Restriction: A Kurtherian Gambit Series (The Rise of Magic Book 1)

by CM Raymond

  “What does scarcity breed then?” the assistant asked.

  Adrien lifted an eyebrow and waved his hand towards his window. “Scarcity breeds prestige. Prestige provides power. And power… whatever the hell we want. That’s why we keep the gates narrow. Control the magic; control the world.”

  Doyle looked down at his papers, his face blushed. “Right then. Do you want to—”

  “That’s not all,” Adrien continued, ignoring the man altogether. “How are we to keep track of all of the authorized magicians?” Adrien turned back around to look out the window, “Can you even imagine the world that the Founder imagined?”

  The assistant shifted in his seat at the speaking of the name.

  “Let everyone study magic?” the Chancellor continued. “Ezekiel was a damned fool. If he had his way, Arcadia would have been in ashes years ago. Hell, he thought that the old world was bad. He went on and on about it. But that’s nothing compared to what would happen if we let any damned fool out there practice magic. It would be bedlam, chaos.”

  Adrien slapped the frame of his window, “No! We’ll keep the class sizes right where they’re at. Besides, what do we need more magicians for? We have the manpower necessary to complete my plan with the students that are here now. We have the pick of the litter. Our primary end is research and design, not enrollment and financials. The Governor is pleased with the new prototype, and he wants to employ the magitech as soon as possible.”

  “Right. Very good, sir. I'm sure he’s pleased. Should I—”

  Adrien looked down at a couple of carts stuck facing each other on a street three blocks over, “Damn right it’s good, Doyle. And he better be pleased.”

  He turned and walked behind his desk, pushing out the chair and sitting down. “That asshat would still be pissing in a pot in that little district of his if it weren’t for the magitech weapons we’ve crafted for him. If it wasn’t for me... me and the Academy, he’d have nothing.”

  The assistant looked down at his feet and pulled on the collar of his cloak. “There are, um, a few other things.”

  Adrien leaned forward, resting his arms on the mahogany desk.

  Voice quivering, Doyle continued, “It's the engineers, sir. Today’s report was, well, troubling."

  "Troubling?" Adrien asked, his voice soft.

  Doyle rung his hands in his lap. Despite his love for the Chancellor, he was clearly terrified at the moment. "Quite troubling, sir. Things are moving more slowly than expected. The lead engineer is saying that the first weapon won't be ready for another four months."

  Adrien stood up and leaned forward, towering over his assistant. “Four months is unacceptable.” His voice was much louder, his anger flavoring his reply. “Tell Lawrence that I can get them extra workers, but if he believes I’m going to wait another four months? Well, he's an idiot. Do I need to remind him what happened to the last head engineer who tried my patience?"

  Doyle shook his head before stammering out, "No, sir. I think that will be crystal-clear."

  "What else?" Adrien's voice boomed. Doyle’s presence was becoming irksome.

  He looked down at his notes and back to Adrien, "Oh, it's nothing. Just that…there was an attack today. Three Hunters. Apparently, they found one of the girls from The Queen’s Boulevard using magic in public. Unlawful, of course. They chased her down and attempted to make a passive capture."

  "And…"

  "Well, something went wrong. Only one of them is currently conscious."

  Adrien knew the power his bounty hunters had. They weren’t the brightest graduates of the Academy, but they were gifted in magic and were also given magitech weapons to assist in capturing or killing Unlawfuls. It was more power than was necessary, but Adrien believed in being thorough.

  Most Unlawfuls quietly developed their magic behind closed doors, where they would never be found. As far as the Capitol knew, most of these folks could do little more than glorified card tricks. But allowing even the simplest of practices unchecked would lead to disaster.

  There hadn't been a serious issue during a capture for over a decade.

  Adrien’s voice lowered. "Unconscious, you say? What happened?"

  Doyle wiped his hands on his pants and looked up at his boss. "Apparently, sir, they said they were attacked by a demon that could control the weather.”

  Adrien dropped back into his chair and laughed. "A demon? Do they take me for an idiot? I'm guessing those three got drunk and were jumped by beggars or something. Once they're released from the hospital, make sure they’re put to work in the factory. That will teach them to shirk their responsibilities."

  Doyle continued his report, but Adrien had stopped listening. Something about the Hunters’ story reminded him of a memory long since forgotten—of a trick that his old teacher Ezekiel used to use.

  His mentor was powerful in ways that Adrien could never match. But Ezekiel was a fool. His notions of justice always clouding out better judgment—Adrien’s better judgment. And it was finally that foolishness that carried Ezekiel into his final quest.

  The quest that would claim his life.

  Despite what the halfwit priests on the street preached, Adrien knew that the Founder would never return.

  And yet...

  He put up his hand, stopping Doyle’s recitation. "Actually, Doyle, I’ll go talk to those Hunters myself. I might have some questions for them."

  Doyle nodded. “Of course, sir. Anything else?”

  Adrien waved him off. “That’s enough for today. Thank you for your work.”

  The assistant nodded, stood up and turned for the door.

  “And, Doyle,” Adrien called out as the man grabbed the knob, he turned back to Adrien.

  “If I ever hear of you speaking to anyone about this demon, you’ll wish that it had been you in that alley today. You understand?” he asked.

  Doyle nodded quickly. “Yes, sir.”

  Adrien could hear his assistant swallow from across the room. He smiled, pleased by the extent of his power.

  ****

  Hannah paused on the step outside of her house. She listened for any sign of her father. The day had gone sideways, and the last thing she needed was a shit show confrontation with the head drunk of the house. Hearing nothing, she turned the knob and stepped across the threshold.

  The room was nearly bare, whether out of poverty or sheer laziness she wasn't sure. But since her mother passed, their house was nothing like a home.

  Tiptoeing across the living room, she turned for their bedroom. She and William had shared one since they were born. Although inconvenient at times, she didn’t mind the arrangement and knew that it was part of the reason she and her brother were so close.

  The two had spent hours lying in their beds in deep conversation of what life would be like if they ever broke out of Queen Bitch Boulevard—what the locals called The Queen’s Boulevard, the slums of Arcadia.

  “What the hell happened to you?" the voice said from behind her.

  Hannah spun on her heels and faced her second adversary of the day. Her fingers moved to her nose and felt where the bump was already forming. She hadn't seen her face, but she could only imagine that it looked pretty bad.

  The Hunter tagged her in more ways than one. Of course, she wouldn't get sympathy from her father. Instead, she brushed more hair in front of her face and hung her head. "Nothing. Just… Nothing."

  Her father's right hand formed into a fist, and she wondered if she would get a second beating. The man was aging, and his sedentary life, split between sleeping and getting drunk, did nothing for his physical abilities. But he had height and weight on her, and he could still do some damage.

  Hannah expected a day would come when she finally fought back, but that would be a day of maximal commitment.

  The day they would run from this town forever.

  "Where's your take for today? With my… disability… you know I can't work. That's why you and your brother need to be out there hustling. A
nd what the hell happened to your nose?"

  As her father's breath, rank with whiskey, spread over her, she considered lashing back. But she learned her lesson before, and it was always better to just keep her head down.

  "I'm sorry. I'll get twice as much tomorrow,” she mumbled.

  He growled, "Damn right, you will.” He pointed off to the back. “And talk to your brother. He’s been crying in his room since he got back. That damn boy is worthless."

  She choked down a laugh at the irony of his words. The man in front of her was literally a waste of space. She couldn’t hate him more if he were the Hunter that attacked her today.

  Hannah sidestepped her father and walked toward the back of the house. It didn't take long; the place was small enough to fit on a merchant's cart. Cracking her bedroom door, she peeked inside. William sat up onto his elbows and smiled back at her. The boy’s color had waned again; black circles surrounded his eyes.

  He spoke as she stepped in and closed the door. "Hey, glad you’re back. I was nervous those men had gotten you."

  "Yeah, you know me. I’m untouchable," Hannah smirked as she crossed the room and sat on his bed. "How’re you doing, anyway?"

  The boy shrugged. "Not sure. I guess I feel almost normal. But… something still isn't quite right. I know I'm not, but I feel like my entire body is still shaking."

  She knew nothing about medicine, but Hannah was sure that the onset of seizures was serious. Arcadia was known for some of the best medical services in all of Irth. Which was great, for those who could afford it. Instead, people in their quarter relied upon home remedies and, at times, some black-market potions to try to cure the most serious of ailments.

  William had always been sickly, but today’s seizure marked something worse, and it terrified her.

  She once overheard a trader say that people in other regions looked on Arcadia with covetous eyes. But they didn’t know what life was like in the QBB. William was the only thing that got her through each miserable day. With her mother dead and her father a drunk, her little brother was nearly the only thing that made her believe life was worth a damn.

  "Listen, when I hit the streets tomorrow, I'm gonna ask around. See if I can find out something about what happened to you. If I can, I'll get some medicine. But for now, get some rest."

  He nodded to her. “OK. But what about what happened to you? That green light…”

  Hannah subconsciously raised a hand to the tag under her hair. Whatever happened back there in the streets, it was still freaking her out. “That’s nothing for you to worry about.” She ruffled his hair, “Go to sleep.”

  Moments later, Hannah laid in bed listening to the uneven breaths of her brother’s labored sleeping. Sleep never came easily for her, and with a day like she had, it might not come at all.

  Outside her window, the Boulevard had come to life. Her quarter was safe for locals during the day. They were a group all down on their luck with no hope on the horizon, but they were all in it together.

  But at night, everything changed. The neighborhood was transformed into a den of prostitutes, drunks, and thieves. The only protection for someone like her or her brother was to stay in after sundown.

  She thought about William and their miserable conditions. If she had a shot that was sure, she’d take them both away from it all. Away from her father. Away from Queen Bitch Boulevard. Away from all of Arcadia. Hannah didn’t know where they would go, but that didn’t matter. Anyplace would be better than there.

  As dreams of a better place danced in her head, sleep started to take over. Just as she was slipping away, a scratch on the shutters drew her back to consciousness.

  She jumped, reaching for the dull knife on her bedside table. It was less of a knife, and more of a glorified toothpick, but it was better than nothing. Hannah held the point out toward the window.

  After a moment of quiet, her heart beating hard enough to split open her ribs, she figured it was just her mind playing tricks. She considered dropping back into bed when the scratching returned.

  Keeping the knife extended before her, she slowly reached forward and pulled open the shutters.

  Hannah fully expected to find a burglar lurking outside her window or some drunk vomiting his mead into their rain barrel below. But what she saw shocked her. Two eyes stared at her from the window sill just inches away.

  She stepped back in surprise. As she turned back toward the window, she half expected the eyes to be gone, but they weren’t.

  From a step away, she saw the creature in its fullness. It was a green, spiny lizard. The lizard she had seen transform in the market square. With all that had occurred, she had almost forgotten about that peculiar event, but if she had remembered, she would have marked it up to an optical illusion or maybe even a delusion from the fear of losing her brother.

  But there it was, sitting in the moonlight, gazing back at her. It didn’t look anything like the lizards that lurked around the cobblestoned streets of Arcadia. It was big, bigger than her old cat, Thomas. Instead of the pale skin she was used to seeing, he was darker, the color of the waving bows of the pine trees that grew outside of the city gates.

  If all of that wasn’t strange enough, the creature had a dozen or so spines running down the narrow ridge of its back. Their points were silhouetted in the light of the full-moon.

  She stepped forward to get a closer look. When she did, the lizard leapt from its station on the sill directly in her direction. Hannah shrieked and swatted the thing away from her body. William wrestled around in his bed obviously disturbed by the outburst but remained asleep.

  The lizard landed harmlessly on her pillow. It stared up at her without blinking, and she wondered if it was planning its next attack.

  With its tongue shooting out and back in, it walked off her pillow and started walking in circles on her bed, wagging its long tail before finally curling up into a ball on her quilt—just like her old cat.

  She lowered the knife and relaxed at the sight.

  Seriously? How much worse could this day get?

  “You’re cute. But you got to go,” she said, wondering how she would get the thing off her bed and out of the house. She approached it tentatively, having no idea what it was and if it were dangerous. She waved her hands at it. “Shoo! Get.”

  It trained its eyes on her, blinked, and laid its head on the bed—keeping its reptilian eyes fastened on its host. Hannah drew close, and as she did, she felt the hum of energy run through her body—just as she had in the market square. Reaching out for it, the lizard tongue lashed out and licked her hand once and then again.

  The first lick, Hannah had yanked her hand back... but, it didn’t hurt. She moved her hand forward again. Hannah laughed as the next lick tickled her wrist. It felt good, both to be tickled by the little creature, but also to laugh.

  It had been far too long.

  She smiled and whispered after a moment, “OK, friend. You can stay. But just for tonight.”

  Hannah closed the shutters and crawled back into her bed, shaping her body around the lump of a creature that had become her second roommate in the tiny space she and William shared. As she drifted off to sleep, Hannah felt the lizard lay its tiny head across her thigh.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Sunshine cut through the slats in the shutters drawing Hannah out of her deep slumber. Years ago, beautiful tapestry blinds kept the rays at bay. The window dressings were their only precious heirloom, a treasure passed down through generations.

  Soon after the passing of her mother, they disappeared. Hannah never asked, but she assumed they were sold by her father or given to some Queen Bitch Boulevard whore for the sake of a few thrusts and grunts. The tapestries weren’t the greatest loss, but their absence proved that nothing was sacred. And it showed what kind of an animal her father was.

  The lizard curled between her legs and peaked an eye when she rolled over, then immediately went back to sleep.

  “Lazy ass,” she chuckled. It did
n’t seem to mind the insult.

  She half assumed the thing would be gone when she woke up, just another wisp of a dream destroyed by the morning light. But whatever it was—and wherever it came from—the thing was flesh and blood, and it seemed to have made itself at home here.

  “Well, if you’re going to stay, I might as well give you a name.” She tilted her head to the side and thought for a second. “How about Sal”

  As she said the name, the lizard curled itself tighter into a ball. With a little imagination, she pictured the thing smiling. It seemed that Sal would work just fine.