Past Tense (Schooled in Magic Book 10)

by Christopher Nuttall

“Like this,” Emily said.

  She shaped the spell in her mind and hurled it at him, but she wasn’t too surprised when he blocked it. Master Drake might not have her protections—indeed, she wasn’t sure he had any protections—yet he did have a great deal of raw power. And her spell was actually quite fragile. It wasn’t designed to survive almost any level of resistance.

  “Impressive,” Master Drake said. “And what do you have to offer me”—he gave her a lewd wink—“in exchange for a look at one of my spells?”

  Emily felt her cheeks redden and reminded herself, sharply, that he was trying to get under her skin. She supposed she should be glad that his had been the only lewd suggestion aimed at her—she’d heard the serving girls being teased by the magicians—but it was still irritating, a reminder that she didn’t quite fit in. He wouldn’t have said that to Bernard, would he? Or to his own apprentice.

  “I can show you something very interesting,” Emily said. “And I believe it will be worth your while.”

  Master Drake studied her for a long moment. “And if it isn’t worth my while?”

  “It will be,” Emily assured him.

  “I will be making complaints to your master if it isn’t,” Master Drake said. He gave her a strikingly savage smile. “And you will not enjoy the consequences.”

  Emily nodded. “Show me your spell,” she said. She reached into her bag and produced a piece of firewood she’d taken from the pile, placing it gently on the desk. “Turn this into gold.”

  Master Drake eyed her darkly, then held his hand over the firewood and cast the spell. Emily watched, tasting the spellwork, as the wood shimmered and turned to gold. The spell—like Master Gila’s spells—drained a great deal of power, more than she would have expected. She doubted she could have cast the spell back in her fourth year, let alone her third. And casting it repeatedly would have been impossible without her boosted magic.

  “Impressive,” she said, finally.

  She picked up the golden branch and examined it, thoughtfully. Permanent transfiguration was difficult, certainly when every magician in the world learnt how to cancel spells in their first year of schooling. It wasn’t a bad idea—she knew she would have had real problems if she hadn’t been able to cancel spells—but it could be frustrating. There were students from poorer families who could have made themselves better clothes, if they hadn’t known the spells could be cancelled at any moment.

  “One would hope so,” Master Drake said. “It took me years to grasp that spell.”

  “I imagine it did,” Emily said. “The sheer level of power you used ...”

  Master Drake preened. “I am very powerful,” he said. “And I am hardly insane ...”

  It will come, Emily thought. She’d suspected it from the first spell and the second had confirmed it. Master Drake’s spells had as much slop as anything she’d seen from Master Gila. She wasn’t sure just how old Master Drake was—she’d have placed him in his thirties—but it wouldn’t be long before the slop started to affect his mind. And then you’ll start losing your grip on reality.

  “I trust you found that interesting,” Master Drake said. His voice hardened suddenly. “And what do you have to show me?”

  “Master Wolfe has been working on the fundamental ... rules ... for casting spells,” Emily said, carefully. “He’s been using his work to rewrite spells.”

  “A pointless waste of time,” Master Drake said, dismissively. “I do trust you have something more interesting to show me?”

  “It is far from a waste of time,” Emily said, nettled. She’d spent five years learning to analyze and rewrite spellware, knowing it would give her much more flexibility than merely casting and recasting common spells. “As you can see ...”

  She took a sheet of parchment out of her bag and carefully outlined Master Drake’s original spell, then showed how it could be rewritten to use far less power. Master Drake watched expressionlessly—his eyes didn’t blink once, as far as she could tell—as she finished her work, then cast the spell. The entire desk turned to gold.

  Master Drake said a word she didn’t recognize as he jumped backwards, then poked and prodded at the golden desk. Emily could sense the magic field leaping around him as he worked, testing the gold carefully. The golden stick suddenly reverted to wood, followed by the desk itself. Master Drake looked up, his eyes dark. There was something ugly in them that made Emily want to tighten her protections. And yet she didn’t want to have to fight another master ...

  “Explain,” he ordered.

  “You’re pushing far too much power into the spell,” she said. Part of the reason she’d had so much trouble handling his spell had been because the spell was massively overpowered. He might not realize it, but there were dozens of redundancies -unnecessary redundancies—built into the spellwork. “You can cast it with much less power.”

  Master Drake reached out with astonishing power and caught her arm. “Why?”

  Emily resisted the urge to pull back. “Because you are using brute force,” she said. “And it is working, but it drains your power. The spells you use are grossly inefficient.”

  She sucked in her breath as Master Drake let go of her. Whitehall had kept her busy casting spells every morning, saving her from having to expend or store magic, but Master Drake might have the same problem if he managed to reduce the amount of magic he used for each spell. Perhaps Master Gila had had that problem too. Emily had suffered nasty headaches for several months after the duel, when her reserves had grown too high for her to handle them safely; she dreaded to think what would have happened if she hadn’t kept expending magic.

  It might have driven me insane, she thought.

  “My master taught me how to perform these spells,” Master Drake said. He sounded angry, but not at her. “He never suggested the spell could be modified ...”

  Emily looked at him. “Why not?”

  “He always believed that the spells had to be cast with such force,” Master Drake said. “And when I tried the spells as a young man, they didn’t work.”

  “Because you didn’t have the power to make them work,” Emily said.

  “I assume so,” Master Drake said. “Why ... why does this work?”

  “Spells are structures,” Emily said. “Like houses ... spells are structures. You can take apart a large house and use the materials to build a smaller house ...”

  “And have enough for a second house afterwards,” Master Drake finished. He tapped the wooden desk thoughtfully. “And I could make more gold.”

  Emily frowned. “How long does the gold last?”

  “Not long,” Master Drake said. “If you’d tried melting it down, it would have reverted to wood pretty quickly. But otherwise there would be no way to know.”

  “You’re overpowering the spell,” Emily mused. “And so some of the results are random.”

  She made a mental note to take the transmutation spell apart and see just what every last spell component actually did. It was possible that Master Drake was actually transfiguring the same thing time and time again—and equally possible, she supposed, that some parts of the spell were cancelling out other parts of the spell. If the transmutation didn’t hold when the object was damaged ... perhaps ...

  Perhaps some demon tempted his master with the idea of unlimited wealth, she thought, and his master never noticed the sting in the tail.

  “I shall have to study Master Wolfe’s work more closely,” Master Drake said.

  “And you could let him study your other spells,” Emily pointed out. “Who knows what might happen when he starts looking at them.”

  Master Drake eyed her, sharply. “Secrets are secret for a reason.”

  “But trading knowledge would make it easier to come up with new inventions,” Emily said, softly. “You could do a great deal more if you understood how the magic actually worked.”

  She rose to her feet and bowed, then headed for the door. She could feel his gaze on her as she walked, but ma
naged to resist the urge to start running or to hurl back something nasty, knowing it would merely cause trouble. Robin was waiting outside, looking oddly amused about something. Emily closed the door behind her and then nodded at him. Where was Bernard?

  “He’s out with his master,” Robin said. Emily blinked, then realized that Robin must have read the question on her face. “And I have nothing to do.”

  Emily sighed, inwardly, as he fell into step beside her. “You don’t have more floors to clear?”

  “We’ve cleared enough space for the moment,” Robin assured her. He gave her a mischievous smile. “Didn’t you kill him?”

  “No, I did not,” Emily said, realizing—a second too late—that she was being teased. “We had a very productive discussion.”

  “You don’t seem to have been turned into a dog,” Robin bantered. “Bernard won’t have to do any of his chores for a week.”

  Emily frowned. “He won’t?”

  “Master Drake has a habit of turning apprentices into animals,” Robin said. He didn’t seem worried by the prospect, even though Master Drake’s spells were far more powerful than any of the prank spells. “He turned Galveston into a chicken for babbling too much and Harold into a fish for ...”

  “You’re joking,” Emily said. Turning someone into a chicken was quite bad enough—particularly as there was a very real danger of someone mistaking the chicken for dinner—but a fish? Harold would have been lucky to survive. Hell, she wasn’t sure if he could survive without being dropped into water. “Are you ...?”

  She shook her head. Of course he wasn’t joking.

  “So they all thought you’d be coming out of the room in some other shape,” Robin said, ignoring her comment. “Or that you’d kill Master Drake. And Bernard bet on you and he’s going to be pleased.”

  “Oh, goody,” Emily said, with heavy sarcasm.

  Robin didn’t seem to hear it. “What do you plan to say to my master?”

  Emily shuddered. Master Chambers was a DemonMaster. If he had any speciality, apart from summoning demons, no one had told her about it. And she didn’t want to summon demons. It was just too difficult to keep them from finding a loophole in their instructions and exploiting it mercilessly.

  Although finding a way to dismiss a demon would be useful, she thought. Aurelius had taught her a few Words of Banishment, but they didn’t always work when she hadn’t summoned the demon. But do they know?

  She glanced at Robin. His magic field was tainted, but she didn’t think there was a demon nestled within it. “Can you dismiss your demons?”

  Robin frowned. “It depends on the demon,” he said. “Some have to be summoned time and time again—they can be dismissed easily, if you keep your nerve. Others ... others cannot be dismissed without destroying their sigil in the Book of Pacts. And once you destroyed it, you wouldn’t be able to call on them again. They don’t come when you call.”

  “I see,” Emily said. She wasn’t sure she wanted to ask more questions, but Aurelius’s vast collection of books had included more speculation than hard facts. “Are there limits to what you can ask a demon to do?”

  “Yeah,” Robin said.

  Emily waited, but he said nothing more. “And those are ...?”

  “I’m not permitted to talk about them,” Robin said, after a moment. “My oaths ...”

  He cleared his throat. “All I can tell you is what my master told me, years ago,” he added, slowly. His words were hesitant, as if he were choosing them carefully. “A demon will do anything for you—if you meet its price.”

  Emily nodded, slowly. A couple of Aurelius’s books had discussed that, although the writers had written in such elliptical terms that it was hard to be sure. Demons were omnipotent—they’d insisted—but it had never made sense to her. If they could do anything they liked, why would they do favors for the DemonMasters? And if there was a reason they did favors for the DemonMasters, why weren’t the DemonMasters ruling the world?

  But if they need something from us, she thought, it might put limits on their abilities. Or they might not be so powerful after all.

  “You offered the demon blood for a spell,” she said, deciding not to point out the flaw in the spell. If Robin didn’t already know, someone else could tell him. “What else do you trade?”

  Robin frowned. Sweat was prickling on his brow. “I can’t tell you,” he said. “I ...”

  He cleared his throat. “You should ask my master,” he added. “He could tell you.”

  “I’ll consider it,” Emily said. It was hard enough being close to Robin when his demon was clearly visible. She had no intention of walking into a DemonMaster’s lair. Master Chambers might not want to let her go afterwards. “What are you doing this evening?”

  “Just playing soccer with the lads,” Robin said. “At least until the sun goes down ...”

  He gave her a wry look. “Do you want to come along?”

  “Julianne insists on going to bed early,” Emily said. It wasn’t entirely untrue, but Julianne also insisted on spending half an hour practicing spells first. Besides, she’d never liked team sports. “We have to be up early in the morning.”

  “Yes, we do,” Robin said. He frowned, wiping his brow. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be more helpful.”

  “I wouldn’t ask you to break a sworn oath,” Emily reassured him. Even basic oaths could be unpleasant, if they were broken. And with demons involved, she was sure the consequences would be horrific. “Shall we go for dinner?”

  Robin hooked his arm through hers. “Why not?”

  Chapter Seventeen

  EMILY WAS SURPRISED —PLEASANTLY SURPRISED— at just how quickly some of the seeds she’d planted began to bear fruit over the next few weeks. Master Drake joined Master Wolfe and herself as they worked out the spells for tapping the nexus point, Master Wolfe determined to rewrite Master Drake’s spells so he could use them himself. Whitehall joined them too, abandoning his private sessions with Emily so he could throw himself into the new project. And Sake—now Master Sake—not only learned the spells she taught him, but—at her suggestion—taught them to four of the unattached apprentices.

  “You seem to be encouraging us to share ideas,” Whitehall commented, during one lunch break. Master Wolfe still had problems eating and sleeping, although he’d calmed down a little after Whitehall had started threatening to force-feed him a sleeping draught. “Is that deliberate?”

  “The more minds working on a problem,” Emily pointed out, “the greater the chance of finding a solution.”

  “Not with magicians,” Whitehall countered. “Getting a bunch of magicians working on the same problem is worse than herding cats.”

  Emily concealed her amusement as they finished their lunch and prepared to head down to the nexus chamber. They said the same in her time, although magicians could work together if they learned the habit from the start—or if they liked each other. She recalled how much she’d enjoyed working with Caleb. The thought was bitter—being stuck in the past was enjoyable, but if she stayed she’d never see him again. And she missed him more than she cared to admit.

  “This is dangerous,” Master Chambers warned. He sounded pessimistic. “A single surge of raw magic would be enough to kill everyone.”

  “We’ve been through this already,” Whitehall said, tiredly. He definitely sounded as though he’d had enough horror stories. “We have to tap the nexus point or we won’t be able to remain here indefinitely.”

  Emily sighed, inwardly, as the two men kept sniping at each other. They were meant to be friends, according to their apprentices, but their arguments had grown more frequent over the past two weeks. Master Chambers seemed to like living in the castle—it was certainly better than a village—yet he didn’t like trying to use the nexus point. And, she suspected, he didn’t like her much either. He’d even scolded Robin for trying to spend so much time with her.

  “The spells have been carefully worked out,” Master Wolfe called back. He so
unded confident—or at least trying to pretend he was confident. “We can handle any surges of magic.”

  “And if you’re wrong, we’re all dead,” Master Chambers snapped.

  Emily resisted—barely—the urge to point out that Master Wolfe wasn’t wrong. Master Chambers wouldn’t want to hear anything from her, not after he’d heard how Emily had convinced Master Drake to work with Master Wolfe. Emily had no idea why he disliked her so intensely—unless he was very wedded to the idea that women should be neither seen nor heard—but it hardly mattered. All that mattered was that he wouldn’t listen to a word she said.

  Maybe I should propose calling up a demon, she thought, as they walked into the nexus chamber. He’d drop the idea in a hurry if it was my suggestion.

  She closed her eyes for a long moment as she felt the beating power surrounding her, then opened them and looked directly at the nexus. Her head started to swim a moment later as she tried to comprehend what she was seeing; the nexus point was tiny and yet immensely huge, pulsing with raw magic that made her hair want to stand on end. It was like staring into a terrifyingly bright light, one that could blind you if you looked at it long enough. None of the other magicians, even Whitehall, seemed able to look at the nexus point. Just being this close to it was unpleasant.

  “I have the materials ready,” Master Bones said. “Shall we begin?”

  He sounded oddly amused, Emily noted; it was hard to blame him. Master Bones was an Elementalist, a magician who worked with the elements; he might be considered a master, but he was looked down upon by many of the other magicians. They didn’t see any value in his work, from crystals that held spells to wooden wands and stone knives that could focus and direct magic. And yet, once Master Wolfe had started putting together the spells to control the nexus point, it hadn’t taken him long to realize that something stronger would be required than mere spellwork. He’d pulled Master Bones into the research team shortly afterwards.

  And there aren’t any Elementalists in my time, Emily thought. Master Chambers had sneered at the whole concept, treating it as little better than potions or divination, but she’d had a different idea. The discipline must have been folded into alchemy.