struggle.” Caul continued to walk toward her slowly, step by step. “As a good soldier, I let him believe it. You can believe it, too, if you like.”
“Stop.”
Stanton’s voice echoed through the forest, ringing off the high slopes above. The booming, resonant force of it made Caul freeze, his heavy booted foot halting in midair.
“Miss Edwards is not going to have her hand cut off,” Stanton said.
Caul cocked his head, looking around himself. He struggled to move his leg, as if trying to pull his foot from deep within sticky mud.
“Is this your best, Stanton?” he said. “I suppose I could hardly expect more, after New Bethel—”
“New Bethel was a miscalculation,” Stanton said.
“A classically trained credomancer, a graduate of the prestigious Mirabilis Institute, without sufficient power to prevail over a handful of backwater Bible thumpers?” Caul shook his head. “That’s not a miscalculation, that’s a rout. The faith Mirabilis has invested in you must be pretty small indeed.”
“Sophos Mirabilis,” Stanton said, emphasizing each word, “is a fine man. His power is great, and I am his strong right arm.”
Caul’s lips pursed with distaste. “Such nauseating language you have to use. How can you live this way? How can you be satisfied with such mean scraps of power, so grudgingly bestowed from such unworthy men?” Caul jerked his foot hard, took another step forward. “Men who have no faith in you. Men who have no wish to see you succeed. Men, indeed, who wish to see you fail.”
“Nonsense,” Stanton said.
“Your placement in Lost Pine was a calculated humiliation. You can’t deny that. Why does Mirabilis want to undercut your power, Stanton? Why does he want to make you a failure?”
“I know exactly who’s trying to undercut me, sangrimancer,” Stanton said with a contemptuous half-smile. “You’ll hardly send me crying with a squink or two.”
“Maybe not,” Caul said. “But sangrimancers—men who practice real magic—have better weapons than squinks and Trines.”
He moved quickly, his hand going to his throat and the two-chambered pendant that rested there. In one smooth movement he brought the alembic up and stretched the hand toward Emily, simultaneously speaking words that were dark, low, guttural. His hand was wreathed in brilliant shifting light, but he did not throw the magic; he just kept speaking, the power dancing around his fingertips growing brighter and brighter.
Emily’s right hand shot up as if grabbed. She tried to set her feet, scramble for purchase on the slippery fir needles, but it was no use—she was pulled inexorably toward Caul and the magic gathering around his fist. Dag grabbed her, tried to hold her back, but Caul just spoke louder, and more quickly, and Dag was dragged along with her, skidding toward the chanting sangrimancer. When Emily was within Caul’s reach, he shot up his other hand to grab her throat, his fingers nearly circling it. The magic that had drawn her to him evaporated into the stone with a loud pop; nausea billowed through her, mingling with pain and asphyxiation.
Dag threw himself at Caul, but Caul sidestepped, slamming a heavy elbow into Dag’s back as the lumberman stumbled past. Before Dag even hit the ground, Caul kicked him square in the gut, hard. Dag crumpled, groaning.
Then Emily could see nothing but Caul’s face as his huge hand squeezed more tightly around her throat. But she could hear Stanton’s voice, booming cadent Latin. And she felt sudden little impacts coming from all around them. Little stones were whizzing through the air. Pebbles, cobbles, hand-size rocks, sharp little chips of granite—all were flying with tremendous force right at Caul’s head. The big sangrimancer winced, ducking, but the projectiles were battering him with the viciousness of a bee-swarm.
“Sometimes smaller weapons serve better,” Stanton said, each word keen as the edge of a knife.
The stone was attracted to vast concentrations of power, like the one Caul had summoned, but less powerful spells—like the séance, or Stanton’s ever-ready fingersnap flames—could still work if she was far enough away …
The storm of small missiles pelted Caul mercilessly, peppering his face and arms, leaving bloody cuts and welting bruises. Thrusting Emily roughly to the ground, he seized his alembic and stormed toward Stanton.
With a roar, he threw his body against the protective magic of Stanton’s Trine. The alembic glowed in his hand as he slammed his shoulder against the Trine’s magic again and again, as if he was trying to break down a heavy door.
Finally, drawing a deep breath, Caul gave a rumbling bellow from the deepest part of his