Elisha Barber: Book One Of The Dark Apostle (18 page)

Again, Brigit cleared her throat, and Elisha opened his eyes to find her frowning at him. “Are you well, Barber?”

“Aye, I’m well enough,” he said, though he did not feel it, and she did not press him.

“Would you like me to write out your response?” She held out the letter, and it trembled slightly.

“That won’t be needed. Thanks.” He snatched the parchment and re-folded it with jerky movements.

“It’s no trouble,” she offered.

“Thanks, but no.”

“Please yourself.” Brigit walked a few steps to the river’s edge. After a moment, she slipped off her shoes and dipped in one toe. Glancing over her shoulder, she said, “In this whole valley, I love the river most.”

Narrowing his eyes, Elisha watched her step into the water, ripples forming around her bare ankles where she held up her skirt just a bit. Then a chill
struck through him as he watched; she was confronting him, challenging him to stand beside her, to reveal his knowledge of the words which flowed in the water. Was she speaking even now to those below?

She lost all trace of smile and said, “Come in, Barber, I swear it will not harm you.”

Slowly, Elisha tucked the letter into his pouch. What was the invitation she gave him? Could he accept that communion of the waters she shared with some strange and distant people? And yet, if she could help him, tell him about the Bone of Luz, how could he not? Carefully, he pulled off his boots and set them standing on the river bank. Then, his eyes upon her, he stepped into the rushing stream.

The cold whipped about his ankles, and he shivered, thinking not of water but of fire, of flames licking at his feet as they had devoured the angel so long ago.

“
Bittersweet,
” the water said, and Elisha twitched, glancing quickly to Brigit.

When she caught his gaze, she grinned, full and triumphant, and the words came again, though her lips did not move. “
I thought it was you, I thought it must be you—twice now, am I right? You’ve come down here, and heard voices.
”

Confused, Elisha looked around, then back to her. “Marigold?” he asked aloud, hearing the strange echo of his own voice somehow trapped in the water all around.

Shaking her head, Brigit gazed at him steadily.
“Do not speak, not aloud. You can hear me, can’t you? Let the water be your voice. Imagine you address me, and I will hear you.”

Intently, he focused on what he would say, and asked, “
How is this possible?”
forming the question at the back of his throat, biting his lip to still the words.

Brigit laughed aloud and spun a circle in the water, splashing his knees.

“
What is it? I don’t understand,
” he said.

“
How is this possible? How indeed
,” the river laughed. “
You speak as one of us, and yet we know you not. You are a magus, you must be! Why did she not say so?”

Confused, Elisha put out his hand to stop her dancing, but withdrew. “
I’m not a whatever-you-called-me. I’m just a barber. And who should have said?”

Stopping, with a hand pressed to her chest to still her eager laughter, Brigit let the water carry her words. “
A magus—a witch
.”

At this, Elisha held up his hands. “No,” he said into the air. “I am not. I’m a barber, nothing more.”

Taking a step nearer, Brigit pleaded with her eyes. “
How else could you speak through the water, or hear my words? You are, just as I am.
”

Shaking his head, Elisha felt the brush of his hair warmed in the sun and thought of flames. He backed away, and the stones slipped beneath his feet—treacherous footing indeed.

Brigit pursued him, putting out a delicate hand that hovered, but did not touch him. “
What is it you fear so much?
”

Elisha gained the bank, standing once again on solid ground.

“Is it what you saw?” She asked aloud, her voice in the air seeming smaller, more human. “When you were a child?”

“They burned her,” he replied, flinging himself to the ground to jerk on his boots. “She was an angel, I could see it, but they shot her full of arrows and set her afire.” He swallowed hard, his eyes seeing not the river now, but the flames. “She had eyes like yours, my lady, and I cannot see you without seeing her, and the blood, and the fire—” He broke off and pulled himself to his feet.

Brigit sprang to the bank and caught his wrist. As he spun to face her, to break her grip, she set her fingers on his cheek, just at the spot where he had once felt the brush of an angel’s wing.

A
fter a long moment,
Elisha let out the breath he had been holding, and the warm, soft fingers withdrew. “How did you know?”

“She was my mother,” Brigit murmured. “Come back to the water, I cannot speak of this in the air.” She beckoned with a turn of her wrist and retreated before his wondering gaze.

Slowly, he did as she asked, slipping off the boots again, afraid to take his eyes off of her. They walked along in the water, carrying their shoes, down to the bend Elisha had come to six nights ago, thick with willows. Here, out of sight, she smiled up at him, but he did not return it, his dismay still too great for him to grasp.

The river tugged at his ankles, saying,
“The woman you saw was my mother. In her final moments, she worked her greatest magic, transforming herself. If she could slip her bonds, she would escape through the air. If not
—” He saw the grief that turned Brigit’s lips, “
she would leave the vision of herself as an angel, not devilspawn as the priests would have you think, but a creature of the Lord, as all of us are
.”

“
She was beautiful
,” Elisha said in the water.

Again, Brigit smiled. “
I was only four, and a hundred miles away, hidden and safe.”

“
Then how could you know about the touch? I have told no one all the years of my life.”

“
My mother told me. She told us all
.”

Elisha shook his head.

“
You and I are speaking through the water. She spoke through the fire, even as it consumed her. Any of the magi can speak in water—it forms a contact between us, but few can speak in fire. We heard her—everyone. Father thought she meant to talk to me. Instead, she found you.
There was a rapture in her voice that I cannot describe
.” Brigit’s eyes focused in the distance. “
‘I have touched a child and seen the man
.’” The green eyes flickered to Elisha’s face.

His lips parted, Elisha tried to think of what to say, but there was nothing.

“
You came here after the death of your brother. My mother said, ‘He will be a man of healing, yet bring death in his hands
.’” She watched him closely.

In his hands? Elisha smiled grimly. Not in his hands but in his traveling chest, he had brought death indeed, beyond even the memory of his brother. At least Brigit need not know all. “
How could she say these things of me? I was a boy and still am no witch
.”

“
Oh, there is power in you, I think all of us can feel it. When I walked across the courtyard that day, I felt it when I neared you, even though I thought my mother had referred to someone else. Some of us believe that when we find this child my mother touched, he will be a leader—and we can finally be as free as other men. Finding him—finding you—is the last sign I need to bring our people together. I think my mother’s touch awakened something in you, something even you are not aware of.
”

“
There is nothing in me; I’m just a barber.
”

“
We’ll see about that.
” Her smile grew, along with a light in her eyes very like a flame. “
Let me teach you; let me show you the ways of the magi, and we will see
.”

“
Magi?
” His brows drew together, trying to recall what the Bible said of them.

“
Yes. Those kings at the Nativity. The wise men, some say. They were not merely wise, but magi— magic. Can’t you hear the very nature of the word? We are the magi. The ignorant term us witches, among many other names, but we are the wise ones, and you are one of us.
”

“
I don’t think so
.”

Brigit spread her hands to take in the river around them. “
How do you explain this conversation?”

“
Perhaps you have enchanted me.
” The words slipped into the water before he could withdraw them, and he gasped, turning away as he knew what he meant to say, and what she must surely hear.

Behind him, Brigit chuckled. “No,” she said aloud. “I have only recognized you.” Then, in the currents around him, “
Let me teach you, let me finish what my mother began.
”

“
But isn’t it dangerous? You say the devil has no part in this
—”

“
And never has. Some of us are born with a skill to sing, others to plan great battles, and others still with this power, to bring up the energy of the world around us and mold it to our will. Gifts from God
.”

Like his gift for healing, Elisha thought, for gift it seemed to be. “
And yet if we are discovered, we’re dead.
”

“
I live with that every day of my life
.”

“
Teaching me would be a greater risk to you
.”

“
A worthy risk
,” she answered, and he faced her.

Brigit stood in the river, her feet planted on the slippery stones, her shoulders back and hands raised as if to draw him nearer. Her shortened hair tossed in the breeze that shook the willow saplings, and her eyes shone. Then, flipping her hair to one side, she bent to the stream and lifted a small stone, holding it out to him.

When he took it in his hand, it wriggled and flashed, and a silvery fish leapt from his palm to splash back into its home, disappearing among the rocks it had once been a part of. “
How
?”

“
The principle of affinity: similar things have a sort of relationship. If you can define that relationship, you can cause them to act like, or even to become, one another. A slippery stone, a slippery fish. Let me teach you
.”

Suddenly, scores of tiny fish raced over his toes, and Elisha laughed. “
Yes, teach me.
”

Instantly, Brigit grew serious. “
We cannot meet often. As it is, I’m sure the physician is suspicious that we’ve been gone so long. But we can speak in the river, even when we are not near.”

“
How?”
he asked again. He was like a child, discovering the world all over again.

“
Magi can speak through living water—any river, stream, or brook—ponds, too, though that is not so effortless. You’ve heard us talking twice now. Water is a form of contact, one of the keys to using your power. The closer you are, the stronger the contact, unless the magus is especially sensitive. Of course, touching skin to skin is the closest.”
She shot him a glance that made him long for closer contact.
“All you need do is touch the water, and any others within reach of it can hear you. The more distant, the less likely they are to hear. Please, please, use only the herbal names when we talk. If one of us should be found out, he cannot reveal the others
.”

“
That’s why the others won’t meet with you
.”

Brigit stamped in the water, sending up a cascade of glittering drops that
turned to diamonds and back again. “
They fear too much. This power we have, why should we be so afraid of ordinary men?
”

“
Because they have arrows and torches,
” Elisha said, “
and there are many more of them than there are of you.
”

“
Of us, Bittersweet. Of us. But the magi will listen to me now—now that I have you.
” She stared at him.

Surely her own strength and magic, along with her mother’s legacy, were enough to make her a leader among her people. Why should anyone care if she summoned a barber to her side? Elisha could not imagine that his presence would influence even this battle, never mind changing the destiny of a people. Brigit was beautiful, driven, and, where he was concerned, quite mistaken. But her belief would keep her close, and he could not bring himself to discourage her closeness.

From the other side of the monastery, a horn blew into the morning light; the call to arms.

With a backward glance, Elisha stepped from the water and pulled on his boots. “I have to go, my lady. Thank you.”

“Come tonight,” she said. “There is so much for you to learn.”

He grinned and took his leave, making his way quickly to the courtyard. He pulled the gate on his ditch for a little while to replenish the water barrel, then entered through the kitchen. Tending a pot full of the latest hot oil solution, Benedict grunted at him. “I’ll apply this lot, Barber. I want to be sure it’s done right.”

Elated by his talk with Brigit—as much for herself, as for the magic—Elisha ignored the physician’s casual slight. “Of course, sir, by all means.”

“Probe the wounds and pull the shot—get them ready for me.”

“Aye, sir.” He popped a bow. Even Helena’s hurtful letter he put from his mind: soon enough, the magic might be to hand that he could use to redress the hurt he had done her.