Instrument of Peace (Symphony of the Cursed Book 1)

by Rebecca Hall

  “Your objective,” Dr Maclyn announced, “is to reach the centre of the maze.” She pointed to a golden cage that floated in mid-air. It didn’t appear to be connected to anything. Mitch hoped he’d be able to find a way in that didn’t involve jumping from the rafters. “You have two hours to finish and you are permitted to use any magic you wish to overcome the obstacles you will encounter.”

  Mitch was prepared to bet that the obstacles were more than just nets to slither under or walls to climb. Dr Maclyn taught Xenobiology, Mitch wouldn’t be surprised if there were monsters of some sort in there.

  “You are encouraged to work as a team,” Dr Maclyn said, “the maze was not designed to be defeated by a lone magician.” She stepped aside, “You may begin.” There was a loud buzz and the timer on the wall started the countdown.

  Mitch’s classmates pelted towards the opening, pushing and shoving each other in order to be the first ones into the maze as if that would be some sort of advantage. Mitch was more than happy to let them have it, they could trip over the first set of magical traps for him. The doors locked behind him and Mitch sighed, so much for an easy exit. Right, left or dead ahead. Mitch didn’t like the sound of dead ahead so he studied the alternatives. Three of his classmates had teamed up and were dashing down the right hand path and a strangled yelp followed by a splash drew his attention to the middle path. Mitch hoped that it was just water and not acid and assured himself that they were probably saving the acid for later in the maze when everyone would know to be careful.

  “Want to work together?” Adnan asked. Mitch hadn’t even realised that the plump boy was standing next to him.

  “Sure,” Mitch said. He’d never spent much time with Adnan but they’d worked together before and Mitch knew that in his case the puppy fat was beneficial. Shape shifters couldn’t create mass and whenever Adnan decided to give himself webbed feet or scales and spines the mass had to come from somewhere and playing with muscles and internal organs was never recommended. “Left,” Mitch suggested. Adnan shrugged and took the lead. For a second Mitch considered trying to match the other boy’s footsteps but that wouldn’t help much if the traps were time delayed and his feet were two sizes bigger. Besides, Mitch wasn’t sure exactly where he’d walked.

  “You’re self-manipulation right?” Adnan asked over one shoulder.

  “Yeah.” Mitch kept his eyes on the path ahead and hoped that nothing attacked him from behind. Adnan would warn him if he saw something but that didn’t mean he’d be able to react in time. He started using a little magic to boost his reaction speed.

  “So we’re gonna be toast if they start throwing lightning bolts and fireballs our way then.”

  “Yeah,” Mitch said, his heart sinking. He’d had a fireball thrown at him before and while he was confident he could fireproof himself it wasn’t an experience he wanted to repeat. He’d never experienced life as a human lightning rod before either.

  “Guess they’re trying to teach us how versatile magic is,” Adnan said cheerily, “they do love telling us that our abilities are only limited by our imaginations. This is probably a dry run for the end of year exams.” He was probably right about that. Mitch wished that their teachers weren’t so imaginative; it would make his life a lot easier. And safer; the number of students sent to the infirmary on the first day of term was quadruple the rate during the rest of the term. At least he could console himself with the knowledge that their teachers tortured everyone, not just him. It wasn’t very comforting.

  They reached a fork in the path.

  “Left again?” Adnan asked, after peering down both passageways. Mitch did the same, forcing his eyes to see in infra-red and ultra violet. He’d have a bitch of a headache if he did it for too long but a second was enough to tell him that something was concealed in the right hand passage.

  “Left,” Mitch said, blinking his watering eyes as his vision returned to normal. Without magic tricks the two passages looked identical. Adnan led the way again. They’d barely gone two metres when static electricity began crawling over the walls. Mitch glanced over his shoulder and found the way back replaced by a wall that was wreathed in electricity.

  “I don’t suppose you can turn into something lightning proof?” he asked. The electricity began to jump from wall to wall across the path, leaving behind a faint smell of scorched air and shattering Mitch’s lingering hopes that it might be some sort of Van der Graaf generator.

  “When have you ever heard of a lightning proof animal?” Adnan asked incredulously.

  “Natural selection has a lot to answer for,” Mitch muttered. Another piece of static flashed overhead, making his hair stand on end and forcing him to blink blue-white afterimages from his eyes.

  “I guess we’re running then,” Adnan said, doing just that. Mitch sprinted after him, his magic enhanced muscles easily propelling him into the lead. He tried to ignore the static but it would be a lot easier if he wasn’t constantly having to blink afterimages out of his eyes or being shocked by the charge building up in his clothing. He’d have to see if he could get a rubber suit next time he was in Taupo.

  Even with magic the dead sprint was beginning to take its toll. The path twisted and turned. He made the first corner, barely, but on the second he careened into the wall and collapsed limply as the charge ran through him. He staggered to his feet, narrowly avoiding the opposite wall and almost tripping Adnan, and started running again, his muscles jumping oddly as they discharged the excess electricity. The air was beginning to heat and Mitch had a nasty suspicion that the charge was growing stronger, a suspicion that he preferred not to test.

  He managed the next corner without incident and found himself confronted by another intersection. He picked a branch at random and dashed on. Hypothetically he could make himself immune to lightning; in practice he’d never tried and didn’t think he could manage the necessary concentration right now. Sheet lightning flashed overhead and Mitch instinctively flinched away from it, looking up fearfully.

  A wire. He didn’t know what the high wire was made of but it didn’t appear to be covered in electricity and the corridor was getting more and more crowded as the lightning multiplied.

  “The wire,” he gasped, raising one hand to point and yelping when it got shocked. Adnan leapt, unconcerned by the fact that it was a metre overhead or that he almost knocked Mitch out as he swung from it and pulled himself free of the electricity. Another wave of sheet lightning flashed overhead, followed by a second and a third and Mitch swore, realising that he wouldn’t be able to make it to the wire without getting fried.

  “I am not a conductor,” he muttered under his breath in broken Latin, “I am an insulator and I can make the jump to that wire.” Screw the rules about not saying spells out-loud, he didn’t care what it did to his neural pathways as long as it got him out of this lightning before he became a crispy critter. He jumped. The lightning washed over him as he soared higher and higher until his hands closed around the wire and he stopped to wonder how he was supposed to get on top of it instead of leaving his legs dangling in the electrical storm. He hung there for a moment gasping for breath and trying not to think about all of the painful places the lightning could shock him if his concentration slipped and he became a conductor again.

  He swung himself onto the wire, grateful that it had no give in it at all, and dragged his legs out of the sea of lightning. Now he just had to get to his feet and keep his balance long enough to snag the wire running overhead. A sudden warmth at his back prompted him to look down and see that the lightning had been replaced by fire. Right, don’t fall off then. There were very definite limits to his ability to make himself imflammable and he wanted to rest before he tried testing them. He looked down the wire and saw that Adnan had lost his shoes and replaced his feet with things that resembled oversized bird talons – if you had to draw one based on a description given by a blind person. They seemed to be working though, Adnan wasn’t holding onto the overhead wire and he was able
to help Mitch onto his far more impractical feet without toppling into the flames.

  To the left the wire led through a waterfall. Possible waterfall, Mitch corrected himself. To the right it simply vanished. Mitch started shuffling to his left, resigning himself to being the first one to get eaten, dissolved or burnt by whatever they encountered next. The wire was rough under his hands and he could feel it cutting into his feet through his shoes though he was almost certain that they had better soles than that. He inched into the spray-filled air and was relieved when it didn’t hiss or burn. The waterfall was made out of water. He resisted the temptation to drink some of it, there was no knowing what it might have been spiked with. His hands slid along the slick wire easily and even the lower wire didn’t cut into his feet so badly. He crept forward another step and his foot slipped. His hands clenched around the wire that in addition to being wet and slippery was now finger-numbingly cold. Both wires were covered in a thick layer of frost. At least he had plenty of practice at ignoring the cold. He found his footing and continued, glancing over his shoulder to confirm that Adnan was still there. He was and he still wasn’t using the guide wire. Mitch wondered if he’d given his bird feet suckers.

  The air grew colder and colder as he advanced. His breath frosted in the air and tiny icicles formed on the wire and cut his hands with their needle-sharp points. Even the waterfall seemed to be freezing, the water sliding past him feeling worryingly solid. He’d learnt how to endure cold, not become a human icicle. He looked back but the icy spray was too thick for him to see Adnan. Mitch hoped he was ok, he didn’t think he could go back through the ice, the maze appeared to have very definite ideas on his direction of travel.

  He took another step forward and, blinded by the waterfall, slipped, only his death grip on the guide wire keeping him from plummeting into a new level of Hell. He pulled his left foot back onto the wire only to have it slip off again as soon as he tried to stand. The muscles in his arms were beginning to burn as they struggled to hold him up under the crushing weight of the waterfall. His lungs were screaming, desperate for air that he wouldn’t get while in the middle of the cascade and the water itself was growing colder. If it wouldn’t have cost him valuable air he would have been groaning in pain as he was pelted with razor-like shards of ice. If he’d had any idea of what was below him he might have been tempted to let go but he wasn’t even sure how far he had to fall and he was certain that no matter how carefully he positioned himself before letting go he’d somehow find himself with a leg on either side of the wire when he did.

  He dragged his feet and what felt like a ton of ice onto the wire a second time and managed to find his footing. He almost sighed in relief before catching himself and pushing on through the almost solid waterfall. Ice cracked around him and he worried that it was damaging the wire. He hoped that Adnan made it through alright, or that he’d been far enough behind not to get caught.

  There was one thing he could do to make it out of the waterfall without frostbite, and hopefully before he ran out of air, but barbecuing his own internal organs was really low on his to do list. On the other hand it beat becoming a human icicle; he’d tried it and it was proving to be vastly overrated. He tried to think, to find the words he would need to heat his body without cooking his brain. The words wouldn’t come but his teachers always insisted that they were a handicap. All that mattered was his intentions. He hoped they were right and started trying to melt the ice.

  He inched forward, ice crackling around him. He thought that it gave a little more easily now but it was impossible to be sure. Another step and his confidence grew. One more step and he burst free of the ice fall and sucked in a lungful of air that tasted of smoke. Mitch swore and hastily released the magic before his clothes caught fire. He couldn’t imagine anything more embarrassing than making it to the centre of the maze butt-naked. Dr Maclyn would probably insist that it was a good lesson.

  With his clothes warm and dry and no longer in immediate danger of bursting into flame, Mitch surveyed his surroundings. He was almost at the end of the high wire. His scream would have done credit to a twelve year old girl; for him it was rather embarrassing but Adnan hadn’t made it out of the waterfall yet. At the end of the high wire a monstrous giant weta awaited him.

  “You have to be fucking kidding me!” he yelled, looking up at its spiked legs and long antennae and... why couldn’t they have gone with the traditional giant spiders, spiders were so much nicer. Black widow, tarantula, Shelob, Aragog... He really didn’t care, anything would be better than the monster-sized giant weta crouched before him. There was no way in Hell that thing was real, it would collapse under its own weight and even magic had limits. It had to be an illusion. A very convincing illusion. Its antennae twitched and he felt the air move as it passed over his head, his hair stirring in its wake. It moved one of its massive spiked legs and the way the platform trembled and dislodged dust suggested that it was very real.

  What the Hell did you do to a jumbo-sized giant weta? Squashing a normal-sized one underfoot was hard enough and his foot wasn’t anywhere near big enough for this one. He’d probably need a vat of industrial strength bug spray to kill it. He couldn’t believe some people actually ate the damn things. He slid back along the wire, he’d take his chances with the ice fall and the fire on the other side, maybe he’d be able to find Adnan again.

  The wire under his feet gave way, whipping through the air as if cut and lashing at his feet while he clung to the guide wire. Giant weta it is then, he thought beginning to swing along the wire and hoping that it would at least allow him to get his feet on solid ground before swatting him out of the air. It probably wanted revenge for all of the innocent flies and mossies he’d swatted over the years.

  The wire snapped and he fell, screaming, only to hit the ground a second later. He’d only fallen three metres, he even managed to land properly. He could still see the weta’s antennae overhead but it didn’t seem inclined to chase him. He didn’t think it could fit its oversized body in the corridor though there was nothing to stop it squashing him like a bug. The end of the wire caught his eye and he frowned, it looked as if it had been cut rather than snapping due to the stress it had been under. Mitch sighed and added guillotines to the list of things to look out for.

  He was back in what appeared to be a normal maze and if he hadn’t been afraid of what was going to come out of those plain, boring-looking walls he would have kissed them. Half an hour later he was beginning to wish for the lightning walls and fire pits, but not the giant weta. He’d rather get lost and die of boredom first. As it was, he was reasonably sure that he was walking in circles and the only excitement had been an explosion at the far end of the gym and the resulting rain of slimy powder-blue ash. Now a thick cloud of smoke hung overhead. He turned a corner and hit a dead end. He backtracked and tried another path: dead end. He looked for the timer and ground his teeth together when he was confronted by a plume of smoke and more powder-blue ash. He hesitated, Dr Maclyn had said by whatever means necessary and by standing on the tips of his toes he could just reach the top of the wall.

  A little careful groping revealed that it wasn’t lined with spikes or superglue, though that didn’t rule out retractable spikes. He’d just have to pray that there weren’t any; their teachers usually liked to present them with challenges they could counter. A surprise spike at a million miles an hour couldn’t be countered.

  After the high wire, balancing on top of the wall was easy and he had a clear path to the centre of the maze. It was too good to be true but he followed it anyway, he had to stop going in circles and get to the middle somehow. The too good to be true path lasted about five metres before crumbing into dust. Coughing, Mitch scrambled to his feet and brushed himself off. All things considered a crumbling wall wasn’t that bad but he was definitely going to need a shower and a change of clothes before dinner. He scrambled onto the next wall, he preferred the dust to going in circles.

  He scowled when he saw
the barbed wire lining the walls around the golden cage, so much for that plan. He looked around, trying to orientate himself. He thought he was near where the climbing ropes were when the gym was actually being used for its intended purpose and now that he was closer he could see that the cage was too high for him to reach from the maze walls. It looked like he’d have to drop in from the rafters after all.

  One of the ropes was conveniently hanging free, the others having been carefully tied back, suggesting that the rafters would be just as riddled with traps as everywhere else. A hasty examination revealed that the rope hadn’t been threaded with needles and if it had been dipped in poison or sleeping potion it was too subtle for him to detect. He decided to take his chances and started climbing, so long as the rope wasn’t rigged in some way it would provide him with an excellent view of the rest of the maze.

  The view was just as good as he’d hoped. He could see a bubbling pool of green goo, a monstrous giant weta and a series of guillotines running along the rafters. It didn’t look like any were missing, or that they were positioned where they could have cut his high wire but there was nothing to say that there couldn’t be a second set hidden somewhere. He couldn’t see any of his classmates.

  He studied the guillotines and decided that that could be a last resort; he didn’t have that much magic left. There was another path below him that was free from obvious traps. He eyed the distance between them, two metres down and three to his right, he could make that from a standing start, he certainly didn’t have enough room for a run up, or even a step up. Or he could use the rope and swing over. He looked down and the world span. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying not to vomit and breathing deeply. He sank to the beam and wrapped his shaking limbs around it. Only when he was sure that he wasn’t going to fall and splatter across the floor did he open his eyes. He threw up.