“Mother Holly was a necromancer,” Lady Barb said, without bothering with the formalities. “She lost control of her powers and released her stolen magic, causing a massive explosion.”
Emily blinked in surprise, then understood. There had to be some kind of cover story, even if it wasn’t entirely believable. But anyone who might recognize the holes in the tale wouldn’t believe what they heard, at least unless they walked into the mountains and inspected the blast site for themselves. For the locals, people largely ignorant of magic, there was no reason to doubt Lady Barb’s explanation.
“That is understandable,” Lady Easter said. “She was always known to be unstable.”
You weren’t that brave when she was a real threat, Emily thought, vindictively. You were under her control from start to finish.
She scowled. In her own twisted way, Mother Holly had been an idealist – not too different from Emily herself. Like Emily, she’d discovered the tools to change things...and put them to use, without any of the scruples Emily liked to think she would show. But the real world didn’t respond well to idealism, let alone attempts to force it to go in a specific direction. If Emily tried to force things forward too fast...
The thought chilled her. She’d seen, in Zangaria and elsewhere, the effects of comparatively minor innovations she’d introduced. And she’d seen how far the old order was prepared to go to resist change. What would happen, she asked herself, when old and new clashed openly again? And how much of that would be her fault? Maybe King Randor was right in trying to co-opt those who had benefited from the changes, but he was riding a tiger. What would happen when he fell off?
Mother Holly only knew the bad, she thought, remembering what she’d been told. No one had visited the hedge witch unless they were desperate. Mother Holly had never had any balance, let alone a detached view...but then, it was hard to have a detached view when one was directly involved. And then there had been her simplistic attempt to steer the course of the mountains...
“We will gladly forbid anyone from entering the valley,” Lady Easter said. “And we thank you for your assistance.”
Emily frantically dragged her attention back to the here and now, silently relieved that Lady Barb hadn’t been looking at her. Not paying attention in her classes could be unfortunate.
“You’re welcome,” Lady Barb said, dryly. “But you might want to consider how much blame you bear for this disaster.”
Lord Gorham gaped in surprise. “Blame we bear?”
Emily was equally surprised. She looked at Lady Barb’s back, wondering just what she was thinking – and why? It wasn’t like Lady Barb to bend the rules on limiting interference with local politics...although, with a necromancer involved, the rules had probably gone out of the window long ago.
“Your families – you aristocrats – have been exploiting your people since you killed your former monarch,” Lady Barb said, sharply. “Even without Mother Holly, the resentment and rage was staggeringly powerful. I would have expected an explosion, sooner or later, even without a necromancer becoming involved. And now you have been proven to be vulnerable.”
Lord Gorham didn’t understand, Emily saw, and Lady Easter didn’t seem to agree with Lady Barb. But Rudolf was nodding his head in quiet understanding, while Lady Easter’s daughters seemed to be mulling it over. A few months of being slaves in all but name had taught them a few lessons. They’d just have to see if they remembered the lessons now they were free.
She felt a moment of hope. The next generation of aristocracy would have a chance to reshape their country without a violent revolution. But only time would tell.
“But...they are ours,” Lord Gorham said, finally. He didn’t understand at all. Emily remembered that he’d lined up extra-pretty maids for his son, expecting Rudolf to make love to them, and shuddered. “We are their masters.”
“They don’t see it that way,” Lady Barb said. She sighed. “Not that I really expected you to understand.”
She stood straighter, then bowed to the aristocrats. “My apprentice and I will return to Whitehall,” she added. “I would request that you prepare reports of your own for the White Council. They will want an explanation of what took place here.”
“It will be done,” Lord Gorham said.
Lady Barb turned and strode out of the temple. Emily followed her, unwilling to spend any more time looking at the aristocrats. Rudolf followed her, then called out as he left the temple. Emily hesitated, then turned back to speak with him.
“I wanted to thank you,” he said. “You saved more than just my life and...”
Emily understood. Rudolf had at least a chance at a happy life, which was more than he’d had before Mother Holly started playing games. She doubted it would be easy, but it would be possible to make it work.
“You’re welcome,” she said, toying with the bracelet at her wrist. “And thank you for coming with me. I might not have made it without you.”
Rudolf beamed. Emily remembered Imaiqah’s advice for talking to young men – praise them endlessly – and smiled, inwardly. Imaiqah had definitely had a point. Maybe, just maybe, Emily would risk a date with someone at Whitehall. Or maybe it would take longer to overcome her fears.
“The offer...well...the offer has to be closed,” Rudolf said. He looked as though he expected her to blast him on the spot – or turn him back into a slug and stamp on him. “I’m sorry.”
It took Emily a moment to realize what he was talking about – and then she started to giggle helplessly. Rudolf had asked her to marry him, partly in jest...and even though she’d declined, the offer was technically still open. But he’d had second thoughts when he’d seen just how much she could do, just like Jade. She shook her head, feeling amusement rather than rejection. It helped that she’d never seriously considered his offer.
“I hope you find someone suitable,” she said. The thought of her giving relationship advice to anyone was ludicrous, yet there was no one else who could say what had to be said. His father certainly wouldn’t. “But remember what I said and be honest with her.”
“I will do my best,” Rudolf said. He reached out and gave her a short, brotherly hug. “Goodbye, Millie.”
Oddly, Emily didn’t feel worried or disturbed by his touch. She wondered, briefly, what he would say if she told him the truth. If society pages had reached this far from their kingdoms, he had to have heard of the Necromancer’s Bane. But she knew she didn’t want the attention, so she said nothing. Instead, she curtseyed to him and turned back towards the guesthouse. Lady Barb was waiting for her at the end of the street.
“You did very well,” Lady Barb said, as they started to walk. “I’m sorry about your staff.”
“I don’t mind losing it,” Emily assured her. The brief moment of panic when she’d feared that she’d lost the ability to cast spells without a staff for good had been terrifying. “If I hadn’t taken it...”
“You might well be dead,” Lady Barb told her, bluntly. “Young Lady...”
Emily looked up at her, puzzled and alarmed. “You are in training to be a combat sorceress, not an obedient servant,” Lady Barb said. “Yes, I set rules for you, and yes, I am quite prepared to punish you when you make the wrong choice – but you need to develop a sense for when those rules can be put aside. Taking the staff was the right thing to do at the right time. It saved your life, and mine, too.”
She patted Emily on the back, then sighed. “We’re going to have to cut our trip short,” she added. Her voice suggested that she wasn’t too pleased. She’d enjoyed the walking from settlement to settlement, helping the people who needed help. “The Grandmaster will need to see us both, I think.”
“I’m sorry,” Emily said.
Lady Barb poked her arm, none-too-gently. “And how much of what happened here was actually your fault?”
Emily flushed. It wasn’t, not really. Mother Holly hadn’t been driven to necromancy by anything Emily had done; hell, she’d been on the slippery sl
ope a long time before Emily had entered the Allied Lands. Madness would have overwhelmed her, sooner or later, and then the mountains would have been drenched in blood. And, once she’d killed everyone in the mountains to feed her power, she would have descended into the surrounding countryside.
“None of it,” she said, finally.
“Right answer,” Lady Barb said. She sounded pleased. “But here’s something else you can think about, if you like.”
She pushed open the door to the guesthouse, then closed it once Emily had stepped inside and set a privacy ward. “Skulls of Memories are not entirely common,” she said, once the ward was in place. “And that book was pretty close to unique.”
Emily nodded. The book might still be buried – or it might have been destroyed by the blast, leaving one fewer copy in the Allied Lands. She would have to go and check before they left the town. If it was still intact, it was hers. She wouldn’t use the spells, but she wouldn’t give it up either. It was a book. The thought of destroying it herself was unthinkable.
“Someone gave them to her,” Lady Barb added. There was a grim note in her voice, a promise of trouble for the future. “But who? And why?”
“Maybe she stole them,” Emily suggested. “Void told me that a necromancer was killed on the other side of the mountains. Mother Holly was good at misdirection...”
“Hardly enough to kill a necromancer, certainly not one who had been a necromancer for years,” Lady Barb interrupted. “So who gave her the tools?”
Emily had no answer.
“And just what,” Lady Barb concluded, “did they have in mind?”
Chapter Forty
"IT WOULD SEEM CONGRATULATIONS ARE IN ORDER,” the Grandmaster said, heavily. His sightless eyes sought out Emily. “Congratulations, Necromancer’s Bane.”
Emily flushed and squirmed in her chair. It had taken three days to ride back to a place where they could step through a portal to Whitehall, but word had somehow spread ahead of them. Somehow, the Allied Lands knew that it had been her who’d killed a second necromancer, although they didn’t seem to know precisely how. Thankfully, the cover story about the explosion had held up to scrutiny.
“Thank you,” she said, finally. The last thing she wanted was more fame, followed by increasingly absurd rumors about just what she’d done to Mother Holly. But, in this case, absurd rumors would probably be better than the truth. “Who told the world?”
“I wish I knew,” the Grandmaster said. He looked down at his hands. It struck Emily, suddenly, that for all his power he was a very old man. “No one I have spoken to has been able to answer that question.”
He shook his head. “But we are grateful for your work,” he added. “You saved thousands of lives.”
Emily nodded, although she had her doubts. Neither she nor Lady Barb had been able to find anything suggesting radiation damage, which meant...what? Had there been no radiation, or was the damage just beyond their ability to detect? She played with a strand of her hair miserably, wondering if the first sign of real trouble would be her hair falling out. There was no way to know.
But if there was radiation, she knew, it would have been swept up into the ecosystem and then deposited on the ground by rainfall. God alone knew what the long-term effects would be.
“We would like to know what happened,” Lady Barb said, from behind Emily. “The explosion was more devastating than any recorded necromancer death.”
“It shouldn’t be talked about,” Emily said, carefully. “There are too many dangers in revealing anything.”
She hesitated, then added three words. “It was small.”
The nuke-spell wasn’t that complicated, she knew. All it would take to cast it was a single magician with bad intentions and enough power to make the spell work. If deployed properly, it could end the necromantic threat overnight...and then rip the Allied Lands apart in the aftermath. It normally took a ritual to perform a Working of Mass Destruction, as Emily had come to think of them. But with the nuke-spell, a single magician could take out an entire city.
“Then we shall tell them that it is a specialist skill of yours, should anyone ask,” the Grandmaster said. He gave her a long considering look, his hidden eyes twitching. “Did you enjoy your trip otherwise?”
Emily had to fight to hide a giggle. She’d broken up with Jade – if what they’d had could be considered a real relationship. She’d helped a girl to go to Whitehall or another school of magic. She’d seen mundane horrors she couldn’t prevent, she’d almost been raped by a village lout, she’d nursed Lady Barb when she’d fallen ill...
But there had been parts of the trip that had been almost enjoyable. Seeing the countryside, learning new magic with Lady Barb...generally, the parts of the trip that hadn’t involved other people.
“It had its moments,” she said, finally.
“You’ve grown up a little,” the Grandmaster added. He smiled at her. “That’s always good to see.”
Metaphorically in his case, Emily assumed. Although, when magic was involved, it was hard to be sure. She had no idea why the Grandmaster tolerated his own blindness when he could have had his eyes rebuilt. Perhaps losing his sight was the price of his power.
“Thank you,” she said. She looked down at her hands, clasped in her lap. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to go back to my room and sleep.”
“Understandable, but unnecessary,” the Grandmaster said. “I have taken the liberty of moving you into a private room, at least for the summer. You won’t be supervised – well, not any closer than students are normally supervised. I suggest you behave yourself.”
“And restrict your experiments,” Lady Barb added. “We can discuss a program of further study tomorrow.”
Emily sighed, but nodded. There had never been a time in her life when she hadn’t had to work, either at school or looking after herself. She’d always envied the children who talked about lazing around all summer. They didn’t know how lucky they were.
But then, most of Whitehall’s students weren’t that lucky. Alassa had to learn how to rule, Imaiqah had to assist her family, and the Gorgon...she shook her head, thoughtfully. Just what did the Gorgon do over the summer?
“It wouldn’t be legal to take the book from you,” the Grandmaster added. “But I would advise you to make sure it is secure.”
“I’ve put it in my trunk,” Emily assured him. “I’ll add additional wards to Cockatrice before moving it there.”
“And don’t read it here,” Lady Barb said, firmly. “People could get the wrong impression.”
“I understand,” Emily said, as she rose to her feet. “And thank you for everything.”
“Mistress Irene will show you to your room,” the Grandmaster said. “And one other thing?”
Emily tensed, suspiciously.
“I suggest – very strongly – that you don’t tell anyone about your new pet,” the Grandmaster said. “It would only upset people.”
Emily looked down at the bracelet wrapped around her wrist. She could hide it, she knew; it wasn’t as if Third Year students were expected to waste time trying to find familiars. Either they found one in Second Year or they assumed that they weren’t likely to find an animal that clicked with them. But it felt wrong to be keeping something from her friends.
And yet, she knew the grandmaster had a point. There were students who had bonded with wolves or even tigers, but familiars were generally smart enough not to hurt anyone unintentionally. The Death Viper, on the other hand, would be lethal to anyone apart from Emily herself. There was no way she could risk letting it curl up on her pillow to sleep next to her.
“I won’t,” she promised. It made one hell of a secret weapon, she had to admit. “No one will hear about it from me.”
Lady Barb gave her a sharp look, then nodded.
Emily nodded back and left the room. Outside, she sagged, feeling sweat trickling down her back. The world had changed and, once again, she’d made it happen.
Mot
her Holly could have been you, a voice whispered at the back of her head. If things had been a little different...
“Welcome back, Emily,” Mistress Irene said. Emily hastily pulled herself back upright and tried to look attentive. In or outside classes, Mistress Irene was a stickler for good appearance and behavior. “I’ll show you to your room. Dinner will be at seventeen bells precisely.”
“Thank you,” Emily said.
The room turned out to be bigger than she’d expected, slightly more colorful than the barren rooms she’d shared with her roommates. She placed her bag on a hard wooden desk, then sat down on the bed and stared down at her hands. Her emotions churned through her head, mocking her. She’d done well, she knew she’d done well, but she didn’t really know where it would all end.
There were a handful of letters placed on her pillow, sealed with simple charms that would destroy them if the wrong person tried to tear them open. She opened the first one with her fingernail, then pulled out the sheet of paper – they’d improved the quality, she noted – and read it quickly. Imaiqah’s letter was bright and chatty, but said almost nothing of substance. There was just a note that she would tell Emily everything when they met in person. Emily wondered what had happened to her, then dismissed the thought. She’d find out soon enough.
The next letter was from Bryon. Emily skimmed it without paying much attention; it merely noted that he’d spoken to both the Faire Master and Paren, Imaiqah’s father, about the planning for the Faire next year. Emily nodded to herself, deciding that she could leave the matter in his capable hands, then moved on to the third letter. The Gorgon talked briefly about living in the village, then to a discussion of magical theory that would be better shared with Aloha. Emily read it anyway, making a handful of notes for later research in the library. At least there wouldn’t be any other students trying to compete with her for scarce books.
Work Experience (Schooled in Magic Book 4) Page 38