by Gail Dayton
“They are?” Jax sounded surprised.
“Here, they are.”
“Then we will go somewhere else. To Scotland. To Yvaine’s tower. The English council doesn’t bar women from magic.” He frowned, as if trying to recall something difficult. “At any rate, there’s nothing in the charter to prevent women from becoming members of the Magician’s Council of England.”
“The Hungarian council bans them, and I can’t leave.” Not until she obtained the justice she needed. The crushing grief and horrible anger that had gripped her when she swore that oath had eased. What held her now was as much stubbornness as anything. She would someday, somehow get justice for her murdered family, just as she’d promised.
Jax shrugged. He didn’t seem at all interested in her reasons for refusing to leave. “Learn the magic. There’s not many who’ll dare cross a blood sorceress in her power. If they raise a fuss, we’ll deal with it then.”
Oh, she wanted to. Wanted it desperately. It wasn’t evil. Who would have thought? It was just knowledge. Knowledge about magic she already practiced in small ways. And it was the more she’d craved for so long. Magic that held justice in its bleeding heart. She wanted it. But did she dare?
Jax offered her more tea, and when she turned him down, took her mug to the dishpan. He poured more tea for himself. “So,” he said. “I thought I might begin with your roof. I noticed the thatching was a bit thin in a few—”
He broke off at a racket of caws from outside, Crow crying alarm. “Someone’s coming. Not from the village. They’re armed.”
How did he know that from a crow’s call? Amanusa’s gut churned, though she was grateful for the warning. This time, they wouldn’t take her by surprise.
Jax was patting around his waist as if looking for weapons. He would get himself killed if he tried to fight—at least six of them always came together. Dear God, how she hated them.
Amanusa caught his arm. “They won’t hurt me. Nor you, if I tell them not to. I think.” She hoped.
“Who are they?”
“Outlaws. Anarchists. Revolutionaries. They hide in the mountains and plot freedom for Transylvania from the wicked Hapsburgs.” Amanusa began gathering her tins of dried herbs and jars of salve, crushing the surge of fear and hate that made her hands tremble. Don’t let them see.
“What do they want with you?”
“Healing. Doubtless they’ve got themselves into another fight trying to rob an imperial shipment of something or other and need patching up again. We have a bargain, the anarchists and I. I heal them when they need it, and they leave me alone the rest of the time.”
“Will they be staying long?” Jax stood to the side of the open door, peeking out at intervals.
Amanusa paused, realizing she hadn’t explained, then went back to her gathering. “They won’t be staying at all. They don’t come to me for healing. I go to them.”
The realization struck her a fraction after it did Jax, for he already stared at her, horrified. “I cannot stay behind.”
“How can—? They’ll kill you.” Amanusa tried to think.
Jax threw his greatcoat and jacket under Amanusa’s bed and yanked the blanket off it. With a kitchen knife, he sawed a hole in the center and popped his head through it. “I’m your servant,” he said. “I’m simple-minded. Treat me like I haven’t the sense of a child and maybe they won’t mind me coming along.”
He scraped his expensive boots against the floor to scuff them up a bit more and scrubbed his hands through his hair to make it stand up as he let his face go slack. Dear Lord, the man suddenly looked like an idiot.
She stared at him in shock until the chink of metal outside reminded her of the situation. She plunged into her role. “I’ll need a bag for myself, Jax. It’s in the drawer under the wardrobe.”
He bobbed his head and walked awkwardly to it. “Here?”
“Yes. Do hurry.” Amanusa turned back to her medicines, carefully wrapping the heavy jars in rags so they wouldn’t clink in their wooden case and perhaps break. Do nothing to anger them.
“I see you were expecting us.” The outlaws’ second-in-command ducked through her door and turned his deadly gaze on Jax. “Who’s this?”
Chapter 3
Hearing Romanian again after two days of nothing but English was almost a shock. Amanusa slid her eyes toward Jax. She didn’t want the outlaws to know she spoke English, but did Jax understand Romanian? Had the outlaws heard her give that order in English?
“He is my servant.” She kept packing her box.
Would they accept this change? “His body is strong even if his mind is not.”
“Where did you get him?” Teo walked to Jax, who cowered and drooled a bit as the second-in-command circled him. The other five stood at the door, blocking the light, but they stayed outside the cottage, thank God.
“I found him in the forest. Filthy, bleeding, and hungry. He’s like a stray dog. I fed him, and now he won’t go away.” She set the last jar in her box, packing it tighter and heavier than usual because this time she wouldn’t have to carry it herself. She braced her hands against the table a moment to steady her nerves.
When she looked up, Jax was pulling double handfuls of her undergarments from the wardrobe drawer and stuffing them into the carpetbag.
“Jax, no!” Amanusa leaped across the room, shoving Teo out of the way to grab her petticoats from her servant’s hands. “No. I won’t be needing these.”
“No?” Teo’s voice was dark, filled with heavy sensuality as he lifted her washed-thin nightgown from the bag with one finger. He laughed when Amanusa snatched it from him and shoved it back into the bag.
Teo caught Amanusa’s elbow and spun her into his arms, crushing her tight as he ground his hips against her. Amanusa swallowed down her revulsion along with another surge of hate. Teo liked that she hated him, the pig.
She turned her face away as he licked a long, wet swath across her cheek, hanging onto her composure with her short-bitten nails. Dark things swirled in her mind, making her heart race. She thrust them ruthlessly away. She did not dare lose herself in memory now.
“You sure I can’t tempt you to revisit old times?” he crooned.
Amanusa spoke in her sweetest voice. “Only if you want to wake with your balls shriveled to the size of peas and your bowels so loose they’ll never close again.”
Teo laughed as he let her quickly go, then laughed again, true laughter. “Look at your idiot. He wants to . kill me.”
The murderous hate in Jax’s eyes sent alarm knifing through Amanusa. She wanted to learn magic from him, not bury him. “Jax. I need two dresses. The brown ones. And stockings. Get them now.”
Jax glared another moment at the outlaw, until Teo lifted his hand as if he meant to strike. Amanusa winced, but Teo only pretended to hit Jax and laughed when her servant pretended to cower in fear. Too much pretending. But it meant survival.
“He is loyal to me,” Amanusa said. “Like a dog who has been kicked too many times and finally finds someone who does not.”
“We have enough dogs at our camp.” Teo glowered at Jax. “He stays behind.”
Amanusa shrugged. “He will only follow. You may as well let him come. He can carry the medicines.”
Teo scowled. “You always carry them.”
“And I often run out because I cannot carry much weight. He is simple. He is obedient. What harm can he do?” Amanusa didn’t truly want the responsibility of keeping Jax and herself alive and unharmed in the outlaw camp, but he could not stay behind.
She glanced up and saw Jax unbuttoning his trousers as if he meant to relieve himself in the corner of the room. One way to convince the outlaws of his missing good sense. Would it work?
“No!” she cried. “Jax, no.”
He turned, holding his trousers together, his expression vacantly wondering.
“Outside.” Amanusa pointed at the door. “You know where you’re supposed to do that. Go on.”
The me
n backed from the door, laughing, as Jax hurried out, clutching at his trousers to keep them from falling.
Amanusa turned back to Teo. “You still think he will be a danger to you big brave outlaws?”
Chuckling, Teo waved his hands. “All right, all right. He can come. But you’re in charge of him. Keep him out of trouble, or our bargain ends.”
Amanusa turned away to hide her terror. Teo liked her fear too. Indifference would keep him away from her, and courage. “Only Dragos Szabo has the right to change our bargain.”
“Maybe so. But I know Szabo and I know what he will say.”
Hating that the man could see her hands shaking, Amanusa folded the dresses Jax had pulled from the wardrobe and laid them over her stockings in their careful rolls. Amanusa also knew the outlaw leader, far better than she liked, and she knew Teo was right. Neither she nor Jax could set a foot wrong in the camp if they wanted to stay alive.
“Jax. Come here.” She went to the door and called. “Get the case.” She gestured at the heavy wooden box on the table.
Jax picked it up and came back to take the carpetbag from her. There was a little tug-of-war until she saw Teo’s smirk and let go. Let the big strong silly man carry everything.
———
The walk to the outlaws’ camp took longer than she expected. Szabo had moved them deeper into the mountains since the last time they needed her. Jax stayed close, pretending to cower under Amanusa’s protection, but she could sense him bristling every time one of the outlaws—especially Teo—came too near. It comforted her, and she didn’t like that it did.
They stopped beside a stream near noon. Amanusa shared the food she’d packed with Jax. The outlaws wouldn’t share theirs. She’d learned through uncomfortable experience. Their women, those at the camp, would feed her, but the men didn’t care.
Sometime in midafternoon, they topped a ridge and descended into a tiny hidden valley filled with the rough-built shelters and ragged tents of the camp. Szabo came limping out to greet her, his black hair streaked with more gray than it had been two months ago. His shirt strained over a thick bandage around one shoulder and upper arm that showed through a bloody rip in his shirt. Szabo’s scowl made her heart pound with fear, but Amanusa didn’t dare let it show. Szabo respected courage, if little else.
“If Costel is not dead, it will be a miracle,” the revolutionary chief growled. “Your insistence on living in that cottage wastes too much valuable time. You should be here, where you belong.”
Then he noticed Jax. “Who is this? What do you think you’re doing, bringing strangers into my camp?” His voice built to a powerful roar.
Amanusa refused to cower. “He is my servant and he is simple-minded. I have already had this argument with Teo. I do not intend to have it with you. Now will someone show me where you put Costel, or do you intend to delay me further and let him die?” She propped her fists on her hips and gave Szabo glower for glower.
Finally the burly man took a step back and pointed. “There.”
“Thank you.” She started down the path of well-trod grass toward the indicated arbor.
“But if he dies,” Szabo snarled, “we will renegotiate this bargain, you and I.”
Amanusa paused and half turned. “If you keep me here,” she said, her voice just loud enough to carry to the chief, “I will kill you. Then where will your revolution be?”
“Go.” Szabo threw his hand toward the hospital shelter. “Just go. Keep Costel alive and maybe you can live to see another day.”
“Your threats are empty, old man.” Amanusa walked backward down the path. “If you kill me, who will heal your hurts next time?”
Amanusa ducked into the shelter, her hands shaking with equal parts anger, hate, and fear. Only when Jax swung the medicine box onto the small trunk beside the sickbed did Amanusa recall his presence. She had been so focused on the confrontation with Szabo, and Jax had done such a good job of making himself seem small and harmless, she had forgotten him.
The girl bathing (Hostel’s, forehead with a rag was new. She couldn’t be much older than fifteen. She looked up, her eyes filled with fear—though whether with fear for Costel or herself, Amanusa didn’t know. Some of the silly girls hereabouts thought the revolutionaries romantic and ran off with them willingly. Others had better sense, but wound up here anyway. Amanusa had.
“What is your name, child?” Amanusa opened (Hostel’s shirt and grimaced. Belly bandage. A gut wound. That was rarely survivable, even had she been here the moment he was brought in.
“Miruna.” The girl didn’t sound any too willing to give up that information. “And I’m a woman, not a child.”
“Of course you are,” Amanusa murmured, her mind on the bandage she untied. Jax handed her a pair of scissors before she asked for them.
“You should have been here,” Miruna accused. “His death is your fault.”
Amanusa shot her a sharp look. One of those then, who fancied herself in love, “He’s not dead yet,” she snapped. “Now make yourself useful and fetch me some hot water.”
Instead, the girl hovered as Amanusa lifted away the bloody bandage, exposing a small black-edged hole still seeping blood. Miruna moaned and began weeping loudly.
“Jax, get her out of here. And get me that hot water.”
With a brisk nod, Jax picked the girl up by the arms, carried her outside the shelter, and set her down on her feet with a thump, hard enough that she stumbled. He crossed to the fire and used a corner of the blanket he wore to pick up the entire pot of steaming water and carry it back to Amanusa. She beckoned him closer.
“Help me turn him. I need to see if the bullet came out.”
Jax nodded. He took hold of the injured man’s shoulder and hip and rolled him onto his side. Costel groaned. Amanusa’s breath sighed out in an almost-whistle. The bullet was out, but it had left a big, ugly hole in his lower back. Fear tried to freeze her. Better that the bullet was out, but what had it damaged on its way through?
“I don’t know if I can save him,” Amanusa whispered to Jax in English. “He’s been shot in the gut. The damage—Even if I had been here…”
Jax placed a clean rag over the small wound on the injured man’s stomach and turned him over to fully expose the exit wound. “Blood magic.”
He met her gaze, the blue-green of his eyes fading until they were fully brown. Amanusa’s spine prickled even before he spoke in that other voice.
“To heal wounds requires either blood or saliva. While blood is more efficacious, especially in the case of life-threatening injuries, it is also more risky, both to the patient and the sorceress. Saliva does not heal quickly, nor will it bring someone back from too near death. But it is effective in most cases and it prevents the putrefaction and fevers which often arise from wounds.”
Jax paused, as if to ask what more she wished to know. It made Amanusa feel crawly inside. The old sorceress, Yvaine, had turned Jax into a living reference volume.
Did she want this magic? Nothing kept her from wanting to heal Costel. He had joined the outlaw band after she left them so he’d had no part in what had been done. And he seemed more the idealistic revolutionary sort than the opportunistic outlaw type. Miruna apparently liked him well enough. That in itself disposed Amanusa more kindly to him.
But the idea of blood magic still made her feel a bit crawly. And Jax—or Yvaine—said healing with blood could be risky. Not something she wanted to attempt on her first try.
“How do I heal wounds with saliva?” Amanusa asked.
“First, expose the injury…”
Step by step, Jax’s voice led her through the process. There was a great deal more to it than simply spitting on the wound, which seemed somehow more wrong than bleeding on it. She mixed the saliva with alcohol spirits—the potent home distillation of the area—and used that to clean the wound. She had words to say over it and somehow felt the medicine, or the magic or whatever it was, penetrate deep into the hole through Costel’s gu
t.
It didn’t seem quite sufficient, so she added a prayer for healing of unseen injuries. Then she got out her needle and thread and began stitching Costel’s back together again. Three stitches in, Jax, who had been serving as candelabra in the shelter’s gloom as well as textbook, crumpled slowly to the ground.
Shouting for Miruna or someone to come help, Amanusa abandoned her sewing. She scurried around the cot to grab up the candle and stamp out the smoldering grass and pine needles that floored the shelter.
“Is he dead?” Miruna whimpered, hovering at the door.
“No, he’s not dead. He just fainted.” Amanusa thrust the candle at her. “Take this. Relight it and bring it back. I need the light.”
“I meant Costel. Is he dead?” Miruna took the candle, but didn’t move.
“He’s just fainted too. Now bring me my light.” Amanusa dragged Jax to the edge of the shelter to get him out of the way and straightened him into a more comfortable position. Blood poured from his nose—had he hit it? He seemed all right otherwise, so she turned him onto his side so he wouldn’t choke. Was it such a strain to be possessed by the magic? She would have to be more careful. Learn the magic some other way.
“What’s wrong with him?” Miruna returned, shielding the candle flame with a hand, her eyes on Jax.
“He gets these falling fits.” Amanusa positioned Miruna where she wanted her and picked up the needle again. “He was possessed by a powerful magician, and it cost him his wits. The power still rides him, and sometimes it does that. Sometimes, he says strange things, strange words too.” That might help, if he slipped and spoke English where someone could hear.
On the’ other hand, these outlaws were a superstitious bunch. They might fear Jax rather than pity him. However, they were already half afraid of her…
“I have some magic myself.” Amanusa took careful stitches in Costel’s skin, piecing the ragged opening together as she made up her lie. She wasn’t much good at lying, but this wasn’t much of a lie. She did have magic. “The others may have told you. I have enough magic to control him, but if something should happen to me…” She shrugged. “Well, he’s always been peaceful enough with me. I shouldn’t worry about what else the magician might have left behind. Your camp conjurer might be able to handle him. Perhaps.”
