Chapter 15
“Come on,” Elric said to the last witch in the hold.
She’d been sleeping when he found her, likely just as seasick as Jessamine, but refusing to tell anyone. The poor thing had been curled up in a tight ball, her arms around her knees as she tried to hold in what little food she’d been able to get down.
He placed a hand on her shoulder, giving her the slightest shake again. “You’ll feel better out in fresh air. The others are gathering.”
“Just leave me here to die,” she whimpered, curling a little tighter.
“Can’t do that.” He sat down on the edge of her cot, trying hard not to wrinkle his nose at the smell of vomit that coated her. “You know that getting up will be better for you. We’ll get some water in you and that’ll help, too.”
“I’m so sick,” she groaned. And then rolled to look up at him.
Her red-rimmed eyes were a bright, vivid blue. A sea witch, most likely, and that was ironic considering how ill she was feeling. He knew how to help someone like that, though.
Smoothing his hand over her tangled blonde hair, he smiled down at her. “You need to connect to the sea, young one, as you were meant to. A sea witch like yourself shouldn’t ever be in the hold. You belong on deck, feeling the sea spray on your face and the waves carrying you.”
She groaned, but apparently the thought of it was enough to convince her.
She rolled to her feet and staggered with him up the stairs.
Once there, he was captivated by the sight of his gravesinger surrounded by a coven of witches.
She’d shaken off the illness, or was particularly good at pretending she wasn’t feeling so bad.
Her dark hair whipped around her face, stirred by the wind.
Even the sailors had stopped what they were doing to stare at the magic that surrounded her.
Those dark eyes practically crackled with rage, commanding everyone and everything to look at her.
The blonde witch clinging to his arm hummed. “The way you look at her…”
“How do I look at her?” he asked, looking down at her, amused at the thought that he looked at Jessamine any different from anyone else.
“Like you worship her. It’s inspiring, even if it does give the rest of us girls a bit of the sadness. I don’t think I’ll ever find a man who looks at me like that.”
His head jerked up. His eyes inevitably found Jessamine again, and that sensation of awe filled him as she commanded the attention of so many.
Maybe he did look at her like he worshipped the ground she walked on.
Because he did. That woman could do no wrong in his eyes, although sometimes he worried about the stress she carried.
She was worthy of so much more than just a dead kingdom, and he intended to give her everything she deserved.
“Ah,” he muttered as they headed toward the coven. “You’ll find someone who looks at you like that. And if he doesn’t? Leave him. He’s not good enough for you.”
She chuckled weakly, her body already shivering in the sea breeze before she reached for another one of the witches. They all stood there together, watching as Jessamine’s eyes danced over each and every one of them.
“On the eve of my death, I was researching witchcraft.” Her voice floated on the wind, blowing all around them, echoing like a goddess spoke to them from the realm beyond.
“Little did I know I would soon die that day. And in my death, I would make a deal with a god who would stop at nothing to be resurrected. I don’t tell you this detail lightly.
It is important. The deal I made is that I would unmake my kingdom, and build it again in his name. ”
A few of the witches stirred at that. Gazes flicked toward Elric, where he stood with his arms crossed over his chest. He knew they didn’t entirely trust him.
Most of them had already suggested sacrificing him.
Knowing that he had always intended for their kingdom to no longer be recognizable? That wouldn’t win him any favors.
“He was right,” she said, and their gazes immediately turned back to her.
“He was right then, and he is now. This kingdom has always had a rotten core. We’ve all seen it.
From the men who tried to control us, fathers, uncles, friends.
To the people who hired us. Everyone hated witches, hated us, wanted us all to disappear, so they didn’t have to think about how powerful we were. ”
It was the truth, and he was pleased to hear her say it. At least someone understood that there was a hardness in this kingdom that had always been there.
“This is our chance to remake it. I warn you now, Inverholm is full of the infected. Nothing we can do will stop that. I wanted to change people’s minds by bringing goodness into this realm, but…
I think now the only option is to save them.
We will be the people who bring this kingdom back to its former glory, and we will be the ones to show them the value of a coven working for them.
” She paused, and the dramatic effect of that hung in the air.
“Or the ruin we can bring about if they do not work with us.”
He could feel those words among all of them. They would destroy the kingdom, and make it anew so that they would belong. It wasn’t going to be easy. They all had family and friends bound to this place and affected by Ajax’s spell.
One of the newer witches lifted her hand and asked, “How are we going to do that?”
“We’re going to make a sleeping spell,” Jessamine said.
“I know some of you have read about them. But I want to make a bigger one. One that will blanket the entire kingdom in sleep. The infected won’t wake.
None of them. We have a coven of fifteen witches, a god at our beck and call, and a gravesinger to add her magic into the mix.
We can make the entire kingdom sleep and then walk among them without fear. ”
Elric blinked a few times, letting the words settle into his mind before he finally nodded. “That could work.”
He could see Sybil shifting back and forth on her feet before she nodded as well. “We could make that happen, I think. There’s enough of us.”
“I don’t think I’d require additional sacrifices for it.
” Even though his magic was sorely depleted, a sleeping spell wasn’t all that difficult.
It would take all of their magic to do it over an entire kingdom, of course, but they would replenish his magic regularly.
“It will have to be woven with a stasis spell. Sleeping for that long may kill them otherwise.”
Sybil chewed on her lip, looking over all of them. “I think we have enough magic here to do it if we wanted to. There are quite a few of us now. It’s a lot of area to cover, but I think it’s manageable. You’ve all learned how to cast a sleeping spell, right?”
A few of the witches were nodding. Some of them seemed concerned. But most of them had squared their shoulders and appeared far more ready than he would have expected. Before him was a coven just as he would have wished for all those ages ago, and that was something to be proud of.
Elric met Jessamine’s gaze and gave her the slightest nod. They could make this happen.
“Perfect,” Jessamine said. “If no one is going to argue, then I suggest we do it right now.”
A clatter echoed from the area of the ship where the captain and a few of his men were. The old man quickly made his way down the stairs to the deck where they stood. “Absolutely not. There will be no witchcraft on this ship.”
He watched Jessamine roll her eyes before she looked at the elderly gentleman who had shuttled them to and from Orenda. “If you don’t let us, then I will include you and your men in this sleeping spell. I can see the shore, Captain. I no longer need you or your men to get home.”
The man’s face went white with fear. “We aren’t bringing you to shore, ladies. There are infected all over that harbor. You can get off my ship here, or I’ll leave you to drown.”
Elric was surprised at the man’s force, but then again, he shouldn’t have been.
People like this were always afraid of witches.
Even if the captain had a soft spot for Agnes, she hadn’t always been a witch.
Or at least, hadn’t been one with influence.
He likely remembered her as she had been before.
A beautiful, strong woman with an aim at being the most influential person in the Pleasure District.
This man must have been so in love with the idea of her that he’d never noticed the rather odd collection she had in her home.
“Agnes,” Elric said, knowing that his tone was amused and yet incapable of making it seem less so. “What do you think your ancestor would say?”
Agnes’s great-grandmother had been a formidable woman. Frankly, he had been terrified of her. The strength that woman had in just her pinky was enough to kill a man. And it was unlikely that Agnes was all that different from her ancestor.
Agnes rolled her eyes at him. “I’d tell her whatever she wanted to do was a bad idea.”
“I would encourage her.”
“Of course you would. You’re incorrigible.”
But she still lifted a hand and flicked it.
The spell that flung from her fingers was a simple one.
It lifted a hammer behind the captain’s head and dropped it down hard.
Not enough to kill him—they weren’t that heartless—but it would certainly leave a bump on his head and knock him out long enough for their spell to take place.
The other witches burst into movement. Soon enough, spells were flying in every direction. Webs of curses, gusts of wind, even sprays of water that came up from the sea itself until the fifteen crewmen were laid out on the deck as well, all of them unconscious.
He talked toward Jessamine, his arms still crossed over his chest as he looked at the work they had all done. “What an impressive coven you’ve built, gravesinger.”
“I do believe that was all your doing.”
He winked. “Oh, you’re right. It was.”
Turning to the witches, he looked them over one last time.
Elric could peer into those reservoirs of magic that he had given them, and he could make sure they were prepared for any spell that he was going to ask them to do.
Some of them were weaker than others, clearly the ones who had been practicing more had less magic. But as a whole, they were ready.
He stood in the center of all of them, lifted his arms, and started the spell.
The monotone old language started in a rhythm they could all join. A lulling sound, quiet and calm, that would spread across the sea. But first, he needed to build it.
Shadows connected him to all the witches in his coven, and he drew upon those connections as the women around him started to chant as well. They sent their intention to him and he magnified it.
“Sleep,” he murmured, weaving the word into the spell.
Elric couldn’t conjure this on his own. He was a god of shadows and death, that was all.
But the surrounding witches had intent, and that meant he could make this spell bigger.
Better. He could do what they wanted, because they demanded it.
Each one of them cried out in their hearts and souls to keep their loved ones safe.
Sleep was easier. Sleep was an endless night of wonderful dreams and quiet thoughts.
Some of the witches wanted just darkness.
They didn’t want their loved ones to know any time had passed at all.
Others wished for pleasant dreams. Some of them wanted their loved ones to be on an adventure, even during their rest. He took all of those hopes and dreams, and he conjured them into a ball that he could throw toward the kingdom.
Once it was over Inverholm, he encouraged it to spread. Like a blanket, a shadow drifted across the kingdom and settled down upon it like a shroud. The darkness settled there, and he watched it while holding his breath.
Everyone else seemed to do so as well. Their words stopped all at once, the sudden silence heavy on all of their shoulders.
He watched the infected stop moving on the beach, fall onto their knees, and then drop onto their faces. He knew throughout the kingdom, more infected were doing the same.
The thin black shroud would remain where it was. As though the entire kingdom was a closed-off house, just waiting for someone to come in and pull the blanket off.
“Did it work?” Elissa asked, her voice quiet.
“Yes,” he replied. “They are all asleep. They will remain that way until we wish for them to wake.”
Or until another god joined them. He knew for certain the Huntress wouldn’t be able to lift this spell, but there were plenty of his other siblings who could.
Jessamine’s troubled expression met his as the other witches started for the boats on the side of the ship. There were two of them, and they were the same ones they had used to get to shore when they’d arrived in Orenda.
“Why do you look nervous?” she quietly asked.
“This should all work as long as Ajax doesn’t bring back the Enchantress.
” He swallowed. “I never told you about her. The rest of us took names that were a little more ambiguous. The Crone. The Many-Faced Mother. The God King. Names that wouldn’t necessarily give away who or what we are, but…
the Enchantress and her crew of wildlings would certainly make quick work of this spell. And every other spell we might create.”
“Would he bring her back before the Huntress?”
Elric shook his head. “I don’t think so. They never got along.”
“Then there is no point in worrying about that just yet.” She threaded their fingers together and tugged him toward the first boat that had splashed into the water. “Come on. We have some work to do, Deathless One.”
He couldn’t help but feel uncomfortable as they made their way down the rope ladder into the boat. Because the kingdom they were approaching was well and truly dead now. It was filled with people who shouldn’t exist any longer, nothing more than mindless beasts.
But as he sat down in the boat and took hold of the oars, he knew without a doubt that they were doing the right thing. Even if it was terrifying to do so.