D. Jackson - A Plunder of Souls

Ramsey stood. Ethan saw his blade flash in the torchlight. “ Impedi respirationem ex cruore evocatum. ” Stop breathing, conjured from blood.

The sudden pressure on Ethan’s chest made him forget the agony in his arm. He tried to inhale, but couldn’t. It felt as though the full weight of the Muirenn had fallen on top of him, pinning him to the deck, stilling his lungs.

Ramsey gazed down at him, a benign smile on his lips. He cut himself again and held out his forearm for Ethan to see. “Here’s blood for you. You can end the spell if you’d like. It’s as simple as speaking the Latin. Or is it? What if your conjuring doesn’t work? I’m not going to cut myself again. You have but one chance to live. Do you trust yourself to cast the spell that would save your life, or do you need me to do it?”

Ethan’s lungs burned. He knew he was beginning to panic, but he couldn’t help himself. His body had gone rigid; he clawed at the wood of the deck with taloned hands.

“Aye, I suppose you’re right,” Ramsey said, regarding his bleeding arm. “It’s my responsibility, isn’t it?” He sighed like an impatient child. “Very well. Fini evocationem ex cruore evocatum. ” End conjuring, conjured from blood.

Ethan inhaled deeply, and knew a moment of blessed relief as a breath rushed into his lungs. He closed his eyes, gulping greedily, savoring the cool touch of the harbor air on the back of his throat.

“Get him off my ship,” Ramsey said. He sounded disgusted.

Two sailors walked to where Ethan lay and dragged him to his feet, making no effort to be gentle with his broken arm. He gritted his teeth and tried once more to cradle the arm against his body, though this did him little good. One of the men swung himself nimbly over the rail. The other man lifted Ethan and practically tossed him to the first man. Together, the two sailors half carried him down the rope ladder to the pinnace waiting below.

As they reached the small boat, Ramsey appeared above them at the rail. Ethan flinched at the sight of him, expecting to be attacked with yet another conjuring.

“Take him wherever he wants to go,” the captain told the men.

“Aye, Captain.”

To Ethan, Ramsey said, “Remember what I told you. It begins in earnest now, and I can’t be bothered to worry about any one person.”

Ethan wanted to ask him what he meant. What was to begin? But he was too weary and in too much pain to speak. Besides, he knew better than to expect an answer.

Ramsey grinned again, and vanished from view.

“Where to?” one of the men asked him.

“The Town Dock,” Ethan said, the words scraped from his throat. It was the shore point closest to the Dowser, and still he wasn’t certain he could walk that short distance.

He had little notion of the time, but he thought that it must be only a few hours before dawn.

The water was calm, and the breeze light. Ramsey’s men had him at the dock in less than a quarter hour, though it seemed to take much longer. The men lifted him out of the boat and rolled him onto the wharf, before pushing off and rowing back toward their ship.

Ethan climbed to his feet, his movements slow and stiff. He staggered with his first few steps, but righted himself and continued on to the Dowser. He didn’t have the strength to go out of his way and so walked right past Murray’s Barracks. There were few soldiers on the street at this hour, but a pair of them stopped him and demanded to know what he was doing walking the city so late. Upon seeing the condition he was in, their bearing changed. One of the men even offered to find the regiment’s surgeon.

“Thank you,” Ethan said, and meant it. “I’m on my way to see a friend who is a surgeon.”

They let him go, and Ethan walked the rest of the way to the Dowser without incident. He let himself into the tavern, locked the door, and collapsed into the first chair he found, the leg scraping on the tavern floor.

He pulled out his knife and having little choice, cut his broken arm. He dabbed the blood onto his skin, just over the break, and said, “ Remedium ex cruore evocatum. ” Healing, conjured from blood.

He felt the hum of power in the floor and walls, and was aware of Reg’s glow beside him. But while the blood vanished, the pain in his arm remained unabated. He didn’t feel the bone knitting itself back together, either.

“Damn it!” he muttered under his breath.

Footsteps overhead told him that he had awakened Kannice, and he cursed himself for this as well. He cut his arm a second time, spoke the spell again. Nothing.

“Ethan?”

“Aye, it’s me.”

Blood welled from yet another cut. He rubbed it gently on the injury, repeated the spell, and watched it disappear. No relief, no healing.

Kannice stepped into the great room, holding a candle.

“Are you-?”

He slashed at his arm, heedless of the pain. Kannice winced. Blood dripped onto his breeches. “ Remedium ex cruore evocatum! ” he said, shouting the words. Healing, conjured from blood!

It was like he was a boy again, new to his power and unable to rely on his conjurings. Except that after a lifetime of casting spells, he had come to depend on them, to regard them as his greatest strength, the one thing that defined who and what he was. He couldn’t give up conjuring now, not with Ramsey poised to strike at the city and at him.

He raised the blade again.

“Ethan, no!” Kannice said, leaping forward, and grabbing both his blade arm and the arm he intended to cut.

He gasped.

“What?” she said, recoiling. “What did I do?”

“Nothing. It’s-” He pointed at his left arm with the tip of his blade. “This arm is broken.”

She covered her mouth with a shaking hand. He saw that there were tears on her face. “I’m sorry,” she said, staring at his wounded arm. “I didn’t know.”

He shook his head, gazing at her, his chest rising and falling.

She raised her eyes to his. “What’s happening, Ethan? What is all this?”

“I can’t conjure, not even to heal myself.”

“Why not?”

He started to say that he didn’t know, but that wasn’t true. “Nate Ramsey is back,” he said.

She frowned. “Ramsey,” she repeated.

It had been a long time, and his last encounter with the captain had coincided with the very beginning of their love affair. But still, she surprised him.

“The sea captain. The one who killed those two merchants.”

“Aye,” Ethan said.

“He was a conjurer, too. I remember you telling me about him.”

“That’s right.”

“What does he have to do with your ability to conjure?”

“It’s not just mine,” Ethan said. “Gavin Black told me that he can’t conjure either. And I expect others are having the same problem.”

“But why would Ramsey make it impossible to conjure? Wouldn’t he be hurting himself as much as you?”

“One would think so,” Ethan said. “But he can conjure as well as ever-better actually. It’s the rest of us who are struggling to cast.”

“I don’t like the sound of that.” She looked him over, taking in the burns on his bared right arm, the bruise on his face from where Ramsey hit him. “He did all of this to you?”

“Aye.”

“You should tell Sephira. She’ll be so jealous that she’ll take care of him for you.”

It was so unexpected that he couldn’t help but laugh out loud. “That’s better than any idea I’ve had.”

Her smile didn’t linger for long. “If you can’t heal yourself, we’ll have to get you to a surgeon.”

He nodded, glanced at the knife in his hand. “All right. First, I’m going to try once more.”