Ruthless Magic

by Megan Crewe

  “Nothing,” Mark said. “Nothing any of you need to worry about.”

  Judith backed away from him as he reached the table.

  “Ah,” I said, “I think it’s understandable for us to be a tad concerned about you detonating random objects.”

  “I’ll second that motion,” Prisha said.

  Mark sighed. He uncapped a bottle of water, took a long swig, and set it down. “It’s not going to affect any of you, because I know better than to try to cast on any of you. All right? I don’t always get the best ‘reception’ with the magic. Sometimes when I cast it’s like a phone call breaking up—and the energy doesn’t take it well. You can probably thank the Confed. My mom was three months pregnant with me when she failed the Exam and they burned her out. I’ve gotten better at controlling it. That wouldn’t have happened if I’d had a meal in the last day.”

  He snatched up a muffin and took a bite.

  I lowered the one I’d been eating. Could burning out alter a developing child like that? It wasn’t inconceivable.

  Prisha had crossed her arms over her chest. “So that’s your special reason for being here?”

  “No,” Mark said around his mouthful. “It’s not.”

  There was a moment of silence, and then Rocío said tentatively, “You mentioned your brother before.”

  He scowled and kept eating.

  Judith’s skeptical expression softened. “Did he get burned out here? Or did… did he die?”

  “No.” Mark’s hand balled against the tabletop. “If it’s so important for you to know, I’ve got a half brother who made Champion two years ago. Since then he’s basically disappeared. He barely has time for us anymore, and when he does, the way he talks, it’s like the Confed has taken over his brain. All he does is recite the party lines. I can’t get him to tell me what’s going on, so I’m going to find out on my own.”

  “I don’t think the Confed is brainwashing people,” Prisha said, a strange edge in her voice.

  My gaze jerked to her.

  “You wouldn’t, Academy girl,” Mark replied. “For some of us, it’s hard to believe they aren’t doing way worse. I’m going to get Tyler away from them too if that’s what I need to do to wake him up. But before I can really reach him, I have to make it through this place, so I’m just asking that none of you get in my way.”

  Prisha’s shoulders had stiffened. Why was she so upset? He was just shooting his mouth off—and I could understand his animosity, given his circumstances. “I’m sure we’ll—” I began.

  A squeal split the air, so shrill it set the hairs on the back of my neck on end. A magic-drawn message started unfurling down the far wall. I squinted at it, but the wan light slipping through the entrance wasn’t enough for me to discern the words. We all edged closer.

  For your next assignment, the message read, each group must locate an object of importance inside their designated building. Turn right from the entrance of your current location and walk until you find a structure with a sigil overhead. Make your way into the building, find an object with obvious magical power, and return with it to the place where you saw this message. Only one item is needed for the entire group, but individual contributions will be noted, as will your speed. The building’s entrance and interior are guarded by automated sentries that can summon more once alerted. We recommend you destroy them before they have the chance. Congratulations to the 29 of you on making it thus far.

  My throat constricted as I read the last line again.

  “Six more gone,” Rocío murmured.

  “Do you think they were killed by their own ’chantments?” Lacey said, looking horrified but also fascinated.

  “The examiners wouldn’t let it come to that, would they?” Judith said. “Even if they left it to the last minute to pull them out... It can’t be normal for six people to have died at this point. It’s only the third day!”

  I wanted to believe the examiners would have intervened, that the six had simply been taken to be burned out, but I didn’t feel sure of it after the callous disregard they’d shown for our safety so far.

  “Who knows if they’re even watching closely enough to step in?” Mark said. “I didn’t get the impression anyone cared what happened to me yesterday.”

  “It’s an Exam,” Judith protested. “What’s the point in testing us if they’re not watching?”

  Mark shrugged.

  Prisha’s lips pursed. “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “We’re all still fine. And this assignment doesn’t sound that hard. Not as bad as the last section, anyway.”

  Desmond shifted his weight, contemplating the wall in his overly intent way. Could he read the message at all? “It’s probably going to be more complicated than they’re suggesting,” I said. “We’re meant to search a building for magical items and bring back one—how large a building? What sort of ‘items’ might be there? And how many of these ‘sentries’ are going to be scanning for us, that we have to destroy before they can summon more?”

  Desmond gave me a subtle nod in thanks.

  “We can use magic to find other magic, right?” Lacey said. “One of the guys in our tutorial class, he had a casting that would make ’chanted things rattle or light up.”

  Like a forte version of the casting I’d used to find my radio. I nodded. “That ought to at least help.”

  “We should take a look at the building,” Rocío said. “We can’t make plans yet.”

  “I don’t know,” Prisha said, tapping her mouth. “The examiners went out of their way to warn us that there’ll be sentries outside the building. I’d say we want to be gearing up for a full-on assault before we’re even in sight of the place. And I’d guess we’ll be counting on you for a lot of that.”

  Rocío’s head snapped toward her. “What?”

  “You’ve obviously got a stronger connection to the magic than anyone else in our group,” Prisha said in a careless tone that pricked at me. “You’ll be able to take down these ‘sentries’ the fastest. It only makes sense for you to lead the charge.”

  “I don’t think we should be ‘charging’ in at all,” Rocío said.

  “Hold on,” I said. “We can at least go outside and determine where this building is before making any concrete decisions.”

  Mark spun on his heel and marched out. The others trailed after him, with Prisha at the rear. I hung back to speak with her apart from the others, but just as we stepped outside, she halted and patted my arm. “I’m going to grab a bottle of water to bring with,” she said, and vanished back inside.

  I meandered along the side of the building after the others, who were heading to the right toward a pair of tilted dun structures that loomed nearby, as blank on the outside as the one we’d just left. Neither of those boasted any sort of sigil. The building we were supposed to scope out must be farther away. Hopefully closer we’d have a better view. From here, the gray landscape beyond was cloaked with that damned mist.

  If the examiners had hoped to establish a general mood of constant uncertainty with these testing grounds, they’d hit the mark. How much of the space was even real and not a temporary magical construction?

  Of course, it was hard to say which was more unnerving: our surroundings or my best friend’s odd behavior. What was Prisha’s issue with Rocío? She’d been uncertain the other girl could protect just me yesterday, but now she thought Rocío was the key to us completing this assignment? There’d been something off about the way she’d broached the subject too. It wasn’t like her.

  Rocío glanced back as we came into the shadows of the buildings. Her gaze caught mine, and she immediately looked away. My chest clenched.

  I caught up in a few paces. She stopped when I touched her shoulder. The others continued on.

  “Are we okay?” I said quietly. “I don’t know what Prisha’s thinking. And I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about the… the weapon right away.”

  When Rocío met my eyes, hers were puzzled. “Why are you apologizing
for that now?”

  “You just— I don’t know.” Why did I lose my capacity for speech around her so often? “You seem upset,” I managed.

  Rocío blinked. “Oh. With you? No. I— What Prisha is saying is right. It’s up to me more than anyone else to get us through this test. I mean, I’m okay with that. It’s just a lot of pressure. I don’t have room to think about anything else if I’m going to make sure everyone stays okay. So I’m trying to just stay focused on the Exam.”

  Ah. That explained why she’d drawn back as soon as we’d left our underground hideout. I ought to have been relieved, but the strain in her voice wrenched at me all over again.

  Her gaze sharpened. “Is your head all right?”

  “Yes,” I said. “Yes, it’s been fine since last night.” I hadn’t felt a twinge since she’d melted the ache away—but even if it came back, I wasn’t going to amplify the weight of responsibility she already felt. O Zeus, let her never again feel she had to make room amid everything else she was tackling to fix me.

  “You’re not alone,” I added. “Remember that. Even if you end up at the front, we’ve all got your back. I can’t speak for the others, but I’ve become rather fond of… well, all of you, including that back, so I promise it’d require at the very least a broken leg or two to get in the way of me protecting it.”

  My glibness earned me one of her little smiles. “Thank you,” she said, as if she was going to say more, but at that moment Prisha reached us, her bottle of water tucked under her arm.

  “Where’s this sigil?” she said, tossing back her hair.

  The other four had stopped by the far corner of the building up ahead, their faces tilted toward the sky. “Over there, I’d guess,” I said.

  As we marched over to join them, I shot Rocío a glance behind Prisha’s back. She met my eyes without looking away this time, her lips still curved in that slight smile just for me.

  I squared my shoulders. It was time to unearth every bit of mage I had in me, because I didn’t think I’d ever forgive myself if I broke the vow I’d just made.

  Chapter Twelve

  Rocío

  Floating high overhead in the midst of the gray-brown haze, the sigil shone like a star. Like the silver sunburst on my necklace. My hand rose to the jagged shape and closed around my mother’s charm. The sigil’s lines faded and brightened in a trembling rhythm.

  “They’re lighting the way,” Lacey said with hushed excitement.

  “I don’t see a building over there,” Judith said. I couldn’t either. The mist had drawn back as we’d approached, but nothing stood beneath the sigil except a smooth black wall, maybe fifty feet away. It appeared to be about as long as a Brooklyn block and twice my height, and it stood alone, as if it had risen out of the flat gray ground at random. Thicker fog ate at its edges, hiding whatever might be waiting on the other side.

  “We’ll have to get closer,” I said. “The building must be on the other side of the wall.”

  “That’ll give us some shelter while we come up with our brilliant strategy,” Finn said cheerfully, with a quick glance at Prisha.

  I’d been trying to ignore my impulse to stay close to him, but his support both spoken and unspoken warmed me. Maybe I shouldn’t ignore it. Maybe his warmth would help me through whatever the Confed had planned for us.

  “Let’s all get a conjuring or a ’chantment ready to cast in case we have to act quickly,” Prisha said. “If even one sentry has time to raise the alarm, we’re in trouble.”

  “How can we be prepared when we don’t know anything about them?” Desmond said.

  “The examiners said we should destroy them,” Lacey pointed out, bouncing on her feet. “I say we blast them apart like we did those marbles.”

  “I guess that’s a good starting point,” I said, even though my skin crawled at the idea of carrying an offensive casting on the tip of my tongue. Was that how Finn felt with that weapon in his pocket?

  But we wouldn’t be destroying anything real. The message had also said the sentries were “automated.” Conjured, I guessed.

  I drew up the words I’d used to shatter Lacey’s marbles and held them in the back of my throat as we started forward. Dale, no pierdas el tino.

  The wall loomed over us as we reached it. The sigil overhead faded out. No sound penetrated our hush. Since the wall was too high to see over, we crept along it, searching for a way past. I trailed my fingers across the glossy black surface and found it cold and hard as glass. The shiver of energy against my hand told me it was conjured, magic condensed into substance.

  Lacey copied my gesture, swirling her fingertips over the glazed black. “It’s like oil,” she murmured. “Or what I think oil would look like. I’ve never actually seen it for real—only in the oil-company commercials back home.” Then her face tensed. “Axton always said magic meant he’d never have to work like that.”

  Axton who’d now be waiting back home, burned out. I got the feeling she wasn’t looking forward to a reunion.

  I slowed coming up on the corner of the wall and realized it wasn’t a corner at all. The black surface simply ended, revealing another stretch of flat gray terrain beyond it. I peeked around the open edge.

  The fog had drawn back farther at our approach. In the thinner haze, a short jog from where we stood, lay a black cube of a building about as big as my library branch. Its face was as smooth as the wall other than the faint protrusion of a doorway, and like the wall it rose straight from the ground as if it’d been placed there without any connection to its surroundings.

  Something was moving outside it.

  Prisha set down her bottle of water at the base of the wall and leaned to peer past me. “So those are our sentries,” she said in a low voice.

  There was an air of unreality about the scene in front of me—a sensation in my eyes as if I should have been able to see right through it. The conjuring didn’t look as if it were so complex the examiners would have struggled to maintain it. If anything, the shapes were oddly vague and artless, more like Lacey’s shadow creatures than the work of several established mages. Was there more to them that we couldn’t see?

  Three boxy almost-human figures were staked out around the building, partly blending into its dark face. They might as well have been people thrown together out of chunks of glossy black stone. One was nearly as tall as the doorway and spindly thin. Another was a bulky giant. The third was shorter and squat.

  A block that amounted to a head sat on each sentry’s torso, but I couldn’t make out any features: no eyes, nose, or mouth. Their faces were as smooth as the building behind them. A muted light flickered in each of their “chests,” nearly swallowed by the black. That pulse, like the beat of a heart, sent an uneasy tremor through my own chest.

  “What do you think the glowing spot is for?” Judith whispered, crouching beside me.

  “A target, maybe?” Finn suggested.

  “It’s not like the examiners to give us an easy solution,” I said. I didn’t like that. I didn’t like the way the sentries lumbered by the building, pausing and speeding up and turning here and there without any pattern I could follow. Even the one that mostly stayed beside the door wasn’t completely still. It shifted in increments, straightening up taller, adjusting its jointed limbs.

  “I don’t know,” Judith said. “It’s a pretty small spot. If that’s the only way to stop them, it’ll be hard enough even with the target.”

  “Blow them up—that’ll take care of everything,” Lacey said.

  Prisha glanced at her with a smile that looked faintly patronizing. “You have a lot of faith in your ability to blast your way through your problems. Those things are bigger than marbles.”

  “So?” Lacey said with a shrug. “I can handle one. I know I can.”

  “What if we all try to aim for the light,” I said, “with as much force as we can manage in case they’re shielded against strong blasts? If two of us each aim at one sentry, we’ll double our chances o
f taking them down.”

  “You should take the one to the right of the door,” Prisha said. “It’s the biggest and the farthest away.”

  “Right,” I said, managing to keep an edge out of my voice. She was following the same line of reasoning as before: I was the strongest mage here, so I should do the hardest part of the fighting. I still didn’t enjoy the feeling of being set up as the group’s attack dog. That wasn’t how I wanted the Confed to see me. That wasn’t who I was.

  As the others decided in hushed conversation who would aim at which sentry, I ran my lyric through my mind, collecting my sense of intent, imagining the conjured blow slamming into the blocky figure’s chest and shattering its “heart.”

  Lacey rubbed her hands together eagerly, and Mark rolled his shoulders. Judith tucked her broken arm tight against her chest and hummed a faint melody. Her lips pressed tight together.

  Finn edged slightly closer to the end of the wall. “All at the same time, then,” he whispered. “Three, two, one—”

  “Engage!” Desmond said.

  We leapt around the wall as one. The lyric dropped from my lips, thrusting a wave of power through the vibrations of the magic toward the glowing spot on the sentry by the door.

  My blow struck it straight on the light, and the crackling bolt of energy Judith had conjured hit right beside mine. Just as I’d pictured, the figure rocked backward. Then its body crumbled into a heap of rubble that melted into the ground.

  The tall, spindly sentry burst with an explosion of dark shards. The short one stumbled backward as if punched, hit the ground, and cracked open.

  “Yeah!” Lacey cried with a pump of her fist.

  Prisha stepped forward as if to run for the building, but at the same moment the air jittered around me.

  “Wait!” I said.

  The invisible presence I’d felt before pulled around my shoulders. Its trembling made the hum of the magic quaver. In that instant, it gripped me so tightly I could hardly breathe.

  What? I thought at it. What are you? What do you want?