Page 96 of Seducing the Sorcerer
“What? Why? What did you find out? You went to Rolling-Hill Farm, didn’t you?”
“Aye. And reckon we both had a hand in it. Two years ago the sacking started moving. Not like a horse, mind. Just dragging itself around. Whinnying a bit. Making a nuisance of itself. Then I turned up. But you started it. You lit the spark. I just fanned the flames, like.”
Morgrim gave him a sharp look. “Rubbish. It was dragging itself around? Now its flying and finding people and...and...” He waved in the direction of the dead man. “You didn’t tell it to do that, did you?”
“No.”
“Right. It’s thinking for itself. Helping you. That’s not my horse. Or my magic. It never was.”
“Why did it bring me to you, then? Eh? You answer me that.”
“Well, I—” Morgrim stopped, frowned.
“Anyway, don’t matter. I’m giving it to you. It’s yours now, see. Your horse. To do what you like with. You can”—Fenn took a deep breath—“get the magic out of it. Do what you need. I got no clue how to stop this Tullivo bloke and his mates. You do. So, take the magic. Use it. Promise me?”
“You’d do that?”
“Knew it almost the moment I left. Blame fool, I was. I’m no magician.”
“Fenn—oh my Gods! You flew here on a worple horse to rescue me! It knew how to find me! It just killed a man! Don’t you understand? That is magic. It’s life and death and love and pain and hope and...and...don’t you see? Of course you’re a magician!”
“Aye, well, maybe. But that ain’t the point. Point is: how can I fight an army with a worple horse? Can’t. But you get some magic back and you can be stopping balefire and conjuring up storms and I don’t know what else. Anyway, ain’t discussing it. We’re getting off this island before someone comes. And deciding what to do with this one.” He jerked his head at Jasper, but couldn’t bring himself to look at the lad.
“They were expecting a ship at high tide,” Morgrim said. “Early evening.”
Fenn glanced at the sky. It was maybe midday.
“Right. So...I take you somewhere, another island where you can hide. Leave you there, safe. Come back here. Pick up the lad. Take him back to the city where he can’t do no more harm. Come back for you.” Fenn realised what he’d said. “Never was no need to kill him, was there?”
“You wouldn’t have.”
Morgrim’s voice was steady, but Fenn wasn’t so sure. He’d been a whisker away from pulling that trigger, and in the end, he reckoned he’d have done it—to save Morgrim and to try to stop a war—though the act of killing a defenceless boy would have haunted him to the end of his days.
“Happen I wouldn’t,” Fenn replied, slowly, because the boy was listening and somehow it felt important to protect him from the truth. But, with his eyes, Fenn said to Morgrim, thank fuck you stopped me. Morgrim gave him a grim little smile, and nodded.
“Mr. Todd?” It was Jasper’s voice.
Fenn looked down at the boy’s white, tear-stained face. “Well?”
“You should kill me anyway.”
“Fuck off,” Fenn scoffed.
“No, you should. Or give me the gun. I’ll do it myself.”
“Give over. What kind of talk is that?”
“I mean it. You don’t know anything. I have a sister. My father told me before he died—look after your sister. She’s only nine and she...and I...I...” Jasper’s face crumpled. “If I’m no use to them, she dies.”
“Well, you ain’t no use dead.”
“No, but maybe, if I died doing what they wanted...maybe...maybe...they’d see I did all I could and...and...”
The hope in Jasper’s voice died as he spoke. He knew how thin it sounded. Fenn looked away from the despair on the lad’s face. So much desperation in the world. So little hope. Because some people were utterly ruthless in getting things they didn’t need, and they dragged others along with them, even twisting something good like a boy’s love for his sister into a tool of evil. It was so wrong, it hurt.
“She’s dead already, isn’t she?” Jasper said, his voice dull. “They probably did it the moment I left. The letters were probably faked. I’ve done all this for nothing. Lied and spied and plotted and tried to whore myself.” He looked up at Morgrim. “I was supposed to get into your bed and get you to tell me your secrets. Only you...you didn’t...I mean...I’m s...sorry.”
Fenn opened his mouth to say your sister ain’t dead, likely. Morgrim had word, but Morgrim shook his head almost imperceptibly and Fenn realised it was probably a kindness, because sometimes hope was crueller than despair. Fenn wiped his eyes on the back of his hand instead and looked through the scrubby pine trees to the restless blue of the sea and above it, the endless blue of the sky.
