Elisha Barber: Book One Of The Dark Apostle (40 page)

Blindly, Elisha set the final stitch, his eyes drawn away to a distant day as bright and fair as this one, and as full of warmth. The warmth of sun on his shoulders dispelled the darkness. The warmth of his companions in the river dispelled the cold.

And despair left him at the merest touch of the warm fingers which, impossibly, gripped his own.

E
lisha drew a full, deep breath
for the first time in nearly an hour. He held Mordecai’s hand gently in both of his, the row of small stitches showing like a pale bracelet against the olive skin.

“How?” the surgeon sighed, his dark eyes searching their joined hands in wonder.

The tension fell away from Elisha’s arms, and a helpless wave of laughter welled through him. He had done it! He laughed, bowing his head as his shoulders quaked.

“But I…” Mordecai began, his thin voice trailing away again.

Shaking his head, trying to quell the laughter, Elisha watched him through the screen of his hair.

Turning his wrist first one way, then the other, Mordecai puzzled. “Sutures? But the bones,” he murmured.

Elisha couldn’t answer. There was too much to explain, and too much he wasn’t sure he could.

Gently, Mordecai slipped free his hand and brought it close to his face. He raised the other hand as well, tracing the line of stitches. “Are they real? I cannot feel them, nor find their beginning.”

“I don’t know,” Elisha said at last, his voice hoarse. He let himself turn away a moment, bending to scoop water from the river and drink deeply. He poured a handful over his sweaty forehead and sighed.

He felt the slightest touch, bearing with it a heat familiar and humbling.

“
Elisha Magus
.”

His chin rose, and tears shimmered at his lashes. He blinked them away. “I’m just a barber,” he whispered.

“
A man of flesh and blood,
” called one of the magi.

Laughter rippled like gold in the water around him. “
Welcome,” “Welcome,
” “
Welcome!
”

But their acceptance reminded him of the duke’s trust, and the memory of the king’s command returned to him with full force. He squinted at the sky. The hour must be up by now, and they would be coming for him.

Elisha shook off the last of his giddiness. Despite the magnitude of the casting, he felt stronger than he had after the arrows in the rain. The magi’s advice about the talisman and the place, not to mention their own support, had carried him through. With an extra lift from the angel’s wing.

Turning from the river, Elisha glanced down at Mordecai. Although conscious, he had not lost his pallor, and would need a long time to regain his strength. Still, Elisha could not afford to leave the king another captive, especially not one he thought already dead.

“The king has given me a charge I must complete.”

The surgeon nodded slightly. “Trading you for the messenger. He asked what I knew about you.” At this, a slender smile trembled on his lips.

Stifling a chuckle, Elisha replied, “Everything.”

“Nothing,” murmured Mordecai, “Not if you are capable of what you have just done.”

“I can’t risk leaving you here. Can you walk?”

“
I asked you that myself not so long ago
.” Mordecai pulled himself to a sitting position, steadying himself on Elisha’s arm. “
A lifetime ago.
”

“Two lifetimes,” Elisha said in return. He slipped an arm around the thin shoulders, and they rose together, both shaky, leaving the shadow of the hanging tree.

As they made their way toward the hospital, a strange wind stirred the reeds on the opposite bank, as if they startled the air itself. In the lords’ encampment, nothing moved but a few pennants and the billowing of the tents, their flaps all lowered. The breeze carried a stamping of hooves from unseen horses. For the moment, Elisha was simply relieved to have few onlookers as he helped Mordecai up to his room.

Wind scattered the pages Elisha had stacked so neatly, and the surgeon
made a soft sound at the back of his throat. “All of my books,” he sighed. “I had so many books.” Disconsolate, he gazed about the room as if they would appear.

Letting him down onto the bed, Elisha retrieved a scrap of parchment and offered it up.

With a glance, Mordecai’s eyes brimmed with sudden tears, as quickly blinked away. “The prayer book. That alone could have no value, not to such as these.”

Elisha bowed his head and sank to the floor. All the weariness of the past few days stole over him. “I was here,” he said, “looking for you. I should have guessed—” He interrupted his regret upon hearing a gentle chuckle, and looked up.

Sitting nearly naked on his bed, his most loved possessions carried off, still Mordecai managed to sit tall, his chin raised. Without a word, he raised his right hand before him, his dark eyes on Elisha’s face, and smiled gravely. That air of knowledge Elisha had once found so intimidating seemed to grow again around him, the crinkles around his eyes and lips holding wisdom Elisha might never know. But then again, he might.

A grin broke over Elisha’s face. Whatever happened next, whatever dark deeds he might be responsible for, this moment would shine. Impulsively, he asked, “Teach me, Sage. There is so much I still need to know.”

The gray eyebrows dipped downward, and Mordecai dropped his hand, his head already shaking. “Too long in secret, Barber, I wouldn’t know how to undertake that. Only went to the river for a little company.”

“But you’ve had surgical assistants,” Elisha protested, then wished he hadn’t reminded him as pain flashed across the other man’s face. “You know what I mean. I know I’m not worthy of such a teacher, I’m just—”

“A barber? Can you still believe that? Dear boy, you are a miracle worker. I am grateful, of course I am.” He glanced away.

A brief cloud of sadness passed over Elisha’s heart, causing the brand to ache. “No,” Elisha murmured, “I’m not sure you are.”

As if unaware, Mordecai’s hand held one corner of the bloodied prayer shawl, his fingers running over the darker band where the hair was woven in. “Sarah,” he whispered, “My wife. Jacob, the eldest, Joshua, my little Rachel.” He blinked fiercely, and Elisha felt the tightening in his own throat as he
knelt before the surgeon. “Baron brought me in to heal his son—a Jew, a last resort. Too late, of course. I had no choice but go.” His voice sank so low that Elisha felt the rumble of grief long held as if a storm approached across an empty sky. “We never have a choice, my people. I called even upon my skill, and could not save him. Such anger rose. I have never felt such anger. How could a Jew know what it was like to lose a child? We murdered Christ. We slay good Christian children for evil rites—the force of his anger almost overcame me. I went to the library at the college of surgeons. I sank myself in words until the weakness left me. I came home.” His voice died away completely.

By instinct, Elisha reached out, setting his hand on Mordecai’s arm.

“
Too late
.” A bitter echo through Elisha’s heart. “
He made sure I understood.
”

After a moment, Elisha swallowed his own pain and weakness. He wondered if Mordecai had ever considered the desperate notion that captured him in his grief. “
Do you believe in the Bone of Luz?
”

Mordecai stirred slightly. “
I have been a surgeon longer than you have been alive, and I have never found evidence of that. However they are to be raised up, it is not for man to know.”

Elisha longed to offer some comfort, even some condemnation of the terrible injustice, but he was spent, and this grief was too old, too deep for any words to reach it. The knowledge fell heavily upon him that his own quest for resurrection had been a fool’s errand. Slowly, Elisha withdrew his hand and laced his fingers together.

A thoughtful movement of Mordecai’s right hand brushed his wiry gray hair across the thinning patch atop his head. “If you’ll excuse me a moment?”

Elisha scrambled up, swaying a little. “Of course. I’ll wait outside. I don’t want—” He shrugged. “I can’t leave you alone.”

“Understood.” He hunched on the bed, waiting.

Drawing the door shut behind him, Elisha propped himself against the wall. The memory of death chilled him even across such a distance. He tucked his hands into his armpits to stop them shaking.

“Elisha Barber!” a voice shouted from outside, and Elisha jerked upright.

Footsteps echoed on the stairs. “Elisha Barber!”

“I’m here,” he called. No good in hiding from them now.

Cautiously, the guard peered around the corner, then stepped into view with two of his fellows behind him. “Get a move on, then,” he snapped, but a cross of newly whittled branches hung around his neck along with a sprig of something fragrant.

“I’ll be down,” Elisha said, softly but firmly.

Glancing at his companions, the guard adjusted his helmet strap, then nodded once. “Hurry it up.” They turned and descended in a clatter.

After they’d gone, the door opened at Elisha’s side, and Mordecai stepped out, clad in a long, hooded robe, his prayer shawl out of view. He was stuffing the remaining pages of his brutalized prayer book into an inner sleeve. “Shame I have no knowledge of deflection. Always meant to learn.” Looking up to Elisha’s face, he gave a brief smile, as if to show he’d recovered, but Elisha saw a few more lines around those eyes, and Mordecai gave up the pretense. “Shouldn’t be around you so much—I’ll have no secrets.”

Elisha offered a rueful smile of his own. “At the very least, you shouldn’t try to cheat if we gamble together.”

“If we partnered, though, could be a new line of work.” Mordecai flipped up the hood to hide his face, and slipped his arms deep into the sleeves.

They descended carefully, both still weak, and stopped for a breath at the landing. How they were ever to cross as far as the castle, Elisha had no idea. Perhaps the duke was eager enough for his company that he would send out a carriage. Lord only knew what the man wanted to begin with.

Together, they took the last few steps and emerged into the sunlight. Two dozen men awaited them, and the leader stepped up quickly, though he halted a few paces short, scowling. “Who’s that then?”

“Ah, my assistant. I can’t leave him.”

“We don’t have orders for that,” the man replied.

Elisha gave a savage grin. “Then maybe I should go before the king to explain.” He took a step forward, projecting menace.

“Still don’t know why we’re not gathering wood for the stake.” The leader narrowed his eyes. “Take him, then, just let’s be off.”

The man radiated tension, poised for violence, and Elisha felt impressed with himself all over again. Apparently, his ruse at the bridge had gained him more than the chance to retrieve Mordecai: he had earned the fear of the king’s men. Good.

As they began the long walk, Mordecai swayed, and Elisha shot out a hand to steady him.

One of the guards falling in behind let out a derisive snort. “Assistant? He’s got a woman under there!”

Elisha nearly succumbed to another fit of giggles, and the hooded head rose with a note of indignation. Smothering the laughter, Elisha turned his gaze ahead, to the rough ground of the battlefield and the distant ramparts of the castle. As he gazed, the drawbridge inched downward, and finally lay open. A small group crossed over and started on their way.

As they walked, sun beat down on Elisha’s dark hair, and he could only imagine how Mordecai must be sweating in his heavy robe. Since that moment in the chamber, Mordecai guarded his every emotion and sensation. Exhaustion crept through, however, and a nagging ache at the sight of his injury. Amputees often complained of feeling the need to scratch their missing limb, and Elisha wondered if Mordecai might now and again feel as if his hand were still lost.

After all the events of this day, Elisha found it amusing that he retained any scientific interest at all.

Still, as the walk wore on, entering the realm of pitted earth and ruined engines of war, sweat trickled down Elisha’s neck, stinging the rope’s path like a thousand insects. He flicked his hair, but it wasn’t long enough any more to relieve that tingle. He gritted his teeth and walked on, turning his mind to the question of the assassination he had agreed to perform.

This duke seemed a man of honor, from Elisha’s brief meeting, but who could tell with a nobleman? And did not the lives of all Elisha’s friends outweigh this one? Assuming the king could be trusted to let them go, especially after Elisha’s little show on the riverbank. He tried to think of a way around their bargain, a way to counterfeit death, but the body in the river was an obstacle he could not surmount, not without much more knowledge than he possessed. If he got a chance on their arrival, he would consult with Mordecai, to see if he might have any suggestions. Of course, once they got there, he had no guarantee of how they would be treated. Not knowing what the duke wanted left him at a severe disadvantage. Perhaps the messenger-prince had spun some tale about Elisha’s value, or perhaps the wounded earl—the very reason Elisha had come face to face with Duke
Randall—had begged his life, if he’d been aware enough to know who tended him.