by T. S. Bishop
“I think you might be talking about vampires,” Hannah chuckled, “And trust me, they don’t disappear either. Their corpses have this horrible smell—“
“Wait, you’re telling me there are really vampires?” I half-shouted, almost falling off my bed.
“Oh yes,” Hannah said, “What, you’re all right with demons but not with vampires? Broaden your mind, Sophia!”
“Oh jeez, sorry for not being accepting of things that supposedly eat people, Hannah!” I said, cracking up at her prim disapproval. “I mean, unless they’re different in real life? Do they not eat people?”
“No, they totally do,” Hannah admitted, cracking up in turn, “Luckily, we don’t have a lot of contact with them, other than regulating their, um, food sources and bringing them to heel if they decide to attack someone.”
“So by food sources you mean blood, right? Do they have secret access to blood banks or something?”
“Well, the Sanctum itself has medical professionals in several prestigious hospitals around the city. I don’t know how they get it to them,” she said quickly, seeing the horrified look on my face as I imagined government-sanctioned blood draws without the victim’s knowledge, stealing corpses from the morgue and other gruesome things, “But I’m sure it’s perfectly legal…ish.”
“But why bother?” I said, hiding a yawn behind my hand, “Wouldn’t it be easier to wipe them out?”
“Well, technically under the New England Accords, vampires have the right to un-life like any other magical creature of earth.”
“Even though their un-life is sustained by killing us?”
“Are you vegetarian, Sophia?”
“Yeah all right, very clever,” I said, rolling my eyes. Then something else occurred to me.
“So you’re saying that by hunting demons we’re—what? Committing genocide?”
“Demons are different!” Hannah said, looking surprised at my question, “You can’t possibly think they’re alive or even un-alive by any reasonable measure!”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you,” I said sincerely.
“It’s okay,” she said, inhaling deeply, “I keep forgetting you haven’t really been in the community very long—just a few hours, in fact. It’s just—with demons, it’s personal. Everyone in the Sanctum’s lost someone to demon attacks. They’re partly why our numbers have reduced so drastically.”
“That sucks,” I said, not very eloquently, staring at the ceiling, “It’s like a literal war, then.”
“Yeah,” Hannah said quietly, getting up. “And the other side’s winning.”
Chapter 11
“Rise and shine!”
“Mmf,” I said unintelligibly, refusing to budge from my comfortable bed.
“Wow, you are not a morning person! Like, at all.”
I turned my head and cracked an eye open to glance over at the window. Where it was still dark.
“Issh no’ morning!” I mumbled indignantly, turning over to find a comfy spot again. Someone ruthlessly dragged the duvet off my body.
“Aah!” I shrieked with surprise and anger, because it was cold, dammit! I flailed around until I hit something. It made a pained sound. Apparently, I had hit a person.
“Noah?” I said incredulously, at the figure that was now rubbing its ribs in a pained way.
“Yup!” he said cheerfully, “Did you forget? It’s training day!”
“I thought I’d be able to sleep in on my first day,” I groaned, rubbing my eyes and sitting up reluctantly.
This really wasn’t how I wanted my first day being a witch to go.
“You’re a soldier now,” Noah explained, still looking impossibly cheerful despite it being before dawn and having to wake up a disgruntled witch.
“You just wait till I can turn you into something hideous with my powers,” I mumbled to myself as I changed into the clothes that I found in my dresser. There was a curtained-off area in the corner of the room where I guess everyone was expected to change. Noah had his back turned respectfully, because he was a nice boy who’d been brought up right.
The clothes were plain but sturdy, and all practical in design. I had half expected some long black robes and hooded gowns but instead there were white shirts and sweaters, pants and skirts and a few light jackets and heavy, long coats—all in black, with a gold symbol stitched into the front.
“I’m ready,” I said, stepping out. I was wearing a plain white shirt beneath a black sweater vest and a skirt. “I think they got me the wrong size,” I complained, tugging my skirt down self-consciously. Noah’s gaze fell to my legs, which were showing an amount of thigh which I personally thought was borderline scandalous, and then hastily looked away when he noticed my raised eyebrow.
“Um,” he said, scratching his neck, “It looks fine to me.”
“Speaking in your role as an impartial observer?” I asked, smirking. “Hold on, let me put on some tights at least.”
I was glad that I was wearing the tights when we went out into the garden. Without even any sunlight, the ground was damp with a light drizzle and the wind was blowing hard. I could feel it even through my coat.
“Couldn’t we have done this inside?” I asked, rubbing my hands together and jumping from foot to foot.
“Nothing like a good morning breeze to wake you up,” Noah said, apparently unaffected by the weather. “Here, I brought you some coffee.”
“I take back every bad thought I ever had about you,” I said gratefully, taking the thermos from him and almost inhaling the coffee. Which was way too hot and burned my tongue, but at least it warmed me up from the inside.
“So, tell me why we’re here and not in the indoor training area that I’m sure exists.”
“Well, because you can’t really start training until you know what to expect. Think about it like…learning to fly a plane. They don’t let you jump in the cockpit and take it out for a spin before you even know what the buttons do! And you can’t start doing magic until you understand what magic is. Does that make sense?”
“Kind of. Also you’re a giant nerd.”
Noah’s face fell.
“No, no,” I added quickly, “It’s cute—very cute.” He looked pleased and led me to the hedge maze I’d noticed in the distance when Adrian had first brought me to the Sanctum.
“Oh, hey Amerhin,” I said softly, as a butterfly hovered next to me for a few moments. It dipped close enough to tough my nose, and then wandered away, apparently satisfied.
“She never does that for me,” Noah said wistfully. I tried not to feel superior.
“All right, so, your first test,” Noah said, bouncing on the balls of his feet. His hair was mussed from the wind, and he looked like an excited schoolboy. “This place is called Alethia’s Maze. It’s as old as the Sanctum. It’s a powerful place of magical protection, and even more importantly, it’s the place where apprentice witches have for hundreds ‘walked the maze’ to see strange visions of their futures and activate their magic.”
“I don’t know if I like the idea of ‘strange visions’,” I said, looking at the entrance to the maze with skepticism. “How’s that supposed to go? I…walk in and something in there is going to make me have visions?”
“That’s not the entirety of it,” Noah said, looking at the thermos I was holding, “Traditionally, apprentice witches would drink a cup of witchwood leaf brew before going in. It helps broaden the mind, I believe.”
“Okay, so where is it? Wait,” I said suddenly, following the direction of his gaze, “You didn’t!” I said, trying for outrage but mostly just impressed by his sneakiness.
“I’ve read that if you know what you’re drinking, it reduces the potency of the mixture,” he answered seriously.
“Let’s have a conversation about giving people drinks that are laced with weird magic drugs later, Noah,” I said, turning to face the maze. “First, let’s get this over with.”
He hovered around me anxiously, reminding me of a moth
er hen as I walked towards the maze’s entrance.
“It should be completely safe,” he muttered more to himself than to me, “You’ll be there for a couple of hours, that’s the average that I’ve read about anyway. And the maze itself usually ejects you when it’s done with you—well, the spirit of the maze. Unless you make it angry, in which case you’ll be cursed to wander the maze forever…er, it didn’t seem important to mention?” he added meekly when I snapped my head around to glare at him.
“You are the worst at giving pep talks. Ever.”
“Would it help if I said I had complete faith in you?”
“Actually, yes,” I said, touched.
“Well, I do,” he said seriously.
We were standing on the edge of the maze now, two small figures against the twenty-foot high hedges. The light from the lantern Noah was holding didn’t penetrate the inner maze in the slightest. I could see maybe two or three feet in, and the rest was swallowed up by the total darkness.
“Have I mentioned that I hate darkness?”
“That’s why we came here so early. It’ll be dawn in a few minutes,” Noah explained, looking up at the sky, which even to my eyes seemed to be lightening slightly.
“You’re definitely the brains of the group, aren’t you?”
“Well, I don’t like to brag,” Noah said, trying and failing to look modest. “Listen…Sophie?”
“Yeah?” I said, looking up into his suddenly serious expression.
“…nothing,” he said finally, taking my hand in his warm one. “Just…your hands are freezing!”
“Oh,” I said, looking down at our hands. His was still radiating heat, “I didn’t bring gloves or anything.”
“Take mine,” he said at once, stripping them off his hands and pressing them into my arms.
“I can’t!” I said, feeling their incredible softness and knowing at once that they must have been insanely expensive.
“It’s all right,” he said gently, pushing me forward. “If you promise to get back here in one piece.”
“Are you kidding,” I said with false bravado, “No maze is going to get the better of me.”
I stepped forward, past the line that marked the beginning of the maze, and looked back at Noah. I wanted to wave goodbye.
But I couldn’t see him. Panicking suddenly, I shouted for him and tried to go back. But some kind of force prevented me from moving in that direction. It held me in place like a vice. I struggled in vain, and stepped back accidentally, further into the maze. The force that gripped me like a fox would hold a chicken in its mouth, let go abruptly.
“Jeez,” I gasped, rubbing my shoulder, where I thought I could feel a phantom pain still, “All right, already. I get it.”
It looked like the maze was going to get me to walk through, willingly or not.
Chapter 12
That tea was really hitting me hard. I could see sparks of white and blue and yellow floating around me. Strange patterns seemed to have superimposed themselves on my eyeballs. I staggered forward, holding on to the hedges for balance. The sky was starting to lighten, making the twenty-foot tall hedges seem a little less intimidating.
I went right, and then right again. Soon, I found myself at a four-way intersection and lost all sense of how I’d gotten there. I had the feeling that I was floating through space, that I was being borne on the back of something great and powerful.
I felt something in me responding to my environment, like a leviathan twitching with interest at someone poking it with a stick. It lazily sent out a bit of itself coursing through me. I arched up off the ground and heard the sizzle of electricity.
My hand was on fire, or at least that was what it looked like to my confused eyes. No, it wasn’t fire, it was electricity, shocking and blue. It sparked up and down the length of my arm and slipped under the sleeve of my shirt. My eyes felt hot, like I’d been in the sun too long, or like I was ill with a fever.
I glared at the hedge next to me, trying to focus my gaze, and something loosened from my eyes and shot into the bushes, burning holes that were scorched around the edges.
“Woah,” I said, and tried it again experimentally. Soon the hedges looked less dense and forbidding and more scorched and like Swiss cheese.
But that turned out to have been a bad idea. My head suddenly felt like it was going to split itself open. I groaned and clutched my head in my hands. I couldn’t take this stabbing pain anymore, I thought desperately, and felt to my knees.
I heard screaming, and realized that it was coming from me.
My face hit the damp earth, and I sank into sweet darkness.
“It’s been a while since we did this.”
“Believe me, I didn’t miss it.”
“Methinks the lady doth protest too much.”
“This lady would like a little light to see by, please.”
The familiar crackle and flare, and I was looking into Jude’s depthless eyes. He cocked his head to the side, looking at me assessingly. I was careful not to get too close to him. I felt like I was inside a cage with a dangerous animal on a very thin chain. At any moment, it could snap and the beast would be free to tear out my throat.
“Well, well, well, little witch,” Jude said, a delighted smile growing on his face, “What have you done?”
“Nothing that would concern you,” I said.
The flames from the match made little lights dance in his eyes, like devils.
“And I see your digs have gotten better,” I added, looking around. I could make out dim shapes that looked like the outlines of furniture. It looked like a table and a chair. A blanket was carelessly thrown on the back of the chair. “You must have done something right. Good behavior?”
“Unlikely,” he snorted, “I’ve made myself accidentally useful. I can’t depend on that to last. So, little witch,” he leaned forward and laughed when I instinctively scrambled backward, “Are you going to free me today?”
“No way,” I said resolutely, “Not even if I owed you my life.”
“It may come to that,” he said, looking away. There was a trace of disappointment on his face, but I refused to let myself feel guilty. “But what if I gave you something in return?”
“What could you give me?”
“What do you want?”
“You’re talking in circles now,” I said, annoyed, “Tell me what you’ll give me.”
“Very well,” he said. He stared directly into the flames for a moment, looking like a statue carved by an indifferent god. Then he looked up at me. “I’ll give you something worth more than gold or time or love. I’ll give you truth.”
“How can you give someone truth?”
His smile gleamed in the darkness, bone white and vicious.
“I cannot lie,” he said simply, “I can only twist my words to make you believe a different version of the truth. But I promise to tell you exactly what you wish to know, if you free me from this cage. I could be a valuable ally to you, Sophia.”
“There’s nothing I need to know that badly,” I said. I was lying. My heart burned with the questions that I couldn’t admit I wanted the answers to, and sitting in front of me in an attitude of indolent repose was perhaps the only person who could tell me what I needed to know.
Could I possibly afford to trust him? He had never hurt me, that was true. But that didn’t mean that he would honor our agreement, and I knew nothing about him. Most importantly, I didn’t know why he was trapped in this cell. He could have been a murderer, a violent madman, or any number of things.
“That’s the greatest lie you’ve ever told me,” he said, but his smile faded. “Very well, Sophia. If you’d like us to remain enemies, it’s your loss. Can you afford to have one more person wishing you harm?”
“What do you know about the other people who want to hurt me?” I asked sharply. He shrugged infuriatingly and sat back.
“I told you,” he said lazily, “Help me escape and I’ll give you all the answers you co
uld possibly want. You’d be surprised at how much I know. And at what a valuable ally I can be. And an equally vicious enemy. Believe me, you want me on your side.”
“I don’t appreciate being threatened into helping criminals,” I said. He raised an eyebrow at me.
“Or you’ll do what?” he said silkily, “Talk at me? You’re not exactly corporeal here, are you?”
“You think you’re a vicious bastard?” I said, clenching my fist so my nails cut into my palms, “If you hurt anyone I love, I’ll send you to a place so dark that this cell is like a suite in a five-star hotel in comparison. Without light and without sound. And without time, so you will live forever in that place, never seeing another living soul until the fucking heat death of the universe. Don’t you threaten me.”
“Stop that,” Jude said suddenly. For the first time, I saw an unfamiliar expression on his face—fear.
I realized the walls of his cell were shaking. I reached out a hand to feel the wall, and it slowly came to a halt under my hands.
“Or maybe I’ll just arrange for an earthquake in your cell and make it look like a bunch of rocks accidentally crushed you to death,” I said, in the ensuing silence.
To my surprise, he laughed.
“I will say this for you, Sophia. You might be a liar and a greedy little fool, but you’re never boring. Ah, I see you’ve overstayed your welcome.”
I looked down at my hands, which were turning fuzzy and translucent.
“Please don’t let me be hungover when I wake up,” I said, devout like I was praying, and closed my eyes.
Chapter 13
“…don’t think she needs gummy bears, Noah…”
“…come…!...doesn’t like…?”
“….Dom…far…know.”
“Dom…every…he’s…dead inside.”
Someone was…having a conversation near me. Or next to me. Their voices kept floating in and out of ear shot. I tried to move my head but it felt like it was made of lead. I tried to say, ‘Where am I? Who are you? What happened to me?’ but,