by Chloe Garner
“I don’t know what that means,” Sasha said.
“And that is why we’re going to a Pure-sponsored school after this.”
“What?” Valerie asked. “Isn’t that dangerous?”
“Every minute of being my daughter is dangerous,” Susan said. “Von Lauv Academy is a huge school, and I think I’ve got every chance of slipping you in undetected. Sometimes the safest place to be is exactly the last place they’d look for you.”
“I’ve never heard of Von Lauv,” Sasha said, and Susan shook her head, perking for a moment’s interest, then shaking her head and relaxing against the wall again.
“You wouldn’t have. It’s been renamed since the first war, and aggregated. The Pure and the non-propagationists came together and decided that they wanted to have a small number of people making high-level decisions at schools, and to try to funnel all of the objector’s kids through the same classes as the Pure kids. It’s a tactic that’s worked. They’ve got a lot of kids graduating who are sympathetic, if not to the Pure, to the non-propagationists.”
“Who are the Pure?” Sasha asked, and Susan sighed.
“The crazies who are going to wipe out the entire civilian population of the globe if they aren’t careful.”
“You mean the Superiors,” Sasha said, and Susan sighed.
“I can’t believe the Council is doubling down on that propaganda. No. I don’t mean the Superiors. I mean the Pure. The non-propagationists would talk to us, if we seemed to be willing and able to have conversations that were anything other than ultimatums and posturing.”
Valerie was stunned to hear her mother talk like that. She’d only been at Survival School for a few months, but everyone walked on eggshells, trying to keep up appearances, at least, with their relationship with the Council. The Council saw all and judged all, and from the look on Sasha’s face, the redhead was just as shocked.
“We’re moving,” Susan said, standing and wiping off her shoulder. Valerie fell into step behind her mother, there next to Sasha, and raised her eyebrows. Sasha mirrored the expression.
A car pulled up to the curb at the corner, and the three of them got in, Valerie and Sasha sliding into the back seat next to each other without a word.
They’d talked late into the night.
No one knew where Valerie and Sasha had gone, who had taken them, why no one had seen them.
“You know that they’ve been after her,” Ethan had said, grim, after a lot of speculation. “I wasn’t sure I believed her, that it was her specifically they were after, because maybe they were just messing with the school, or maybe they were after the Council kids who are all in this year, or maybe they had an agent who had made it into the school, and that made us an easy target. But… There wasn’t even an attack. They really did come just for her.”
“But what about Sasha?” Hanson asked. “What’s she got to do with it?”
“I bet she wouldn’t let them take Valerie without her,” Shack said. “Chick’s tough. Tougher than people give her credit for.”
“Why?” Hanson asked. “Why would she make someone kidnap her?”
“Stuff keeps happening to Valerie,” Ethan said. “And Sasha’s a healer. She can’t just sit back and watch it. Not if she has a choice.”
Hanson sighed.
He was worried about Valerie, but there was something about her, something that had always felt so capable, even when he’d been standing next to her on the street so that guys wouldn’t come try to push her around. She’d always known how to take care of herself, and while she had no problem letting him help, she could deal with anything when she needed to.
Sasha, though.
Sasha was soft and warm and happy, sweet in a way Valerie had never even considered. Ethan was right. Sasha was a healer. Valerie was a fighter.
Sasha had no business being out there, wherever she was, even if she wouldn’t have forgiven herself for letting Valerie go on her own.
“Are they dead?” he’d asked, laying on his back in the dark, unable to see either of his roommates, but glad he wasn’t alone all the same.
“No,” Ethan had answered. “No, they can’t be. I won’t let them.”
The next morning, all three of them had ignored the call for breakfast. Ethan had said something about wondering what Lady Harrington and Mr. Benson would say about the disappearance, but Shack didn’t think they would say anything.
They didn’t know anything, so they wouldn’t say anything.
Finally, they got up.
Showered.
Shaved.
Sat in the room.
“Wish I could go work out,” Shack said.
“Anything,” Hanson agreed.
There was a knock on the door and Hanson looked over at it.
It couldn’t be lunch time already.
“Ethan,” a man’s voice said.
Ethan sat up sharply in his bed.
“Dad,” he answered, standing and going to open the door.
A man walked in, the spitting image of Elvis Trent, tall, dark-haired, and serious. He looked almost nothing like Ethan.
“What have you done in here?” he asked, looking up at Shack.
“Lost a bet,” Shack answered, rolling onto his back and virtually disappearing on the upper bed.
“I need to speak with you,” the man said, looking at Ethan. “We’re going to Lady Harrington’s office to talk privately.”
“I don’t know where she is, Dad,” Ethan said.
The man looked over at Hanson, then shook his head.
“Not good enough,” he said. “That’s what I sent you here for. Come with me, now.”
Ethan sighed, then gave Hanson a shrug and followed the man out into the hallway and closed the door.
“Don’t hold your breath,” Shack muttered from his bed.
Ethan didn’t come back for almost two hours. Franky Frank brought them food in the room when Shack and Hanson declined to go to lunch. Hanson didn’t know why they were staying put, but that was what Shack did, and Hanson could follow a lead.
They ate without talking, then returned to their beds. Hanson needed a ball to bounce off of the far wall, but he didn’t even have that.
It was maddening, how slow time went.
Valerie and Sasha were missing, and he had no idea where.
And there was nothing he could do about it.
Nothing.
Finally Ethan returned, going to lay down on his bed.
“What did he say?” Shack asked.
“He thinks I’m covering for her and that she ran off.”
“Ran off where?” Shack asked.
“Her mom is out of communication with the Council, and her dad just turned up again.”
“He isn’t dead?” Hanson asked, and Ethan shook his head.
“They think that someone told her about it, and she went to go find her mom. And that she knows where to look.”
“How would she know that?” Hanson asked. “And why would Sasha go with her?”
Ethan shook his head.
“I just told him I didn’t know anything, because I don’t.” He paused. “I think they’ve been holding out hope that Valerie would eventually lead them back to her mom, and they’ve lost her… and they’re desperate. I was his last hope that they could get her back.”
There was another knock on the door and Ethan sighed, going to open it.
He stepped back, and Hanson leaned over, expecting Ethan’s dad once more.
“Mom,” Hanson said, leaping to his feet. “Mom.”
“Hanson,” she said, looking at Ethan and Shack. “You landed with a good crowd.”
“Mom,” he said. “Where have you been?”
“Come with me,” she said, her voice low and even. It made him feel cold, but he got up and followed her out of the room, through the school, and to the office where Ethan’s dad was sitting at a table in a conference room.
“Come sit,” Martha Cox said, going to sit next to Ethan’s dad.
/> Hanson hesitated, then took a chair across from them, feeling like this was the worst version of being called to the principal’s office he’d ever seen.
“Mom,” he said slowly. “Where have you been?”
She shook her head.
“That’s not what we’re here to talk about,” she said. “I need you to tell us where Valerie Blake is.”
“How would I know?” Hanson asked, his voice rising. “Mom, you left me.”
“I had a job to do. I told you, over and over again, that you do the job you have to do. This is my job.”
“You left me,” Hanson said. “I got home and you were just gone.”
“Once Valerie Blake knew who you were, there was no purpose leaving your mother on the sidelines anymore,” Mr. Trent said. “So the Council recalled her.”
“And you just left without even thinking about what would happen to me?” Hanson asked, yelling now.
“You had everything you needed,” Martha answered, standing and yelling back. “You don’t need me to feed and shelter you. I trained you and I raised you to be smart and strong, and you were both. You ended up exactly where you needed to be, and you’re fine.”
“But I could have died,” Hanson said. “I walked out here, Mom. I had no idea where I was going. You left me.”
“You need to prove that you’re capable of handing it when things don’t go right,” Martha stormed back. “Not come whining to someone to fix it.”
“I’m your kid.”
“And I’m proud,” she retorted.
“Mr. Cox,” Mr. Trent said loudly - though not as loudly as either Martha or Hanson had been yelling. Hanson looked at the man, then reconsidered his pitch.
“Yeah,” he said. “I don’t know where Valerie is.”
“We heard that she had made up with you the night she disappeared,” Mr. Trent said. “I think she probably told you something, given the timing. She didn’t want to run off and leave things the way they were, so she came back to her oldest friend and told him what was going on.”
Hanson tipped his head to the side.
“You’ve never met Valerie, have you?” he asked.
Martha gave him a dark look, and Hanson almost laughed.
And then he did laugh.
“She didn’t forgive me for spying on her to you guys my entire life because she needed a friend. Yeah, she missed me and I missed her, and you guys messed that up pretty bad, but she wouldn’t have done it just because she was desperate. She’s so much more than that. Have you even considered that maybe the bad guys finally got her? I mean, why else would Sasha Mills be missing, too?”
“Because teenage girls take five of them just to go to the bathroom,” Mr. Trent said. “They flock. This is normal. Valerie left and so Miss Mills went with her. I need to know every word Valerie Blake said to you before she left.”
“I don’t remember,” Hanson said without hesitation. “But none of it was about her parents. It was about us and about how hard it is for her to trust anyone right now, for how hard the Council is working to try to spy on her. And… I had no idea. Until right now.”
“Hanson,” Martha said, pointing a finger at him. “That woman is the key to winning this war. I gave up my entire life in order to keep tabs on her for the Council, I spent my son to do the same, and now, when it matters most, I expect you to come through. This has been the reason behind everything I have ever done.”
Hanson crossed his arms, looking hard at his mom.
He loved his mom.
She made him laugh until his sides hurt and she was the kind of woman he admired most for how strong and how confident she was. She’d basically raised him on her own, for as much as his dad had had to work, but it had never seemed like a burden on her.
He thought she’d been happy.
“That’s sad, Mom,” he finally said. “Because we had a good life before you walked away from it.”
“I gave up magic for this,” she said. “Because winning the war that was to come was the most important thing that I could do, and the biggest contribution I could make to that was making sure that the Council could find Susan Blake when the time came.”
“And now with her daughter showing such aptitude,” Mr. Trent said. “We need Valerie, too. She may be key to the survival of our way of life.”
“Is everyone in your universe there for you to use them?” Hanson asked.
“Yes,” Mr. Trent said, giving Hanson a very hard look. “Because my direction is the only thing between ourselves and death. Do not kid yourself that I’m exaggerating. I know that you don’t know about us, or our war, or our methods, but the Council was forged by the first war, and we exist with the knowledge that our vigilance is the best chance we have of surviving the second.”
“And if that means filling Valerie’s life with spies and never letting her have a real relationship with a human being who cares about her?” Hanson asked.
“You should try being on the Council,” Mr. Trent replied. “What did she say to you?”
“I think she’s in danger,” Hanson said. “She didn’t say anything to me, and honestly if she was planning on just up and leaving, I think she would have at least hinted at it. I think that someone came and took her by force, and that they took Sasha, too, and if you think her life is important, you need to start looking for her, because…”
He didn’t want to finish that sentence, because he didn’t want to think about it.
Mr. Trent looked over at Martha and lifted his chin.
“You think you can do it?” he asked.
“I think I’m your best bet,” Martha answered.
“All right,” Mr. Trent said. “Take him, take whatever resources you need, and bring me Susan Blake.”
“Oh, if I play my cards right, I’m going to bring you the entire Blake clan,” Martha answered.
First Day?
Ground School was a brick building an hour away. Valerie no longer had any sense of where they were; she’d been in a car in the dark for too many hours between Survival School and now, and they’d gone through open country and dense city, and while she was sure she could have been watching road signs to figure it out, she instead sat in the back seat watching her parents and trying to figure out what in the world was going on with them.
Her mom was the same as she had ever been, happy and confident and very bossy, with a devious playfulness to her that Valerie had always loved. Grant was just the way that he had been, for the two weeks she’d spent with him, gruff and sarcastic and dismissive, but the two of them together…
They made sense. She could see it. She could see how her mom made her dad into a different person, really, and how he could keep up with her and could make her laugh… For the first time, Valerie realized that her mother had been alone, raising her, and she caught a glimpse of what life would have been like if her parents had been able to figure out how to stay together.
And it was the same and different and completely bewildering all by itself.
And then you added in magic and a war.
Valerie had doubted her father, once. Been willing to believe that he was with the Pure or the Superiors or whatever the right word was for them.
Right now?
She didn’t doubt that they weren’t with the Pure, but she was beginning to doubt that they were with the Council, either.
For all intents and purposes, the two of them appeared to be on their own team entirely, and…
It was so tempting to just throw herself into that, go be team Blake, go charging into the middle of the war and blow it up and be fantastically right where the two entrenched sides were completely wrong.
But there was a strong possibility that both of her parents were crazy.
She couldn’t overlook that.
Oh, no.
Sitting there in the back seat looking out at the school, Valerie was more and more convinced that her mother was crazy, and that Grant was simply crazy in love.
And that may
be Gemma was the most reasonable one of them all.
“All right, these are your papers,” Susan said, turning in her seat and handing them back. “You won’t have the same class list, because people would have noticed that, but you do have five classes together, and the same lunch period. Try to sit with other kids if you can.”
“Remind me what the point of this is?” Valerie asked.
“I think you’ll figure it out pretty quickly,” Susan said. “But the point is for you to see how the other side lives. These are kids who didn’t come from magic families, so they don’t come from money. Tuition here is killing their families, and it’s barely twenty percent of what they pay at Survival School. They have no preparation or training, they have very few resources. This is how kids come into magic.”
“So I might actually learn something,” Valerie murmured.
“Don’t out yourselves,” Grant warned. “The Council will be looking for you, and you don’t want the teachers or the staff to figure out that you’re more than you seem.”
Sasha hesitated.
“I’m really bad at that, actually,” she said. “I raise my hand a lot.”
“Then don’t,” Susan said, turning in her seat. “Sit at the back of the class, don’t look at the teacher - look around the room - avoid eye contact, and pretend you know nothing. Spend one day seeing how that feels.”
Sasha looked at Valerie, and Valerie shrugged.
“I’m game. You can stay or you can go.”
“I did want to look at School of Magic Fundamentals,” Sasha said slowly. “I’d read that they had different teaching techniques.”
“If the point is that this is some slum school with no academic accomplishment, I’d rather pass,” Valerie said. “I don’t get it.”
“Oh, no,” Susan said. “Every kid here is working hard. As hard as you or harder. Trying to justify what their parents are spending to send them here. Trying to figure out what magic is. The kids that get it? They get a green light into our world, where money…”
“Money falls in your lap, if you’re willing to do the right things for the right people,” Grant said. “And a lot of them are even legit work.”
Susan nodded.
“I’ve never worried about money; none of our families have ever worried about money.”
