Academy of Falling Kingdoms Box Set

by Marisa Mills

  Copyright © 2019 by Urban Epics

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof

  may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever

  without the express written permission of the publisher

  except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons,

  living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  New York, NY

  www.UrbanEpics.com

  Book 1: The Source of Magic

  “A roller-coaster of emotions.”

  “I turned each page with breathless anticipation.”

  Book 2: The Secret of Magic

  “The characters are poignant and the story never fails.”

  “More twists and turns in this book than I thought possible.”

  Book 3: The Scourge of Magic

  “Nothing about this series is disappointing.”

  “Exciting, intense, imaginative. I could not put it down.”

  If you enjoy this series,

  Please post a review!

  BOOK 1

  One

  I DUCKED UNDER THE MASSIVE, rusted fence that separated the Scraps from the Dregs, keeping my head low, looking out towards the piles of junk that stretched in every direction. It was refuse to the sky dwellers – everything from half-empty containers of high-end cosmetics and old clothing to malfunctioned mage tech – but that didn’t mean it was worthless. Even their garbage was often finer quality than the stuff we were used to. Dig long enough and you could find something really valuable. Only problem was, the Dregs was forbidden, though that hadn’t stopped me before. There was no sound except for the wind whipping through the barren earth and the crumbling ruins of long-forgotten buildings. I clenched my jaw to keep my teeth from chattering. My threadbare jacket did nothing against the sharp, winter wind. Sterling settled beside me, and for a few seconds, we listened.

  “If we die of hypothermia, I’m gonna come back as a ghost and haunt your uncle for the rest of his life,” Sterling hissed. “It’s too cold for us to be doing this crap, Wynter.”

  It would be even colder in the Dregs. Darker, too. Looking up, I could see the rocky underside of the Floats above us, casting a deep, perennial shadow over their protected refuse piles. Just around the ledge I could see the bright tips of the floating city in the sky, an impenetrable fortress to those without a magical means of reaching its towers. While the Scraps got some shade depending on the time of day, the Dregs were always dark, and at night, the inky blackness was especially ominous.

  “If you die of hypothermia, you’ve got my full support in haunting my uncle,” I said.

  “Good. I was worried about having your approval,” Sterling said. “I totally wouldn’t have haunted your uncle anyway.”

  “We both know that’s a lie,” I replied. “How many times have I had to talk you outta something dangerous?”

  “A lot.”

  “And how many times have you listened?” I asked.

  “Never,” Sterling replied, “But I do it for you. See. That makes it okay.”

  I stifled a laugh. “How is ignoring my legitimately good advice doing anything for me?” I asked.

  “You get a lot of pleasure from saying, I told you so,” Sterling joked.

  I shook my head and drew my attention back to the fence. Normally, it had wards magicked into it that would prevent intruders, but those wards had been down for years. They weren’t really needed. Mage tech could be dangerous, and few had both the courage to brave the Dregs, as well as the skills to repair it into something useful. I had neither, but I was more afraid of my uncle’s belt than the Dregs, and his connections knew enough about magic to use it without blowing up half the town. Usually. Gold and silver were nothing next to the value of magic.

  I crept slowly forward towards a small hole at the base of the fence. I dropped onto my belly and squirmed beneath the fence, careful not to catch my hair or clothes. When I emerged on the other side, I edged along, leaving room for Sterling.

  As he crawled in, I reached into the pocket of my coat, my cold fingers fumbling with the match and candle I carried. It took me three tries to light it. The candle’s flame did little to fill the darkness, but that also meant we’d be harder to find. I knew there was a security tower near the main entrance, but it was sporadically manned by underpaid and lazy human guards. They weren’t the ones I was worried about. The fire danced over the trash before us, illuminating jagged shards of metal and broken glass. We got to work, taking turns between holding the candle and digging through the dump with long sticks.

  I carefully pulled aside a warped piece of metal—potentially a frame of some sort—and nudged it aside. Leaning forward, I gingerly pulled on the thin, silvery-blue piece of metal out of a tall mound of garbage. When it came free, I breathed a sigh in relief. More than once I’d inadvertently collapsed an entire mountain of metal on my head. Even if I’d emerged unscathed, the noise would have attracted unwanted attention from other scavengers, if not worse. Dark things bred among the mages’ discarded garbage.

  The item was some kind of broken rod. I turned it, and a weak blue glow shone through the cracks on its otherwise dark surface. Definitely mage tech of some sort. Sterling held the candle closer; the blue seemed to brighten and flicker in the firelight. “I’ve never seen anything like that before,” he said.

  “Me neither,” I replied, turning the item around in my hands, “But it didn’t blow up in my face.”

  “It’s a good day, then,” Sterling said.

  He’d been on the receiving end of an explosive piece of mage tech more than once. By sheer luck, neither of us had ever gotten more than a minor burn or scrape from a piece of mage tech. Others weren’t so lucky. I’d seen people with missing limbs and blackened skin after having an accident in the Scraps, which is why jobs like this were left to stupid kids. Like us.

  I unshouldered my backpack, an old and heavily patched find from five years before. After carefully wrapping the tech up with a rough strip of cloth, I slipped it into the front pocket and kept looking. My uncle wouldn’t be pleased with one piece of mage tech, even one as unique as this one, and the last thing I wanted to do was anger Gabriel. He was a volatile man even in his best of moods.

  Sterling and I spent most of the night rummaging through the trash, looking for the diamonds in the rough. I had never seen a diamond before in my life, but I’d heard of them. In my mind, diamonds were shimmering bits of metal. They were a good length of steel or copper wiring. When the moon was at her fullest, after filling our bags with treasures, we sneaked back through the trash heaps and crawled through the fence surrounding the dump.

  This was the dangerous part; some gangs preferred to wait in town and jump scavengers just when they thought they were safe. We kept to the shadows, eyes tense and watchful as we snuck through the dark streets. We passed tight alleyways glowing from the yellow oil lamps, and soft moans from ladies of the night as they entertained in the shadows. I jumped at the sound of a broken bottle, followed by bursts of raucous laughter. I sighed in relief when the entrance to the old subway appeared. Gabriel said it had once housed a form of transportation that could carry a thousand people great distances, but that was before the mages first appeared.

  “Well, looks like that’s a wrap, Wynter,” Sterling said, furrowing his brow.

  “I guess,” I said.

  Sterling pulled his pack off his shoulder and handed it to me with a wry smile.

  “Make sure old man Gabriel doesn’t cheat me, huh?”

  �
�He wouldn’t,” I replied.

  Not enough to get caught anyway.

  Sterling grinned. “Yeah, sure.”

  “You are the one who decided to do business with him,” I pointed out. “I told you it was a bad idea.”

  “I thought we’d already established that I never listen to you,” Sterling replied.

  “Rude,” I said.

  Sterling laughed.

  “You know,” I said, “You could stay the night and make sure Gabriel doesn’t cheat you.”

  Sterling’s easy smiled fell. “I need to get back home, so I can sleep. I’m heading out to the forests in the morning. Mom needs medicine.”

  I nodded. Sterling’s mom, Claribel, had always been good to me. When I’d been very little, she’d set me by her, with Briar and Sterling, and read from this old book of fairy tales she had. I’d loved visiting her, until Gabriel said Briar and I were too old for children’s tales. Claribel been sick for a while, and she relied on the forests outside the Northern area of the Scraps for medicine. Gabriel never let me go to the forests, but Sterling had learned to gather herbs and plants for his mother.

  “No problem. I’ll make sure you get paid,” I replied. “Be careful.”

  He punched me lightly in the shoulder. “I’m always careful. It’s everyone else you gotta worry about.”

  He was careful, but that didn’t mean I didn’t worry about him walking home alone in the dark. Although he was probably safer than me, now that I was lugging two bags full of loot. I’d been carrying a short dagger since last year, but my hands were too full to reach it. Still, they’d have to be stupid to rob me on Gabriel’s front doorstep. My uncle and his connections practically owned the full expanse of the subway tunnel.

  I waited until Sterling’s footsteps faded, then walked quietly down the stairs, ducking into the darkness of the tunnel. Bits of metal poked my back through the thin fabric of my backpack as I trod down the broken steps and stepped into the shadows to wait for my brother. He was younger than me and less experienced, so he usually scavenged in the Scraps, never venturing close to the Dregs. There were safer places to search, places without fences or dangerous mage tech, but those places didn’t usually offer rewards as good as the ones I found. This was my inheritance, all the trash held behind locked places and high fences.

  Soon, I heard the slap of boots, and Briar descended the stairs. No one would have guessed we were brother and sister; we looked nothing alike. While I was short and dark-haired, Briar was tall and blond with hair that stuck out in every direction, like the briars on a scraggly rosebush. The only similarity between us was our blue eyes, and even then, it wasn’t the same shade of blue.

  “How’d it go?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “The usual,” he said, sighing, “Which won’t be good enough for Gabriel.”

  It never was, and it probably never would be.

  I forced a smile and threw an arm over his shoulders. “Someday,” I said, “We’re gonna find our own place on the outskirts of the Scraps, and then, we won’t have to deal with Gabriel anymore.”

  Wishful thinking, and I knew Briar was too old for bedtime stories. Our uncle was too powerful to run from. Spiteful, too. Every time I tried to save up some money, or even fence a valuable piece I’d discovered on my own, Gabriel found out and left a permanent mark on my skin, so I wouldn’t forget the betrayal. I had a small collection of them now: a row of burn marks and scars running up my arm.

  “Yeah?” Briar asked. “Are we doing that before or after you discover you’re a long-lost princess?” He was teasing, trying to make light of our situation like I was, but I could see the jaded skepticism in his eyes, and along with a darkness that hadn’t been there a year ago. We both knew there was nowhere to run.

  “Obviously, we’d run away first, peasant,” I replied, with an exaggerated sniff.

  “You’ll have to change your name to something really pretentious,” Briar joked. “I’ve never heard of any princess being called Wynter. You’d have to be Kristiana or something.”

  I gasped, as if irreversibly offended by the name Kristiana. “Wrong. When I’m a princess, I can have any name I want,” I said smugly. “If anyone is getting their name changed, it’s you. I hope you don’t mind being called Chanticleer.”

  He laughed. “That’s horrifying!”

  “So is your face,” I joked.

  Briar nudged me with his elbow. “We have the same parents!” he protested. “If my face is horrifying, yours is, too!”

  “Maybe I got all the good looks,” I replied. “Sorry. I don’t make the rules.”

  Briar sighed. “You’re so mean to me,” he said. But the spark of humor stayed in his eyes, and for a moment, we were ourselves again. Then we grabbed our bags and headed into the tunnel.

  ***

  “So how’s Sterling?” Briar asked.

  “The usual. His mom’s really sick.”

  “She’s been sick for months,” Briar said.

  “I know.”

  “Do you think she’s…?” Briar trailed off.

  “I dunno,” I replied. “Maybe. I hope not.”

  We’d reached an old part of the subway; Gabriel said it used to be called a station. Gabriel himself was there, waiting on a dark leather couch under the glow of a lamp. While most of the people in the Scraps were gaunt and bore the scars left by starvation, my uncle never had. He remained handsome, but it was a strange, frightening sort of beauty. His star-pale skin stood in stark contrast to his thick, black hair.

  He smiled at us, revealing his unnervingly sharp teeth. “Children,” he said.

  “Hello, Gabriel,” I said.

  Briar’s greeting was quieter.

  Gabriel hummed and clicked his tongue loudly against the roof of his mouth. He didn’t look at us; he’d already turned back to the book he was reading. “I’m sorry. Did you say something? I can’t hear you.”

  Briar audibly swallowed. “I said hello.”

  Gabriel sighed. “You should be more careful. When people sense weakness, they go for the throat. You know I won’t tolerate weakness in my family.”

  “I know, Uncle,” Briar said. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s always I’m sorry with you, ain’t it?” Gabriel asked. He tugged at the collar of his fitted shirt. He tried to dress like a gentleman, because it inspired trust, but I knew it was the only fine suit he owned and his rough speech gave him away immediately. “You wouldn’t need to apologize nearly as much if you’d just do things right the first time. I don’t know how I managed to raise such a useless child, but here we are.”

  “Is this really something you need to make a big deal out of?” I asked.

  Of course it was. Gabriel pounced on every mistake, no matter how small. Arguing with him was pointless. Gabriel couldn’t be reasoned with, only distracted. And over the years, I’d become very good at diverting my uncle’s anger before it boiled over.

  I walked past him and set my backpacks on a nearby table. When I looked over my shoulder, my brother hadn’t moved. But Gabriel had. He tilted his head, his green eyes considering me over the cover of his book. Gabriel was reading about gemstones again.

  “Sterling went home,” I said, “But I brought his pack in with mine.”

  “Briar,” Uncle said slowly, “Hand me your wares. You can go for now.”

  He stuck out his hand, expecting his command to be obeyed. My brother’s pale eyes darted between our uncle and me. I nodded, and Briar handed over his backpack. Before my brother could leave, Gabriel pulled him close and hissed something in his ear. Briar’s eyes widened in alarm. He glanced once to me, before leaving quickly. My stomach lurched, but I still forced myself to turn away. As I unzipped my backpack and emptied my wares, my hands trembled.

  I felt my uncle before I saw him. The man moved with a predatory quietness, and as hard as I’d tried over the years, I never heard him coming. “I don’t think your brother’s been beaten
enough,” Gabriel said. “That would explain his cowardice. But with you, I can’t quite tell. Maybe I was too harsh. I’ve read you make the most mistakes on the eldest child.”

  “I’m not your child.”

  “No, but as I recall, I did raise you.”

  Yes, but only because my parents weren’t around and never had been.

  “I didn’t ask you to take care of me, so don’t act like it’s my fault you’re stuck with me.”

  “Someday soon, this defiance will be your undoing,” he said.

  “Will it?”

  Gabriel grasped my chin without warning and pulled my face around, so I met his gaze. “Do you recall Sterling’s little sister?”

  When I was a little girl, Gabriel used to tell me scary stories about how Sterling had a little sister, who liked to misbehave. One day, a mage lady came from the Floats. She couldn’t have children of her own, so she went around stealing little kids out of jealousy. After she found Sterling’s sister, the mage lady took her away and ate her. And if I misbehaved, Gabriel always said, the mage lady would come and take me, too. Stories about cruel and powerful mages were common in the Scraps, but I was too old to believe in such tales.

  “Everyone knows Sterling doesn’t have a sister,” I said, “And he never did.”

  Gabriel smiled thinly. “Come with me.”

  I began to gather up the items I’d just scavenged, but Gabriel was already at the door.

  “Leave them,” he said. “I’ll collect them later. I’ve got something else in mind.”

  I frowned. Gabriel usually opened my backpack like a present on Christmas morning, but tonight he didn’t even want to look at what I’d discovered. Something was wrong.

  Gabriel beckoned for me, and after a second’s hesitation, I followed. We entered his study. It wasn’t anything special—just a room of concrete with mismatched chairs and a metal drum that was sometimes filled with fire. There was a smattering of old psychology, business, and geology books, which Gabriel read often and forbid anyone else from touching.