by Erin Hayes
“Let me ask you something, Alec.” He waved his hand to the side. “Do I tell you how to do your job?” He raised one eyebrow. “Because if I did, that would be acceptable, would it not? I am your superior. And yet, I have never told you how to do your job, have I? I’ve extended you the respect of just expecting you to do it, however you must to get it done.”
Alec swallowed around the lump forming in his throat. “Of course. I didn’t mean—”
Dvorak lifted a hand to stop him, his lips pressed into a thin line as he shook his head. “You are aware, I would hope, that the whole reason we need an heir—immediately—is because the magic currently accessible to us is limited. And that is because of how much I have done compared to Regents of the past. I have used several lifetime’s worth of magic to keep this sector safe, even as the original runestones have failed. I have sacrificed, countless times, my own well-being to repair what stones can be repaired. And I have used an inordinate amount of magic to create that device!”
He’d only been brimming with fury up until now, but by the end of that last sentence, he was nearly shouting. Alec could think of no appropriate response that wouldn’t anger the Regent further.
The Regent closed his eyes and took a deep breath through his nose. When he opened his eyes again, his expression seemed minutely calmer. “Alec. You are a bright young man. Consider for a moment that we don’t have women lining up to confess as witches. If a woman says she is, does it not make more sense to trust she wouldn’t lie about that than to waste magic confirming? If she wasn’t a witch, then sure, I’ve traded the magic to perform the Display for you to use that device. If, however, she is a witch—and I think it’s fair to assume most who admit to it are, despite today’s events—then we have wasted that magic and will still have to use yet more to perform the Display.”
That made sense. The game that could come with saving the Sector would only be good if the women making these claims had the power to actually do so. By lying, they had everything to lose and nothing to gain.
But the woman today had shouted she wasn’t a witch. Alec bit down on those words, though he didn’t like it, even if what the Regent said was true. Finally, they had a way to bypass these events, even if only some of them, only for their very predicament to prevent them from being able to reasonably do so.
He dropped his gaze to the ground, and the Regent placed both of his hands on his shoulders.
“I’m trusting you to use the device responsibly,” Dvorak said. “Don’t let me down. You’re the only one I can count on.”
When Alec still didn’t speak, the Regent released him.
“I have something I want to show you,” he said. “Follow me.”
A few moments later, Alec found himself in one of the Regent’s private sitting rooms. Dvorak sat in one of the leather-bound chairs and motioned for Alec to join him.
Once Alec was seated, the Regent lifted a large book from the chest-style coffee table between them.
“Do you know what this is?” Dvorak asked.
Alec was almost too big for the chair he was sitting in, the bulky muscles of his thighs and width of his chest making him feel as though he was a grown man sitting in a child’s chair. This was why Alec rarely sat.
He shifted his weight and peered at the book in Dvorak’s hands. “I do not, Sir.”
“This,” the Regent said, “is one of the first ever transcripts of magic. From the Original Sixteen. It is how I was able to make that device, and it is how—with the help of an heir—I will be able to save our Sector.”
Alec studied the spellbook, guessing it to contain at least a thousand large pages. The cover was worn and nearly falling off at the binding, but in its own way, it was new. It was hope. There was still new magic—or new to them, anyway—in this sector to be discovered.
Was this the only book Dvorak had found? Or were there more? Why was he showing this to him now?
The Regent set the book back down and pulled his ankle up onto his knee, resting both of his hands there. “I think I know what’s going on with you.”
A shiver scurried up Alec’s back, and his cheeks burned. Of course Dvorak knew. He probably knew everything, and just wanted to see if Alec would confess.
“Sir, I—”
“It’s okay, Alec. I don’t think it makes you weak. You’re human, and that is not a bad thing. Today you had a scare. That Ravager nearly took your life. It terrified me, too.”
Oh. His heart was still pounding from the adrenaline rush of thinking he’d been caught in a lie, but his breath came a little easier.
“The runes on the sword are weakening,” the Regent said. “I had hoped we could wait a little longer before restoring them, but today was an awakening for me. We reserve magic for when it is needed, and this is one of those needs. The sword is one of our last viable defenses. We must repair it.”
“I agree, Sir,” Alec said, thankful to finally have an honest and acceptable answer to offer the Regent.
“Good,” he said. “Then we are on the same page. Now, I have business I must attend to. The crops need my help to grow, I’m afraid, and I need to devise a plan to make the most of what little magic we have to spare for sure things. The people need to eat.”
The weight of the situation slammed into Alec. Dvorak was right. They couldn’t just use magic for every little thing. Even if that meant some people died as a consequence to their lies.
Alec lifted the book. “Do you mind if I look at this?”
Dvorak’s lips dipped as though frowning were another way to shrug. “Have at it. I’m afraid it won’t be much use to you, but maybe you’ll see something I haven’t had the time to find. You will let me know if you find anything?”
Indeed. The book was little more than fire kindle to Alec. But for Adira… “Thank you, Sir. If anything sticks out to me, I’ll let you know.”
Dvorak rose to take leave from the room, but paused just inside the doorway to call over his shoulder.
“Our queen is out there,” he said. “Find her.”
Find her. Alec shuddered.
The problem was, he worried he already had.
Chapter Nine
This was not good. Of course, the old woman had every right to take Adira, especially if the Guard was doing nothing about her thievery. It wouldn’t be the first time they’d let a vendor deal with things…privately. But why would Alec let the woman take her?
Was it to save face? He clearly wasn’t arresting her, so if he’d protected her from the old woman, she might have reported him. That would likely mean his job…and possibly also his life. It would make him a traitor. So of course he let the old woman take Adira.
Maybe it was for the best. If the old woman killed Adira, she wouldn’t have to face a Ravager or the Regent.
On the other hand, Adira had heard some horror stories of the way some vendors dealt with thieves. At least death by a Ravager would be quick.
Adira gave the woman a sideways glance. No, she wasn’t the type. She wasn’t like the butchers in the market. She wasn’t a killer.
Was she?
Adira was certain the stress of the situation alone would be enough to end her life. But before long, they arrived at large dilapidated building with boarded windows.
As they approached the door, Adira became more resistant to walk at the woman’s side. “I’ll replace the fruit,” she said. “I’ll pay you for it, or I’ll work it off somehow.”
The old woman did not speak, and her firm grasp did not loosen. Apparently Adira had taught her the better of that when she’d escaped back at the market earlier.
Once inside, the woman led Adira up narrow, creaking flight of stairs, then turned a corner to lead her down an even narrower hall with crooked floorboards. At the end of the hall, adjacent to one of the boarded up windows where only a sliver of light sliced through, the old woman fished a ring of keys from her skirt pocket and unlocked a door.
As the door swung open, Adira realized the doors
seemed to be the only thing kept up in the whole building. The locking mechanism was perfect, and there everything else in the building seemed about to crumble, the door looked sturdy and new.
“Here we are,” the woman said with no emotion in her voice.
Adira looked around the small dusty room. An armoire stood catty-cornered in one corner of the room, and a small metal frame with a mattress butted up against one of the walls on the other side of the room. The small nightstand beside the bed was bare.
“Where is…here?” Adira asked.
“Home,” the woman said. “This is your room.”
Then she turned and left.
Please tell me this isn’t a brothel.
Adira’s breaths came in short. She circled the room, corner to corner, tight to each wall, looking for some way out. The window. She darted across the room and yanked at the edges of the plywood boarding up the window, but it didn’t budge. She tried the second window; same problem.
It was just plywood and nails. There had to be a way to get them open.
Adira checked in the armoire and the nightstand drawer, but there was nothing she could use to pry the boards with. Again she pulled with her hands, her fingernails starting to bleed before finally she stepped back and took a deep breath, remembering what she was capable of.
Ha. She’d spent her whole life trying not to use magic, so much so that now half the time she forgot she could. That must have been why Alec wasn’t worried to let her go. He knew she would get out of here. Now she just needed to think up the right spell.
She still had the cloves in her pouch from the market place, though that wouldn’t do her much good now. She could create a rune symbol on the plywood, but she would need something to carve with.
Adira heaved a sigh and looked around again. Well, if all else failed, she could just break out the next time the door opened. Problem with that was, likely there would be two people there the next time…the old woman and some John.
Adira’s skin prickled at the thought. She was not going to be that person. That could not happen to her. She would get out of here and…and…do something to get whoever else was here out, too.
Pressing the heels of her palms into her eyes, Adira counted back from ten to clear her mind. Okay. When she opened her eyes, she would truly see the room. She would see past her panic and see a way out. She had to.
Adira’s eyes fluttered open again, and once more she scanned the room. Slower this time. Step by step. Inch by inch. Unhurried, like someone who was trapped with nothing better to do…which was exactly what she was.
Finally, she found something—a small piece of glass. It wasn’t much, but must have been from one of the windows before they were boarded up.
Once back to the window, Adira carved the Uruz rune into the wood. Power. Creative force. A gateway. This was the rune she needed.
“Osvobodit,” she whispered. Break free.
Nothing happened.
“Osvobodit,” she said, louder. “Osvobodit!”
Still nothing.
Adira’s hands curled into fists at her side. This didn’t make sense. Her magic was a little rusty, but what the hell? This was a simple spell.
She walked straight up to the window and placed her palm over the carved Uruz symbol. Maybe she would get more if she asked for less. All she needed was a start.
“Tříska,” she said firmly. Splinter. “Tříska!”
“Damnit!” She pounded her fist against the wood, but all that did was make her hand ache and swell. “Why won’t you open?”
Adira sat on the edge of the bed, trying not to cry, holding back the urge to rip the room apart—for all the good it would do to try when she couldn’t even get the damn plywood off the window.
Her anger and frustration built in her until finally she could take no more. She was getting out of here, even if that meant using the one magical word she’d been warned never, ever to use.
Before she could calm down, she was already halfway across the room, her arm outstretched, the angriest, darkest word leaving her lips. “Smrt.”
Death.
The board blew open, revealing the city in the distance below for only a moment before Adira’s world went dark.
When Adira awoke, she was in the bed. Her gaze darted to the window. The board was already back in place.
It looks exactly the same.
She squinted, becoming more and more certain it was the same board.
But that would be impossible.
“For someone so smart,” came a voice from by the door, “you are very stupid.”
Adira’s gaze darted to the voice, finding none other than the old woman standing there. The woman walked farther in to the room, the door already closed—an undoubtedly locked—behind her.
“What do you want from me?” Adira asked, sitting up and moving as far from the woman as possible.
The woman’s mouth puckered into a scowl, and she looked down her nose at Adira. “You have potential for greatness, but you run from it. You hide. You are perhaps the strongest witch in this Sector that I have ever witnessed, and yet you use magic like a child!” Her tone turned angry at the end, and she threw her hand throw up. “Psh. All emotion. No sense. No control.”
“It worked, didn’t it?”
“Like a bulldozer,” the woman muttered. “Because you were so wrapped up in yourself you didn’t realize the window was enchanted. You could have removed that spell and plucked that board right off the window with mere human strength. But look what all you did instead.”
Adira stood now. “If you know so much about this, then why even leave me here alone. If I could have, like you said, so easily escaped.”
The old woman waved her off. “Aye, I had you pegged for a fool the moment I laid eyes on ya. I just wanted to see what you would do if left on your own. Now come on. Dinner won’t eat itself.”
This time, the woman opened the door and walked down the hall without Adira firm in her grasp. And Adira followed. Down the hall, down the stairs, past the front door—Adira’s path to freedom—and down another, wider hall that led into a large room overflowing with chatter.
The old woman never looked back to see if Adira was following. It was as if she knew. She knew she had Adira’s attention now. Her curiosity.
As Adira stepped into the great room, she saw where all the noise was coming from. Over a dozen children, small to tall, sat around one long table. They laughed, they shared food. One of the younger ones floated a roll from across the table, then grabbed it midair and dipped it into gravy. Another child stole a handful of grapes from a platter. None of them seemed to even notice that Adira and the old woman had walked in.
But one: a lanky, young man with dark hair and round, wire-frame glasses swiveled in his seat to face the dining room entrance.
“Miss Balek!” he said.
The old woman raised her hand. “Settle down, settle down. We have a new arrival.”
The room grew quiet. All eyes turned to Adira.
“This is Adira,” Miss Balek said.
Adira’s eyebrows knit together. “I didn’t tell you—”
“And yet I knew,” Miss Balek said with a smile. “You have a lot to learn, but I think we should start with what a full belly and a proper sleep feels like. Please. Sit down.”
Miss Balek swept her hand toward the table, and the lanky young man moved over, making room for Adira. Adira sat beside him, realizing now that the man wasn’t as young as she originally thought. His jaw was shaded with a light shadow and he was, perhaps, a good head taller than Adira.
He broke some bread and put it on Adira’s plate. “Radana has cooking duty this week, so it’s all edible,” he said, then used some thongs to place some meat on Adira’s plate along with a handful of grapes and cubes of cheese. “Trust me, you’ll want to get your share now, because Kveta takes over tomorrow, and she doesn’t give a rat’s ass about what we eat.”
Adira used her finger to pull the plate clos
er and rip off a piece of bread to nibble on. “Thanks,” she said between bites. “And you are?”
The young man dusted his hand against his pants, then held it out to her. “Erik.”
She took his hand and gave it a quick shake. “Nice to meet you. I’m Adira. But I guess you already knew that.”
“Not until a few minutes ago,” Erik said, his eyebrows raising. “That’s Miss Balek’s thing. I can’t read minds, and frankly, don’t want to. Would you want to know everything everyone is thinking?”
The thought turned over in her mind. “To be honest, right now it wouldn’t hurt.”
Erik’s finger punctured the air beside his head. “That’s what you think!”
A short girl with long, raven curls bustled past them, picking up Erik’s plate along the way.
He lunged after her. “Hey! I wasn’t finished!”
“You are now,” she said, throwing a smirk back at him.
Erik locked his gaze with Adira’s. “Be right back.”
Then he leapt over the bench seat and darted after the girl, who ran off in a swirl of giggles and bouncing curls. Erik pursued her until he seemed to slam into an invisible wall, which made the smaller of the children at the table burst into a fit of laughter so sincere that one of them fell over sideways.
Adira slouched in her seat, picking at the meat and cheese. This place was…nice. Happy. And the food was good. But she felt wrong eating it, wrong being here. After all, she’d tried to steal from the woman who’d brought her to this place.
Adira looked up at Miss Balek, who was smiling warmly at her. As if all was forgiven. As if she were happy that Adira had stolen from her cart. As if everything was going to be okay.
And maybe it would be. Until Alec came for her.
Then she would be forced to face a Ravager, and there was no way this place could teach her all she needed to know to survive that. Not in thirteen short days.
Chapter Ten