Chapter 22
Previously: The Rose of Whitby – Chapter 21
Darcy is back on her feet and charges into the bushes where their attackers are hiding. So, straight through the wards, of course. Arthur’s heart skips a painful beat, because now she’s outside, unprotected.
Though there’s a shout, and a mighty rustling and crackling of branches, and snarling, and then a choked, gurgling sound, and the blood that arcs up over the leaves looks black in the light of the spell circles. So maybe Darcy doesn’t need the protection of the wards that much.
But with the blood, more spots of corruption bloom on the wards. And Arthur doesn’t know whether it’s because they were close to the spell circle, maybe some sprayed into it, he can’t see well enough, but it’s death magic that’s attacking the wards.
So he yells: “Don’t kill them! It’s feeding the spell, don’t kill them!”
Darcy rises up from behind the bushes, her hair matted on one side and dark stains around her chin. She looks in his direction. Arthur can’t make out her expression well, but he thinks she’s scowling at him.
But then there’s the crack of a gunshot, and a man shouts something in a language Arthur doesn’t understand. Darcy whirls, and snarls, and turns into a wolf and jumps back into the bushes. More shots ring through the night, and the sound of those crossbows, and shouts and feet stomping through grass and brush.
There are more men there, Arthur realizes. The darkness hid them, but now two are dragging a cage into the spell light, a crude thing of wooden slats. Inside is a doe, and as they pull up the door, it steps out. Its movements are wooden and jerky, like a marionette, as it walks into the circle where the stag was. The magic floods on it like a swarm of tiny, purple fireflies.
The owl and the fox are gone, too, and the men bring another cage, a smaller one, but heavy, by how low they keep it. Again, the animal inside shuffles out like it’s being controlled. This one is low to the ground, compact, but the light shines bright on the white stripes of its face- a badger.
There are enough spots of corruption in the wards now that Arthur can see they form a pattern- a circle at about chest height of a man, growing denser and denser.
He doesn’t want those animals to die, too. He wants to do something before it’s too late, but what?
Darcy is clearly too busy fighting off their attackers to get to them- and Arthur has no idea what would happen if she charged into one of the circles, but he doubts it would be anything good.
He looks around, and that’s when he realizes Dr Seward is gone.
He hadn’t heard him leave, and for a moment he looks around the dark grass behind the bush in a panic, thinking that maybe he got shot and Arthur didn’t notice or something.
But no, there’s no body, no trace of him.
Well, Arthur decides, he has enough to worry about, Dr Seward will have to take care of himself.
Gregory is rising from the grass, tearing the last of the singed ropes off of himself with a roar. Another set lashes at him, but now that Arthur knows what they are, he doesn’t hesitate to hit them with the biggest fireball he can before they can fully entangle Gregory again.
It works, and Gregory lunges forward, to where they came from… there’s a scream, and cracking sounds, and meaty tearing sounds, and more spots swarming in the wards. Gregory roars again, and the only thing Arthur can hear in the sound is rage.
He has to do something.
He has to do something now, before the wards collapse and they get overrun.
Before it’s too late for the animals in the circles. While he was distracted, the men must’ve filled the third circle again- there’s a crow now where the owl was.
He thinks Darcy is leading the men beyond the circle in a chase or something- there’s still a lot of stomping and rustling and shouting.
Above it all, a woman’s voice coos: “Oooh, who’s a pretty wolfie? I want the pretty wolfie!”
The crow’s feathers are being eaten, and the fur of the badger and the doe.
Gregory leaps, a huge, striped shadow, a gun fires desperately, and the corruption in the wards fuses. A dark hole appears, free of soap bubble glow, free of bruised corruption glow- a hole in the wards, the size of Arthur’s thumb, Arthur’s fist, Arthur’s spread hand- spots merging into a sickly ring eating away at the soap bubble.
Through the hole, Arthur can see the apprentice’s face. His teeth are bared in a grin- effort or triumph, Arthur can’t tell. His eyes are narrow, malicious slits.
He’s the lynchpin. He’s holding the ritual together.
And Arthur doesn’t know what’ll happen, Gregory and Darcy are near there, what if the death magic runs out of control and hurts them… or worse? But he has to end this, now, while the animals still have a chance and while the hole is still small and…
It’s a new spell. He isn’t sure why he even learned it, but things have been scary and… just in case, he thought.
And he can’t cast through the wards, but there’s a hole in the wards.
And it’s not like the spell takes up room. It’s not like the spell is a physical object, travelling through space.
All Arthur needs is to see his target- his victim. And no wards in his way.
Maybe he should’ve learned a different spell, one that just knocks people out. But any he found were really short range, and difficult, and apparently ‘only’ knocking people out can kill them, too.
Turns out, it’s a lot easier to kill people than to just stop them.
Well. There’s no time, and no other way he can think of.
Arthur takes a deep breath, aligns his thoughts, visualizes his spell pattern- clear, clean, flawless.
He sends his magic through.
~~~~
The light is far brighter than he expected, a jagged, searing, blue-white bolt that rips through the night, engulfs the apprentice. It’s soundless, and that feels wrong- there should be a crackle, or a boom, but there’s nothing but the flare of light and the jagged shadows it casts, the shapes of men and animals in a frozen black-and-white tableau for just a moment.
Spots dance in Arthur’s vision, and there’s a big, black blob where the apprentice was. Everything seems dim and dull after, but he does see the light of the circles go out like candles extinguished by a strong wind.
The hole in the wards surges, yawns wide as a barn door for a moment- then the glow of the corruption goes out, and the edges reverse, race back together.
“You can go on with the killing now!” Arthur yells- these men know too much, have seen too much. They’re working for the Shiver, and they torture animals.
Arthur knows he doesn’t like the killing, but he also knows that it’s the rational choice, the safest choice.
Personally, he wants to go heal the animals, which still seem frozen in place despite the circles having gone out- but they’re on the other side of the wards. And his father could be out there.
Maybe if he just sticks his hand through the wards? He could at least reach the doe…
With the spell light gone, even if his vision wasn’t still recovering (the next time he casts this, he needs to remember to close his eyes right away), he can’t really make out what’s happening beyond the wards. There’s a lot of noise, shouting and grunting and stomping and snarling and growling and choking and tearing and whimpering- which he takes to mean Darcy and Gregory are doing as he yelled.
He takes a deep breath- he wants to do something good, something helpful with his magic- he knows it doesn’t change that he killed someone, but… those animals definitely didn’t hurt anyone, were just going about their business. And he doesn’t know how much damage the magic did, he doesn’t want them to run off when whatever holds them wears off and die from their wounds in the forest.
So he takes a deep breath, ducks low, and hurries across the stretch of grass towards the wards and the doe in the circle. Surely everyone is too busy being mauled by a wolf and a demon to pay attention to him.
He reaches the wards safely- there’s only some tall grass here, the next bushes a yard away to either side, so he just crouches low, right at the edge, squints into the dark- but he can’t really see anything much. Everything is dark shadows in the darkness. The hole in the wards has disappeared, and they’re fading from sight, taking the weird murkiness of everything with them.
The world looks normal again, and the only light comes from the stars above, blocked by intermittent clouds. That leaves Arthur with a vague, silver-grey shimmer for illumination.
It’s enough to see the shadow of the doe, but no details.
Squatting out of anyone’s line of fire, he hopes, he reaches through the wards- his hand passes through with no resistance, no tingle, no sign of magic. It must’ve passed right over the circle, too, because the next thing he knows, his fingers are encountering damp, smooth-rough fur over bones- damp with blood or sweat, he doesn’t know. But he can feel a captured tremble in the leg of the doe, her body heat, he can smell her musky scent.
He feels exposed, with no cover and his arm unshielded by the wards, but he forces himself to settle, to ignore everything around him and concentrate, concentrate on nothing but the feeling of his magic he’s gotten to know over the last few weeks, the sense of it moving- ephemeral, so he’d tell himself he was only imagining it if he didn’t have the results to look at when he succeeds. He forms it into the patterns of the healing spell, his favourite spell, the one he enjoys casting the most, and pours it into the doe. He can’t sense her injuries as such, but he can feel their presence, like a cup he can pour the magic into. After a few moments, he can feel the cup is full, and the spell collapses as there’s nothing more for it to do.
The doe is still standing frozen and shivering, but whatever the magic did to her, she should now be alright. Arthur gives her leg a gentle little pat, and then faces the question of whether to cross the wards to heal the badger and the crow.
He can’t reach them from where he is, and he wants to help them- and they’re smaller, they might have gotten worse damage, they might be dying right now.
It’s not far, and it’s dark, and everyone’s busy fighting, and yes- they’re small, surely it can’t take long to heal them.
So, he takes a deep breath… and scoots out of the wards. There’s a clump of bracken and other plants he can’t make out in the darkness next to the badger’s circle, and he crouches in it, hopes it’ll disguise his silhouette should anyone come by.
He reaches out, touches the badger’s coarse fur, and concentrates- yes, this will only take a moment.
A moment too long, because a light flares in the darkness, pale and ghostly and only a few yards away from him, across the badger’s circle and a bit of trampled grass. Arthur freezes, the healing spell collapsing as his concentration is ripped away from his target. His fingertips are still resting on the badger’s fur, and they suddenly feel very pale and visible and exposed.