"I've won," I mumbled as I collapsed into the blankets. "I've done what the Master wanted me to do after all. I've defeated Elerius."
But as my eyes fell shut the voice in the back of my mind pointed out that I had not in fact defeated him at all. I had separated him from the wizards who were assisting him; I had separated him from his son; and I had driven him from his castle. But the Ifrit had told Antonia that he had not killed anyone, and that must include Elerius.
Hurled violently through the air, landing miles away, once he recovered his wits enough to use a flying spell, he might not have his defenses and his allies but he still had his abilities—and he was always the best wizard of any of us.
At this point, any hesitation about using a demon would be long gone. And the first thing he and his demon would do would be to hunt me down and inflict on me tortures that would make in comparison the Ifrit's abandoned plans for me seem like a stroll through the flowers of a summer meadow.
* * * *
"So Maffi helped me," Antonia explained. She sat on the tent floor beside me while I lay, propped on my elbows, in my camp bed. Early morning light came through the canvas. I wasn't sure how long I had slept, but it had not been nearly long enough. But if my daughter had not wakened me now evil dreams soon would have.
"Freeing the Ifrit was Maffi's plan, then?" I prompted, stifling a yawn. Left behind while I went first to create and then to transport my dragons' teeth warriors, Maffi was much too active a young man to have let enforced idleness drain his initiative.
"Of course not," said Antonia firmly. "It was mine. He explained to me about the bronze bottle when we found it here, though I must say he didn't make it clear enough just how scary the Ifrit would be."
"So you were scared?" I asked with a smile. "To me you looked perfectly confident, standing there in the Ifrit's hand ordering him around."
She gave me a grin. "Well, I had to make him think I wasn't afraid. It's the same as with dogs. But I was terrified! My insides hurt so much I could hardly breathe, there at the end!"
"You and me both," I agreed. Chiding her for irresponsible behavior didn't seem to be working as well as I had intended. Maybe Theodora would be firmer.
It had been just about forty-eight hours, I realized, between when I swore to Elerius to give him a two-day truce and when Antonia had released the Ifrit. Elerius might imagine I had done so myself—if it gave him reason to worry, wherever he was, so much the better.
"We could hear the Ifrit even inside his bottle," Antonia continued, "cursing both you and the mage Kaz-alrhun. That's why, when I decided we might be able to use him against Elerius, I knew I had to be the one to open the bottle. The Ifrit would know right away that Maffi was Kaz-alrhun's pupil, because their magic is the same, but he would never know I was your daughter, because I'm a witch instead of a wizard."
And Maffi, who was indeed a true pupil of Kaz-alrhun, would have calculated that even if everything went completely wrong, his chances of escape would be at least marginally improved if someone else had pried the seal off the bottle. My insides went all cold again.
"Anyway," Antonia went on, "Maffi gave me suggestions on what to say to get the Ifrit's attention even before I let him out, and exactly what to tell him about breaking Elerius's defenses—including being very sure that the Ifrit knew I didn't want anybody dead. But he wasn't with me when I went ahead and opened the bottle, so I had to improvise the part about destroying those warriors. That's why the Ifrit was able to get me confused for a minute over how many wishes he had granted me."
"If he's got his bottle now," I said slowly, "then it's going to be very hard for any other mage or wizard to imprison him again."
Antonia nodded vigorously. "That's what he told me. He didn't like it in the bottle. He told me that even before I let him out. It must be awful for someone so big to be squeezed into such a little space. It's a good thing I realized I could use the poor thing against Elerius, or I might have had to let him out anyway."
I closed and opened my eyes, taking a deep breath. There didn't seem to be much helpful to say to this. Maybe Elerius had been right about one thing, and it was time to start Antonia's real wizardry training. She had the tricks of magic down just fine. Now all she needed was the sense of consequences and responsibility.
And the school had managed to teach even me some of that, though I still sometimes had doubts about Whitey and Chin. Maybe now that I had weakened Elerius the masters of the school would be able to do the rest. Once they had captured him—especially if it took the demonology experts to do so—I would have a quiet conversation with them about admitting their first girl student ever.
* * * *
The tent flap was pushed back, and the bishop put his head in. "I thought I heard voices," he said with a smile. "If you are awake, Daimbert, there are several people here who would like to speak with you."
It didn't look like sneaking in an extra hour's sleep was an option. I sat up, started trying to straighten the torn and filthy clothes I had slept in, and decided it was hopeless. "Talk to you later!" said Antonia with a new grin and darted away.
Pale sunlight and cold air came into the tent along with Joachim. I noticed he was wearing his formal scarlet vestments and looked composed and well-brushed, even though he must have had even less sleep than I had. Jostling behind him were the two dozen young wizards who had been with Elerius.
Evrard again was nudged forward as spokesman. He stroked his red beard for a minute, trying unsuccessfully to look wise and wizardly. Someone nudged him again.
"We come to you to confess the full error of our ways," he said then, speaking too fast, as if rattling off something memorized. "We beg you in full penitence to accept us as your followers, as you take your rightful place as the head of the wizards' school. We will never again try to reach beyond the boundaries so wisely established for wizardry, to help mankind but never to set ourselves over them. We will always be mindful to be sure that you, as our leader, also do not pass these boundaries, but we foreswear rebellion and desertion until all efforts of reason and persuasion have failed. Recognizing our failure and our limitations, we beg you to reinstate us within organized magic at the lowest possible position, so that in hard work and obedience we might make ourselves worthy."
If he had smiled as he finished I might have had to slap him for such a sanctimonious confession. Coming to me as the new head of the wizards' school, indeed! But his blue eyes were genuinely troubled. I frowned, an expression doubtless made worse by the headache building behind my eyes, and the corner of his mouth gave a convulsive twitch.
"I really am sorry, Daimbert!" he burst out, sounding like himself now. "And we all are! Just like I said!"
Over his head I caught the bishop's eye. Although I was probably the only person there who could have spotted it in the angle of his cheekbones or the glint of his deep-set eyes, he was pleased.
Well, I thought gloomily, at least Joachim hadn't made the wizards put anything in their confession about throwing themselves as miserable sinners on the mercy of God, though I didn't like his assumption that now that I was back I would accept the position as the old Master's heir. It looked as if the bishop had done all my work for me, in reintegrating the rebellious young wizards back into wizardry's organization. Now all I had to do was to make sure they stayed properly penitent once they realized that the great and marvelous Daimbert, miraculously returned from death, had no intention of becoming their Master.
"All right," I said, standing up and pushing my hair back. "I'm glad you've all seen reason. You still have to persuade the teachers, of course, but—"
"You mean you'll take us back?" cried one of the younger wizards in the back row, in an eager voice. "You won't cast us out of organized wizardry after all?"
"Um, well, no. That is, I won't. It's really up to them. I'm so glad you're penitent." I could hear myself starting to babble and decided to stop while I was still ahead. "Later today we'll all go to the City, and we can talk
to the teachers to see if they agree."
And the school's defenses might be able to protect me from Elerius, when he came looking for me. I started feeling prickly unease, wondering how much time I had left before he attacked, and if the Cranky Saint really would keep him from summoning a demon.
I tried frowning again, which stilled what I considered an inappropriately frisky murmur starting to run through the assembled wizards. I had no desire to punish them harshly, but I didn't want them getting complacent either.
"You can all begin your first act of penitence at once," I said gravely. "It will be to tell Whitey and Chin—no, I know those aren't their real names, but you know who I mean, and yes, I know they haven't even graduated yet, but deferring to them is part of your punishment—to tell them everything you know about Elerius's defenses and plans. Talk too to Maffi—he's the eastern wizard here in camp. And see if you can get word to any of the kings who might have opposed King Paul's army that Elerius's might is broken, and that even his wizardly assistants have deserted him. Now, if you all will excuse me, I would like a private word with the bishop."
Abashed, they trotted away. If I was going to send Antonia to the wizards' school to learn responsibility, I was going to have to hope she didn't learn much from that group.
IV
When the tent flap dropped back into place, Joachim turned his enormous dark eyes on me. "How can I help you, Daimbert?"
"Thank you," I said, rubbing the last of the sleep from my own eyes. "You've already helped me. I'm not sure what you told them, but it seems to have worked."
"Counseling contrition is what I was trained to do," he said with a gleam of what had to be amusement. "Are you forgetting that I am a priest?"
I shook my head. Someday I really might understand his sense of humor. "I haven't forgotten. But tell me. What happened in the battle?"
"It was not as deadly as we had feared," he said, serious now. "The royal armies won, of course—the armies that march in your name. King Paul had ten times as many men under his command as did the war-captain from the castle. I believe Elerius's strategy had been to have those unliving magical monsters decimate Paul's troops before battle was ever properly engaged. When you instead destroyed them—"
"Actually just stopped them," I put in. "With Maffi's help."
"—and the royal armies rode up in full strength, most of the castle troops retreated, and some who were not quick enough were captured. I do not believe more than two dozen men were killed on both sides—which is two dozen too many, but substantially fewer casualties than for the battle I understand was fought here a week ago. King Lucas was wounded, and I heard him this morning boasting about the scar he would have to show his grandchildren, won during Daimbert's War. King Paul was untouched, though he rode in the forefront of battle and, I believe, slew several men himself."
There were several points here to which I might have responded. Out of all of them, I chose the term of Daimbert's War. "Joachim, I don't want a war named after me!"
"Not even a short, successful war?" For all I knew he was being humorous again.
"Well, if it might turn out successfully, it certainly hasn't yet. Elerius is gone for now, but he'll be back. If he survived the Ifrit, he'll soon be assembling new forces. And I assume the forces from the castle are holed up in it again."
"For the moment," agreed the bishop "But not for long. There will be a confrontation—or perhaps a ceremony—this morning at which I have been asked to be present. After the battle last night I had a long conversation with Gwennie, who I was very pleased to see again, as I have known her since she was a little girl in Yurt. She gave me an idea which I shared with the assembled kings; they have been meeting since before dawn. Then this morning I have been speaking to a delightful young lady who greatly admires you: Hadwidis, or, as she told me in confidence, Sister Eusebius."
I asked in amazement, "Do you realize she is a runaway nun?"
"Yes, of course, but this sin puts no stain on her admiration for you. And while certainly I cannot condone in the normal way of things an avowed nun leaving the cloister, in her case I believe she had no choice—remember, I have had a vision of Saint Eusebius myself. After we are through here, I shall have to go at once to the nunnery of Yurt and speak to the abbess about her. Hadwidis has asked me to help her in something which for another might be a defiant rejection of the cloister, but for her will be painful penitence."
He reached for the tent flap, preparing to go out, but I put a hand on his arm. "Joachim, please wait. There's something I need to tell you. You're the only one I can talk to about this. Saint Eusebius appeared to me."
He turned back sharply then, his eyes burning. "Not in a vision or dream?" he asked quietly. "But face to face?"
I nodded. "Face to face."
I told him about it briefly: Elerius's aborted attempt to summon a demon, the saint's abrupt appearance, his words to me, and the healing of both my cracked leg and young Prince Walther's lifelong limp. "I've faced a demon twice, Joachim," I concluded, looking at the floor, "but I think this was even more terrifying."
"Evil we can recognize in ourselves," he said, even more quietly. "But fallen as we are, absolute good always seems to rebuke us—even when God and the saints, through their chastisements, also offer us divine mercy."
"It may be strange, Joachim, but the only thing that has made me capable of functioning the last few days, rather than giving way to terror and awe after that appearance, is knowing that I am not the true object of the saint's attention. He's really more concerned with Hadwidis than he is with me, because of her being named for him in the nunnery. I can't tell her that, of course, and I hope you don't feel you have to either: she wouldn't be chattering with you about some ceremony if she were contemplating the active presence of a saint. He's helped me enormously—I wouldn't even be here if it weren't for the saint being cranky with Elerius—but mostly he's left me alone."
"God does expect us to do our best to work out our own salvation," the bishop commented, "even if we could never do so unaided."
I didn't want to think about salvation; I still had to concentrate on what to do with Elerius, and all my best plans seemed to involve danger to my soul. "Well, I've actually been aided a lot lately," I said, looking up again. "Everybody has been treating me as a great hero—including you, who ought to know better—but I've done almost nothing. The undead warriors are gone, the western armies have stopped fighting, and Elerius has lost his grip on the younger wizards and on his kingdom, but it's had nothing to do with me. It was all done by the saint, the Ifrit, you, and my daughter."
"And what we all have in common," he said, holding me with his eyes, "is our friendship with you." He smiled then.
"But come. Hadwidis will be growing impatient. You will say that she is accomplishing this on her own, but she too is your friend."
* * * *
I emerged into a camp which Hadwidis's mother seemed to have made her own. The queen sat grandly in a chair in the center as though sitting in a throne, her son by her side. She surveyed the assembled kings with an imperious gaze. Hadwidis stood back a little, chewing her fingernails.
"Am I to understand, then," the queen was demanding of Paul, "that you consider me a prisoner of war? And that you will require that my knights surrender the castle on penalty of my life? Because if so, this is not at all the way I understand royal prisoners of war are to be treated!"
"Not at all, my lady," said Paul. The king looked as sober as I had seen him in years, his eyes rimmed dark with fatigue. He was not wearing his armor for the first time since I had returned from the East. Almost he looked like the losing rather than the winning commander in what I refused to consider Daimbert's War. "You are free to go whenever you like."
"What about Prince Walther?" she demanded, a protective hand on his shoulder. "I cannot believe your supposed magnanimity would extend to the rightful heir to this kingdom! Or are you expecting him to issue the surrender you appear unwilling to
accept from me?"
"Well, no," said Paul uneasily. Then he spotted the bishop and me, and for a moment his face lightened. But only for a moment. "This will all become very clear in just a few minutes," he said quickly and stepped aside.
There was something going on here, something the kings had worked out. I suspected that the bishop had been instrumental, but if I didn't watch it I would again be given all the credit.
Joachim came forward then, and even the queen seemed somewhat abashed under the dark intensity of his gaze. "I speak here not as someone on one side or the other of battle," he said in a clear voice, "for those in God's service can never be part of battle. My only side is that of right and justice. Members of this army have asked me for my spiritual counsel, but if you would prefer, my lady, we can defer proceedings until the bishop of this kingdom could be summoned."
She looked uncertain for a moment, suddenly having to deal with a bishop when she thought she was only going to have to face down kings of kingdoms smaller than hers, men she considered her inferiors. But then she waved the issue away. "I have never had much use for our bishop," she announced. "If you are here to offer these kings' terms, I will be happy to hear you."
Prince Walther had been looking uncomfortably from side to side, but he gave me a quick smile before turning back to the bishop.
"I am here for quite a different purpose," said Joachim. "I am here as spiritual supporter of the oaths of the Princess Hadwidis."
Hadwidis hesitated a second, then squared her shoulders and came forward. She had put on a silk dress from Xantium, in which she shivered, and had apparently made some attempt to regulate her short, unruly hair. She stood before the assembled kings and war-leaders, chin up, a girl not all that much older that Antonia, wearing a thin dress that gave her a boldness they would never have allowed in the nunnery. She opened and closed her mouth, scanning her audience with an expression almost of disdain. I knew her well enough to realize that she was in fact almost too terrified to go on. But she did go on, and I thought her performance one of the bravest things I had ever seen.
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