Elisha Magus

by E. C. Ambrose

  Morag wanted him to rise. Elisha squeezed his eyes shut so hard that he saw red now instead of black, a dancing red like the carpet page of a rich manuscript furling with poisonous vines.

  How long had he been down here? It felt like ages. Thomas and the rest must be gone by now, the road abandoned to those who knew nothing of what had happened or else could not afford to avoid the place.

  Even changing direction was an arduous process, digging his fingers upward and pushing at the earth, turning his body and wrenching his wounded shoulder. He sobbed with the effort, and with the knowledge that he was doing what his enemy wanted, and he had no choice.

  But the thought of Morag presented a tantalizing option. Somehow, the mancers could appear and disappear, travelling a secret corridor of Death. Elisha might be able to use it, if he only knew how. It was something to do with using blood to seed the ground, as they had at the arch where Alaric met them, and at the stone where Morag had dragged him from the abbey. It needed preparation then, and what? Death? But Morag did not seem aware of the death already around him, in those mounds of ancient burials. Murder? Did it truly take them to another place, or straight to Hell like the demons that they were? Had Morag shown him Rome, or merely told him that? In spite of the horror they inspired, the mancers did not seem any more supernatural than he himself.

  When he touched his old razor, he had triggered the memory of his brother’s last moments. It had been that effortless for Morag the night they met. He had seized Elisha, draped him over a shoulder, and opened a door that didn’t exist. Tentatively, Elisha reached out again toward Chanterelle. He had known her, surely better than the mancer who slew her; if there were a door she could open, would she not open it for him?

  His fingers sifted through the soil and the remnants of her. Ash struck like a thorny vine, tearing along his skin with a prickling pain. It surrounded him, scraping at him, entwining about his trembling arm. He aimed his awareness to this end: to bring all the focus he could spare, from the process of keeping back the dirt, into those outstretched fingertips. The cold insinuated itself through contact, but he had little sense of Chanterelle. She was fragmented, her body and self so broken he could not find her center. She surrounded him, pulsing with pain and terror so that his skin crawled, but the sensation was so pervasive he could not bring his awareness to bear upon it. Unlike that connection he briefly shared with his dead brother, this was as thin and dreadful as mist, binding, clinging—not a thing he could push away or avoid without shedding his awareness completely. And if he did that, he was doomed to die beneath the ground. Up, then. Up to face whatever monsters lay in wait.

  Elisha steeled himself to thrust in a new direction, and his muscles protested. Already, he weakened from the efforts expended. Dear God. He might come bursting from the earth to collapse at Morag’s feet, ripe for the skinning. And whoever else witnessed his emergence would acknowledge Morag the hero of the scene, killing the fiend that dodged his own death.

  His left hand gripped his talismans a little tighter. Thomas’s compassion, Nathaniel’s sacrifice. His tutors among the magi always chided him for failing to build more strength with his talisman, rather than allowing it to resonate with the focus of his power. He practiced now, recreating the braid of strength he had earlier drawn on, but damping the full intensity of the razor. His situation was too precarious for that. The grief alone would overwhelm him.

  Armed as best he could be, Elisha moved upward, wriggling and pushing through the earth like a mandrake root being harvested. He wished he could spring forth from the ground with a shriek. Pressure built up within as well as around him. As he moved despite the protest of his twitching muscles and burning lungs, the urgency transformed his progress from escape to confrontation. The sooner he rose, the sooner he would know what threat awaited him; to meet it with his strength or fall before it into nothing. We are each of us soldiers, fighting our own enemy until we fall and do not rise again. Mordecai’s words, before Elisha knew who and what he was. At the time, in his arrogance and excitement, Elisha’s reply had been to suggest that he might rise again in a way that none expected. Today, he would be lucky to rise at all.

  The earth above grew lighter, the pressure slowly releasing, and Elisha moved more carefully, until his fingertip touched air and he froze, praying it had not been noticed. He mustered his scattered thoughts first on searching the ground around him, reaching for attunement. He could feel no one, but he was not fooled. Morag would be here, whether he waited so well concealed that Elisha could not sense him, or whether he would appear from nothing in a howl of the ravening dead.

  Deflection would not alone suffice against an enemy magus who expected him, but it might buy a few minutes for Elisha to understand the situation and find some advantage. He sucked back his senses, projecting his own absence as he wriggled the last few feet and pushed his right arm, then his head free of the earth. Dirt scattered down over his shoulders, and he fought the urge to shake himself—any further sound or disturbance would make the deflection that much more difficult.

  The dull light of an overcast afternoon showed him little but the nearby mound that covered his grave. He heaved and shoved against the surface, kicking and finally had his knees on the broken ground. He gulped a breath, reeling in the sudden release.

  A familiar acrid odor reached his nose, but it was out of place here, so much so that he did not immediately place it. He started to get his feet under him, and the edges of his tunnel trickled away with a soft rumble.

  A slithering rattle followed by the tap of metal. Then he realized that he had smelled smoke, but not from the wood fires that would heat any local houses, and he froze, eyes wide. The air was so dry it hurt his eyes and nose and throat. This unnatural dry felt like Sundrop’s doing, taking the rain from the site of Elisha’s grave. Mud would have made Elisha’s escape all the more difficult. But if Sundrop meant to help him, he must not know about the offended crows, or what had happened to Chanterelle. Sundrop had urged her to flee out of fear she would be discovered by the mancers. Did he now search for her with the touch of his soft rains upon her earth?

  When he heard the blast, Elisha first thought of thunder. But the percussive force of something shot past him from the left in a rolling wave of smoke. Instinctively, Elisha threw himself to the ground. A bombardelle. Someone had shot at him. Why not arrows or the sword, something sure to strike, at the very least?

  It came from behind, and he scrambled to his hands and knees, peering into the smoke that swirled around him.

  Why not an arrow? Because he couldn’t be seen. Until now.

  Another rattle of metal on metal, the hiss of flame. Elisha flattened himself, only to draw down a wraith of smoke like a pointing finger over his head. Deflection might fool the eye but not the air. Instead, he sprang up and dodged right. A second shot cracked the air, and Elisha dove away as the lead ball slammed into the dirt where he had emerged. Smoke roiled out, spilling down in the wake of the thunder.

  Elisha projected his breath, pushing the smoke briefly away, and caught a glimpse of the bombardier, standing in the open on the ring of earth despoiled by Chanterelle’s ashes, leaning slightly back on one foot as he braced the bottom of the staff where his weapon was mounted. Unhurriedly, he drew something small from a pouch at his side, stuffed it into the mouth of the tube with that rattle of metal as he drew out the slender shaft he used to pack it. A bit of flame flickered at his hand, obscured by smoke into a pale light.

  “So, this’s how a death-mage dies: shot full o’ lead on the dirt-whore’s grave.” Morag’s head swung like a hunting hound, scenting his prey. His form shifted slightly, the flame crackled.

  Elisha dove as the shot thundered by. He struck hard, his injured shoulder grinding into the dirt, and he bit back a cry. The smoke allowed him to be tracked, but it also made the aiming that much more difficult. A few running steps and he’d be free, beyond the range of the wicked instrument. He floundered up again, panting, then used h
is breath to make contact, gathering the smoke rather than letting it disperse. He thickened it around him, between himself and Morag, then leapt first left, then right, improvising a dance to confuse the eddies and the ears.

  “Hah!” Morag laughed. A rattle, and another shot that punched a brief hole in Elisha’s smoky defense.

  No matter, Elisha ran, easily avoiding the direction of the shot. One, two, three, four, steps—and then stuck fast, his sole rooted to the spot so that he wrenched his ankle and fell to his knees, crumpling sideways with a cry. The earth sucked at his foot, wrapping it like a gripping hand that dug in its fingers as he tried to move. It seized him like ice, a burning agony that pulled at every inch of exposed skin. Chanterelle’s ashes awakened to her killer. Morag used his own trick against him, but instead of moving the tainted earth, the ashes marked Elisha heel and hand and dragged him down. He twisted, looking back.

  Beyond the turbulence of Elisha’s passage, Morag laughed again. The smoke began to clear from the last shot. Elisha tried to gather it once more, but Morag’s presence shone through like a beacon in a fog. He braced his weapon, stuffed in the shot and slowly drew out the tamping rod, then lifted his head to stare directly at Elisha. He slipped the rod into his belt and raised a wick that sputtered flame.

  “You think someone might hear? Somebody might come a’runnin’ to find out what’s on? Not to a witch’s grave at a crossroads. Not to the sight of smoke and the smell of brimstone.” Morag drew a deep sniff, like a lady with a nosegay. “ ’ave no fears about the common folk. They think I’m the Devil come to take you home.”

  He chuckled. “Come to think of it, mebbe they’re right.” He touched off the flame with a sound like thunder.

  Chapter 37

  Elisha grabbed at the smoke with all of his strength. He flung his awareness through the writhing space between them and felt the impact of the ball striking through. Contact. He struck back with a ferocious need, but smoke alone was not enough. The ball slipped just a little, streaking through his smoky grasp with a sizzle, burning a furrow down his side. Elisha winced. It saved him for a moment, but it wasn’t enough.

  “You’re quick, I’ll grant ye that.” Morag propped the staff to begin his ritual of reloading.

  Crouched on the ground, a bare ten yards from his enemy, his foot clamped down, Elisha didn’t feel quick. But Morag took his time, letting the smoke disperse, moving no nearer. He, too, needed contact, and the band of ruined earth gave it to him—enough to keep Elisha in his grip. Elisha groped through the contact, forcing himself to face the thousand piercing grains of Chanterelle’s suffering. Every grain diminished him, striking another tiny blow against his crumbling strength. He panted, pushing as hard as he had under ground, with barely greater results. He could feel the pressure of Morag’s feet upon the dirt, but he could not sense him at all. Just as before, Morag’s presence and absence were one: He had as little character as a stone, and he gave as little hint of what lay inside. Without that, Elisha’s awareness slipped around him, broken into useless eddies like a river pierced by bridges. Rage as he would, he could not strike a man he could not sense. He felt only the iron pressure of those boots that held him, too, upon the ruined ring.

  Magic pinned Elisha down, but simple lead could kill him. He recoiled his senses, fleeing the dread of Chanterelle’s destruction. Every gasping breath brought a stinging pain from his latest wound. But if he would not die for Brigit’s use, he would be damned if he died for Morag’s. He reached out again and found the lead ball marked with his blood, burrowed into the earth not far away. He clung tighter to his talismans and borrowed the racing speed of his heart. Quick, Morag had called him. He would see about that.

  Morag braced the weapon and brought up his flame. Elisha flung his shot. With every urgency of his being, he sent it home, back to the barrel that launched it.

  Steadying the staff, Morag touched off the flame. Elisha’s shot slammed into the hollow core, and the thing exploded with a ferocious blast. Shards of smoking metal flew. One of them slashed Elisha’s face, leaving a burning trail, as he ducked for cover. Across the ring, Morag staggered with the impact, stumbling free of the ruined earth. For a moment, Elisha was free. He scrambled to his feet, limping a few steps beyond the ring, the smoke searing his nostrils and throat as he tried to catch his breath.

  With a snarl Morag flung away the broken staff with its smoldering shape of bronze petalled like a flower from Hell. Blood streamed down his face and arm from a dozen rents in his clothing, and one ear dangled. “Oh, barber, ye’ll regret that shot.”

  Elisha stumbled as he ran, trying to think of some way to defeat the mancer. He screamed as he unwillingly stopped again, his knees buckling at the terrible sucking at his soles that held him down. His right hand dragged backward, pulled everywhere the tainted earth touched him. Morag had regained his circle. He not only had contact with the dirt, but also intimate knowledge of Chanterelle’s death and desecration. He called out to the dirt with the force of that knowledge, and Elisha was held like a deer at a net, waiting for the hunter, and the hunter came, boots scuffing the ground.

  Elisha reached back through that same contact, but he didn’t have the knowledge. For him, it was still too faint and fragmentary.

  “I met a woman at your graveside, oh, barber mine. Weeping she was for love of you.” His breath rasped, then bubbled as he coughed. Elisha stilled his struggle, listening.

  Morag grabbed his arm, fingers digging in and dragged him, Elisha’s back pressed to Morag’s thighs, the other thick hand clamping Elisha’s jaw. Morag pulled him up, smearing him with blood, squeezing Elisha’s head until his teeth ached, and the mancer stared down from his burned, battered face. “Pay for that, ye will. I had to leave my pretties home, ’cause I was that worried what you might do with ’em. Needn’t’ve worried, eh?” He chuckled in Elisha’s ear, his own dangling against Elisha’s forehead. “You haven’t learned shit since last we met.”

  Elisha reached up with his left, flicked open the razor, and snapped it across Morag’s throat, but the mancer turned with the cut, spinning like a dancer, and seized Elisha’s hand, crushing it.

  With a fierce lunge, Morag bit down on the razor’s back and tore it free of Elisha’s grip. He spat it aside and flung his captive down, slamming a knee into Elisha’s chest, holding him spread like Christ on the cross. “You can’t beat me,” he spat, and Elisha felt the mancer’s blood, mingled now with Nathaniel’s dried remains. His stomach clenched with nausea. The new wound gaped at the side of Morag’s throat, but too shallow to kill. Why couldn’t his brother have failed so dismally? Failed—and lived.

  The mancer bore down on him, and his ribs cracked. He could no longer draw breath. “I tasted your brother’s death,” Morag murmured, his voice gone soft now with something like lust. “Ooh, it tasted good. Steeped in despair.” He licked his lips, lingering on a gash that cut the lower one. His gruesome glee was the first emotion Elisha had felt in him. Hoping to overwhelm Elisha with repulsion, Morag sent him this, making a breach in the utter lack of presence he affected. Morag’s shield had a flaw.

  He tasted Nathaniel’s death, but he did not know it. And so, Elisha showed him. He ripped open his memories, his own and the awful vision captured by the razor. He could not vanquish this demon with horror; he didn’t even try. But there was more to dying than that. From the flickering memories of that moment, Elisha chose the thread of guilt, the layers of his own remorse from his doubt of Helena to his silent acceptance of his sentence. He sent Nathaniel’s mistrust, his late action, his realization at what must be done to save his wife, and the moment he was sure both wife and child had died and might have lived if not for him.

  Morag shivered, his tongue protruding. He blinked a few times and Elisha felt the rush of unaccustomed emotion, a feeling so foreign to Morag that he had prepared no defense against it. Tears streamed down his captor’s face. Impatiently, Morag shook them away. He shifted his grip, blood flying as he shook his h
ead again, trying to shake off the emotions. His loose ear flapped, but his lips curled now with sorrow rather than hate. Morag stared at Elisha with tear-stained eyes, a mixture of guilt and wonder on his face.

  Elisha called Death. He called it quick and sharp from the flecks of his brother’s blood and slipped it like a razor through this fracture in Morag’s defenses. The mancer thought he knew death, but he was wrong. His knowledge was inflicting it, torture, murder, shock, and horror. Pain, to him, was power, but this … he struggled to understand, and Elisha undermined his struggle. Elisha summoned up the howling blast, the cold, the cracked abyss. There was no control as there had been with King Hugh, there was only desperation. Morag’s labored lungs seized, his torn face split as he realized his danger. He thrashed and kicked, but Elisha held on. The two of them rolled, the cold of dying lashing between them until it lanced home through the blackened shard of bronze from the bombardelle that lodged behind the ruined ear. Elisha sought for Morag’s death and found it there. A nudge and the shard drove inward, eager.

  Morag’s body convulsed, his eyes flaring, tears drying, then he finally stilled, sagging onto Elisha, pinning him and dribbling brains.

  Elisha shoved him away, and vomited. He rested his forehead on his trembling arm. King Hugh’s death seemed so easy now, so distant, thanks to the numbness he had cultivated. Then, he had called on the body’s natural decay, turning the flesh against itself, using his talisman to bring out what was already there—the death inherent in the idea of birth. Alaric’s death was different, true, but it had come in battle, as a king should wish to die. Morag’s death was murder. Personal and ugly.