Elisha Magus

by E. C. Ambrose

  “I asked you, my lady. You were hardly taking advantage.” Indivisi. Utterly devoted to one thing. If a man could know Death in such an intimate way, did that make him indivisi? But if he used that knowledge, he became a necromancer, a wielder of terror. If a man could know Death …

  “No,” she said, studying him sidelong. “You asked me where a man would hide. There’s a village close to here, or rather, there was a village, but the Conqueror had it cleared out when he claimed this land back for the crown. Not much left of it, I guess, but it would be a dry place, if a man didn’t have another place to go.”

  “Nobody’s using it?”

  “Just beyond the village is the heath, with all of those pagan burials. Who’d want to live there?” She shivered, then took another swallow of her cider.

  Elisha remembered his own cup, cool enough now not to scorch. It tasted sweet and wonderful down his bruised throat.

  “If you leave Beaulieu to the west, you can take that road for a bit, then you’ll turn at the pond.” Scooting down into her fur and blankets, Rosalynn tipped her head toward the window where rain had left behind the steely sky of late afternoon. Her knuckles whitened on the mug. “There was a sweep of the forest after the princesses were killed, and I think any bandits in the village were routed. Except, they’re coming back now, aren’t they.” She faltered, moved to sip her mug again, and found it empty. “Elisha.”

  His name echoed softly from the empty mug, and he had to lean forward to hear what she said next.

  “The man who seized me, today, he said something strange. Their captain had torn my dress, and the man, he asked if I were a part of the price, and the captain laughed, and he said, ‘No, mate, she’s a bonus.’ ” She stirred as Elisha put his hand on her arm. “I don’t understand.”

  For a moment, he didn’t either, looking into her dark, puzzled eyes and thinking of the men who held him, who did not merely slit his throat and take what they would. “They weren’t bandits,” Elisha said. “They were mercenaries. They were hired to kill us.”

  Chapter 16

  After taking his leave as gently as he might, Elisha pelted down the stairs and burst out the door.

  The startled Mary shouted after him, “At least take the filthy boots I carried for you!” When he glanced back, she flung them at him, catching him in the shins, causing him to stumble.

  Ignoring her triumphant air, he snatched the boots and winced as he stuffed his aching feet into them, then hobbled back into a run. The moment he put the truth to Rosalynn’s words, he knew who would hire out the attack and why. It wasn’t their deaths the brigands sought, but something else—something that required subjecting Rosalynn to their foulness, something that made them hold Elisha without killing him, even after Rosalynn admitted their poverty and tried to escape. They didn’t want him dead, they wanted him frightened and furious—desperate enough to save Rosalynn that he would summon up the very essence of Death from the talisman he carried. So that the woman who had marked it with her blood could learn how to use it herself. Brigit.

  He ran all the way to the gate of the abbey grounds, dodging a drift of people moving in the opposite direction, before he realized that speed would avail him little: it had been hours since the attack, and Brigit would have been ready for the next step, whatever that might be. Even if she kept contact with the talisman from the comfort of the lodge, she could have mounted up in pursuit once the attack was over. But she need not hurry either. She would be expecting Elisha to carry the talisman as far as Beaulieu. Once she knew he had defeated the bandits, all she needed was an excuse to come looking for him. She knew he was a sensitive. She wasn’t—she didn’t know what little it might take to alert him of her interest. She would not, therefore, risk maintaining her contact with the talisman when she already knew where they were going. She would expect to find Elisha taking the talisman away with him. If she did search, it would lead her directly to Thomas.

  In this one foolish act, allowing another man to carry his burden, Elisha had aimed all of their enemies in a single direction.

  Elisha turned for the stables and stopped short. A large party of riders milled about there, dismounting and handing off their mounts to the grooms. A stocky fellow hesitated, then glanced in Elisha’s direction. He put out a hand toward the nearest horse, where its rider waited for a stable boy. The rider looked sharply up and smiled.

  “Why, Elisha! The very man we’ve come to see.” Prince Alaric’s smile, spread upon his youthful face, was nearly contagious. “I was surprised to find you gone so early, but it did not take much work to find out where.” He kicked free of his stirrup, the other man still holding his mount, and slid down, straightening the layers of his sumptuous clothing, ermine close about his throat beneath a golden chain.

  Another member of the party glared down at Elisha before sliding from his own mount. “Please tell me we needn’t violate sanctuary to gain satisfaction, Your Majesty.” Mortimer—the drunk from the ball—rested his hand on his sword, his own dark woolens replete with golden stitching. Elisha liked him better drunk.

  A boy hurried up, hands out for the reins, but Alaric gave him a resounding slap across the face with the short crop in his fist. “You’re late.”

  “Sorry, my lord,” the boy piped up—and Alaric threatened the crop again as the boy cowered.

  “Do you not recognize your king?” Mortimer snapped, and the boy dropped to his knees, head bowed nearly to the earth.

  “Forgive me, Your Majesty.” He huddled at the prince’s feet. Elisha’s hands clenched of their own accord, his wrist throbbing. He had once had much the same view of the royal boots of King Hugh, and he noticed Prince Alaric wore his father’s silver spurs.

  “What do you want of me?” Elisha took a step forward, drawing their eyes from the quaking stable boy.

  Alaric tossed down his crop and gloves and strode over. “You left me with a foreign mess, Barber. I intend to know why. You have done me service in the past, for which I am grateful, but I will not be tolerant forever.” Behind him, the boy gathered up Alaric’s riding things and scrambled for the horse. A sharp, red welt crossed his face.

  “My lord king,” called a monk as he hustled toward them, bowing, a trio of other monks at his back. “The abbot is clearing his house for you, Your Majesty, but it won’t be ready for a little while. Is there another way we might accommodate you? There is a fine solar in the—”

  “We need a private place to talk.” He reached out and slung his arm through Elisha’s. “Immediately.” Six of his men moved forward as well, with casual menace.

  The monk scowled at them. “If you will join us for Vespers service, Your Majesty, the brothers shall to bed, and you may have the Abbey entire.”

  “We must away shortly after Vespers, for an appointment at Compline. Pray you leave the gates ready for us on our return,” said Alaric with a gracious smile. The monk’s lean face failed to show any change of expression though the king-apparent planned to claim the very church and bend the monastery to his own regimen. The bells had nearly finished, and Alaric tugged Elisha with him toward the church, Mortimer following close at their back with the retinue of soldiers. They joined the press of monks, lay brothers, guests, and townsfolk. Elisha spotted Rosalynn and her maid among the crowd, not far from a ragged gathering of beggars assembling in the hopes of offerings from the parishioners. Was Thomas among them? Elisha felt chilled. Pray God he had not chosen to return tonight.

  “Come, Elisha, join us in the abbot’s row,” Alaric murmured close to his ear. “If you look penitent enough, perhaps people will stop calling for your head.”

  Mortimer gave a snort, eyes narrowed as they met Elisha’s.

  “This is absurd, Your Highness,” Elisha said. “Tell me what you want from me. There are a thousand other places we might go.”

  “Don’t you want to go to service? Why not? Are you afraid of God?” But Alaric’s throat bobbed as he said it, his glance sneaking up to the cross they pass
ed below. With a twitch of ermine, he swept the crowd with his gaze as they entered the church then moved toward the rood screen beyond which the monks would be gathering. Then he hesitated and his smile twisted. “Her? Are you trying to protect Rosalynn? Lord, Elisha, tell me you’ve not fallen for that baggage. You’ve already got Randall’s favor, and I can’t imagine any other reason a man would court her.”

  Elisha gritted his teeth. “You may not know her as well as you think, Your Highness.”

  Alaric chuckled. He stared in Rosalynn’s direction and tipped his head towing Elisha past to stand in the front. Once there, Alaric glanced around a bit, his grip tightening. “I ought to have sent my rider on earlier—then at least they’d have set out a chair.”

  The prince’s men crowded close by Elisha’s other side, hemming him in. Their entry had been so public that even the strongest deflection wouldn’t allow him to slip from the church. Nothing short of an earthquake would free him from Alaric’s oppressive grip.

  The abbot, resplendent in his dark habit and gold-embroidered chasuble, emerged from behind the rood screen to the monks’ chanting. His voice rang in prayer through the church, then changed mode, calling out over his congregation. Latin, of course. Alaric stared up at him, listening, frowning, one of the few on this side of the screen who would understand Latin. His fingers gripped Elisha’s arm from time to time, as if the abbot’s words were aimed at him, and he did not like them.

  As the abbot droned on, Elisha studied the statue of the Virgin Mary, placed to one side; a lovely wooden figure, brightly painted with a gown of red and mantle of blue. She balanced the chubby Christ child on one hip and held out a lily in her other hand. Beneath her benevolent gaze, Elisha grew warm, Father Michael’s injunction to repent resounding in his skull. She was a mother—the Mother—why did she not intercede on behalf of the mothers he had known? Helena had prayed to her for her own child’s safe delivery, and that, like so many other births, turned to grief. The statue’s pretty face and attentive look concealed a heart of wood. She reminded him of Brigit, herself a mother-to-be. Would the baby soften the mother’s heart?

  From behind the screen, the monks began to sing, and Elisha caught his breath. The choir of masculine voices resonated through the grandeur of the church, giving that attentive Madonna something worth listening to. They sang in unison, but with a range of tones, from the fluting of the youngest novice down to the sonorous depths of his elders. The stone hummed and echoed; some monks, glimpsed only through the elaborate gilded carving of the screen, swayed with their song. Glory, Hallelujah, Elisha thought—there was some beauty in the church yet, and some who still found their distant God worthy of all praise.

  The office at last wound to an end, though the song reverberated a while longer, and Alaric herded him up to receive communion, the prince kneeling first among all for the wafer. “Interesting service, Father Abbot, especially for a sanctuary. A den of thieves, indeed. I hope you didn’t extemporize the whole thing.” He gave the abbot a hard stare.

  The abbot merely stared back down his long nose and crossed the prince’s forehead as he intoned a ritual blessing, but the prince’s face softened, his lips a-tremble, as if every word of God were reaching him tonight.

  Then came Elisha’s turn. The body of Christ tasted dry, the Son’s battered figure sagging on the cross above them, the Frenchman’s flayed chest overlaying Christ’s own wounds in Elisha’s mind.

  Mortimer came next, his eyes closed in a reverent expression as the wafer touched his tongue. While the others accepted their communion and retreated outside to the remnants of day, Elisha stood with Alaric and his soldiers, waiting, his wrist and throat aching, the Body of Christ still clinging to his tongue. Rosalynn and her maid moved up with the line, her glance darting toward Alaric and away, barely resting on Elisha. He moved to speak to her, but Alaric caught the back of his neck, a gesture that might have looked friendly, but he let his thumb and fingers dig in painfully against the fresh bruises. Elisha winced. He wanted to knock the prince’s hand away, but it would avail him nothing. The service felt like his mother’s warning after bad behavior, ushering in the long wait until his father decreed what punishment should fall.

  Behind the rood screen, the monks shuffled away toward the south transept leading to their cloister and their beds. They’d be up in a few hours to do it again. Mortimer strode about, trailing the monks and the congregants, giving the abbot a smile and nod and shutting the door firmly behind them.

  When the church had emptied but for Alaric’s men and the radiant, mocking glow of the stained glass windows, Alaric pushed Elisha in front of him and gave a gesture that spread out his men around them. “You were talking to the French. Why?”

  “A man came to me at the ball, he wanted my help. I wasn’t talking to the French, I was talking to him.”

  “Don’t listen to this miscreant, Your Majesty,” Mortimer said, jabbing a finger in Elisha’s direction. “Why else did he kill your father? I’ll wager he went over to the French before he ever saw that battlefield.”

  Both noblemen had a few inches over Elisha, with Mortimer given to leaning in. Elisha caught himself cringing slightly, obeying some memory of childhood when the lord’s reeve came to loom over his father, searching for a way to squeeze out more work or more tribute. Elisha forced himself to stand straighter. He spoke carefully. “I believe, my lord, that the prince knows exactly why I killed his father.”

  Alaric made a low sound, but Mortimer cocked his head. “Indeed? I’m sure he knows what you want him to think. The Duke may claim you as his”—a wrinkle of the lips—“champion, but the laws of challenge were not met, nor do you qualify for such consideration. You expected more protection than that, I’m sure, before you did the deed. Protection the French offered to supply? Is that why the Frenchman sought you out? A masked ball is a perfect place to betray your king.”

  Elisha’s throat ached as if he were about to be hanged all over again. “I didn’t even know the man was French until after he was dead. If anything, he wanted my help against his own king.”

  “Really? What did he say to make you believe that?” Mortimer stared him down.

  “He feared assassination.”

  The lord laughed sharply, dismissing this with a slice of his hand. “A servant in the house of the king? I’m sure King Phillip runs a tight household. The man could’ve been punished at any time.”

  Alaric stilled Mortimer with a touch. “We have no need to make more enemies,” said Alaric softly, and Mortimer drew back.

  The Frenchman was thought of as part of the ambassador’s retinue, not directly tied to the king, though he had told Elisha about his royal connection. Perhaps Mortimer had learned about it after Elisha’s departure from Dunbury. Or did he know more? Elisha met the lord’s haughty gaze.

  “Don’t let mercy weaken you, Your Majesty. He’s already an enemy.” Mortimer drummed his fingers on his sword hilt. “A man cannot fraternize with sorcery and remain godly.”

  “Peace.” The prince spread his hands and smiled. “I have more powerful allies whom I trust even less.” He pivoted back to Elisha. “You said he wanted your help, Elisha—with what?”

  Mortimer and the soldiers stood watching, and Elisha said, “You wished for privacy, Your Highness. This hardly seems private enough.”

  For a moment, Alaric sucked on his lip, then he waved Elisha over to the north transept, motioning for his men to stay where they were. From that side crossing, they could still see the soldiers, but were unlikely to be heard. Mortimer growled and stalked back toward the altar, receding around the corner.

  Elisha stood a few paces from Alaric, considering him. His regal attire looked a bit loose, the gold chain of office quivering with his breaths. The prince tried his smile again, but it had lost the youthful carelessness that Elisha remembered. There were echoes of his brother’s face about his brow and nose. “The man who spoke to me was a magus. He told me the king was against them, was hunting them
down. He was looking for a place he and his companions might be safe. Apparently, he didn’t find it.”

  In turn, the prince watched him carefully. “And the ambassador?”

  “I never spoke with him. Or with the French lady.”

  Alaric nodded slowly and shifted his weight, looking toward one of the recessed chapels. “I am inclined to believe you, given our history.”

  “Then may I go, Your Highness?”

  “You went back to view his body—why?”

  “Did you hear about the other funeral that night?”

  Alaric frowned. “Another funeral? What’s that got to do with the French?”

  With a shrug, Elisha said, “We found another body on the battlefield and the funeral was held that afternoon. Someone tried to shoot me with a crossbow during the burial. I thought the robbery might have been another attempt. Besides, the robber had an unusual weapon. I wanted to know more about it.”

  “An unusual weapon? I don’t recall hearing about this.” Alaric’s profile was calm, but his Adam’s apple bobbed, and Elisha made himself relax, spreading his senses to envelop the prince’s nervousness.

  “The Frenchman was in fear of his life, then he lost it. That doesn’t seem coincidental to me. I assume the weapon was something foreign.” Something about the slaying put the prince on edge, but why should mention of the weapon attract so much interest?

  “You think the French ambassador had him killed?”

  “As a traitor, Your Highness, with the added benefit, perhaps, of embarrassing the duke or yourself.”

  “I see. Well, the more they fight among themselves, the less likely they are to bother us.” Alaric tapped his lips. “So what did you determine about this weapon?”

  The prince was not the only one nervous about this line of questioning. Beyond him, in the church, Mortimer was nowhere to be seen. Elisha unfurled his senses further, and found him lurking just past the corner, holding his breath. “It has more than one blade, perhaps as many as five, not flat, but …”