "Colchicine would only explain part of the problem. Something happened that wiped out memories Jane had formed years ago —many years ago, by the sound of it. And that suggests extensive damage to several parts of the brain."
"Can you use your magic to heal that damage?" I asked.
"It's not that simple," Sandra answered. "Unlike other cells in the body, neurons aren't replaced when they die. Damage to them is permanent. The connections between the neurons—the dendrites, synapses, and axons—can sometimes grow back. But if the neurons themselves are damaged, there's no way to repair them—even with
Jane grimaced, and touched a hand to the side of her head. No ... she was touching her ear, running a finger along the rounded top of it as if feeling for stitches. Had she really done what I suspected: used plastic surgery to remove the pointed tips of what would otherwise be eleven ears? Was she actually an elf, masquerading as a human? If so, why?
Sandra plunged on with the story of the horrifying medical experimentation of a previous century. Her anger was clear; this case really wound her crank. "After his operation, poor H.M. couldn't hold a thought for more than twenty seconds at a time. He still had the same personality as before and knew who he was, but he suffered from severe amnesia. A nurse could leave the room and return five minutes later, and H.M. would forget that he'd ever met her before."
I looked at Jane, then at Sandra. "Jane seems to be having the same problem," I said. "She keeps forgetting who I am." She also kept forgetting who the elf named Galdenistal was, but that didn't bother me nearly so much.
"From what Romulus has told me, Jane, you're able to retain a short-term memory for several hours at a time."
Jane nodded.
Sandra continued: "So it's not your hippocampus that's damaged. If it were, you wouldn't be able to form new short-term memories at all. You would only be able to hold onto a piece of information for five to fifteen minutes, maximum, and then only by continually concentrating on that data.
"No, it's the ability to form and access long-term memories that you've lost. That would suggest that the storage sites themselves are damaged. And unfortunately, memory is not localized; it's spread all over the brain."
I was still thinking about the possibility that Jane might be an elf. Like me, she might not be as human as she seemed. The fact that she was fluent in Sperethiel seemed to confirm this. And it had been an elf—one with connections to the Tír government— who had tried to kidnap her, to take her back to Tír Taimgire. The thought jogged something in my memory.
"What about lae s?" I asked suddenly.
I was referring to a drug that was rumored to be in use by Tír Taimgire's Peace Force. An injection of laes was said to produce retrograde amnesia. I figured that Sandra, given her profession, would have heard about the drug, and I wondered why she hadn't mentioned it yet.
" Laes only works on memories that have been laid down immediately prior to the injection," Sandra answered. "Fifty micrograms of laes will wipe the two to twelve hours that immediately preceded the administration of the drug. Laes physically changes the potential gradients of various chemicals in the neurons, erasing those memories. It doesn't cause the type of damage Jane has.
"If a drug were involved, my guess would be colchicine. In experiments done on mice in the late 1900s, it prevented newly acquired memories from becoming permanent memories by preventing the stable molecular configurations of tubulin in the cell membrane."
"So somebody drugged Jane?" I asked.
Sandra gave a slight shrug. "Colchicine would only explain part of the problem. Something happened that wiped out memories Jane had formed years ago —many years ago, by the sound of it. And that suggests extensive damage to several parts of the brain."
"Can you use your magic to heal that damage?" I asked.
"It's not that simple," Sandra answered. "Unlike other cells in the body, neurons aren't replaced when they die. Damage to them is permanent. The connections between the neurons—the dendrites, synapses, and axons—can sometimes grow back. But if the neurons themselves are damaged, there's no way to repair them—even with
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