Faith Hunter - Seraphs

Of course, if I killed them, I had better be ready to fight the entire town. And if they got my amulets away before I could mount a defense strong enough to save myself and my friends, I’d be toast. Worse than toast. Stripped, raped, flayed, beaten, butchered, and left to rot in the snow. Most humans didn’t care much for mages. I smiled as I took the steps to the dais. I was pretty sure it wasn’t a sweet smile.

Reason mulled over battle plans as I looked at the side door. A second alternative presented itself. I didn’t like it, but it would be smarter. I could let Rupert and Audric take care of the bailiffs and hold off the crowd, and I could run. Yeah. Cowardice might save my friends, and me too. And there was a third way. I scanned the town fathers who would act as my judges, wondering which of the unknown ones were for me and which were against. I had risked my life to save this town, even if they hadn’t been there to see it. I had lived in Mineral City for a decade and had hurt no one. Not once. Yet someone had decided I should face trial and die for an accident of birth that made me a neomage.

Holding my cloak closed over my mage-attire, moving slowly so my skirt bells didn’t jingle, I took the seventh step, reaching the stage that used to be a holy place, mage-boots silent on the scarred wood, walking stick clacking softly. Flanking me, so much taller than I, Rupert and Audric climbed. I must have disappeared behind them, vanishing from the crowd. I felt my body drawing on the amulets as we came to a stop in front of the judges’ desk.

“What’s this?” Waldroup asked. Without looking, I felt the bailiffs step forward. Violence shimmered in the air. “This won’t do. We called a mage to speak, not you two.”

As if they had rehearsed it, Rupert and Audric stepped to either side, revealing my small frame to the audience behind us, and emerging in my peripheral vision. It was a clever move with a two-pronged outcome: A triangle made a good defensive fighting position if we had to draw blades, and it made me look quite defenseless and helpless before the judges. Mages are small, and behind the bulk of my friends I probably looked like a young kid standing before the principal’s desk.

“We are her champards,” Audric announced into the silence, one eye on the slow-moving guards. At a gesture from the bench, the bailiffs stopped, but I noted a slight twitch beneath Audric’s cloak. He had drawn weapons.

“What’s a champard?” Waldroup asked the man on his left, voices lowered as they conferred. Elder Culpepper darted a glance at me, furious, hate-filled, and bobbed his head down, realizing I had seen his reaction. He had plainly hoped I’d be alone and unprotected. When no one at the judgment bench seemed to know what a champard was, Waldroup addressed me. “Well?” I stood silent, letting Audric handle my response. A champard’s responsibilities included acting as a legal consultant, hauling firewood, acting as a human shield, fighting to the death, and keeping his charge warm at night, among other things that had been known to include being sex slaves. If I survived this, I would have ammunition to tease Audric unmercifully.

“You may think of it as a companion, a partner, and a champion,” Audric said.

“Oh? Well, the girl don’t need neither. Sit down.”

“We will not. It is a mage’s legal right to have us beside her. You may refer to the case of Masters vs. Tomlinson.” Which I had never heard of, but I wasn’t going to argue.

Waldroup looked nonplussed but, after an even shorter conference with the men to his left and right, he shrugged. “Fine. Speak your name, title, and address, girl.”

In a clear tone, I said, “I am Thorn St. Croix, residing over Thorn’s Gems on Upper Street.” I gave the street number.

“Not Stanhope?” he asked.

“No,” I said, offering no explanation. Lucas had divorced me. I had seen no reason to keep his name, and I saw no reason to tell the court my personal business unless they asked officially. But I was aware of Ciana’s distress at my reply. I didn’t understand how I knew what she was feeling, but I could sense her unhappiness and growing dread.

“I asked you for your title.” Waldroup said, seeming to understand that getting information from us was going to be like pulling pig’s teeth.

“Mages have no titles,” Audric said.

Waldroup, a tiny, ancient black man, shook his head and sighed. The wrinkles around his eyes tightened into an aggrieved weaving. “What kind of mage is she?”

“I’m a stone mage.” I was other things too, having received training as a battle mage, but they didn’t ask for particulars, and likely they had no idea what differentiated one mage from another anyway.

“It’s come to our attention that you lived in Mineral City for a time without presenting a visa. Mages have to have visas and a GPS thing any time they leave, uh, one of them Enclaves.” When I didn’t respond, he said, “Well?”

“When you ask a question, the mage will be happy to reply,” Audric said. The crowd tittered. I had a glimpse of Ciana, pushing up in her father’s lap so she could see better, her face pale and anxious.

“Do you have a visa and a locator band?” Waldroup asked, eyes narrow, patience wearing thin.

“Yes,” I said.

“When did you get them?”

“She refuses to answer,” Audric said.

“On what grounds?” Culpepper asked, steepling his hands in front of his mouth.

“Irrelevancy. The mage has a visa. According to international protocols, the moment someone asks for her visa, it will be presented as proof that she legally left the sovereign nation of the New Orleans Enclave, and her concurrent right to be in Mineral City.” I hadn’t been wearing it not so long ago when Durbarge, an investigator for the Administration of the ArchSeraph, arrested me. I just hoped no one present remembered. I resisted the urge to look around at the thought of the AASI, assey to the insulting. Durbarge should be here, standing right beside me, glaring at me with his one good eye, and he wasn’t. In its own way, that was more unsettling than anything else today.

“Let’s see this visa,” Culpepper said.

Stepping to the table, I displayed my left wrist, encircled by the bracelet containing my GPS locator device. From the folds of my cloak, I dangled the visa, carved of pink tourmaline, for inspection; it was similarly inscribed and softly glowing. At the revelation of a seraph-blessed object, two of the town fathers sat back. Culpepper, however, stared at the official stone visa and bracelet. His brown robe of office falling away from a bony wrist, he reached out, coveting them both and surely not aware that his desire showed so clearly on his face.

My first thought was to step back, but I stood my ground. He brushed the bracelet with a thumbnail, discarding it for the watermelon-colored tourmaline. Hesitantly at first, and then with inquisitive fingers, Culpepper stroked it like a cat. I knew that the flat, four-inch, ring-shaped stone would cause a faint, pleasurable tingle to a human. I had heard a visa could sometimes calm an angry man.

Unexpectedly, Culpepper made a fist around the visa and yanked. Surprised, I was pulled forward, nearly losing my balance. Faster than a pure-blooded human can move, Audric slammed his hand down on the elder’s wrist, wedging his body between the desk and me. He compelled me back, off balance, forcing Culpepper to drop the visa. I heard the elder’s wrist bones creak; his face flattened with fury. Wrenching his hand away from the bigger man’s grip, Culpepper stood, toppling his chair with a crash. Instantly, the guards moved to surround us, weapons sliding from holsters.

Time dilated, expanded, decelerated. As if in slow motion, I saw Audric and Rupert throw back their cloaks, swords sliding free.