by M. J. Putney
“Not entirely.” After a long silence, Cynthia said, “Your mother’s pudding was well received at the Rainfords’ Christmas dinner.”
“I’m glad. Were you there, too, or did the pudding attend on its own?”
“I was there.” Cynthia sighed heavily, then pushed the covers away. “I suppose I can’t hide from you if you’re going to insist on staying here.”
“Well, it’s my room as well as yours,” Tory pointed out.
“If you laugh at me, I’ll never forgive you!”
Cynthia sat up and swung her legs over the edge of the bed, her expression wary. Her blond hair was in a long braid and she wore a warm bathrobe over her shift, but there was nothing to inspire laughter in her appearance. Except …
Tory frowned. “Did you have an accident? Your cheek looks scratched.”
“It’s … it’s complicated.” Cynthia drew a shaky breath, looking on the verge of tears. “I have to tell someone, so I suppose it will have to be you.”
Cynthia was as gracious as always, Tory thought dryly as she dug into her bag for the elderberry wine and the box of hazelnut shortbread. She had two glasses in her clothespress, so she poured them each some wine.
Crossing the room to give a glass to Cynthia, she said, “Speak and I shall listen, and not tell anyone else if you don’t want me to.”
This close, she saw that the line on her roommate’s cheek was not a scratch, but a long-healed scar. Confused, she looked harder, and realized that Cynthia’s appearance was subtly different. Not quite believing what she was seeing, she asked, “Have you been using illusion magic and now you’ve stopped?”
“Is it that obvious?” Cynthia wailed as she broke into tears.
Tory hastily took the glass of wine from the other girl’s hand, then sat in the chair by Cynthia’s bed. “It’s not obvious, but that scar isn’t new. I just remembered that when we returned through the mirror, for a moment it seemed as if your features were melting.” She shivered. “It was very strange, but so quick I thought I must have imagined it.”
“You didn’t.” Cynthia wrapped her blankets around herself and began a disjointed account of her holiday. “I’ve been using illusion magic constantly ever since … ever since I got this scar. Going through the mirror was so draining that for a moment I couldn’t maintain my appearance.”
As Cynthia continued, Tory listened quietly, not wanting to interrupt the flow of words. So the other girls had been dreadful, Jack Rainford had dragged Cynthia to Swallow Grange, she’d turned out to be a powerful hearth witch—Tory felt a pang of envy—Cynthia and Jack had rescued a French refugee family from drowning, and in the process Cynthia had burned out her power.
“I’ve been hoping that my magic would recover enough so that I could disguise my face before classes start again,” Cynthia finished brokenly. “But it hasn’t. It might never come back!”
“I’ve never heard of magic burning out permanently.” Tory handed her roommate the elderberry wine and set the box of hazelnut shortbread on Cynthia’s desk where they could both reach it. “According to Nick, it was a fortnight or so before Polly Rainford really began to recover. You’ve only had a few days.”
“That’s another thing. Nick hasn’t sent a message in weeks.” Cynthia helped herself to two pieces of shortbread. “Jack is getting really worried.”
Tory bit her lip, concerned. “There could be any number of reasons.”
“None of them good,” Cynthia said gloomily. She took two more pieces of shortbread. “I’ve been hiding out here since I returned from Swallow Grange. Since I put the sign on the door the maids leave food outside, but it’s never enough.”
“You’ll have to come out when classes start,” Tory warned.
“Tell everyone I’m too sick!”
“If you don’t emerge, eventually a teacher will come looking.” Tory replenished their wine. “They’ll wonder if I murdered you.”
Cynthia gave a rusty crack of laughter. “The other girls would think you were justified if you did.” Her brief levity vanished. “I’m praying that I’ll be able to hide until I have enough magic to cover up at least the scar.” Her hand went to her left cheek.
“Maybe I can help,” Tory suggested. “I couldn’t manage a full illusion spell here in the abbey before, but I might be able to conceal the scar until you can do it yourself.”
Cynthia’s face brightened. “That would be wonderful! I can’t bear to have everyone see this ugly scar.”
“It’s not that noticeable, but I’m sure it feels horribly visible.” Tory leaned forward and touched the scar. “If I can’t do this, perhaps Elspeth can. She was planning to return tomorrow and she’s better with illusions.”
“She would probably tell me that humiliation is good for my character,” Cynthia said tartly.
Tory smiled, then concentrated on summoning her magic to create the illusion of smooth, unmarred skin. To her regret, she had to use all the power available to her under the abbey suppression spell. Dropping the hearth-witch magic left her shivering with cold, but she was successful.
“There.” She sat back, pleased with her effort. “That should hold you until you can conceal it on your own. The other changes in your appearance are too subtle to really be noticed.” Privately she admitted to herself that she’d always found Cynthia’s perfect appearance irritating. She was still intimidatingly pretty, but she looked more real.
Cynthia rose and carefully studied her appearance in her clothespress mirror. Touching her cheek, she said, “I can feel the scar, but as long as no one can see it, I’m all right. Thank you! I am so sick of being in this room.”
Tory frowned thoughtfully. “A thought has occurred to me. Traveling through the mirror has been hardest for you.”
“It almost killed me!” Cynthia shuddered. “Never again.”
“I hope none of us do,” Tory agreed, though she didn’t know if they’d be that lucky. “I wonder if you had so much trouble going through the mirror because you were using your illusion magic. That might have interfered with the mirror magic.”
Cynthia shrugged. “Perhaps, but there’s no way to be sure since I’m certainly not going to travel through time again. I’ll settle for passing through the refectory without having other girls sneer at me.”
“I’ll enjoy getting back to most of my classes,” Tory said. “Except Miss Macklin, of course.”
“Of course.” Cynthia sat on her bed and took two more pieces of shortbread before Tory prudently closed the box and moved it out of reach. “I look forward to study sessions in the Labyrinth. You must be pining to see Allarde.”
Tory winced at the unexpected mention of his name.
Cynthia frowned. “What’s wrong? Surely Allarde didn’t send a letter to your brother’s house to end things between you! The lad is mad for you.”
Tory squeezed her eyes shut, fighting tears. “His family seat is only a few miles from my brother’s estate so we saw each other over the holiday. We rode over to Kemperton. When I saw how strongly he is connected to that land and realized that he’d be disowned if we stayed together, I told him we could no longer be together.”
“Oh, Tory!” Cynthia stared at her. “How miserable for you. For both of you.” She frowned. “Don’t you ever get tired of being noble and self-sacrificing?”
“Cynthia, don’t!” Feeling shattered, Tory kicked off her shoes and dived into her bed fully dressed. She pulled the covers over her head and buried her face in her pillow, completely understanding Cynthia’s desire to hide from the world. Sharing her room with Molly, Tory hadn’t allowed her grief to run free, which made this disintegration even worse.
Her bed sagged under Cynthia’s weight. If her roommate tried to pull the covers off, Tory would scratch out her eyes.
Instead, Cynthia pushed a handkerchief under the blankets near Tory’s hand. In a surprisingly gentle voice, she said, “I’m really sorry. Not only that it’s over, but that he isn’t even available for me.” She pa
tted the blanket in the vicinity of Tory’s shoulder. “One thing every student at Lackland learns early is that no matter how dark things seem, they will get better.”
The mattress creaked again as Cynthia moved away. Probably to finish off the box of shortbread. But as Tory wiped her nose with the handkerchief, she felt a little comforted.
It will get better.
* * *
Tory was so paralyzed by the thought of seeing Allarde again that she could barely force herself to return to the Labyrinth for their first post-holiday meeting. But she needed to see her friends.
She was so tense that a rabbit would have made her fall into hysterics, but Allarde made it easy for her. He didn’t come to the session. Nor to the one two days later. Tory began to worry. He needed the group as much as she did, and she hated that she might have driven him away.
He came to the third session, arriving late and slipping in quietly. She didn’t realize he was there until it was time for the closing circle and she felt his energy when everyone joined hands. She flinched at the familiar warmth, and hoped that no one noticed her reaction. After the circle he didn’t stay for the eating and socializing that followed each session.
He arrived on time for the fourth session, but quietly kept his distance from Tory. She had to admire how well he did it. She no longer flinched when she looked at him. She doubted that he did any flinching. His handsome face was entirely calm and contained and detached.
The other Irregulars noticed, of course. Several girls made attempts to catch Allarde’s attention. Tory was profoundly grateful that he had no interest in them. Apparently he’d learned his lesson and would now avoid mage-born girls.
She told herself that perhaps, in time, they could be in the same room without her being intensely aware of him at every moment.
She told herself that again and again—and knew that she lied.
CHAPTER 18
Tory and Allarde were doing a fine job of mutual avoidance—until a Labyrinth session a month after Christmas. In the good-natured swirl of departing Irregulars, she turned and almost ran into him.
He was a mere yard away, so close she could feel the warmth of his body. She wanted to step into his arms.
Allarde froze, as shocked as Tory. Though his expression didn’t change, his gray eyes were full of pain.
Tory ran.
Not quite literally, but she gave Allarde a bare nod before spinning away and taking refuge in the nearest tunnel leading out of the Labyrinth. She stopped when she was out of sight and leaned against a wall, heart pounding. Broken hearts were supposed to get better. Hers wasn’t cooperating.
She closed her eyes and tried to think of something beside Allarde. Cynthia was a good topic. In the weeks that had passed since the end of the holidays, Cynthia had recovered enough power to disguise her scarred cheek herself.
Tory was grateful for that. The winds off the English Channel were freezing, and she needed what hearth witchery she had to stay warm in the viciously drafty corridors.
There was no more talk of changing roommates. Tory and Cynthia were getting along well, perhaps because they knew each other’s secrets.
There was still no word from Nick Rainford in 1940.
Despite settling back into the school routine, Tory had felt restless, as if something was about to happen. She wasn’t sure what. A message from Nick? Invasion by Napoleon’s army? She would reach her breaking point and shatter into small pieces?
With a sigh, she opened her eyes. This particular tunnel led to Merlin’s mirror, which she hadn’t visited since before Christmas. Of all the Irregulars, she had the strongest affinity for the mirror. Even several turns of tunnel away, she could feel the deep thrum of its energy.
Should she check the mirror to see if a message had arrived from Nick Rainford? He was the first person Tory had met when she accidentally fell through the mirror and was terrified by the strange new world she found herself in. She would always be grateful for his taking her home to his family, and becoming her friend.
But Jack checked the mirror regularly, and Allarde and Elspeth probably did the same. A message stone was unlikely to lie unnoticed for long, so there was no need for Tory to look. She was upset enough already without subjecting herself to the mirror.
She was heading back to the hall when she felt a twang in that deep energy. Something had happened at the portal.
Hoping it was a message from Nick, she swiftly made her way to the mirror, mage light in hand. She rounded into the corridor where the mirror blazed invisibly. To her shock, a motionless body lay on the chalk floor below.
The blond hair looked like Jack Rainford. Had he come looking for a message from Nick and fallen?
Not Jack, Nick! She ran the remaining distance and dropped on her knees beside the limp body. Tossing her mage light up to hover over her head, she gently rolled Nick onto his back. He was breathing, thank heaven, but his hand was icy cold when she clasped it.
She rubbed his hand between hers, surprised at the calluses and scars he’d acquired. He had been doing heavy labor recently.
“Tory?” His eyes fluttered open. “Thank God I’m in the right place!”
She frowned as she helped him sit up. “Nick, what happened? We’ve all been worried because we hadn’t heard from you. Are Polly and your mother all right?”
“They’re fine.” Nick tried to stand and lurched so badly that Tory was barely able to keep him from falling. Once he was steady, they began walking back toward the hall, Nick leaning heavily on her.
“And your father and brother?” She’d never met his brother, Joe, who had been training as an RAF pilot, but Nick’s father, Tom Rainford, had led her to the greatest adventure of her life.
“They’re also well,” he assured her. “But the tunnel to the mirror collapsed when bombs landed on the abbey ruins. Rather than try to clear it, I mapped the surrounding tunnels and found the shortest way to reach the mirror. It took time, though.”
“I can imagine!” Tory exclaimed. “A good thing chalk is soft.”
“Not soft enough.” He held out one callused hand. “When I finally broke through to the mirror, I found a whole pile of stones with messages.”
“Why didn’t you send us a message immediately?”
“It’s complicated,” he said with a sigh. “Are the other members of the weather brigade in the hall? Easier to talk to everyone at once since I need advice.”
“Advice is easy,” she said warily. “Going through the mirror to help would be a very different matter.”
“Believe me, I know! It’s not something I would ask of anyone else.”
“You did once before.” She glanced at his face, thinking he’d aged in the last months. He and Jack, his distant relative, were about the same age, but Jack always seemed older. Perhaps having lost his father young had matured him. Now Nick looked older than Jack. A lot older. “You’d ask again if you thought it necessary.”
“You’re probably right,” he said with rueful humor. “Things are bad, Tory. Evacuating so many soldiers from Dunkirk made it possible for Britain to keep fighting, but now the Nazis are trying to bomb us into surrender. Since Lackland is right on the southeast coast, we have fighter planes and bombers flying overhead all the time. I’ve seen more dogfights between the RAF and the Germans than I can count.” He swallowed. “Sometimes the pilots manage to bail out in time, but not always.”
It sounded dreadful. “You said your brother is all right?”
Nick’s face eased. “Joe has had some close escapes, but he’s never been injured. Mum gave him the sixpence you infused with protective magic, and it’s working.”
Privately Tory hadn’t much faith in the coins she’d charged with magic before returning from her first trip through the mirror. She’d given them to Nick and Polly and their mother mostly as a token of her gratitude. Perhaps believing in luck helped create luck. “Given the magical talent in your family, Joe may have some special abilities that are helping him st
ay safe.”
“I surely hope so.” They were nearing the main hall, so Nick straightened, removing his arm from around Tory’s shoulders. “Better not to show up draped over you. Allarde might not like it.”
The usual pain stabbed through Tory. She managed a brittle smile. “No need. We are no longer together.”
Nick stopped and stared at her. “How is that possible? Even I could see the energy bond between you.”
“It’s complicated. Don’t worry, there was no horrid fight. It’s just … better this way.” Tory was relieved to enter the main hall so she needn’t say more.
Most of the Irregulars had left for home. Usually the two teachers and the student prefects were the last to leave, but tonight Miss Wheaton and Mr. Stephens had left earlier than usual. They were in love with each other, and Tory guessed they had wanted some private time.
Unfortunately, Allarde was the prefect for the boys’ school, so he was still present, along with Elspeth, Cynthia, and Jack and Rachel Rainford. To her surprise, Tory noticed an energy bond between Cynthia and Jack. Was there something going on there? They squabbled all the time.
Now that Tory thought about it, Cynthia had been avoiding Jack since the spring school term began. Something interesting must have happened during the holidays. Given Cynthia’s snobbishness, it would be delicious if she couldn’t resist Jack’s considerable charm.
Tory’s companion was recognized immediately. “Nick!” Jack was the first to leap up. He reached Nick and pounded him on his shoulder. “Where the devil have you been?”
Nick gave a tired smile. “Sorry to have worried you.”
“The mirror passage was as ghastly as usual, I see.” Elspeth took Nick’s hand so she could send him healing energy. “A message stone would have been easier than coming in person.”
“I presume you had your reasons.” Allarde studied Nick narrowly. “You want us to go through the mirror with you.”
