Bone, Fog, Ash & Star (The Last Days of Tian Di #3)(7)

“Foss?” asked Eliza. She was beginning to feel faint again.

He met her gaze with a sorrowful face.

“I fear that you cannot rely on the help of the Mancers in this matter,” he said.

“That’s ridiculous!” cried Nell. “We’ll persuade them! We’ll –”

“Hush,” Rea said to her sharply, which startled Nell to silence.

“Foss.” Eliza struggled to keep her voice steady. “Tell me what you know.”

“I do not know anything,” he replied. “But Great Magic was worked in the Citadel recently. I had no part in it but I felt it of course, we all did…the kind of Magic that might be used to summon a great being. Or call the Thanatosi.”

Eliza shook her head. No words would come.

“I do not know,” Foss repeated. “But it seems possible, even likely, that the Mancers called the Thanatosi to kill your friend.”





Chapter

~3~

Charlie woke with a start and shouted, “Help me! I’m drowning!”

Somebody grabbed his hand and the world swam into view. He was lying in a tent lit with candles and the somebody holding his hand was Eliza. The candlelight threw shadows across her face, with its pointed chin, beaky nose and serious black eyes. She had such an odd look on her face, like she’d just put something very hot in her mouth and couldn’t decide whether to swallow it or spit it out.

“Bad dream,” he muttered. “What’re you doing in here?”

“Do you remember what happened?” she asked, her voice high and strained.

Charlie thought about this a bit, then said, “Something definitely happened. I cannay move. Why cannay I move?” He kicked his legs in a sudden panic. “Oh. I can move. Then what’s wrong with me? Something’s different, aye.”

“There were…assassins,” began Eliza.

“Forsake the Ancients!” Charlie sat up in the bed and stared at her. His face had gone quite white.

“Charlie?” she said anxiously.

“Eliza…I cannay change. I cannay change. Why cannay I change?”

“I couldnay…I could only save part of you. This part. The human part. I’m so sorry, Charlie.”

“Start again. Oh, by the Ancients. Start all over again, Eliza. Why cannay I change?”

She told him what had happened and he held a hand to his chest as if aware of his beating heart for the first time.

“I’m just a person,” he said dully when she had finished. “Lah, I’m just a person. What good is that going to do me?”

“Some of us manage to live with it,” said Eliza. “The real question is why the Mancers would send assassins after you.”

“You’re nay just a person, you’re a Sorceress,” said Charlie. “It’s nay the same thing. You can do Magic.”

Eliza took a deep breath.

“How are you feeling, Charlie?”

“Like I’ve been shot with arrows and killed and drowned and then dragged back. I cannay change, I cannay protect myself and there are assassins after me. Otherwise, fine. It hurts to sit up, though.”

“Then dinnay sit up.”

“No. I want to sit up.” He looked at her for a moment. “So you brought me back from…lah, being dead.”

“Yes.”

He paused to ponder this, and then said, “Thank you.”

She gave a nod and he laughed feebly.

“Ouch. It hurts to laugh too. I dinnay recommend being shot with arrows, Eliza. Keep that in mind. And thank you doesnay begin to sum it up of course. I dinnay know what to say to you.”

His hand was still in hers. She looked at it.

“I couldnay let you go. Charlie, do you remember just before the assassins came? I was about to tell you…” Her sentence trailed off as Foss swept into the tent.

“Ah!” he said. “You are awake. And alive! Well done. A far better state than the alternative, or so we tend to think, though we’ve no empirical evidence to back it up. The Thanatosi are back.”

“Already?” cried Eliza. She ran to the entrance of the tent. It was just after dawn. Outside the camp, the desert was obscured by fog. The wheeling white bodies of the assassins spun along the edges of Foss’s barrier.

“Thank the Ancients we have a Mancer here,” said Nell, who had been waiting outside. She was pale, and there were shadows under her eyes. “Is he awake?”

“Yes.”

Eliza could not tear her eyes away from the swift-limbed Thanatosi. They moved in a white blur, feet flashing, bright blades swinging. But they could not enter.

“We need to discuss our next move immediately,” said Foss. “Come, Eliza Tok. And you too…Eliza’s friend.”

“You still dinnay know my name, do you?” said Nell in disbelief. Foss pretended not to hear her, and the two girls followed him back into Charlie’s tent.

“Everything OK?” Charlie asked weakly.

“For the moment,” said Foss. “I assume you have realized that you are no longer a Shade.”

Charlie nodded. Nell gasped and began to ask a question but Foss carried on, cutting her off: “You will live out your life as a mortal human now. No doubt you will adjust. However, if we do not hide you from the Thanatosi it will be a very short life indeed.”