Book 7, Chapter Ten – Lop-Sided Loyalties

“Well, that was terrible,” an exhausted voice said, and Pandy looked up to see Empress Glory limping over, supported by Captain Reedsley and trailed by Healer Sinnett, with a pink-cheeked Thaniel at his side. High Priest Hobart was behind them, and Pandy didn’t like the way he was watching Thaniel – like a dog who’d just noticed an unattended pie sitting on the counter.

Pandy stuffed the two super-special rocks into the deep pockets of her pants and held out her hands for Thaniel even as she smiled at Empress Glory. “Thank you,” she said sincerely. “I couldn’t have done it without you.”

An unfamiliar emotion lit Glory’s usually guarded face for a moment, but by the time Pandy identified it as genuine pleasure, it was gone, and the woman glanced away with a shrug, then grimaced and rubbed her shoulder. “Being helpful shouldn’t hurt this much,” she complained, and this time it was Thaniel’s turn to brighten.

“I can help! Probably.” He held out a hand, frowning until a warm, wavering light flooded out of it, touching Empress Glory. He grinned. “Look! I can do it!”

Then Glory clutched her stomach, groaned, and vomited what looked like half-digested cheese all over the library floor. High Priest Hubert hurried forward, giving the heaving woman a partially sympathetic and partially outraged look.

“You mustn’t use the Light element on Dark mages, Nathaniel,” the little man said, gently tugging the boy away from Empress Glory. “They cannot bear its purity.”

Hmm. Sounded like Hubert didn’t particularly like Dark mages. That was going to be a problem, but Pandy already had enough of those, so this one would have to wait. Fortunately, Thaniel didn’t look any more impressed than she felt as he pulled free and went over to Glory’s side. She’d stopped throwing up already, but looked like she was even more miserable than before, if that was possible.

Healer Sinnett stepped up, opening his bag and removing a vial of some faintly reddish liquid. Offering it to Thaniel, he said, “Make sure she drinks this. A few sips at a time, to be certain it stays down, until it’s all gone.”

Glory started to protest, but her own misery, along with Thaniel’s renewed enthusiasm for his role as a healer, was enough to convince her to give in. Captain Reedsley helped her to a chair, and the children gathered around, each eager to help their new heroine. Eleanor – who was the only one who had known the woman for more than a few days – stepped in and started ordering the others around, with a new confidence and authority that made everyone else obey out of surprise as much as anything.

As soon as the little group – who seemed to have entirely forgotten that Thaniel had almost died less than fifteen minutes earlier – moved away, Sinnett said, “I’d love to examine those stones, if it’s at all possible.”

He was looking at Pandy’s bulging pockets. Pandy laid her hand over them, and Augustus stepped partially between the healer and Pandy, saying, “I’ll speak to Queen Louisa about it, but for now, I’m afraid they need to remain among a very select group.”

Sinnett looked disappointed, but his eyes narrowed just a bit. “And Lady Eurydice is part of that group, is she?” Seeing Augustus’s expression, he held up his hands, face relaxing back into jovial companionability, and said, “No, I quite understand. Just remember that I asked first, eh?”

Clearly trying to change the subject, he looked back at Thaniel and the other children and said, “If I was seeing Thaniel for the first time, I would tell you his injuries were at least a year old. Which they are, but before they looked no more than a few weeks healed. They were still raised, red, and tender, but are now noticeably diminished in both appearance and depth. His heartbeat is clear and steady, and to my eye, he’s a perfectly healthy child of six or seven years old.”

He paused, shaking his head as he looked at Pandy. “If I hadn’t been told that you, ah, have a different affinity, I would swear you must be the strongest Light elementalist I’ve ever met. And that’s saying something, because I was fortunate enough to work with Grace Stanley, before she married young Lord Bryan and moved to the countryside.”

Pandy blinked. Come to think of it, this was the first time she’d heard Grace’s original last name, wasn’t it? “Like Winstanley?”

This obviously wasn’t the reaction Healer Sinnett had expected, because he blinked right back at her. “Er, yes but no. The Winstanleys are an offshoot family, but there are very few Stanleys left, so the Winstanley name is far better known these days.”

“And the Stanleys are related to Queen Nora?” Pandy persisted.

It was Augustus who answered her. “Direct descendants of her youngest daughter, just as my family can be traced back to her eldest. The Stanleys were the only ones who still regularly produced Light mages, just as the Conroys were among the few families who still had Dark mages in almost every generation.”

Right. Pandy knew Grace had to be directly descended from Nora, and Grace and Augustus were ‘cousins’, even though as far as she could tell, the families hadn’t intermingled in the last several generations, probably not for a century or more. Noble genealogies were weird. Nodding absently, Pandy pressed on, asking another question that had been bothering her for a while now. “What happens if a Light or Dark mage gets pregnant with a baby with the opposite element?”

Sinnett sighed, suddenly looking several years older. Even the waxed tips of his mustache seemed to droop. “The babe… cannot survive, and it’s risky for the mother as well, I’m afraid. I told Grace that when she decided to marry Lord Bryan, but she had the optimism of youth. I was happy to hear that she’d had two healthy children.”

Pandy’s brain hamsters were spinning in their wheel so quickly she was surprised no one commented on the squeaking. “What if the mother was a very powerful Light elementalist?”

The healer huffed a small laugh. “And a talented healer? She might be able to heal herself and keep her magic from affecting the baby for a while, but eventually nature would take its course.”

“What if,” Pandy said slowly, feeling her way forward,, “she had someone remove her power? Make her magicless?”

Sinnett blinked. “If that were possible… I suppose it might work, though I can’t imagine it would be good for the mother. Light and Dark are the only two elements that seem to be truly antithetical, and a magicless person can safely bear a child with magic, or the other way around.”

Pandy’s gaze landed on the High Priest, who was intently staring at Thaniel. Grace had been trying to reach Ismara’s temple when she died. Why had Bryan been so desperate to stop her, and who had she hoped might help her? She had to know no Light mage could help a baby with the Dark element. After all, she herself was the most powerful Light mage outside of the church, and she had, if not a direct line of communication with Ismara, then a strong connection.

Pandy had one more question. “Is it possible… to cut a baby from its mother? Safely? Like, if something went wrong, and the baby got stuck or-” What other reasons were there for caesarian sections? “What if the mother was unconscious and couldn’t push? Might a child with a Dark element be born that way?”

The healer frowned, then his gaze dropped to Pandy’s abdomen before flicking to Augustus. His brows rose sharply, but he said, “I believe they do such things in the Valley, and perhaps elsewhere, but you must understand that, ah, reproduction is not a specialty of mine. If I found myself with such a patient, I might call for an Earth healer to shift the babe, or a Nature healer for salves or poultices to aid in the birth. Should I… Would you like me to provide you a referral for such a-”

Pandy’s face was so hot that it felt like it would melt right off her head, and she shook her head vigorously, noting as she did so that the corners of Augustus’s mouth were in full-on twitch-mode. Waving her hands vigorously, she said, “No! I don’t… It was just a… Hold on, I need to go- I need to speak to the High Priest.” She managed to plaster an undoubtedly hideous false smile on her face before putting words to action and making a beeline for High Priest Hobart. Augustus trailed after her, and she was probably only imagining the small snorts of laughter that seemed to come from that direction.

When Pandy stepped up beside the round little priest, she realized that she was actually slightly taller than he was. His bald scalp gleamed up at her, so bright she was almost startled that she couldn’t actually see herself in the reflection. He was still completely focused on Thaniel, and barely seemed aware he was no longer alone until Pandy cleared her throat. Then, turning slightly, so he could keep an eye on the newcomers and the boy, he offered Pandy an abstracted smile. “Hello, young lady. You must be very proud of yourself. He’s a wonderful child, and losing him truly would have been a terrible tragedy.”

Pandy stuffed her hands into her pockets, feeling the wooden boxes containing the stones. “He is. I just wanted to thank you for your help. Ah, for being willing to help, that is.”

Hobart’s smile grew slightly more genuine. “Of course, of course. It’s my duty as Ismara’s chosen High Priest to look out for all of her people, but especially any up and coming young Light mages.” He managed to focus on Pandy as he asked, “Or is he an elementalist? I saw you change… Well, I’ve never seen such a thing before, but I…” His round pink cheeks reddened a bit more.

“No, I’m not his elemental,” Pandy said, with a small, mental apology to Thaniel, who very much considered her exactly that, at least when she was in her Bunny form. “He’s still a mage. The stone was preventing his magic from working correctly, so-”

The High Priest nodded, becoming as stern as it was possible for a cherub to look. “Indeed. It seems that Bryan Conroy has quite a bit of explaining to do. I warned young Grace that he was a poor choice, but of course she’d made up her mind, and no one else would do.” He sighed. “I’ve often wondered if I did the right thing when I performed their marriage ceremony, but I knew Grace well enough to be certain she simply would have gone to someone else if I’d forced her hand.”

That wasn’t why Pandy had come over here, but it was interesting. “You were friends?”

Hobart gave a noncommittal shrug-nod. “As much as a teacher and student could be. As a Light elementalist, she trained with the church, and though I was already a high-ranking priest, I was also the only one with power nearly equal to her own, so I was chosen for the duty. Grace was a truly gifted elementalist.”

He bowed his head, only to jerk it back up as Augustus offhandedly said, “I believe High Priestess Lillian even suggested Grace might be a better successor than you, didn’t she?”

Suddenly looking far less like an adorable angel of love, Hobart said, “I believe she did say something like that. It was at the wedding, of course, and people are always prone to flatter the bride and groom rather extravagantly.”

This was rapidly going off the rails, so Pandy quickly pulled the wooden box from her right pocket and flipped it open, revealing the Dark stone in all of its rather subdued glory. “Did you get a chance to see the stone, um, your excellency?”

Distracted, the high priest deflated and even managed a self-deprecating chuckle. “Please, do call me Hobart, Lady Eurydice. I’ve only been the high priest for a bit more than a year, and I’m not used to all of the formality that comes with the title.”

This time Augustus’s little snort held no real amusement, but Pandy wasn’t paying any attention to him. Instead, she pushed the Dark stone a bit closer to the priest. “Didn’t you wonder what this is?”

She winced internally at the obvious question, but Hobart only glanced at the stone. “Yes, well, of course Sinnett filled me in on it when he asked for my help. I do wish someone had thought to include me sooner, especially as the boy is such a strong Light mage, but fortunately it wasn’t too late. Now that I know, we can take steps to bring the boy into the church, at least until this is all over. I intend to meet with Queen Regent Louisa immediately after leaving here, and I’m certain she’ll agree.”

Normally, that statement would have concerned Pandy, but at the moment she was focused on something else. She waved the stone under Hobart’s nose once more, saw no reaction, and finally closed the box again. Well, it probably would have been too easy if the thing reacted to him in some way, though she had been wondering what his reaction would be to it. “It’s amazing that Bryan was able to make this crystal and use it to save Thaniel’s life, don’t you think?” She saw Augustus’s sharp look from the corner of her eye, but made sure she stayed as relaxed as possible. She wasn’t interested in the answer to this question. Nope, not at all.

Hobart nodded, though it was a bit reluctant. “The man is a genius, we must grant him that.”

Pandy smiled, and they exchanged a few more words before she finally thanked the high priest again and drifted away from the others. Once she was fairly certain they were out of normal earshot, Pandy lowered her voice and asked Augustus, “What did you tell Hobart and Healer Sinnett about where the stone came from?”

Augustus shook his head, looking grim. “As little as possible, since we’re still trying to keep the fact that making them is even possible a secret. We said Bryan had a magic stone that had been passed down in his family, and used that to save Thaniel, but that it was running out of magic, and needed to be removed.”

Pandy nodded. “But the problem with that is that anyone who knew about the magical god-rocks would immediately think about, um, the Dark god’s stone, right?”

Augustus inclined his head in agreement.

“But Hobart didn’t even twitch. Not interested. So either he doesn’t know about the stones-”

“Like most people,” Augustus put in dryly.

She waved a hand. “Yes, like most people, or he has some reason to believe that this stone isn’t the real one. Otherwise, wouldn’t he react the same way Healer Sinnett did? There should at least be some interest there, even if it was negative because it’s Dark magic, and Hobart obviously doesn’t like Dark mages. But he barely even looked at it.”

Augustus frowned. “What did you figure out, Rabbit?”

Glancing back over her shoulder, Pandy said, “Bryan told his captors that the stone he used to save Thaniel was one he’d created based on stories from his family history. If you didn’t tell Hobart anything about where the stone came from, and Sinnett believes it was a family heirloom, why would Hobart think Bryan made it? Why wasn’t he more interested in it?”

“It’s… not much, especially to use against the High Priest. He could have just been agreeing with you,” Augustus said, but his gaze was thoughtful as he watched Hobart, who was now talking to Thaniel.

Pandy grimaced. “I know. Honestly, it’s more of a feeling than anything else. But I don’t think you should trust him. I don’t know what he wants, or why Ismara’s High Priest would help a cult that was trying to put a whole new god in place, but there’s something off about him.”

“Like he might be planning to kidnap Thaniel and turn him over to the Shadow Exchange?” Professor Beeswick asked, appearing from behind Pandy, even though there was nowhere for him to have come from. Pandy was coming to believe that Dragons were just overgrown, scaly flying cats.

“What?” Augustus demanded, moving back toward the rest of the group.

Pandy spun around too, automatically looking for Thaniel. All of the other children were there, as were most of the adults. Thaniel was missing, along with High Priest Hobart.