by Katie Cross
“Five years,” she murmured, drumming her fingers along her arms. Her blue eyes glowed in the moonlight. “Quite an offer.”
She spun around to face me.
“I’m not entirely opposed to a deal, but it will be on my terms, not yours. The Esbat should be coming up soon. Have you ever heard of an Esbat before, Bianca?”
The Esbat was a meeting of the Network’s Council of Leaders. The ten oldest and most respected witches in the Network sat on the Council, and they met with individual coven leaders to discuss Network business. No one but those attending knew when it would be, and even they were only notified a day or two in advance.
“Yes, I’ve heard of it.”
“I’ve been thinking about taking an Assistant with me to take notes for years now. I get so bored doing it myself, but I’ve never had a student I thought could complete the Esbat mark. It’s so advanced and difficult. You’ve already shown a bit more spunk than the rest.”
She paused, mulling it over.
“Yes, I think this will work. The Esbat meeting could pop up around then. If you can earn the Esbat mark, it may be worth your grandmother’s freedom. Not yours or your mother’s. Just Hazel’s.”
Her words echoed in my head. Just Hazel’s. Both disappointment and hope whispered through me. It wasn’t my life, but at least it could spare Grandmother some relief from her pain. The curse was more than just the slow destruction of bone and joints. It was a heavy weight that pressed down over time. My mother called it her invisible shackle, following her, waking with her, bearing down on her.
“Not that Hazel has much life left,” Miss Mabel added as an afterthought. “Cheer up, Bianca. Everyone dies at some point, whether it’s fair or not.”
“Yes,” I said with a steely voice. “But at least she wouldn’t be in so much pain when she passed.”
She acted as if I hadn’t spoken.
“I need you to show me that you’re worth something before I remove the curse from you completely. Prove yourself to me by finishing the Esbat mark in three weeks, then we’ll ease Hazel’s transition to death.”
Stunned, I blinked several times, hoping it would clear my mind.
“Three weeks?” I repeated.
“Did I stutter?”
Her cool tone took on a sudden warning, her mood changing as fast as a blink.
“No, Miss Mabel,” I said, truly disarmed for the first time.
The curriculum for the Esbat mark was the most difficult schoolwork the Network offered. The Network expired many marks, marks that faded away because times changed and so did needs. The Esbat mark lay dormant but not forgotten. Only a witch with a hope to work in the Network as a leader, or directly with the High Priestess, ever attempted the Esbat mark. It was all books, studying, and memorization. A veritable prison of classroom time and scrolls. For Leda, it would be heaven.
For me, hell.
A bolt of inspiration told me that she knew. Miss Mabel knew how much I hated bookwork, how difficult it would be to sit at a desk and memorize ancient languages, to concentrate for that long with no escape. My throat tightened just at the thought of it.
“Miss Mabel–”
“It’s possible to pass it after only three weeks instead of the usual twelve week course, and has been done once before. At least, I think.”
A quarter of the usual time. She’d found a weakness to exploit within minutes of when I met her. A weakness I’d never planned for.
You signed up for an interesting school year, Bianca, I silently chided myself. One you’ll be lucky to survive. You’ve already underestimated her.
Isadora’s warning came back to me with a flash.
“If I don’t earn the mark?” I asked, using the last of my reserves to fake a confidence I didn’t have.
“You’ll still have the contract to work as my Assistant until you earn all three marks.”
The words and then you die seemed to hang in the air.
Too simple.
“And?”
She smiled, “You’re very wise, Bianca. Never get into an agreement you don’t thoroughly understand. If you don’t earn the mark, I’m not going to punish you. At least, not directly.”
“Then what will you want?”
Miss Mabel walked to the other side of the room in a slow saunter. Her dress slipped over the floorboards with a whisper.
“If you do not complete the Esbat mark in three weeks’ time, you will serve me for thirteen years from today. I’ll extend the curse to cover the length of your servitude. You will not be allowed to see or speak to your family, no exceptions for death or sickness.”
My heart stuttered. Thirteen years? I may never see my mother again. Grandmother would die without me. I’d be in bondage to Miss Mabel in dark magic hell and escape only through death at the end of it.
I floundered. It would be three sleepless weeks of learning new languages, creating impossible trust potions, and memorizing Network leadership structure. The idea made my head hurt. Miss Mabel waited with her hands folded behind her back.
Battles never go the way you plan, Papa always taught me. The best talent any Guardian or Protector has is the ability to adapt his or her plan to the circumstances. Above all, have confidence in yourself.
Of course I’d do it. I hadn’t lived sixteen years waiting to die. I’d go out fighting, no matter what form the battlefield took, no matter how bleak the stakes looked. I squared my shoulders and met her steely gaze.
“I’ll do it.”
“Fantastic. I’ll write up a contract tonight that you can sign in the morning. I love contracts. They prove what a good person I am.”
She stopped, and took on a motherly tone. “Sweet Bianca. You do look tired. We have a lot to do tomorrow. Go to bed, darling. A good night’s rest will help this all feel better.”
18
In Vino Veritas
A thick book dropped on my desk with a thud and puff of dust the next morning, rattling the half-full inkwell. The quill, made of tiny emerald and gold feathers lay across the top of the desk, glistened with the wet ink I’d just used to sign the contract.
“Now that the contract is signed, we can move forward to your education. This is the textbook on the history of the Esbat.”
Her long-sleeved, deep blue dress swished as she walked past me. From where I sat in the attic classroom, I could see out the back windows and into the gloom of the lifeless forest. One lonely desk stood in the middle of the floor. A fire crackled behind me. At the front, a blackboard ran from floor to ceiling and covered the whole wall, like Miss Bernadette’s classroom. Cryptic swirls decorated the edges of the blackboard; it almost looked like an extension of Letum Wood.
The book smelled new, and the pages were undisturbed and fine, filled with symbols and script. I turned each page one at a time, perusing decades of information. The appendixes in the back contained three separate languages known only in the Central Network and allowed only in the Esbat.
“That is a special book. The High Priest is a very thorough man in his oversight of Network Education and has to approve every student who takes the Esbat curriculum. He put a special protective spell on this book that no one else knows, which makes it so only you and me can see the information. That prevents the secrets within from being gathered by unapproved eyes. The ink that you write your homework scrolls in is also special and will only be visible to you and I.”
She held out her hand, palm up.
“Let me see your middle finger.”
I hesitated, but she wiggled her fingers in an impatient gesture. I reached forward, holding my hand above hers, not wanting to touch her. She grabbed it, produced a small golden dagger in the center of her palm and pressed it to my fingertip before I could pull away. Her hands felt warm.
“Ouch!” I tried to jerk away, but she held me fast. A single red drop formed at the tip. She grabbed the inkwell and let the drop fall.
“There,” she said, releasing my hand. “That will tie you to the in
k.”
Miss Mabel followed the same procedure, cutting a tip on the end of her middle finger. Once she squeezed a drop of blood out, the cut vanished.
“And that ties me. No one else will read your work. Once I’m done correcting the papers, I’ll burn them as a precaution.”
Tempted to heal my own cut, but not wanting her to see me perform the magic—she’d surely make me explain how I knew it—I sucked on the tip of the finger until the bleeding stopped. It tasted coppery, like putting a sacran coin in my mouth.
“The Esbat mark focuses on protecting the Network,” Miss Mabel continued, positioning herself behind me to look over my shoulder. Her blonde hair swept my arm and sent chills across my skin. “Secrecy as well. There are several languages you’ll need to learn, at least be passing conversant in, by the final test for the mark. They are used during the meeting and are typically the hardest part of the class.”
I recognized a few words from old spells and history books Papa used to teach me. These languages had been around for centuries.
“To begin with,” Miss Mabel said, “you need to read the entire book. I’ll quiz you on it as soon as you’re done. If you answer any question wrong, you’ll read the book again before you go to bed. Any questions?”
“No.”
“Miss Celia will bring your lunch up today in order to optimize your time. I’ll be in my office. Do not bother me.”
The sound of her shoes disappeared with the closing of a door. With a sigh, I glanced at the clock.
“You can do this,” I said. “One day at a time.”
I opened to the first page and began to read.
The day shifted away from me, chronicled in the crawl of the sunbeams across the floor as the hours passed. Miss Mabel gave no indication of life, not even a creak of the floorboard. The restless quiet made me uneasy, and I found myself staring out the window several times, lost in thought. Without meaning to, I spent most of my lunch hour just flipping through the pages to look at the painted pictures.
After the final event of the Competition, the solitude and silence were a welcomed reprieve, but I missed my friends. My thoughts often strayed to Camille and Leda, as well as Miss Bernadette’s warm classroom.
Head throbbing, I turned the final page of the book later that afternoon and closed it in relief.
Take that, devil woman.
Miss Mabel swept into the classroom.
“When was the first Esbat held?”
Her words came in a fast, demanding clip. I straightened up, startled by her sudden entrance.
“O-over four hundred years ago.”
“What is the most common ingredient among the four simple truth serums?”
My voice sat in my throat, paralyzed. I didn’t remember reading about truth serums. She stopped and turned to look at me.
“Well?”
Grandmother sold ingredients for serums, potions, and simple baking spices at the shop in Bickers Mill. A wizened old man often came in, a worker at Chatham Castle. He bought spices for truth serums in high quantities from us all the time, so I took a wild guess.
“Gingko biloba?”
“Was that a question?”
“No,” I said, more firmly this time, although my confidence wavered. “The answer is gingko biloba.”
She narrowed her eyes, but continued. “Wrong. Tell me the names of the first High Priestess and Priest to use the language Dekkon.”
I inwardly groaned. There had been too many names to keep track of who did what, but I did remember the pictures drawn and painted in the book. One in particular came to mind when I visualized the chapter. A painting at the beginning of the book with two people standing near a large throne. The High Priestess had black hair, reminding me of a woman named Viv. Although my guess could be wild, I threw it out anyway.
“Vivianne and Alexander.”
Miss Mabel stood in front of my desk now, towering over me like a marble goddess. She launched into the lesson, drawing a breath of relief from me.
“The Esbat is a meeting of neighboring covens, Council Leaders, the High Priest, and the High Priestess. They meet to conduct business. How many Council Members?”
“Ten.”
“Correct. Why is it so important to protect the Esbat meeting?”
This question was a summary of the entire textbook. “We discuss the needs of the Network at the meeting, which exposes our weaknesses.”
Miss Mabel stared at me, then took a step away from the desk. It was easier to breathe when she wasn’t looming over me.
“Yes, very good. It’s unfortunate that we don’t trust other Networks anymore. Once the mortals left centuries ago and we had no one to fight with, we naturally turned to hating each other. It hasn’t been very many years since our own Network wasn’t a very safe place to live. That was well before your time.”
Evelyn reigned over the Dark Days, only part of the reason Miss Mabel cursed my grandmother. Anarchy was the leader; hysteria the rule.
“I’ve heard of them before,” I said, realizing she expected me to say something.
Her smile seemed aggravated underneath her charm.
“Yes, I’m sure Hazel told you all about our darling High Priestess Mildred who swooped in and saved the Network from Evelyn. Let’s not talk about her. Let’s talk about potions.”
Her abrupt twist in conversation surprised me, but I welcomed it. Potions meant action, not words.
“You can read all the books you want, but knowledge means nothing without action.”
“Yes, Miss Mabel.”
Then why did I sit here all day reading a book? I wanted to grumble, longing to feel the sun on my face.
“Tonight, I want to introduce you to a famous little gem that originated in the Western Network. They brought it over to our Network a few hundred years ago.”
Her shoes clicked as she walked toward me, producing a glass of water in her hands. “It’s important for you to know that simple truth potions are weak. Any attentive witch will know when they are influenced by one, and she can usually stop it through a few simple herbs. But not all truth potions are that easy.”
My gut twisted as I sensed her direction. She sauntered to the corner of the room where a small shelf ran along the wall, filled with glass vials topped by corks. Humming as she looked over them, Miss Mabel picked a skinny little vial with an emerald liquid inside. Her hair swayed along her shoulders when she stepped away.
“This is Veritas. Have you seen it before?”
Papa told me wild stories of the confessions that witches made under the influence of Veritas, for good and ill. He’d warned me away from it with religious devotion.
“No, Miss Mabel,” I cleared my throat. “I’ve never seen it before.”
She tipped the vial upside down. The liquid clung to the walls of the glass, moving like clear green molasses.
“It’s difficult to make,” she said, studying it. “But easy to recognize. No other potion has this appealing shade of green. I’m quite fond of it. A single drop can extract superficial secrets from anyone. Two drops can reveal hidden information, and three will kill.”
She pulled the cork, and it came off with a light pop. Placing the glass on my desk, she put a single drop of Veritas in the water.
This was not good.
She swirled the glass until the Veritas disappeared without a trace, then looked at me.
“Have you ever taken Veritas?”
I shook my head.
“I drank it once,” she said, musing. “The Veritas dissolves clear, can survive in any liquid for an indefinite amount of time, tastes like mint, and burns going down. That’s how most people know they’ve drunk it. But by then, it’s too late. Most witches put it in wine, as it hides the aftertaste. I’m sure you’ve heard of in vino veritas? In wine there is truth.”
She lifted the glass of water up to look through it, and I held my breath. If she demanded that I drink it, I would have no choice but to obey. Refusing to take it
would only make her suspicious, but what if I said something about Papa under its influence? It could be disastrous.
“Some people will tell you to never take wine from a witch you don’t know. I disagree. I never take wine from any witch. Ever.”
She opened her hand, and the glass fell, shattering into a hundred crystal specks on the floor. The water evaporated in a fine mist, curling off the planks and into the air like an early morning fog.
“Veritas leaves no trace. If you suspect a liquid is tainted with it, let a single drop fall. If the liquid touches the ground, there is no Veritas.”
As she headed for a bookshelf on the other side of the room, I breathed for what felt like the first time. The glass shards glittered and crunched on the floor as she strolled over them.
“As a leader, witches from different Networks may try and use Veritas against you to get our secrets. That’s why we talk about it in the Esbat curriculum. Veritas is not allowed amongst the general public in our Network, thanks to our … annoyingly diligent High Priestess.”
The ironic tone of her voice was no accident. Miss Mabel waved her hand, beckoning several books.
“You will make the Veritas serum. Once you have finished brewing it, you’ll sample it in my presence so I can interrogate you. Everyone must sample Veritas once as part of the Esbat curriculum.”
Any relief I felt at not drinking it tonight disappeared in a wall of anxiety. The books landed on the desk with a bang.
“These are some books to reference if you have questions.”
“Yes, Miss Mabel.”
Her sharp eyes narrowed in thought.
“You have three days to complete the potion, starting tomorrow morning. While it’s brewing, work on these.” She extended a thick roll of parchment. “Your homework questions are written in the Almorran language, so you’ll need to translate them in order to answer correctly. For now, you may answer in our language.”
She left me standing with a hollow feeling in my gut and the sound of Miss Celia walking up the stairs with our dinner.
19
