Барб Хенди - First and Last Sorcerer

“You’re strong,” Magiere whispered, “so very strong, my girl. And no one’s taking me from you again.”

As Wynn’s eyes began watering, she fumbled about for the bar of soap.

Not long after, Wayfarer removed the damp strips of sheet and managed to wash her own body. Wynn offered to help wash her hair by having her lean over the bucket. Some water was splashed onto the floor, but that couldn’t be helped with this makeshift method of bathing.

After that, she dabbed salve on the girl’s legs and helped her dress while Magiere took up the soap, knelt by an urn, and began to wash herself. Once she was clean, Wynn helped wash her hair, and then Magiere too dressed in some of the clothing purchased. Wayfarer wore the smaller red tunic and Magiere took the midnight blue one.

When all was settled, the three women—and Shade—left the bedchamber and went back into the main room.

Leesil had finished for the most part, though he hadn’t pulled on his new tunic. His hair was still dripping wet but cleanly white-blond once more. He already wore the muslin pantaloons, which fit him quite well. Though thinner than Wynn remembered, his chest and arms were still tightly muscled. He let her tend to him with salve before he pulled the burnt-orange tunic over his head.

Watching him from a few paces away, Magiere said, “That color suits you.”

If nothing else, Wynn’s three friends were now clean and hopefully a bit more comfortable. Magiere stepped closer to Leesil as Wayfarer sank down into a chair on his left side, and Wynn couldn’t help assessing them.

By this point Wayfarer’s hair was nearly dry in the warm Suman air. The red of the tunic flattered the girl’s tan skin and green eyes, and her brown hair was long and thick. Wynn did not remember her being so beautiful.

However, she had hoped the local clothing would help her friends blend in a little better, and that was clearly not the case.

Magiere’s clothing fit her slender frame well, but the lightweight pantaloons and dark blue tunic made her look only more exotic. Her skin was white and her hair was black with bloodred tints in bright light. In this part of the world, that was unusual at best. She would need to wear a cloak with the deepest hood.

At least they had plenty of cloaks.

Throughout all of this, Brot’an sat cross-legged on the floor near the window, offering neither comment nor assistance.

Magiere settled on the floor directly in front Wayfarer’s chair, and the girl immediately reached for the comb on the nearby table. She began untangling Magiere’s damp black hair, and the sight turned Wynn nostalgic.

In the past, she’d often brushed and braided Magiere’s hair. That seemed so long ago. Now she took care of herself and her own companions, and she glanced toward the main room’s dim back corner.

Chane lay dormant beneath a blanket, and so far no one had mentioned him. That was best, though it wouldn’t last.

And then there was Osha.

He stood near the front door. His gaze shifted toward Wayfarer, remained there a moment, and then moved to Wynn. He looked away quickly, as did Wynn, and she found Chap watching her intently. Her various worries must have been apparent on her face.

She and Chap had always read each other with a fair amount of ease, and he must be nearly overwhelmed by so many things in their current situation:

A daughter who refused to acknowledge his existence.

A vampire in their midst—and being forced to accept his help.

A duplicitous domin attempting to use Magiere as bait.

Wynn wished she had a moment alone with Chap. His gaze shifted to Magiere, then to Leesil, and finally to Wayfarer before he looked back to her.

I am glad you are here ... that you came after us. I don’t know what would have happened had you not.

It wasn’t like him to share doubt or express gratitude, and that worried her a little. Of the four of them, so far he had appeared the least affected. Perhaps the past moon had affected him more than anyone but she would realize.

Of course, he did look filthy again.

Wynn lifted an urn still half full of water, shifted it to one arm, and then took up a bar of soap as she straightened.

“Your turn, Chap,” she announced.

The floor was about to get very wet.

Chap put up only a little struggle as Wynn set upon him. When Wayfarer got up from her chair to come help, the girl clearly found the whole situation unsettling.

Certain aspects of her people’s reverence for majay-hì would likely never change. But given the need for normalcy, or the illusion of it for a moment, Chap knew Wynn would be suspicious if he made the enterprise too easy.

Wayfarer lugged over another urn to rinse him. As she tilted it, he jerked out of Wynn’s grip and back-stepped when she tried to grab him. Wayfarer’s eyes widened just before the pail’s contents splashed into Wynn’s lap.

Wayfarer sucked a breath. “Oh ... oh, no ... oh, my!”

“He’s never liked getting wet,” Leesil put in absently.

Wynn grabbed for Chap, trying to gain a solid hold. “You ... you mangy mutt.”

“You did that on purpose?” Wayfarer asked, staring wide-eyed at him. “You ... you are a ... a bad majay-hì!”

Wynn huffed. “Try chasing him with a brush across the rolling deck of a ship sometime. And if you didn’t catch him, he’d be ... a filthy pig!”

Wayfarer’s little jaw dropped at such irreverence, perhaps forgetting she’d just scolded him herself.

Chap merely licked his nose at both of them—his usual flippant response.

In truth, he did not mind Wynn’s ministrations. Neither did he enjoy them. Rather, he felt numb inside except for a dull anger at himself. After the shock of being rescued had worn off, and he had learned more of what had happened to Magiere, his sense of failure weighed on him more than ever. Even begging her forgiveness, when she had come out of the bedchamber earlier that day, had not eased this. She and Leesil were his primary charges to protect, and he had failed.

In the past, they had fought side by side when outnumbered or outmatched. Chap had known fear of losing one or both more than once. What he felt now was so much worse. He had not seen the arrest coming or been able to stop it, nor had he been able to take any action once they had all been imprisoned. An entire moon had passed as he’d watched Leesil and young Wayfarer suffer, and Magiere was beyond even his sight. And as he had listened to her screams in the dark ...

All that Chap could hope was that her suffering would end—and it could end only one way—and not just for her sake but for the secrets he bore concerning the orbs.

She should not have forgiven that, even when he had begged her.

What would have happened had Wynn not come? In his sinking heart, he believed Leesil and Wayfarer would have eventually died as well. He had seen no other outcome but to hope that he would follow them soon. And the orbs he had hidden would never be found again.

But Wynn had come and found a way to save them. Now Chap found himself suffering a different fear concerning Magiere.

A necromancer named Ubâd, a servant of the Ancient Enemy, had sacrificed one of each of the five races so that Magiere could be born. With the blood of the five in her veins, she could walk into any land in the world unaffected by any safeguards placed for protection. She had been conceived via that bloody ritual to become the Enemy’s servant ... a tool.

Chap, in separating from his kin, the Fay, who existed outside of time but were now and forever linked to the living world, had chosen to be born into flesh. His sole purpose in the beginning had been to keep Magiere from fulfilling the reason for her creation, though he had not known all concerning that in the beginning. And he had used even Leesil’s own grandmother to find the half-blood and thereby use Leesil to find Magiere.