by Gail Dayton
The tea was brought in on a little footed tray, with five cups rattling in their saucers around the fat white teapot. Amanusa had the apprentice set it off to the side and poured a single cup of tea. One would make it easier to disguise the fact that she didn’t take any of the tea, and the men needed to take only a swallow for the magic to take effect.
Then she walked to the center of the semicircle and faced her accusers. She held up her hand with the lancet around her finger, let the light glitter along its sharp silver point. The light flashed with the trembling of her hand, but hard as she tried, she could not stop the trembling.
“Dragos Szabo. Anton Kazaryk. You claim yourselves victims, that your blood is innocent. Do you offer your blood to prove your claim?”
“Yes.” Kazaryk looked as if he wanted to spit at her, but refrained. Perhaps because of the Massilean alchemist standing just behind him.
Szabo couldn’t meet her gaze, but the stubborn old goat firmed his jaw, glaring at the magicians in the chamber behind her, and nodded.
“Say it aloud.” Amanusa gestured at the crowd of observers. “So they can hear you.”
“Yes,” he muttered, then flicked an angry glance at Amanusa. “Yes.”
“Give me your hand.” Amanusa held out her left hand, palm up, her right poised with the lancet.
Szabo extended his hand, squinching his face up and turning away.
She isolated his longest finger and, with a quick stab and a squeeze, drew out a fat droplet of blood. She let the others—the witnesses and the two Massileans on the dais—see how small the drop was, then she scooped it up with the side of the lancet and strode to the tea tray, her skirts swaying with every step.
She stirred Szabo’s blood into the tea, and with her wide skirts hiding her actions, quickly lanced her own finger and squeezed a few drops of blood into the cup. She sent magic with it, praying that the spell would work as she intended. As she hoped. If it did not—she thrust away that fear.
When she returned for Kazaryk’s blood, he didn’t hesitate, holding up a finger in a rude gesture. How childish. She enjoyed his wince when the lancet drove home. Perhaps that was childish too. She didn’t care. Again, she collected a drop of blood and stirred it into the tea, along with a spoonful of sugar to hide any metallic taste.
Amanusa picked up the cup and turned to face the audience as she brought it to her lips and pretended to drink. “One swallow,” she said, handing the cup to Szabo. “You need to leave enough that everyone gets some, but you need to take a good mouthful.”
Szabo sipped warily.
“A mouthful, Szabo.”
The Massilean behind him shifted position, nothing more. Szabo took a larger drink. The others , drank in turn—Kazaryk, Vaillon, Rosato. More than a swallow was left when the cup came to Rosato, but he tossed it all down.
“It would have been better with a nice Chianti,” he said, handing her the empty cup with a smile. “Magic always goes down better with wine.”
“Really? I’ve found vodka to work quite well.” She had to force the feeble quip past her frozen face, astonished she could make one, no matter how inane. Everything depended on this.
Rosato burst out with a laugh, but smothered it quickly at the hum of disturbance from the watching crowd. Apparently they did not approve of levity at such moments. For herself, she was grateful someone could laugh.
Amanusa set the cup back on the tray and moved the tray beside the podium in the corner, for something to do while she waited for the magic to settle into their respective bloodstreams. She returned to her chair and sat, folding her hands in her lap.
Her hoops didn’t do well in the throne-like chair. Exchanging it for one of the small armless chairs on the chamber floor gave her another few endless minutes that she could occupy her mind with something besides worry.
“What are we waiting for?” Cranshaw demanded from the floor.
“I told you there wouldn’t be much to see,” Amanusa retorted, then regretted it. Those on the floor were watching, not participating. She did not owe them answers. Not until the spell was done.
She sat again in her chair. “Catch me if I fall,” she murmured to the Massileans behind her. One of them inclined his head in assent.
“We are waiting…” Amanusa offered her explanation to Vaillon, the nonmagician in the room. “Because it takes a little time for the magic to reach the bloodstream. I believe we are ready now. I will bring you and Dr. Rosato into the magic first, then we will inquire of M. Szabo, and then Inquisitor Kazaryk.” The Inquisitor was the mind she dreaded visiting most, so she would put him last. He’d killed his conscience long ago.
“If you will relax into your chairs?” she said. “You will probably be more comfortable if you close your eyes.”
Amanusa spread her feet a little more for stability, and settled firmly into her chair as she closed her own eyes. This was the moment of proof. More even than the spell binding the dead zone, this spell would demonstrate the power and the value of sorcery and her ability as a magician.
Justice magic was one of the foundations of sorcery, the magic that no other guild could perform. If she could not do this right, she did not deserve the name of sorceress. Moreover, if she did not do this right, she would lose everything in the world that mattered to her—both Jax and the magic. Therefore, she could not fail.
She took a deep breath, and her lips moved without sound as she invoked Blood of my blood.
Chapter 27
Amanusa reached first to touch Jax pacing in the lobby and worrying. She couldn’t speak to him, could only touch and hold him somehow, and assure him she was well.
She let him go reluctantly and followed the fresh magic into Vaillon. Without much magic of his own, he might need more help from her and more time to adjust to the spell.
She checked his mental shields. Vaillon had a right to his privacy while they went rummaging through Kazaryk and Szabo. They were strong. He had a decent magic sense, though somewhat thready, and his years as a policeman had helped build solid shields. Without blood magic, no one would know what Vaillon thought if he didn’t want them to.
The captain’s shielding secure, Amanusa gently opened his inner vision, adding to it until he ought to be able to see whatever she did, then she… glued it to her own. Or perhaps she put her vision over his like a pair of spectacles.
Amanusa reached for her blood, her magic inside Dr. Rosato. His shields were pristine, his mind bright with curiosity. He felt warm and—green—when she showed him how to open his inner vision. When both men seemed comfortable to her inside the magic, she reached for the magic inside Kazaryk, then it was time to ride Szabo’s blood.
Dr. Rosato exclaimed as they rushed into Szabo’s bloodstream and halted near his heart. It pounded furiously, clearly demonstrating his anxiety. She invoked her own blood in its role as innocent, as victim of Szabo’s heartless leadership. She opened her memories and Szabo’s and let them see the past.
Vaillon actually snarled as the brutal deaths of Amanusa’s mother and her little brother flowed past. Szabo’s guilt and regret registered. So did his joking about “breaking eggs to make an omelet.” Then Amanusa unveiled her own pain, her “deflowering” at the hands of the entire outlaw gang, and the years with Mihai, while Szabo looked the other way, telling her when she wept that she would get used to it. She let them feel everything she had experienced, made them experience it with her. Her bargain, allowing her to live apart from the camp and Szabo’s determination to bring her back, unfolded for them.
Then Szabo threw up a shield. Or he tried. Amanusa’s magic shattered it with a thought. Nothing would be hidden. Memory bloomed, and the watchers saw Szabo meeting with Teo while in the background, Amanusa worked over Costel’s wounds.
“We need her here at the camp,” Szabo growled. “This having to go and fetch her is no good. I have had enough of her defiance.”
“I could make her stay,” Teo said, his voice dark as he watched her in the ho
spital shelter.
Szabo gave Teo a wary look. “Without her striking back at us? We can’t afford another episode like the last one.”
“When I break a woman, she stays broken. She won’t dare do anything but what I tell her.”
“She still needs to be able to heal my men. It’ll do us no good to have her in camp if she’s too damaged to work.”
“I won’t break her wits.” Teo’s grin made Szabo shudder. “Only her will.”
“Her pet idiot might object.”
“Then he’s a dead man. He might be a dead man anyway. Depends on if I can train him to serve you and me as well as he serves her. Or if he annoys me enough.”
Szabo stared at the flames of the campfire a long moment. The watchers could hear him thinking. The revolution truly did need a healer. It was Amanusa’s own stubborn defiance bringing this upon her. It wasn’t like she was an innocent virgin, anyway. She was older now, not a child. It wouldn’t be so bad this time. Besides, they needed her. The cause demanded it.
“I’ll take a party down to the river to trade tomorrow,” Szabo said. “Wait ‘til I’m gone.” That way he could deny knowing anything about Teo’s plans. And he wouldn’t have to hear the screams.
In a flash, Amanusa shared the events of that morning, the working of the justice magic, and the crimes committed by the men who died, not only against her and her family, but against other innocents. They saw Szabo’s outrage when he returned to the decimated camp, and his awareness of just which men had died, and which ones remained alive. And they saw him plotting with Kazaryk for revenge against her for destroying his cause.
Then she followed her blood into Kazaryk, bringing the others along. Shields barred her way, better-built shielding than Szabo had attempted to throw up. But her blood was inside the man. He could not keep her out because she had already breached his deepest barrier.
The Inquisitor’s mind was a darker place than Szabo’s, full of self-righteousness, self-importance, and self-interest. Whatever Kazaryk wanted was right and virtuous. Whatever got in the way of that was wrong and wicked. He was zealous in the performance of his duties because that way led to promotion, and the greater possibility for power and for enrichment.
Finding a witch powerful enough to kill so many men at once would garner promotion, possibly over the heads of several of his rivals. If torturing one crack-brained Englishman would get him this witch—or any other profitable information—then the Englishman deserved torture. Anyone who thwarted his goal by snatching the man out of his grip committed a crime. And anyone who thought to make him suffer for anything he had done deserved to die.
“I have seen enough,” Rosato announced as Amanusa brought them up from the depths of Kazaryk’s sludge pit mind. “And if this is an example of the standard operation of the Hungarian Inquisition, I believe the conclave should investigate.”
“Are you satisfied with the investigation, Herr Vaillon?” Gathmann drew near the dais to ask.
“Oui.” The Frenchman came to attention, seated in his chair. Amanusa thought he might still be a bit disoriented.
“Then, I break this spell and release the witnesses.” Amanusa let go of the magic, murmuring the words that would send each man back into his own mind.
Gathmann mounted the dais again. “What is your report, Wizard Rosato?”
The Italian drew himself slowly to his feet. “If I were to tell you the horrors I witnessed, horrors suffered by this innocent woman when she was a mere child, you would weep in sympathy. Terrible crimes were committed against her with the willing collaboration of these men. And she received no justice.”
Rosato flung his hand toward her accusers on the stage, and Amanusa noticed tears flowing down Szabo’s face, crumpled in remorse. Kazaryk stared straight ahead, expressionless, almost as if his mind was not at home in his body. Quickly, Amanusa checked the magic. Her blood still flowed through him, but the magic was quiescent, as it should be.
“The men who died committed torture, rape, and murder,” Rosato was saying. “They deserved their punishment. It was justice, delivered at the impartial hands of magic.”
“You lie!” The shout came from the traditionalist side of the chamber.
Rosato drew himself up in outrage. “Do you dare to insult my honor? Do you wish me to describe in detail every crime? Every blow? Do you wish me to describe the faces of the men who forced themselves on an innocent girl of fourteen? On a little boy, eight years old? Do you truly wish to fill your ears with such degradation, as I have just filled my mind?”
“Lies,” someone else cried half-heartedly.
“No,” Szabo whispered, shaking his head back and forth, back and forth. “No.”
He lifted his head, still shaking it. “It is true, all of it. I did not watch it. I could not bear to watch it, but I heard their screams and I did nothing to stop it. I heard the men joking afterward, and I joked with them.”
He broke into loud, broken sobs. “God forgive me, I joked with them.”
“And what happened to the men who died was justice, was it not?” Rosato demanded.
“Yes,” Szabo sobbed. “Yes.”
“What about the assault against the Inquisitor?” Cranshaw demanded. “What about that?”
“Self-defense,” Rosato said. “Signora Greyson’s fiance, now her husband, was illegally arrested and tortured by the Inquisition for being a foreigner in an unexpected place, and having had a spell worked upon him. Signora Greyson used the innocent blood of her fiance to free him. A magician is permitted to use magic to prevent harm to oneself or others. Signore Greyson still bears marks from this ill treatment. Self-defense.”
“The government of France concurs with this report,” Vaillon said. “No crimes were committed by this woman. But if this man, this Inquisitor, were in my police force, I would have him in irons for corruption and abuse of power.”
“The conclave has oversight of enforcement of conclave law governing magicians,” Gathmann said. “Two reliable witnesses have charged Inquisitor Kazaryk with crimes. These charges will be investigated.”
The Austrian and Hungarian councils immediately protested, arguing that the conclave had no jurisdiction to investigate events inside Hungary. Amanusa feared the session would disintegrate into political wrangling without resolving her situation.
Harry climbed the first few steps of the dais to shout, “I propose that all accusations against Madame Greyson be dismissed as unfounded.”
Archaios started the huzzahs. It was some time after Gathmann climbed onto the dais to beat his gavel on the podium, but it was not until the battered podium was carried back to the center of the platform, that the chamber began to quiet. It took considerably more time before the vote could be determined, because each side tried to shout the other down.
Finally Gathmann and the governors declared that Amanusa was free to go. She had done nothing wrong. She sagged back into her chair in sudden relief. It was over.
The chamber erupted in a violent uproar as those on Amanusa’s side celebrated, and those on the other attacked. Vaillon leaped to the floor to take command of his policemen in the lobby. The Massileans around the dais swept up everyone on it and hustled them into the maze of offices behind the chamber.
When they reached the safety of the governor’s meeting room, the governors noticed that Amanusa and Szabo had both been spirited away along with themselves.
“What about this man? What is to be done with him?” Gathmann asked, looking to Amanusa more than the governors. “He is no magician, so we have no role in his fate. We could turn him over to the Austrian authorities…” He watched Amanusa now, without any pretense that he consulted anyone else.
“You cannot say that you’ve done nothing wrong,” Amanusa said to her old nemesis. “When you look the other way and do nothing to stop what you know is a crime, you have that crime on your own hands. Especially when you conspire with someone and encourage him to do it. You are guilty of everything done by the me
n under your leadership.”
Szabo groaned and curled into a smaller ball.
Amanusa sighed. “Let him go. His revolution has been destroyed by his own blind eye. He will never forget what he has done, or be free of the guilt that chokes him—at least until he finds some way to make amends for what he has done. It may be impossible. I do not know yet if I am capable of forgiveness myself. Perhaps someday. But until someone forgives—” She felt the visceral click of a spell locking into place. “He will find no peace.”
With a jerk of his head, Gathmann signaled to the Massilean guard captain who hauled Szabo to his feet and propelled him out the door.
“What will you do now, madame?” Gathmann still watched Amanusa with an intensity that felt a bit predatory.
“Find my husband.” Her smile flickered. “I am sure he has the news of my vindication already, but I am also sure he won’t truly believe it until he sees me.” It wouldn’t seem real to her either, until she found Jax.
She sighed. “And then, depending on what you gentlemen decide about my master magician’s status, I suppose I will go lay claim to the sorcerer’s tower I have inherited in Scotland, and begin taking apprentices.”
“Conclave law states that a magician must take apprentices—”
“Whatever likely candidates the national councils send me—or any woman who asks—I’ll be happy to test for her affinity to sorcery and her talent for magic. If she passes the test, and has a good heart, I will teach her, whatever her status in society.”
“A good heart?” The Egyptian governor frowned. “What does that have to do with—”
“Everything. Magic without morality, without heart, is too dangerous.” She summoned up a smile. “Now. If you gentlemen will excuse me?”
Gathmann signaled for the Massileans to provide her an escort, though the noise from the chamber seemed to be dying down. The Massilean leading the way opened a door onto chaos filling the lobby. Magicians shouted at each other, occasionally degenerating into shoving matches, but no further due to the swift intervention of Massileans or Vaillon’s policemen.
