Past Tense (Schooled in Magic Book 10)

by Christopher Nuttall

  She scowled. She’d never really considered the idea of having children, even after she’d started her first serious relationship. Her mother had soured her on the idea of being a mother herself. And yet, she knew Caleb wanted children. She’d be the mother ...

  Unless I never get home, she thought, morbidly. A year ago, she wouldn’t have believed she could have real feelings for a young man, but now ... the thought of losing him was unappealing. How long will Caleb wait for me before he finds someone else?

  Whitehall cleared his throat. “Perhaps we should discuss something more relevant to your apprenticeship,” he said, stiffly. “There is definitely something odd about your techniques.”

  “I use less power,” Emily said. She was silently glad he’d seen fit to change the subject. “I think you use too much.”

  “Explain,” Whitehall ordered.

  Emily took a moment to gather her thoughts. “You’re a strong man carrying a ... a very heavy object to and fro,” she said, finally. It was a fairly good analogy, although it did have its weaknesses. “I’m placing the object on a wheelbarrow and pushing it to and fro. We’re both accomplishing the same thing, but I’m using less energy to do it.”

  “Which gives you more power to use for other things,” Bernard observed. “Could you teach me?”

  “No,” Whitehall said, sharply.

  Bernard looked down. “But Master ...”

  “No,” Whitehall repeated. “Learning magic from two different magicians is likely to complicate your studies.”

  He had a point, Emily suspected. Given how crude his spells were, there was a good chance that his training wasn’t compatible with any of the other masters. Master Chambers might be able to cast his own fireballs, but they’d be very different from Lord Whitehall’s. That wasn’t a problem in the future—she’d had no difficulty studying charms in both Whitehall and Mountaintop—yet it was clearly a problem now. If she taught Bernard something—anything—it might make it harder for him to learn from his master.

  “Yes, Master,” Bernard said, reluctantly.

  “You can experiment on your own, after your apprenticeship is complete,” Whitehall told him, gently. “Right now, you have to learn from me.”

  He gave Emily a long look. “There isn’t much more I can teach you, without the oaths,” he said. “Did you really enjoy spending time with Master Wolfe?”

  “It was interesting,” Emily said. “He has a number of thoughts and concepts that reminded me of my tutor.”

  “You will have more time to spend with him,” Whitehall said. “He stayed up all night studying the spells you used to bind the nexus point. I couldn’t stop him raving about them this morning. Your master must have been a remarkable man.”

  “He was,” Emily said.

  “He’s dead,” Whitehall reminded her. “You are no longer bound by any of the oaths you swore to him.”

  “I don’t know what will happen if I break them,” Emily said, quietly.

  “If he’s dead, nothing will happen to you,” Whitehall said. “Even a vow of perpetual secrecy loses its power over time. But you’re right. You shouldn’t take too many chances.”

  Emily nodded, relieved. Breaking a magical oath was impossible, as long as one knew one was breaking the oath. They could only be abandoned by believing, truly believing, that the oath was no longer valid. That, it seemed, was true in Whitehall’s time too.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  “Don’t worry about it,” Whitehall told her. “I swore oaths to my master too.”

  He paused, staring towards the forest as a handful of young men emerged. “But I do think we should talk about your techniques at some point.”

  “Yes, Master,” Emily said.

  She watched the young men hurrying towards the castle, carrying a number of dead animals over their shoulders. One of them was carrying a wild boar and grinning hugely from ear to ear. Emily understood. Wild boars were tasty, she had to admit, but killing one without magic was difficult. They were savage creatures. Sergeant Miles had warned his students not to mess around if they had to hunt for food.

  But at least we’ll have something more to eat, she thought. We need food to power our magic.

  “Dinner,” Bernard said, cheerfully.

  “One would hope so,” Whitehall said. He looked at Bernard. “I need to think. Take Emily and get some lunch, then join the teams sweeping the upper floors. I’ll restart your lessons tomorrow.”

  “Yes, My Master,” Bernard said. “Do you want me to bring you some food?”

  “I have to speak to Alfred,” Whitehall said. He shook his head. “We’ll come down and get something ourselves, afterwards.”

  Bernard bowed, then motioned for Emily to follow him.

  Chapter Seven

  “I THINK YOU IMPRESSED HIM,” BERNARD said, as he led the way into the dining hall. There was still no sign of any tables. “I never saw him quite so much at a loss for words before.”

  “Thanks,” Emily said, dryly.

  She saw Julianne on the other side of the room, talking to a pale-faced older man and waved to her. Julianne nodded back as Bernard sat down on the rug and waited, looking impatient. Moments later, a serving girl hurried over with two bowls of soup, bowing deeply as she presented them and withdrawing as soon as she could. Emily watched her go—clearly, the tradition of treating servants well hadn’t started yet—and then tested her soup before starting to drink. It tasted faintly oily, a taste that grew stronger with every mouthful. She decided, reluctantly, that she didn’t want to know what had gone into the soup.

  Probably the remains of an animal, she thought, wryly. Sergeant Miles had insisted that every last part of a slain animal was useful for something. Boiling the bones added flavor to stock, if nothing else. The legs, perhaps, or the bones.

  “Your tutor must have been very capable,” Bernard said, after he put his bowl aside. “I’ve never seen spells like yours.”

  “He was a good teacher,” Emily agreed. “I’ve never seen spells like yours either.”

  “Master Whitehall says I need to grow older before I can use some of his spells,” Bernard said, ruefully. “I just don’t have the reserves to make them work.”

  Because you can’t redesign the spells to use less power, Emily thought. Bernard was strong, perhaps stronger than she’d been a year ago, but his spells were as crude as his master’s. The spellwork you dismiss as boring is the key to becoming a more powerful and dangerous magician.

  Bernard nodded over at two of the other apprentices, who didn’t look pleased to see either him or Emily. “It could be worse,” he said. “We could have to wait for our education.”

  “They might wait too long,” Emily mused. She had no idea what would happen if someone’s gift wasn’t used, but she had a feeling it wouldn’t be pleasant. “The old system is doomed.”

  Bernard looked up at her. “I beg your pardon?”

  “You have one apprentice to one master,” Emily commented. “And here you have umpteen apprentices per master, some of whom may never get a complete education.”

  “They can’t get a complete education without a master,” Bernard pointed out. “They need one-on-one education.”

  “You could also teach them in groups,” Emily countered. Whitehall School had taught a number of students at the same time. The largest class she recalled had had twenty students, all learning from a single teacher. “But that would be difficult with your magic.”

  “Yes, it would be,” Bernard said. He rubbed his forehead. “Master Whitehall took weeks to show me how to cast spells safely.”

  “I learned quickly,” Emily said. “But I think I started with smaller spells.”

  She leaned forward. “What can you do?”

  Bernard looked back. “What do you mean?”

  “I saw you cast a handful of spells,” Emily said. “Could you turn me into a frog?”

  “Of course not,” Bernard said. He shook his head firmly. “That’s ad
vanced magic, you know. Even Master Whitehall would have problems doing it so casually.”

  And first-year students at Whitehall can turn their fellows into frogs or mice or small bedside ornaments, Emily thought. It only took me a week or two to master some really dangerous spells.

  She contemplated the problem for a long moment. “What can you do?”

  “I can use my magic to fight or defend myself,” Bernard said. “Or defend others, if necessary. What else do I need to do?”

  He frowned. “What else should I be able to do?”

  Emily leaned forward. “Can you heal a wounded man?”

  “No,” Bernard said. “Lord Gila was once a great healer, but he’s now advancing towards utter madness. His poor apprentice will take his place once his mind snaps completely.”

  “And you can’t heal yourself,” Emily mused. She’d have to learn what Lord Gila had been able to do and compare it to what she knew from her own time. “Did you ever think to ask him to teach you the skill?”

  “Master Whitehall would never have permitted it,” Bernard said.

  Emily nodded in irritation. None of the tutors in Whitehall School would have been upset if their students had asked other tutors for advice, certainly not when the other tutors were specialists in their fields. But here ... Lord Whitehall had made it clear that she wasn’t to teach Bernard anything, not as long as he was Lord Whitehall’s student. Afterwards ... she shook her head. She had no idea if she’d be remaining in the past long enough for Bernard to graduate or not.

  “I should talk to Lord Gila,” she mused. “See just what he could do.”

  “He’s on the verge of madness,” Bernard said. “Talk to his former apprentice, if you must.”

  “Understood,” Emily said. She frowned, trying to remember what other skills she took for granted. “Can you work alchemy?”

  Bernard frowned. “What’s alchemy?”

  “Tapping the magical proprieties of plants and animals,” Emily said. “Brewing potions to help people ...?”

  “No,” Bernard said. “I didn’t even know it was possible.”

  Emily frowned. He didn’t know ... alchemy had been invented at Whitehall. Or so history said. Was it something else she was meant to introduce? She had hardly been a stellar student, but she knew enough to get them started. She’d just have to see if she could find the ingredients and then brew a potion or two, just to prove the concept was workable.

  And that won’t be easy, she thought. She knew where to find some ingredients—Professor Thande and Sergeant Miles had taught her a little about harvesting supplies—but Whitehall School had sat at the center of a trade network that had spanned the entire continent. It was quite likely that she’d never be able to find any of the rarer ingredients she’d used in her first year. But I should at least try.

  “It is possible,” she said. “I’ll have to show you.”

  Bernard eyed her. “Your tutor taught you this ...this alchemy?”

  “Yes,” Emily said, flatly. “He was a man of varied interests.”

  “So it would seem,” Bernard said. He sounded envious. “My master is rarely interested in anything other than his magic.”

  Emily nodded, then spent the next twenty minutes bouncing questions off him. Bernard knew nothing of teleporting, nor subtle magic; he certainly didn’t understand how the runic alphabet worked or how to use it to craft spells. He talked about a couple of ceremonies that sounded like rituals, but they bore so little resemblance to anything Emily knew that she had no idea what to make of them. And his wardcrafting was appallingly weak.

  I could punch though his wards by brute force, she thought. But I could also break them by cracking through the weak points.

  But there were also some oddities in what he knew. He knew how to craft illusions, but they didn’t seem to behave like the illusions she knew; he understood how to influence a person’s mind, yet not how to avoid doing real damage while tampering. Whitehall had even taught him how to shield his mind without using magic, just in case he was captured and deliberately drained by his captors. Emily had heard of similar techniques, but she’d never had to use them. Void had made sure of that.

  “We should talk about something else,” Bernard said, finally. “I feel a headache coming on.”

  Emily nodded, feeling a glimmer of sympathy. She wouldn’t have enjoyed the interrogation either. Whatever Whitehall said, she would have been surprised if Bernard hadn’t been a little embarrassed—and humiliated—by watching her outclass him so effortlessly. Perhaps, by their standards, she was practically at master-level already. And if Whitehall spent more time with Emily, he’d have less time for his apprentice.

  And that would relegate him to join the others, Emily thought. He’d hate that.

  “I think it’s time you answered a different question,” she said, sternly. “Why did the commune flee to Whitehall? Who was chasing you?”

  “We don’t know,” Bernard said.

  Emily stared at him. “You don’t know?”

  Bernard took a breath. “It’s a long story,” he said. “Really.”

  “Then start at the beginning, go on to the end and then stop,” Emily said. Professor Lombardi had said that to her, after she’d messed up badly in her second year. “Who’s chasing you, and why?”

  For a moment, she thought Bernard wasn’t going to answer. And then he started to talk, so quietly that she had to struggle to hear him.

  “I was born in a small town,” he said, gently. “I started to show signs of magic at twelve, so my parents sent me to the Gathering. Master Whitehall met me and tested me, then offered me an apprenticeship with the commune. We had a small village to ourselves, deep in the forest: masters, apprentices, and servants. Master Whitehall taught me how to control my powers ...”

  He broke off for a long, chilling moment. “The commune was a lot smaller then,” he added, slowly. “There were just four masters and four apprentices. But there were other villages nearby, so we would travel to them or they would come to us ... and, of course, there was the yearly Gathering. Did your tutor never take you?”

  Emily shook her head. It was possible, quite possible, that Bernard’s Gathering was the start of the tradition she’d encountered in the future, but there was no way to know for sure.

  “You should have gone,” Bernard said. “There were masters and apprentices from all over the kingdom, gathered together to exchange news. But there were rumors too, rumors of ... things ... attacking magicians. Villages being destroyed, masters being killed ... apprentices being left to roam free. We didn’t want to believe them, but they were spreading too rapidly for our comfort. I recall Lord Alfred summoning demon after demon, trying to glean some hint of what was going on from them.”

  He paused, his face darkening with remembered horror. “Seven months ago, more or less, we went to a village that had welcomed us before,” he continued. “It had been destroyed, houses smashed flat and temples pounded into rubble. There was no sign of any bodies, no sign of who had attacked a magical settlement and destroyed it. We didn’t know who to blame.”

  Emily frowned. “Mundanes? People without magic?”

  “The king has banned the hunting of magicians,” Bernard said. “As long as we take magical children away from their families, they have as little to do with us as possible.”

  He shook his head. “It was only the first village to die. Another died a month later, even though the masters had tightened their defenses; two more died afterwards, with no clue as to who was doing the attacking. And then a number of refugees ran into our village, apprentices and camp followers from another nearby village. They claimed that the village had been attacked by monsters.”

  Emily frowned. “Monsters?”

  “Monsters,” Bernard repeated. “And then we were attacked ourselves. The defenses were broken with very little effort and so we had to flee. I saw them, but ... but I can’t remember what they looked like. No one can. They just came and killed and dest
royed and hunted ...”

  His voice trailed off. Emily forced herself to think. If he couldn’t remember what the creatures had looked like ... it suggested subtle magic or a very powerful and unusual glamour. And yet, subtle magic worked best when its victim had no idea he was under attack. Breaking the spell—by hitting the target directly—would ruin the effect.

  “We fled,” Bernard said. “Masters Poe and Wallace talked about making a stand, but it was useless. They were crushed. We picked up more masters, more apprentices, but we didn’t know where to go. In the end, Lord Alfred summoned a demon and put the question to it.”

  “And the demon pointed you here,” Emily mused.

  The thought made her smile, humorlessly. She’d heard plenty of stories about Lord Alfred, but most of them had been badly exaggerated. Even Professor Locke had believed that Lord Alfred’s reputation had grown in the telling, something that was genuinely surprising when Professor Locke had believed that the ancients had possessed all kinds of long-forgotten magics. And if Lord Alfred had been a DemonMaster ...

  “It did,” Bernard said. “We thought we’d gathered enough supplies, but we were on the verge of starvation when we finally reached the castle.”

  He frowned. “How did you get here?”

  “We walked,” Emily said, shortly. “Getting here was not easy.”

  She rubbed her forehead, feeling her temples start to pound. She needed time to think. She’d assumed that the commune had been fleeing mundanes, but it was clear that things were a little more complex than she’d thought. If the creatures were truly inhuman, they might well have some connection to the Faerie. The Faerie War couldn’t be that far off. And if they were hunting magicians specifically ...

  But they didn’t follow the commune to Whitehall, she thought. Were they afraid to go too close to the castle?

  Bernard met her eyes. “How many people accompanied you to the castle?”