A Radical Act of Free Magic

by H. G. Parry

  “Then why not use the dragon to take France first?” he said, as though their conquest of his home country were a thing they had discussed a thousand times. “The kraken was enough to prompt a military coup without it ever being used. With a dragon we could seize power from the Directory.”

  “We don’t need a dragon for that either. And if we use it too early, Britain will have time to arm itself against it before we mount our invasion.”

  “There’s very little they could do. When dragons were used in the past, none could stand against them.”

  “Until somebody did. There were three dragons in the last Vampire Wars, and all three were defeated in the end. The Temple Church may be dying, but it still has some of the most advanced magical scholars in the world, and many of them have taken refuge in Britain since Robespierre and I forced them out of France. It won’t take them long to rediscover ways to destroy a dragon. When we use this one, it must be when the invasion of England is certain, and when not a soul suspects it. We need to keep this a secret.”

  “Even from France.”

  “Especially from France. For now. You need to trust me. I’ve led you this far, haven’t I?”

  A terrible suspicion came to Napoléon then. Perhaps it should have come earlier. He had suspected after all what his friend was, even if he was only now certain.

  “Just how far have you led me?” he said sharply.

  The shadows shifted on his friend’s face as he frowned. “What do you mean?” he asked, and his confusion seemed genuine.

  “I’ve wanted to come to Egypt since I was a child. I’ve wanted to bring scholars and soldiers and learn its secrets. And once I had the kraken, I wanted to do it straightaway. None of that was my own idea, was it?”

  “That would be quite a coincidence. Of course it wasn’t. I nudged you toward Egypt soon after we met. I nudged you again when I was ready last year. And then I pushed the Directory somewhat harder to agree. Is that a problem?”

  “Never do that again.” Anger burned hot in his voice. “I would have listened to you if you’d come to me and spoken, as we are now. I won’t have you influencing me against my will.”

  “I doubt I could have done so. It fitted your own plans perfectly—that’s why you caught the idea so fast and so well. But I apologize if I offended you. I only thought to save time. As I said, I’ve been very busy, and so have you. I don’t always have the leisure or the security to wait for you to doze off, slip into your dreams, and talk everything through.”

  “Then you will make the time. I won’t be manipulated. I haven’t forgotten what happened to Robespierre, you know.”

  “You don’t know what happened to Robespierre.”

  “I’m not a fool. My brother Lucien was right in the thick of the Robespierrists. There were rumors, especially after Desmoulins was executed, that Robespierre’s knowledge came from a vampire who survived the wars. It was you, wasn’t it? You helped him to power, and now he’s dead.”

  “I helped Robespierre create an army of the dead. That was his entire purpose. That army now marches across Europe, in part under your own command. Soon, if we play this cleverly, they’ll be under your command entirely, as will the rest of the French Empire.”

  Unexpectedly, his friend leaned back against the sand-colored wall and folded his arms.

  “Let me be honest with you, Bonaparte,” he said. “Since I see you’ve surmised just enough to steer you in the wrong direction. I chose Robespierre for his magic. To give him his due, he did very well with my help. He had vision, a sharp mind, and a healthy dose of paranoia—all qualities I respect. But those qualities were incidental. I used his magic as a tool, and I made very sure I could throw him away when I was done. You I chose for yourself. I’ve looked for people like you occasionally over the years, but either they weren’t quite right, or the time wasn’t, or they died before I could use them. You’re the one for whom everything fell into place. You had qualities I thought I could work with. But importantly, you were not a strong magician. Strong magic would draw attention from the people looking for me, and you are the direction in which I particularly wish them not to look until it’s too late. The downside to this is that I can’t simply withdraw my support and watch you fall without me, as I did to Robespierre. When you become the leader of France, the power will be yours. I won’t be able to snatch it from you.”

  “You’ll try,” Napoléon said, but his anger had cooled. “You aren’t helping me to take power because you like me, and you won’t be content to act through me for long. You want to be leader of France yourself.”

  “Very well,” his friend said. “Since we’re being honest. Yes, I will try. That will be the final stage of this war, when everything else is either conquered or turned to ash. I will come out of the shadows and take control of the army of the dead. I will reach out with my mesmerism and stir the people of France against you, and toward me. I will try to take France from you, after we’ve won it together. But I can only try. And I suspect I’m quite safe telling you this, because you have every confidence that I won’t be able to succeed.”

  “People have tried to take things from me before,” Napoléon agreed. “It hasn’t ended well for them. You underestimate just how long and how tightly I can hold on.”

  “Perhaps I do. In any case, I’ve waited a long time. The whole of your life is not so very long to wait. It may be that you die on the throne before I stretch out my hand, and it never comes to an overt clash between us.”

  “I hope not,” Napoléon said. “I’d enjoy the clash, I think.”

  He thought a moment longer. Outside, the shouts had quieted, and the Corsican sky was blue and cloudless.

  Leader of France. It had been impossible, before the world changed, and now it was not. Perhaps the world had changed more than his friend thought. Perhaps he could indeed do more than take power from France. Perhaps, in the end, he could take it from the last of the vampire kings.

  It was a terrifying thought, and an intoxicating one. If he were to pursue it, he would not be just a soldier in a war anymore—even a very great soldier, in a very great war. He would be fighting a very different battle, against the most powerful men of the age and an age far older, not for his country but for himself. He would be fighting to become emperor of the world.

  And he could do it. Deep down, he believed he could do it. That thought was the most terrifying and intoxicating of all.

  “Very well,” he said. “We may play it your way.”

  “Very gracious of you, I’m sure,” his friend said wryly.

  London

  Summer 1798

  What in God’s name were you doing?” Wilberforce demanded.

  Pitt, deep in conversation with three other gentlemen with a giant map spread out between them, looked up with surprise that smoothed into understanding. He turned to Grenville, who had frozen pointing somewhere in the vicinity of Belgium.

  “I’m sorry, would you please give us a few minutes?” he said, in a tone that was polite but clearly not a request.

  Wilberforce waited, teeth gritted, as the other three men left. It was at times like this, when he was furious, that he found Pitt’s habitual calm most infuriating.

  “I’m glad you’ve come,” Pitt said, once the door had closed. “I wanted to speak to you in person.”

  “And I you,” Wilberforce returned, with exaggerated patience. He folded his arms. “What were you thinking?”

  “When?”

  “Shall we begin with anytime from Saturday up to and including three o’clock yesterday afternoon? You know exactly when.”

  Pitt didn’t deny it. The whole of the country was talking about it, with varying degrees of censure, delight, and amusement.

  On Friday evening, an argument had broken out in Parliament over the war, largely between Pitt and a Foxite MP named George Tierney. This was nothing new: arguing over the war was by now the full-time occupation of the House of Commoners. This time, however, Tierney had felt h
is honor had been slighted. The following day, he had sent Pitt a challenge to a duel. This was also not unheard of in political circles, particularly among Aristocrats, for whom the rise of battlefield magic was making duels of magic fashionable once more. What was more surprising was that Pitt had accepted. Since neither was officially a magician, it had been a duel of mundane weapons only, and they had met the following afternoon at Putney Heath to exchange worrying but largely symbolic pistol fire. The duel had ended in a draw, with both unhurt, and both had parted ways with their honor satisfied.

  Pitt didn’t offer much opportunity for scandal. For many of the British public, it was the most interesting thing he’d done his entire time in office—certainly the most interesting since he’d failed to get married the preceding year. The papers had loved it. It also had the potential for more serious political ripples. Neither of those things was what concerned Wilberforce.

  “I can see that it distressed you,” Pitt said.

  “Really?” Wilberforce said, with very uncharacteristic sarcasm. He was very capable of sarcasm, even inclined to it, but he usually went to great lengths to avoid using it in anger. “When did you first notice that? When I burst into your cabinet room and asked what in God’s name you were doing?”

  “I would have written to you and broken the news more gently if I could. But I knew you were out of town, and so you would almost certainly see it in the papers before my message reached you.”

  “I read it over breakfast yesterday. I dropped my piece of toast on the floor.”

  “I’m very sorry about that. I hope your seventeen guests weren’t too concerned.”

  “There were only five that particular morning, thank you very much. They were all very concerned, as was I. Except ‘concerned’ in my case is probably not the word.”

  “I realized at the time that you would be shocked.”

  “I think I was,” Wilberforce said evenly, “and am, more shocked than almost ever.”

  “Almost ever.”

  “Well, I concede it isn’t quite as shocking as the spellbinding and enslavement of hundreds of thousands of human beings. But then, I don’t expect very much of slave traders and plantation owners. I expect more of you.”

  “I really do think you may be reacting a little too strongly.”

  “You know how I feel about duels. It’s in my book.”

  “Which is on my list of things to read.”

  “Where it has been for a year.”

  “Tell me what it says about duels.”

  “It says that they are a deliberate preference of the favor of man before the favor and approbation of God, wherein we run the risk of rushing into the presence of our Maker in the very act of offending him.”

  Pitt half smiled, apparently against his own will. “I see. Like having a heart attack whilst swearing and robbing a nunnery.”

  Wilberforce was very far from smiling himself. “And that doesn’t even allow for the fact that you did it on a Sunday.”

  “For that you need to blame Tierney. He challenged me on Saturday. Sunday happens to follow Saturday. It could have been postponed until today, I suppose, but I had a full schedule. It also happens to be my birthday, coincidentally.”

  “I know. Many happy returns.” He stopped to collect himself before going on. Even these days, it was too easy for arguments to segue into banter with Pitt. Their speech patterns knew each other too well. He hadn’t come to banter this time. “I know you don’t care about the Sabbath. It doesn’t answer my first question of why you would do something like this at all.”

  Pitt noted the change in tone and adjusted himself accordingly. “I don’t see what else I could have done. I didn’t issue the challenge; Tierney did. He had every right to do so, and once he had, I was honor-bound to accept.”

  Wilberforce shook his head. “Nonsense. I’ve been challenged to two duels, on two separate occasions. I’ve politely explained that I don’t accept them because they go against my principles. As far as I could tell, nobody thought any the worse of me for it—including you.”

  “That was entirely different. You meant it, and everybody knew you meant it. If I said something similar, it would be seen as withdrawing in fear for my own life.”

  “Possibly it would, by some. Would that really be so terrible?”

  “Of course it would.”

  “Why? Because it would be a blow to your pride?”

  “It isn’t a question of pride. It’s a question of honor.”

  “Oh, for God’s sake. I’m so tired of Aristocrats talking about their honor. What could possibly be honorable about two people trying to kill each other over an insult?”

  “I didn’t try to kill anybody.” Now, at last, there was an edge to his voice. “You must know me better than that.”

  “But deaths happen in duels even when they’re not intended,” Wilberforce reminded him. “Besides, it isn’t primarily Tierney’s death that concerns me. You do realize that you could have died? Your life isn’t your own to throw away. It belongs to God—and if you don’t believe that, it belongs to this country.”

  “Don’t.” Anger flashed, briefly, behind his eyes. Perhaps something else did too. “I think nobody could accuse me of not having given enough of myself to this country. I’ve lived for nothing else since I was twenty-four years old. And I don’t see how I can be trusted to lead it through war and magic and chaos if I compromise my own honor to do it.”

  “Perhaps we wouldn’t be in the midst of war and magic and chaos if it weren’t for—” He caught himself.

  “Go on,” Pitt said, too calm. “If it weren’t for what, exactly?”

  It came to Wilberforce, belatedly, why his accusation about Aristocrats trying to kill each other had touched such an unexpected nerve. He had made it, after all, in very different circumstances and in very different form on the night Pitt had broken the Concord and plunged the two countries into a war of magic.

  Are you asking me if I feel any desire to kill people? Pitt had asked on that night.

  Aren’t you fighting a war? Wilberforce had shot back, almost but not quite without thinking.

  It had hung between them all these years. They had brushed it aside; they had papered over it; they had tried to speak to each other as though it had never been said. But it couldn’t be brushed aside. It bled through everything. It had been said.

  It wasn’t just that he had implied that Pitt desired to kill people—that, at face value, was ridiculous enough to disregard. He had accused Pitt of fighting a war. Not England, not the British government, but Pitt himself. He had implied—more than implied, if he were honest—that the war of magic was not being fought between England and France, but between Pitt and the enemy, with the entirety of Europe as their unwitting pawns. And neither he nor Pitt had ever forgotten it.

  This wasn’t the argument Wilberforce had come to have. But perhaps it was the one they needed to have. Perhaps it was the one that lay, veiled, behind every conversation they had ever had since that day.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Wilberforce said.

  “No, please,” Pitt said, with the same deadly calm. “If it weren’t for me, do you mean? You wouldn’t be the first to say it. It’s undeniably true. The king and Parliament made the final ruling to break the Concord, but it was my decision. For that matter, it was my decision to declare war on France in the first place, after the execution of the French king. And you think I should have withdrawn from that conflict as well.”

  “Not the conflict with the vampire, no.” The words felt torn out of him, as they might be by mesmerism. He supposed it could have been mesmerism, given Pitt’s magic. It wasn’t. It was his own anger, pure and simple. “He needs to be stopped. But he can’t conquer this country if we’re at peace with France, and in terms of the war—yes, if you really want to know, I still think that we missed an opportunity for peace. I think we should never have let this become a war of magic. I don’t mean to imply that had anything to do with pride.”<
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  “But you do think it had something to do with honor.”

  “I think then, as now, you accepted a challenge because you believed it to be the honorable thing to do, and perhaps because you were afraid to appear weak before an enemy.” Wilberforce shook his head, frustrated. “I didn’t come to preach at you.”

  “No, you came to tell me that I was wrong, and not for the first time.” The calm in his voice had turned to ice now, cold and sharp. “I’ve tried to make peace multiple times over the last few years. But you still believe I want war and bloodshed.”

  “I don’t believe you want it,” Wilberforce returned. His own voice was fire rather than ice. If they had been in the House, the walls would have been a cacophony. “I do think you don’t always back away from it as readily as you could.”

  “Europe has all but fallen to France. The Channel is all that stands between us. Do you truly think that we could have held back the army of the dead if we had held to the Concord?”

  “I truly don’t know. I only know it would have been the right thing to do.”

  “Perhaps it would have. I don’t always have the luxury of doing the right thing.”

  “And that is exactly where we differ. Doing the right thing can’t be a luxury. It can’t be a matter of honor, or reason, or even choice. It simply needs to be done, whatever the consequences.”

  “The consequences are death and chaos. How many people would have died for the sake of your conscience?”

  Wilberforce laughed, and it hurt. “How many people are dying right now? Do you really think this war between you and the enemy is about saving lives? Tens of thousands have been killed already. Someone could have died again today, in the stupidest of ways, if either you or Tierney had hit each other. There are men and women dying in slave ships across the Atlantic because this war has made freedom synonymous with revolution. You might want to think about those lives before you talk too much about the good of the country.” He drew a deep breath. “I don’t know what would have happened if we had held to the Concord, you’re right. Perhaps peace could have been reached then despite the enemy; perhaps it couldn’t. But we didn’t try, not then. And I do know that ever since that night, we’ve become a country that sends magicians to die on foreign soil while crushing their magic on our own, and this conflict has become less and less a war between nations and more and more a war between two vampire kings.”