“At least I will not be the only one who is late,” said Ebon.
“I lost track of the hour,” said Kalem, wheezing hard. He had never been athletic. “After she visited our ‘friend,’ Theren required some consolation.”
Ebon frowned. “Is everything all right?”
Kalem’s brows shot for the ceiling. “Of course not, Ebon. How can you even ask that?”
He grimaced. “Later.”
They pushed open the doors and entered the dining hall. But both of them froze in the doorway, for they found they were not the only ones present. Many other students had been called, and all of them were sitting at a few tables near the entrance. Some looked up curiously to see them standing there, but most kept their eyes on Jia.
The instructor stood at the head of the little group, watching them all with a keen eye. She seemed ready to give a speech, but it did not appear she had started yet. As soon as she saw Ebon and Kalem, she waved them to the benches at once.
“Come, come. Sit, sit,” she said. “There we are. Excellent. Now, I believe we may begin.”
The other students began to quiet down. But Kalem whispered quickly in Ebon’s ear, “Why are we here, but not Theren? What is this?” Ebon shrugged.
Jia lifted her chin. “This,” she began, “is a dangerous time. Not only for the Academy, nor for the Seat, but for all of Underrealm. The High King is beset on all sides, and she requires the help of every one of us to preserve the nine kingdoms.”
She paused for a moment. The dining hall settled to silence. Ebon and Kalem stared at each other. Ebon was even more mystified than before.
Suddenly Jia shook her head, as if she had remembered something. “Yes, she requires our help,” she went on. “But some may help more than others. Some have greater strength of arms—or spells, in our case. Some have larger armies, and some have deeper pockets. These must aid her according to her means—but it begins at the very roots, with each one of us, and not with the grand schemes of the kingdoms. Who better to defend Underrealm against its enemies, than the noble families of which you are a part? A short time ago, Lilith had the wise idea to form a group of you for just such a purpose. The Goldbag Society, I believe she called it, though it is an uncouth name.”
Ebon’s blood ran cold. He looked at Kalem. The boy’s face had gone Elf-white. A quick glance around the room confirmed it: Ebon saw no one there but the children of merchants and royalty. These were the same children Lilith had called together when she was under Isra’s mindwyrd.
Jia spoke on, but Ebon could scarcely hear the words. He leaned over to whisper in Kalem’s ear. “She is here.”
“She cannot be,” said Kalem. “How could …?”
“No time for wondering now,” said Ebon. “Go and fetch Theren, as quickly as ever you can. And tell her to bring Kekhit’s amulet.”
Kalem nodded, but then gave Jia a wary look. Slowly he stood from his bench. Jia seemed to take no notice, but only continued her speech. Step by step Kalem backed away, edging towards the door of the dining hall. Some students caught the motion and stared, but Jia droned on regardless. It was as though she did not even see him. Ebon’s stomach did a flip-flop. Kalem turned and ran, vanishing into the Academy’s hallways.
Ebon looked about him carefully. Other than the few tables near the front, the Academy hall was nearly empty. But there, at the back of the hall, he spied the doorways leading into the kitchens, which were now dark and looked abandoned.
One of the doors was ajar.
He stood from his bench and walked towards it. Jia took no more notice of him than she had of Kalem, though some of the students watched him go. He hesitated on the threshold of the kitchens for a long moment, trying to let his eyes adjust to the darkness. But when at last he could see inside, no one was in sight.
Heart thundering in his ears, he stepped into the darkness.
The dish room was empty. An oak door in the corner opened into the kitchens proper—and Ebon saw that it, too, was ajar. He crept carefully forwards, muffling each footstep as best he could.
It was darker still inside. No lanterns were lit here, and no windows let in the moonslight. He longed to reach for his power so that his eyes might help light the way, but then he might be seen. So he crept forwards, avoiding the tables around him, which might send dishes clattering to the floor if he bumped them. The air smelled of meat left out too long.
He thought he could hear a murmuring drawing near. And then, from the next room, he caught a faint glow. But something was … wrong about it. In its light he could see shapes, but not their color or distance. It was like an awareness, rather than true sight. His mind hurt, and his eyes kept shuddering away from it.
He stepped into the doorway.
It was a storeroom, and here at last there was moonslight from a window high in the wall. There were barrels and sacks in great piles all around the place, and crates stacked in its center.
In one corner sat a girl in the robes of an Academy student—only they were filthy and threadbare, and Ebon thought he could smell them from where he stood. Her hair was just as dirty, and hung lank around her shoulders.
It was Isra. The glow that shone from her eyes sent a lance of pain through Ebon’s head. She was facing away from him, but it leaked around her edges like a malicious, oozing thing, a poison that sought the mouth and nose to slither in and choke the breath.
At first he could not force himself to move, or even to think. When at last he did, he grew curious what it was that she was doing. She remained hunched over, her back to him, and the feverish rasping of her voice bounced harsh off the stone walls into his ears. He took one step forwards—every moment a skipping of the heart, a fearsome clenching in his gut.
A few paces in from the door, he could at last see what it was she held in her hand. It was a lantern. At first he thought that was where the black glow was coming from—but then, looking again, he realized it was coming from her eyes.
He remembered something … something Kalem and Theren had told him about a black glow in the eyes. Then it came to him in a flash: magestones.
At once he realized what must have happened. Jia had called the assembly in the dining hall under Isra’s control. Somehow the girl had got her hands on magestones, and she was using the power of mindwyrd once again.
Ebon realized he could do no good here. Quickly he backed away. He was almost to the door.
He did not think he had made a noise, but Isra stopped chanting. Her head jerked up, and then it turned around.
“Drayden,” she growled.
An unseen force snatched him up. He flew through the air and into a shelf of pots, and now made up for all the clatter he had avoided while sneaking in. The dishes scattered everywhere, and after his hushed entrance it sounded like the breaking of the world. But was it loud enough for the other students to hear from the dining hall?
Isra’s magic clutched him around the throat. She hoisted him up until his feet dangled helplessly above the stone floor. He gasped for breath as stars burst in his vision.
“This is a gift beyond reckoning,” said Isra, walking towards him. The black glow in her eyes had increased. Now Ebon thought the sight of it might drive him mad. “I could not have planned for you to be the first to die tonight. Yet here you are, delivered as though upon a platter.”
A flash of silver in the moonslight caught his eye. In Isra’s hand, she still held the silver lantern over which she had been chanting. He could see something inside it: some faint and twisting light, pale and green, spinning in and around itself like the threads of a tapestry, over and over again without end. But he could hardly spare a thought for it while he hung in Isra’s grip.
Then from nowhere, a blast of power rocked the kitchens, and Isra flew through the air. She crashed into another shelf of dishes, sending them flying in all directions. They were wood, and none broke, but the clatter was deafening. The magic holding Ebon vanished, but he was unprepared for that eventit, and landed hard on
his hands and knees with a cry of pain.
Isra tried to find her feet, but the magic struck her again, and she flipped over backwards. Ebon heard the crack of her shoulder on a carving table. He looked in the direction he had come.
There stood Theren, and beside her was Kalem. The boy’s eyes were alight as he touched his magic, though Ebon knew not what he hoped to do. Beside him, there was no glow in Theren’s eyes at all—yet she held her hands aloft, and Ebon knew it was she who had attacked Isra. He could not see it, but he knew that beneath her robes was Kekhit’s amulet, which gave her magic the strength to match Isra’s.
Across the kitchen, Isra snarled as she fought her way to standing at last. Darklight flared in her eyes, and she threw a contemptuous hand through the air. Yet if she hoped to bat Theren away like some child, she was disappointed. Theren’s magic met her, and it matched her. Then Ebon saw a ripple in the air, forming a wall that swept around Isra like a cage. Isra gritted her teeth as she blasted it, but the rippling air held firm.
“Are you whole, Ebon?” said Theren, though she spoke through a clenched jaw herself.
“I am.” He went to stand by her. “Can you hold her? Shall we fetch an instructor?”
“She is—” But the words were cut off. Isra screamed, and Ebon felt the room shudder as Theren’s barrier was cast aside. Before he could blink, Isra flung the silver lantern she had been holding at them. It clattered to the ground at their feet, but its glass did not break. Then Isra ran into the storeroom and leapt. Magic lifted her towards the ceiling, and she vanished through the high window onto the grounds beyond.
Theren made to go after her. But Ebon looked at the lamp on the ground. He saw the light within it—it was spinning faster and faster now, and blazing with a fury like the sun. Now the kitchen shone as if it were daylight.
“Down!” he cried, and snatching Kalem’s collar, he tackled Theren behind the storeroom’s crates.
THOOM
The air was wracked by an explosion. There were no flames, no heat. Instead it was as though an unseen battering ram struck everything in the room at once. Crates from the pile rained down atop them, but Theren batted them away with her magic. All around, sacks of flour and barrels of grain burst, coating the room in white dust and small brown kernels of wheat.
All fell silent. Slowly, Ebon got to his feet. But Theren did not hesitate. The moment she had shoved off the last crate, she jumped up and leapt through the window where Isra had vanished.
Ebon hauled Kalem up and ran through the kitchens. There was a door leading outside, and they burst through it together. Winter’s air blasted them, and Kalem huddled against him on instinct. They met Theren outside, where she stood with hands raised.
But the grounds were empty. Fresh snow fell from the sky, covering everything. No one was there. No figure in a black robe could be spotted against the white. Isra had escaped.
“Darkness take me,” said Theren, kicking a great fountain of snow into the air. “I thought we had her for certain.”
“What is she doing here?” said Kalem. “I thought she left the Seat.”
“We all did,” said Theren. “It would have been the wise thing to do. I do not know what she hopes to achieve by being here.”
“Do you not?” said Ebon. “She called all the goldbags together. Every merchant’s son. Every royal son and daughter.” He shuddered as he remembered Lilith’s cold, lifeless voice saying the words, prodded by Isra’s mindwyrd. “But where is Erin?” he said suddenly, as the thought struck him. “If she is here, Erin must be nearby.”
“Or dead,” muttered Theren.
Ebon was about to respond in anger, but Kalem raised a hand to point. “Look,” he said quietly.
His quivering voice silenced them both. Going to either side of him, Ebon and Theren followed his outstretched finger. Yet Ebon saw nothing untoward.
“What is it, Kalem?”
“The window. She jumped out the window. And yet …”
It took another moment. Then Theren gave a sharp hissing gasp, and Ebon saw it in the same instant.
There was only one set of tracks in the snow, and they led right to Theren. Isra had leapt through the high window above, and then had vanished without so much as a footprint.
five
THREE AMIGOS [1]
“We must tell the instructors at once,” said Kalem. He took two quick steps, running back towards the Academy’s white cedar doors. But Theren snatched his collar and hauled him back around, like a mother with an unruly kitten.
“We must do nothing of the sort,” she snapped. “We can do nothing of the sort. I hold the amulet, Kalem, or had you forgotten? How do you mean to explain that to them?”
Kalem blinked. His mouth opened, then shut without releasing words. But in another heartbeat he shook his head. “No. We must tell them, Theren. Everyone thinks Isra has left the Seat, but she remains here. She infiltrated the Academy itself. If they do not know they are in danger, they can do nothing to protect themselves.”
“Those words come easily to you—it will not be your neck upon the chopping block if the amulet is found. We cannot afford any attention now, not while we still hold a magical artifact beyond the King’s law. Not to mention that we hold Dasko in mindwyrd.”
Ebon caught Kalem’s uneasy look. “Theren, we cannot simply ignore this.”
“What do you mean to do, then?” Theren’s shout was sudden and loud, and it looked like it surprised even her. “Shall we run inside and find Perrin and say, ‘Instructor Perrin! We saw Isra, Instructor Perrin, and her eyes glowed black. But I defeated her, for I wore Kekhit’s amulet and used my strength of magestones against hers. Oh, yes, I should likely have mentioned that Kekhit’s amulet is not in fact missing, but is about my neck.’ The High King has declared martial law, Ebon. I will not receive mercy. The constables will execute me, if the Mystics do not get their hands on me first.”
Kalem spread his hands. “Ebon. Do you really mean to let everyone carry forwards in ignorance?”
It seemed an impossible question. Ebon looked back and forth between his friends, but found no words to speak. In the end he shrugged. “I cannot go against Theren in this, Kalem. She has the most to lose if we tell the whole truth. But Theren, neither do I think we can keep this only to ourselves.”
Theren’s jaw clenched. She looked up at the window, and then at the snow where no footprints showed Isra’s passage. Then, all at once, the fight went out of her. Her shoulders sagged, and her head drooped. “I know,” she said. “I know it. Damn her. Damn her for coming back.”
Ebon put a hand on her shoulder. “We will not tell them about the amulet. Of course not. Only … only we must find the right lie to tell.”
Kalem’s mouth soured at that, but he held his peace. Theren did not seem wholly convinced. “We could tell Jia … mayhap we could tell her we came upon Isra by surprise—”
“Not Jia,” said Ebon quickly. “She is the one under mindwyrd. We must tell someone else. Perrin, as you said. Though not the words you said, of course.”
“Yes,” said Kalem. Still he looked unhappy, but he gave a grudging nod. “Yes, Perrin might believe us. Especially you, Ebon.”
“Then let us make our story.”
Quickly they built the lie, and then they ran into the Academy and through the halls to Perrin’s classroom. They found her at the front of the room, sitting at her desk. She stood at once as they burst through the door.
“What’s this?”
“Instructor Perrin!” said Ebon, trying to fill his voice with panic. “We saw her. We saw Isra.”
Perrin’s eyes sharpened at once. “What? Where?”
“In the kitchens. She was doing … something, I am not sure what. We had grown hungry, and I thought to sneak in for a snack. I know that is not allowed, and I am sorry.”
“Never mind that,” said Perrin. She started for the door. “Where is she now?”
Ebon put up his hands to stop her, though it felt lik
e a mouse trying to stop a bear. “She is gone. Whatever she was doing, we startled her.”
“She attacked us with spells,” said Theren. “I fought her off, but barely. She fled after throwing this at us.”
She held aloft the silver lantern. Perrin snatched it from her hand like a venomous serpent. She went to a high cupboard, gingerly placed the lantern inside, and then locked it.
“What happened when she threw it at you?” said Perrin. “How are you …?”
Ebon nodded. “The explosion. I saw a light brewing within it, and something told me to run. We barely got out of the way in time.” He felt a glimmer of relief—it was much easier to tell that part of the story, for it was true.
“Very well,” said Perrin. “I will fetch some of the others. The three of you must go to your dormitories, immediately.” She pushed past them into the hallway.
Kalem put a hand on her arm. “Instructor. There is one more thing. I …” he looked anxiously back and forth down the hallway. A pair of anxious tears leaked from the corners of his eyes, and Ebon marveled at his ability to act—though considering the circumstances, he likely did not have to reach far to summon the terror in his eyes. “I know I should not know of this. But … but Theren said Isra was more powerful than she had been before, and … and her eyes glowed black, Instructor.”
Perrin’s ruddy features went pale. Carefully she removed Kalem’s hand from where it rested, and then pointed at the three of them. “Into bed with all of you. Now. Do not leave for any reason. And tell no one of what you have seen. Do you understand?”
“But what about Jia?” said Ebon. “She is in the dining hall, speaking to some other students. And she will not answer when anyone tries to speak to her. Something is wrong with her.”
“Mindwyrd,” Perrin whispered, almost too soft for them to hear. Then she roared, “Bed! Now!” They all jumped and hurried off as she thundered down the hallway in the other direction.
The Firemage's Vengeance Page 3
