by Eva Chase
We shouted out more defensive spells to cover our retreat, the four of us scions letting the less powerful mages exit first. My mother extended her hand toward us, and I flinched in anticipation of a spell. But that wasn’t what she was doing at all.
“Persephone,” she said. “Please. It doesn’t have to be like this. You were meant to stand with me. Let me show you the future we’re going to make.”
Her plea and the rawness of her voice tugged at me. I wanted to believe I could still change her mind. I wanted to believe I could still make a difference through peaceful means.
But her colleagues had just tried to slaughter the men I loved, and she hadn’t done a thing to stop them, even if she hadn’t attacked me herself. I’d tried appealing to whatever compassion she had in her so many times before—and her need for power had always defeated me.
“I’ll listen to you when you’re ready to listen to all of us,” I said.
Malcolm grasped my arm. The last of us retreated, hustling down the stairs with magical barriers thrown up behind us to protect our backs. Every step reverberated through my body with a growing sense of finality.
There was no going back from this—for any of us.
Chapter Fifteen
Rory
“We left too many people behind,” I said as Malcolm’s car raced on toward campus. We’d taken off in a hurry, not wanting to risk the barons themselves or their loyal blacksuits catching us in our escape. My gut was twisted with the memory of the bodies that had been lying limp in the office—most if not all of them only unconscious, I hoped, but even so, they’d be facing harsher punishments once they woke up.
“They knew they were getting into something dangerous,” Malcolm said. “They were willing to take that risk. If we’d stayed back to try to get them out, we’d all be in some blacksuit detention center—or worse.”
My gaze lingered on the bloody sleeve of his wool jacket. Connar and I had managed to stop the bleeding with our amateur healing efforts, but the wound had to still be hurting him. He could have faced a much worse fate. He could be dead right now.
“The barons really don’t care about anything except this plan now, do they?” A hollow sensation spread through my chest. They didn’t care about their people, or about their heirs—would they slaughter us all in the end like they had the joymancers, just to make sure we wouldn’t stand in their way? Was ruling over the Naries so important they didn’t mind if the hearts of their baronies passed to someone who’d been born outside the family—or were most of them counting on the younger siblings falling in line once we were out of the way?
Maybe that was why my mother had held back with me: not because I meant all that much to her but because I was the only remaining thread in the Bloodstone line.
“We’re not worth anything to them if they can’t order us around,” Malcolm muttered.
“The blacksuits and their other allies there witnessed how they treated us—how they treated the fearmancers who stood up with us,” Declan said from the back. “The violence all started on the barons’ side. Anyone can see they’re getting out of control after that. I wish it had gone better, but I think in some ways we did prove our point.”
“Now what?” Connar asked, his voice strained. “They’ll be even more prepared for us next time. If they won’t back down, what else can we do?”
“Let’s get back to campus and regroup,” I said. “And then… then hopefully we’ll be able to come up with a better idea. There are only two barons from the original pentacle left. How long can they keep people’s faith when their own group is falling apart?”
No one attempted to answer that hypothetical question. I suspected we were all afraid the answer was, “A hell of a lot longer than we’d like to think.”
Several other cars pulled into the campus garage with ours as our Guard and some of our other allies also came to regroup. Victory’s parents had driven her; Hector Killbrook had gone with a couple of his colleagues. The man now first in line for the Killbrook barony still looked sallow as he got out of the car. Blood flecked the collar of his shirt, and his jacket lapels were charred. A burn mark someone had done a hasty and incomplete healing spell on darkened the pale skin that showed there.
Holden and Noah moved to join us as we left the garage, Declan clasping his younger brother’s shoulder with tightened lips. I couldn’t imagine how worried he’d been for Noah during the fight.
I assumed we’d gather in the Guard room to take stock. But as we crossed the grounds toward Killbrook Hall, a mass of students surged off the green to meet us, a few professors in their midst.
“Traitors!” the yell went up like it had before. “You don’t belong here. We don’t want people who’ll attack the barons messing things up for the rest of us.”
I halted with the other scions around me, abruptly exhausted. The few blacksuits who’d joined us for the confrontation stepped forward to break up the crowd, but a couple of the students flung spells at them defiantly.
Were we going to have to fight all over again just to get back to the closest thing some of us had to a home right now?
“There will clearly need to be sanctions placed on all those students who participated in this embarrassing spectacle against our leaders,” Professor Crowford was saying when the front door of Killbrook Hall flew open.
Ms. Grimsworth strode out, flanked by several of the other professors—including Viceport, who was my current mentor, and Razeden, who’d supported me more than once—and the rest of the blacksuits who’d defected. The oncoming crowd quieted as the headmistress approached.
Ms. Grimsworth came to a stop and clapped her hands with an air of absolute authority, made more rather than less imposing by the fierceness in her normally prim expression and the strands of hair that had come loose from her tightly coiled bun.
“Enough is enough,” she said. “I will not have my school turning into a warzone—and it’s clear which side has instigated the conflict. From this point onward, I declare Bloodstone University a safe haven for anyone who disagrees with the barons’ attacks on the Naries and needs protection from retaliation. Anyone who attempts to instigate further violence will be escorted off campus and blocked by the wards. You may leave of your own accord or force the issue, but I will not let this savagery continue any further.”
Faced with a few dozen of us, including the scions, on one side and the ultimate authority over the university on the other, our accusers faltered. Mutters passed between them as they stirred restlessly. Professor Crowford looked as if he’d swallowed his tongue.
Hector Killbrook appeared to shake himself out of the semi-daze he’d been in since his fatal skirmish with his brother. He stepped to the front of our group with his shoulders squared. His voice came out firm.
“As acting Baron Killbrook, I support the headmistress’s declaration. This isn’t a time when I expect any of you can focus on classes. If you want to stand with us, you can stay and we’ll discuss how. If you’d rather support the other barons, who are acting more and more irresponsibly and beyond the law, I suggest you take the opportunity to leave now and rejoin your families until this dispute is settled.”
Many of the students started to move toward the garage to get their cars and make good on that suggestion. The professors in the bunch glanced toward Ms. Grimsworth.
“Helene,” Crowford said with a note of protest in his voice.
She fixed him with a steely stare. “I know where your loyalties lie. I’m not going to punish you for them, but your teaching skills will not be required until this situation is resolved.”
His mouth twisted, and he marched past her to Killbrook Hall, I hoped to collect his necessary things from his apartment in the staff quarters before he left campus too. The headmistress turned to the blacksuits with her.
“A few of you can handle the adjustments to the wards, I assume?” she said.
The man next to her nodded and gestured to a couple of his colleagues to accompany
him. As they jogged ahead of him down the road toward the edge of campus, he swiveled to face us scions again.
“Miss Bloodstone, Mr. Nightwood, and Mr. Ashgrave, if you’d accompany us, please? With your help, we should be able to attune the wards so it’s at least more difficult for your parents and aunt to breach the university’s defenses, if they should choose to try.”
“Of course,” I said. My heart beat faster as we moved to join them, but it wasn’t all anxiety now. We were in an awful situation, and I didn’t see the way through it yet, but our allies were more willing to stand up than ever. I didn’t know whether we could win this war, but we’d at least make the barons work for any victory they claimed.
By the evening, the campus wasn’t so much less populated as differently populated. While dozens of students had left, many of the older members of the families who agreed with us had arrived, either wanting to be part of our planning or feeling the campus was safer from the barons’ possible vengeance than their own homes—or both. Several more blacksuits had arrived, at least a couple of whom I thought I recognized from our confrontation with the barons. Apparently our leaders’ show of force had turned some people against them instead of into more avid supporters.
We had at least one mage in our midst who didn’t fully support our cause. After I spoke with Hector about the evidence that someone in on our plans had revealed them to our opponents, the new baron asked several of the blacksuits to question those who’d stayed on campus with a spell to compel their honesty. It wasn’t long before they turned up a friend of one of our Guard members, who blanched as the confession spilled from his lips.
“My family has really been struggling,” the young man stammered in an attempt to defend himself. “I thought I could get a favor from the barons if I helped them a little—I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt.”
I wasn’t sure how much I believed that, but I was just glad to see him escorted off the grounds.
As daylight dwindled, Ms. Grimsworth called all of the Nary students onto the green with many of us looking on. Regret colored her voice as she spoke to them.
“You’ve undergone a lot of turmoil during the past few weeks, and all of that under my watch. I apologize for not intervening sooner. The situation has become untenable. Unfortunately, the spells that were cast on you are keyed to the mages who performed them, and we don’t have them with us to undo that magic. But while I can’t let you return home with what you know, I’m making it clear to all the magical students on campus that attacks on our scholarship students will not be tolerated. For now, you can at least relax and know you won’t be harmed any further.”
There was no mistaking the relief, if wary, that passed over most of the nonmagical students’ faces. They drifted back to their dorms more like people and less like panicked prey. Watching them made me think of the Nary student I had managed to get out of here before the chaos had reached its peak.
How was Shelby doing with all the chaos that was now happening in her own world? The city where she was now living for her new orchestra job wasn’t a huge one, so I didn’t think there’d have been violence there, but I couldn’t be sure of that.
Hey! I texted to her. Just wondering how you’re doing with all the craziness that’s been happening lately. Have there been any protests near you?
My worries eased when her reply came just a moment later. Nothing around here, but it’s scary seeing that stuff on TV. Thankfully my family’s nowhere near the worst of it either. I can’t believe the White House is really going to go through with some of those policies.
I know, I wrote back. It’s ridiculous. Hopefully things will get resolved soon. You stay safe!
You too!
At least she had her music and her orchestra performances to distract her. I’d feel better if I knew how the hell we were going to resolve the conflict already, though.
As I put away my phone, Ms. Grimsworth motioned us scions over, and several members of our Guard came with us. A couple blacksuits flanked the headmistress.
“Our colleagues have adjusted the wards around campus not just to repel those we’ve removed but also to alert us if any magic is used on them,” she said. “We want to be prepared if the barons attempt to break through those wards. There’ll be a sound like a fire alarm that should carry right across the grounds.”
“Good to know,” I said. Then we’d just have to worry about stopping the barons and their allies from managing to break through, if they made that attempt. My stomach knotted at the thought of another battle.
“We’d like to gather everyone together to discuss our own strategies moving forward,” Declan said. “I assume it’s no problem for us to make use of the gymnasiums?”
The headmistress made a weary gesture with her hand. “Make whatever use of the university buildings you see fit to. The sooner we come out of this mess, the happier I’ll be.”
It didn’t take long to put out the call. Within the hour, we’d gathered all of our allies who’d come to the university in the larger gym in the Stormhurst Building.
“We can’t simply hide away here forever,” Mrs. Blighthaven jumped in as soon as Declan had thanked everyone for joining us. “That won’t change anything that’s happening.”
“Do any of us really want to go up against the barons in a full-out fight, though, especially after they’ve shown no mercy before?” another woman said.
“Technically, we should have the greater balance of power.” Malcolm motioned to our cluster of barony families that had grouped together at the head of the room. “Barons Nightwood and Bloodstone may not want to acknowledge them, but we have the only qualified Baron Killbrook as well as the rightful soon-to-be Barons Ashgrave and Stormhurst too.”
Declan nodded. “Some of you here would have supported the current barons in the past, but you’ve recognized their growing instability and flouting of the law. We need you to reach out to any friends and colleagues you think you could get to recognize that too. If we draw away enough of their support, they won’t be able to keep this effort up.”
“We can’t let the situation with the Naries escalate in the meantime.” The new Baron Killbrook scanned the crowd in front of us. “We know that several fearmancers have taken assignments in Washington and other areas of major political activity to instigate anger and violence among the Naries. We can challenge those goals directly. I’d like to hear from volunteers willing to head to those areas and work magic to counteract the effects of our opponents’ spells. Cut off the barons’ plans at the root, and they’ll have to reconsider.”
A bunch of the older mages in the room stepped forward with offers of support, including Victory’s parents. I guessed there wasn’t much for those of us school-aged to do other than continue our regular efforts. We’d already tried pretty much everything we could think of.
Declan stepped to the side to discuss something with his brother in hushed tones. “I think I may have a way to strip away my aunt’s political power,” he said when he returned to us. “I’m going to consult with the blacksuits and see if we can put that in motion quickly.”
That would leave my mother and Malcolm’s father running the show alone. I glanced at the Nightwood scion, but he just grimaced. “I don’t know if anything short of death is going to force my dad to back down now.” His gaze slid toward the doorway. “I think I’d better bring Agnes onto campus. At this point, the grounds are more secure than the apartment I set up for her. You all can survive a few hours without me?”
Jude rolled his eyes. “Just make sure you survive stepping outside the wards.”
“We’ll be fine,” Connar said, clapping his friend on the back. “Even with the protections we put in place at the apartment building, she’ll definitely be better off here with us now that Ms. Grimsworth has given us the campus.”
We’d have all the heirs together in one place then—well, all except one. I glanced at my phone as if Maggie might have texted me without me realizing it. I hadn’t he
ard from her since the confrontation, and that didn’t seem like good news. I knew for sure now that she hadn’t been the one who’d tipped off the barons. Had they realized she’d given away their location to us? What would they be doing to her if they had?
Even if they hadn’t figured it out yet, she’d taken enough risks for us. I didn’t want her death on my conscience too.
“I’m going to tell Maggie to come here,” I said to the guys. “She’s helped us a lot, and maybe she could help us more if she stays out there… but I don’t think it’s fair to leave her in the line of fire. Sooner or later, the barons are going to realize that she’s leaking information to us, and I don’t think she’d survive that.”
“She’s your family,” Malcolm said to me before he headed off. “You do what you think is right.”
“And hey, the more the merrier!” Jude gave me a tight but genuine smile.
I tapped out the message on my phone. Things have gotten too dangerous. I’d rather have you here with us than out there and vulnerable. Come to campus as soon as you can, please.
Now I just had to hope that she saw the message in time to accept my plea.
Chapter Sixteen
Declan
Every time I tried to loosen my grip on the steering wheel, my fingers started to clench again a few seconds later. My chest was clenched up too and had been since the moment we’d set off.
“It’s going to be fine,” Noah said, stretching out his long legs from the seat beside me. “You’ll be right there, and we’ll have plenty of cover from our ‘friends’ in the back.”
“If there’s anything to cover the two of you from,” muttered one of the blacksuits sitting behind us.
There were three of them back there, although they’d cast spells that made it nearly impossible to make them out unless you knew the signs to look for. A defector who’d joined us on campus had convinced two of her colleagues who were still officially on duty but unofficially on the fence about their loyalties to join us for this trip. The other woman had stayed pensively quiet since we’d picked them up; the man seemed to be making a show of his skepticism.
