The Magician’s Apprentice

healing increase rapidly. She concentrated on the rents in the tubes and watched them slowly shrink and close. She sent power to the torn pulse paths and felt a rush of triumph as they all but snapped shut. The general damage to his insides from the toxic liquids was more subtle, but soon she could feel a sense of rightness return.

As she channelled power into him she began to feel the way his body used the magic. She understood it in an instinctive way that she could not have explained to another. Perhaps if I somehow memorise the way this feels and flows, I can apply my own magic to a non-magician and heal them, too.

Soon the damage within his abdomen was all but gone. She concentrated on the tear in his skin, boosting the magic until flesh drew close to flesh and knitted itself together. But even as she saw the scar tissue form, she knew that he was not completely healed.

He had lost a lot of blood. Delving deeper, she wondered if there was anything she could do to replace it. Healers did not agree on which organ produced blood. But if he rested, ate and drank some water perhaps his body would recover by itself.

– Tessia?

– Yes, Jayan?

– I felt that. I felt you healing me. I wasn’t imagining it, was I?

– No. I’ve found it. The secret. It’s—

– Don’t tell me.

– What? Why not? More people need to know. In case you’ve forgotten, we are both still in the middle of a war, stuck on our own in a city of people who want to kill us. If I die this discovery will be lost.

She felt a wave of emotion from him. Fear. Protectiveness. Affection. Longing. All mingled, yet something else.

– Don’t talk about dying, he told her. You have to survive this war. I’ve waited too long and it’s almost over.

– What are you talking about?

But she knew even as she asked. She felt it leaking through the cracks of his self-control. Even as she recognised it and felt astonishment, she felt her own body respond in a way that no healer had ever been able to explain in a satisfactory matter. One of the mysteries. One of the more delightful mysteries, her father would have once said. What was the heart for but to pump blood? Why then did it do this other, inexplicable thing?

And why me? Why not some rich woman? Some pretty apprentice?

– I love you, he told her.

Sweet joy rushed through her. But there was a distinct smugness about his words. He’d sensed her feelings in return, and was pleased with himself for doing so.

– Turns out I love you too, she replied, communicating her wry amusement. Of all the annoying people in the world.

– Poor Tessia, he mocked.

– I’m sure as soon as we get back to Imardin you’ll be off flirting with rich, pretty girls. Maybe I shouldn’t tell you the secret of healing. It’ll make you even more appealing to them.

– More appealing than I already am? He didn’t pause to let her retort. Actually, you are right. It would be safer if another person knew.

So she told him, and when she was sure he had grasped it she withdrew her mind from his body. As she opened her eyes she felt a hand slip behind her neck and draw her down. Jayan rose and pressed his mouth to hers. Surprised, she resisted a moment. Then a shiver ran through her, not cold but warm and wonderful. She kissed him back, liking the way his lips moved against hers, and responding in kind.

I could get to like this.

She almost protested when he let her go. They stared at each other for a moment, then both began to smile. Then Jayan’s smile faded again. He pushed himself up onto his elbows and looked down at his bloodied clothes, then grimaced and put a hand to his forehead.

“Dizzy,” he said.

“You’ll be faint and weak for a while,” she told him.

“We can’t stay here.”

“No,” she agreed, standing up. Looking round, she saw that the fire in the house nearby had almost burned itself out. “Let’s hide in there until morning. Nobody will bother entering because anything valuable will have been burned, and the walls might fall in. I can protect us with a shield.”

“Yes. This is the main road, after all. We can keep watch, and come out when someone we know passes by. It might take a while, but someone is sure to come along eventually. Where’s your bag?”

“I don’t know. It doesn’t matter, though. If I can make this healing work on non-magicians, I won’t need cures or tools any more.”

He nodded, then rose to his feet in stages, first sitting up, then rising into a squat, then leaning over, and finally straightening. As they started towards the house she felt a wave of tiredness and stumbled. Healing had taken more magic than she’d realised.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” Jayan asked.

“Yes. Just tired.”

“Well, wait until we get inside before you fall asleep, won’t you?”

She gave him a withering look, then let him lead her into the house.

CHAPTER 49

Anagging thirst dragged Jayan out of sleep. He opened his eyes and saw charred walls bathed in morning light. They looked no softer than the surface he was lying against. His body ached. There was a pressure on his arm. He looked down.

Tessia lay curled up against his side, asleep.

His heart lifted and suddenly the hardness of the wall and ground wasn’t so unbearable.

I should have waited until the war was over and we were safe, he thought. But she was there, too close to my mind, and I couldn’t hide how I felt.

Yet he couldn’t bring himself to regret anything.

She loves me. Despite all the stupid things I’ve said. Despite me pushing her away. He realised he hadn’t expected her to. That he’d thought that, when they returned to Imardin and he gathered the courage to let her know his feelings, she’d turn him away.

Maybe she would change her mind. When she was famous for discovering healing. When she grew older. She was still young. Seventeen or eighteen? He couldn’t remember. When he considered what he had been like at that age – constantly changing his mind – he couldn’t delude himself that she would never grow tired of him and find some other person to be interested in.

But she is not like me at that age. She fixes on something and remains true to it – like healing. Perhaps she will be the same with people. With me. And I wasn’t completely incapable of sticking to one thing back then. Nothing ever took away my interest in magic, or my loyalty to Dakon.

He reached for the bowl of water she had brought him last night, after disappearing into the burned house for a while, and drank deeply. The water tasted of smoke. He closed his eyes and let time slide past.

After a while something roused him. In the distance the sound of hoofbeats echoed. Several horses, coming closer. Jayan felt his heart skip a beat. He and Tessia had meant to take it in turns to sleep, the other watching for passing Kyralians, but they had both succumbed to exhaustion. He suspected the healing had used a lot of Tessia’s power. She had probably needed the sleep as much as he had.

The hoofbeats were growing rapidly louder.

As he shifted, intending to disturb Tessia as little as possible, her eyes flew open. She blinked at him, then frowned.

“Is that horses?”

Instantly awake, she pushed herself to her feet. Jayan rose and they both moved to the broken wall. Peering out, they saw twenty or so Kyralian magicians riding towards them. Jayan looked around, checking for signs that anybody might be watching. The road and nearby houses appeared deserted. He stepped out and waved an arm at the riders.