Page 46 of The Deathless One
“I can do this,” Sybil grunted, forming her hands into a circle as the black magic closed. “I can… I can…”
There was a strange thud from inside her chest, the knocking of a fist against a door and the echo of something empty beneath it. With an enraged cry, she threw out her hands, and suddenly the dark cage around the infected contracted.
Jessamine whirled away from the sight, so he couldn’t see what happened to the man, but he knew the sound of an implosion. Sybil had destroyed the man, completely and utterly, as though he were a bug to be squashed. When Jessamine finally turned back to the grisly sight, he was glad to see Sybil had the wherewithal to keep the magic blanketing the infected body in a dark shroud.
Breathing hard, Sybil gestured to the wet pile. “See? No problem at all. I don’t know what I was so worried about.”
“Other than the dead man currently trapped in a spell?” he asked sarcastically.
“Oh, no one will notice. If they do, they won’t know it was either of us. There’s no easy way to track magical signatures anymore, not without a witch at their side. And there’s so few of us left!”
He didn’t think there was any confidence in her voice at all. He’d known Sybil to be proud, but this… she almost sounded nervous. Or exhausted.
With a narrowed gaze, he watched the witch attempt to straighten before she nearly tripped over her own feet. Breathing hard, she pressed a hand to her chest, and that was when he knew. She was weakened from just that attack? What little power did she have left?
“What kind of spell was that?” Jessamine breathed.
“Old magic,” the other witch replied, but it wasn’t entirely the truth.
He knew why Sybil didn’t want Jessamine to have the answer.Apparently, they were still keeping secrets from each other. But he wanted his gravesinger to know what kind of magic that was. It would only entice her to his side even more.
“That was the magic only a patron can give a witch,” he rasped. “The kind of magic that is stolen or gifted from the gods themselves, and can be tapped only in small amounts. The spells you have cast thus far are magic any witch can cast. But the power she just used comes only from true worship of a god.”
Jessamine glanced over her shoulder into the mirror. “Then why haven’t you asked me to worship—”
“I’m fine,” Sybil said, holding up a hand before he could answer that question. “I can see your disapproval through the mirror, Deathless One. I will get her to the Owl’s Nest safe enough.”
“You’re hardly a witch anymore, with the meager coffers of magic you have left.”
“I am well enough,” she hissed in response.
But when they both turned toward the road again, they froze. Three more infected stood there. Two men and a woman this time, all of them hovering in the middle of the road as though they were waiting for something. A noise, a smell, anything that would send them sprinting after their prey, just like the man Sybil had killed.
Three against two weren’t fantastic odds, especially considering that Sybil had already depleted her rather meager source of magic. He needed to be summoned, or lose his opportunity to come back for good. He could not use an infected witch.
Growling, he slammed his fist onto the mirror. “Summon me, damn it!”
He heard the words at the same time he felt the tug at his navel. Not the summoning spell that Jessamine had used, but the magic that only a worshipping witch could use. Not a resurrection, but at least it brought him into the realm of the living for a few moments before his magic depleted. It was a cry for help in the darkest of times, as only a witch could do.
It wasn’t bringing him fully back into being, but it was a call he could answer.
The tugging yanked him out through the mirror, a black mist gathering in front of Sybil like the shield he was. Still nowhere near as powerful as he should be, but it was a power he was a little more used to. He could feel his direct tie to Sybil, and the intent behind the summons. He would linger no longer than the amount of time it took to save them. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Apparently, even his own disciple didn’t trust him. He’d never been more proud.
Turning, he faced the infected, who were already sprinting down the street toward them. They were nasty beasts, dripping with all manner of disgusting liquids that no person should ever leak. But they were human, nonetheless.
Crouching to the ground, he pressed his palms to the sparse grass that he could not feel and let his magic sink into the shadows that surrounded him. Summoned, the shadows came to him like puppies ready to please their master. They pulled from where they were attached: trees, buildings, even Sybil’s and Jessamine’s shadows—they all came to his call.
Then he sent them down the road, all coiling together to create something so much worse. First, he tried to give it the shape of a bear. Most humans knew better than to toy with a creature such as that. But he could feel the excitement rolling through the infected. They were pleased with the image of a bear. They wished to feast upon its flesh, and that simply wouldn’t do.
He wanted them afraid, not more bloodthirsty than they already were. Flexing his power again, he created paths around them. Buildings like he’d seen in his own realm when he had followed Jessamine. When he had given her permission to just be a woman for that night.
There it was. Confusion settled into the creatures as they looked down the sudden alleyways that appeared in front of their eyes.
“Go,” he ground through gritted teeth. “Stay to the right. That way is blocked off from their view.”
“But where will you—” Jessamine stopped talking the moment he snapped at her.
