And Lord Gorham is still too ill to lead his troops, in any case, Emily thought.
“If you want to go back to your father and ask,” she said, “you can. But it won’t make much difference.”
Rudolf scowled at her. It took Emily a moment to realize she’d effectively accused him of being a coward, a sure-fire invitation to a duel in the Allied Lands. For Rudolf, given his leanings, the suggestion had to sting. Emily mentally rolled her eyes. There was nothing wrong with being scared of a necromancer, not when even the most powerful magician would think twice before challenging one. She was scared herself.
“Come on,” Rudolf said, stalking past her. “We need to get there before the rain stops.”
Emily concealed her amusement as she followed him up the rocky path. The castle was a dark brooding shape in the distance, larger than Lord Gorham’s castle but much more vulnerable. Thankfully, the designer hadn’t seen the merits of placing it on top of a needle of rock, with only one way to reach the entrance. Even so, it was still a forbidding shape.
“Stop there,” she called, as they reached the edge of the path. “Let me check for surprises first.”
Rudolf looked impatient, but paused.
Emily gritted her teeth as she sensed the first ward surrounding the castle. It wasn’t anchored properly, nothing like the wards surrounding Lady Barb’s home, and there was something about it that puzzled her. She probed it, carefully, and realized that it didn’t seem to be attached to any warning system. It could just be taken down...and no one would notice.
Emily shook her head in disbelief before probing further. A second ward was nestled behind the first, monitoring its existence. If she crossed or took down the first ward, it was the second that would sound the alarm.
“Clever,” she muttered. She’d seen something comparable in Blackhall – and had been caught, every second time she’d attempted to sneak through. “And we don’t have any blood this time.”
Rudolf gave her a sharp look. “Blood?”
“You can trick a ward if you have blood from someone keyed into their structure,” Emily said, absently. She’d done it herself in Zangaria, but those wards hadn’t been linked into a magician’s mind. They certainly hadn’t been smart enough to notice that one person was in two separate places at the same time. “But we don’t have any, so it doesn’t matter.”
She probed further, satisfied herself that there wasn’t a third ward monitoring the first two, then looked up at Rudolf. “When I start moving,” she ordered, “follow me as closely as possible.”
Rudolf nodded. Emily took a breath, then reached out with her magic and touched the first ward. Breaking it would have been simple – it was a very basic design – but that would have alerted the second ward. Instead, she twisted the ward, praying silently that the second ward was incapable of noticing anything less dramatic than the first ward snapping out of existence. But then, it would be tricky to program for every contingency without a nexus for power.
She took a step forward, then another and another, bending and twisting the ward around them. Rudolf followed her, his breath touching the back of her neck, unaware of the complex interplay of magic surrounding him. Emily let out a breath as the first ward snapped back into place, seemingly unaware of being warped out of shape. The second ward did nothing in response. As far as Emily could tell, they’d made it through without being detected.
“The gates are locked,” Rudolf observed, as Emily caught her breath. She was sweating, despite the cold. The effort had taken more out of her than she’d expected. “But we could climb the walls.”
Emily looked up at the smooth stone and shivered. Sergeant Miles had taught her how to climb – she’d been up and down structures she would have sworn were impossible to climb before his training – but the walls of the castle seemed too dangerous to risk. One gust of wind and they would be sent falling to their deaths. But there was no way through the gates either, she realized, grimly. The guards would know they’d broken through the wards and alert their superiors.
She took the bracelet off and placed it on the ground. Rudolf gave it a wary look, clearly expecting her to send the snake through the portcullis to kill the guards. Emily doubted it would work. The guards might well be innocent...and, in any case, the wards would probably monitor their condition. She dared not make any assumptions about what the wards would or would not consider alarming. Mother Holly wasn’t a properly-trained magician.
The best swordsman in the world doesn’t fear the second best, Sergeant Miles had said. He fears the worst, because he doesn’t know what the idiot will do.
Emily looked up at the battlements. It was hard to be sure, but there didn’t look to be any guards up there. But then, in this weather they were probably hiding in the guardhouse. She shaped a plan in her mind, then looked at Rudolf. Some magicians would have pushed ahead without asking, but she knew how badly it would hurt him if she did. She wasn’t one of those magicians.
“I can turn you into something small, then turn myself into a bird and carry us both up there,” she said. She would have to carry the snake-bracelet in any case. Transfiguring something into one form and then into another could have dangerous side effects. They’d been taught never to do it, unless there was no other choice. “Unless you really think you can climb up there?”
Rudolf looked torn. Emily left him to think about it while she buried the grimoire, then left a couple of protective and concealment spells to ensure that it remained unharmed – and undiscovered. Like most people, Rudolf probably dreaded the thought of being transfigured, particularly as he had no way to reverse the spell himself. But climbing up the walls might prove impossible. If Mother Holly had established wards, she might have worked a few nasty surprises into the walls, too. Whitehall certainly had a few tricks to deter students from climbing the walls.
“Do it,” he said.
Emily felt a surge of respect and admiration as she cast the spell. Rudolf shank and became a small statue of himself. Emily gritted her teeth, then sat down and cast the second spell. Her vision warped and twisted; she closed her eyes too late to stop her seeing feathers growing out of her hands. When she opened them again, she was staring through the eyes of a hawk.
She picked up the bracelet in her beak, then the statue in one claw and took off, feeling the winds gusting around her. The hawk’s mind seemed to love the thunderstorm, even though Emily’s human awareness was tempted to panic. She’d never flown before coming to Whitehall, but being on a dragon’s back was far superior to flying under her own power. Maybe it would have been different if she’d been able to fly on a broom.
The hawk’s mind screamed at her as she dropped towards the battlements, sweeping the stonework with eyes that were so sharp she could see tiny marks on the stone. It didn’t like trying to land, but Emily forced it down. She didn’t dare let go of herself, not now. It wasn’t possible to protect her mind from a spell she’d cast on herself. If she fell into the hawk’s mind, no one would ever see her again.
There were no guards on the battlements, she realized, as she finally forced the hawk to land and released the spell. She slipped, almost at once, and barely managed to catch herself before either dropping her cargo or falling over the edge. The hawk’s eyes had seen the battlements as more than large enough to protect her, but in truth they were barely larger than something from a model village. Desperately, Emily crawled forward until she was lying on flat stone. The designer of the castle, she realized, hadn’t really given any thought to protecting the soldiers on the roof. They might be blown off by a gust of wind if they got careless.
Carefully, she returned the bracelet to her wrist and released the spell on Rudolf, using a minor sticking hex to hold him in place until he had gathered himself, his eyes wide and staring. Emily felt a shiver of guilt, which she ruthlessly suppressed. Rudolf wasn’t unaware that he lived in a world where magicians could turn men into swine with a wave of their hands, but he’d never experienced anything
like this until now. How could he take it in stride? But there had been no alternative...
“The guardhouse,” Rudolf said. He pointed towards a small stone hut; Emily couldn’t help thinking of a penthouse perched on top of a skyscraper. “The stairs will be hidden inside.”
Slipping and sliding, they made their way to the door. Rudolf opened it – and came face to face with a guard. He cocked his fist as Emily readied a spell, then hesitated. The guard was standing still, as if he was utterly unaware of their presence. He didn’t even show any reaction as Rudolf waved a hand in front of his face.
“He’s under a spell,” Emily said, softly. “I don’t think he can see us.”
Rudolf gave her a sharp look. “Are you sure of that?”
“...No,” Emily admitted.
She studied the guard’s blank expression thoughtfully. There were upper-level obedience and loyalty spells that were so powerful that they damaged their victim’s mind, leaving them little more than robots, even if they had been forced to accept the spells. Could Mother Holly have enchanted the whole castle? It would be simple enough, Emily decided, assuming that the hedge witch had long lost any moral objections she might have had to taking someone’s free will. Lady Easter could just have called her guards in, one by one, to be enchanted.
But is she doing it of her own free will, Emily wondered, or is she merely the first victim?
“Leave him,” she said. She braced herself, then squeezed past the guard, uncomfortably aware of his body pressing against hers. He showed no reaction at all. “Hurry.”
Rudolf followed her as she found the stairwell leading down into the castle. It looked almost painfully cramped, just like some of the stairwells in Zangaria. An attacking force that happened to get over the walls would still have to advance one by one into the castle itself. And they probably couldn’t swing their swords properly inside the stairwell.
“Let me take the lead,” Rudolf said. “You’re probably more capable of helping me then I am of helping you.”
Emily watched as he stepped into the stairwell, then followed, feeling claustrophobic as the stairs led down and down. There was almost no lighting, leaving her feeling her way forward. If she’d worn a dress, she might well have tripped and fallen down the stairs.
By the time they reached the bottom, she was on the verge of creating another light globe and to hell with stealth. Rudolf sucked in his breath sharply as he stepped out into another guardroom. There were more guards waiting for them. But they didn’t move.
“They’re under a spell, too,” Rudolf said.
Emily nodded as she followed him out into the guardroom. There were five men, wearing light suits of armor, standing in the room. They showed no reaction to the intruders, not even when Emily walked over to the other door and opened it. Outside, she saw a servant marching through the corridor, eyes as blank and unseeing as the guards. She couldn’t help thinking of the Borg from Star Trek. They’d ignored intruders on their starships until the intruders had posed a threat.
“I could smuggle an entire army past them,” Rudolf muttered, as he joined her in the corridor. “What’s the point of keeping them all under control like this?”
Emily shrugged. “A magician wouldn’t need an army,” she said, although she knew it wasn’t strictly accurate. Shadye had produced an army of monsters to attack Whitehall. “But if these guards are loyal to Lady Easter, they might react badly if they knew she was under outside control.”
The interior of the castle wasn’t as bare as Lord Gorham’s castle. Tapestries hung everywhere, each one showing an achievement of Lady Easter and her three daughters. Emily would have thought they were propaganda if it hadn’t been for the fact that no one outside the castle staff would see them. Or maybe the guards and soldiers were expected to admire them and understand that while Lady Easter had the body of a weak and feeble woman, she had the skill and determination to do well by her tiny kingdom.
Would that have been enough, Emily asked herself, if Rudolf had married one of her daughters? Or would the guards have switched their loyalty to him at once?
They stopped when they reached a large chamber. A throne, painted gold, sat at one end, while a large stone table was placed in the center of the room. Emily froze as she heard singing, then dragged Rudolf to one side, hastily casting concealment spells over them both. As long as they were quiet, she muttered, they should remain undetected.
It was only just in time.
Chapter Thirty-Six
THREE GIRLS LED THE WAY, WEARING long white dresses that were tied around their waists with rune-sewn cloths. All three of them were singing softly, chanting words that Emily didn’t recognize, their faces blank and almost motionless. There was something about their appearance that reminded Emily of Alassa, save for the birthmarks all three of them had on their faces, just below their left eyes. Lady Easter’s daughters, Emily guessed.
Rudolf tensed beside her. His father had tried to force him into marriage with a brainwashed girl.
He’d described the oldest girl as ugly. Emily didn’t see it; the oldest girl looked plain, but very far from ugly. Her face was pale, as if she hadn’t seen the sun since the day she was born, while long dark hair cascaded down her back. The white dress, almost translucent, revealed that her breasts were high and firm, bigger than both of her sisters. Emily suspected, rather cynically, that if Rudolf hadn’t been homosexual he would have found far fewer complaints about the marriage.
The two younger girls weren’t really prettier, she decided. One of them had dark hair too, while the other had red hair that hung down to her shoulders. Unlike her sisters, she didn’t seem to want to go in for the long hair that was traditional for aristocrats, probably deciding that it was a pain to wash. Emily privately suspected that the fashion was just another way to control women; they were forced to spend hours washing and dressing or they wouldn’t look fashionable. Thankfully, magic made personal grooming a great deal easier.
She watched as the three girls, still singing, came to a halt beside the stone table. Moments later, an older woman entered, her back as straight and stiff as a board. Emily glanced into her eyes, very briefly, and saw a furious struggle taking place inside the older woman’s mind. Lady Easter wasn’t a willing participant in what was going on, she realized numbly. Mother Holly had laid compulsion spell after compulsion spell on her until it was a miracle she could still resist, even if only mentally. Her body did as it was commanded by the hedge witch.
Lady Easter sat on her throne, eyes locked on the stone table. Emily studied her for a long moment, wondering if she dared try to cancel the spells, then turned her attention back to the entrance, just in time to see a young girl enter. She looked to be about twelve, young enough to be innocent, old enough to be poised on the edge of womanhood. Like the others, she wore a long white dress, her face scrubbed clean, then carefully made up by experts. There was a vacant expression on her face that suggested she was drugged rather than under any form of magical compulsion. Emily gritted her teeth as the girl inched towards the stone table, then was helped to climb onto the stone by the three daughters.
The magic field rippled suddenly as Mother Holly entered the room. Emily had never seen her before, but she couldn’t be anyone else. She walked like an old woman, she had the face of an old woman, yet her body seemed to be middle-aged at most. Rudolf trembled beside Emily, either in fear or in anger, and she caught his arm before he could do something stupid.
She focused her attention on Mother Holly. Why did she look so old? Emily puzzled over it for a long moment before deciding the rituals that stripped children of their life force had been misapplied. Or maybe Mother Holly just wasn’t vain enough to try to rejuvenate her face as well as her body. There were sorceresses who didn’t care about their appearance, just as there were sorceresses who wasted hours rejuvenating themselves or applying careful glamors.
But there was something deeply wrong with the old woman, she realized. Her face twisted cons
tantly, moving from a faintly regretful expression to an expression that delighted in the pain and fear she was inflicting. The woman’s hands twitched constantly, as if she was on the verge of casting a spell, while her long white hair moved in odd patterns. Emily couldn’t help thinking of gorgons, except there were no snakes in place of hair. There was nothing, as far as she knew, that could account for such an effect. Maybe she was having a reaction to all the magic she was using.
Mother Holly walked up to the throne, passing close enough to the hidden couple to touch, then turned and faced the table. Two guards appeared, both wearing black robes, carrying Lady Barb between them. Emily had to cover her mouth to stifle a horrified gasp. Lady Barb had been beaten bloody, then chained so heavily that she could barely stand upright -- hands cuffed behind her back, chains encircling her ankles. And a nasty, but familiar, scent wafted over the room...
Emily cursed mentally as she realized what must have happened. There was a potion that damped a person’s magic, at least for a few hours, rendering them helpless. Emily had been forced to drink it, two years ago.
They forced her to drink it, she thought, fighting to keep from springing out to help her mentor. They wouldn’t have been able to batter her halfway to death if they hadn’t stolen her magic...
She shuddered. And now Lady Barb had no magic, not as long as they kept forcing her to drink the potion...
She switched her attention to the guards, resisting the urge to leap out and attack the old witch. One of them looked as blank as the other guards, obeying orders robotically, while the other seemed to be practically shaking with horror. Emily looked into his eyes and realized that the guard had seen terrible things. She wondered if they could count on him as a possible ally, but dismissed the thought. The guard was too terrified to do anything but watch helplessly, no matter what happened.
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