“Where have you been?” Marcus shouted as he placed his hands on Sema’s bleeding skull.
“We were barely back from the edge of the Barrier when they attacked.” Rajan lifted Ling’s head gently, and her eyes rolled as she blinked. “They must have been waiting for us.”
“I made a mistake,” Gabriel said as he fell to the ground beside Teresa.
“Tell me something I don’t bloody know,” Marcus growled between clenched teeth.
Teresa’s wounds were extensive, and Gabriel devoted his whole attention to them. He still held the magical energy of the imprints of the Battle of the Somme fed to him by the Sword of Unmaking, and he used the full power of them to affect her healing. He knitted bone back together, fused severed tissue, repaired stricken organs, and remade burnt skin. When he finished, she opened her eyes.
“Don’t leave me like that.” Teresa’s voice sounded weak. “I can’t protect you if you run off.”
“I won’t leave you again.” He kissed her lips briefly, gently.
Gabriel lifted her with Wind Magic and carried her to Ling. He healed Ling’s wounds before taking them both to where Marcus still worked his Heart-Tree Magic on Sema. Thanks to the connection through the Sword of Unmaking to the imprints at the Battle of the Somme, Gabriel had the advantage of far more magical energy than Marcus could command. Unfortunately, that connection began to wane.
While Gabriel set about healing Ohin’s wounds, he tried to keep command of the emotions the negative imprints generated within his heart. When Ohin regained consciousness, his mentor’s own anger manifested the moment he saw Gabriel’s face. Gabriel released all of his imprints as he saw Sema sit up nearby, held by Marcus’s strong arms as he caressed her face.
“What were you thinking?” Ohin’s ragged voice, torn between fury and sadness, sounded like a klaxon to Gabriel’s ears.
“I wasn’t.”
Gabriel said no more. He had no words for his shame. For his disgrace.
“You followed him for a vendetta.” Ohin’s eyes burned with a wrath Gabriel had never seen before. He grabbed Gabriel’s shoulders.
“Aurelius.” Gabriel could feel the tears filling his eyes, but he refused to look away from his beloved mentor.
“You may have to sacrifice our lives one day for the sake of the war or the Continuum, or to save your own life, but do not throw our lives away out of vain anger and a lust for revenge. Our lives are worth more than that.” Ohin nearly spat the words out, struggling to control himself.
Gabriel choked back a sob, tears streaming down his cheeks. He had betrayed Ohin’s teachings and the faith of his team. He had left them to die so he could pursue a pointless revenge. He nearly died with nothing gained. A revenge left unfulfilled. And he had left Teresa, who would have surely died in another minute. A minute of time he wasted to assuage the loss of Aurelius. How would he have coped with the loss of both of them? Or the loss of all of them?
“I’m sorry.” Gabriel’s whispered apology hung in the still air of the yard behind the old house, seeming to quaver between himself and Ohin.
Ohin blinked back tears of his own as he pulled Gabriel into the embrace of his powerful arms. Gabriel cried as Ohin stroked his hair. “You can no longer be the impetuous boy.”
Gabriel felt the hands of his friends and companions touch his back.
“We are a family.” Ohin’s deep voice soothed Gabriel’s heart as he leaned back from his mentor’s arms. “No one doubts your courage or your love for us, but you must learn to think not simply how your actions will affect you, or us, but how they will ripple out and change the course of the war, and all the lives everywhere.”
“I understand.” Gabriel wiped his eyes on his muddied sleeve.
Ohin looked at the mud covering him as though noticing it for the first time. “What happened to you?”
“Maybe we should clean him up first.” Teresa wrinkled her nose as she sniffed at Gabriel.
“He does smell like a dung heap,” Marcus said.
“Which is different from usual in what way?” Ling asked.
“It might be good if we all took a moment to recuperate,” Sema said.
“I could use a meal,” Rajan said.
“And a bath.” Teresa sniffed at Rajan, as well.
“And a cold ale to ease my pains after a day like this,” Marcus said.
“Can they come back?” Ling asked.
“No,” Ohin said. “They ghosted our time trail. Once they’ve gone, they have no way back without a relic. We’re still safe here.”
“Good.” Gabriel glanced around at his friends, landing on Teresa’s face but finding it hard to look her in the eye. “Then I’ll tell you how stupid I was over dinner.”
Dinner consisted of a mismatched assortment of canned foods — baked beans, tomato soup, green peas, corned beef hash, Texas three-bean chili, and fruit cocktail. Gabriel ate little. At first, because he found himself too busy recounting what had happened during his encounter with the Apollyon on the Battlefield of the Somme, and later because his recitation of his foolishness had squelched his appetite.
His teammates listened to his story with a mixture of curious anger and worried disbelief. When he finished, his eyes fell to the empty place at the end of the table. The seat Aurelius would have occupied. Gabriel thought about the emperor’s sad eyes, so filled with wisdom and laughter and pain. He blinked and looked away. Too soon to think such thoughts.
“I can’t decide if that’s brave or moronic.” Teresa ground her teeth as she spoke.
“Bravely moronic.” Rajan stuck a spoonful of chili in his mouth.
“Moronically brave, more like.” Marcus shook his head as he pushed his bowl away.
“At least we’ve learned a few things.” Ling leaned back in her chair.
“Like how to sever the Apollyons’ connections with each other.” Sema placed her napkin on the table and crossed her hands.
“Other things, as well.” Ohin put his fist beneath his chin. “Even I had no idea it was possible to steal the imprints another mage held.”
“Not surprising,” Marcus said. “Grace Mages don’t spend much time fighting each other.”
“And we’d never be able to steal negative imprints from a Malignancy Mage, anyway,” Rajan said.
“Gabriel can.” Teresa waved her hand near a sputtering oil lamp and the wick leapt to life again.
“Assuming I can learn how.” Gabriel considered the process and what it would take to accomplish the task.
“We can practice later.” Teresa’s smile had returned, mischievous as ever.
“I wouldn’t mind observing that,” Ohin said as Teresa’s grin faded. “After we sweep the house and make sure it’s clean. We should get a good night’s rest. In the morning, we’ll return to the castle. We’ll be going back only minutes after we left, and there will be a great deal of work to do. Tending to the wounded. Repairing the castle and the defenses. Planning the next steps.”
“Can we trust the Council to make those plans?” Marcus took a slow sip from the last bottle of beer.
“The question isn’t whether we can trust the whole Council,” Ohin said with a sigh. “The question is who on the Council cannot be trusted.”
“There’s no way to know,” Rajan said.
“So we make our own plans on the side,” Ling said. “Just in case.”
“There is one way to know who we can trust.” Sema stared at the flame of one of the lamps. “At least for everyone except Councilman Toulouse.”
“How do we know Toulouse can be trusted?” Teresa asked.
“We don’t.” Ohin joined Sema in gazing at the flame.
“Councilman Toulouse is the only member of the Council who is a Soul Mage.” Gabriel watched Sema and Ohin staring into the flicking light of the oil lamp.
“You mean you want to read their minds?” Rajan coughed in surprise.
“Not want to.” Sema turned her eyes from the lamp to the others. “But it mig
ht be for the best.”
“Should have done it ages ago,” Ling said.
“There are rules about peeking into other people’s minds,” Sema said. “Without just cause, it is extremely unethical.”
“Something certain mages should remember,” Teresa said in a low voice to Gabriel.
“Well…of course,” Gabriel said softly.
The idea of looking into Teresa’s mind to discern her feelings for him had never occurred to Gabriel, which, he now realized, had probably been a good thing. Beyond the fact that his skill in Soul Magic came nowhere near Sema’s, the mere thought of Teresa catching him poking around in her head made his stomach tremble with fear.
“I’ll speak to Akikane about the possibility of…increasing surveillance at the castle,” Ohin said, his voice lingering on the euphemism. “Until then, we’ll keep the idea to ourselves.”
The team sat in silent agreement.
Ohin pushed his chair back and stood up.
“Let’s get to work then.”
Chapter 23: Paradox
Gabriel helped clear the table and clean the kitchen. Afterward, he and Teresa assisted in making the house seem as abandoned as it had been when they arrived. When they accomplished as much as could be done that night, they retreated to the backyard to practice stealing imprints from one another under Ohin’s patient observation.
It took Gabriel several tries to manage wresting control of the imprints Teresa held. Once she had seen it done, she had little problem replicating the feat. As they practiced, Ohin joining in, it became clear that the process required an exceptional level of skill and concentration to be successful against a mage who knew how to fight back against the usurpation of the imprints they held.
Considering the unheard-of nature of the technique among Grace Mages, Gabriel assumed it remained a closely guarded secret among Malignancy Mages. This made a certain macabre sense. If a Malignancy Mage stole the imprints from another, it would be unlikely for both mages to survive the encounter. Gabriel doubted it would have much application among Grace Mages. At least he hoped not. It also gave him pause to think how close he came to protecting that secret with his own death.
Later, after the others had gone to bed, Teresa and Gabriel sat on the steps at the top of the worn wooden stairs, holding hands and speaking quietly.
“You have to stop being so stupid.” Teresa leaned her head on Gabriel’s shoulder.
“It’s not as easy as it sounds.” Gabriel breathed in deep, taking in the aroma of Teresa’s hair, the scent of lavender and smoke.
“Are you smelling my head?”
“Ah…no.”
“Weirdo.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Here’s what you do.” Teresa tightened her grip on his hand. “Next time you’re about to do something stupid, stop, take a moment, and consider what I would do.”
“And that’s going to improve things how?” Gabriel grunted as Teresa dug her elbow into his gut.
“Okay. Point taken. Maybe think about what Sema would do. Or Akikane. Or Ohin. Or anyone but Ling.” Teresa laughed.
“That’s the problem.” Gabriel wanted to laugh, but found he couldn’t. “I can’t make decisions the way they would because I’m not like everyone else.”
“Don’t tell me you’re falling for the Apollyons’ Nietzsche-inspired superman crap.” Teresa sat back to look at Gabriel.
“Of course not.” Gabriel struggled to find the words for his thoughts. “They will never have to make the decisions I have to make. I have to find my own way of…being me. Of making decisions without betraying myself.
“It was stupid to follow that Apollyon, but was it stupid to save him? Was it stupid to sever his connection with the other twins? Was it stupid to let him go? I don’t know. Would Ohin or Sema or Akikane have made those same choices? I don’t know. But those decisions feel right to me. But leaving the team alone — that wasn’t a good decision. And leading that Apollyon back to the house…”
“That wasn’t your fault.”
“It was. I should have noticed. If I had…”
“Ohin blames himself, not you. No one blames you.”
“I do. I didn’t know him long, but Aurelius…”
“I know.”
Teresa enveloped Gabriel in her arms. They sat silently on the steps of the stairs, gently kissing until they heard Marcus stumbling from his room, half asleep, heading for the stairs and eventually the backyard — his midnight journey to relieve his bladder. Gabriel and Teresa stood up and said goodnight as Marcus descended the stairs.
“I remember when I was young enough to stay up late kissing in stairwells.” Marcus sleepily rubbed his face. “Now I’m only up to race to a makeshift outhouse.”
Gabriel walked Teresa to her room and kissed her goodnight. Teresa closed the door and Gabriel retreated to his own room. He eventually fell into a fitful sleep, filled with twin Apollyons chasing him through a battlefield occupied by warriors from every age in history. Morning and wakefulness came as a relief.
After putting the final touches on the abandoned house, like magically spreading dust evenly over the furniture, Gabriel and the team assembled in the backyard one last time. A moment after Ohin took a lump of amber from his pocket, they stood in the Upper Ward of Windsor Castle, 125 million years in the past.
Their return through time deposited them a meager fifteen minutes after they had last departed. Much had happened in that short span of time as Gabriel surveyed the damage.
Fire Mages had extinguished the flames across the castle grounds, thin wisps of smoke gently rising from still-smoldering ruins. More wounded mages had been gathered into the impromptu triage area in the Upper Ward courtyard. With the return of the mages from Akikane’s expedition to Dresden, the numbers seemed to have doubled. People carried wounded, or ran on various errands across the grass. Akikane stood at the center of a group of people, pointing and giving instructions on how to manage the repairs and defenses. Akikane’s face did not hold its usual blissful continence, but he seemed calm, and Gabriel found that reassuring.
“I’ll get Councilwoman Elizabeth,” Gabriel said to the others.
“Meet us in her office.” Ohin looked to Akikane. “I’ll see if I can get Akikane to join us for a moment to figure out how we can be most useful, beyond trying to figure out how to revive Elizabeth.”
“Don’t forget to break Elizabeth’s favorite teacup if we’re going to meet in her office,” Gabriel said.
“Yes, thank you.” Ohin nodded his appreciation. “I’d forgotten about that.”
Ohin patted Gabriel on the shoulder and walked toward Akikane.
“Need company?” Teresa asked.
“Um, sure,” Gabriel said, happy to have Teresa with him at any time. He looked at the rest of the team. “We’ll meet you in a second.”
Gabriel warped space-time around himself and Teresa, delivering them a moment later to the cellars beneath the castle. Justine looked up, her bright blue eyes shining with sudden excitement at Gabriel’s arrival. Her enthusiasm dimmed when she noticed Teresa standing beside him. Justine knelt beside Elizabeth, holding a wet cloth to the elderly mage’s forehead. Leah and Liam sat on the other side of Justine, playing a game of checkers. The electric lights burned brightly. Someone must have fixed the castle generators.
“Gabriel.” Justine stood up, smoothing out the wrinkles of her tunic.
“Gabriel!” Leah and Liam shouted in unison, jumping up from their game and running to embrace him. He knelt down to them.
“Is it safe yet?” Leah asked.
“Have you seen our mommy and daddy?” Liam asked.
“I haven’t seen them yet, but it is safe now, and we’ll try to find them very soon.” Gabriel hugged the two children. “You’ve both been very brave.”
“And they’ve been very helpful.” Justine stood beside Elizabeth. She had placed some towels beneath Elizabeth’s head to make her more comfortable.<
br />
“Hi, Teresa,” Leah said, suddenly seeming to notice her presence. Liam beamed bashfully, but remained silent.
“I’m sure you’ve both been a big help.” Teresa smiled warmly at the two children.
“How is she?” Gabriel nodded toward Elizabeth as he looked at Justine.
“No change.” Justine’s face clouded with worry. “She doesn’t seem any worse, but there’s no waking her.”
“We learned cheppers.” Liam pointed to the game board on the floor, seeming very proud of himself.
“Checkers.” Leah sighed at her little brother’s misstatement. “Justine taught us how to play. I won two games.”
“I lost two games.” Liam kicked his sister’s ankle. She pulled his ear in retaliation.
“Stop it, you two.” Justine stepped forward to put her arms around the two children and separated them. “I found a pile of old games in a cupboard in the back. I thought it would keep their minds off…other things.” Her blue eyes looked sad as she glanced between Gabriel and Teresa.
“It was a good idea,” Gabriel said.
He looked at her a moment longer, noticing again how blue her eyes were. Those blue eyes reminded him of something. Of someone? Who? When?
“Are you okay?” Justine frowned.
“Is something wrong?” Teresa instinctively looked around the room, peering into the dark shadows at the back of the cellar chamber.
“I’m not sure.”
Gabriel tried to shrug off the odd feeling permeating him, but as he looked again into Justine’s eyes, his body tingled with a realization — he had seen those eyes before. Eyes like hers, but not on her face.
Agrace. The girl from the food line at the medieval castle Chateau Gaillard had eyes like those he stared into now. Eyes very like those.
A coincidence, surely. Two girls could have similar eyes. It happened all the time.
He shook his head, convinced his wild suspicions could not be real. He looked away and caught sight of the checkerboard on the floor, causing another vague memory to bubble up from the back of his mind. What memory of a game of checkers? When had he last played checkers? And who with?
Gabriel grasped the Grace and Malignancy imprints of the concatenate crystals in his bracelet and formed a space-time seal around the room.
The Wizard of Time Trilogy (A Fantasy Time Travel Series) Page 54