“No need to ask them,” Alys said dryly. “They’re going to trap it and take it far from here. Farther than they have already. It won’t find its way back this time.”
“I still feel horrible. Its emotions…They wrench me apart.” Moira sighed. “It’s just a cute little baby.”
What were they talking about? Leaning back in my chair, I let their conversation distract me from my inner demons.
Alys snorted. “It won’t be a baby for long. Soon, it’ll be as big as its three-headed parent. Can’t have anything like that stomping all over campus. It could hurt someone.”
“Three-headed baby?” I whirled around, giving up the pretense I wasn’t listening. Tria sitting at an adjacent table, and I waved to my “bodyguard” before returning my attention to Moira and Alys. “What are you talking about?” Though I truly didn’t need to ask. I already knew.
“Can’t you see we’re studying?” Alys pointed to her open textbook. “Leave us alone.”
Moira scowled at Alys then said to me, “There’s a Cerberus pup that keeps leaving the forest and wandering around the pastures, bleating. Poor thing. It seems lonely.”
“Not such a poor thing, Moira,” Alys said. “It chased away an aldakor herd. If they don’t relocate it permanently, the tranas will never let us catch them. Then we’ll fail the next part of Professor Grim’s class.”
“Capria,” I whispered, my suspicion confirmed. Had I somehow lured her close when I returned the dandybucklions to the pasture?
“What’s a Capria?” Alys asked, frowning. “Some weird spell you’ve dreamed up? You do know magic has rules, right?”
“It’s the name of a friend.” Ignoring her, I focused on Moira. “You said they’re moving the Cerberus soon?”
“Yes, relocating it,” she said. “Taking it to a larger, magicked forest in western Massachusetts. They hope it won’t be able to find its way back here after that.”
“But the pup’s home is here, in the eastern forest.” With its puppy siblings.
“It refused to remain in the forest,” Alys said. “What else can they do?”
Them? Nothing.
Me? Maybe something.
I wouldn’t rush into this, however. That would be stupid. And, contrary to what some people who shall remain nameless might think, I was not stupid. I was ruthless. Ruthless was completely different. It was cool and edgy and it took on the world.
And my bodyguard, after a strong chastisement from Justine, was watching.
I might be ruthless, but I also had to be careful.
If I could sneak away, there was no reason I couldn’t flit to the eastern pasture, get Capria back to her family, then flit to my Coven room before anyone realized I’d left the campus.
Tossing my books into my backpack, I crossed over to Tria.
“What’s up?” she said, her finger holding her place in her textbook.
“I’m going to the bathroom.” The library’s bathroom was located near the entrance. “Then I’m going to flit to my Coven room.” I wanted to add I planned to go to bed but I’d stretched my lie too far already. My face would give me away.
Tria nodded and went back to her reading.
I crossed the room and passed the main desk.
The librarian, Mr. Zoriate, looked up and smiled. “Have a nice evening.”
“Thanks. You, too.”
As I reached the door to the bathroom, an electrical tingle slid down my back.
Turning, I caught Alys glare. She wrinkled her nose at me.
Yeah, well, I don’t like you, either.
I stormed into the bathroom then exited out into the hall.
* * *
Partway between the library and the stairwell to the skywalk, I ran into Ashton, Vik, and Eben.
Figures.
“Whoa, watch it,” Eben said, grabbing my arms, steadying me. “Almost knocked me over.”
Vik snickered.
My bag clunked on the tile floor, and Ashton picked it up and started to hand it to me with a slick smile. When I reached out, he yanked it back, grinning, holding it aloft.
I ground out a sigh. “What grade are we in again? Third?”
His smile soured, and his gaze hardened to ice.
Jumping up, I snagged my backpack and jerked it from him. “You sure you’re a prefect? I think you need prefect remediation.” Or to be fired. How many infractions would the Headmistress allow before she yanked his prefect privileges?
He drew himself up stiffer than a toy soldier. “Don’t push it, outling. As a prefect, I can give you detention if I choose.”
“For what?” Rolling my eyes, I shoved past him. “Go right ahead, because I love babysitting vrilla toddlers.” Definitely a bluff, but he couldn’t know that.
Vik and Eben stood between me and the stairway. Pivoting, I didn’t turn as I strode in the opposite direction. Okay, I did look. The guys stood where I’d left them, watching me with matching speculation in their eyes. Vik flicked his hand in my direction, and shivers crept down my spine.
Awesome. Only the fae knew what would come of this interaction. Had they arranged for more snipped nightlace to spring out and grab me? Since none of them were Bespellers, it was doubtful they’d send the nightlace after us outlings.
Hold on. My steps slowed before picking up again. That conversation I’d overhead on the path during Orientation. Ashton had been speaking with someone. At the time, I couldn’t identify the second voice. Had it been Eben? He hadn’t officially been on campus yet, but he could’ve flitted in for a day. What had they said?
Oh, yeah.
“I’m sorry,” the guy had said. “I am trying.” And, “I can handle it.”
Handle what? Plants? A ward?
The only other thing I remembered guy saying was, “Give me one more chance. I promise I won’t… Just don’t tell anyone.”
Don’t tell anyone what? I growled out my frustration and wished I’d crept closer to them, heard more. But I’d flicked a mosquito, and Ashton had come running. To avoid discovery, I’d fled.
That’s when I realized I was walking to my Coven room when I could flit.
A blink and the thought, my Coven room, and…I still stood in the hallway.
“Oh, Fleur,” Eben called in a singsong voice. Ashton and Vik chuckled. “You lost?”
Again, I tried to flit myself to my room. Not happening.
Was I experiencing a flit malfunction, assuming such a thing was possible?
“Having problems, outling?” Ashton asked, stalking toward me with his fists flexing at his sides. “Maybe I can…help you.”
“Yeah,” Eben said, slithering along behind Ashton. “I’m training to be a prefect in Earth Coven. Guess I can help, too.”
“Me, three,” Vik said, rounding out the trio.
Not waiting around to hear more, I ran.
Their footsteps thundered behind me, but I pulled ahead, darting out into the inner courtyard then back inside the main building. As I raced down the hall toward the lobby, I tested flitting one more time, without any luck. I’d need to see a healer or ask Cloven about my flit problem tomorrow.
I planned to exit the main building through the western entrance and, if able, sneak past the Council Seekers. It shouldn’t be hard to locate Capria after that, assuming she was the Cerberus Alys and Moira had talked about. I’d convince her to return to her family. I’d be in my Coven room within an hour, Tria completely unaware I’d done anything unexpected.
Sunlight slanted low across the sky, blinding me as I scooted around the outside of the building, taking the path on the inside of the moat. Less chance of running into the Seekers since they’d be patrolling out farther. I hoped.
Leaving the path via the eastern bridge, I headed toward the pasture.
Weird that I saw no one as I scurried from one concealed location to another.
Not so weird when I saw why.
Eirib and Leelith stood in the upper part of the pasture, battling a wall of nightl
ace with Searing Shears. The vines writhed and strained to get past them, seeking the campus.
Seeking me and the other surviving outlings.
They must’ve sensed or smelled or seen me standing in horror on the edge of the field, because they flung themselves frantically at Eirib and Leelith while the centaurs galloped back and forth, their Shears clicking. This had to be an unbreakable bespelling. Severed vines snapped back to the woods as if a larger, even more deadly parent plant hid, feeding its young to the Shears.
“Get to your Coven room! It’s not safe here,” Cloven said as he rushed past me, Searing Shears in his hands. “Go,” he shouted over his shoulder.
A mournful bleat in the woods made my lungs freeze, though I couldn’t see her behind the writhing wall. Capria. I recognized her voice. She cried again, the sound coming closer. Then she burst through the thrashing mass of nightlace, her three heads ripping and tearing and chopping, sending segments of torn vines into the air.
As if gaining the energy of ten wizards, the wall of nightlace slithered forward, knocking Cloven backward, to the ground. Vines descended on him like hyenas on downed prey. They lashed him to the ground while other vines reached for his neck.
An outling, they’d murder him in front of me.
“No!” I rushed forward, shrieking out a stupid song about birds and flowers.
A dandybucklion army sprung from the ground and attacked the wall of nightlace, spitting anti-venom, making them shrink and sizzle.
More vines rushed from the woods, surrounding us, some slashing at me, others joining the attack on Cloven.
Calling threads of power, I swirled them into my moonstone until it strained at the seams. My heart thrashed as my feet thudded the ground. I had to save him! I’d done it once, and I could do it again.
A black thread wavered in front of me and I mentally shoved it aside. Useless thing.
Reaching Cloven, I clawed at the vines encircling his throat.
The plant dug deeper. While bucklions snarled and spit at the nightlace engulfing us, making little headway, Cloven’s eyes bulged. He strained to rip the vines away, to suck in a breath.
One vine—pointed on the tip—lifted up, prepared to carve an O and a number on his neck.
“Get away from him!” I snatched up the Searing Shears that had fallen beside Cloven and roared to my feet. With a gouging cut, I severed the strands latched onto his throat and the one about to strike. The vines writhed and sizzled and snapped back to the others.
Capria continued to trample vines while the Seekers fought new clusters emerging from the forest. More dandybucklions popped out of the ground and, with Sparky leading, charged at the wall of snake-like vegetation.
I helped Cloven stand, and we were instantly driven back by more clusters.
“There are too many!” Cloven bellowed. “Run. Ping Justine.”
“I can help!”
“Go. Now.” Seizing the Searing Shears from me, he pivoted and attacked the advancing wall of nightlace. It towered over us at least two stories high, a tsunami of toxic plants seeking our death.
Cloven, seeing my hesitation, turned me and gave me a shove toward the Academy.
A nightlace cluster snapped out, latching onto my waist.
While Cloven’s Shears slashed and sliced the plants around him, more vines struck, determined to overwhelm us.
Releasing a guttural shriek, I pulled my blade and hacked at the plant clinging to my waist. More vines snagged my legs and my thighs. They dragged me down to the grass and encased me like wrappings around a mummy.
I was a goner. Even if Cloven and the Seekers saw what was happening and fought their way to me, they’d never reach me in time.
Screaming, I struggled to get free but the weight of a billion vines piled on top of me. I’d smother before they choked and branded me.
A black power thread rippled in front of my eyes, but I couldn’t shove it away.
When I drew in what might be my last breath, the thread jumped down my throat. I gagged and my belly heaved. Like a river of lava, the thread’s energy cauterized through my veins, traveling through my body, to the tips of my limbs. The power hit my blade and sunk into my moonstone.
According to Cloven, black threads were useless to most wizards. They hadn’t been manipulated…
…since the last Unraveler?
Gathering the power stored in my stone, I shoved it out with a command, shrieking it at the top of my lungs, “Unravel!”
A shock wave smacked into me like I’d ignited a nuclear bomb.
The vines froze.
As if in horror, the cluster released me and cringed backward. The strands slithered off my body, unwrapping themselves from around me.
I rose to my elbows, watching.
The plants retreated to the forest, leaving only me, my friends, and one nightlace cluster behind.
It must’ve sensed I’d escape, because the cluster flowed toward me, littering the ground with its leaves.
I scrambled backward as it pounced, diving through the air to land on top of me, driving me onto the ground. My wind was knocked from me, and I lay stunned for only a fraction of a second. Much too long. Vines tightened around me as I pulled in more of the black threads surrounding me. Did they sense my need?
Reaching out, I tried to grab onto them, to pull them in to store in my stone, but they slipped through my mind’s fingers.
While the vines encircled my throat in a chokehold I’d never escape, I tried to draw the threads again. They whipped away, and I screamed as they sliced my fingers like razorwire.
Giving up on then, I gathered the scraps of what little Unraveler skapti power remained in my moonstone and sent it out in a rush. “Unravel!”
The nightlace tightened all around me, choking my breath from my lungs and making it impossible to suck in another, while one solitary, pointed strand wavered above my chest. It had all the time in the world to mark me.
Kill me.
Someone rushed over and, with a snip, sliced through the limb about to carve into my throat.
A shriek of mortal pain rippled across the meadow. As the voice wavered, the vine lifted up and, with a shudder, morphed into something else.
Someone fell on top of me.
Alys reeled off me, screaming. Blood rushed from where the tip of her index finger had been severed. Her wail reached for the sky. She gaped at her hand. “What’s happening?”
The vine cluster was Alys?
She’d been bespelled and the pain had temporarily suspended the spell.
Cloven and the Seekers rushed over and grabbed Alys, pinning her arms behind her back. A pop and the four of them flitted from the pasture.
Dropping onto the ground, I rubbed my face. I couldn’t believe what had happened. Alys—bespelled—had been hunting outlings. Had she been aware of her actions?
Would I ever learn who had bespelled her?
Her heads swaying, Capria whimpered nearby. I needed to give her hugs and kisses, play with her for a while, then send her back to her family. Once I found the strength to move.
Sparky, at the head of a group of dandybucklions, hopped over and saluted me with a stick arm to his forehead. In a flash, he and the others dove back into the ground.
Exhausted, I dragged myself to my feet and turned to my savior.
Tria grinned, Searing Shears clasped tight in her hands. “Any more left?” she asked, looking around. “Let me at ’em!”
Chapter 35
Two Days Later
I lay on the top of the tallest Academy roof, next to Donovan.
While I’d been unable to stop thinking about him, I hadn’t sought him out in the meadow.
The king was finally gone. The Academy had held a departure ceremony on the front lawn near the crystal dragon today. After Niles and his entourage flitted to the palace, Donovan pinged me. Concern had reached through his mindspeak voice, telling me how worried he was that I hadn’t communicated with him.
He’
d flitted here. I’d taken the stairs. My flitting capabilities were gone, though Justine assured me the lack was likely from a simple warding.
Only time would tell.
Could a newbie Unraveler release a bespelling on herself? I had no idea, though I’d tried. This was virgin territory for me.
Alys. We’d heard nothing about her other than she’d been bespelled and was unaware of what she’d done. The Court Bespeller denied the crime, as did Katya, even when they’d been put under Seeker Serum.
Which meant we were dealing with a rogue Bespeller. He—or she—could be anyone. I imagined they were still here at the Academy, watching. Waiting for the chance to strike again.
Without an Unraveler, Alys would remain a nightlace. For all I knew, she’d been shipped off to Demon’s Gate Penitentiary, the magical reform school for the under-eighteen crowd.
Turning to face Donovan, I rose up onto my elbow in time to catch him fingering the charm he wore on a chain around his neck. A gray spider the size of my thumbnail with beady red eyes that shifted.
She watched me. Mocked me.
Because she knew she’d won.
While I’d lost.
I hated her, and as soon as we were allowed to go to the mall at Grathe again, I was going to be all over that spider. But growling about her wouldn’t help me right now.
“I’m an Unraveler,” I said. “That must be my main skapti.”
“By the fae,” he exclaimed.
“If I’m lucky, I’ll hit Level One by the end of the Term.”
“There’s no living Master.” Sadness came through in his voice because he knew what this meant.
We both knew. There was no one to guide me.
“I’ll learn on my own.” No hiding my desperation. It leaked from my pores. “I’ll reach Level Five.” By the time that happened—assuming it was even possible—it would be too late for Donovan.
For us.
Sitting up, I tucked my legs beneath me and watched his face. Watched how he reacted to me. His eyes…they softened.
“I want you to take it off.” I forced out the words through my throat clogged off with pain.
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