Chapter Six #2
Even as he spoke, another bolt of magic struck the boat, punching it down into the water, and a moment later, several heads appeared above the top of the bank.
A blue bolt flew at the enemy. A glance at his own forces confirmed that one of the sisters had sent it, but it failed, slamming into the shimmer of a shield of power that popped into place in front of the five people who now stood on top of the bank.
His own off-duty fighters had changed direction to emerge on the off-side of the boat, and one of the sisters had dropped to one knee and was waving her hands over the water of the canal.
In the next moment, she leapt to her feet, saying something to her companions.
All of them leapt onto the water and ran across it as easily as if it was dry land.
The mage above them dropped his shield to send another bolt, this time aimed at the fighters who were now leaping onto the bank from the canal surface. Jasper hurled two bolts of his own. One deflected the enemy missile. The other smashed into a force shield hastily thrown up from the enemy side.
The enemy mage let out a shout. A single word, and not one Jasper knew.
Just like that, the fight was over. All the attackers, on both sides of the canal, disappeared.
Human translocation, and of normies as well as gifted.
The enemy, whoever they were, had sent a very powerful magic user.
Jasper and his companions had been fortunate that, today, Jasper’s own gift had behaved itself, for without that, they would have been in trouble.
They continued along the canal, with their guards on full alert. Once they were underway, Jasper, the guard captain, and Sister Louise met in the lounge to discuss what other precautions they could take.
“We have no more than twenty or thirty miles to go on the canal,” Jasper said, “and I can make sure a force from the castle meets us at Bugsworth Basin, but that still leaves us vulnerable for as many as three hours.”
Did he sound calm and in control? He hoped so, but it wasn’t true. Recently, whenever he used magic, a force seemed to build up inside him, like molten rock in a volcano, seeking a way to burst forth and destroy everything around him.
Today, he had used magic more prolifically than usual, and the pressure made it hard even to speak, much less concentrate.
Taking a drink or two, he had found, made it worse.
Spending time with people frayed his control until he was afraid he would lose it.
All he could do was retreat to a quiet room and try to sleep. So far, that recipe had worked.
But today, it was not possible, for Miss Nettleford needed him to keep her safe. He sent up a quick prayer that he could do so without hurting anybody.
“The mage in charge was Cymry,” said Sister Louise. “Or what I should say is that he gave the order to retreat in Cymraeg.”
The land called Wales by the English and Cymru by its own people had never sat easily under the rule of the English kings.
Since they tended to produce strong mages, parts of the country had never been defeated, and others had changed hands back and forth for generations.
English control was confined to the coasts, Angelsey, and a few heavily fortified mining towns.
Jasper thought about the implications of that one Welsh word. “One must conclude that all of the attackers understood Cymraeg, whether or not they were themselves Welsh.”
“Which doesn’t tell us who sponsored the ambush,” the captain pointed out. “The Cymry are always happy to take up arms, whether on their own account or for pay. They could have been contracted by the French. They could have been a band of mercenaries who had been schooled in a few Welsh words.”
Which was also true. “Then we know nothing,” Jasper acknowledged. “Except that they had at least two mages with them, one strong and the other less so.”
“Not as strong as the mages with us,” said Captain Harewood, with deep satisfaction.
That was true, but now the enemy knew their strength, and could plan the next attack with that knowledge.
*
Delia had had no part to play in the—thankfully brief—fight, except to follow Sister Louise’s command to “stay away from the window, and keep that wretched beast from attacking the door.”
Sapphire was in a red-eyed rage and determined to get to whatever enemy threatened his maiden. “And the last thing our warriors need,” said Sister Louise, “is a mad baby with three inches of sharp horn attacking every male in sight.”
So, Delia and Polly clung to the little foal’s neck, singing lullabies, until suddenly Sister Louise announced, “They are gone. The attack is over. I shall go and find out what happened, Delia, and come back to tell you.”
Delia and Polly applied themselves to their duties.
Sapphire still required soothing, as did Mary, who had hidden herself in her cot by pulling coils of her body up over her chest and head.
It was nearly feeding time, and Delia decided that a meal might give her charges’ baby minds something else to think about, so she sat with one arm around Sapphire and the other cradling Mary while Polly prepared their bottles.
They had been fed and had settled to sleep before Sister Louise returned. “We are coming up to the junction with Peak Forest Canal,” she reported. “We shall be safely within castle walls tonight.”
“Who attacked us?” Delia asked. “And can we expect them to attack again before we reach the castle?”
“We do not know who they were. Our resistance must have been stronger than they expected, for they broke off the attack and escaped before we could capture any of them,” Sister Louise explained.
“As to whether they will attack again, we hope not, but Mr. Thornton has ordered everyone to be alert, and has doubled the number of guards on the roofs of the cabins and on the tow path. And he has sent a message to the castle, asking them to increase the escort with the wagon they are sending for us.”
Without knowing who the attackers were, it was probably impossible to know what they wanted. Delia asked the question anyway. “Do you think they were after me?” she asked. How awful if she was putting everyone with her in danger!
“Possibly,” said Sister Louise. “It might just be that they saw a heavily guarded canal boat and assumed it carried something worth stealing. After all, we were supposed to be going to London. Our plans changed only the night before we left Nettleford Manor.”
“They could not have been a secret, though,” Delia pointed out. “If nothing else, we had witnesses on the canal banks when we boarded the boat.”
“Yes, and it would not be hard to work out that the disturbances around Nettleford Manor are due to a catalyst.” Sister Louise was not in the habit of sugar coating her remarks.
Delia respected her honesty, and should probably have appreciated it, even though a craven part of her would have preferred a little reassurance.
“Sister,” said Polly, who had been so quiet that Delia had quite forgotten she was listening, “what is a catalyst?”
“A catalyst is a person whose magical gift is causing magical gifts to appear,” Sister Louise said. “That means more people than usual manifest gifts, and more magical beasts are born around her. Or him, I suppose, though all the catalysts in the records have been female.”
“Oh,” said Polly, then added, “are you the catalyst, Miss Delia?”
“We think so,” Delia sighed.
“Can you turn it off?” Polly asked.
Sister Louise answered that one. “No one has been able to do so as far as I know, Polly, but catalysts are so rare there is little written about them. The last one in England was the Lady Niniane. She was the reason there were so many magical gifts and beings in the reign of King Arthur the First. Some believe she was responsible for Lord Merlin becoming a Dragon Lord. Or, I suppose I should say, her gift was responsible, for there is no suggestion in the archives that Lady Niniane had control over it.”
“The Lady of the Lake was a catalyst?” Delia asked.
“She was. Scholars believe that Cleopatra, the sister of Dragon Lord Alexander the Great was also a catalyst. The Persian mages teach that Azadokht Shahbanu, wife of Shapiro the First, was a catalyst, and in Chinese history, Princess Pingyang, of the Tang Dynasty. Wherever there has been an unexpected flowering of magical beasts, magical gifts and scholarship, one can usually find a catalyst.”
Those were impressive shoes to fill. Delia was just an ordinary girl, not the relative of an emperor. A girl with average looks and no talent for anything, fit only to take charge of the household, as her mother had often told her.
Rather than dwell on her unsuitability for the role that had been thrust upon her, she returned to the question of the attackers. “Do you think those ambushers will make another attempt?”
“I do not know, Delia,” replied the nun. “However, we drove them off easily. I do not believe they were prepared for the strength of our defense. Let us hope it will take time for them to regroup.”
With those less-than-reassuring words, Delia had to be satisfied. She spent the next two hours waiting for disaster to descend. However, they arrived at Bugsworth Basin without any further attacks or other delays.
Sister Louise poked her head into the cabin for long enough to tell the two girls to be packed and ready.
“I shall come for you when the wagon is ready for you and the babies,” she said.
“They are loading the other wagon first. We shall be using booted horses for the journey, so the pegasus’s mother will need to travel by wagon, too. ”