A Witch's Feast (7 page)

Oswald gaped. Clearly he hadn’t expected Thomas to change his plans.

The Theurgeon picked up Thomas’s watch, one eye bulging as he inspected the silver. “As you know, there is no cure for the Black Death. Though it is treatable.” He gave them a tight-lipped smile. “Is it you who have caught it?”

Oswald crossed his arms, leaning forward. “If ye hasn’t the cure, then how’s it none of ye pearly-caps gets the tokens?” William had been training him in the dialect of the literate classes, but to use it in front of the Theurgeon would betray his illegal education.

Asmodeus’s mouth twitched. “We maintain our health through proper hygiene.”
 

Oswald snorted.
 

“It’s not for me,” said Thomas. “There’s a little boy and girl outside. Both have the plague.”

Asmodeus closed his eyes and nodded. A stream of light brightened the room, and the Theurgeon’s eyes snapped open. “Mmmm. Terrible times. May the gods lift us from our dark abyss.” He stroked Thomas’s silver watch. “I do have a foxglove tincture for you—charmed with a particular Angelic spell that I find most effective for the plague. It will keep the symptoms at bay for a few weeks.” He furrowed his brow in something like sympathy. “Of course, they’ll need another dose at that point.”
 

Oswald snorted again. He muttered something that might have been
quacksalver
—an old world for “charlatan.”

Asmodeus ignored him. “Jedediah!” He snapped his fingers without turning his head. “Fetch the potion for the plague. And check the door. I thought I saw it swing open.”

 
Thomas’s temples throbbed. He was possibly making one of the stupidest decisions of his life. “Will one bottle be enough for two children?”

Asmodeus nodded again. “Split the dose between them.”
 

A servant in a simple black uniform shuffled to one of the shelves lining the wall, scratching at his sparse beard. He muttered to himself as he scanned the rows of glass vials and jars.
 

Asmodeus crossed his legs, folding pale fingers over his knees. “There are those who think we should give these things away for free, but of course then we’d have no money to make new potions. I may know the secrets to making gold, but our laws state that we may only create gold for the King. The rest of the nobility must turn a profit. Or we would all be in a dark abyss.” He slipped Thomas’s watch into a pocket in his gown.

Oswald’s sigh was deep and guttural, nearly a growl, and Thomas’s shoulders tensed.
We need to get out of here before Oswald shoves that wizard cap up his dark abyss.
 

Asmodeus scowled at the servant. “What is taking so long? The purple one! On the shelves by the door!” He clucked. “Honestly. Sometimes it’s irritating to work with Tatters, even if they’re cheap.” He raised his eyebrows innocently at Oswald. “No offense, of course.”

The front door swung open, and Thomas saw someone run out—someone the size of a child, gripping a purple potion.

 
Asmodeus jumped to his feet. “Guards! She stole a tincture!” He toppled his chair, scrambling to the door. His robes billowed behind him as he dashed across the hall, a black wand in his hand. One of the Viking-looking fellows sprinted behind him, while the other remained, scowling while he readied his pike to guard the dais.
 

Oswald stood, rubbing his hands. “It seems someone believes this medicine should be free,” he whispered.
 

Thomas rose, and the servant brought over another glass jar of violet liquid, handing it to Thomas with a low bow before gesturing to the door. Clearly, he wanted Thomas and Oswald to leave.

“Thank you.”
Thomas gripped the small vial, sealed at the top with a cork.
 

They crossed to the exit, and Thomas rolled the bottle around in his hands.
Was that Chloris, the little girl?

Oswald yanked open the front door. The morning sun dazzled Thomas’s eyes, but when they refocused, his heart stopped.
 

Asmodeus’s wand pointed to Chloris, who stood immobile in the center of the square. A stream of light bound her wrists together. She screamed, still clutching the potion in her hand. Next to her, her brother Ayland sobbed, tears streaking through the dirt on his face.
 

“What do you think you’re doing?” Asmodeus shrieked at Chloris.

“My broder ha’ the token.” Her voice quavered, and her whole body shook on the square’s flagstones.

“And you thought you’d help yourself.” Asmodeus snatched the tincture out of her hand, still shackling her with his wand’s light. The little girl must have been listening in when Asmodeus had described the bottle. “Guard! You know the penalty for thievery.”
 

Oswald took a ragged breath, running a hand over his open mouth. All the color had drained from his face.
 

Thomas stared in horror as the guard lifted the girl, dragging her toward the fountain. “What’s going to happen to her?”

Oswald’s whole body had gone rigid. “They’ll cut off her hands and fill the fountain with her blood as a warning to others.” His voice was toneless. “They could do it painlessly, but that wouldn’t make it as good of a warning.”

A punch to the stomach would have hurt less. “We can’t let this happen.”

Oswald eyed him. “We don’t have a choice. We have no weapons, and there are hundreds of guards in the fortress.”

Thomas sized up the guard, who lumbered toward the fountain—the girl in one arm, his pike in another.
 

Chloris sobbed. “Run, Ayland!”

The guard shoved her hands over the side of the fountain, and Asmodeus followed, still aiming his wand at her wrists. She was pinned in place, her whole body trembling. The guard pulled something out of is belt—a knife. Thomas wanted to scream. His mind raced. He’d seen too much blood here already.
My chance to atone.
He shoved the potion into the deep pocket in his woolen shirt. “You should get out of here.”

“What?” Oswald barked, but Thomas was already running across the square.

The guard pivoted just as Thomas approached, and Thomas landed a hard punch in the ribs
before the man could ready himself. The guard stumbled back, stunned. His pike clanked against the cobbles. Thomas darted for the weapon, and he held the pike’s shaft in his hand. But as he stood, a thick, muscled arm gripped his neck, choking him from behind. He dropped the pike. He couldn’t breathe.

I have about seven seconds before he squeezes the life out of me. 
His lungs were going to burst. 
Six… five… four… 
He’d learned how to get out of this hold in his mixed martial arts training. He just had to remember it. 
Three. 

Leverage. It was about leverage. He pulled hard on the guard’s arm. 
Two. 
He bent lower, squeezing his head out of the man’s grip, giving him just enough time to kick the guard behind his knee. The man doubled over. Now free, Thomas slammed him in the back of his head with his elbow. 

He rushed toward the pike again, yanking it from the ground. Clutching the cool metal, he pointed it at the bearded guard, who rubbed the back of his head while he glared at Thomas. 
With any luck, he won’t realize that I have no idea what to do with this.
 The guard roared, and the sound sent a shudder down Thomas’s spine. 
Still, I have the pike.

Peripherally, he could see that Oswald had joined the fray, wrestling Asmodeus for the wand. In the confusion, the Theurgeon had lost his control over Chloris. She started to run. “Chloris!” Thomas yelled. She turned to look at him as he reached into his shirt pocket. “Split this with your brother!” He tossed her the potion.

“Traitors!” The guard roared. “They attack the King’s Guard!”

 
Grunting, Asmodeus struggled to utter a spell through as he grappled with Oswald. Thomas sidestepped toward them, keeping his eye on the guard at all times. The guard continued to shout for help, and Thomas’s pulse raced at the thought of an oncoming force of guards.
We need to get out of here—fast.
 

He stepped toward the Theurgeon, who still grappled with Oswald. When he was close enough, he slammed his elbow into the back of Asmodeus’s head. Asmodeus slumped on the ground, his jaw slack.

“Thanks.” Oswald stuffed the wand into his pocket and held out his hand. “Give me that. I can use it.”

Thomas handed him the pike, glancing around the square for the two children.
They must have made it out.
 

At the sound of clanking metal, his mouth went dry. Dozens of guards poured out of Throcknell Fortress’s portcullis. They chanted a spell in unison, a deep and resonant sound that bounced off the stone surrounding them. “We need to run.”
 

They broke into an all-out sprint, Oswald chanting a spell of his own. A few times he turned, slashing the pike through the air at the guards. Blue light streamed from it, repelling some of the oncoming force. Whatever spell the King’s Guard were using, Oswald seemed to be able to deflect it.
 

The pair of fugitives disappeared into a narrow alley, heading south to the Shore Muck Canal. Oswald dashed forward, taking the lead.
 

A grin crept over Thomas’s face. “I think we lost them. I think—”

Before he could finish, a sharp pain screamed through his head.

A wall of humidity and an oppressive scent of gardenias hit Fiona as she and Mariana stepped onto a gravel path that ran between the hedges.

The bright spring sun dazzled her eyes. She glanced at the bound marble woman as they passed, the mouth open in stony agony. After crossing through the gardens, they turned right toward the large willow.
 

As they approached, Munroe waved at them, and a few others trickled in—Sadie and her friend Connor among them. Tobias leaned against a magnolia tree, his hands jammed into his pockets. Fiona glanced over at his profile—the straight nose and high cheekbones. He stared at the river, his face as still as the garden’s statue. She stopped by his side, glancing over at his squared shoulders and stiffened spine. There was almost a hint of menace in his unnatural stillness.

 
Munroe’s auburn hair cascaded over a bright yellow sundress. “Okay, I think that’s all of us.”

Great clumps of Spanish moss from the enormous willow dangled into the river, their filaments rotting in the gently flowing water. Fiona waved a fly away as she looked into the red-rimmed eyes of some of her classmates. The past week had turned them all into mourners.
 

Next to her, Tobias’s still gaze had shifted to Munroe, whose face beamed as she continued her monologue: “…and that’s when my ancestor decided to build this plantation, soon after they founded Jamestown. Thanks to the Sanguine Brotherhood, some of the colonists survived the Indian massacres. They helped make the country what it is today, and created freedom so that we no longer had to live under tyranny.”

Fiona craned her head to the left. On the other side of the gardens, tobacco fields stretched out for miles. “After they created freedom, where did they keep their slaves?”
 

Munroe frowned. “I don’t know. I think by the fields.” She swatted a mosquito. “It was legal back then,” she added, before anyone could object. “They were treated better here than in other places. It’s not like you see in the movies. And my grandmother says they were better off…” Her sentence trailed off. She looked around at her classmates, then at the willow roots, tapping her fingers on her thighs. “Anyway, let’s not dwell on that. There’s a lot more important stuff to see here.” Munroe walked off, Tobias close behind.
 

Alan gave Fiona a horrified look. “Did she say
better off?
What is wrong with these people?”
 

“Several centuries of entitlement,” said Mariana.

Alan pulled a half-eaten Rice Krispie treat from his pocket and began gnawing on it.
 

Fiona eyed his snack. “You still have Rice Krispie treats? I’m starving. The kale pulp didn’t do it for me.”

“This is part of my training diet. I can’t spare any, or I risk sacrificing some of this.” He raised an arm, flexing his bicep.
 

“That would be devastating,” said Mariana. “I’m not sure the world can handle another tragedy of that magnitude.”

“I don’t want to disappoint the ladies.” He finished the last bite. “And that’s why I can’t share with Fiona. Because I care.”

“Right, your training diet,” said Fiona. “Like Mountain Dew and vodka were part of your training diet last year.”

He shrugged. “My level of nutritional knowledge is too complex for you to understand. Just accept it.”

For a moment, everything felt normal, until she caught a glimpse of Tobias’s broad shoulders up ahead. Something
was
different about him. His black T-shirt hugged his muscled torso, and there was an almost feline grace in the way he stalked through the wildflowers. She couldn’t shake the feeling that he had some sort of plan, and she wanted to know what it was. As they walked over the gravel paths, she caught his eye only for a brief moment. Something feral and otherworldly glinted in his eyes, and for a moment, the primal part of her mind whispered
Run.