Santabe threw back her head and laughed, leaving herself exposed. Telo twitched to run forward and tackle her with the idea of beating her brains out. His feet stayed frozen to the stone, though.
Here, in the square of the greatest temple of God in his birth city, before the very feet of the saint of tolerance and forbearance, where the kind Father Ansuro had lived to serve and taught him to give over hateful ways, how could he murder? After being invited into a holy place for dreamers, how could he choose violence? How could he respond to evil with evil?
Inwardly, he asked Teresa for her forgiveness at what he was about to do.
“Turn away from your purpose before it’s too late,” he urged Santabe. “You can still change. Turn away from hate.”
Her head snapped down and he saw that she’d been ready for him all along. But she had not expected this. Pity she could not tolerate. Her nose flared. Murder stared from her eyes. Her grip on the knife switched to a stabbing position.
“God always forgives,” Telo said. “You can be the person you were meant to be. Turn aside.”
“And be like you? Weak. A coward. Never. If you won’t fight me. Return to another life and try again.” She drew back her arm. Despite himself, Telo flinched, but managed to speak.
“Then I pray for your soul. God have pity on you.”
A giant form appeared behind them out of the gloomy rain. Sancha seized the back of Santabe’s robe in her teeth. Though standing on only three legs, the mare flicked her muscled neck and spun Santabe around. The knife rose and fell as Santabe stabbed at the mare.
Telo rushed forward to intervene and was brushed aside.
As Sancha shook Santabe, the knife fell from the priestess’ hand along with the white Diviner. Sancha brayed with effort and threw Santabe toward the steps of Her Beauty.
A great blast of wind shoved Telo backward. Banners on the market stalls cracked with the force of the gust, tearing lose. A sudden, sharp coldness surging against Telo and brought tears to his eyes. The wind intensified.
A sharp crack rang out above them. Telo looked to the heavens where the clouds flew across the sky like kites. The statue of Santiago rose over them, canting over. It parted from the base of its pedestal and fell. Telo dodged, stooping to drag Teresa with him, and Sancha limped after them. A boom from the ton of stone hitting the ground shook the square as the statue landed squarely on Santabe.
“By all that’s holy.” Telo sank to the ground and gathered Teresa to his chest. His arms and legs shook at the near miss. The foot of the statue was inches from their heads. The wind burst over them again, making Telo squint from its blast.
Teresa opened her eyes. Her hair blew around her face as if alive. “Is it over? I thought if I lay quiet, I could do more good than trying to get up. At least I’d be out of the way. But Sancha. The statue. All that wind. I didn’t expect that. How?”
“You’re all right?” Telo had to shout to be heard over the wind. The rain continued to wash over him, though the clouds began to break up.
“Well, not all right. It bloody hurts. But I’m not dying.”
Sancha collapsed. One minute the mare stood, the next she slid to the ground, air expelling from her lungs in a great gust. A half dozen stab wounds covered her chest. The halo surrounding her from the fog dimmed.
“Oh!” Teresa scrambled forward to stand over Sancha’s head, then embrace the horse. “Oh! Ramiro told her to protect us, and she did. She did. Though so badly hurt.” Tears fell over Teresa’s cheeks to be washed away by the rain and dried by her swirling hair. “This is our fault. If we’d handled Santabe properly in the first place. We have to do something. Save her.”
“The red.” Telo dragged himself to the statue, pulling himself over the form of Santiago.
He prepared for a gruesome sight, calling for Teresa to stay back, but words died in his throat. No body lay pinned under the statue. Santabe was gone, except for a splotch of blood and her belt caught on Santiago’s staff. He searched but found no figure limping away. The priestess was gone as if he’d dreamed her.
“Can you find it?” Teresa asked.
“Yes. Stay there.” Still in the belt, he found what they needed, stooping to retrieve the red Diviner. Miraculously, the staff was whole and undamaged. More worrying, Santabe had found the willpower to escape Dal’s wrath without the protection of the staff. Teresa didn’t need to know their enemy remained at large, with hate still in her heart. Not yet at any rate. He hurried back to her.
“If we use this now, we have no protection against the Leviathan. It likely will be trading one sort of death for another.” Telo eyed the diminishing glow around his body. The fog wore off and that would leave them exposed to Dal. His hate would extinguish them. They didn’t know if the magic could heal horses. It might be useless effort and a waste of the magic.
“Do it,” Teresa said, echoing his own wishes.
Telo stretched out the Diviner and Teresa gripped his wrist so they could do this together. “I pray this works. A hero is a hero, no matter whether human or not. God be with us.” He touched the Diviner to dapple-gray hide. Electric jolts sent them all to the ground in one puddle of pain.
Weakness overpowered.
The influence of Dal pushed down upon them, rendering Telo unable to move. It tried to crush the spark of life in his chest. His will began to shrivel. He grasped at memories of kindness, deeds of decency, and hung on with all he had left.
Claire thrashed under more attacks from Dal. A slice started near her ear and traveled toward her neck. She clapped a hand over the area, and the slice continued to cross the thin skin of her hand. Julian was screaming defiance beside her. She couldn’t stand or speak. Could barely move. Hate and putrid disgust washed over her from Dal. Hatred of all life. Disgust at the beauty of the infinite being contaminated by vulgar, grasping life. So messy. So impure. So destructive.
It tried to force everything of beauty and hope from her heart to be replaced with despair—killing her spirit before it killed her body.
A single blade of grass shot upward in front of her nose, so close that her brain saw the grass as two images. She focused on it. So green. Persisting here in the desert where only the spiny survived. A single bit of green life. Valiantly defying the odds. Refusing to wither.
She drank in the green reminder of life—too small to capture Dal’s attention—but needed more. More reminders of the good.
She flopped onto her back, forcing her hands deep into the loose soil. The wetness of the sand soothed the slice across her hand. Raindrops striking her face made her blink. The clouds above caught her attention. Not simple iron gray as they seemed, but swirls of white and all sorts of grays. An infinite variety of shades. Beautiful. Full of life-giving rain.
Beside her Julian tried to cover Beatriz to protect her, while she did the same for him. Their hands entwined. A love that couldn’t be divided.
Tears of unalloyed determination flooded Claire’s eyes.
Agony came from her hip as another cut started, but this time Claire smiled. Death came in the end, but nonetheless even now beauty lived and love flourished. This was not the end. When she died, others would fight. Joy and thankfulness flooded her heart. Gratitude for memories of her mother, of Bromisto and Errol. Appreciation of all the beauty and kindness in the world. Thankfulness for having met Ramiro and felt love.
From her back, with no technique, she Sang. Not in words, but in sound and feeling. An outpouring of pure emotions of her delight in life to share with everyone around her and give them hope. Her joy grew. The rain might wash away the magic, but it couldn’t stop the sound. She heard Beatriz add her own song, clumsy and off tune. Then Julian and Fronilde sang in their own way. A last act of defiance. Others added their voices. And their songs held a different kind of magic. Not of power, manipulation, and control of others, but of hope and love.
Not real magic, but the ordinary, everyday gift of music to uplift and comfort.
The hate lighten
ed as if Dal pulled back. She felt its puzzlement. Then it withdrew entirely, taking its hatred and leaving only the stink of rotting meat. Someone stepped over her.
Claire lost the song of joy. She sat up.
Black and yellow. A Northern soldier with a red Diviner cradled to his chest stood next to her. His hair was plastered to his head by the rain. He inched his way forward, past groaning bodies. All around him people stirred and looked around. Outside of a perfect circle of ten feet around him in each direction, people still writhed on the ground. Claire watched blood bloom from their hips down to their thighs as Dal worked its evil.
Inside that invisible circle that included her, it was as if Dal didn’t exist.
What was happening? She was in a center of peace. Dal could not reach her and it had nothing to do with her Song. This man was resisting Dal. Pushing the demon back. How?
“The staff,” Julian said. “Get the staff.”
Northern magic. Of course. Claire knew the red Diviners could give life to the dead. It apparently had another use—a use much like her illusion Song—repelling Dal.
Out of nowhere great gusts of wind swept over the field of bodies. It drove Claire’s hair into her eyes and pushed the clouds, sending them flying across the sky. It struck the Northern soldier with the Diviner, sending his arms flailing for balance. A fresh gust pushed him over. When Claire tried to get to her feet, the wind forced her back down. It sent the already-rising Julian into a tumble.
The soldier inched forward, taking the protection with him, and Claire felt Dal’s glee as the monster crept back on its prey, and its anger as other victims were ripped away. She tried to go after the man with the Diviner even as Julian struggled to do the same. Her limbs responded as if buried in quicksand. Too sluggish. Too slow. Dal had already taken its toll on her physically. Fear exhausted as surely as physical exertion.
She managed to brush her hair from her eyes at the expense of smearing mud and blood on her face, and somehow get to her feet only to trip on Fronilde and go back down.
Her body was still too confused for fine movement. Her mind, however, had grown clear. Clear enough to realize with a spring of hope that the rain had slowed to intermittent drops. The gusts of wind had sent the clouds elsewhere. Even now, the wind continued strong, while shafts of sunlight made their way through openings in the thinning clouds.
No rain.
The Song. Her magic would work again.
Malice. Hate. The desire to remove all life beat against her. Smothering.
Not today. Today she would live. Her magic would see to that.
Confidence grew inside her. A certainty she could prevail. After all, she’d fooled Dal before. She Sang of an empty field. With each note she added more details down to the little pincushion cacti and a single blade of grass among the stones, piling the illusion higher and spreading it farther.
An empty field. No life. Nothing to crush.
Dal receded again. She gasped with relief.
Despite her success, her will flickered and wavered. Her body and mind was so tired, even if her heart wanted to fight on. She force-fed more strength into the Song anyway, drawing it from somewhere, though her knees folded. The illusion spread farther, making a bigger circle than the soldier with the Diviner had, but not by much. Not near enough to save all.
Then Jorga joined her Song. From yards away came the familiar raspy voice of her grandmother to add to the magic and create her own circle. From the opposite direction, Eulalie Sang with them, and Muriel added her considerable power.
The horses. The horses had carried them apart, separating the Women of the Song. If they had remained together in a clump, their magic would have been limited. Somehow Valentía had known to divide the Women of the Song and spread them out. Now it saved them.
Their circles of protection linked together and expanded to cover more souls. Rachael found them from farther away and another voice came from a different direction. Their range widened to cover more.
All around, people sat up as Dal’s hate was pushed away. Not nearly far enough to cover everyone in the field—their magic couldn’t reach to the outside acres of the killing zone, and there, people died as they were ripped apart by inches. Claire tried to press more energy into her magic, but had no more to give. She could barely maintain her voice. Soon her Song would fade and allow Dal to take all.
Then the last clouds broke apart and the hot sun reappeared. The heat hit the puddles of water lying on rock or running from clothing and turned it to water vapor. The air began to fill with a thin skin of moisture as patches of fog rose with an eerie beauty. Her magic clung to the water in the air and spread more easily. Without any extra effort their protective cloak widened to include all.
If she hadn’t been Singing she would have collapsed. Beatriz and Julian hugged, clinging together as Julian kissed his wife’s face.
The sight heartened her, yet Claire felt only more worry on how much longer she could hold the Song. Already she used the magic much longer than she’d ever extended it before. And she couldn’t stop, for Dal hadn’t gone.
She sensed it not high above, but somewhere in the air exactly at the center of their circle. The demon growing more and more angry, knowing trickery robbed it of its prey, but not what sort of deception. Claire searched back along the strands of music to find each Singer in the stirring crowd: Jorga, Eulalie, Muriel, Rachael, Susan, and Anna, by Violet’s body. Easy enough to spot with the naked eyes as the Elders were some of the few on their feet.
But not the only ones.
Near each Elder, including Claire, was a Northern soldier with a red Diviner. Almost as if they’d been paired. In between each pairing were other soldiers with red Diviners, forming a perfect oval around the center of the field, created by a strange happenstance. And at the heart of that oval, about ten feet off the ground, pulsed a monstrous . . . thing.
It wriggled as if trapped. A great oblong blob that floated in the air, looking somewhat like a grossly engorged caterpillar. Without clothing, fur, hair, or feathers it appeared naked, though without features. No limbs. No head. No wings or other means of keeping it aloft. Just a great pulsating, formless body with flesh that appeared spongy, like a cake that hadn’t been baked long enough. Almost colorless, it matched the hue of the boiling tallow she used to make soap, though veins of blackness crisscrossed its form, cutting into the flesh like wire.
Dal.
Gooseflesh covered Claire’s skin. All across Dal, spots about the size of a coin and the color of the blackest night opened and closed, then vanished. Appearing and disappearing at random as if summoned.
Eyes.
Sometimes a handful of eyes. Sometimes several dozens of them popped into existence at once. Lasting just a few seconds at a time. They moved and tracked as if searching.
Searching for them. For the source of the magic tricking Dal.
A scream of rage split the silence and everyone twisted to look. There, near Eulalie, a man broke into a run. He carried a sword and wore rusted bits of armor. He bolted at Dal hovering over the field.
Suero.
“You took my son!” Suero bellowed, followed by oaths so black they scorched Claire’s ears. Somehow she maintained the Song and watched in wonder as the greasy little man charged at Dal, heedless of the people he stepped upon in the process. Dozens of the black eye spots opened on Dal, trying to track. Finding nothing because of their illusion.
Suero had to leap when he reached Dal. His sword cut into the monster. Hope blossomed in Claire’s chest. If only this killed the demon . . .
There was a blast like a thunderclap over her head. She lost the Song as she grasped at her ears. Sound disappeared, swallowed by a high-pitched ringing. Dimly, she was aware of Suero flying through the air to crash into people lying not far from her.
The hilt of his sword was still clasped in his hand, but the blade had turned to a puddle of silver metal, melted. The pieces of armor on his body had melted as well. Hair and cl
othing had been burned away. And Suero . . . what was left of him resembled a man-shaped cinder. Burned into charcoal. Not an inch of flesh remained. Dead.
Great Goddess.
Claire sank to her knees as Dal’s weight pressed on her again. Magic couldn’t harm it. Weapons rebounded. It was over.
We can’t kill it. We can’t even touch it.
Chapter 41
An arm snaked around Claire’s waist and lifted her to her feet. She shivered as a scent better known to her than her own—and more anticipated—enveloped her. “I knew you could master your magic,” his voice said in her ear. His beard caught in her hair as she turned in his arms to bury her face in Ramiro’s neck. “And you brought other Women of the Song.”
He was solid. Real. Not her imagination. Here at last.
A little piece of her world swung back into balance, becoming whole again.
Even as she put her arms around him, she grasped for the Song and began Singing again, continuing the illusion of an empty field.
Julian and Beatriz had Ramiro’s other arm, while Fronilde clung to them. Claire couldn’t tell Ramiro how much she missed him, as his parents did—couldn’t even kiss him while working her magic—but she showed him with the glowing look upon her face and the force of her hug.
The sun shone off his armor in a reflective blaze, blinding her and presenting an image of herself as she quickly checked to be sure he was unharmed, before focusing on his face. It looked older, graver, but she supposed hers did the same.
He wrested his arm from his parents to touch her face. “Claire, will you marry me?” His face reddened, though his eyes remained steady, locked on hers. “I know I should have asked long ago, and I know it’s not part of your tradition . . . but I’m asking you now.”
Her Song died as she lost the words. She found herself nodding like a simpleton.
“We can make new traditions,” he said. “Is that a yes?”
“Yes.”
As he kissed her, Beatriz sniffed. “About time.”
Time.
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