An Unkindness of Magicians

by Kat Howard

  “I’m not quite sure why you’re asking me for advice,” Verenice said. “It seems to me that you have two options—you duel, and you duel to win, because I am sure Sydney will, or you forfeit.”

  He continued pacing, a pendulum swinging wildly across the room. “That can’t be all there is. I feel like there’s something else going on. Like, there’s part of the challenge that’s a secret. Which I would really like to know about, since I’m one of the people maybe dying over it.”

  “And even if there were, how would that change what you are required to do?” Verenice asked. “You signed a contract with House Prospero. You agreed to stand as their champion, knowing that the Turning always ends with the invocation of mortality, knowing that if you got that far, you would risk your life—you would kill—on its behalf. You may not like the fact that you’re matched against Sydney, but this can’t have come as a complete surprise to you.”

  “Intellectually, of course I understood this was possible.” He slumped into a chair and dropped his head into his hands. “But this isn’t what’s supposed to happen.”

  “ ‘Supposed to?’ ” Verenice set her teacup down. “The last time I checked, you were an adult with some degree of awareness as to how the world works. Unless you’ve also become an oracle, I don’t think ‘supposed to’ enters into it.

  “Now, if you mean you’re frustrated by having only a bad choice, well, I can understand that. But the fact is, you do have one. If you want to be sure that both of you walk away, forfeit the challenge and deal with Miranda later. I assume you’ve shared your frustration with her and she’s not moved by the fact that you’re occasionally sleeping with your opponent?”

  Ian winced. “I didn’t phrase it like that, but yes. All she said was that she had spoken to Sydney and the duel would be held as scheduled.

  “I mean, what the hell? And why will she talk to Miranda and not me?”

  “And have you told Sydney all your secrets? Does she know, for example, about your aunt?” Verenice asked.

  “No.” He couldn’t. He’d seen the scars on Sydney’s arms and he knew those were the least of it. He didn’t know how to look her in the eye and tell her that Shara was his aunt.

  “Then you can hardly blame her for clinging to some of her own. As I said, you still have a choice. You may not much like it, but it’s there. The worst that will happen to you if you forfeit and it’s found to be for a reason outside of the immediate terms of the challenge is that your magic will be stripped. And as unfortunate as that might be, I would think that a life without magic is still preferable to death. Or killing someone you have feelings for.”

  “I’d feel better about making my choice—even if it’s a bad one—if I knew what Sydney was doing,” Ian said. “Laurent said the challenge was Sydney’s idea. She has to have a plan, right?”

  “The challenge was Sydney’s idea?” Tea sloshed over the rim of Verenice’s cup.

  “She even insisted on delivering it in person.”

  Before she had left Shadows, Verenice had learned the identity of the House that had given her up. She had never used her House name, taking her own instead. But she was certain that Sydney would have learned the same thing. Certain, too, now, of what she had only suspected before—that this challenge was at the direction of Shadows, that Shara had set Sydney against Prospero for a reason. That Sydney would not be allowed to forfeit or to show any mercy. And that she wanted Miranda to know who she was before it happened.

  “Verenice? She has a plan, right?” Ian repeated.

  “Yes,” she said, her voice shaking, “yes, she does. Ian, forfeit the challenge. Even if it means Miranda enforces the letter of the contract and strips your magic. Sydney will kill you if you don’t.”

  “That’s not very comforting,” he said, and pushed a grin across his face, a feeble attempt to lighten the atmosphere in the room.

  “It isn’t meant to be.”

  “Well, I should go,” he said. He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. “Thanks, Verenice.”

  She closed the door behind him, “Goodbye.”

  • • •

  Sydney stood on her balcony, watching as the sun set.

  Darkness fell early this time of year—such a change from the blue-purple evenings that seemed to stretch on forever that she’d seen when she’d first left Shadows. It was quiet—or as quiet as the city got, anyway—the horns of taxis and the hum of the subway white noise in the background of her life.

  Magic twisted like vines through her. She could see it, sparking, beneath her skin.

  She had gotten used to it now, the sharp greenness of the magic, the way it would roar through her if left unchecked. It would be enough, and more than enough, to get through the challenge tomorrow. She didn’t allow herself to think of any moments past that. There would be consequences, but then, there always were.

  Ian had tried and tried again to talk to her. She had text after unanswered text on her phone. But talking to him wouldn’t change anything, so she hadn’t. Shadows had given her a task, and she would see it done.

  She did not want to kill Ian. She would kill him if she had to.

  There were more things at stake than simply what she wanted.

  The ragged ends of her shadow wept at her feet.

  For now she was here: outside, in her own space, above the city, under the stars. She could get through tomorrow. And whatever came after.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Harper passed the candle over the page: PROSPERO, MIRANDA. IN THE MATTER OF PROSPERO, GREY. This was it—the disinheritance. If she hadn’t been so exhausted from spending twelve hours a day every day for the past two weeks in the archives, she would have broken out into a dance. Madison had gotten a spell to use to help sort the files, but it had been clumsy—the candle would burn blue if the file related to House Prospero, and red for anything else. Which was great, except there were a lot of files for House Prospero—it was one of the oldest Houses. And the candle didn’t distinguish between a hundred-year-old disagreement over disappearing carriage horses and files that actually involved Miranda. It had been a long and headache-filled two weeks. Still, she paused to grin and punch the air in victory.

  Grey had, apparently, been disinherited for “improper appropriation of magic (attempted).” Harper’s mouth twisted. That wasn’t a phrase she had seen in the archives, and she had seen plenty of weirdness since she had started reading through them—“inappropriate reappearance” was her favorite so far. But this just sounded like someone making something up so they could pretend to be official.

  The first pages of the file detailed the legal consequences of his disinheritance. House Prospero, in itself and in its members, would no longer recognize him; he was no longer heir to any of Miranda’s goods or property, real or otherwise.

  And then what he’d actually done became clear.

  It was not a police file—there were no photographs of his victim, and for that Harper was desperately grateful. But there was a description. Language so cold and detached that she read it twice to make sure she hadn’t missed something.

  Grey Prospero was disinherited for trying to murder his girlfriend for her magic.

  Not Rose. Another woman. Grace Valentine.

  Not Rose. But in circumstances so similar, it could have been.

  Harper wasn’t sure if it was better, or not, to know that some other woman had been hurt that way. Like Rose had been, like she’d heard other women had been. All the little details that matched up so well that she kept seeing the image she had tried every day for two years to banish from her mind. The image of a man, his face in shadows, bent over her friend’s body, cutting into her hands. Grace’s hands had been cut, carved into, but she had stopped Grey, had escaped, before he had finished.

  A sob burst out of Harper, echoing off the walls of the archives.

  Harper pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes, holding the tears in. Sucked in a breath. “This is what you came here
to do, remember? This will help Rose.” Her voice was shaky and thin, but she felt better for saying it.

  She kept reading. Nothing ever said what happened to the woman involved, to Grace, after the disinheritance had been finalized. Harper wondered if it would be possible to find her—to talk to her.

  She read a few key paragraphs of the disinheritance papers out loud then, testing the binding. No magic rose up to choke off her words in her throat, and nothing happened when she tucked the file into her messenger bag to take back downstairs.

  She went to Madison’s office and closed the door behind her as she walked in. “I found the file. And there’s something I need to tell you,” she said.

  • • •

  Sydney’s phone rang. A text alert popped up simultaneously. From Madison: Answer. Emergency.

  Sydney answered. “I’m on my way to fight a mortal challenge against Ian, so I hope this really is an emergency.”

  “Trust me, Sydney, this is something you’ll want to know. The blue fox eats pies for moon day breakfast.”

  “Madison. Are you drunk?”

  “Fuck. No. I’m not. I’m trying to tell you about that thing you wanted me to look up.” Frustration rang through her voice.

  Sydney considered. “The disinheritance?”

  “Yes. The sea overflows onto candy floss.”

  “The binding seems to be fully in place.” It was almost, almost funny, Sydney thought.

  “Damn it, yes. But Sydney, there’s no good to come of a universe in a house.”

  Sydney stopped. Pinched the bridge of her nose. “There’s a difference between something that’s an emergency for me, personally, and something that means I should forfeit this challenge. I trust you, Madison—which is it?”

  A pause, and then a breath blown out. “Fight your challenge, Sydney. Win. This will still be there for you when it’s over.”

  Sydney hung up and turned off her phone.

  • • •

  Madison clicked her phone off and turned to Harper. “I’m guessing from your face that it sounded like I was talking nonsense to you, too.”

  Harper’s eyes were wide. “That was bizarre. And probably also means that having her come here to look at the files herself won’t work, either.”

  Madison said nothing.

  “Right?” Harper asked.

  Madison shook her head. “Sorry. Preoccupied. You’re right. Yes—what just happened shows the binding is keyed to people, not place. She wouldn’t be able to read it if she came here, and—if by some miracle we could get it out of the building—it would still read as gibberish if we brought it to her.”

  “But that’s good, right? I mean, not in and of itself, but that we know that.”

  “It is. I just . . . I have the awful feeling that I just gave Sydney the wrong advice.” She stared at the file on her desk like someone reading an augury.

  “What else were you supposed to say? You literally can’t tell her what’s in the file, and even if you could, it’s not like she’s dueling Grey tonight.” Harper leaned against Madison’s door.

  “I know,” Madison said. “But something is off. I can’t quite put things together, and I don’t like it.”

  “She’ll win, though, right?” Harper thought of those seconds of video, of flying cars and the woman who had made that look easy. She didn’t want to imagine the magician who could beat her.

  “She should,” Madison said. “She should. Anyway, you should go—it’s late, and there’s obviously nothing else we can do right now. Oh, and you did great work on this, Harper. Thanks.”

  “I did it for Rose. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I like this job, but I did this for her.” She felt oddly washed out inside, like it hadn’t quite sunk in, what she’d found. She’d go to Rose’s grave this weekend, tell her. Not absolute proof, and not justice, not yet, but Harper knew in her gut that she was close.

  “I get it,” Madison said.

  “Anyway, good night.” Harper went to her office to close out a few things and gather her stuff. It took longer than she’d planned. There was always one more email, and her brain felt like it was thinking through mud. As she was finally leaving—so ready to go home, have a hot bath and the world’s largest glass of wine—she heard Madison’s phone ring, then heard Madison say, “Oh my God.”

  She dropped her bag and ran to Madison’s office.

  • • •

  There was no party this time. Nothing fancy. No passed champagne or elegant gowns. Only Sydney and Ian and death between them.

  Even now, Ian thought, Laurent looked more nervous than Sydney did. He looked fidgety, stressed, closed off. Not his usual collected self. Ian couldn’t read Miranda either. She had chosen to attend, which she hadn’t done for any of the challenges that weren’t attached to social occasions. Though, he supposed, this one was, in its own way. Nearly all the other Houses, candidate and established, their Heads and heirs and champions, were in attendance. Blood in the water and all that. Miranda looked preoccupied, focused on Sydney as if she would be the one dueling her.

  Sydney looked as calm as ever, as if they were standing in the center of the room to shake hands or exchange recipes. Not to cast magic at each other until one of them was dead. There should have been words. He had words for so much magic, but no magic word to help him understand what she was doing.

  She had to have a plan.

  His father was there, because of course Miles Merlin was there. Ian wasn’t sure if Miles was more looking forward to seeing House Prospero or Sydney lose, never mind that in one of those scenarios his own son died. Lara stood, blank-faced, next to him. Ian felt like he should say something to her, but other than, “I’ll try not to die,” he wasn’t sure what.

  He had written her a letter, just in case. Verenice would give it to her, if. He had not written anything for his father.

  Verenice stood in the back of the room, clear of the press of the crowds, watching Sydney.

  Grey Prospero stumbled into the room, clearly in a bad mood and possibly drunk. He headed for Miranda, but Merlin pulled him aside, whispered something to him, and Grey stopped.

  Ian felt disconnected from the people, the place, like he was watching a film from behind a window. It was such an ordinary room.

  He didn’t particularly want to die today. He didn’t want to kill Sydney either.

  He knew what he had to do.

  The clock rang the hour. The challenge began.

  • • •

  Sydney opened her hand. Power knifed between them.

  Ian stumbled back, shouted a word that rippled the air and raised his hand to shield himself as he fell.

  A line of red appeared across it, and blood ran down his arm. “Sydney!”

  “I’m sorry. Did you not hear that we were starting?” She coiled shadows like snakes and sent them slithering. They crawled over Ian, wound their way up his legs, holding him in place as he tried to stagger to his feet. “Or were you just planning to not fight back?”

  A window exploded behind Sydney, shards of glass in the air like death in pieces. She didn’t even look, simply raised a hand. The glass paused in its fall, an afterthought of shattering, then changed shape and fell as snowflakes to the floor.

  “Ian, do better.” Her face was a terrible thing.

  Ian bent his hands at such severe angles, it looked like they would snap. He spoke a phrase that scorched the back of his throat, that spattered blood across his lips and sent a dragon of flame rising into the air.

  “Thank you. It was like you weren’t even trying.” Sydney raised her hands in the air and the room darkened. Shadows, creeping from their corners, growing and rising and thickening. The shadows carried terror. As they grew, Ian felt his own heart grow darker, lonelier. The small part of him not focused on controlling his magic registered the sounds of weeping from somewhere in the room. The shadows resolved into a shape—reverse negative of the dragon. It opened its mouth impossibly wide and began to swallow the dragon o
f flame.

  Somewhere in the crowd a scuffle. A snap of magic that was neither of theirs—a spell that shouldn’t have been cast. “Sydney!” Ian shouted.

  “I’ve got it!”

  He felt the terror release its grip on him at the same time as he let go of his own spell. Felt a ward pass over him like a tidal wave, and he flung his own after it.

  The dragon, now a thing of combined flame and shadow, plummeted toward the assembled magicians. It burned out, disappeared as it dropped, the magic sheering off of it.

  As the flames extinguished, as the shadows dissipated, it became clear that the wards he and Sydney cast had been almost enough. Nearly everyone in the room was unharmed.

  Miranda Prospero lay, unmoving, on the floor.

  Sydney spoke into the shock. “House Beauchamps forfeits the challenge.”

  • • •

  Chaos ensued.

  • • •

  “What in the actual fuck was that?” Ian asked, pulling Sydney away from the crowd.

  “You’re going to want to take your hand off my arm and rephrase your question, Ian, or we’re going to continue our duel in an unsanctioned manner. And in case you hadn’t noticed, I was winning.” Fury in every line of her body.

  “I had noticed. I noticed very well that you were actually trying to kill me.”

  “I’m not sure how that was a surprise to you, what with the notice of the challenge and all. And even if that were somehow a surprise, you fought back. Poorly.”

  “Seriously?” He stared. “So are you angry that I fought back, or that I didn’t meet your exalted standards?” He turned away from her, then snapped back, “You could have forfeited.”

  “You could have. I couldn’t. And before you get self-righteous, Ian, look.” She held up her shadow, displaying the ragged ends. “Shadows owns me. Owns.”

  Shock on his face. “Sydney, no.”

  “Did Verenice not tell you that part of it? I can’t blame her—it’s worse, somehow, than being sent there in the first place. Shadows owns me, and my magic, and it wanted this challenge fought, and yes, had I refused, they could have forced me. It’s bad enough that I forfeited at the end.” She shuddered.