“Wait, there are more?” I asked, pushing to my feet. “More like me?”
“Do you really think you’re the only one?” Miss Morton laughed. “Oh, my dear, children just like you are popping up all over. Like weeds. More and more are being born every year. You’re really not as special as you think you are, Mother Book aside.”
“What? Where are they? Why haven’t I ever heard of this?”
“It’s Coven Guild’s deep dark secret,” Miss Morton chuckled. “Only a few elite members of the Senate know. Not even your precious Mrs. Winter is aware, and she thinks she’s aware of everything. They don’t want to start a panic among the Guardians, so they’re keeping it hush-hush.”
“And how do you know?” I asked. I had to keep her talking, to give Ivy time to undo the limitations on Alicia’s magic and give them time to climb up here with me.
“Before I came here, I worked as a government archive clerk, one of the most boring jobs available to Coven Guild members, but the only position available to someone like me with no connections, no status. I handled the reports, archiving every panicked moment and discussion. I knew I simply had to come to the school. That eventually, they would be drawn to the school, some Guardian family would be so terrified of being caught fostering a Snipe witch under their roof, that they would send her here and try to pass her off as a Guardian. And then, I could cause all sorts of trouble. Undo major houses, destabilize the government. Your waking up the Mother Book was a lovely surprise, though. I’d spent years trying just to open the case and couldn’t get close to it. But, oh, you have expedited my plans faster than I could ever hope. It all just fell into my lap, proof that even the Fates have agreed upon my destiny.”
“These other children? Are they being kept somewhere?”
“No dear,” she told me, a mock note of false sadness in her voice. “Those children were murdered, taken from the families by the time they showed the hint of magic. I’ve never met a Changeling any older than eleven.” She tilted her head, smiling softly at me. “We’re so alike, you know, I felt that right away when I met you. You, a girl out of place in a world you don’t understand. My house, the great Grimstelles, reduced to nothing. I’m going to change it all, this sick world order that rewards laziness and mediocrity. No longer. I will send my armies into the Capitol. I will topple the very foundations of Guardian society, restore the balance. I will create a newer, better world. I would think that you, of all people, would understand my point of view.”
For just a moment, it sounded like music to my ears. No more manipulations, no more lies, no more “guidance” in how to run our lives. Our society was sick. Snipes were servants for no other reason than being born without magic. I wanted to see that change. I wanted to see Callista and Mr. Crenshaw, all of the high and mighty Guardians knocked down a peg or one hundred. I wanted them to know what it was like to work for their bread.
And then I thought of Alicia and Ivy and all of my classmates who would suffer in Miss Morton’s “Utopia.” And while the current system was unfair, I couldn’t punish my friends for being born with magic and wealth any more than I wanted my family to be punished for being born without it.
“But we won’t be free, will we?” I sighed. “The Snipes will be just as terrified and helpless as the Guild Guardians. We’ll have the dead at our doors, without magic to keep them out. Things need to change. I do want to change the world, but not like this. Not your way.”
From below, I felt Ivy and Alicia’s magic, nudging at my own, letting me know they were there. Alicia’s magic was strong, like a slap to the back of my head, reminding me how misguided this plan was. I realized I felt alive, refreshed and whole and ready for a fight. I stood, much to Miss Morton’s surprise and walked toward the book stand. She tried to stop me, but I flung my hand up, Wit singing out of my sleeve. The force of a shield rune threw her across the tower room and into a column.
Behind us, I could hear my friends coming up the stairs. I turned in time to see Miss Morton flinging a flaming brazier at them, burning coals and all. I screamed, “No!”
Alicia fanned her hands, blade flashing in a symbol even I didn’t recognize. The burning coals transformed into lemon blossoms. I stopped, staring at my tiny friend. I’d never heard of changing matter from one form to another, but Alicia had done it. Even Miss Morton appeared impressed.
“So the little mouse has mastered her magic has she?” Miss Morton chuckled.
“It’s easy when you have good friends,” Alicia said casually, plucking lemon blossoms from her skirt. She picked one up in the palm of her hand and blew on it. The flower spun into the air, aided by a counter-clockwise conductor’s twirl of her athame. The blossom grew into a massive black blob of black, oily liquid as it flew towards Miss Morton. Miss Morton rolled her eyes and flicked her wrist. The black slime splashed over an invisible dome-shaped shield over Miss Morton, streaming down as if against glass, where it puddled at her feet.
“And what about you, Cow?” Miss Morton sneered. “I don’t see much of a change in you. So much for the healing powers of friendship.”
I felt something flare through Ivy’s magic, rage, white-hot rage that seemed to singe the edges of my brain. I whipped my head toward Ivy, who was glaring at Miss Morton in an expression of rage I’d never seen on her sweet face. Her dark eyes glittered with a wrathful light that sent a shiver down my spine.
“You will not call me that,” Ivy told her.
Miss Morton snickered. “What, Cow? Oh, you poor poppet, did you actually believe that being the Translator’s little flunky made you anything more than the pathetic creature you are? You’re nothing, less than nothing. You’re not even brave enough to become nothing, Cow. You’re just like every sad, talentless girl who has shuffled these halls before you.”
With Miss Morton’s attention focused on Ivy, I turned back to the book. Alicia shifted her body ever so slightly, placing herself between my back and Miss Morton. I turned to the page showing the spell to banish a malevolent spirit into the next world. Phillip lighted on the bookstand, feathers ruffled and agitated, but not making a sound.
Miss Morton scoffed. “You’ve never fought back in your life. Just go downstairs, girls, while Miss Reed and I finish our business. I’ll come for you, soon enough.”
“You will not call me that,” Ivy said again, her fingers flexing.
“Salt,” I whispered to Phillip, who flitted away into the depths of the tower. “Or what?” Miss Morton laughed at Ivy.
“Or this!” Ivy shouted, dropping to the ground and stabbing her blade between spaces in the stones. Flames leapt from the floor, zipping towards Miss Morton as if following a trail of lamp oil. Ivy’s fiery anger had transformed into actual fire, and it seemed to be taking on the shape of a bull, running at Miss Morton at top speed. Miss Morton’s eyes went wide at the sight a giant flaming cow aiming its horns at her and held up her blade to ward it off.
The bull’s nose met the tip of Miss. Morton’s worn silver athame and folded in on itself, becoming a tiny ball of smoke and ember. Miss Morton couldn’t quite relax, though, because her skirts were in flames. She shrieked beating at them for a second before summoning a storm of dirt and grit from the unkempt tower floor to suffocate the flames.
I rushed to Ivy and Alicia, standing shoulder to shoulder with our blades pointed at Miss Morton. Behind our insane librarian, Jeanette stirred awake, eyes wide in alarm. Her thrashing against her bonds woke the other two girls, who came to just in time to see Phillip drop a small bag of salt into my hand.
Ivy took the bag and threw the salt into the air. She raised her blade and drew restraining wards. The salt landed in a perfect circle around Miss Morton’s feet, a stark white contrast against the ash and dirt. Miss Morton screamed in rage and tried to run at me, but the circle held her. Alicia flicked her fingers and the salt sputtered to life, a circle of green energy that surrounded Miss Morton on all sides. Alicia’s magic thrilled through the bond, pleased with her creation
.
Miss Morton howled, scrambling to protect her already damaged skirts from the crackling walls of ghostly light. She slashed at the walls with her athame, her blade making quickly reforming scratches on her green prison.
Miss Morton hissed through the crayfire. “All that time with the book, sharing your magic with me, I am bound to you now. I am in your every pore. I will return! I am the mistress of Death! My undead armies will rise! I will bring House Grimstelle to glory once again! And I’ll do it with your help!”
Alicia and Ivy’s magic swirled and danced with mine, not appreciating the insinuation that Miss Morton’s magic was stronger. I didn’t need an army. I had one. I had Alicia and Ivy.
I smiled, just as frosty as Mrs. Winter ever dreamed of being. “You don’t even know me. You’re not even half the witch I am.”
Phillip flew over my head, beating the air with his tiny blue wings. Alicia’s hand rested on my left arm and Ivy’s right shoulder pressed to mine. We raised our blades. I looked Miss Morton in the eye and drew the most dangerous symbol in the Mother Book. “Unmake.”
Like the spell promised, Miss Morton became nothing. A dark shadow seemed to slip out of Miss Morton’s body, rising like dirty green-grey smoke. Her body dropped to the floor and was consumed by the green fire, burning bright for a moment and then collapsing on itself like a dying star. The smoke hovered over the glowing circle before fading away onto the wind.
The three of us stared at the ashy green smear left on the stone. Callista, Helena and Jeanette remained in their chairs, blinking rapidly. In the distance, birds chirped. The world spun on, just as before.
Ivy broke the tension by blowing her hair out of her face and saying, “Well, that was decidedly odd.”
“Really? I do this sort of thing every Tuesday before bed,” Alicia said in a bored tone, making Ivy laugh.
But while her tone was bored and haughty, I could see in Alicia’s expression that she was alarmed. She was staring down at her arm. I could see a mark similar to mine, smaller, but in the now-familiar dragonfly shape, forming around the inside of her left wrist, the hand that had been holding mine during the spell.
Ivy was already moving the neckline of her dress aside to examine her own dragonfly on her shoulder.
“I’m not sure Mother is going to like this,” Ivy whispered. “She’s worked her whole life to achieve a mark, and never earned one.”
“Nonsense,” Alicia told her. “Just think of the hideous dresses she’ll have designed to highlight it.”
“Where did you two learn those spells?” I asked. “I don’t remember anything about flaming bulls or flying slime in the books we studied.”
“Well, I will admit we studied more advanced spells while we were mastering some of your remedial skills,” Ivy said. “I’m sure you’ll catch up in no time, considering you just unmade a human being.”
I nodded. “Still. You made a bull, made of fire.”
Ivy jerked her shoulders.
“Would someone mind telling me why the blue Hades I am tied to a filthy chair?” Callista demanded, fully awake and thrashing against her bonds. “Let me loose, now!”
Ivy frowned as Callista thrashed against her ropes. Jeanette and Helena were a bit more polite in their requests to be released. “Do we have to untie Callista?” Ivy asked.
“Yes,” I sighed.
“We could leave her up here. Nobody would mind her going missing,” Alicia suggested, slumping against me. Her face was pale behind her smirk.
I snickered. “Alicia.”
She sighed. “It’s just a suggestion.”
18
Hothouse Flower
It seemed that preventing the rise of an undead army helped raise one’s social standing.
I wandered Mrs. Winter’s greenhouse, the detached glass garden where she grew her most delicate and exotic specimens, caring for the specimens her friends from the Demeter Society sent to me. The very moment I’d arrived at Raven’s Rest, my dress in tatters and covered in Miss Morton’s ash, the tributes began arriving. Exotic potted plants, restorative tonics, books to keep me entertained while I recovered from my “dreadful shock,” and each of them with a note asking me to attend tea at the sender’s home when I felt well enough.
News of our fight to the death with Miss Morton had, of course, spread like wildfire amongst the students, and then their mothers. No one knew exactly what happened. Callista, Helena and Jeanette could only give bits and pieces. In their stupor, they only heard twisted fragments of story about the attempts of House Grimstelle to re-establish itself (the gall!) and whispers of necromancy being involved (how distasteful!) Now that society had been re-assured that I was Guardian enough to save three prominent daughters from certain harm, I was welcomed back into the tea-and-tarot circuit with open arms.
With Mrs. Dalrymple leading the charge, all of the proper ladies of the most prominent houses dismissed “those nasty rumors” about my heritage as vicious gossip from the jealous ladies of the Benisse house. After all, I couldn’t have prevented a Grimstelle uprising without being a true Coven Guild Guardian. And with the help of little Alicia McCray and Mrs. Dalrymple’s own dear granddaughter!
Clearly Ivy and Alicia had been underestimated by society at large, the matrons whispered. Ivy was receiving tea invitations from several matrons associated with the Athena Society, a research guild dedicated to ward construction. And this was without those matrons knowing that Ivy had restored Alicia’s protective limitations before Gavin even knew they’d been removed. Alicia had suffered very little reverb symptoms afterwards, just feeling shaky and a little fatigued after our adventure. Ivy was as she always was, steady and exasperated with us both.
I’d begged Mrs. Winter to send them all back, to burn them. I’d had quite enough of Guild Guardian society, thank you, and didn’t particularly want to be welcomed back into the fold. But Mrs. Winter insisted that this was all part of her carefully worked plan, and I would not only open these gifts, but write thank you notes for each of them.
I carefully placed heated stones around the potted demon orchid, a rare red specimen that released an odd sulfurous smoke on nights of the full moon. The snow was piled deep against the outer panes, giving the already quiet room an eerie, isolated feel. Mrs. Winter had re-keyed the wards to accept me. She insisted that the warm, moist air of the hothouse would help restore the vitality that had been drained by my ordeal. I wasn’t sure about that, but it was nice to have a bit of peace after the bustle of insanity that had marked the last few days.
Of course, that brief peace was disrupted by the greenhouse doors opening. I didn’t bother looking up from my orchid specimen, calling, “Go away, Owen. I’m recuperating. And your mother tells me that not being thoroughly annoyed is an important part of the relaxation process.”
“Well, I don’t plan to annoy you, but I certainly understand why you would give your cousin such a warning.”
My head whipped toward the sound of the voice that was certainly not Owen’s. Gavin McCray was standing in the doorway, holding a bouquet of purple weeping hyacinth – a flower that meant the giver was so sorry, he or she was crying. Through the glass, I could see Mrs. Winter’s retreating back. “Gavin. What are you doing here? I thought.. well, never mind what I thought. I’m very happy to see you.”
“I’m sorry my mother’s actions gave you the impression that I didn’t want to continue our acquaintance,” he said. “She’s been more dependent on me since my father died and, I don’t think she appreciated the thought of someone who would take my time or attention.”
I raised my eyebrows and his cheeks flushed. I might not have believed the excuse about his mother diverting his messages, except that his letters, which I read during my recovery, had been a series of increasingly urgent pleas for me to respond. The final letter had asked me to send some word, even through Alicia, to tell him that he could hope for my friendship.
“I’ve moved to the residence halls at Palmer’s for the t
ime being,” he said, clearing his throat.
“I hate to think that you’ve moved from your home because of something to do with me.”
“It’s not because of you,” he assured me, standing and crossing the greenhouse to stand near me. “If I don’t make a dramatic gesture now, I can only expect more of the same. And I’m on the verge of taking over the family business. She can’t treat me like a child and then expect to have the responsibilities of a patriarch. She can learn to respect my choices or she can live separately from me.”
“I feel like I could have cleared this up by reaching out to you, but I was concerned that the things people were saying about me might mean you didn’t want to contact me again.”
“I’ve learned a long time ago not to listen to the gossip that circulates through the society set,” he said softly. “You’re one of Alicia’s closest friends. If she had any concerns about you, she would have told me. You’re a sweet girl, but funny and biting and smart. If any of the society matrons have a problem with that, it says more about them than you.”
“Thank you,” I said, my own cheeks heating now. “I think you are very nice… also…”
It was all I could do not to roll my eyes. Clearly, this was the biting wit Gavin mentioned.
Smiling, Gavin leaned forward and kissed me softly on my lips, a quick experimental peck.
“I will write to you again, as soon as possible, if that’s agreeable,” he said, his lips twitching.
“I look forward to your next letter,” I told him. “It should be very long, to make up for the recent lack of them.”
He took my hand and bowed over it. “I will do my best.”
With that, Gavin left me in the greenhouse, walking into Raven’s Rest to pay his respects to Mr. Winter. Alone now and suffering a sudden case of sweaty palms, I carefully approached the juvenile specimen of drosera aureus Headmistress Lockwood sent me.
Changeling (Sorcery and Society Book 1) Page 24