Sing a Graveyard Song, page 9
part #3 of Enclave Book Series
No, Leute relished, the babe isn’t interested in milk. He wants blood, the blood that gives Harroth life. Verel senses the nourishment that feeds his placental twin, and he wants it.
Magretha wet her finger and put it in his mouth. He sucked at it weakly and gnawed her flesh with his gums. He sucked some more before he loosed it, turned his head, and resumed the feeble crying. “He’ll suck, at least. But a babe not interested in milk? I never heard of that.” She prodded his hollow belly, looking for unusual bumps.
“Has he got a blockage?”
“No. No, I don’t know what’s wrong. Everything feels fine.” She examined each of the limbs, the tiny hands and feet, the opening mouth. Then she turned him over and searched gentle fingers down his back. Finally, she wrapped the blanket around his shivering body and gathered him up. “Maybe it is your milk. Are you all right? No fever? No soreness?”
“I was doing work in a couple of days. I’d get more done if I wasn’t keeping Verel at my breast, trying to get something in him.” She took him from the younger woman and cuddled him close, rubbing her cheek against his downy head. “The other four didn’t have this problem, Magretha. Took right to the nipple. The only problem they gave me was weaning them.”
“Have you tried him with anything else?”
“I pumped some of my milk into a glove. He didn’t like that. My mama said it might be too rich for him, so we diluted it. He took that for a few days, and we got our hopes up. He was such a greedy little pig. But then he went back to pushing it away and throwing it up. So we boiled and diluted some cow’s milk. He didn’t keep that down at all. Spit it right out. I wish Feldie was here. She would know what to do. Not even Leute knows.”
Leute met Magretha’s eyes gravely and knew she had to contribute something. “It’s a right trial to watch him nurse. He sucks a little then cries and sucks and cries. And then he spews it out. He’s hungry, you can see that, but the milk ain’t nourishing him.”
“He started out so strong,” Grisetta whispered, “but now he’s back to his birthing size. What can we do?”
“You can try goat’s milk. Feldie told me once that it would work. And I’ll search again for her journal, to see if she’s treated the like before.”
Leute stood aside to let them pass, talking of other ways to get nourishment into the babe. She knew nothing would help. As the babe weakened, Harroth strengthened, fed by the blood it craved. Even if by some chance they managed to get milk into Verel, any nourishment he took, Harroth would absorb through the strands of sorcery that connected them. That connection would be severed only when one of them died.
And the baby would die before Harroth. He would live until he killed the five people she had spelled into him. So far, he’d succeeded in killing only one. She had her vengeance on Feldie, for rejecting Leute as her apprentice. Odbear and Ruod and Karel and whoever else he’d killed didn’t matter. Anyone who died so Harroth could sustain his spell-linked life didn’t matter. Not until the five people who hurt her had died.
Four remained. Magretha, for replacing her as Feldie’s favored apprentice. Chanoine, for marrying Olva instead of her. Stupid Père Hals, for counseling forgiveness when she burned with anger. And Jaeger, to round out the number. Jaeger, to prove her power. She needed no wizard title and no elusive Fae to increase her power. She would keep Harroth alive until all five died, and if others were hurt, what of that? She would have her vengeance, and Alpage would look to her as wise woman.
. ~ . ~ . ~ .
Early Evening of the Eighteenth Day
Puzzling over Grisetta’s babe, Magretha returned home. Kortie, distracted by her care of Evangel, had offered no solutions that the mother and Leute had not already tried. Her father’s hammer rang out in the later afternoon chill. Thereiss sang in her kitchen. As she passed through the yard between the house and the smithy, she heard people talking in the garden. Raul’s voice she quickly identified. The other was a woman she didn’t recognize. Alstera? Curious, she crept up the long shadow cast by the arch and stood beside the sun-warmed wall.
“Aye, well,” Raul said, “doesn’t matter what you think, does it? Leastways, you never gave me cause. And I am interested in her. Believe me, I am.”
“She is bound to this village. She is their wise woman. Did you not just tell me this? Don’t play with Magretha. You’re a rover, Raul.”
“You ever thought I might have been forced onto the road? That it became my life, but it wasn’t what I wanted? Magretha says I can make a life here. She wants me to.”
Magretha caught her breath, wondering how Alstera would react. Last night the woman had said that she and Raul were only friends. If she stayed quiet and listened, she might discover if Alstera had lied. She might also discover why they’d come to Alpage.
“She wants you to stay? After one day?” The woman’s shock echoed Raul’s reaction. “How randy have you been? If you’ve bedded her and she’s demanding marriage—.”
“It ain’t that way,” he protested. “I’ve scarce touched her. I ain’t even kissed her.”
“Strange and stranger. She does not even know you. She has no idea what you are.”
“She doesn’t seem to think that’s necessary. She said the old wise woman here told her she’d know the man when she saw him, and she’s said that’s me.”
“She had a lot of faith in the woman, then. I would not, but I’m better acquainted with you. Does the poor girl know you’ve never stuck to one place, let alone one woman?”
“She knows. I told her.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Don’t know. It bum-flummoxed me,” and the remnants of surprise gave timbre to his voice. “You know, Alstera, nobody’s ever asked me to stay. Especially no woman.”
“Out of all the legions, Raul? I find that hard to believe.”
“`Struth. They wanted a tumble or two, nothing more. No staying, no setting up house.”
“Because you made it clear you were moving on.”
“Maybe. Maybe not one of them cared for me, just for the brief escape I gave them.”
“You should stay away from her.” Magretha couldn’t tell if jealousy or something else edged Alstera’s voice. “I like the girl. She is honest and open. She does not deserve to mend the tatters of her life after you tear through it.”
He laughed. She shivered at its reckless sound. “I gotta do something while we’re here.”
“Then pick someone else. Not Magretha. She is the daughter of the headman, Raul. He could have both of us in chains if you hurt her.”
“Who would you suggest? Yourself?”
“I do not backtrack roads I have already walked. You kept the cold and loneliness at bay, and you stayed charming when it was over. For that I thank you, but not again. No, Raul,” she snapped, and Magretha wished she could see, wished she knew what he had done to make Alstera slash out with that refusal.
“Fine, then.” He didn’t sound subdued, and she marveled at his good humor. Alstera had said he was easy tempered; now she believed it. “I’ll get kisses from Magretha.”
“Leave her alone.”
“You want to protect her, you open up to me again.”
“No,” she slashed. “Or would I be protecting you from her?”
“Damn, you got a sharp tongue on you.”
“It’s truth if it hurts.” She sounded like a cat that had dipped its whiskers into cream. “One day, and she’s got you snared. You do want me to protect you from her.”
“How long do we stay here?”
“Long enough to find out why this village is plagued with death.”
“Jaeger said it was a catamount.”
“And Père Hals showed me the man killed the night before we arrived. It was murder, Raul, not a catamount. Foul murder, that uses blood-magic.” Magretha heard Raul mutter but couldn’t distinguish the words. The other woman retorted, “This is why we came. I told you that. I gave you the choice.”
“Your wizard’s choice.”
“I hid nothing from you. Before we turned off, you knew I was tracking sorcery. You knew, Raul. You did not have to come. You could have stayed with Mossley Stringer.”
Magretha retreated carefully. She backed into the yard, hesitated a moment then hurried to the forge. Jaeger looked up at her entrance. Something in her face alerted him, for he hooked his hammer on the anvil and dipped the plow blade he’d been shaping into the bucket. The hot iron sizzled in the water, sending steam into the forge-warmed air.
“Papa, that woman’s a wizard.”
“Alstera?” He looked up. Carefully, he set the long tongs and the newly made plow blade on his workbench. Then he wiped his hands on a rag. “Where did you hear that? Père Hals wouldn’t have told you.”
“I heard Raul say she was. You knew this?”
Jaeger propped his iron-blackened hands on his hips. He glanced through the open window. “I heard her talking with Père Hals. She went for a blessing this morn, and he—. That’s neither here nor there. This Raul, did he just come out with it? In front of you?”
“I overheard them arguing. She said she came here to track sorcery.”
“Tell me exactly what they said.”
Magretha repeated it in a rush, holding back their conversation about her. When she finished, he didn’t respond. His gaze focused outside the window. She pressed, “Papa, she knows what’s going on. If she’s got power, if she knows how to fight the Walking Death—.”
“Can we ask that of her? She owes no village right. Feldie claimed village-kin when she came here. This Alstera’s got no ties to us.”
“But if she can fight it—. With Feldie gone, I can’t do it, not alone. Alstera can help. She tracked sorcery to here, Papa. She must have come to fight it.”
“Unless she came to use it, Magretha.”
“I-I hadn’t thought of that.”
“Think on it. I have. It explains why she’s here.” His gaze returned to the window.
Magretha looked to see what claimed his attention. Framed by the window, Alstera stood under the garden arch, looking toward the forge. She shrank back from the woman’s crystal-clear eyes. “Did she hear us?”
Jaeger untied his leather apron. “If she says nothing at supper, we’ll know she didn’t.”
“Are you leaving it there?”
“What else can I do?” he ground. Then he shoved his fingers through his sweat-damp hair. “Nay, daughter, I won’t leave it there. Say naught of what you overheard. Say naught of power at all. We’ll find out how much we can trust this wizard by how much she tells us.”
Chapter 8 ~ Eighteenth Night / Seventeenth Night / Winter’s End
During supper, Jaeger stayed quiet, watching their visitors. Raul focused solely on Magretha. He teased her, and she retorted, their sallies creating a laughing hour. Thereiss watched them, laughed with them, occasionally inserted a comment.
Jaeger watched Alstera. How much of a wizard was she? Witch he’d be happy to call her, for all day he’d not gotten out of his head the way she’d looked last night. Thereiss was his wife, but he kept seeing Alstera, hair down, crystal-clear eyes slumbrous, the quilted doublet discarded to reveal her womanly shape. Witched him she had, with naught but that, and the simmer in his blood gave him another reason to mistrust her.
As supper ended, Thereiss went early to bed. Magretha began to clean up the kitchen, and Alstera joined her. When she reached for the bowls on the table, her sleeves shortened, and Jagger saw the tattoos circling her wrists. Sigils of the elements. Glimmering with magic. Power-filled ink. And the remnant spark of attraction died.
In his world, obvious ink spelled trouble. While some cities branded or mutilated for lesser crimes, hanging for the greater ones, other cities used tattoos. Those were usually on the hand or the neck, harder to hide. Slavers marked property with tattoos, band after band on the forearm. Nefarious guilds like the assassins inked their signs where they could be hidden while others used obvious tattoos to cast out members. Alstera’s tattoos looked like shackles. What kind of guild inked signs of imprisonment? Dangerous religious sects inked members before they sent them back into the world. Just what kind of wizard is she? Secret guild. Zealous fanatic. Escaped prisoner. Or some other danger that would destroy Alpage.
The glimpse he’d had looked like weirdly intricate links of the elemental sigils. Tattoed manacles. He wanted to grab her arm and study the ink.
Again he recalled last night again, her hair loose, those compelling eyes half-lidded, her arm bare as it lifted to push back the mass of her hair. The tattoo around her wrist, glittering like a bracelet. Her arm crisscrossed with scars, old and new, and one still raw and scabbed.
Alstera had caught his look. She dropped the bowls and tugged down her cuffs to hide the tattoos. She didn’t scowl or stare him down, just gathered up the bowls and spoons and bread plate, but she reached more carefully. The marks must shame her. He doubted she would share the story behind those tattoos and her scarred arms. Not until they reached to a mutual trust. They were days from that, and the monster loosed on Alpage wouldn’t give them days.
He got to his feet and reached for his coat. “Going to see Père Hals. I never got a chance after they came down the mountain.”
“You’ll be careful, Papa?”
“Aye, daughter, that I will.” He took his wheel-lock musket from over the mantel and checked the flint and powder. “Don’t wait up.”
As he reached the door, Alstera said quickly, “Do you think you can defend yourself against that catamount with only a musket?”
In her clear eyes was the knowledge that no natural beast was responsible for the attacks. “I’ve done it before,” he gritted and slammed both doors as he clumped out.
Stars glittered in the clear sky. Wind wailed on the heights, heralding a freeze by dawn. He saw nothing moving as he slogged his way to the chapel. Light peeked through cracks in the shutters at the back where the priest liked his austere life in a common room and a much smaller private room.
Père Hals opened his door, a brown roll in his hand. Calmly chewing, he raised an eyebrow to question this late visit.
“Sorry to interrupt your dinner, Father, but I need some answers.”
The elderly priest waved him inside. “Have you eaten? Would you like some cider? Baudoin gave me a small cask from his stock.”
He eased down at the table and cast his eyes over Hals’ meager meal. Bread and broth and a stoup of cider. “Nothing, thanks. I’ve had supper.”
“Ah, the thought of Thereiss’ cooking makes my mouth water.” The priest sat with his back to the hearth’s heat and picked up his bowl. He dipped a bite of bread into the thick broth. “How did your morning hunt go?”
“Found nothing. No tracks, no trace. Didn’t expect to, with two days of snowmelt. That’s not what I came here for.” He opened his coat then bent forward, propping his elbows on his knees. “I want to know what that outland woman told you this morning.”
Père Hals shook his head. “I will not tell you, son. I cannot, and you should not ask it.”
“Did she confess and receive penance?”
“No, for she didn’t repent. That is a crucial element of penance, Jaeger, to have regret for committed sins, to wish them undone. She does not wish her sins undone. She even seemed proud of one of them.”
“So, what she told you ain’t under the seal of confession. What did she say?” He waved a hand to cut off Hals’ refusal. “What did she say about being a wizard?”
He tore a bite from the brown roll. “I do not think she would have told me had I not sensed it. The gods have blessed our need by sending us a strong wizard. Even at my poor age I can sense her power as I never sensed Feldie’s or Magretha’s or anyone else’s here.”
“Why did she visit you?”
“She wanted a cleansing for a crime, one that she claimed good reason for.”
“Can we trust her?”
“Ah, now we come to the reason for your visit.” The barest smile softened his priest’s white-bearded face. “Jaeger, you must not forget, wizards have motives far different from yours or mine or any mere mortal. Motives that drive them into actions we may not understand.”
He looked up, his gaze narrowed and keen. “So whatever crime she committed, the crime she wanted you to absolve, we wouldn’t understand it.”
“I didn’t say that, my son. I understand her explanation quite well. Yet it was only partly an explanation, partly an excuse, and not the whole of her reasons.”
“So, she came to confession, but she didn’t bare her soul to you.”
“We did not complete the rite. I would not, when she did not regret her transgression. Do not judge so harshly. She is neither first nor last to sin in the pursuit of a greater good.”
“The first and the last aren’t coming here where we’ve got three people murdered and two others missing.” He bent forward, planting his elbows on his knees. He studied a whorled knot in the planked floor. “She’s a mystery we don’t need. Not just her power and not just her past. What are those tattoos she’s got around her wrists? Has she bound herself to some cult?”
“Saw them, did you? I’ve noticed she tries to keep them covered. I wouldn’t have seen them myself if she hadn’t raised her hands for confession.”
“What are they?”
Before answering, Hals chewed his sopped bread and washed it down. “Signs of her penance. Sigils for the five tenets of wizardry. Binding her, I believe.”
“Binding her how?”
“Binding her power. She said naught, but I know enough of wizards to know the reason for them. She committed crimes against wizardry, not people. Those magicked sigils are her sentence. You know the five elements, Jaeger. You work with three of them in the smithy, earth and fire and water. Add air, and you have the four base elements of most power. Add chaos, the fifth and mostly forgotten, the one we call the empty vessel—for it waits to be filled—and you deal with great power.”
“And her power is bound by these tattoos?” Shackles, indeed.
