Witch Bane (24 page)

“
I should have known I would find my
daughter entrenched amidst the enemy,” the White Witch said, her
tone as fiery as the flames that flickered at her
fingers.

Elizabeth took a step back, her own magic
coming to life in her hands.

“
Did you think I wouldn’t recognize a
mobile camouflage ward when I came across it, Elizabeth? I taught
you the damn spell, woman, though I must admit I’d never imagined
hiding an army beneath it.” She laughed, turning her gaze to
Emerald. “And you, child…I’d wondered why you ran away, but now I
see what’s become of you. It’s a boy in your belly, I imagine,
otherwise you’d have not given up the soft life of Corilea during
such a difficult time.”

“
You’ll not have my son!” Emerald
glared at her mother. She reached down and touched the core of her
power, keeping it at bay, but readying it nevertheless. She would
not let her mother take her child from her, not even if it meant
both of their lives. The dagger Victor had given her was in her
bag, and out of easy reach, so her magic was all she had. She
backed away slow, hoping to reach the dagger with the resistance
man who stood a few yards away.

“
Stay where you stand, Emerald,” her
mother commanded. “You’ll be returning with me. Your flight has
ended and you will pay the consequences for your defiance, but I’ve
another witch to deal with first.”

The Red Guard oozed forward, the forest all
around erupting with soldiers and naked steel. Elizabeth looked
about as she, too, crept backward toward the mass of her people.
Emerald could see the fear in her eyes and all the hopes of the
woman conquering the Council fell to dust at the sight. She was a
coward, playing at queen among the peasants too foolish to know any
better.

Emerald hung her head, knowing there was but
one choice to be made. Without Victor here to rescue her, she must
stand for herself. She touched the power inside just as Elizabeth
drew alongside her. She couldn’t bring herself to look at the
woman, her disappointment and disgust a knot that caught in her
throat and diverted her eyes.

A moment after the resistance witch
moved past, Emerald wished she
had
spared a glance.

Elizabeth stepped up behind her and wrapped
her arm about Emerald’s throat, her other hand reaching around and
hovering just above her round belly, the flames close enough to
sting the skin through the thin cloth of her tunic.

“
Let me pass, Deborah, or I will burn
the life from your daughter,” Elizabeth called out. Emerald gasped,
unable to wrench free of the woman’s grasp.

The White Witch snarled and waved to the
soldiers, halting them. “You go too far, witch. Release my child
and let us settle this, you and I, once and for all.”

Elizabeth shook her head. “I go free or I
end the line of Altus, here and now, both mother and babe in womb.”
She inched her hand closer to Emerald’s stomach. “The choice is
yours, Deborah.”

Twenty-Eight

The Green Witch willing to meet his advance,
Sebastian realized the charge was a mistake. He veered off behind a
cluttered strand of trees, hoping to confuse her with his sudden
redirection. She only moved to the side to keep him in view,
cleaving through the air before him with a scythe of fire. He
backpedaled to avoid the flames and darted back the way he’d come.
To his dismay, she was ready for that, as well.

Another burst of magical energy ripped past
him, and he barely managed to throw up his shield to deflect it.
Though his wounds were mostly healed, the pain gone, he had yet to
truly rest since his fight with the Red Witch. He could feel his
weariness weighing upon his power, making it sluggish in his veins.
As slow as it came to bear, she would tear through his defenses
were she to strike a direct blow. Of that he was certain.

The curse of the warlock, sacrificing
control for power, would soon be the cause of his death. He had
burned himself out, willing his magic beyond its limits, and now,
it had failed him.

Sebastian feinted left and darted right,
trying to close the distance before the witch could target him
again. His magical defenses uncertain, he fell back on his martial
training. Though the move bought him a few heartbeats of time, she
lined him up once more. Her finger trailed his path toward her. He
ran, staying low, doing his best to throw her aim off. The feeling
of stones in his stomach told him he didn’t think he did enough.
Flames erupted from her hand.

The thrumming
twang
of a crossbow made his heart leap. His
father had joined them, at last.

The witch spun to face the sound, her gout
of fire whipping around with her. The bolt grazed her hip. Blood
sprayed and she was flung about, the strike amplifying the momentum
of her spin. The branches above caught fire as she fell to her
back, and the flames died at her hands as she rolled to get back to
her feet.

Sebastian was beside her before she
could.

Without hesitation, he thrust his sword at
her face. The witch jerked her head away, six inches of his sword
sinking into her chest, just below the collarbone. The Green Witch
screeched and bucked as the blade sheathed inside her flesh. She
whipped her body sideways to tear the sword loose, and crumpled to
the ground as soon as it ripped free. Her back to him, Sebastian
lifted his blade to finish her off.

His father’s cry stopped him mid-swing.

He looked up to see Darius stumbling
forward, a red waterfall spilling from his shoulder, down over his
chest. His crossbow slipped from his fingers, his arm limp at his
side.

Sebastian ran toward him as a massive shape
stepped out of the woods behind his father. He recognized the Lord
of the Hunt instantly. Darius stumbled forward a step, then
another, and fell face first with a grunt. The Lord stepped over
top of him, a crooked smile shining behind his beard.

Sebastian shouted as the Lord raised
his great, double-bladed axe. The man met Sebastian’s eyes as the
blade dropped to land with a meaty
thunk
in Darius’ back.

His father screamed, his voice shrill for
just an instant, and then gone, drowning in a bubbled gush of blood
that spilled from his mouth. His head fell limply to the ground,
bouncing slightly on the humus before settling.

Sebastian stumbled to his knees, his legs
suddenly weak. He stared up at the Lord, who casually withdrew the
axe from Darius’ back, flinging the blood from its blade with a
flick of his wrist.

“
Now, Darius and I are even. Perhaps
he was right about me, after all.”

Twenty-Nine

Fury washed over Sebastian, and he felt his
strength return in its wake. He jumped to his feet.

“
I will kill you,” he shouted at the
Lord.

Victor shrugged, holding his axe out. “I’ve
no quarrel with you, boy. Walk away.”

Sebastian came forward, unable to
rationalize such a request. “You struck my father from behind after
all he did to protect the mother of your child, and you expect me
to stand down?”

“
So, you know, do you?” The Lord
chuckled. “No matter. That child will be your future king, the hero
who saves the untied realm of Mynistiria from the scourge of the
witches.”

“
You won’t be alive to see that day.”
Sebastian drew forward, slashing at the Lord’s head.

Victor parried the blow with ease and
stepped away from Darius’ body, a broad smile on his face. “We both
want the same thing, boy: a world free of the witches’ rule. I did
only what I was compelled to do, nothing more. We do not need to be
enemies, you and I.”

“
Liar!” Sebastian lashed out, whipping
his sword at Victor in furious arcs. “We can be nothing
else.”

The Lord of the Hunt blocked each blow in
turn, circling off to force Sebastian to reset, but doing nothing
more. His reluctance to engage only deepened Sebastian’s anger.

“
My father told me you were not to be
trusted. I only wish I had known that when we first met. I would
have slain you then and rid the world of your
treachery.”

“
Just like now, you would have failed,
boy.” The Lord parried again as Sebastian darted toward him. He
shoved Sebastian away and settled back into his defensive posture.
“Your father knew his time would come, which is why he trained you
as he did. He didn’t just raise you to avenge your mother, but to
take revenge for his own death.” He pointed to the Green Witch, who
had gotten to her knees to crawl toward the cover of the trees.
“
She
ordered your father
killed. I am but the vessel she used, against my own will, if not
my interest, boy; the sigils in my flesh a compulsion I cannot
deny. If you would punish someone for his death, let it be the one
who commanded it. Kill the witch and have your revenge.”

Sebastian growled low in his throat. His
father had told him of the tattoos, which bound the Lord’s will to
the witches, but he had no doubt Victor was less a pawn than he
pretended. The man had fathered a child with Emerald, under the
very roof of the White Witch, and had sent the girl off to the
resistance for his own purposes. The Lord’s existence was a
contradiction, but Sebastian understood only one thing. Victor had
killed his father. It had been his hand, his axe, which had done
the vile deed.

He looked to the Green Witch and saw how
slowly she moved, every inch a labor that looked ready to kill her.
The quicksilver boiled in her blood and would end her soon enough.
The shouts of the Red Guard off in the distance forest, he slowed
his pulse, willing his mind to focus as he had been taught. His
grip easy on his hilt, he looked back to the Lord.

“
There can be no peace between
us.”

He leapt to the attack.

Thirty

“
You’re in no position to threaten,
Elizabeth,” the White Witch told her. “Let my daughter go and I
will grant you a painless death.”

“
Like you did, Alise?” Elizabeth
countered, backing up slowly, pulling Emerald along.

The burning hand of magic searing the flesh
at her belly, Emerald squirmed to be away, swallowing hard at the
words she heard.

“
You know better than to lay that at
my door, witch.”

“
Deny all you will, Deborah, but the
truth will be known.” Elizabeth leaned in close to Emerald’s ear,
keeping her between the two witches. “Did you know your mother
killed the last woman to sit upon the throne, Emerald? Beloved
Alise, the former White Witch, struck down by her would-be
successor. All for the audacity of holding love above the selfish
desires of Deborah and her crones. Alise dared to put decency
before the blood of innocent children.” Elizabeth snarled. “Her
last decree from the throne, before she was brutally murdered, was
to outlaw the bleeding of warlocks for use in spells of longevity.
That order, the missive it was sealed in put to the flames, never
saw the light of day, though another miraculously did. You wouldn’t
know anything of that, would you, Deborah, the order forever
condemning warlocks in Alise’s name?”

“
Do not listen to her, child. She
lies.”

“
Do I? I believe General Darius and
Alise’s warlock son might attest to my honesty and Alise’s
intent.”

Emerald rolled her eyes to look at her
mother, unable to pierce the expressionless mask held rigid upon
her face. The Red Guard soldiers inched forward.

“
I swear, Deborah, keep your dogs at
bay or I will murder your daughter as coldly as you did
Alise.”

The White Witch held up her hand, the Red
Guard halting once more at her order. “You can twist reality all
you like, Elizabeth, but in the end, it matters not. Your lies will
die with you, and the world will be a better place without your
pitiful excuse for a rebellion.”

“
The resistance will live on, no
matter what occurs here. The people will not allow you to bleed
their children forever. They will rise up and bring the fight to
you.” She continued moving away in small steps.

Emerald glanced to her side to see the
resistance man who carried her bag. She caught his gaze.

Elizabeth stopped as she spied more of the
soldiers in the trees off to the side of them. “You doubt my word,
Deborah?” She set her hand against Emerald’s stomach, just long
enough for the material of the tunic to catch fire.

Emerald shrieked as her skin burned,
Elizabeth dousing the flames before they could do serious harm to
Emerald or her child.

“
I will kill her!”

Deborah growled at the witch, waving
the men in the trees back. “You test my patience
and
my love for my child. Lest you
forget, Elizabeth, she ran away, pregnant with an abomination. Do
you truly think I won’t make an example of her if you force my
hand?”

Elizabeth said nothing, but Emerald could
feel the fury in her as she trembled against her back. Emerald
looked once more to the resistance man who carried her bag. She
motioned with her eyes for him to open the bag, mouthing the words
so he might better understand her. He looked at her without
comprehension for a moment before glancing down at the bag as
though he’d forgotten he held it.

“
I will not stand here all day waiting
for your choice, Elizabeth. You and I will end this here,
regardless of your decision. What will it be?”

The man looked back to Emerald and she
pleaded with her eyes for him to open the bag. He did so with
reluctance, his gaze wandering back and forth between the witches
as they argued. At last, with no one seeming to pay attention to
him, he reached inside. Emerald nearly burst out crying. His eyes
went wide and darted to hers. She knew he had found the blade, but
likely believed she meant for him to use it.