I gulped down a lump of tension in my throat. “Maybe I’ve got a solution that suits all of us.”
“Oh?” She lifted her head, wary. A red strand of hair narrowly avoided a caffeine dip.
“Actually, it’s something I’ve been thinking about for a while, same as most people my age.” I gulped again, to try and shift the pesky lump. “The SDC is my home, but…”
Ah, how do I phrase this? I didn’t want to come off as ungrateful or spiteful, or like I was childishly trying to win this argument with underhanded tactics. But if I didn’t say this now, chances were, I never would.
“I think I’d like to move to another coven.” I wiggled my tongue inside my mouth, wondering if those words had actually come out of my mouth. “It’s hard enough here, with the Merlin dynasty hovering over me—Little Miss Magicless. But it’s even harder under Leviathan’s shadow, with you and Dad treating me like I’m made of glass.”
Mom walked forward, compelled by maternal instinct to come closer. And I had a childish instinct to step back. “Persie…”
“You don’t want me to go near Leviathan, and I get that you know more about him than I do. But you have to see it from my perspective. It’s a huge temptation, having him nearby and knowing there’s this big gap in who I am that only he can reveal. So maybe I take myself out of the equation. Maybe I put some distance between us, so I don’t keep wondering all the time.” I kept talking, determined not to clam up. “The SDC is your territory. It belongs to you and Dad. I see your names, and I hear all those stories about everything you did before you had me, and I’m so proud that you’re my parents. But… I want something that’s mine. A place to start fresh.”
Mom fell silent, pausing halfway across the room as though someone had flipped her off-switch. “I… didn’t know you felt that way.”
I took a deep breath. “I’m nearly done being taught here. Plenty of people move on when they’re my age.” Her eyes burned into me, but not in a harsh or angry way. The heat of sadness, more than anything else. Confusion, maybe. “Genie and I were looking through some prospectuses for other covens. There’s one in Austin that sounds like it was made for me. They’ve got this Mediocre development program, where Mediocres get specialized training to boost their abilities. And it’s pretty there, so I can keep up with my painting, and there are programs that Genie’s interested in, too.”
Mom stepped closer, weirdly cautious. As if I were a fawn she didn’t want to spook. “Persie…”
“I realize this is all a bit of a shock, but I know you’ll come around once you’ve looked at the prospectuses. And it’ll get me away from the SDC, and from Leviathan, and I can start building a life of my own, and—”
“It’s not that,” she interrupted, closing the gap between us. Her hand grazed my upper arm, her expression gentle and sympathetic. “A Mediocre development program wouldn’t do you any good, Persie. You aren’t a Mediocre. You don’t have any magic at all. I hate to put it so bluntly, but it’s the truth.”
Ouch. That never got easier to swallow.
“That’s why it’s better if you stay here,” my mom went on. “We can protect you here. You might not have magic, but you’re still a Merlin, and we have one of the best non-magical relations departments in the US. This coven doesn’t belong to your dad and me—it belongs to all of us. You belong here.”
“What if I want something else?”
Mom relaxed her hold on me and stepped back, turning her eyes downward. “We can revisit it in a few years, once we understand the threat from Leviathan.”
A few years?! Speech evaded me. Literature liked to keep its madwomen in attics—take the wife in Jane Eyre, for example—but I’d wind up as a basement dweller, hiding out until I hit forty. The magicless girl who vanished into the darkness and never emerged, driven insane by her overbearing parents.
“Besides, the magical world might look like it’s at peace, but it’s not safe out there for someone like you. Your name and your… uniqueness make you vulnerable.” Mom softened her voice. A sure sign that I wasn’t going to like what she had to say.
“What does Dad think about this?” I shuffled away from her touch. It felt too much like a shackle around my arm.
“He… agrees with me.” Her hesitation said everything.
“Does he, or are you just saying that?” I bit my tongue so I wouldn’t spew out something I wouldn’t be able to take back. “He’s always saying he wants me to be happy. If he knew I wasn’t happy staying here, he’d let me leave.”
My mom lifted her chin. A mannerism I hadn’t inherited. “Your dad wants what’s best for you, and he knows that means staying here. I’m not the bad guy here. I’m trying to keep you alive.”
“Not everything is life and death!” I exploded a little—at least, enough to make her eyes widen in surprise. “Saving the world twice is great and everything, but it’s messed with your head. You think everything is a catastrophe waiting to happen, when all I’m asking for is the same thing a million other eighteen-year-olds ask for! Freedom.”
“You aren’t the same as a million other eighteen-year-olds,” she reminded me. As if I needed reminding.
“Aren’t I?” My eyes turned steely. “I don’t have magic. That makes me the same as most of the population.”
Mom clenched her jaw, her cheeks sucking in. “Persie, you asked me to see things from your perspective, and I do understand your frustration. But see things from mine. You’re my only child, and there’s a monster who wants something from you. I can only fight him if you’re near me.”
Because I’m so useless and defenseless that I need you to stand up for me? It saddened me, looking at my mother, to wonder how much this stemmed from my lack of magic. I was constantly second-guessing my relationships with everyone around me, and it sapped so much of my energy, making it harder to think and breathe clearly.
I loved her more than anyone else in the world. But I wondered if she’d ever see me as an equal, with my own ideas and capabilities and contributions. Eighteen was a milestone for a reason—the ascent into adulthood. But she didn’t seem to realize that. Instead, the older I got, the harder she appeared to cling, refusing the inevitable truth. One day, I would leave. One day, I’d be my own person.
I found some grit at the back of my mind. “And we’re right back where we started. You haven’t listened to a word I’ve said.”
“I have, Persie, but I’m asking you to listen to me in return.”
I straightened, pulling my hands out of my pockets. “We’re never going to agree on this. So, as long as you won’t let me speak to Leviathan, and I don’t get answers, I’m going to start looking for other covens to call home—somewhere to put as much distance as possible between me and this secret that’s followed me my whole life. If you won’t help me, then I have to help myself. I won’t wait for the axe to fall.”
I turned, even though I knew we weren’t finished. Unspoken words lingered heavy in the atmosphere, like clouds gathering, chasing me out of the room. The lightning would strike later, after simmering awhile. Holding my head high and putting one foot in front of the other, I resisted the urge to storm out of there. And I refused to let the clouds break now, with silly tears stinging my eyes. For once, I might have won an argument with my mother. At least temporarily.
Brushing away the hot tears that had fallen regardless, a quote from Voltaire popped into my head: A long dispute means that both parties are wrong. It seemed he’d missed an important exception in the case of Merlin women—what if we were both right, in a way? In either case, arguing with my mom left me feeling like a salted slug, all dried up and fizzing. The brief victory meant nothing, not when we’d both pay for it in future tension.
Between Genie and me, seeing eye-to-eye with our parents verged on the impossible.
Four
Persie
The Physical Magic classroom sweltered in the late-afternoon heat. Balmy bronze sunlight sashayed through the windows and draped everyt
hing in a syrupy glow. Half the students propped their chins lazily on their hands, eyelids heavy, moments away from an elbow slip that’d jolt them right back into reality.
At least it’s a good excuse to keep out of Mom’s way. I tilted my notebook against the lip of the desk, positioned away from prying eyes. My pencil etched gray strokes, the soft scratch barely audible above the commanding voice of the preceptor: Alyssa Soanoke, Jacob’s wife, who’d taken his birth-given surname after he’d changed it from Medina. A one-woman dynamo with a mysterious past. People said she’d been in the magical Secret Service, or that she used to be a bounty hunter. Others said she had a full-body tattoo of a phoenix, which meant she was part of an ancient cult—the rumors changed year after year. I didn’t know which I believed, if I believed any at all.
“Oi!” She rapped her pointer against the board. “I get that it’s late in the day, but I’d appreciate it if you didn’t nap during my class! This isn’t kindergarten.”
Everyone sat up a little straighter, and I kept right on doodling, half pretending she had my attention. As preceptors went, she was one of the good ones. The kind who spoke to her students with respect and made her lessons interesting. Even for a magicless dunce like me. We were getting into the theory of Physical Magic, from the early twentieth century to present day. Usually, I’d be scribbling down notes and hanging on her every word, but the argument with my mother had stolen away all my concentration. And… not to sound petulant, but what was the point of learning this stuff if I could never use it? At least I had purpose in drawing.
“This is Kyu-Ho Min, one of the finest magicals from South Korea, famous for his unique hex work and manipulation of Elemental abilities. This recording was taken in 1972, during the Global Magical Expo. There is an entire library in the Seoul Coven dedicated to his Grimoires—all of which are filled with experimental spells and ingenious methodologies.” She paused. “Well, perhaps not an entire library, but definitely a bookcase. And there are books written about his personal style in magical combat—some of which you’ll be able to see here.” She tapped her pointer against the board, which doubled as a cinema screen.
A square-jawed, dark-haired warrior spun and twirled like a dancer across the board, magic sparking out of him like fabric: silky and uniform in its spirals. It didn’t even look as though he had to raise his palms, he moved so fast and fluidly. Bright colors exploded in the face of his assailant.
“Here, he uses a preemptive strike of flurried hexes to startle and disorient his attacker, and immediately follows through with a swipe of Air to further unbalance his opponent. You’ll notice he jumps in with a hex to the chest, designed to immobilize.” Alyssa stared at the grainy film with adoring eyes. “The reason we use him as an example is because, as you can see, there’s no hesitation between each hex and the switch between his abilities. One follows the other in quick succession, so his enemy has no opportunity to adapt.”
Diana raised a slender hand. My cousin’s Esprit—a cuff bracelet with an opal the size of a scarab beetle—slipped down her wrist. “Is he still alive?”
“Sadly, no,” Alyssa replied. “He died under mysterious circumstances in the 1980s.”
“Then I guess he wasn’t that good,” Diana murmured. A few snickers rippled around the room.
Alyssa pushed back a curtain of thick chestnut hair flecked with fiery auburn. “What is the first rule of magical combat, Miss Merlin?”
Diana replied without pause. “Hit first, ask questions later.”
Sounds about right to me. I shaded in the snout of a monster, a creature conjured from the depths of my tense brain. I had no idea what it was. A griffin-looking thing with the head of a turtle and the body of a scaly horse. Weird to imagine, but my imagination liked to dip into the weird from time to time. It kept things spicy.
Alyssa did not look amused. “While that may serve you well in some circumstances, you know very well that’s not the first rule. It’s respect, Miss Merlin. I suggest you show some to a magical far greater than any of you can ever hope to be, who was taken before his time.”
“Sorry, I wasn’t trying to be obtuse.” Diana turned more serious. “I’m genuinely curious. If he’s as good as you say, how come he got knocked off?”
“Come on, Di.” Marius ran a hand through his supermodel locks. “Why do you like the grisly stuff so much?”
“I’m interested.” Diana shrugged, batting baby blues at the preceptor, who looked annoyed by the display. Diana was the broccoli of the SDC—you either loved her or you hated her. I fell into the former category, but then, I knew her better than most. She used a lot of bluster and humor to hide a lack of self-confidence, even though she had nothing to be concerned about. Still, they say the prettiest girls are the ones with the most self-doubt.
Alyssa twisted her pointer between her palms, and I sensed a different storm brewing. “Precisely because he was that good, Miss Merlin. I’d expect you, of all people, to understand the threat that comes with great power. People want it for themselves, or they seek to remove it if they can’t have it. It took him twenty-four seconds to floor his opponent in this video—another famed magical by the name of Barnaby Pierce, of the London Coven, at a time when the best magicals in the world were coming directly out of England. So you can imagine the outrage. Kyu-Ho became a champion in those twenty-four seconds, and a target.”
People are scared of things they can’t control. My mom’s fear of Leviathan, for example. Still, I felt sorry for the guy on the screen. He’d worked hard to succeed, and someone had killed him for it. The green-eyed monster had far more sway than any physical monster, because it could infect more people in one fell swoop.
Azar looked up from her notes. “He invented the Hexent moves, didn’t he?”
I mustered a half-smile. You could always rely on the Catemaco-Levis to break up an imminent argument. A skill they’d had to learn fast, with Santana’s fiery temper and Raffe constantly quarreling with his inner djinn, Kadar.
“Very good, Miss Cate—Azar.” Alyssa gave up on the long double-barrel. “He did. Otherwise known as the Min Spiral, it is a deadly combination of a hex and an Elemental ability used simultaneously. Few are able to master it, even now.”
“Are you going to teach us?” Diana turned her cuff around on her wrist.
Alyssa made a frustrated face, pursing her lips. “I… can’t do it, personally, but there are plenty of books on the art. You can find some in the library if you want to research it in your own time. It’s also… uh… not strictly on the syllabus.”
It’s frowned upon, you mean. I drifted in and out of the conversation, focusing on the fine details of the monster I’d sketched into the margins. The delicate curve of a nostril, the spark of life in an eye that I imagined to be green, if I had colors. And the shine of light on each of those horsey scales, to urge it into three dimensions.
“Ooh, nice kapafin.” Genie leaned precariously on her chair, the legs straining.
“Huh?” I replied, sharply scratching up with my pencil tip to detail some fine hairs on the beast’s back.
“That thing.” She pointed to the creature. “It’s a kapafin. Third-turtle, third-horse, third-bird. There was a picture of one in my favorite book when I was little. Never seen one in real life, though. I don’t think anyone has. Is there one in the Bestiary that old Tobe’s keeping quiet?” I glanced at her. She was jittering with all the excitement of a kid on Christmas.
I shrugged. “You’d have to ask him. I don’t think I’ve seen one in there, though.”
“Didn’t people say he sold his soul to a djinn?” Merrick cut into the class debate. A hulking, six-foot-six man, with his mom, Astrid’s, dark skin and razor-sharp intellect. He might have looked intimidating, but he had a heart of mush. The kind of person who stopped to let a snail pass in front of him.
Alyssa grumbled under her breath. “There are some who said so, yes. But I suspect it came out of jealousy. People will do anything to denigrate the reputa
tion of someone who’s truly gifted.”
“It would explain why he died mysteriously, though.” Marius chewed the end of his pen. I’d never wanted to be a pen more. “Making deals with the djinn comes at a steep price, most of the time. Unless you get a more benevolent one.”
“There was no djinn deal! He had discipline and a gift, and he suffered for all his hard work. That’s something most of you could do with learning—hard work!” Alyssa switched the film to a newer video. She’d clearly had enough of having someone she admired brought under scrutiny. I’d have tried to offer her some support, but I rarely spoke in class unless the preceptor asked me a direct question. Shy, but very capable. Could do with putting her ideas forward more. The same old school report for as long as I could remember.
“Who’s up next?” Diana sprawled, feline-like, across her chair.
Alyssa smiled. “Someone you might recognize.”
“It’s my dad, isn’t it?” Diana groaned, all her bravado disappearing in a haze of embarrassment, which quickly turned to relief as the next video began. “Thank Chaos, it’s Aunt Harley. I thought you were going to put on that video from the 2024 Magical Olympics. The one everyone turned into a meme.”
I looked up, and my insides tensed. My mom stood at the edge of an arena, speaking to my dad. Our earlier argument rushed back, unraveling all the meditative work my sketching had done.
“I wouldn’t do Finch the injustice of showing everyone that particular video.” Alyssa smirked, but I sensed she wouldn’t have minded putting it on to keep Diana quiet.
“Earth calling Persie.” Genie lobbed a scrunched-up ball of paper at my face.
I recoiled from the missile. “Huh?”
“What’s going on up there?” She wiggled her finger at my head. “You went all… sad.”
I shaded in a few feathers to try and get my thoughts back on track. “It’s nothing.”
Harley Merlin 18: Persie Merlin and Leviathan’s Gift Page 4