The Artful Apprentice

by Christopher Nuttall

  “I had no choice,” Simon said. “My oaths...”

  “You could have died,” Emily snapped. “You could have let the oaths kill you!”

  “He was my liege,” Simon said. “I... I couldn’t say no.”

  Emily resisted — barely — the urge to blast him into ash. “So you helped her to develop her powers,” she said. “What then?”

  “It was hard to teach her to control them,” Simon said. “The king worked hard, but... she was too young to understand. He got frustrated and pushed her harder and harder... she really didn’t like it. Her mind... I think something snapped inside her mind. One moment, she would be normal, a sweet little girl. The next, she would be... somewhere else, away with the other folk. Her father didn’t like it. He wanted her to be a killer. I... I don’t know what happened next...”

  “She killed her father,” Emily said. “Right?”

  “I think so,” Simon said. “She... he’d taught her how to kill in a manner he believed to be untraceable. He’d already done something to the wards to ensure they didn’t register her magic. She... I think, one night, she killed her father. I don’t know if she meant to do it, Lady Emily. She’s a child.”

  “A child who was brutally abused,” Emily said. “And you said nothing.”

  “My oaths wouldn’t let me,” Simon said. His voice became a wail. “I had no choice!”

  “There’s always a choice,” Emily snarled. “And then... she tried to kill me.”

  “I guess so.” Simon shook his head, bitterly. “I guess... she knew, on some level, what she’d done. You were looking for the killer... she decided to kill you first. And it failed and... the duke’s sons were being bastards. One of them even told her she’d be the first to die, when his father returned. And... she killed them. They just collapsed and died.”

  Elena took a step forward. “And no one knew who’d killed them?”

  “We’d all been forced to drink potion,” Simon said. He looked at Eve, bitterly. “No one could sense a thing. It was a surprise when they dropped. I was the only one who knew what had happened.”

  “And no one forced Eve to drink potion, because no one knew she had magic,” Emily added, slowly. It made sense. “Would it even work on her?”

  “I don’t know,” Simon said. He glanced away, as if there were a hope of finding succor in the dark corners. But the shadows were already growing darker as Eve’s magic pervaded the room. “I... I really don’t know.”

  “You utter bastard,” Elena said. “You killed her.”

  Emily said nothing. The magic seemed to be fading, but she knew it was an illusion. Eve would have surge after surge of power until she either collapsed under the strain or the entire castle exploded. Emily knew it was just a matter of time. The king had done a lot worse than merely encourage his daughter to develop her magic nearly a decade too soon. He’d worked hard to shape her power into a weapon. And there was nothing she could do to save the girl.

  I can’t even put her in stasis, she thought, grimly. Aurelius had managed to put his daughter in stasis, in a desperate bid to save her life, but Eve was surrounded by wild magic. The spell might fail completely — or it might kill her. She’s too far gone for a stasis spell to have a hope of working.

  “I had no choice,” Simon repeated. His voice rose. “I had no choice!”

  “So you’ve said, repeatedly,” Emily snapped. She felt a flash of anger. She’d liked Simon, damn it. “And there’s always a choice.”

  She cursed him under her breath. Simon hadn’t had a choice, not when he’d sworn his oaths to the king. The king had wanted an obedient servant as well as a court wizard and he’d got one. God knew he could have offered Simon a lot to keep him loyal as well as obedient, from a sizable sum of money to an heiress’s hand in marriage. And Simon couldn’t have turned against the king. His oaths would have killed him.

  And maybe he wouldn’t have sworn his oaths if he’d known what the king would want from him, she thought. She would certainly have been very careful. But that’s water under the bridge now.

  “You’ll hang for this,” Elena said. She stamped her foot, every inch the princess. “You...”

  Simon sounded broken. “For obeying the king’s orders?”

  Emily sighed, inwardly. The hell of it was that Simon had a point. He could say he was only following orders and it would be a perfectly valid defense. No aristocrat worthy of the name would want to set a precedent for defying the king’s orders... she wondered if Elena could convince Sir Mowbray to make an exception. Or simply kill Simon herself. She had magic now. Or she could borrow her brother’s dagger.

  “Damn you,” she said. Void must have known what was happening. No wonder Master Lucknow and the rest of his association had been so concerned. Eve... she could unleash a surge of magic that could destroy, or reshape, the entire city. Her slightest wish might become a twisted reality. “Do you have any way to stop her?”

  Simon shook his head, miserably.

  “Right.” Emily met his eyes, silently daring him to look away. “You are going to do two things for me. Right now. Do you understand me?”

  “Yes,” Simon managed. He looked as if he desperately wanted to break eye contact. His hands were still twisting frantically. “I’ll do whatever you want.”

  “Ha,” Elena muttered.

  “First, go to my suite and... assist my maid to go home,” Emily said. Silent had said she was going to pack, hadn’t she? They’d have to leave the castle in a hurry. “You can teleport her to Zugzwang.”

  Simon nodded, once.

  “And then, get lost,” Emily said. She silently bid farewell to the part of her that had liked him. He might have reminded her of Caleb, but Caleb would have killed himself rather than brutalize an innocent child. “I don’t care where you go, as long as it’s a long way from here. If I see you again, I’ll kill you.”

  She watched the man scramble to his feet and practically run to the door. He should be able to get Silent as far as Zugzwang, although... Emily shook her head. She’d settle for him telling the maid to leave the castle at once. Silent knew how to use the portals to get home, dragging the charmed trunk behind her. And afterwards... she didn’t care where he went, as long as she didn’t see him in the future. She hadn’t lied to him. She would kill him if they ever crossed paths again. He’d forced her into a dilemma.

  “Lady Emily,” Elena said. She rounded on Emily, her fists clenched so tightly her skin was inhumanly pale. “You have no right...”

  “I have no choice,” Emily said. She turned to look at Eve. The girl lay still, her eyelids twitching as if she were having a nightmare. If her grip on reality faded completely... Eve could do an awful lot of damage before she woke, if she ever did. Emily gritted her teeth. “I need you to do something for me.”

  Elena eyed her. “What?”

  “Take your little brother and go to your chambers,” Emily said. She put as much command into her voice as she could. There was no time for an argument. “And then...”

  She shook her head. She didn’t know what to say. She didn’t want to tell anyone what had happened. It would only give them ideas. And yet... they’d have to tell the family and the rest of the world something. Perhaps they could just blame everything on the duke. It wasn’t as if he were still around to argue. His entire family was dead.

  “Help will be sent,” she promised. “Go.”

  Elena said nothing for a long, cold moment. “Willis has a crush on you,” she said, finally. “I don’t see it myself.”

  “Go,” Emily repeated. Willis had a crush on her? He’d sent her the flowers? Right now, it wasn’t a problem. She’d worry about it later, if there was a later. “I’ll deal with Eve.”

  She watched the girl leave the room, careful not to show despair until the door was safely closed. Eve moaned, twisting uncomfortably. Emily shuddered as wave after wave of wild magic brushed against her defenses. The sensation was horrible, as if her protections weren’t keeping it ou
t at all. As if, on some level, Eve was just humoring her. Emily stared down at the girl, knowing she was trapped. She couldn’t let the poor child live.

  He knew, she thought, angrily. Void knew what was happening.

  She gritted her teeth. Eve was too dangerous. The dragon might’ve been less dangerous. She would never master her powers, never control them... even if she did, she’d never survive puberty. And she might kill everyone around her, simply by accident. Emily couldn’t find it in herself to blame Eve, not for the regicide and not for trying to kill her... it simply didn’t matter. Eve was just too dangerous to live.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, unwilling to take the risk of waking the girl. “I’m truly sorry.”

  Tears prickled at the corner of her eyes. Eve was innocent! She shouldn’t die! And yet, she had to die. There was no way to drain her, not without necromancy... even necromancy would kill her or drive them both mad or... Emily didn’t know. The choice was a simple one. Eve’s life or thousands of other lives. And yet...

  She reached for her magic, shaping it into a single spell. It would be quick. It would be painless. It would ensure thousands of lives were saved. And yet, she didn’t want to do it. She’d killed before — she knew she’d killed before — but she’d always been able to convince herself, at some level, that those people had deserved it. She felt no guilt over killing Shadye. She felt no guilt over killing Fulvia. She felt no guilt... she knew, all too well, that Eve was different. She was an innocent who had to die. Cold logic — the cold equations of magic — demanded her death. And she was the woman on the spot.

  Void could have taken care of it himself, she thought. He could have slipped into the castle and killed her long before anyone else knew there was a problem. But instead he chose to test me.

  Sure, her own thoughts answered. And would you have felt any better about it if he’d spelled out your mission from the start?

  Eve twitched, her entire body shuddering. Emily stared down at her. She wouldn’t be the same, not after she killed an innocent girl. She would have committed murder... it would be murder, even if it was in a good cause. Her thoughts spun in circles. There had to be a solution, but what? She felt the battery in her pocket, wondering if she could somehow drain Eve’s power into a pocket dimension. It might work... she shook her head in bitter frustration. Perhaps it would, if she had time to build a valve that could handle the power. But she knew she didn’t have the time. She wasn’t even sure where to begin! And there were no other spells that could save the girl’s life.

  She’ll die anyway, Emily argued, trying to convince herself. Her power will destroy her, sooner or later. You’ll be giving her a peaceful end to her torment.

  She cursed Simon, and the king, and Void as savagely as she could. The king had been mad. He had to have been mad. Hadn’t he known the risks? Simon certainly should have known the risks! But he hadn’t been able to talk the king out of his mad plan... had he even tried? Emily wanted to hunt him down and flay him alive, or burn the magic out of him until he truly was a drooling moron. He should have tried to put a loophole in his oaths, something he could use to get out of the king’s service... he’d been too desperate to negotiate when the king had offered him a job. And now... she wondered, morbidly, if Simon would be the only one to survive. The magic was starting to surge again.

  I’m sorry, she thought. She wasn’t sure if she was apologizing to Eve or to her own lost innocence. It needed to be done. She knew it needed to be done. But she knew she’d spend the rest of her life questioning herself. I’m...

  A thought struck her. She could take Eve out of the castle, take her somewhere nicely isolated and then... and then what? She’d be a danger to the surrounding area — and population — until the day she died. The magic had gone too far to be stopped. And Void would want to know what she’d done. He’d want to read her mind, to watch through her eyes and... she thought she understood, now, why Lady Barb distrusted him. He would do whatever he felt he had to do. And he expected the same from her.

  She stopped, dead. There was a possibility. It might just work. And...

  If it fails, I can still kill her, Emily thought. She reached for the battery, hastily respelling the valve. Thankfully, she hadn’t charmed a spell into the wood before the duke had launched his coup. I might have to kill her.

  She braced herself, lifting her hand to cast a single spell. The timing would have to be perfect or the entire show would be worse than useless. Eve moaned again, her hand batting away invisible flies. The magic surged, again and again. Emily winced as she saw the mattress shift into something more comfortable. The bed itself was starting to wobble. Eve’s power was wearing it down.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, again.

  She took one last look at the girl, capturing the image in her mind before she looked away and triggered the spell...

  ... And, when she looked back, there was nothing left of the bed but ashes.

  Chapter Forty

  “YOU KNEW,” EMILY SNAPPED.

  Void looked up from his chair as she stormed into the room. “Why, hello Emily. Good to see you again, Emily. How have you been doing, Emily?”

  Emily was too angry to care. It had been a long day. She’d killed an innocent girl, sent an urgent message to Lady Barb about how Elena needed help, given the regent an explanation that explained as little as possible, ignored Willis’s blushing suggestions that she stay for a day or two and teleported back to the tower. Her memories were a confused mess, a nightmarish series of impressions she had no time to sit down and sort into a coherent order. She needed to go to her room and sleep for a few hours, but she wanted to talk to him first.

  “You knew,” she repeated. “About Eve! About everything!”

  “I didn’t know about the dragon,” Void said, evenly. “That was a bit of a surprise. I’d heard the stories, of course, but I didn’t really believe them. Who would?”

  Emily ignored him. “You sent me to kill an innocent girl!”

  Void studied her for a long cold moment. “Yes,” he said, finally. “I did...”

  “You utter...” Emily got a firm grip on her temper. “How could you?”

  “I am your master,” Void said. His face was unreadable. “I am responsible for your development in all fields, not just magic. I am obliged...”

  “You are not obliged to turn me into an assassin!” Emily glared at him. “And you shouldn’t have sent me to kill a little girl!”

  “There are masters who would do unspeakable things to an apprentice who cut them off like that,” Void said, coolly. “And I would appreciate it if you let me finish.”

  Emily clasped her hands behind her back to keep them from shaking. “What do you have to say for yourself?”

  Void showed no visible reaction. “By the time we realized what the king was doing, it was too late to stop him and save his daughter. He wasn’t the first to try something as stupid as turning a child into a weapon, but he had a streak of odd magic running through his bloodline that gave him an edge. It wasn’t until he died that we knew what he’d been doing — and that it was too late to do anything but kill the girl.”

  “And you sent me to kill her,” Emily said. “You could have told me.”

  “You wouldn’t have learned so much if I had,” Void said. “And you wouldn’t have known — truly known — that there was no other choice.”

  “I nearly got killed,” Emily protested.

  Void laughed. “And how many times has your life been in terrible danger over the last six years?”

  Emily said nothing.

  “What happened?” Void said. “What did you do?”

  “Here.” Emily met his eyes, shoving the tangled ball of memories at him. She felt his mind brush against hers for a long moment, his calm thoughts seemingly untroubled by the death of a little girl. Emily felt a surge of pure anger, directed at both her master and herself. He’d sent her to kill... and she’d killed. “Happy now?”

  Void stood
. “There is little room for doubt or scruple in our line of work, Emily. We exist to handle problems that cannot be solved by normal means, by sorcerers and kings and aristocrats who are too focused on their own interests to put the good of the majority first. You didn’t enslave a dragon, or launch a coup, or murder an arbiter, or seek to murder your relative to unleash a nightmare. You didn’t turn Princess Eve into a living weapon, you didn’t turn her into a threat to the entire kingdom... did you? None of the mess was your doing. You simply cleaned it up.”

  “I know,” Emily said, quietly. “It doesn’t help.”

  “I’ve seen worse,” Void said. “People who do the most awful things because they think it will give them power. People who think they have no other choice. People who go too far and discover, too late, that they have to be put down. People like poor Gennady...”

  He squeezed her shoulder, lightly. “It can be a lot worse. I am so tired of clearing up other people’s messes.”

  “It doesn’t help,” Emily repeated.

  Void cleared his throat, as if he were ashamed of showing even that much compassion. “It’s interesting the dragon couldn’t talk,” he said. “It must be a very young dragon. I’ll make a few inquiries. Some of us will be very interested in knowing how to enslave a dragon.”

  “And when it breaks free, anyone who tries will regret it,” Emily said.

  “I have no doubt of it,” Void said. “Go to bed. Take a day or two off. Silent has requested permission to visit her family, so Barley will handle your needs until she returns. We’ll resume your lessons on Thursday.”

  Emily scowled at him. “Thanks, I guess.”

  Void shrugged. “I’ll see you then, if I don’t see you earlier,” he said. “And Emily?”

  “Yes?”

  “Well done,” Void said.

  Emily kept her face impassive as she dropped a curtsy and turned to hurry up to her room. His praise meant something, but... right now, she felt as if she’d failed. A little girl was dead, her immediate family dead or traumatized... she had no idea how much of the real story would leak out, over the days and months to come. Sir Mowbray would blame everything on the duke, as she’d suggested, but there would be too many discrepancies in the story for everyone to believe it. She had no doubt someone would start putting the pieces together.