“What the hell happened here?” Hayes demanded as Lucas went to the fallen student. Her heels tap-tapped toward us at a furious pace until she was standing a short distance away, fists on hips as she surveyed the door, the fallen student, and us.
“An attack,” I croaked as Isaac helped me stand. “Some kind of darkness. It tried to get into his mouth, his nose—it could have been what killed Sadie Chapman. I don’t know. It was… strong.”
She narrowed her eyes at me, and the rest of us, before glancing back at the emptying room. “Mister Turner,” she said, “get Mister Waverly to the clinic, if you please. Miss Cresswin, Mister Crowley—come with me.”
“We’ll come as well,” Isaac said. “Lucas can join us—”
Hayes pinched the bridge of her nose. “Mister Roth, I realize that you are quite close with Miss Cresswin and Mister Crowley but this really does not—”
“They can come,” I said. “Please. They know about… I don’t keep secrets from them, and they can potentially help. Plus, they saw as much as we did. Maybe more. Nathan and I were focused on casting.”
She appraised Isaac and Hunter, then Lucas as he helped ‘Mister Waverly’ to his feet. She nodded once and turned on a heel. “Fine. My office.”
We trailed behind her, past clumps of students going through varying degrees of crisis. There were at least a dozen vampires among them. It was easy to spot them, because they didn’t seem the least bit affected. The witches were nowhere to be seen. Just about every student from Goldhaven and Rosewilde, though, seemed to be in a state of shock.
Hayes ignored every question shouted or whispered at her as she passed them, so we did the same. Lucas peeled off to take Waverly to the clinic, but by the time we made it to Hayes’ office he came jogging up the hall that adjoined the front of the Rosewilde Academy building, breathing hard.
Hayes unlocked her door and led us in.
“Headmistress Hayes,” Nathan started as soon as we were all inside, “if you’ll allow me, I believe I have some idea what’s happening, and—”
“A moment, Mister Crowley, please,” Hayes muttered. “There are two more on the way, and I’d like us all assembled before we go speculating.”
Nathan looked like she’d slapped him. “I don’t speculate about these things, Headmistress, and I assure you that I’ve put a great deal of effort—”
She drummed her fingers on the desk once; the act somehow managed to be menacing. Nathan grit his teeth, pressed his lips tightly closed, and clasped his hands in front of him. He looked shaken, maybe even a bit pale. From what we’d seen? Or maybe it was just the stress of casting. Or keeping his mouth shut.
Or, maybe, he’d had another spell. The very moment the shadow made its move. Like when Sadie had been killed. There was something to that, but I couldn’t quite pin it down yet.
Before I could ask about the timing of any other episodes, the door to Headmistress Hayes’ office opened, and Percy entered, followed by Emira. The security officer looked grim, and not at all happy to see us. She and Percy moved past the group of us, and Emira went to Hayes, eyebrows pinched. “This seems like a lot?”
“They’re attached at the hip,” Hayes muttered. “But… in their defense, all of them were involved in that business last year. Plus Miss Venturo—where is she?”
I cleared my throat as I raised a hand. “Um… she and her, ah, boyfriend didn’t intend to stay for the whole event. They may have left early to… socialize privately.”
“No matter,” Hayes said, dismissing it. “Professor Turner, Miss Athenbow?”
Percy rubbed his neck self-consciously. “Yes. Right. Well… we believe… that is, Security, and Headmistress Hayes, and myself, after a great deal of analysis and tapping some old resources that I happen to—”
Hayes groaned softly. “Professor Turner…”
“Of course,” he said quickly. “We believe we may know, at least in part, what’s afoot here. It seems… that something may have come back from the Abyss. With Mister Crowley. And it seems to be running loose.”
“That’s the general consensus,” Emira confirmed, “not just among the faculty here, but from the other academies that are here for the summit as well.”
“Okay,” I interjected. “Well, that’s a start, right? So, you can just… bring someone in and have them send it back?”
Headmistress Hayes gave a quiet sigh.
Before she could respond, though, Nathan spoke up. “The two most likely candidates for that job are already in this room.” He kept his hands clasped as he looked to me. “I suspect that task falls to you and me. I hope you retained Sinclaire’s lessons. You’re about to need them.”
Nathan
I knew the details of my return from the Abyss. At least, as they were reported. A small detail that had been left out, though, rankled when security officer Emira offered the rationale for their belief.
“When Mister Crowley was initially brought to the clinic,” she said, “there was a black substance which was reminiscent of what was found on Sadie Chapman. It also underwent some sublimation process.”
Percy cleared his throat. Twice. “Yes. Ah… it is my professional opinion that… the entity in question is one of the offspring for which… um, the Dreadmother is known. She with the thousand hungering offspring. Though, it is worth noting that the age which originated that moniker was one before the number ‘zero’ was widely disseminated, and that at the time the number one-thousand was considered to be… as large as was conceivable to count to. Which is to say—”
“That Az-Harad has countless offspring,” I said, rolling my eyes at the man’s need to go on and on. “Obviously, Percy. What leads you to believe it’s specifically that? There is no shortage of monstrous things in the Abyss, I assure you, all… melded into one endless empty space.”
“That’s Professor Turner, Mister Crowley,” Hayes said sharply, eyeing me.
“Beg your pardon,” I said, and gave Percy a hint of an apologetic bow from the waist. “Professor Turner. What makes you think that?”
He glanced around the faces in the room and seemed to straighten his shoulders a bit. “Experience.”
Turner men and their damned egos. I kept my expression carefully neutral. “All right. Let’s say that it is—”
“We don’t know that, though,” Hunter put in, stepping forward to hover over me. “I mean—that it came back with Nathan. There are plenty of examples of similar substances appearing on anything that passes between planar states—even ghosts leave behind ectoplasm during strong manifestations, and it can range from clear to pitch-black. It also evaporates. Ectoplasm is a well-documented phenomenon, and this thing was… it was just a cloud of black. It looked like some kind of spirit; aren’t we jumping to conclusions here?”
Percy’s cheek twitched and he went a bit red around the nose. “I know my business, Mister Webb, and I’ll remind you that I’ve spent more than a decade—”
“Plumbing decrepit temples,” Hunter growled, “yes, we know, Professor, and that’s about all we know from your class—your adventures, but precious little actionable magic—”
“Just what are you suggesting?” Percy demanded, louder now.
Hunter was never one to be outshouted and got even louder as he took another step toward the good professor, jabbing a finger out at him. “I think you know exactly what I’m saying, you fucking fr—”
“Boys!” Hayes snapped. She accompanied it with a stomp of her foot that made the room shake despite having barely raised her foot for it.
Both Hunter and Percy quieted.
When they’d been silent a moment, Hayes folded her arms over her chest and stared imperiously at them. “We have a dead student,” she said calmly, “and another attempted… murder, or killing, or whatever can be assigned to this entity. We have more than merely Professor Turner’s experience to suggest this. There were a number of incidents over the summer that could not be confirmed, but which security believes support the timin
g, at least, to suggest that the entity’s origin is indeed Abyssal.”
She turned to me, and glanced at Amelia as well, grouping us together, it seemed. “Now. In fact, we have invited a specialist who has a practical background with Abyssal magic and its consequences and effects in our world. It will take him some time to arrive due to his… particular restrictions around portal travel. In the meantime, we have a summoner, and perhaps the only individual to have visited the Abyss in recent history—certainly the only one able to carry on a conversation. We are magicians. You may be students, but you are not children, nor are you incompetent or incapable. This is to be the sole focus of your investigation into the summoning path from now until a solution is arrived at. Am I clear?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Amelia said, right away. A paragon of justice and virtue. I could see the same brilliance the other three saw in her. See why they replaced me.
I feigned the last remnants of a headache—it wasn’t difficult, in fact—and searched the timelines for some hint as to what I should say. I seemed to recall several visits to the headmistress’s office in which Amelia was taken away as responsible for these deaths. No, just the one—or, no, someone was supposed to have died at the ball, weren’t they?
“I… forgive me, the backlash from the bolstered containment spell has given me a migraine,” I said by way of excuse. “The ball… was there another fatality?”
Emira shook her head. “No. Not this time. You and Miss Cresswin were adequate, this time.”
That was wrong. There was supposed to be a fatality. There were two, by this point, always. Which meant…
“Another timeline,” I found myself murmuring, in half a panic as I instinctively tried to find the next intersection back to something predictable.
“Mister Crowley?” Hayes inquired. “You haven’t answered me.”
“Hm?” I backtracked a little, trying to remember what she’d said. To focus on solving the problem, I thought. “Yes, of course, Headmistress. It will be our top priority. Are we to suspend regular classes?”
She snorted. “No, Mister Crowley, you are not.”
A shame. I had already consumed all the textbooks for my classes and mastered the ‘new’ techniques and bits of knowledge meant to be delivered over the second half of the year.
“However,” Hayes added, “you have another eleven days of break before classes resume. I trust that a young man of your abilities, and a young woman of Miss Cresswin’s considerable talent, will be able to resolve this problem. Or at least find a way to mitigate the potential damage. Professor Turner will be at your disposal over the break—”
“Oh, I have a great deal of—” Percy started.
“—and he will assist you in any way he can,” she finished with a bit of snap to it, cutting her eyes toward Percy as she did. “You have full access to the restricted library as well.”
“Of course,” I said before Percy could come up with some excuse. Not that I particularly needed or wanted his involvement. I was inclined to believe Hunter, and he’d already told me all about Percy’s ‘class’ and the many, many anecdotes of his adventures that seemed to have taken the place of practical instruction. That fool would be more of a hinderance than anything else. How he’d conned Hayes into hiring him was beyond me. “We’ll get to it immediately, of course.”
Hayes flicked her hands. “Go, then. Get to it. I won’t have another student dying at the… tentacles of some malicious Outsider. I’ll forward any discovering made by myself or the faculty to you, if there are any.”
“This specialist,” Percy asked meekly, “you said he takes issue with portal travel? Would that happen to be… Aramus Klein?”
The headmistress nodded, apparently weary of the subject. “Yes, the same. Aside from you, he’s the only specialist in these matters currently sane.”
“Ah,” Percy breathed. “Yes. Yes, of course. Excellent choice. We’ve worked together before.”
She looked him over and raised an eyebrow, first at him, and then the rest of us. “You’re all dismissed, please. Go. Except you, Miss Athenbow. I have a few new policies I’d like to discuss with you.”
We filed out in a tidy line. Once outside, I turned to Percy to inform him that his presence wasn’t required. He beat me to it.
“Nathan, if you’ll just excuse me,” he said quietly, “I have some… ah, some books that I should consult. If I find anything, of course, I’ll let you know.”
I gave him a blank stare. “Please do.”
“Yes,” he said. “I’ll just…”
He left us in a hurry, and the five of us watched him go, muttering to himself as he did. Not about the issue at hand, though. I could have sworn I heard him cursing Aramus Klein.
“Any idea about that?” I asked Lucas.
Lucas shrugged. “Honestly, I see Percy for Christmases and his birthday. He never misses his own birthday, believe me. He’s definitely got a bug up his ass about this Aramus guy.”
I sighed and let it go as I turned to Amelia. “Shall we?”
“She needs rest,” Hunter warned. “The two of you can pick it up tomorrow, Nathan. You should rest as well.”
Dear, sweet Hunter. The grumpy mother hen. Clearly, he hadn’t changed entirely while I was gone. I looked to Amelia. “It’s your choice. I’ll be in the library either way, working on the problem.”
She bit her lip a little as she looked around at the four of us, conflicted. Lucas and Isaac no doubt were with Hunter. The question was, would she make her own decision or not?
“I’ll join you,” she said finally. “But in a little bit. I need to get out of this dress, it’s not exactly… um, fighting the Abyssal legions material.”
“No,” I agreed, “I suppose it isn’t. I’ll see you there.”
Hunter came closer before I could leave them. “Nathan,” he said softly, “back there in the ballroom you were—”
“And now I’m not,” I snapped. I smoothed my embroidered jacket. “Thank you for your concern. I’m well aware of my limits, and haven’t yet reached them, so if you’ll pardon me, I have a great deal of work to do.”
His eyes were hard for a long moment before he finally stepped back, hands up. “Fine,” he said. “Let me know if you need me, I guess.”
He turned and stalked away.
I shook my head slowly. “He still thinks I’m invalid.”
“Maybe he just gives a shit,” Lucas said. “Imagine that; Hunter giving a fuck about…”
We had a brief staring contest, which I won. I had no doubts about Hunter’s feelings. They simply weren’t relevant. Not now. Not until there was time for things like that. I turned to Amelia. “Don’t be long.”
She nodded, and I left them, my mind swirling with concerns. Foremost among them, where we had deviated from a known timeline. I’d been so fucking careful to keep the most relevant ones. Had I missed something? I blamed ‘master’ Larson for urging me to limit them to a mere twenty. The man had no conception of the complexity of the matter or the capabilities of my intellect. I could have taken thirty, perhaps more, and managed them just fine. In one of those, I knew, there was an answer I no longer had at hand.
Slightly behind that, there were other worries.
For one thing, the evidence was beginning to mount, and I could no longer rationally deny it. Not after tonight.
I had experienced a brief interruption of consciousness when the shadow attacked. And around the time Sadie Chapman had died. And just before Amelia reported her assault. There was a fourth, as well, which I suspected coincided with another event. And when Amelia’s banishing was directed at the thing, I felt it. As if it tore at something inside me.
All of it added up to something terrifying to contemplate.
The shadow wasn’t some manifestation of Amelia’s darkness.
It was connected to me.
Amelia
“We should get you back to your room,” Isaac said gently as Nathan stalked off in the opposite direction
from Hunter. “Get you changed, and make sure you’re not injured.”
I smiled at him, but with a bit of exasperation. “Isaac, I’m fine. I mean… physically, I’m fine.”
“You were in a state,” he said. “I haven’t seen you like that… it was worrying.”
Lucas held out his hand. “Come on. Master Crowley isn’t a patient man.”
“I do know that,” I said. “Um… but you two go on. I’m going to check on Hunter. He seemed… I think Nathan really hurt him.”
The two of them heaved half a sigh and went to great length to cover it up as they nodded. “Yeah, that’s a good idea.”
“You could… come with me,” I suggested.
“When it comes to Nathan,” Isaac said, “I really don’t think we can. Not that we’re not willing.”
Lucas looked down the hall where Hunter headed off to. “Hunter is, I think, still a bit sensitive to our opinions on the matter. You go, see how he’s feeling. If he’s up to it, Whisper us and we’ll come. Don’t want to set him off, though.”
They did at least walk me most of the way there before peeling off to go to their own room. I made my way down the hall and braced myself before I knocked. Hunter was inside, I thought. There was a light under the door. Though, it might have been his roommate. I waited, nervous until finally the door opened.
Hunter had already taken off his tie and jacket, and his shirt was half unbuttoned. He blinked when he saw me, and quickly began to button it again. “Sorry,” he muttered as he took a step back from the door to let me in. “I was just changing out of this damned suit. I was just going to wear my uniform. Nathan insisted though…”
“I’m sure he did,” I said. “He looks like he’s a stickler for class and appearance.”
It was easy, being in the room with Hunter. If I let myself, I could imagine that it was like last year, our beds close but separated by paranoid wards. Hunter’s solid presence letting me know I wasn’t alone. Him crawling into my bed and shielding me from my nightmares. I wanted that back, I wanted him back like that. Not living with him, sharing quiet jokes, working on homework in the same room together… I didn’t realize how lonely I felt until now. I had Lucas and Isaac, but I didn’t have him.
A Spell for Shadows: Rosewilde Academy of Magical Arts Page 19