by Priya Ardis
“Enough,” he said. A strong wind shoved at me. I looked up to see him separating his hands. He pushed us apart. He glared at Gia. “If I’d wanted to watch a training exercise I would have told you.” He beckoned Mark the Brute forward. “I want a real duel. She thinks she can handle it. Let’s give her the chance.”
Mark took Gia’s place. Gia gave me a silent look that said ‘Good Luck.’ The more time Grey spent with her the nicer she got towards me. As Mark’s hawk-like focus settled on me, I had a feeling I would need all the luck I would get. Mark didn’t hesitate to come at me in a fury. Very aware of the sharpness of the blade, I barely deflected the first few blows. One nearly cut off my nose. Another swing. In slow motion, I saw the arc of the blade reflect off the light from the windows.
I stopped thinking. My heartbeat seemed to slow and a hum started in my ears. I swung up the heavy sword in my hand. My biceps screamed at the effort but I managed to stop the blow. Our swords met with a clang. I kept his sword above me.
His eyes widened in surprise. Time caught up. My hands shook.
Mark smiled. Our next few sequences sped by in a blur of speed. Every time he moved, I countered. I don’t know how long we went back and forth. But then, he started throwing moves I had no idea how to respond to. He almost took my head off.
Finally, Vane said, “Stop.”
A strong wind knocked the sword out of Mark’s hand. It threw me backwards. It pinned Mark across the room. I slammed down on the gel mat. I heaved, struggling to breath. When oxygen returned to my brain, I could feel every eye in the entire room on me.
I made myself stand up. “I’d do better with training.”
Vane tossed the sword back at me. I jumped out of its way. The edge barely missed me as the sword fell flat onto the mat.
“Clearly,” he sneered, “you’re ready.”
***
“All you had to do is ask,” I mimicked. “What bullshit.”
I followed Vane out of the classroom. I’d already apologized to the Regulars for getting their hopes up and failing. They’d actually been surprisingly sweet about it. Most had been awed that I’d even tried to stand up to Vane the Terrible.
Vane came to an abrupt halt. Instead of going to his office, we were headed down the narrow confine of a turret-style circular stairwell that led out of the cathedral. We faced off midway down the stairs on a small landing. Although we were the last ones out of class, a few students milled around on the bottom steps.
With a flick of his hand, he slammed me high up against the circular wall. I gurgled as what felt like compressed air threatened to choke me. Someone below us gasped. I was pretty sure he wasn’t going to kill me with witnesses present. Still…
A bland expression on his face, Vane tilted his face up and regarded me with dispassionate eyes. “Let’s be clear on one thing—I am not your friend, DuLac.”
“Good to know,” I rasped.
“Leave,” Vane commanded the students lingering below. They scattered.
Great. We were alone. I closed my eyes and felt Guinevere’s amulet warm. It broke Vane’s hold and I fell…right on top of him.
He caught me easily. I must have surprised him. I was pretty sure if he’d been expecting the fall, he would have let me drop to the floor.
“You’re heavier than you look,” he grunted.
I dug my fingernails into his biceps. Unfortunately the muscles were too hard to make much of an indention. “Matt and I weren’t kissing.”
“By the way your eyes are always eating me up, you can hardly expect the rest of us to believe in your restraint.”
“I do not eat you up!” My whole face heated. Okay, that did not come out right. “I mean,” I mumbled, “You know what I mean.”
Vane set me down with a leer. “The lady protests greatly.”
I glared at him. “Why are you such a barbarian?”
“Sir Barbarian,” he corrected.
I wrinkled my brow. “Is that a joke? Did Vane make a funny?”
“Sir Vane,” he corrected again.
“That explains why Camelot fell,” I muttered.
Vane sighed. “What do you want, DuLac?”
I looked at him curiously. First he’d tried to choke me. Now he was trying to play with me. I was starting to form a hypothesis that guys from the medieval time period suffered from bipolar disorder. “There is no need to tell the Council about Matt and me. You were right. Matt thinks I’m interfering with his visions. He doesn’t w-want—” I broke off as the last word wobbled.
Vane gave me a look of disgust mixed with pity. “You’re not going to cry, are you?”
“N-No,” I stammered.
“Good.” He turned to walk away.
I hurried to grab his arm. “You won’t say anything?”
Vane looked down at my unpainted nails, then, followed along the length of my arm, up past the curve of the neck to my face. He said conversationally, “I could break you easily.”
I tried to yank my hand away. He grabbed it before I could.
“But oddly enough, I don’t seem to want to,” he whispered. His fingers tightened on my hand until I winced. His hold eased but he didn’t release me. He said in a louder voice, “My brother gave you the amulet he made for Guinevere. He must think you’re special. You could be. Just be careful you don’t end up the same way as her.”
“And which way is that?” I asked.
He let go of my hand. “Burned at the stake.”
***
The kiss consumed me, heating my body from inside out. I hung on for life and allowed my mouth to be devoured. The acrid smell of fire broke through the fog of pleasure dulling my mind. I pulled away. I lay in a field under the protective branches of a tree. Stars twinkled in the dark night. They shone down on the one I still had my legs wrapped around—Morgan. His face twisted. Fangs shot out of his mouth. His forehead enlarged to become swollen and hard.
“Time to have some real fun, babe,” he said.
Fire blazed on the eaves of the tree above me.
I screamed. I grabbed a rock and hit him in the face. He snarled in pain. I wrestled out of his grip. I started running. But all of a sudden, a thick fog of smoke filled the field. I stopped.
From out of nowhere, Morgan jumped in front of me. His beautiful face twisted into a snarl. I cried as he grabbed me by the neck. I fell to the ground.
He squeezed my throat.
I couldn’t breathe. I was going to die.
“Wake up, Ryan,” Matt’s voice commanded from somewhere far away.
I jerked up in bed. My eyes stung with acid-like tears. My neck throbbed in pain. I coughed as smoke clogged my lungs. Flames engulfed our room. Fire alarms rang in ear-piercing screeches.
I stumbled out of bed.
“Gia,” I cried out and wished I hadn’t. Choking on smoke fumes, I ran to her bed. She lay deathly still. I grabbed her wrist. To my relief, her heartbeat felt normal. I scrambled to get her iPad out of her school bag to call for help. She stowed it under the bed. I didn’t have to open the bag. The contents lay scattered under her bed. My lips thinned when I saw the iPad. Someone had smashed it. I had no doubt mine was in the same condition.
I looked at the door. A wall of snapping fire blocked the way.
The window. I hooked my arms under Gia’s shoulders and dragged her to the lone window at the center of the outer wall. I dropped her briefly and touched the wall. The exterior stonewalls remained cold, but most of the interior burned as if it were made of tinderbox wood. I pushed the window shutters open. Iron bars covered the lower portion the window. The fire alarms should have disabled them, but Gia had told me that the bars also had a layer of magic on them. I had to neutralize it somehow.
I reached around my neck for my amulet and touched the iron bars. Please, I told it, I need you. An image of Matt flew in my mind. “Kavas,” a voice said in my head.
Heat filled the ruby gemstone. The iron bars swung outward.
With a cry of rel
ief, I hung Gia half out the window and peered out… to the ground five stories below. Getting a room on the top level had seemed like a good thing. The entire residence hall had already evacuated to the courtyard in front of the building. Our room was on the side so I could only see them by craning my neck and looking to the right. Despite the alarms and burning inferno, I could hear various teachers taking roll count.
“Help,” I yelled. No one heard me.
Floating balls of water exploded around us like grenades. I saw a white robed wizard at the front directing fire hoses. I waved to him, but he was busy spouting instructions to the other wizards and he didn’t notice.
I eyed the curtains around the window, but they weren’t long enough. We could make possibly two floors, but I wouldn’t be able to jump the rest. Not with Gia unconscious.
Leaning out of the window again, I spotted a narrow ledge that ran around the building. It was just wide enough for one person to inch along if I balanced just right. The ledge ran across several other rooms. Fire occasionally burst out through the iron bars like octopus arms. Once fire engulfed the whole floor, the ledge wouldn’t even be an option. It was my best chance… if I was willing to leave Gia behind. Except I wasn’t.
Flames licked my heels. I took the curtains from the window and used a technique I learned babysitting some of the neighborhood children back when my life had been normal. I wrapped the cloth around me and then used the ends of the cloth to tie Gia to my side. I must have resembled a lopsided kangaroo. I cinched the curtain tight around my waist. I don’t know how I found the strength, but with one hand on Gia and one hand against the wall, I edged out onto the ledge.
I’d only made it a few feet when it started raining.
I had a feeling the wizard firefighters had a hand in the sudden downpour. Inch by inch, I made it to the first window. Even a small spark of fire would set my highly combustible outfit aflame as soon as I tried to cross. I glanced at the corner of the building—only three more windows to go after this.
I took a breath and took another step.
I landed awkwardly and slid on the wet ledge. Gia and I fell. My side hit a rainspout that one floor down and I screamed. My rib cracked as it slammed against the stone. Luckily for me part of the curtain wrapped around me also caught on the long snout of the beast-shaped spout. I grabbed at the stone edifice to hang on. My jostling caused the curtain started to unravel. I let go of the rainspout with one hand and caught the loose cloth. Gia hung in the curtain sack like a baby.
I don’t know how long I hung, holding the double weight of Gia and myself with one hand. I just knew I couldn’t let go. It seemed like hours passed. The adrenaline thumping inside me started to ebb. My arm numb and stiff, I felt my grip slip. Ash and rain clogged my nose. The night had become pitch dark. I blinked, trying to stay conscious.
“There they are,” a voice called from below.
“Ryan, let go,” someone else said.
I couldn’t have resisted if I’d wanted to. My grip broke. Gia and I plunged down. Compressed air caught us before we hit the ground. We hung a few feet in the air while someone lowered us slowly to the grass. I lay on my back looking up into the starless night sky. Rain spit down on my face.
Vane peered down over me. “Enough lying down, DuLac, Get up.”
I shut my eyes. I giggled.
Vane roughly pulled me up into a sitting position.
“Better?” he said.
I opened my eyes.
Rain poured down his face. It followed in a line past wanton cheekbones over wicked lips, leaving his whole countenance clean and fresh. He smiled. All the harsh lines disappeared into something breathtakingly beautiful.
Wet mud covered most of my body. My clothes clung to soaked skin, exposing every secret, revealing every curve. I took a heaving breath.
I heard Vane catch his.
I squeezed my fingers. Thick dirty goo squirted out from the spaces in between them. My hands fisted. I punched Vane in the face.
***
Hospital beds separated by thin wood partitions had been lined inside a barn-like structure. There were about twenty beds placed into two rows. Most of them were occupied. Many of the girls were suffering from smoke inhalation. Several healers dressed in brown robes over scrubs moved from bed to bed checking on patients.
Gia dozed peacefully on the bed next to mine.
A healer wearing a dull green robe walked up with a clipboard. He closed the partition, cutting off my view of Gia. I opened my mouth to protest.
“She’ll be alright,” he said. “And so will you, but I want to keep you here for the night. The fifth floor girls have the brunt of the injuries.” The healer glanced up and noticed Aurelius in flowing white robes making his way directly to him. Hastily putting the clipboard on a hook on the hospital bed, the healer left to meet the head Councilmember.
Aurelius glanced at me once or twice as he talked in whispered tones to the healer.
Matt entered the triage room and crossed through the long space straight to me. Vane stepped from around the partition curtain.
“I want him locked up for trying to kill me.” I pointed at Vane.
Vane responded with a lazy once-over. “You look mostly alive.”
Aurelius approached the bed without the healer in tow. “I’m glad to see you well, Ms. Dulac. We’ve never had such a thing happen at the school before.”
“It’s his fault.” I glared at Vane. “He threatened me saying I would burn at the stake like Guinevere and the next thing I know my room is on fire. Do you really expect us to believe it’s a coincidence?”
“I think it would be best if we spoke more privately.” Vane made a circle with his hand. A faint red light surrounded us forming a nearly invisible bubble.
Aurelius frowned. “Ms. DuLac, are you saying the fire was not an accident?”
Matt made an impatient noise. “What have you done, Vane?”
Vane rounded on me. “I want to know the details. What happened in the room?”
“Why?” I demanded.
Vane smiled cryptically. “Tell me and I’ll consider answering.”
“Yes,” Aurelius said. “I want a full account. Ms. DuLac, please tell us what you know.”
I glanced at Matt. “This afternoon Vane choked me in front of several students after class—”
“What?” Matt jumped up, hands fisted.
Vane snorted. “I held her up in the air. If I’d wanted to choke her, she wouldn’t be here.”
I leveled a disgusted look at him. “He compared me to Guinevere and said I would burn at the stake just like she did.” I picked up the glass of water someone had placed on a steel nightstand next to the bed. I took a sip. My throat felt so swollen that it was painful to swallow. “Tonight, I woke with my room in flames. They covered the door.”
“Completely covering the door? What about the walls near it?” Vane asked.
“I don’t remember about the walls. I wasn’t trying to get through them,” I said dryly. “The window bars had some kind of locking spell on them.”
Aurelius raised a brow. “Those have been spelled to open in emergencies. They should have opened automatically on detecting fire.”
“How did you open the window?” Vane asked.
I touched my neck. The amulet sat silent. “Somehow the amulet disabled the bars. I remember it heating. I thought I heard Matt—”
“It’s not unexpected,” Matt said abruptly. “The amulet has tied itself to you. It knew to defend you.”
Vane’s eyes fixed on Matt. He murmured, “Interesting.”
I coughed. Matt handed me a water glass. I lifted my lips to take a long sip.
Matt put a hand on my shoulder. Taking the water glass, he touched my chin and gently angled my face to better see my neck. Without warning, he launched a fireball at Vane.
Vane barely caught it before it burned him. “What did I do now?”
Matt glared at Vane. “She’s got bruises on her neck.
”
In a flash, Vane was out of the chair and at the head of the bed on the opposite side from Matt. I squirmed under their scrutiny.
“An air hold doesn’t leave that kind of bruise. I didn’t do this,” Vane said. “Those bruises are deep. Someone tried to choke her. I’m surprised they didn’t snap her neck.”
“I dreamt Morgan was choking me,” I said softly.
“The boyfriend?” Vane said.
Matt said, “Tell us about the dream.”
I described it and ended with, “I woke up when—” I broke off abruptly. My eyes went to Matt.
“When?” Vane asked sharply.
I colored. “Matt called me in the dream.”
“The amulet is protected,” Matt said musingly. “They must have tried to take it from you, but it wouldn’t come off.”
Vane nodded. “When the alarms went off, he probably got out in the chaos. Only he was clever enough to lock the iron bars in her room.”
“It could have been a girl,” I said. “It would have been easy for one to blend in during the evacuation.”
“A lot of wizards entered the dorm after the alarms went off.” Vane pointed out.
Matt sent him a fuming glare. “You suspected a traitor. You used her as bait, didn’t you? And you risked a whole building!”
“I did not mean for my words to be take literary.” Vane’s gaze locked on me. “I only said it to you.”
“You said it loud enough for anyone near the stairwell to hear,” I said acidly. “Don’t pretend that this was an accident. You specifically said Matt gave me the amulet—”
In a blink Matt was on top of Vane. He grabbed Vane by the collar and decked him hard on the jaw. Matt pulled back to throw another punch.
Vane barely managed to block him. He locked Matt’s arms in a tight hold so Matt couldn’t move. “Merlin attacking with his bare hands. Color me shocked. But I was right, wasn’t I? You like—”
“I could easily kill you,” Matt ground out, throwing Vane off him.
“Please,” Aurelius asked. “Why did you do it, Vane?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” Vane backed away from Matt. “There’s a traitor among us.”
The words hung in the air with subversive malice.
