Archon's Hope: Book III of 'The Magician's Brother' Series

by HDA Roberts

  "My preferred lackey is currently wrapped around my preferred male, she's busy," Tethys commented, pulling gently on my arm.

  With Kandi latched on like she was, I'd have trouble following, so I used a little Will to pick her up and carry her after Tethys.

  "Oh!" Kandi said, blushing like Cathy had.

  Girls like being carried, who knew?

  Tethys and Kandi started making calls, and so did I. I was reluctant to leave them until I was sure nobody else was coming after them.

  Cathy was both miffed and enthusiastic. She was in a cab, heading for the club, before we'd finished talking.

  "Tethys? Is it alright if Cathy comes here? She's worried," I asked.

  "No she isn't, she wants to see where you spent Christmas," Tethys replied, "interesting choice, giving her the excuse. And yes, it's absolutely fine. I'm looking forward to it."

  "She says it's fine," I said, suddenly worried.

  "Wasn't a request," Cathy said.

  "Okay, see you in a few," I said.

  We hung up.

  "Kandi, would you go and expedite for Miss Campbell?" Tethys said mischievously.

  "Sure," Kandi said, smiling evilly at me.

  "This was a horrific mistake, wasn't it?" I asked.

  "Bringing your girlfriend to a strip club you've stayed in, where a woman that enjoys sleeping with you lives? No, I'm sure this'll end just fine," Tethys said dryly, "And that doesn't even cover Kandi, who, as we both know, is rather attached to you."

  "Crap."

  Well, nothing I could do about that. May as well get the next bit out the way.

  I called Kraab.

  "Oh, what did you do now?" he asked without preamble.

  "That hurts."

  "I'm looking at one collapsed roof, a big molten hole in another and footage of someone that looks an awful lot like you standing between a monster and a woman that looks an awful lot like Tethys Smyth," he said snarkily.

  I did my best to explain myself, and was barely a third done when Kandi led Cathy in. My girlfriend smiled at me, and Tethys went over to say hello. They'd never been properly introduced, but Tethys handled it astonishingly well. Cathy smiled shyly as they chatted, and I finished up talking to Kraab.

  "I'll need to take your statement," he said finally, "I'll have Lady Hopkins talk to you about it, but this seems relatively cut and dried."

  "Doesn't that make a nice change?"

  He snorted and we said goodbye.

  "What do you mean he touched you?" Cathy asked, still chatting with Tethys.

  Oh, I just knew this was a bad idea...

  "Only in his sleep, I doubt he even remembers," Tethys said.

  Kandi sat next to me, grinning like the Cheshire Cat, "This is fun," she said, patting my knee.

  I turned to glare and she planted a tiny kiss on the tip of my nose. I blushed; she grinned.

  "That's nothing. You should see what I did to him while he was snoozing. He's such a deep sleeper," Tethys continued.

  "Wait, what?" I said.

  "Shush, Mathew, women are talking," Tethys said with a smile.

  "My grandmother was right, no good deed goes unpunished," I said. Kandi laughed and took my hand in hers. Karina was watching all this from the other side of the room, grinning evilly, always letting her eyes drift back to me. It was creeping me out.

  "Before my ears start to bleed, could I ask something?" I asked Tethys, who grinned at my obvious attempt to change the subject.

  "Oh, alright," she said with an impatient expression.

  "Have you seen any strangers around lately? Anyone that came out at you? Someone suspicious?"

  "Someone obviously Black-Magicy, you mean?" Tethys said.

  "Essentially."

  "Nobody leaps out, or has leapt out," she replied after a moment's thought.

  "How about injuries? Have you been scratched lately? Shed any blood?"

  "Not that I can remember; maybe," she said, shrugging.

  "Hm," I said, thinking.

  "So anyway, sleeping with Mathew..." Tethys continued.

  "Isn't it time we were getting back to school?" I begged.

  "I keep forgetting you're a schoolboy," Kandi said, distracting me, "adds a certain spice to the ol' imagination."

  "Oh, for heaven's sake..." I said with a sigh.

  "And no," Cathy said with a smirk, "this is the kind of dirt I'll be able to hold over you for years."

  "I'd never blackmail you, Matty," Kandi whispered in my ear.

  I tweaked her nose, and she darted her chin up so she could bite my finger.

  "You're not very nice to me," I said.

  "I can make it up to you," she said sweetly.

  "I'm watching you, too," Cathy said over her shoulder.

  "She likes to watch, huh?" Kandi said.

  "Please don't complicate my life any further," I begged.

  "Aw, but there's a plan," Kandi said, "Tethys will punish me if I don't do my part. Think of it, me bending over her desk, Tethys standing over me with a whip in her-"

  I put my hand over her mouth like I had with Tethys, Kandi seemed to enjoy it, giggling manically.

  "She likes being gagged, you're only encouraging her," Tethys said.

  I pulled my hand away and Kandi looked flushed, fanning her face with her hand, "Oh, that's nice," she said in a shuddering voice.

  I rolled my eyes and tried not to have a panic attack as Tethys and Cathy continued to chat.

  "So, how was your Christmas?" I asked Kandi, desperate to steer the conversation onto safer ground.

  She told me about going home, spending time with her mother and four sisters (good grief, four more Kandis?), she told me about them. Her mother was a teacher, her eldest sister was a surgeon, the next oldest was an office manager, and her last sister was a law student. It was quite a high-powered group to include an exotic dancer. But then I remembered that Kandi had originally trained as a ballerina, which made more sense now.

  Cathy and Tethys seemed to be getting along. I briefly tuned into the conversation and immediately wished I hadn't.

  "Cathy, don't tell her stuff like that!" I said, utterly mortified.

  "Why? She asked," Cathy said.

  "She asked me, too, but I didn't spill!"

  "What, really?" she asked.

  "No! A gentleman doesn't kiss and tell!"

  "Girls do," Tethys said, "all the time, you little rock star, you."

  "Cathy, stop telling her things," I said.

  "Or what?" she said.

  Well, she had me there.

  "Or I'll... um," I replied.

  "That's what I thought, where was I?" Cathy said.

  "Bushes behind the bike shed," Tethys said, licking her lips.

  "I'm going for a walk, or possibly to hang myself," I said, standing up.

  "Bring back cookies!" Tethys said, "From Gerrino's; none of that store-brand crap!"

  "Fine," I grumped.

  "I'll come along, you'll never get the right ones," Kandi said, bounding after me.

  So, I went for a nice walk with Kandi. We ended up at a cafe next to Gerrino's for a while, and we chatted.

  "I like talking to you, Matty," she said after I'd paid and we'd started for the cookie shop, her arm through mine, "You don't judge."

  "What's there to judge?" I asked, "As long as someone else isn't getting hurt, I say let people do what makes them happy. Live and let live."

  "I don't know a lot of Magicians, but I get the impression that there aren't a lot of them who feel the same way," she said.

  I shrugged, "I guess I've got a broader perspective."

  She smiled warmly and kissed my cheek.

  "A lot of my friends turned away when they found out where I work; you never even looked at me funny. You were always polite, treated me like a person. A lot of guys hear the phrase 'exotic dancer' and think 'dancing whore'."

  "Direct me to those people and I will neuter them for you," I said, only half joking.

 
"I know you would," she said, squeezing me tighter, "Cathy is a lucky girl."

  "So's Tethys," I said, returning the squeeze, she blushed.

  "She talks about you, you know? I've heard her talk about men in the past, ones that she needed for something or other. It started like that with you, but she hasn't thought of you as a means to an end for a long time. I thought you should know that."

  "I already did."

  "Good. She hasn't stopped trying to get at you, though. Her plans are starting to get... weird."

  "Do tell."

  "Nope, she'll get mad at me, and that generally means withholding things for a while. But don't worry, she's nowhere near a working idea yet."

  I snorted.

  "And she is so pissed off about that little bit of 'Evil Logic' you dropped on her before Christmas, that's what she calls it. She hates being outmanoeuvred, but funnily enough, she doesn't mind as much when it's you."

  "She's still going to get me back one day."

  "You'd better believe it," she said, smiling even wider.

  Kandi picked a pile of cookies. I paid and carried them back to the club. The doors had already been replaced, the bar gone, and the carpet had been pulled up. It had been less than half an hour.

  "Damn, that was quick," I said.

  "Tethys has a firm on retainer," Kandi said, opening the various doors for me.

  I heard stony silence from the office, and when I entered, I saw why.

  Hopkins was sitting on the sofa with Cathy, who was beet red with embarrassment. Tethys was sitting at her desk, looking miffed. Karina hadn't moved from her spot.

  "I take it Kraab talked to you?" I asked.

  "What was your first clue?" Hopkins asked acidly.

  "Oh, how are you mad at me? I didn't cast the damned spell!" I said.

  "No, but you went after whatever it was alone!" she snapped, standing up, "You knew it was a Revenant, and I'll just bet you knew it was a Sorceress to boot, and you still went alone!"

  "There wasn't time to call for help," I said as reasonably as I could.

  "There really wasn't," Tethys said, "I was seconds away from a nasty death when he turned up. My sister, too."

  "Hi!" Karina said with a cheery wave.

  Hopkins massaged her temples, "I know that these... people are your friends, Mathew, but that thing should have killed you! If it had been more than a few minutes old, it probably would have!"

  "I was doing just fine!" I said, a little defensively.

  "It was quite impressive," Tethys said, "I didn't see it, but Karina did. She said it was impressive, didn't you?"

  "Yep," Karina said, "It was actually a little bit sexy."

  I rubbed my eyes.

  "Be that as it may," Hopkins said through gritted teeth, "a Black Revenant is not something that anyone short of an S.C.A. Battle Mage should even go near, much less fight toe to toe!"

  "Could we talk about this outside?" I asked, gesturing at Tethys, who was maintaining a neutral expression, but I knew her well enough to see how hard a time she was having holding back the pain.

  "What? Oh, my apologies, Ms. Smyth," Hopkins said, her anger making way for compassion, "That was... unforgivably thoughtless of me."

  "I understand. I love him, too," she said, smiling at me.

  "This isn't about emotion, this is about necessity," Hopkins said, looking uncomfortable, "Come on Matty."

  "Be right back," I said.

  Kandi made a crude gesture and a suggestive eye movement, which I glared in response to.

  Hopkins led me into the main room and sat down at one of the tables, gesturing for me to take the other side.

  "I'm sorry," she said, "that was inconsiderate of me."

  "I'm sorry I worried you," I said.

  "God, Matty!" she said, thumping the table, making me jump, "Every five minutes I hear about you doing something dangerous! I can't have it, do you understand? You may be something of a prodigy, but you're still just a kid! And even you freely admit that you don't know what you're doing when it comes to fighting! In the last three months alone, how many times have you been injured?"

  "I was only trying to do the right thing," I said tiredly.

  She thumped the table again.

  "That makes it worse! Because that is the kind of sentiment that gets good people killed! And you are a good person. You could have easily made a monster of yourself, and you chose not to. Why do you think I spend so much of my time looking out for you? It's because you're a precious thing, a Shadowborn that doesn't care about power, who is compassionate, who sees the power that could be yours and says 'no'."

  "I'm not all that, Miss Hopkins. I just want to be able to look in the mirror again one day."

  She looked down at that. Palmyra had been blabbing, damned Empaths...

  "Lucille told me how what happened affected you. I know it's my fault. But you shouldn't hate yourself the way you do, Matty. It's not fair."

  "As long as I don't look, I don't remember," I said softly, not enjoying this particular conversational tangent.

  "When was the last time you looked in a mirror?" she asked.

  "When I got this," I said, pointing at my scarred cheek, "It's easier."

  "How do you shave?" she asked, lightening the tone a little.

  I chuckled, "Barely need to yet, but with Magic, when I do."

  "You know that what happened to your brother was always going to happen, whether you cast the Severing or not, don't you?"

  "What do you mean?" I asked, my forehead scrunching in confusion.

  Her eyes went a little wide.

  "I wish you'd come to me earlier," she said, sighing, "talked to me about it. I'd have told you that when Magician twins are born, they always turn out different. One will be a Pyrokine, the other a Aquamage, or Earth and Air. It's always an opposite, like a full Magician gets split in two. One will be decent, and the other..."

  "My brother is not the evil twin."

  "I wish I could agree with you," Hopkins said, "but one of you is, and I don't think it's you."

  "Why does it have to be evil? Isn't the world in shades of grey?"

  "Usually. Mostly, in fact. But with Magical Twins, one is inclined towards good, the other evil. That doesn't mean they land smack-dab in the extreme, just that they're more inclined to one or other. It also doesn't mean that a bad one can't come good or that a good one won't go bad, it's just about the starting point. Your brother..."

  "Don't. Please?"

  "You need to hear it, Mathew," she said gently, "Your brother started just the wrong side of the line, could have gone either way. He went through life without really altering that morality, he was never presented with a crossroads. When that time came, he chose to be cruel, rather than kind or even neutral. I know which one of you is which because I saw you face the same fork in the road, more than once, and I saw you be kind, or compassionate, and ask for nothing back. In the end, Desmond could have kept the Black inside, stomped it down and refused to use it. The Black doesn't create evil. Nothing can. It only brings out of a man that which is already there."

  I felt tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat. I looked away.

  Hopkins stood and pulled me into a hug, holding me close.

  Tears flowed, mostly mine.

  "It's alright," she said, squeezing me tight, "I swear that nothing that happened to your brother was ever your fault. On my life, I swear it."

  "I want to believe you. I want to more than anything to believe you. But wanting to believe something is what caused this problem in the first place."

  I cuffed at my eyes, trying to clear them.

  She stroked my back, still holding me.

  "If you hadn't believed, you'd be lost to us all right now. It's the relationships, the people we love that keep us sound, that keep us living; that keep us shining. Without the ones you love to keep you in the light, the shadows will claim you, and that's where the Black is waiting for you."

  I nodded, understanding.


  Whether or not Hopkins did what she did for me, she made the right choice. If I'd cast the Severing on myself, I'd have cut away the very best parts of me. And I would have gone dark. I'd probably already be using the Black.

  "Thank you," I said quietly.

  "You're very welcome. I'd say that one day you'd do the same for me, but I'm not stupid enough to need that sort of help."

  I laughed and she patted my back, "That's better."

  She let me go and resumed her seat.

  "Any idea who did this?" I asked, changing the subject.

  "Someone who really hates you. My first guess would be Hellstrom, but that would mean that she was responsible for that Fairy Harvest, and I have trouble believing that. Even she would baulk at associating herself with something that ugly."

  "Then who?"

  "Damned if I know. It must be Hellstrom. She's the only one with the clout to buy Golems, move property and get around Fairy Queens. But insane though Hellstrom is, there's no way she'd have anything to do with a group that would kidnap Adriata's daughter. How's that going, by the way?"

  "We came to an understanding."

  "You may have. I doubt that she has," Hopkins replied with a grin, "Sidhe are jealous creatures, Mathew. She won't appreciate your relationship with Miss Campbell."

  "I'm working on that, but the whole thing is so complicated."

  "It usually is, but you really don't have anything to be afraid of."

  "Not afraid, just tired."

  She patted my shoulder, "It gets better."

  "Any time soon?" I asked with a smile, "Only it'd be nice to go a term without someone trying to kill me or someone close to me."

  "There we may have a bit of a break. As you know, Black Magic spells are hard to come by. Very few exist outside of that book of yours. No group will have more than one or two. And if they tried to use a Revenant, the chances are they didn't have anything better. And you can't cast a Summoning on someone twice. So Tethys, at least will be safe, and I doubt that anyone else you know has a beloved sorcerer waiting to be raised."

  I actually relaxed a little, "That does help."

  "See? There's always a silver lining."

  I nodded.

  "By the way... Succubae, Matty? Really?" she said with a smirk.

  "Tethys is reformed, more or less, I only just met the other one."