Fantastic Schools, Volume 3

by Emily Martha Sorensen

  If I were really lucky, my last blasting spell had blown open the door to that distant room. Anyone chasing me that way would assume I’d escaped into the corridor. It was time to move vertically. Up was impossible. Down looked to be the right answer. Careful use of a cutting spell let me pull a plug from the floor. Two feet down was the ceiling of another room. The floor beams were ironwood, four-by-twelves, meaning they were decently far apart; I’d fit through the gap between two of them. The wood paneling at the bottom doubtless held lathes for plaster. Was anyone down there? I’d drop a section of that ceiling. Loud protests would be silenced with blasting spells. On silence, I’d lower myself through. My trusty cutting spell dropped a section of the floor down the two feet onto the next ceiling. A repeat dropped the lathe and plaster ceiling into the room below. All was dark. There was no telling what was down there. The falling ceiling was followed by silence, not by outraged shouts. I lowered myself over the edge, set Dance of the Air, and let go.

  The drop had to be most of twenty feet. If I’d tried it without Dance, I’d have broken my legs. I summoned light. This was someone’s very expensive receiving room. The walls behind me were heavily warded. That had to be the entrance to these quarters. At a guess, I should go the other way until I reached an outside balcony. These rooms must be deserted. No one could have missed the roof collapsing, let alone me dropping though the gap.

  A central pair of doors, all deeply carved gilded wood, led me to a modest corridor, perhaps only ten feet wide, with more receiving rooms to the side. The decorations were amazing for their lack of taste. If it was metal, it was solid gold. If it was crystal, it had the oily sheen of diamond. A Triskittenion heir who proposed wasting money on this scale would be disinherited. The thought that these were rooms for landheirs was too dismaying for words. Someplace there were likely to be the his and her bedrooms for the master and mistress of the house. I couldn’t check; the side doors were mostly warded.

  Here, however, was an open door, a dressing room with closets and all sorts of clothing, including an assortment of bathrobes. I grabbed what looked to be the warmest, cut off the bottom, and made haste. Behind me, smoke was curling down into the receiving room from up above. At the corridor’s end were glass-paneled doors. They opened to a balcony overlooking a great room, a room on absurd scale. I had to be thirty feet above the floor, and twenty feet below the ornately painted and gilded ceiling. The center of the room was occupied by a dining table; the expression ‘larger than a swimming pool’ came to mind. The table had to be a hundred feet long. At its far end was an enormous stained--glass window. Presumably the human figures in the glass were glorious ancestors, people I did not know, shown trampling unmen underfoot. From the light, beyond the glass was outside. No outside doors were to be seen.

  “You!” The shout was directly behind me. “Unman serf! Hands high!”

  I sent a half dozen combat spells over my back, then pivoted to see what I was facing. The fellows in livery had clearly not been expecting my response. One of them was flat on the floor, one was reeling, and two had set solid defensive wards. I was outnumbered several to one, more adults, at least one drawing a spellcasting sword. I let them have it, targeting not their wards, but a length of the ceiling, walls, and floor. The walls collapsed nicely. The ceiling fell onto their heads. They couldn’t see me, and would have trouble pursuing. Still, it was very definitely time to go. I gave myself a moment to focus, summoning more power, and blasted the entirety of the stained--glass wall. I’d made sure to catch the window frames. They all blew outward.

  Steel shutters the height of the windows started to slide in from left and right. They slid a few feet, screeched loudly, and ground to a stop. I’d warped their rails enough that they could not close farther. Dance of the Air did not exactly let me fly, but I slid down an invisible ski slope, targeting the center of the window. Outside was a lawn and wall.

  As I slid, I summoned flame diagrams, the ones we’d seen earlier this term in Diagrammatics. I massively overpowered them, enough that I saw a bunch of their secondary fillers. Tapestries on the walls burned. The dining room table burst into brilliant flames. Someone had spent centuries oiling the wood regularly. Now it was going up in a blaze of glory. Anyone chasing me had another obstacle in their path.

  Crossing the threshold, I soared over a stone patio and its low, decorative walls, then dropped fast to the ground. The patio had been another ten feet up, with a line of arbor vitae masking its foundations. I glanced around. I was facing the house’s perimeter wall, something a good twenty feet tall. I could see where that wall turned ninety degrees to head around the house. Each corner had a gods-help-me turreted decorative watchtower. Coming in from the towers, and reaching the house, were a pair of ten-foot-high walls. None of the walls had any doors – or the doors were enchanted to be invisible. There might be doors back into the house, but walking back into the building I had just torched sounded to be a bad idea.

  OK, Adara, I told myself, think carefully. Grandfather Worrow’s books on combat magic didn’t say much about escaping from prisons. That’s why you have barristers and money. The walls were so heavily enchanted they glowed to the naked eye. There didn’t seem to be an alternative. I threw a line of analytic spells, ones I had memorized but never used other than in lab, at the walls. Were there weaknesses?

  More alarms wailed in the distance. Were those fire alarms, or had I just told them – whoever they were – where I was? I heard guards shouting, their voices getting louder. Someone was closing on my location.

  For once, luck was on my side. Folks who waste money this way sometimes have egos to match, and can’t imagine anyone getting into their estate to attack their walls from the defender’s side. Almost all the wall wards pointed outward. The control spells were diagrams, an enormous lot of very complicated ones, on the inside, not quite exposed to the weather. I’d need months or more if I wanted to decipher them, but I didn’t need to. I could see points from which magic seemed to be leaking from wards under stress. The wards were very complex, heavily overlaid, and had never been quite properly tuned. I drew hard on my void nodes, released the limit stops, and hit the leakage points with ward-breakers.

  For a very brief while, everything became very bright. My second sight was dazzled. The released energies had smashed outward, leveling a wide stretch of wall. Beyond the walls was a tangle of trees. I dashed. A trail gave me a choice of directions. I headed downhill, pausing only to tighten the belts on my nightgown. A thousand feet brought me to a road, well-paved, with another woods and hill on the far side. Atop the hill on the far side was a castle, a gingerbread confection of white stone and blue onion-domes atop towers. The image nudged at my memory, but I couldn’t quite remember where I’d seen it.

  Downhill led to a major street. I could see people crossing the road ahead of me. I told myself that if you carry yourself as though you are in charge, people will give you the right of way, or at least not look askance at your somewhat eccentric but perfectly decent clothing. As I approached, I could read the street sign. Avenir del Pescadores. The glyph by the street name was a mammoth’s hoof...I was in Capital. I had just torched a chunk of someone’s Hotel de Ville. They were going to be annoyed.

  The street was lined with small shops. Patisseries. Household ornaments. Jewelry. Fine clothing. The far side of the street was lined with people looking up at the sky. Rather, they were looking up at a pillar of smoke illuminated from within by lightning flashes, the pillar of smoke arising from the chateau I had just escaped. Every so often, there was a crash as of thunder. My side of the street was quite empty. Here, however, was a bookstore.

  Inside the shelves gleamed. There was a faint smell of orange oil from wood polish. Behind the counter was a young man in the traditional long white surcoat of a bookmonger.

  “Hello,” I said, “Might I please look at a map for a moment? I’m trying to find Staunton’s Avenue.”

  “Two blocks behind you,” he said, pointing ov
er my shoulder. “Take a left off Fishing Street. Staunton’s runs parallel with Fishing Street here—that’s Fishing Street we’re on. Any place in particular?”

  My pursuers would doubtless guess where I was going. “Triskittenion Bank,” I said.

  “I walked by there this morning,” he explained. “It was all guarded. Outside, to your right, left on the first street, then right on Staunton, two blocks. But you won’t get in, even if you’re a customer; it’s locked up. The kidnapping, you know.”

  “Kidnapping?”

  “Miss Triskittenion, the land-heiress. Someone snatched her out of Dorrance Academy.” He put his newspaper flat on the table. “That’s her,” he said.

  It was, too. Me, and the golem from last year. He looked again at the newspaper, and again at me.

  I broke into a grin. “I escaped,” I explained. “Whose castle was on top of the hill behind your shop?”

  “Fourbridge,” he answered. “Was?”

  “Escape got a bit violent,” I explained. “Can you not please tell people I came through, so I can get home, as a favor to me?”

  “Happy to, Miss Triskittenion.” He pinched his nose. “Favor in return? When you write a good book, I’d like first Capital sale rights.”

  “Sure,” I said, “not that I have a book in me.” He gave me a card for his shop, Codfish Books, with ‘First Sale’ scrawled across it. I pocketed the card.

  I was two doors down the street when the ground shook. The release of the Presence, from the direction of Fourbridge Castle, was enough to trigger some of my wards. The crowd across the street was pointing and talking loudly; I’d stay on this side of the street where few people would be close to me. On the bright side, those folks looked to be so distracted they didn’t notice my fast-walk by them.

  Flashes of light illuminated the cross street; that thoroughfare was Bragg’s Crossing. Now I was distinctly curious. What had I wrecked during my escape? Excessive curiosity might draw someone’s attention to me, but I risked a glance. The castle’s citadel was in flames. Once and again, a ward’s anchors released. A burst of flame followed. It looked as though the entire building was wood in its framing, very old and dry wood, and their fireproofing spellwork had failed.

  Capital was laid out on a rigid rectangular grid. I could take advantage of that to cover my approach to our bank. I followed Avenir del Pescadores for an extra block, cut left for a block and a half, and took the back alley toward the bank. Once in the alley, mostly out of sight, I called all my combat wards. One did encounter an occasional drunkard hiding out of site, the sort of person who would think he could prey on a young adult. Anyone who tried that on me would get a violent and hopefully fatal surprise.

  Triskittenion Bank was much of the way to the far end of the alley. For a factoring operation on our scale, the building was small. Offices were not cramped, but individual offices weren’t the area of a small house, either. Our warehouses were well outside Capital, where land taxes are much lower. House Triskittenion prides itself on thrift, a practice reinforced by electing our family council and land-heirs. Heath and Moore knew that they had to perform well, or they would be rusticated. For sure, I’d had enough people tell me that if I only gave up on General Magic in favor of something practical, they’d someday support my bid to join the Family Council.

  The bank’s shields were up, surrounding the building in a poisonous green haze. I could see a half-dozen sentries in the distance; there were likely more guards inside.

  “Here, here,” one of them called. “No closer! The bank is closed!” He started to run toward me.

  I put one hand firmly against the outer shield and, under my breath, spoke my full name. The wards near me changed color from green to luminous House blue. “I am Adara Triskittenion,” I announced, “landheir-third of this House, and this is my bank.”

  The guard almost tripped on his own feet. “You were kidnapped!” he said.

  “I was. I escaped. Brother Heath or Moore might be here?” I asked.

  “Yes, Ma’am! I mean,” he stammered. At my age, ‘mistress’ would have been correct.

  “Please notify whoever is in charge inside that I would like to get in,” I asked. The ‘please’ was somewhat pro forma. I could have made it an order, but no sense in getting anyone’s back up. Actually, I could probably have ordered the wards to let me pass, but anyone inside might have panicked and started throwing spells in my direction.

  “At once, mistress!” he answered.

  A few minutes later, I was in Heath’s conference room. As I approached, I had heard shouting, but when I entered the room there was dead silence.

  “Adara!” Heath said. He was delighted to see me.

  “Ady!” Grandpa Worrow always used my baby name.

  “Mistress Adara?” Sitting at the far end of the table was someone I did not know, wearing the colors and sigil of the Order of the Axe. “I am OverCaptain Karel Gudmundson. We were just discussing your disappearance.”

  “Kidnapping,” I corrected. “They also seem to have stolen my gnothdiar.”

  “That and your carryall have been recovered,” Gudmundson said. “They were left where you were taken, lying on the ground. Eye-witnesses agree that you and your clothes vanished, leaving your things behind.”

  “In that case, I have another criminal charge,” I said. “I’m wearing the robe I borrowed while making my escape.”

  “Theft of your clothing, nominal value,” Gudmundson said.

  “Ummh, no,” I corrected again. “When I woke up, after being kidnapped, I was tied face up to a bed wearing absolutely nothing.”

  Gudmundson looked upset.

  “Heath, that’s fourth degree rape, isn’t it?”

  “Third,” he corrected. “You have to give evidence that you were naked.”

  “That’s easy. To whom?” I asked.

  “Just to the Overcaptain here,” he answered.

  “You can’t take my word for it?” I asked Gudmundson.

  “I could have this place, wherever you escaped from, searched for your clothing,” he answered. “Where was that, by the way?”

  “Fourbridge Hall.” I said firmly. “Or so I was told by a bookmonger. The tall hill behind Codfish books. Your search likely fails. My escape got violent. When last I looked, their central keep was a pillar of fire, and their wards were busy collapsing and exploding.”

  “Fourbridge Hall?” He looked upset. Fourbridge was a major political player. “On fire? I need some evidence that you don’t have your clothing, though I agree that robe isn’t yours.”

  “That’s easy.” Perhaps I was too impulsive. I walked over to him, so everyone else was behind me. The gesture is usually associated with truly little girls, perverts, and raincoats, but the robe fell open very nicely all the way to the bottom, so he, and no one else, saw I was -- as the line goes -- as naked as a jaybird, except for my boots.

  “Ah, ah,” he squeaked. He choked and turned beet-red.

  “Adara!” Heath shouted. Heath was always a bit of a prude.

  “The defendant presented irrefutable evidence?” I asked.

  “Absolutely!” Gudmundson said, averting his eyes.

  I pulled my robe shut and tied it very tight at waist and neck. “None of you are house servants, but this thing looks to have escaped from a second-rate bordello—or a romance novel. Could I persuade someone to buy me some decent clothing? Please? I’ll pay you back.”

  “House will pay,” Heath said. “Marjorie, Abstractions, Unlimited? Across the street.”

  Marjorie, I remembered, was his lead assistant.

  “Happy to,” she said. “I need sizes.”

  Fortunately, I had those memorized.

  “You had claimed,” Gudmundson said, “that you escaped from Fourbridge Hall. But the gown you’re wearing has a locator tag, one that tells anyone who finds it where to return it. Of course, wards here obscure its effectiveness, but if that gown were from Fourbridge Hall, it would take us back there.�
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  “It will work on the roof,” Heath said. “after she takes it off. After she gets some decent clothing.”

  “That will also let us confirm her claim that their Hall is burning.” Gudmundson shook his head. You would think that after claiming I was wearing no clothing under the robe, and then seeing me prove it, he would have learned his lesson, but no such luck.

  Somewhat later, we found ourselves on the top of Triskittenion Northwest Bank. My new clothing even fit. The view to the north was superb. Fourbridge Hall had been built at the top of a steep slope, so it loomed over Capital. Two of its four towers were engulfed in flames, as were the lower buildings around its central spire. Once again, bright flashes and thundering roars signaled that yet another major ward had collapsed. If anyone was trying to fight the fires or stabilize the house wards, it wasn’t obvious from here. At a guess, whoever was in residence was trying to evacuate residents and valuables. This being House Fourbridge, I would not have been shocked to learn that the House’s unmen servants had been abandoned to their fates.

  “While you have all been watching the pretty lights,” Gudmundson said, “I have activated the location charm. I can confirm that this robe, well, what’s left of it, claims it came from the Fourbridge establishment.”

  At that moment Fourbridge Hall’s central spire collapsed, dropping down almost vertically.

  “Where is the Fire Brigade?” Heath asked. “Surely no one in Capital can have missed this catastrophe?”

  “Fourbridge is a walled keep,” Gudmundson answered. “There’s no way for the brigade to get in, so they aren’t bothering to try.”

  “It used to be a walled keep,” I said. “While I was leaving, the entire southern wall of that compound was seen to collapse.”

  “The entire wall?” Heath questioned.

  “Perhaps not the towers at its two ends, but, yes, the entire wall. It was seen to fall over,” I explained. “By me. It was in my way when I tried to flee.”