The second question turned out to be just as easy as the first: Which of the four schools is best suited for dealing with the undead? There were four choices: Warrior Warfare, Mage Skills, Holy Arts, and Alchemy. Sam marked Holy Arts.
It can’t be this easy, Sam thought, reading the first two questions over again to make sure he hadn’t misread them.
But he had read them right. He continued on and discovered that none of the questions were all that difficult. Everything on the test had been covered during their training. Sam didn’t see how anyone could struggle with it if they had paid attention at least part of the time.
He finished, handing his completed test parchment to Alsted with an hour to spare. Alsted eyed him suspiciously. “Finished already, are ya?”
“Yep.”
Alsted glanced at Felgorn. “Always a speedy one in the bunch.” He looked back at Sam. “Ya can go stand over there until the rest are done. Practice on one of the dummies.”
Sam walked over to where several practice dummies had been set up. He pulled Rusty from its scabbard and took several practice swings, but got bored quickly.
Sarah was the next to finish, which did him little good since she wouldn’t give him the time of day. She seemed to find the practice dummies less unusual, having no problem drawing her sword and practicing different offensive strategies they had learned.
During the next fifteen minutes, more boys finished and joined him near the practice dummies. Curtis finished with half an hour remaining, finally giving Sam someone to talk to.
“Gee, brain,” Curtis said. “Way to suck up.”
“What do you mean? Didn’t you think it was way too easy?”
“It wasn’t as tough as I thought it would be, but I wouldn’t say it was easy. Look who’s last,” Curtis said, pointing at the table where only one boy remained. It was Cully Duke. “It’s your favorite person.”
Sam took satisfaction in watching Cully squirm; he obviously wasn’t finding the written portion of the test nearly as easy as Sam had. Finally, with only five minutes left, Cully stood up and handed his test to Alsted. He joined Braxton O’Connell and Dartis Malavant, who stood brooding in a corner.
“Serves him right,” Sam said.
“Maybe he’ll wash out,” Curtis said. “That would be a dream come true. Break up the Terrible Trio.”
Not with my luck, Sam thought to himself.
If good luck were an animal, Sam thought Wilkes Haversham would have been in charge of handling it, as it seemed to be an imaginary beast as far as Sam was concerned; a fairy tale. Bad luck existed, he knew that because he was cursed with an extraordinary amount of it, and, without knowing it, he was about to receive another heaping helping.
“Don’t go too hard on me,” Curtis whispered to Sam. “But be sure to make it look good. Realistic.”
Sam nodded and smiled. After discovering the written test was much easier than he had expected, the upcoming practical didn’t seem nearly as nerve-wracking. After all, with his best friend as his opponent, it couldn’t be that bad, right?
Alsted stood in front of them, holding a large stone bowl in both hands. “Just to make things fair – and interesting,” Alsted said, “we’ve paired ya all up randomly. Prevents anyone from being too chummy with their opponent.”
Upon hearing this, Sam knew instantly what was going to happen.
Felgorn began calling names in his deep, rumbling voice. “Curtis Meeks and Victor Blume. Jasper Mellon and Trevor Neeley. Dartis Malavant and Sarah Gemstead. Sam Finch…”
Sam held his breath, hoping against hope, but deep down he realized that there weren’t any gods smiling down on him today. Perhaps it was payback for the written test being such a breeze, but whatever the reason, Sam felt his heart start to pound harder.
“…and Cully Duke.”
Sam couldn’t hear anything but the blood pounding in his ears after that. He glanced up and saw Cully staring at him, a smile plastered on his face.
“Everyone find yar partner!” Alsted commanded.
With growing trepidation, Sam approached Cully.
“This should be good for a laugh,” Cully said. The place where Curtis had hit Cully in the forehead with the rock had healed, but the injury had left a tiny pink scar. Rather guiltily, Sam thought: Shouldn’t it be Curtis who you’re mad at? He’s the one who hit you with the rock. Not me.
Both Felgorn and Alsted were keeping score so that two pairs of boys could go at the same time. Sam watched as Curtis and Victor took their turn. Victor was the same height as Curtis, but much wider. He quickly gained the upper hand in the duel, but Curtis put up a valiant effort, managing to avoid several attacks before being overcome by Victor’s sheer brute force.
Just as Felgorn motioned for Sam and Cully to step forward, Sarah and Dartis Malavant were beginning their duel as well under Alsted’s watch.
At least she won’t have the satisfaction of watching me have my head caved in, Sam thought as he stepped forward, squaring off with Cully, who wore a smug smile.
“I’m really going to enjoy this,” Cully muttered, raising his sword.
Distantly, Sam heard the clang of sword on sword as Sarah and Malavant began to duel.
Trembling, Sam raised his sword, forcing himself to meet Cully’s eyes. Maybe he was about to have the snot beat out of him, but he wouldn’t do so as a coward. He steeled himself, prepared to go down fighting.
“Begin,” Felgorn said.
Cully was strong and fast and didn’t waste any time. He surged forward, thrusting, and Sam only just managed to dodge out of the way, bringing his own sword around to parry the attack. Cully, appearing slightly baffled that he hadn’t won already, gritted his teeth, and came at Sam again. He swung his sword behind his head, brought it slicing down toward Sam. Sam brought his own sword up just in time, meeting Cully’s sword, but the force of the blow was enough to bring Sam to his knees.
All hatred now, Cully said, “Time to die, turd.”
Sam knew he didn’t stand a chance given his vulnerable position. He raised his sword with one hand, while trying to get to his feet. Cully was already darting forward with another attack…
…when, suddenly, there was a loud gasp, and Alsted yelled, “Stop!”
At first, Sam had mistakenly thought that Alsted had sensed Sam’s impending doom and halted the duel, but he soon realized his error as everyone gathered in a circle ten feet away.
Sam got to his feet and walked over to see what all the fuss was about, happy to not be dead. Since he couldn’t see over the other boys, he worked his way through the crowd. He was unprepared for what he saw.
Dartis Malavant was lying limp on the ground, his breathing shallow, a puncture wound in his chest. Sarah was standing several feet away, tears in her eyes, her sword on the ground near her feet. There was blood on the tip of it.
“I don’t know what happened,” Sarah said hysterically. “He tripped and fell onto my sword. I would never intentionally try to harm anyone. Will he be all right?”
Alsted knelt down beside Malavant. He glanced up at Felgorn. “Get her to the castle. Send a physician.”
Without hesitation, Felgorn grabbed Sarah around the shoulders and led her out of the arena.
Sam couldn’t take his eyes off Malavant. Murmurs and snippets of conversation ran through the crowd. A faint moan passed through Malavant’s lips and then he was silent. Alsted put his hand against the injured boy’s forehead. “Can’t be,” he said. “He’s burning up.”
Curtis worked his way over. “Did you see what happened?”
Sam shook his head. “No. You?”
“Not really. I was more focused on Cully trying to kill you. Looks like he accidentally met the end of her blade. Doesn’t look that deep, though. It isn’t even bleeding that much.”
Curtis was right. It did appear to be a shallow injury; one would think it wasn’t life-threatening, but, then again, Sam wasn’t a doctor.
It took an eternity for the phy
sician to arrive. The crowd parted to allow him through. He knelt down beside Alsted.
“What happened?” the physician asked.
“Accident. Caught the tip of a sword. He’s got a fever.”
“Couldn’t have a fever this soon,” the physician said, but when he touched his own hand to Malavant’s forehead, his eyes widened. “There’s something peculiar about this. A fever doesn’t normally come on that quickly. It isn’t a deep cut. Was he sick before this?”
“Not that I’m aware of.”
The physician shook his head gloomily. “We need to get him to the hospital wing.”
Alsted scooped Malavant up in his arms and started for the castle. The physician singled out Sam and pointed at Sarah’s sword, which was still on the ground. “You. Bring the sword.”
Sam had a difficult time keeping up as he followed Alsted and the physician up to the castle. Rusty was sheathed in its scabbard on his back while he carried Sarah’s sword in his hands. He couldn’t help noticing that her sword was much lighter than his own.
Apparently, Felgorn had alerted the guards, for when they reached the main entrance they parted and the doors swung open immediately. The physician led them into the castle’s spacious foyer and through the first set of double doors to their left.
After walking down a long hallway, they entered what had to be the hospital wing, which was a large room, flanked on either side by dozens of narrow beds. It reminded Sam of the living quarters except much larger.
“Put him down there,” the physician ordered. Alsted placed Malavant down gently on one of the beds.
“What do you think it is, Arnaldus?”
“I don’t know,” Doctor Arnaldus said. “What I can tell you is that it is more than just a small cut.” And to Sam he said, “Let me see that, please.”
Sam handed the sword to Arnaldus. The physician examined it closely, giving the most attention to the tip of the blade. “There’s fluid here. Not just blood, I think.” He called for a young man tending to another patient. “You there, summon Instructor Zosimus.”
The physician’s assistant appeared to be in no particular hurry to obey as he finished changing the other patient’s bandage. “Soon as –”
“Now!” Arnaldus snapped. “Or else I promise you will find yourself banished to some two-bit hovel of an infirmary in the southlands.”
The physician’s assistant went pale, hopped to his feet, and scurried out of the room like a frightened mouse.
While they waited for the alchemy instructor, Arnaldus tended to Malavant’s wound. He soaked a cloth in water, ringing out the excess, and cleaned the wound thoroughly. He then took a small glass vial filled with a golden substance and poured it over the wound. It oozed out of the vial with the consistency of thick syrup. He spread it out evenly. The bleeding stopped almost immediately. Arnaldus applied a dressing.
Although Malavant appeared intensely pale, white as the sheets on the hospital bed, there was a powerful heat radiating from his body. The physician soaked a fresh cloth in water, folded it lengthwise, and draped it over Malavant’s forehead.
“It is a particularly strong fever. I haven’t seen anything like it since the plague struck twenty years ago. He won’t last long if we can’t bring it down.”
Sam stood next to the bed, gazing down on Malavant, still shocked by what had happened. He wondered where they had taken Sarah off to. Would she be in trouble? Obviously, this wasn’t her fault.
Moments later, the physician’s assistant returned, Instructor Zosimus striding along next to him. Zosimus was a black man with closely-cropped hair and a goatee. A shiny hooped earring dangled from his left ear. To Sam, he more closely resembled the pirates he had seen pictures of in his books than an alchemy instructor. But perhaps that wasn’t such a stretch since Sam had once heard that alchemists were required to travel frequently in order to procure new ingredients for various potions.
Zosimus picked up Sarah’s sword and examined it. His eyes narrowed knowingly. “Yes, I believe I know what this is. One sure way to tell. You might want to stand back.”
Sam took several steps back; so did Arnaldus. Alsted remained where he was.
Zosimus held the sword by the handle, the blade pointing downward. He moved it so that it hovered above a bowl of water, and lowered the tip of the blade into the bowl. As soon as the blade made contact with the water, Sam could hear a loud sizzling sound as the water began to boil.
The alchemy instructor nodded as if he had been expecting it, and then put the sword aside. “Poison from the Snag Beetle. Very rare. Indigenous to the Western Steppes, which is a thousand miles from here.”
“Poison?” Arnaldus asked.
“Yes,” Zosimus said. “Whose sword is this?”
Alsted said, “Sarah Gemstead.”
Zosimus fixed his gaze on Alsted. “Really?”
Alsted nodded somberly.
“Well then, that is strange.”
“How difficult would it be to get this poison?” Alsted asked.
“Extremely. None of the alchemists in the village carry it. We don’t carry it in the castle stores, either. Would anyone besides the girl have access to the sword?”
“Doubtful,” Alsted said. “But there’s no explanation other than tampering.”
“Yes, of course, that is the only possibility.”
Sam listened, trying to take it all in. It seemed as though they didn’t’ suspect Sarah of any wrongdoing. He was mildly surprised at how quickly they had dismissed her as a suspect, but then again, her parents were close to the King so maybe that placed her above suspicion.
“Could it have been an accident?” Sam asked. The others looked at him as though only now realizing he had been standing there the entire time.
“Impossible,” Zosimus said. “It would have taken someone with vast resources and wealth to procure a poison like this. Mere possession of it is illegal unless a person is an accredited alchemist. And even then, they would need signed authorization from me in order to keep it anywhere in the kingdom.”
Arnaldus gestured to Malavant. “And the boy?”
Zosimus slipped his hand into his robe and pulled out a small amber-colored bottle. “This draught will help with the fever, but there is nothing known that can counteract the poison. It works its way through his veins even as we speak. I’m afraid there’s nothing that can be done.”
“So he’s going to die?” Sam asked before he could stop himself.
“The poison is lethal,” Zosimus said.
Arnaldus had already removed the wooden cork from the bottle Zosimus had given him, and was now pouring the draught into Malavant’s mouth. Malavant gagged and made choking noises. His eyes shot open and he sat up in the bed, his arms flailing wildly. He knocked the bottle from Arnaldus’s hand and it struck the floor and shattered.
Malavant thrashed and writhed and bucked, his eyes bulging. He screamed, “DON’T LET THEM TAKE ME!” He fell back on the bed, eyes closed, and didn’t move; there was only the almost imperceptible rise and fall of his chest as he breathed.
“He’s delirious.”
“How long?” Alsted asked.
“Soon.”
“I must inform the King.”
That’s it? Sam wondered. They’re just going to give up and let him die? There must be something!
Alsted stood to leave. Sam’s mind scrambled frantically to come up with an alternative to this unacceptable situation.
“Wait!” he shouted before Alsted had reached the door. His outburst had succeeded in getting their attention. “What about Finnaeus? Couldn’t he do something?”
“As I said before,” Zosimus said, “there is no cure. Even Finnaeus’s abilities cannot change the outcome.”
Sam said, “But I think they can.” Sam turned his attention to Alsted. “Don’t you remember the zombie? He mentioned there was a resurrection spell.”
Alsted stared at Sam curiously. “What do you think, Arnaldus?”
“
It isn’t my specialty, so I can’t say with any certainty if that would apply to the present case. It might.”
“You forget,” Zosimus said, “that this boy isn’t dead yet.”
Sam could tell he had their interest, and he wasn’t about to let that slip away. “Yeah, but if he’s going to, then couldn’t Finnaeus try the resurrection spell right after…it happens? Isn’t it at least worth trying if we could save his life?”
The older men stared at each other for a long time. For Sam, years seemed to tick by as they stood in silent debate. Alsted was the first to speak. “It will be a tragedy to lose a boy so young. Especially under such mysterious circumstances. I think it’s worth a try.”
Zosimus only shrugged, having little faith that Sam’s idea might actually work.
And then it was down to Arnaldus, whose expression said (if Sam was reading it correctly) that he didn’t enjoy carrying the weight of the deciding vote on his shoulders. “A death such as this would be a scandal,” he said. “A dark mark against the school and against Dashelmore. It seems to me that it is our duty to exhaust all options.
“Barber?” The wispy physician’s assistant, who up until this time had remained silent and watchful, poked his head up behind them. “Fetch Finnaeus. They’ll be in afternoon meditation, but press upon him that this matter cannot wait.”
The physician’s assistant shuffled off, almost tripping over his own feet.
Sam had never seen a dead person before (unless he counted the zombie in the cathedral courtyard, which was something altogether different).
Dartis Malavant had died peacefully, eyes closed, and without another outburst. One minute, his breathing had been shallow and ragged, Sam watching the rise and fall of his chest, and the next minute – Malavant had stopped breathing entirely.
Sam, Alsted, Zosimus, and Arnaldus stood around the bed. Malavant’s skin went from pale white to sickly gray.
“How long before the soul flees?” Arnaldus asked of Zosimus.
Sam Finch and the Zombie Hybrid (Sam Finch Series Book 1) Page 16
