Dawn and Devilry

by S. Usher Evans

  She sobbed and held the child tighter.

  "Think of your other children," Alexandra said, walking toward her. "They need their mother."

  "I need my daughter," Mary snarled. "You can't take her."

  "Mary." Alexandra closed her eyes. "I order you, by command of the Guild and my place as Guildmaster, to relinquish your child."

  Mary wailed, but her arms detached from the child. Without thinking, I took the child's hand, stepping away from her mother as she collapsed to the ground.

  "Please, Alexandra, please," Mary sobbed. "Please don't take my child from me."

  "I don't have a choice," Alexandra replied.

  "I'll take care of her," I announced. "It will be quick and painless."

  Alexandra gave me a look of surprise, but it was quickly drowned out by Mary throwing herself at my feet.

  "No, please! Please Gavon, I beg of you. Don't take my daughter from me. She's a babe—she's innocent! Please, Gavon—"

  I knelt beside her, wishing with every fiber I could tell her I would be taking her daughter somewhere safe. I'd find her a family in Salem—Irene would have to understand if I told her. And if she didn't, I didn't care. I wasn't going to let anything happen to this little girl.

  But for her mother, in front of this crowd of magicals, I could do nothing but stroke her head, listening to her hysterical sobs as she contemplated the sanctioned murder of her baby.

  "She won't feel it," I whispered. "I promise."

  "Gavon, you can't let them do this." Her eyes, bloodshot, begged for relief. "You're so much kinder than the rest of them. Don't let them take my baby. Don't take my baby."

  "Enough of this."

  A flash of magic whizzed by my hand and Mary fell backward. I knew before I heard the screaming what Cyrus had done.

  Mary scrambled to her knees, clutching the little girl in her arms. But the girl was gone, with open, unseeing eyes.

  I swallowed the bile that rose in my throat. It was hard not to picture my daughter's face. Hard not to imagine what might happen if Cyrus were to find out about my own child. Hard not to strangle him right then and there.

  Cyrus straightened, a cruel smile on his face. "It's taken care of, Gav. No need to shelter this woman from it." He adjusted his shirtsleeves, impervious to the heartrending wails echoing up from the ground. "Let that be a lesson to all of you. Lawbreaking will not be tolerated. Vermin will not be tolerated."

  "This child wasn't vermin," I snarled, letting my anger rise. "This child was a child, no different than any of the creatures you've sired in the past few years."

  Cyrus lifted his chin. "Are you saying we should let Potion-makers live? For what purpose?"

  I was treading on dangerous ground, and felt the gaze of the gathered on the back of my neck. "You could've at least let the mother look away before you killed her child. That was inhumane."

  "She chose to ignore the rules of the village."

  "Cyrus." Alexandra stood in the middle of the fracas. "You've done enough. Return to your home and leave them be."

  "You don't get to order me around," Cyrus replied with a sneer. "You aren't my mistress anymore."

  "True, but I remain your Guildmaster," she replied with icy certainty. "Now go."

  That he couldn't argue with, so he swished his cloak and wandered off, giving no second look to Mary, who cradled her child through body-wracking sobs. My heart broke for her, but I couldn't show too much sympathy. Not with an audience.

  "All of you," Alexandra bellowed. "Be gone. There's nothing more to see here."

  The villagers, who, like Cyrus, couldn't disobey a direct order, turned and disappeared into their homes.

  "Come," Alexandra said quietly. "Let's take care of your child."

  It was an interesting procession, Alexandra carrying the small baby, and her grief-stricken parents following behind. I held the rear, making sure no curious onlookers were following us.

  With a gentle wave, Alexandra magically dug a small grave at the end of our cemetery. She stood, her hands clasped behind her back, giving Mary the time she needed to grieve. A cold wind blew right through my shirt, but I seemed to be the only one who noticed it.

  Mary's husband rose with the child in his arms and handed her to Alexandra without looking at my mother. Carefully, Alexandra laid the child in the ground and re-covered her with dirt. Then she magicked a small white stone at the head of the grave—similar to the small stones dotting this part of the cemetery. All the Potion-makers. There were more than I could count, almost like the innumerable stars in the sky.

  So much death.

  "I am sorry," Alexandra said. "Come, Gavon. Let's leave them to grieve."

  I followed her, still torn between shock and anger. Still picturing that little girl who resembled my own, and hating this ridiculous tradition that had no reason for existence. I was now torn between wanting the tear closed to keep Cyrus away from my girls, but also wanting to keep it open so I might save more Potion-makers. It wasn't just the Charmers and Enchanters I was sending to their deaths if I closed it; I would be condemning every Potion-maker born.

  "Thoughts, Gavon?" Alexandra said over her shoulder.

  "Many."

  "Feel free to share them. I can hear you seething from all the way back there."

  I stopped mid-stride. "The killing of Potion-makers is an absurd tradition that we should've done away with a long time ago," I said hotly. "That we continue to do it is barbaric."

  "I don't disagree," Alexandra said softly. "But change comes slow—"

  "Change comes as quickly as the Guildmaster decrees it," I responded hotly. "You made an entire village turn around and go back to their houses today."

  "I look forward to hearing your opinions of what the Guildmaster is capable of when it is yours to hold."

  I swallowed. "I told you, I don't want it."

  "Still?" she tutted. "You'd give Cyrus that kind of power? After what you witnessed today?"

  "You'll live long enough for James to grow into a man, and then give it to him," I said.

  "You know, I had a Potion-maker," she said, looking at the dark gray sky above. "My first child. I miss her every single day."

  I stood back, aghast. "You let them kill your child?"

  "I had no choice in the matter," she said, her face somber. "I barely got a chance to look at her face before they took her away from me." She continued walking. "I don't blame Mary for what she did. I only wish there was another way. If I'd let that child live, others…would wonder why not theirs? Why not my daughter?" She sighed. "It's a tradition I don't know how to break."

  "Easy. Just stop killing the children," I asked.

  She sighed. "I would have petitioned strongly for it. Especially considering your work in changing minds about potions in general. But I would've been overruled by the Council."

  "And you would've abided by it?"

  "It's a small village, Gavon. There's not much to hide here," Alexandra said, turning to look out the window. "As poor Mary found out."

  I couldn't stomach returning to the village, so I came home. Nicole met me at the door, and the very sight of her was like a kick in the gut. If things had been different—if I'd never made the tear—she wouldn't even be here. She would have been taken from me, killed at birth. A powerful little magical who could make a healing potion to rival even the strongest healers…

  I held my little girl tightly to me, thanking my lucky stars that things had turned out the way they had.

  "Baby, what is it?" Mora said when I walked into the kitchen. "You look like a wreck. Did something happen over there?"

  In the twelve years we'd been together, I'd never told Mora about what happened to Potion-makers. She'd never understood why I'd been so happy to have Nicole, so eager to show her just how perfect she really was. I suppose I'd never wanted her to see the people of New Salem for the barbarians they were. Perhaps I was afraid she'd blame me for partaking in it.

  But today, I needed her to know.


  "We found another little Potion-maker today," I began, my voice cracking. "Potion-makers aren't…well, they aren't valued in New Salem. In fact they're…" I looked down at Nicole and cast a charm around her ears so she wouldn't hear. "They're put to death at birth."

  "Oh my God," Mora said, inhaling sharply. "Are you serious?"

  I nodded as Nicole looked up at me, obviously confused why she could no longer hear. "This little girl, her mother had hidden her. I don't know how. She was Nicole's age. Just…just a baby."

  "Don't tell me someone…"

  I nodded. "Cyrus. He killed her in one strike. It was…" A tear fell down my cheek. "Mora, I couldn't stop it. I was going to save that little girl. Bring her here, give her to a family who would show her love and…"

  "And my mother would've had a cow," Mora said, coming to sit next to me. "But I would've let her stay here. There are some things worth fighting with my mother for."

  "My mother had a Potion-maker before me," I said, letting Nicole slide off my lap and walk away, poking her still-charmed ears. "A sister. So I suppose it runs in my blood."

  "Your mother let them take her child and kill her?" Mora said with a gasp.

  I averted my gaze to our joined hands. "She didn't have a choice. Mary didn't have a choice. It's…it's just how it is there."

  "And you still have a loyalty to those people?" Mora said. "You still want to let them loose in our world?"

  "They can't help that they're ignorant," I said, but I didn't feel it. It was hard to justify what I'd seen on pure culture alone. Not when Cyrus had been so gleefully unrepentant about murdering a child.

  Thirty

  I thought a lot about that little Potion-maker over the next few days, especially as Nicole and I worked through her book more. I also thought about all the other Potion-makers who'd died since I'd had the tear open. How many could I have saved by removing them from New Salem?

  "You should be focused on closing the tear, not trying to save hypothetical children," Mora said, as we discussed it, lying in bed. "I know…I know that it's hard, and you feel responsible, but there's nothing we can do."

  "I mean, there's nothing really preventing me from bringing them over," I said.

  "Other than my mother threatening to banish you—and me and our girls—from the clan."

  Damn that Irene. "She wouldn't do that. The clan wouldn't agree to that. Not if we were saving lives."

  "I don't know. You aren't at these clan meetings," she said, rolling onto her side and walking to the bathroom. "I swear this kid is right on my bladder."

  "What are they saying?" I called to her.

  "Oh, you know." She reappeared in the doorway, holding a bright purple attack spell in her hand. "Curious to know how we're going to handle this lovely miracle."

  "Oh, she'll be fine—"

  "No, not just her, Gav. They want to know about our kids' kids. We've disrupted the peace amongst the magical community here." She absorbed the magic back into her body and climbed into bed. "Imagine what'll happen in a hundred years when there's a whole brood of Warriors and Healers and Potion-makers…"

  I kissed the side of her head. "Have I mentioned how beautiful it is when you use magic like that?"

  "Uh-huh." She moved away from me. "Don't change the subject. It's a problem people are starting to consider. Especially some of the younger people—the ones who always ask why they don't get to use more of their magic."

  "Oh? And see, from what I hear from Irene, everyone's just ecstatic about the Danvers Accord."

  She rolled her eyes at me. "Jeanie was telling me about a group she fell into. Some secret society or some crap like that. It's part of the reason Mom pulled her out of that Arlington School for Magicals down in D.C. Too many rich magicals with too much time on their hands." She let out a sigh. "God, when did I become such a mother?"

  "You're a great mom," I said. "Maybe one of the other clans would absorb the magicals. The Vargas Clan in Spain might."

  "You've got to get this idea out of your head. The only thing you should be focusing on is closing the damn tear, not trying to bring all the unwanted Potion-makers to this side. If they decide to do what they do—no matter how barbaric—that's not your problem."

  But it was my problem, and it gnawed at me when I returned to New Salem for a Council meeting, and I walked by Mary's house, which had draped black sheets over all the windows. Her children, who would've normally been outside playing, were nowhere to be found. The village itself had become despondent—even the tavern was less busy than it had been.

  The only person who seemed to be in good spirits was Cyrus.

  "Oh, why do we look so glum?" he said with a laugh. "Our village is strong. Our magicals are happy."

  "The Enchanters are not happy," Rogers said. "They would like the Council to formally censure Master Cyrus for his role in the death of Mary's child."

  "The only role I played was administering justice," Cyrus said. "Had she followed the rules in the first place, we never would've had that spectacle. Don't the midwives have some blame here? Who let the woman give birth and didn't take the child immediately—"

  "Cyrus, that is enough," Alexandra said. "Have you no sense of decency?"

  He quieted, but the look of superiority remained.

  "What's done is done," Alexandra said after a moment. "How is…how is Mary?"

  "She has declined to make bread for the past three weeks. She's sworn she will never make again," Rogers said. "The other Enchanters are…asking that they not be asked to make bread."

  "They're revolting," I said under my breath.

  "I will deal with Mary," Alexandra said wearily.

  "Good. It's about time we restore some order in this town," Cyrus said. "Shall we make a spectacle of her or simply send her to the gallows?"

  "Maybe we'll send you to the gallows instead," I said with an acidic look. "Or would you prefer to starve when all the Enchanters and Charmers decide to stop making food for us? Do you know how to make bread from crumbs? Milk a cow? I suggest that you quiet down before you get us all killed."

  "We'll make them make it. This isn't complicated," Cyrus said. "We have power. They don't. If they fall out of line, we'll merely start destroying them one by one until they're docile again."

  "If this is how you plan to lead us when you become Guildmaster, Cyrus, I'm afraid I must strongly object," Rogers said, his face growing pale.

  "And I'm afraid it's not up to you, is it, Rogers?" Cyrus said.

  "No, it's up to me," Alexandra said. "And I happen to agree with him. Until you decide to challenge me for this seat, you will quiet down and not speak of such horrible things. Am I clear, Cyrus?"

  The look she gave me wasn't lost on me.

  When the meeting was over, I disappeared from the council room, but didn't return home. I was too angry, and I could already predict what my wife would say: Close the tear, Gavon.

  And leave the inhabitants of New Salem to Cyrus and his unique brand of justice.

  I needed to cool off, so I returned to the manor I was supposed to be inhabiting and walked into the library. I took a moment to breathe in the dusty air, quiet my mind, and let the events from the past few days disappear. But I couldn't. All I could see was that tiny little girl.

  I paced in the library, feeling trapped between two very bad outcomes. Close the tear, doom the village. Keep it open...

  And what? Bring them over? Let an entire population of magicals not bound by the Danvers Accord loose in the world?

  Then again, that was already a problem. My own children were that problem. And any children they had, and so on. The only solution to this problem, the solution someone like Irene wanted, was for me and them to be locked up in here with the rest of New Salem.

  Or…

  I stopped pacing, standing in the middle of the library. There was a rather elegant, albeit challenging solution—update the Danvers Accord. I knew little about pacts, having made precious few in my life. But Alexand
ra kept a tome about them. As I didn't trust myself to be nice, I summoned the book from the library, plopping down in the seat where I'd spent so many days of my childhood, and started reading.

  Traditionally, pacts were designed to have loopholes and double-meanings, which was why they should never be entered into lightly. Much as Alexandra's decrees were enforced by the collective magic of the guildmembers, a pact would use the magic of both individuals—or however many members of the pact there were—to force them to adhere to it. The book was full of details on the different kinds of pacts, how to word them so one didn't get hoodwinked, and there, at the end, was a long chapter on changes with one very important passage:

  If a pact must be updated, it requires the original signatories or their descendants.

  Well, that complicated things a little. In the case of the Danvers Accord, there were over two hundred signatories, each representing a clan or guild around the world. That amount of magic had been the only way such monumental changes could be enforced. The original Danvers Accord was signed in 1714—twenty-two years after the Separation. It had taken Johanna Chase that long to track down Clanmasters and have them agree to the details. And as Josefa had said—it was either sign or be eliminated.

  Tucking the book under my arm, I returned to Salem and made one final detour to Ashley's house.

  "Ah, Gavon, so nice to see you," he said, opening his front door. "Come in, come in. You look troubled."

  "Very much so," I said, following him inside.

  "I hope you haven't come to a dead end with the tear research?" he said. "Did you visit Clan Vargas?"

  "I did, thank you. Josefa helped with a few ingredients, but I'm still searching for the final two."

  "Is that what you've come to talk about?" he said.

  "Ah…no, actually," I said, momentarily second-guessing myself. Mary's child reappeared in my mind, strengthening my resolve. "I wanted to ask to see your binder full of Clanmasters. I was…hoping to contact them."