A Wizard's Sacrifice

by Amanda Justice

  Jug empty, she returned to the curtained corner where a hand pump dripped into a sink. The handle cold wrought iron, she marveled at the intricate scrollwork and the ease with which it drew water out of the ground.

  “Have you anything like it in the East Reach, my lady?”

  She started at the oily voice but fixed her lips into a pleasant curve as she turned to Nelchior. “No, sir. In my father’s house, the pipes are ceramic and the pumps enameled wood, but many of my people carry their water from wells, in buckets.”

  He nodded. “So it is in the southern Kiareinoll. Murnoran supplied most of the iron and steel we have. His army includes more smiths than soldiers.”

  “I believe your alliance is the first Knownearth has ever seen, sir.”

  He inclined his head. “So it is.”

  His gaze raked her, his lips stretching into a leer as an awkward silence lengthened. Face heating, she took a cup from the shelf and splashed water into it. “Were you thirsty, sir?”

  The leer shifted into a malicious grin. “I was, thank you.” As he took the cup, his fingers grazed hers. A shock snapped between them. The cup smashed, water spraying boots and hemlines. A jolting heart pumped fire up her neck. Ducking, she picked up the porcelain shards and offered apologies.

  “It’s only water,” Nelchior said, glee edging his voice as he filled a new cup for himself. “We must be more careful next time. Until then, my lady.”

  The curtain fell into place behind him, and she slumped onto the floor. Her heart thudded, and worry stuffed the space behind her eyes. He knows. He’d seen her with Thabean, and now he’d touched her. Thabean had felt her Woern almost instantly, and he hadn’t been looking for them. Elesendar, Nelchior knew!

  * * *

  “Ow!” Vic yelped as Prenlin’s fingers probed her ankle.

  The healer grunted and began wrapping fresh linen around the splint. “It would heal faster if you would stay off it.”

  “I do.” A wave of dizziness swept over her, and she had a sensation of floating, her feet kicking for purchase as dark cold water swirled around her. The sensation had hit her from time to time over the past month. More than mere wooziness, it felt peculiarly specific and, for some reason, reminded her of Wineyll.

  “Are you all right?” Prenlin asked, sharp eyes roving over Vic’s face.

  Vic waved the feeling away. “Fine. Just a spot of dizziness. As for the ankle, I can’t lie in bed all day. I have duties.”

  “Do your duty as you must, madam, but do not stand on this foot.” Prenlin pressed a tube to Vic’s belly, the other end to her ear. “The babe’s heart is strong. How do you feel?”

  Her lips curled around a soft chuckle. “Good. Actually, good. My head hasn’t hurt in weeks, and I can hardly remember what nausea feels like. The brooding sickness—or Woernsickness, either one—they’re gone.”

  The healer smiled, a rare sight. “I always felt my best in the middle of a brooding term. You’ll tire more easily, though, and your appetite will increase. Feed yourself with whatever you wish, but make sure to eat red meat when you can. Horseflesh is best, if you can get it.”

  “I think I’ll have to settle for goat.” Whatever horses they had in camp were for hauling, not feeding rogue pregnant wizards.

  “Perhaps so. Good day, madam.” Prenlin stalled her exit as Bethniel swept inside. “Did you finish your tasks already?”

  “Yes—I got permission from one of the other Healers to leave early. We’re burying Dealn today.”

  “Of course. My condolences, my lady. Madam.” With a nod, the Healer left.

  Vic hopped out of bed and shrugged into the robe Beth had laid out for her. “I suppose it’s time to get ready.” She blinked at the princess’s stained hospital smock. “You’re not wearing that, are you?”

  Bethniel glanced down. “Oh! Oh, no. No.” She ducked behind the privacy screen; water splashed into the basin and dribbled on the floor while Vic threaded her robe’s sashes through its slits. “My hair’s a mess,” the princess said, emerging in one of the formal gowns she kept in Vic’s tent.

  Vic picked at the silken snarls knotted across her waist. “If you can fix this, I’ll take care of your hair.”

  A smile ghosted over Beth’s face as she knelt and tugged the sashes loose. While Vic tucked curls into place, the princess relaced the robe and gnawed pensively on her lip. “This is getting tight—we need to ask the tailors to add a panel.”

  “What’s wrong, Beth?”

  Her foster sister laid a palm flat on the finished weave, her eyes glistening. “Do you mind?”

  Vic covered her hand. “Of course not . . . wait . . .” She shut her eyes and imagined the baby in her womb, reached out and gave him a gentle nudge. The babe awakened and jabbed a foot at Beth’s palm.

  “Was that her—or him?”

  “Him,” Vic said. Warmth flushed over her skin as she imagined Ashel’s dark eyes shimmering while he held his son, and she grinned at the Woern-borne certainty that it was a son.

  Tears spilled down Beth’s cheeks.

  “What is wrong?”

  “I think Nelchior knows about me. He saw me helping Thabean recover. He knows you’re the only wizard who didn’t take ill when you were all making the moat. And in the hospital just now, he contrived a way to . . . to touch me, and a spark passed between us. I think he felt the Woern.”

  “Touch you? How?”

  “Just a brush of the fingers as I handed him something.”

  “Why were you talking to him?”

  “He spoke to me—just some trivial observation about Munoran’s iron. It’s not as if I can ignore him—here, the wizards are the nobility, Vic.” Her breath caught round a sob. “And Thabean said . . .” Shivering, she cleared her throat. “When I think about how Woern can pass from someone like me to a wizard, and what Thabean said about how the wizards of old would hold latents captive—Elesendar, I think about what you went through with Lornk Korng and—”

  Vic pulled Bethniel around to face her. “Nelchior will not harm you. I will kill him before he does.”

  “He could tell the Council.”

  “Saelbeneth will keep him under control because she’d have to explain to the others why she kept your secret. But if it gets out, we’ll leave.”

  “And go where? What about history—we can’t go home unless we can get to the master Device in Meylnara’s keep.”

  “I know, but I will not let them harm you.” I hope you protect my sister better than you protected my father. Ashel had said that, the day after they’d all watched Sashal’s life drain from his throat.

  The crowd roars. She issues orders. The Dagger pelts off the stage into the audience, searching for a faceless assassin. Silk sifts against her skin as she steps toward the prince, but his suffering halts her advance, and she stands paralyzed while Elekia wraps her arms round his head and mother and son weep together, the man who was husband, father, and king held tight between them. Vic’s head is stuffed with helpless, hapless awareness that she can do nothing to remedy the pain of this family she has come to love as dearly as her own. Suffused with rage and impotence, she stands apart as Ashel mourns.

  Groaning, Vic sank onto the bed, the heels of her hands pressed into her eyes. Water splattered, and a moment later a damp cloth cooled her forehead. Beth bared her knife.

  “No.” Vic pushed the blade back into its sheath. “It’s not the Woern—just a bad memory. One of my failures.”

  The lines eased out of Bethniel’s forehead. “My sister never fails—that’s why she’s called Victory.”

  “I wish that were true. Ashel’s fingers, your father, Wineyll, you being stuck here with me . . .”

  “None of those were your fault.”

  “They feel like it.” Her throat tightened. “Three hundred and thirty-seven, Beth. The dead at Olmlablaire—those are all mine.”

  Bethniel’s arms sprang tight around her. “I love you,
sister.”

  Vic returned the embrace, her face pressed into Beth’s curls, her mind reaching across time to Ashel, wishing she could comfort him, relieve him of the worry he must be feeling. She couldn’t image how she’d bear the impotence of being able to do absolutely nothing to save him, if their places were reversed. The only hope for all of them was for her to kill Meylnara and figure out how to use the Device to return to their own time.

  Rest Among the Trees

  Traine’s east gate had an iron portcullis and steel-plated doors that shone like silver. Wineyll’s hand gripped the case strap while panic whipped her heart into an uneven rhythm.

  I’d like you to be my First Councilor.

  Her body is lifted up and up, feet dangling above the earth.

  What does he want from me? she thought as she trod past bored guards and out into the parklands surrounding the city. Nannies pushed prams along graveled paths. Children flew kites on wide lawns. Lovers snuggled in flower-draped arbors.

  You’d have to do the Penance.

  A frothing monster slams her onto the hard, gritty surface.

  Earnk had left nearly three weeks ago, and her mind had buzzed with his proposal ever since. Clutching the flute case, she trekked across a verdant swath toward a clump of trees crowning a knoll.

  What do I want from him?

  She was sick of asking herself that question and just wanted to be alone. Utterly alone, with no one around to hear her lose herself in music or weeping.

  As she came to the wooded slope, voices crushed her hopes for privacy. A smattering of laughter and applause, then a single deep voice—Ashel’s—filtered through the trees. So this was where the cerrenils were? She paused, looking around the park for another clump of bushes where she could find privacy.

  Ashel began a hymn, and homesickness drew her toward him. She followed a path through dense underbrush, beneath a thick canopy, to a clearing where several dozen people sat on the grass. There were three cerrenils young enough that Wineyll could have encircled the trunks with her arms. As she came among the crowd, Ashel finished singing and began speaking about the comfort of the old mothers.

  “I’d give him all the comfort he desired,” one woman whispered to another.

  Her friend leaned close. Elaborate coifs mingled, bejeweled locks clicking softly. “I met him once.”

  “When?”

  “Years ago. He was the sweetest young tom you could imagine, but when I tried to pet him, he scurried off like a frightened kitten.”

  Cheeks burning, Wineyll sidled away from the tittering courtesans and stopped beside some soberly dressed Weavers. Ashel’s gaze flitted to her as someone asked about the difference between the Kia and the old mothers.

  “The mothers are our mothers,” Ashel answered, patting the white trunk. “They receive our prayers and pass them to Elesendar. They give us a place of peace and solace when our hearts are troubled. The Kia is the spirit that connects the mothers to all life. And Fembrosh is the will—the mind—that pervades the forests of Latha, particularly those east of the Lathalorns.”

  “Is it true the trees walk there?”

  “The trees themselves don’t move so much as Fembrosh reshapes the forest around your perception.”

  “But don’t Lathan forests kill people?” That fear echoed among the Trainers, prompting indignant mutters from the Weavers.

  “Fembrosh will protect itself when roused,” Ashel replied. “Fire and clearcutting always bring some kind of retribution, but we can live safely within the Kiareinoll so long as we respect it. Elesendar and the old mothers will guide us—not just Lathans, but everyone—to a mutual understanding rooted in mercy and compassion, if only we’ll listen.”

  The Weavers gave satisfied nods, but a gaunt man stood and spat, “Rubbish.” Filthy culottes sagged off a skeletal frame; dirt stained a bald head and calloused hands. “No mercy but in ground.”

  Ashel scooped up a handful of soil and dropped it at the man’s feet. “Mercy is within you, friend; it begins with forgiveness.”

  “You forgive him did that?”

  Holding up his butchered hand, Ashel’s shared a sardonic smile. “Not yet.” Drawing the Buzzard to the tree, he placed the man’s palm on the trunk and laid his fingerless hand beside it. “That’s why I pray with her.”

  “What about justice?” a woman cried out. Dirty yellow hair jabbed out of her scalp like wheat stalks after harvest. “We won’t get that praying to trees.”

  “No, we won’t.” His gaze roved round the onlookers, pausing at a knot of city guards and again at a trio of Citizens. “Justice is the product of power and mercy. Mercy without power begets pity, and power alone births only oppression.”

  “Or vengeance!”

  He nodded. “Or revenge—it depends which side of the gate you’re on, doesn’t it?”

  Suspicion, rancor, and admiration—a cacophony of opposing thoughts assaulted Wineyll’s Hearing and jabbed at her temples. The pain eased as Ashel held up the blunted hand again, recapturing the onlookers’ attention. “The price of vengeance is high, and the sacrifice usually comes to nothing. I lost these fingers half a year before they were butchered, on the day my father—or the man I knew as my father at the time—died, and I vowed revenge.”

  The crowd roars. She issues orders. The Dagger pelts off the stage into the audience, searching for a faceless assassin. Silk sifts against her skin as she steps toward the prince, but his suffering halts her advance, and she stands paralyzed while Elekia wraps her arms round his head and mother and son weep together, the man who was husband, father, and king held tight between them. Vic’s head is stuffed with helpless, hapless awareness that she can do nothing to remedy the pain of this family she has come to love as dearly as her own. Suffused with rage and impotence, she stands apart as Ashel mourns.

  Wineyll slumped against a tree, an odd sensation stuck in her mind, of Vic reclining on a soft bed in an ornate tent.

  She shook off the strange fancy as the crowd climbed to their feet, some heading directly down the path out of the copse, others pausing first to rub their palms against the cerrenil’s trunk. She Heard more doubt than conviction, but the Weavers broke into a hymn as they ambled away. Grinning, Ashel rubbed his ears as he came over. “We won’t ask them to join the choir.”

  “Choir?”

  He chuckled grimly. “I suppose I’m mixing some conversion into the subversion. Alek has been spreading the word, and the crowd’s been growing little by little. Some actually come for the sermons.”

  “I thought people already worshipped Elesendar here.”

  “They do, in chapels with Loremasters intoning scripture, the sort of worship Silnauer would make common in Latha, I expect.” He gestured at the case slung over her shoulder. “Did you come here to pray or to practice?”

  Wincing, she stared at her feet and thought of all the people she’d failed: her father, Mane Thrushwind and his tribe, Ashel, and Vic too. Her sins jeered at the hope that lingered like a guttering flame within her. She swiped at welling tears. “Not to pray. I’m beyond forgiveness.”

  “Come here.” He led her to a cerrenil and pressed her palm on the trunk. “No one is beyond forgiveness, and Elesendar knows you deserve compassion. I’m just as lost as you are, just as surrounded with bitter roots and shadows. I’ve lost my entire family—everyone but you, Wineyll. You’re my sister, and I don’t think any of us will come out of this Concordance unless we cling to our loved ones the way a sailor clings to a mast in a hurricane.”

  She sank to the turf and drew her knees to her forehead. “What if we don’t have any loved ones?”

  “I love you.” He tapped on the case. “I think he does too.”

  “Did he tell you that?”

  “No, but I can recognize the signs.”

  “He asked me to be his First Councilor, but he said it was a business proposition and I’d have to do the Penance. If he loved me, he wouldn’t ask
that of me. And then if I did it, became his wife, the joke would be on him. Every time I’ve used my abilities—in the Badlands, in Olmlablaire—it’s been a disaster. People died or”—she grasped his maimed hand—“they lost everything.”

  Ashel rubbed the knuckles on his stump. Leaves rustled above them. Some creature scratched and skittered through the underbrush. “Earnk has been broken and mended many times over. Most people like that are steeped in cruelty, but it filled him with compassion. I think you need that, Wineyll, more than all the iron in Traine.”

  “Why would he ask me do the Penance?”

  “Because it’s the only way you can be together.”

  “He could leave Relm.”

  Ashel chuckled bitterly. “He could, but it’s not so easy for a ruler to walk away from that responsibility, especially when there’s no clear succession. Think of it this way. Earnk has offered you a chance to leave the darkness behind. The Penance is a very old custom among the nomads, and I believe it’s intended to bring the perpetrators redemption as well as the victims solace—it is a path to forgiveness, one a lot clearer than most of us ever get. If you agreed to do it, I expect your term of service wouldn’t be too long. That’s something Earnk would make sure of. The Relmlord would need his First Councilor sooner rather than later.”

  Anguish spilled down her cheeks. “I don’t deserve a short Penance. Every nomad in that camp died because of me, and I murdered the last one myself.” She choked. “I sliced his throat. I’m a murderer. Mane wasn’t even the first! I killed my own father—”

  He folded her into his arms. “We cannot change what we’ve done, Wineyll. I wish you hadn’t been forced to hurt a single nomad, but it was my sister who ordered that raid and Vic who commanded it. Neither of them would have had to kill anyone if I hadn’t let my rage carry me to Olmlablaire in the first place. As for Winder, Silnauer put you both in a terrible position. I remember how sick he was, how much pain he was in, and if he were my father and I had no other way to relieve his suffering, I might have done the same.”