Chapter Twelve
~
“That’s funny,” Morgan said with no smile. “A dandy like yarself protectin’ me. I believe I can protect my young friend as well.”
The ram’s head of Morgan’s staff, which leaned against the wall next to the door, glowed brightly for a moment. It may have even vibrated against the planks. My skin crawled from the energy that moved up and down my back. It was the worst I’d felt it yet.
“Stop it!”
Both Morgan and Selene jerked to look my way.
Somethin’ broke the moment, the majicin’, and I took a deep breath in relief.
“You expecting to learn how to manage it with the ogre’s help?” Selene asked.
“It?”
“You know what I mean. I sensed you had it before you ever came in sight. May even be stronger in you than the ogre. Though he may have simply learned to control it out of dumb luck.”
“Don’t talk about me as though I’m not here.” Morgan growled.
Selene turned back to him. “Have you ever been trained?”
Morgan remained deathly still, except for his fists, which clenched and relaxed the tiniest bit.
“This past spring the majic you unleashed rattled the council.”
“Council?”
“They don’t like surprises. The untrained, those with power that can be felt hundreds of miles away, are a danger to all of us. A crazy witch here or there we ignore. But the ethereal surged as though a pair of high wizards battled. Is it true it was all your doing?”
Morgan stood still. How could the ogre know if what this council felt came from him?
“Speak to me,” the man said.
“What are ya?” I asked, breakin’ a bit of the tension in the cabin.
Selene took a dramatic breath. “A wizard lad. One of very few. The council ensures that. Too many and their authority could be usurped, and worse, diluted.”
Diluted? Usurped? Speak Standish.
I glanced back at Morgan, who didn’t press Selene with any more questions. He kept his hands busy on the counter now. Perhaps his disinterest rose from the man ignorin’ his question about that council.
“What’s this council?” I asked for him.
“Exactly what it implies. It rules over all wizards—whether they wish it or not.”
“But Morgan’s a warlock, right?” I asked.
“Warlocks are as benign as witches. Like them, they impress the gentiles with an occasional pre-sight.”
Gentiles?
“The good ones,” Selene continued, “can set a thought into a weak human’s mind. Little more—of concern. What we sensed in the ethereal didn’t derive from any warlock.”
I turned a smile to Morgan but the ogre didn’t appear happy to hear any of this. I worked to clear the emotion from my face. “What’s wrong?”
Morgan’s chest vibrated, not in the ogre-chuckle fashion. The rumble sounded threatenin’, directed at an enemy. “He said his council doesn’t like to share the wealth.”
Selene broke the tense mood with a sharp laugh. “Never considered it that way. I’ve always seen it as cullin’ the herd. How I was taught.”
Morgan reached out and his staff flew through the air into his grasp. Selene lunged sideways to get away from the staff’s path, just as I lurched in shock.
“Let yar council try to cull this ogre!”
The ram’s head glowed sun-bright. Orange spikes shot from it. I blinked away the discomfort of the glare.
“Nice performance,” Selene said after a moment. “But you haven’t seen anything like what the wizards who come after you will unleash.”
“Why are ya here?” Morgan shouted.
“Officially, to assess the danger you represent. But I think the council has already made up its collective mind. They each sensed the same thing I did.”
Morgan glared. “But!”
Selene smiled. “If in some miraculous manner you represent no danger, controlled some specific, meaningless grasp of the ethereal, accommodations could be made. Perhaps I could even provoke one of us to—you may find this ironic—take you on as an apprentice.”
Morgan’s grip on the staff relaxed. “But?” Odd, that didn’t anger him even more.
“That you have your own apprentice inextricably complicates things.”
In-ex-tra— “Why?” I asked, ignorin’ the word that meant nothin’ to me. It was enough to guess it wasn’t a good thin’.
Selene faced me, his expression turning sad. “The common mindset is there are already too many wizards within the fold.”
“Then ya might as well go,” Morgan said. “Tell them what ya’ve seen. Tell them I’ll be waitin’ for them.”
Selene shook his head slowly. “Don’t be so quick to discourage my partnership.”
“Why, because ya’re all I have?” Morgan asked.
“Not only that, but you have a dependent soul relying on you. Are you so willing to discard what help I can lend him?”
Morgan’s face reddened, but not in embarrassment. His eyes narrowed in a hateful glare. No one spoke for a long moment. Morgan dropped his hand, but the staff remained vertical.
Selene grinned. “Have you named it?”
“What?”
“Your staff, ogre, what else would I be talking about?”
Morgan growled again. Ogres must enjoy growlin’. Second nature, like winkin’ is for Miss Gladys. “Bacchus.”
“Ah. Interesting name, choice, for an ogre.”
Morgan shook his head slowly, his eyes hintin’ at a seethin’ anger. Warmth spread across my chest as I remembered my outburst in the dinin’ room. Beasts. Morgan was indeed different, perhaps brusque. Stronger than any human. But not a beast.
“I’ve found ogres are well read,” I said.
Selene peered at me, his grin broadenin’.
“I’m gonna brew tea,” Morgan said, whirlin’ toward the hearth. Bacchus, the staff, found its way back to the wall behind us as though it had a mind of its own.
Perhaps it does. Intriguin’ thought. Love that word. Intriguin’. Never had an excuse to use it before.
I found my mouth hung open after Bacchus leaned again-lifeless in its place next to the door. I met Selene’s glance. He no longer wore a smirk. He pulled his modest pack off and dug inside it, withdrawin’ a package wrapped in cheesecloth. As he walked to the table he selected a strip of dried meat. Selene sat, rippin’ off a length with his teeth, and motioned for me to join him.
Watchin’ the man suckin’ on the end of the jerky made me instantly hungry. My mind raced to the treats Louisa packed for me. I hurried to retrieve my own backpack off the porch. Returnin’, I sat on the overly tall chair, feet propped on the cross support of the chair’s legs as Selene did. Selene watched with interest as I untied the string around my package. I hid the smile that longed to escape.
“How long have you been on the road?” I asked.
“Ten days,” Selene answered. “You wouldn’t believe how bad some inn food is.”
“You’ll enjoy the food at the Black Lake Inn. Mmm. Good cookin’.”
Selene smiled faintly and nodded.
“I thought ya said yar home wasn’t that far away?”
“Started from north of there, and have been wandering around in these woods for a couple days.”
With no night fur, he musta got pretty cold. I laid out Louisa’s fare, opened the lid of a crock containin’ strawberry jam, but stopped, scrunchin’ up my lips.
“What’s wrong, lad?”
“My knife was recently, uh, misplaced.”
Selene reached to his waist and withdrew a huntin’ knife with a ten-inch blade, turned it and handed it to me hilt first. “A little overkill for jam, but it’ll get the job done.”
I sliced open a biscuit and slathered it with jam, gorged on the treat, followed by a second. I wiped the blade on the paper Louisa packed my lunch with, and held it out to Selene.
“Keep it. Every man needs a blade.”
Morgan strode by us carryin’ a bucket. I caught him roll his eyes, but I turned my attention quickly back to the knife. Sucked in my breath, studyin’ the craftsmanship of the tool greedily. “No. I can’t accept this.”
“Of course you can. Besides, I have another just like it at home, and one to use in the meantime.”
He pulled out a narrow one from his other hip, opposite where he wore his sword, which he had removed and laid on the floor before sittin’. No huntin’ knife this one, unless ya were huntin’ for a man’s lung. Six inches long. Not a stiletto exactly, but it was definitely for thrustin’, bulky hilt, double-edged blade.
“I, I—”
“Just say thank you,” Selene said.
I studied the man’s eyes for a moment. They didn’t shift away. “Then, thank ya.”
“You’re welcome. So how did you come to be in the warlock’s company?”
Morgan, returnin’ with a sloshin’ bucket, harrumphed.
“Originally, he came to our cabin to help my mama.” I gestured toward Morgan.
“Why did your— Ahh. The plague?”
I nodded, but turned my eyes to my lunch to avoid the emotion that always wishes to gush out when I think of Mama. I took a deep breath and got the story of Mama’s death and Papa’s departure out of the way quickly.
Selene remained quiet for a respectful time after I finished. I cut open a small wheel of goat cheese, which crumbled. I left it where it fell on the raw planks, motioned to Selene to help himself.
“Tell me about the cities, in the North?”
Selene chose a large chunk of cheese and leaned back. “Hectic pace, the city. Too much noise. Too many people. Wagons everywhere. Warehouses, factories belching smoke, boardwalks, street-side cafes and bordellos, fancy carriages flying by endangering everyone. Gas lights becoming popular. I say they’re dangerous, laying pipes everywhere.”
“What’s a bordello?”
Selene closed his eyes, munchin’ on the cheese as though it was the best he’d ever eaten. Decent enough, I didn’t think it tasted that special. The man rose and joined Morgan at the counter, and snagged a gourd of fresh water. He swallowed heartily, but jolted when a call rose from outside.
“Hail, those in the cabin.”
Bacchus was in Morgan’s hand in a flash and Selene held his sword. I stared. Never saw man or bull move. How did Selene retrieve the blade from the floor?
Morgan and Selene strode for the door. It might have been comical another time as the two jockeyed to get out the door first. The human wasn’t about to out-muscle the massive ogre. I was happy to be a slow third.
A man stood fifteen feet from the tree line. Two others held back in the shadows. The nearer man donned clothes eerily similar to Selene’s, but wore a full beard, clipped short. The other two men did as well.
“Selene,” the newcomer said in greetin’.
“What are you doing here, Blake?”
This Blake was busy studyin’ me and Morgan. His eyes twitched back and forth as though he made an important choice.
“A child and an ogre? Which?” Blake asked.
I had already figgered these three weren’t gonna be friends, but callin’ me a child hastened my distaste for this Blake.
“I was given two weeks,” Selene said.
“That was ten days ago.”
“Two weeks to assess,” Selene hissed. “Not two weeks from the moment the council decided.”
“That’s how you interpret the council’s decision. You shouldn’t be talking about—”
“He has the right to know, if we may be putting him down.”
“I’m not a beast to be put down,” Morgan growled, stampin’ Bacchus.
I winced from the jolt in the middle of my back.
Selene shot out his hand and hissed, “Not now, ogre.”
But Morgan strode toward Blake, who took a step backward. I caught a grin slip out on Selene’s face for a fraction of a second.
“Morgan,” Selene snapped. “Now is not the time.”
“I like settin’ the time of my battles,” Morgan said, continuin’ to stride toward Blake.
The two other men stepped nearer. But Selene waved his arm and Morgan’s bare foot slowed mid-step, hung in the air. His free arm swirled as though he was tryin’ to catch his balance. He leaned back, withdrawin’ that oddly hangin’ foot. He pressed his hand out. It jolted to a stop.
“What is this?” Morgan shouted.
Blake laughed.
Morgan drew back Bacchus and swung it at the— I have no idea what to call whatever held the ogre back. The staff soundlessly bounded back at Morgan.
“Your wizard doesn’t know what a ward is?” Blake asked. “That is not good. For him.”
Morgan turned and glared at Selene. “Did you do that?”
Selene wafted his left hand in a who-else manner.
“Take it down,” Morgan hissed.
“Yes. Take it down,” Blake said. “Let’s get this over with.”
“I have two weeks.”
Blake grinned. “We’ll give you those four days remaining, no more. We tire of sleeping in these cold hills.”
“The council won’t take kindly to—”
“But by then your ogre will be dead, won’t he?” Blake said. “So the argument will get you nowhere. They know we followed you. Think any of them will be surprised we took care of their little problem? As though they ever wanted to be involved.”
Selene shook his head. “I don’t understand what motivates you. This ogre is nothing to you.”
“Ah. But you argued against us, in front of the council. You insist on making enemies instead of allies. That’s enough reason to oppose you, Selene. You’ve erred too often. Two apprentices gone bad, you’re lucky to be alive yourself.”
“You’ve always been jealous of my rapport with Lord Ollimon. You’re pathetic.”
The expressions of Blake and his two comrades turned from smirks to obvious hate.
“You would be dead,” Blake shouted, “if you weren’t his pet.”
“It’s eating you up, you know that, don’t you?” Selene said. “The hate will eventually destroy you.”
“Your naiveté makes you dangerous, Selene.”
Ni-eve— These folk refuse to speak Standish.
“I have no desire to be on the council.”
Blake forced a mirthless laugh. “You’ll join the council over my dead body.”
“Sounds like the two of ya should get yar own battle over with,” Morgan muttered.
Selene threw an angry glance at Morgan, perhaps a warnin’ to stay out of the discussion. With his attention divided, Blake motioned with his hand. The energy—I don’t know what else to call the tinglin’ in my spine—changed. Had Blake removed the—ward?
“Why don’t we do that?” Blake said, drawin’ his sword.
“Blake!” the man’s two comrades shouted at the same time.
One stepped forward and leaned close to Blake, holdin’ a hand in front of his mouth as he spoke softly. Blake’s expression turned from maniacal to simple anger. Whatever the companion said must have restored the wizard’s sanity, but the words weren’t appreciated. Was it tied to this Ollimon person?
Morgan took two steps forward and the two humans stopped their jawin’. Blake jerked his attention toward the ogre. What was the man up to? A mixture of fear and curiosity swelled inside me. Found myself steppin’ forward to stand beside Morgan, though I had no idea why—some kind of—message of support?
“Back, lad,” Morgan hissed.
I stood fast. Behind us, Selene groaned, a frustrated sound.
“Another step, ogre,” Blake said, “and you’ll give me an excuse to slice your heart out.”
“I’ll have split yar skull open long before yar scrawny arm could reach me, human.”
A laugh exploded from my throat. Heat plunged across my body. The laugh may have been inappropriate, but Morgan’s statement continued to rain-funny. I couldn’t wipe away the stupid grin I knew painted my face.
Blake’s companion said, “Your two friends are bold, and arrogant, Selene. You haven’t a prayer with them. Why don’t you walk away now? Go home. Let us take care of this.”
Selene remained quiet.
I wanted to turn around and look at the man. What was he thinkin’? Prolly that the man’s suggestion made sense. Perhaps laughin’ at the wizard wasn’t my best decision today. Well, Papa had told me once durin’ a particularly talkative afternoon in the field, “If ya’re in a corner, your only path is forward.”
I strode toward Blake, cockin’ my fists. The world somersaulted around me and a jolt vibrated through my back. Found himself lyin’ on the ground, scannin’ the sky. I recalled a hand, a monstrously strong hand, claspin’ down on my shoulder a moment before everythin’ went crazy, otherwise I would have believed Blake struck me with some kind of majic.
The three humans were laughin’. Selene groaned again.
I peered directly up at Morgan. Upside down, an ogre’s snout and tusks appear even stranger, more frightenin’. The split white and black of his dreadlocks swingin’ nearly to his waist left the sensation of a willow swayin’ in the wind.
Silence returned, along with it the tension. I rolled over and stood quickly, moved behind Morgan. I considered kickin’ the ogre in the shins, but the embarrassment of bein’ so easily put in my place stole any boldness that existed moments earlier. Besides, the pain of the ogre’s grip on my shoulder was sinkin’ in. I’d have a good bruise. Five of them.
Blake’s companion backed toward the third man. Was the standoff over?
Blake pointed a finger at Selene. “When we come back, don’t get in our way.” He turned, joined his friends, and they disappeared into the gloom of the forest.
“Ahhhhh,” Selene hissed a ten-count later.
I turned to look at him. The man pressed his hands into the sides of his head, eyes closed. A dozen scenarios of what Selene could be thinkin’ ran through my mind. My threatenin’ motion probably wasn’t overly bright. Could it have gotten me killed? A new wave of heat passed over me.
Morgan walked away. There wasn’t a sunny expression on his stony face.
“I’m sorry,” I called after him.
The ogre shook his head, before disappearin’ into the dark of the cabin.
“Lad,” Selene said. He stood starin’ at me a moment, before he too shook his head, turned, and followed Morgan.
“Okay, so I was stupid.” Even though a grin crept onto my face, it had been incredibly dumb to challenge a man holdin’ a sword in his hand. A wizard, no less.
~
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