Dark Mirror 2 - Dark Passage

by M. J. Putney

  In this time that was not their own, only the moment seemed to matter.

  CHAPTER 27

  Cynthia slept all day after arriving in the cave. She didn’t even say good-bye to the scouts as they went off. When she finally awoke, she was stiff from sleeping rolled up in a blanket on hard stone, but felt otherwise refreshed.

  The soft glow of a mage light revealed, among other things, that Jack had rolled his blanket up next to hers. Now he slept beside her. And was holding her hand. That was the source of her well-being, and the gentle desire pulsing through her.

  Since he was asleep, she didn’t feel compelled to yank her hand away to demonstrate that he wasn’t supposed to touch her. She liked holding his hand when there were no complicated emotions involved.

  When he shifted a little closer to her, she decided it was time to get up. She stood and stretched her sore muscles. Though she was in no hurry to go through the mirror again, she was glad to know that temporarily dropping her illusion magic had spared her from being almost killed by the mirror passage.

  Since it took more than one meal to rebuild the energy lost in mirror passage, she was ravenous. Creaking in every joint, she investigated the pantry area that Jack had set up with their supplies. The first requirement was tea.

  Jack had brought a lightweight pot that held enough water to make half a dozen cups of tea, and he’d filled it the night before. A blast of hearth-witch magic brought the water to a boil. She wrapped tea leaves in cheesecloth since straining would be difficult, then let the tea steep while she piled ham and cheese on a piece of bread.

  She couldn’t toast the sandwich without an open flame, but it was easy to heat the sandwich till the cheese melted. Delicious!

  The scent of warm food awakened Jack. He sat up and covered a yawn. “Could you make one of those hot sandwiches for me, Cynthia?”

  She supposed he was entitled since he’d brought the food. She assembled one and heated it for him. Her father, the most noble Duke of Branston, would be horrified to see a daughter of his preparing food like a scullery maid, much less sleeping in a cave with a young man of inferior birth. But then, everything she did horrified him.

  Smiling to herself, she handed Jack the sandwich. She enjoyed watching his appreciation when he bit in. Though she didn’t much like sleeping on rock, the rest of this little adventure was rather amusing.

  Jack swallowed a bite and sighed blissfully. “Thank you. Where’s Elspeth?”

  “Just outside the cave,” she called back. “The others are almost back.”

  “Just in time for tea,” Cynthia observed. Jack had also brought a set of light mugs that nested together, so she used one to scoop tea from the pot. A pity there was no milk, but with a chunk of sugar added, it would do.

  Tory bubbled into the cave, flanked by Allarde and Nick. Cynthia felt deep envy. Tory might not be beautiful and she should look absurd dressed like a boy, but her warmth and vitality and vivid prettiness drew eyes no matter where she was. Even Allarde, who had ignored all the other girls at Lackland, hadn’t been able to resist her.

  It was hard to blame everyone for liking Tory. Even Cynthia did, though she had tried not to. Jack liked Tory a lot, but then, he liked everyone. He seemed to like Cynthia even when she was at her bad-tempered worst. There really must be something wrong with him.

  Maybe his judgment was weak where she was concerned … but she did like him back. She always had a weakness for handsome young males. Once she’d been attracted to Allarde, whose rank matched her own, and heaven knew he was good-looking. But he was far too serious. Jack was much more amusing.

  She also recognized with a start that because he was impervious to her barbed tongue, she could relax with Jack as with no one else. A pity he was such a flirt.

  All of those thoughts passed through her mind in an instant. Aloud, she said, “I just made a pot of tea if you’d like some.”

  “Splendid!” Nick poured cups for all three returnees. “It’s chilly out there.”

  Tory took a swallow of tea. “Heavenly! I have longed for tea!”

  “Tell us what you discovered,” Elspeth said impatiently. “Will we be able to rescue Dr. Weiss’s family?”

  “The tunnel is open!” Nick said jubilantly. “Tory hiked all the way up to the castle cellar. It’s time to make final plans.”

  “But first, we eat,” Allarde said firmly. “Wisdom is scarce when one is hungry. I’m glad you brought such good supplies.”

  “I brought some clothing, too.” Jack opened his knapsack. “Lovely as you ladies are, it might be safer to have the freedom of trousers. I have small sizes for Elspeth and Tory. Since Cynthia is taller, I brought an old pair of mine for her. I also have coats and shirts. The styles are plain and shapeless enough that they shouldn’t look too out of place in 1940. The fit won’t be wonderful, but they’re good outfits for midnight raiders.”

  “That was really clever of you, Jack!” Tory said. “If Allarde hadn’t visited a used clothing shop, I’d have needed the trousers. I found how useful they were when we sailed to Dunkirk.”

  Elspeth nodded agreement. “I would have brought trousers if I owned any. Thank you.”

  “I will not dress like a hoyden!” Cynthia said flatly. Not to mention that she found the idea of wearing Jack’s nether garments appalling.

  Tory laughed. “I quite like being a hoyden.”

  Jack’s eyes sparkled mischievously, but he contented himself with saying, “You don’t have to wear my old trousers. I brought them just in case.”

  “You’re a good planner,” Nick said admiringly. “What kind of food did you bring to go with the tea?”

  They were all hungry, and getting everyone fed took several minutes. Cynthia heated up ham and cheese sandwiches for the others. It was nice to have a skill everyone appreciated so much.

  Then it was time for their council of war. Allarde sat next to Tory, and Cynthia was pleased when Jack oh-so-casually sat next to her. Nick remained standing, almost vibrating with intensity.

  “It’s too late to start tonight, so we’ll have to rescue the Weisses tomorrow night,” he said. “Before the three of you appeared, we’d decided Tory and I would go to the castle, and Allarde would collect Dr. Weiss, with Jack’s help if he joined us.”

  “That seems like a good plan,” Jack remarked. “There’s no need for Elspeth and Cynthia to go to the military camp. They can send us energy as needed without going into the line of fire.”

  “I’ll go with Tory and Nick,” Elspeth said in a voice that brooked no disagreement. “A healer might be needed, and hands-on healing is more effective than working from a distance.”

  As everyone nodded, Cynthia considered kicking Elspeth. Staying in the cave was a lovely plan. The two of them could easily send their power the short distance to the military camp. But no, Elspeth the Fearless wanted to make a target of herself. Which meant that Cynthia would look like a coward if she didn’t do the same.

  Worse, she’d be left out while the others developed a battlefield bond. Jack envied that bond because he’d stayed in Lackland rather than sailing to Dunkirk. His decision had been the right one, but ever since, it had bothered him. Which was why he’d been determined to join Nick on this mad mission.

  Cynthia had no desire to prove her courage. She was a girl, for heaven sakes! She didn’t have to be brave. Tory and Elspeth were setting a terrible example.

  Jack turned to her. “We need someone to hold our base here. You and I can easily work together on the weather over such a short distance.”

  Perversely, when Jack said that, she immediately wanted to do the opposite. “I think I should be there, too. If there’s a crisis, response needs to be immediate. Magelings have already been in and out of the compound a couple of times, so it’s not like leaping into the unknown.”

  Tory made a face. “I ran into a guard, but he let me go. We’ve been so lucky till now that it seems time for something to go wrong. Rescuing Dr. Weiss should be fairly stra
ightforward, though. We’ve been into the laboratory, and we know exactly where he’s being held. Getting his family out of the castle will be more complicated.”

  “Once I’m there, I can locate them,” Nick said confidently. “They’re on the lowest level of the castle. We go up the tunnel, I find where they’re being kept, you unlock their door, and we leave. Simple.”

  “Optimist,” Cynthia said tartly. But he was right that the tunnel would make all the difference in achieving success.

  “We’ll need weather magic to shut down the power again,” Nick continued. “On our first entrance, we destroyed the power pole. This time, we need to take out the whole generating shed since that will take longer to repair. Can that be done, weather mages? It’s a building about the size of my family’s henhouse, only taller.”

  “Not a problem,” Jack said. “I’ve been herding a North Sea storm in this direction. I’ll time it to strike about midnight tomorrow. Cynthia is good with lightning and can annihilate the shed with a cluster of strikes.” He raised his brows questioningly.

  Cynthia reached out to the oncoming storm and tested its shape and power. Its energy made her smile. “This should be easy. It’s delightfully vigorous.”

  “Does it have powerful winds?” Allarde asked. “Rather than burn huge amounts of magic flying in and out of the compound, I’d like to knock down sections of fence so we can enter and leave on foot. That will be faster and we won’t be such easy targets.”

  “This storm has plenty of wind to work with,” Jack replied. “Do you want me to blow something into the fence, or would you rather do it with your magic?”

  “I’ll do it with lifting power. More precise than wind.”

  There were nods of agreement all around. Cynthia was relieved. Flying didn’t interest her, not when the magic wasn’t under her own control. Much better to go into the compound on her feet. “After, will we meet up outside and return here together?”

  “The castle rescue will take longer, so we should probably go separately,” Tory said, her brow furrowed. “Smaller groups are less likely to be noticed as well. After we’re all safely back here, we’ll take everyone to present-day Lackland. That shouldn’t be difficult since we’ve all been there.”

  “Will it be a problem taking nonmages through?” Jack asked.

  “I don’t believe so,” Tory said. “All people have at least a spark of magic. I think it will go smoothly. At least as smoothly as mirror passage ever goes.”

  “We’ll need to obscure people’s memories of their rescue,” Allarde said. “Does anyone know the forgetting spell used by Miss Wheaton and Mr. Stephens?”

  Cynthia hadn’t thought of that. In Nick’s time, magic was largely unknown and considered mere superstition. The Weisses would be grateful for rescue, but the magic was going to be a shock.

  “I can’t do quite what Miss Wheaton does,” Elspeth said. “But I should be able to blur their real memories and give them impressions of confusion and perhaps a vague belief that they crossed the channel in a small boat.”

  “And were seasick so they didn’t remember much. That should work,” Nick said with a grin. “Easier to believe in a boat ride than the truth.”

  “I hope all will go smoothly tomorrow,” Elspeth said. “But what if soldiers catch us and point guns in our direction? Magic won’t stop bullets.”

  “I’ve got a pistol,” Nick said. “It was my father’s when he was in France and he isn’t using it now, so I borrowed it.”

  Cynthia felt chilled. Talk of guns and the chance that they might be needed was sobering. They were taking a deadly risk.

  Her face showing a similar reaction, Tory asked, “Do you know how to use it?”

  “Yes,” Nick said tersely.

  “What about the laboratory raiders?” Cynthia asked. “Will we be unprotected?”

  “We’re less likely to run into armed men,” Allarde said. “But if we do, I’ll pull down roofs or throw things.”

  “I can do the same.” Tory glanced at Allarde, her expression unreadable. “Since Allarde and I have somewhat similar abilities, it’s easy for us to share power in an emergency.”

  Other possibilities were tossed out and discussed. By the time they were ready to sleep, they’d considered all the problems they could think of and discussed possible solutions. They were as prepared as they could be.

  When Cynthia rolled up in her blanket again, she felt more confident about what they would be doing. They were mages with powers the Germans had never imagined, and their dual raid was completely unexpected. They would be in and out before the enemy knew what happened.

  But when Jack’s hand reached out to her in the darkness, she was glad to clasp it. Even though they were both awake.

  CHAPTER 28

  After the war council broke up, Tory was too restless to sleep. Rather than go into the dark woods, where cold autumn rain was falling, she decided to explore the cave a bit. With luck, she’d leave here the next night and never return. If the mages who’d created the mirror portal had left anything else interesting, now was the time to look.

  She retraced the path to the mirror, brushing off the old spells meant to dissuade nonmages from finding it. She didn’t expect any messages, since almost anyone who could send one was already here. But she wanted to pay her respects.

  The mirror was its usual self, an ancient vortex that throbbed with deep power just out of sight and sound. She had the odd sense that it silently acknowledged her presence. She touched it with her own magic in an equally silent greeting. After thanking the mirror for bringing them all here safely, she said that soon they would be in urgent need of its power again. The mirror felt—cooperative.

  Feeling vaguely foolish for conversing with an invisible magical space, she withdrew and headed off to explore other passages. One led to a small chamber with the pool of springwater they’d been using for drinking and washing. Others ended in blank stone or became too small to use.

  Aware that it would be easy to get lost if she wasn’t careful, she tried one last branch. To her surprise, she saw a glimmer of light ahead as she traveled deeper into the hill. One of her friends was also exploring?

  She reached the end and caught her breath. The water that had formed the cave had created a gallery of treasures. Stone pillars and curtains and lacy threads glimmered in the reflections of her mage light. She smiled in delight as she drifted among the stone icicles and frozen fountains and clutches of sparkling crystals.

  “Beautiful, isn’t it?” Allarde’s deep voice was soft behind her.

  She turned with a feeling of inevitability. Awareness caught fire between them as their gazes met.

  Even in ill-fitting clothes and with dark bristles on his chin, Allarde was as handsome as a prince from legend as he moved toward her through the magical stone formations, his strong features and broad shoulders barely brushed by light. The sight of him would live in her heart forever.

  She’d avoided being alone with him because she didn’t want to talk about their separation. Her head knew that she had done the right thing, but that knowledge was a frail barrier against the power of Allarde’s presence. Trying to be sensible, she said, “Let’s not speak of impossible things, Justin. Our world is too far away to worry about.”

  “Indeed it is.” He reached Tory and put his arms around her. Before she could point out weakly that this was a bad idea, they were embracing and he was kissing her with crackling intensity.

  Passion, magic, and need blazed between them, burning away all her reservations. The longing that had been building since Kemperton Hall shattered in a firestorm of heat and magic that flooded her senses and burned away the world. When they broke the kiss, she said dizzily, “When we kiss, it feels like I can move mountains. Literally.”

  He laughed. “Small ones, perhaps.”

  She gave him a crooked smile. “Are we kissing to increase our shared power? That will be useful on our raid, I think.”

  “No.” Tenderly he br
ushed a strand of hair from her brow. “It’s because I don’t want to die without kissing you again.”

  She froze. “Does your foretelling talent see disaster ahead?”

  “Not exactly, but something unexpected will happen tomorrow night. A great complication that we haven’t anticipated.” He shook his head, frowning. “I’m not sure how much trouble we’ll be in. Because this concerns me so closely, I don’t have a clear sense of how it will work out.”

  Guessing at what he wasn’t saying, she said, “But it could be bad.”

  “Perhaps,” he agreed. “But I think we must go ahead. Lives are at stake.”

  “We have our magic. We can do things the Germans won’t expect.”

  “That’s our greatest strength.” He kissed her again, his hands roaming in delicious ways. “You give me strength, Tory.”

  “And you make me weak,” she said shakily. “Common sense goes out the window when you touch me. But you can’t choose me over Kemperton! Life is uncertain. What if I die? Then you’d have nothing. Choose Kemperton and it will be yours as long as you live.”

  “So practical,” he murmured before he kissed her forehead. “But as you say, life is uncertain. One or both of us might die. We might become trapped in a time not our own. There are a thousand other possibilities beyond our imagination. Which is why I don’t want to waste what time we have to be together.”

  She let her eyes drift shut as her head rested against his chest. “You make it very hard to be practical,” she sighed. “But I’ve thought of a solution. You can marry a girl with no magic and I’ll be your mistress.”

  “That is nonsense in so many ways that I’ll ignore it,” he said firmly. “Now let us sit on that lovely stone formation that is rather like a bench, and we will discuss possibilities for our missions between kisses.”

  Eyes bright, she took his hand and led him toward the stone bench. She suspected there would be more kissing than discussion. And that was fine with her.