Elisha Magus (19 page)

“My friends already dislike most of your allies,” she pointed out. “But you and I agreed we need to build a strong core, of both magi and
desolati
, especially when we strike down the laws against sorcery and make this kingdom free.”

Alaric shook his head, bright hair lashing the rich velvet of his cloak. “Your ambition is one of the things I love about you, darling, but you still think too small.” He cradled her face in his hands, his eyes tracing her features, then lifting. “If my plans succeed, you could be queen of much more than this little island. You’re impatient for action, for your mother’s sake if nothing else, and I understand that. I knew her, too, remember?”

“What do you want of me, then?” She jerked away from him, her skirts swirling with a hint of power. “You want me to ride a carriage to London and sit there with my stitching? Why? When you won’t even tell me what you’re planning? I thought we were together in everything, and now I find you stalking about in the forest, speaking of allies you will not name—” This time, Brigit interrupted herself, her breath caught, her profile sharp with sudden interest. “Allies,” she breathed, turning back to him. “Let me stay, Your Majesty. Your allies might well wish to meet your queen.”

For a moment, Alaric’s soft, boyish features turned hard, his eyes with a glint of white. “No. Brigit, that I cannot do.” He wet his lips, spreading his hands. “Negotiations are complicated, and these are dangerous people. I had much rather you were a hundred miles away. I would not risk you, or the baby.” He came to her, his hand spreading over her stomach, over Elisha’s child growing inside.

Elisha forced his fingers to relax, taking a deep and quiet breath.

She pressed her hands over his, entwining their fingers as she brought his hand up to her lips. “I have things to offer, my love. Things they might desire.”

His throat shivered, and Elisha did not need his extra senses to know the lust that must be firing through the prince’s loins. His jaw clenched as he watched, not daring to look away, but Alaric met her eyes over their clasped hands. “And they would not hesitate to hurt you to get what they want. Trust me, darling, and we shall have so much more.”

“Together,” she murmured, almost too low for Elisha’s ears, then she leaned forward, finding his lips with hers. Elisha did glance away now, suddenly fascinated by the dark recesses of the house around him, but he could not miss the man’s groan of desire. Or Brigit’s next words, “Let me stay. You will not regret it.”

With an ostentatious rattle of sword and armor that brought Elisha back to attention, Mortimer returned, another figure trailing after. “Highness. You asked to see Farus when he returned.” He gave a little bow before retreating to the perimeter, and the man he’d brought slipped back his hood. Parsley, the iron-mage, the assassin even his master did not understand. Was Alaric here to meet with the
indivisi
? Had they committed to his aid?

“Your Highness.” The iron-magus, too, bowed, but stiffly—as he did everything. He glanced at Brigit with dull eyes, then back to the prince. “I trust you found the place without trouble.”

“Thank you, Farus. I have a new task for you.”

Parsley remained bowed, his lips down-turned. “I thought you might allow me to join the … hunting party, Majesty.”

“Not now,” said the prince firmly. Alaric stepped away from Brigit, bringing her forward on his hand with the grace of a dancing master. “Our future queen requires an escort back to London. Will you accompany her?”

“You cannot make me go,” Brigit hissed, but Alaric offered a sad smile.

“My love, I’m afraid we can.” He leaned as if to kiss her, but she turned her face from him.

“I have ways—”

“Please,” said Alaric, and the magus stepped forward to wrap his hand around Brigit’s wrist.

“The great barrows you asked about are just a little farther, Majesty, past a field of smaller mounds.” Parsley gave a short bow, then nodded to Brigit. “Right this way, my lady. Let’s get you back to London, shall we?”

She jerked against him, but his arm was rigid no matter how she tugged or twisted. “What are you?” Then she did not speak again, but locked her eyes to his, and Elisha guessed they were speaking through the contact. Fighting.

“Sergeant? Take four of the men. The others shall stay here. Keep her safe.” Then to Brigit he said, “We’ll speak again when I return.” Alaric planted a kiss on her cheek though she writhed to escape him. But his body gave a sharp jerk, and he pulled away from her as if he’d been struck.

“Speak,” she snarled, “but when you touch me again, I’ll grant you no mercy.”

Alaric looked hurt as the iron-magus climbed onto a horse, hauling Brigit up before him, still locked in his grip. “One day, Brigit, you’ll understand.”

“One day, you’ll be sorry!” she flung over her shoulder as Farus galloped away with the soldiers.

I
n the wake of their departure,
Mortimer strolled back to Alaric’s side where he spent a long moment smoothing out his gloves, speaking as to no one. “The lady seems a bit … fiery.”

Alaric scowled. “Leave my betrothed to me, Mortimer. She’s safe, for now, and I have other business to attend to.”

Elisha turned and sank down, his back against the wall, his heart thundering. Alaric was here to meet his allies. He still didn’t know his brother was anywhere close by, and his arrival had prevented Brigit from locating the talisman, then removed her from the area, so Elisha had that to be grateful for, at least. But where was Thomas?

Elisha searched his memory for any clues about how Thomas thought and what he might do. It seemed a very long day. Had it been only that morning Elisha first felt Brigit’s approach? He sat up straighter as it dawned on him that her blood might serve his uses as well.

Now that the other magi were gone, so far as he knew, he risked expanding his awareness, reclaiming his attunement to this place. Thanks to his earlier efforts, it came easily, marking every house, the church, the soldiers, the prince, as vividly as day. Now, he sought Brigit. The fact that she had marked the talisman and tracked it this far showed it could be done. Elisha accepted this knowledge and stretched out. In other circumstances, he could search for the talisman itself, but if he activated it again, those earlier, eager minds, the ones who reached back when he used it against the bandits, could find them both.

The chill of death still hovered nearby—it had not gone with the retreating soldiers of the queen’s unwanted retinue. He found the brightness of her presence moving quickly into the distance with the mounted men, hot with a fury he could feel even from here. What he knew of Brigit layered over this sense of her presence, a high spirit, a seductive touch, a hint of laughter, a depth of desire, a suggestion of her movement and her beauty. But the sign he searched for would be more subtle, older. Not far away to his left-hand side, he caught the slightest echo that reminded him of her, like the glimmer of light from a distant stream. By focusing his awareness in that direction, he honed the echo, it was dull, slight, but clear—a little patch upon the cold blackness of the talisman. His stomach tightened, and there, at last, he could sense the warmth of the man who still carried it. Thank God.

After such a brief acquaintance, he could not fully characterize Thomas from this distant sense of him, as he could Brigit, but it was him as surely as if Elisha beheld his lean form and vivid eyes and felt the weariness that overlaid the strength of his heart. Outside, the guards regrouped around their prince and moved back toward the trail they had come from. Elisha kept his awareness spread about him like tingling whiskers as he rose to a crouch and hurried across the darkened square to the woods on the other side. Chanterelle’s patient sharing had shown him the precision that his attunement could achieve, and he used that knowledge now. By the time his eyes adjusted to the gloom, he already knew where the trees parted and where the rocks rose up. Cold shadows flicked among these shapes, shades he could not quite make out that rose at his approach and shrank back again as he passed by. These mysteries must wait. To the right, Alaric and his men nearly paralleled his own course. Damn.

Elisha ran faster as the fringe of woods fell back leaving him knee-deep in heather, then he stopped short in the deeper black by the hulk of a ruined house. The shadows rose higher here, and he could nearly see them with his open eyes: shades of the dead, as if the earth remembered them. Chanterelle’s guidance had shown him how to look—and now he did not know how to filter what he found. He turned slowly, skin tingling. Thomas was nearby, his presence obscured by the leaping shades. The chill of Death hung heavily all around him. The rising moon showed brush-covered mounds before him. The village at the edge of the woods had given way to another of the ancient burial places that dotted the heather of the New Forest. Each mound echoed with the dull presence of the dead, but they rang as well with sharper notes, a taste of fear like blood upon the tongue, as if Death scattered the ground with scraps of dread.

Elisha’s legs felt rooted, his body heavy with the pull of these sensations. An owl clacked its beak nearby, then a crow startled from the trees and flew off, cawing. The crow-woman watched him still, waiting for him to lead her to the carrion her companions craved.

“Thomas,” he called, as loudly as he dared. Nearby, overhead it seemed, something stirred.

Elisha turned in the shadow of the broken house, then a man leapt down before him, sword drawn in a heartbeat, and its tip struck Elisha’s breast. Thomas held a duelist’s stance, the barest pressure needed to thrust home his blade. “Why did my brother take you aside, Barber? Why clear a church to meet with you?”

Elisha held out his hands, once more at the mercy of his king, but the long day and the weight of all that he had seen and done settled upon his shoulders. He could not see Thomas’s face, only the hard determination of his form that shivered the sword’s point against Elisha’s heart. He stared down the long blade, recalling the tenuous trust that they had found, and he felt like weeping. “He’s afraid I’m working for the French. There was a man who came to see me back at Dunbury, a Frenchman. The man was killed in an attempt on my life, and the French are angry.”

“Why should I believe you? A barber, a witch, my father’s killer. You took communion second only to him.”

The depth of Thomas’s anger and his despair simmered along the sword, Elisha’s awareness making contact at the length of a blade, the span that separated him from his own death. His next words could end that separation, but they must be said. “Your Highness, he’s coming. Here. Now.”

Thomas’s eyes flared, his body tensed. “Judas,” Thomas hissed.

“No!” Elisha winced at the sound of his own voice. “No. I came to find you, to warn you. He doesn’t know you’re here.”

“How does he know where to come, if you’re not leading him to me?”

“The heathen burial grounds are used by witches—one of them works for your brother’s man, Mortimer. He guided your brother this far—please, Your Highness.” Framed by his wild hair and beard, etched by burdens too great for one man, Thomas looked more like a bandit than those Elisha had killed, but it was the pain in his eyes that showed the truth. Elisha’s heart pounded beneath his blade.

“Lady Rosalynn was scared for you,” Thomas said. “It took all I had to keep her away from the church, and by the time I went back, you’d both gone. She swore he meant to kill you, and now I find you alive. Is she part of your plan?” In a moment, with a snarl of frustration, he had answered his own question. “She must be—she sent me to the village. She said you would find me there if you could, but when I got there I wasn’t alone.”

Gently, Thomas shook his head, then purpose returned to the sword, forcing Elisha back. The rough wall held him, the king’s sword pinning him there. Thomas took a deep breath. “By God,” he whispered, “I needed to trust you.” His grief cut Elisha more sharply than any blade.

“Then trust me now. Rosalynn has no reason to ally with your brother, nor do I. He is your father’s son, born a tyrant. I begged her to keep you from your brother, and she did.” She had done brilliantly, and he would give her all due gratitude when they met again. If they met again. “I would swear upon the Cross, Your Highness. I would carry a bar of burning iron if that would convince you.”

“And wouldn’t the Devil give you strength. You’ve already told me you’re not devout. Do you even feel pain?”

Elisha flinched and saw the hurt echoed in Thomas’s own face. Betrayed again, just as he had dared to put his faith in another. Betrayed as Elisha had been the morning of his hanging. He swallowed, his own breathing pressing the sword’s point harder, and met the prince’s haunted gaze. At last, he spoke, carefully, quietly. “I swear upon your father’s grave, as the man who put him there, that I mean you no harm.”

Thomas’s chin lifted, his breath caught as he searched Elisha’s face. With the grace of a fallen angel, he stepped back, sliding his sword back into its sheath, his eyes downcast. “Forgive me,” he whispered.

“Your Highness, we have no time for anger, or regret.” Elisha wanted to touch him, to lay a healing hand upon his shoulder and mend the wounds his king carried so deeply, but there was no time for that, either. “The talisman, that thing I asked you to carry.”

“It’s here.” Thomas fumbled at his waist a moment, then passed over the bundle.

Elisha stripped off the wrapping with numb fingers, removing Brigit’s contact, and tossed it away. He should like to put the cloth to flame, but he dare not. “My enemies are looking for this. I should never have let you carry it.”

A clatter of horses moved by, beyond the house, toward the heath of mounds.

Thomas regarded him across a great distance. He lowered his voice. “You trusted me. I should have done the same.”

“No time,” Elisha said, matching his hushed tone, though he thought the prince’s men too far away to hear. Thomas gave a rueful smile, which vanished at Elisha’s next words. “You need to go, to hide. I think they’ve left the lodge, you may be able to return there.”

“And you?”

Elisha spoke the plan almost before he knew what he would do. “Your brother is going to meet someone—I need to know who.”

“Oh, do you?” Thomas folded his arms. “If my usurper is gathering allies, it seems that I’m the one who needs to know.” He spoke lightly, still treating his crown as a distant hope or folly.

“Let me be your scout, Highness, until you can afford a better one.”

Thomas gave a firm shake of his head. “This was not meant to be your fight, Elisha, and you cannot win it alone.”

Elisha tightened his grip on the talisman. Would Thomas be safer with or without him? It all depended on the roll of the dice—which enemy must he next confront? Before he could say anything, Thomas had stripped off his cloak and set out at a trot, moving low through the heather in pursuit of his brother’s horses. Elisha hurried to catch him up. Thanks to the hilly ground, they were able to parallel Alaric’s course without being seen. Elisha spread his senses, trying to find out if Alaric had other magi with him who might reveal their pursuit. When he focused ahead, he stumbled and nearly fell but for Thomas’s hand upon his elbow, catching and holding him with its strength. Ahead, in a dell nearer them than the road the prince followed, lay a patch of frigid night where the layers of Death grew dense upon the ground. It stung Elisha’s awareness and sent the shades of the mounds around them dancing as if on the gibbet. For a moment, he fought for breath, then glanced at his prince. “I know where he’s going,” he whispered hoarsely. And, in knowing, he knew whom Alaric must meet.

Somehow, he found his footing and led them around to the west, coming up carefully atop a tall mound. At its collapsing end rose a pair of huge stones, tilted to one side beneath a broad capstone, the lintel where the ancient heathens had gone to meet their dead. Elisha found purchase on the rough, slanted stone and scrambled up. Thomas followed, and they lay on their backs, side by side on the narrow slab. Elisha turned his head to overlook the circle as Alaric and his men entered and dismounted. The knights lit a pair of torches to plant in the shaggy mounds to either side of the entrance before Alaric ordered them back. Leading his horse, they complied, though Mortimer shook his head and grumbled. The men spread out in all directions, moving away until they could not be seen, and Elisha could barely sense them.

“Twelve men, in a ring around us,” he breathed.

“Holy Rood,” Thomas lay back, resting his head against the stone, laid out as if for his funeral. “I’m a dead man.”

“You won’t die,” Elisha told him, and nearly smiled. “I know a thing or two about Death.” But even as he said it, the air thickened around him with a stabbing cold that sent his words out on a cloud of mist. Elisha’s heart lurched, his grip tightening on Thomas’s arm so the other man glanced back at him, face etched in a frown of moonlight and shadows.

“Something’s changed for you,” Thomas murmured. “And not for the better.”

Elisha let him go, suddenly stung by their contact. He tried to deny what he felt, what he knew, but it was too late: Death stalked his king tonight.

Death seeped from the earth around them, buried in the mounds and creeping through the heather. Already, his fingers stuck just a little to the metal of his talisman, and he carefully set down the pot over his head, his arm passing before his face. Someone approached the lintel, alone: Alaric. The sense of death grew stronger, seeping out of the stone beneath him, up from the barrows and the torn bits that scattered them as if scavengers had been at the bodies they once contained. Elisha’s throat closed over his misty breath. He should have made Thomas leave him. Rosalynn found a way to save the prince, why couldn’t he? Instead, he brought him to the precipice from which no man returned. Tears burned at the back of his eyes—the only thing still warm.

“Always cold, you said.” Thomas reached toward him, covering his shaking hand. “What’s wrong?”