Traitor Savant (Second Seal of the Duelists)

by Giacomo, Jasmine

  Tarin looked between Calder and the three who were heading into the maze, but said nothing. Her eyes were wide.

  Taban held his hands up and stepped back. “Barmy, the lot of you.” Everyone looked at him. Bayan felt his guts clench. Was Taban about to shout everything to witten Oost and get Bayan’s whole hex potioneered? “But secretly barmy,” Taban added. He locked his lips with an imaginary key.

  Bayan turned toward the rock face at the far end of the meditation garden. “I hope you change your mind, Calder, for your sake. After all, if witten Oost is so good and kind, he surely wouldn’t harm you for visiting his office and trying a nut.”

  Without looking back, he summoned Timbool from the rock face. The giant stone dog crouched down, and Bayan, Eward, and Kiwani climbed into his back and descended into the mountain.

  ~~~

  Calder stalked back along the road toward campus. Tarin could almost see the steam gushing from his ears. Knowing Calder’s history with smiling villains, she felt he had a right to his feelings. But more and more, she was beginning to doubt the necessity of the extreme line he’d taken because of them. “Did you really try to kill Treinfhir?”

  He didn’t answer for a long moment. His eyes stayed on the road ahead. “Aye.”

  Resisting the urge to ask the obvious, Tarin said instead, “I want to go to Master witten Oost’s office. I want to make sure, one way or the other.”

  Calder glared at her. “How can you think Bayan’s in any way right about that barbarian?”

  She glared back. “This is too important to be wrong about, Calder Micarron! That’s all I’m saying. Don’t you put words in my mouth. I’m not your enemy. And deep down, you know Bayan isn’t either. Stop being a bloody-minded idiot, and either stand behind your proof or admit you’re wrong.”

  “You’d be wrong too.”

  “Aye, and I’d admit it! It’s a scary proposition, that someone like Master witten Oost would do the terrible things Bayan accused him of. But someone kidnapped Kiwani. If even half of the rest of Bayan’s accusations are real, I don’t want to be in the dark about it. Do you really want to be right more than you want to be safe?”

  “Master witten Oost thinks it’s Langlaren who’s behind all of this. He’s a Hexmagic Duelist, and he’s been around campus a long time. Can you really see someone putting together all this detail only to frame someone else? What a waste of time!”

  “Look, come with me or don’t,” Tarin said. “I’m going.” To her relief, Calder sullenly tagged along behind her, though his face looked like that of a schoolboy who’d just had his lunch stolen by his archenemies. No matter what they found in the master’s office, she didn’t want the hex split any further.

  As they approached the Hall of Seals, she detoured toward the side entrance leading toward the headmaster’s office.

  “What if he’s in, aye?” Calder whispered as they paused in the wide wooden hallway.

  “He’s not in. Right after Kiwani told me to come with her to meet Bayan, we passed him and Instructor de Rood talking outside the History classroom stairwell. He was saying he couldn’t speak to the newniks about their test results until this evening because he would be off-campus for an urgent meeting.”

  Calder frowned, despite his resistance to her idea. “Off-campus? How’s he going to manage that?”

  “Sints only know. Maybe Bayan’s right about that, too, and he’s off through a Singer’s portal.” She reached the master’s office door at the end of the hallway. It was locked. She considered her options on how to get inside without leaving any trace. “We could use a Singer right about now.”

  Calder rolled his eyes and performed the Elemental Invocation, possibly about to attempt a Woodcast on the door. Tarin would never know, since his magic failed to appear.

  “Steel,” she whispered. Slowly and with wide-eyed care, she stepped away from the wall into the center of the hallway. Were those mouldings along the top of the hallway concealing the vicious little balls? Were they in the sconces?

  Calder pressed close, eyeing the ceiling like a mouse hoping to be still enough to avoid the cat’s jaws. “Bloody sints.”

  Tarin lowered her chin and gazed at the locked door. “There’s just one way in. We have to do unfocused magic, like Bayan said.”

  “I am not doing anything of the sort.”

  Tarin’s nostrils flared. “Then step back, you bloody coward. The Mistress of Flame is not afraid of a little unfocus.”

  Calder backed down the center of the hall. Tarin caught herself beginning the Elemental Invocation despite her intent not to. She gritted her teeth at the force of her habit. She scrubbed her hands through the air, licked her lips, and tried again. Very carefully, she performed the motions of Dry Rot.

  A large section of the door before her crumbled to powdery fragments, allowing her passage. Raising her chin, she gave a sniff of smug satisfaction.

  Calder thudded up behind her, aghast. “What did you do, you great stupid filly? He’s sure to see that mess!”

  Tarin ignored his outrage. “I did do a fine job, didn’t I? My first unfocused magic in years, and it was flawless.”

  Calder made claws of helpless frustration with his hands.

  “Go find the nut bowl already,” she said. “For all we know, his magic can tell him that I just broke his door. Guilty or innocent, he willna like it.” Not that I care right now. What a feeling! I can do magic around steel!

  Calder stalked past her with his lips in a thin pale line. She followed him inside and headed toward the decorative shelves holding Master witten Oost’s treasured knickknacks and collectibles, searching for a bowl of nuts.

  “If we find what Bayan says we’ll find,” Calder said, “what’s your next move?”

  “My plan? This was Bayan’s idea,” she shot back. After a few moments’ thought, she added, “I’d go to Langlaren. He may not be the headmaster anymore, but he’ll know what to do—and if Master witten Oost isn’t what he says he is, it’ll be Langlaren’s job to do it.”

  “Fair enough, for a theory.” Calder’s voice rose from behind Master witten Oost’s enormous desk. “Here, I think I found them.” He slid a wooden bowl onto the top of the desk, then stood up and stared down at the fat brown walnuts inside.

  Tarin approached. “There are only a few. I thought there were more than a dozen last time.”

  Calder gave her a frown that doubted her intelligence. “They’re nuts. He probably ate them.”

  Tarin noticed sweat at Calder’s temples despite the cool room. “You’re afraid. You’re afraid you’ll actually be wrong, and that Bayan will, what, hate you? Never speak to you again? Think you’re a naïve little boy?” His hot stare told her she’d guessed right. “He willna. Bayan’s your best friend. If there’s anyone we should have been trusting all along, it’s probably him,” she finished in a quiet voice.

  “Let’s find out once and for all who’s the naïve little boy and who’s the clever git, then, shall we?” Calder’s mouth twisted in bitterness. He fumbled through a couple of aborted invocations before casting his avatar summoning in the steel-warded room. Marblenose coalesced on the strength of a single spell, far smaller than usual. The heavy white marble collection appeared out of thin air and thudded onto the wooden floor, making it creak. Calder Idled him toward the bowl of nuts. Marblenose picked up one of the walnuts with fingers that looked like strings of pearls. The avatar rolled the walnut onto his palm, cupping it in the central divot among the marbles that formed his hand. With a swift, crushing motion, Marblenose’s hand clamped shut, crushing the shell and exposing to the air what lay within.

  Marblenose crumbled. His white spheres shattered in midair, and his fragments scored and cracked the wooden floor in the moment before he vanished entirely from the room. In the avatar’s place, a single steel ball thudded to the battered wooden planks. It rolled down a crack and came to rest against Calder’s boot. He froze, staring wide-eyed at the abomination against his foot. He didn’t
even seem to breathe.

  Tarin’s eyes locked on the little ball of forbidden metal. “Oh, sints.”

  Like a statue coming to life, Calder jerked into motion. He snatched up the tiny sphere and bolted for the door. He snagged Tarin’s hand with his and yanked her out the rotted door.

  “But Calder, I have to fix—”

  “Nae. Too late. It’s all too late. Our only hope is to get to Langlaren before Master witten Oost realizes what we’ve done.” They reached the door that led out of the Hall of Seals. Calder leaped down the entire staircase in one jump and landed on the broad stone porch. He thrust a misty ball of pale blue energy at the sky and leaped again, coming down on Honker’s back. “Fly, Tarin!”

  Tarin wrenched her passion under control and shoved her terror aside. With a swirl of soft blues, Mistbow, her first avatar, slammed a Chinook spell to the ground, hurling Tarin airborne across the turnaround in close pursuit of Calder. Wind sheeted through her hair. We can throw ourselves through the skies with the power of magic, but we’re just now learning we’re pawns on the Master’s board. Do we still have time to counter?

  Before the Octet

  Tala infused light into the stifling air of the black room, but its sudden presence made Doc Theo wince. She dimmed it further, though she could barely see.

  “Father?” She stumbled over the unfamiliar form of address. “Something terrible is going on at the Duelist Academy. Bayan learned a bookful of secrets from our library, and now he’s gone back to tell the others what he found. He said the secrets told him that someone named Master witten Oost was a liar. He wanted me to ask you why you had to leave that campus. Did it have anything to do with Master witten Oost?”

  Doc Theo—her father, she reminded herself—let out a long, slow breath. He rubbed a hand over several days’ worth of spiky gray stubble. “Tricky thing, memory. There’s a lot about my last days at the Academy that I cain’t recall much of. I do remember arguing with witten Oost. A lot. We never did get on well. He’d been coming in to the Chantery, or to my home late at night, for years, with strange injuries. He’d always ask for me, as if we had some special bond. That didn’t change after he became a Master Duelist, when all things should become possible. Even healing. You follow? I know he’s got his habits of holding his power back and all, but if your arm’s nearly severed, you probably should see to that yourself instead of walking across campus in the middle of the night. It just rubbed my mind wrong. He was hidin’ something, but I never did find out what.”

  “Bayan thinks that the First Singer must have either helped him discover the book that Bayan and I found behind a ward, or—”

  “Bayan dragged you through a ward?” Doc Theo’s tone carried a strong protective note.

  “I unlocked it. A sint gave him the keynote song. Bayan’s certain the First Singer has been helping witten Oost learn his old secrets. I don’t know why she’d do that, though. Bayan made the man sound dangerous. Do you think she’s in trouble?”

  Doc Theo shook his head with regret. “More than she knows. Something she said to me right before she locked me in here… I think she’s helping him because he’s twisted up her emotions.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that I think the First Singer of the Temple of Ten Thousand Harmonies is in love with Master Duelist Ignaas witten Oost. And that’s exactly how he wants it.”

  Tala gaped. “What can we do about it?”

  “There ain’t no cure for love, Tala, but it might help her think a little more clearly if we showed her that book you and Bayan found. Did Bayan take it with him?”

  “No, I portaled it somewhere safe.”

  “Good. Then it’s time we paid the First Singer a visit—as long as you understand, Tala, you could end up in here with me if things don’t work out.”

  Tala leaned forward, reaching for Doc Theo’s hand, and squeezed it. “Bhattara na.”

  ~~~

  Tala’s portal opened in front of the First Singer’s door, and she and Doc Theo stepped through from the oubliette. Doc Theo squinted against the relatively bright light in the hallway, scrubbing at his eyes with his knuckles.

  “Suddenly, I seem to need a bath,” he commented to himself, staring down at his dirt-encrusted brown robe. He reached for the handle to the door, but jerked it back as a ring of pale light appeared around the handle.

  “She has the ward up,” Tala said. “Not a problem.” She sang as quietly as she could, ending with the ear-piercingly high keynote. The ward faded, and Doc Theo thrust the door open and strode through. Tala hurried behind him.

  In main office area, Liselot de Vosen sat behind her desk, speaking to a ring of seated Octet members. Tala had seen them around campus and knew all their names, but being in their collective presence popped a nervous sweat onto her brow.

  “This recent information means we must step up our timetable—” The First Singer broke off and stood abruptly, glaring at the intruders. “How dare you barge in here? Who let you in? Was it Pherenike? I’ve already demoted her from the Octet on suspicion of subversive activity in the Chantery.” She turned to her coterie, who looked just as shocked and surprised as she did. “Or was it one of you? Don’t think I don’t know dissension when I see it! Sabotage, at this critical stage of our plan, is the lowest form of betrayal, and I will know who is humming the minor scale behind my back!”

  “Has she always been this paranoid?” Doc Theo asked. He was so calm. He could have been discussing what was for dinner. Uncertain looks passed among the choralists, and Kleon muttered behind his hand to Cigwe, who pursed her lips and nodded in agreement.

  Choralist Margaretha lowered her brows in disapproval, but at the First Singer. “No. Some of us wonder if she’s not breaking under the strain of her own plans.”

  “Oh, they’re not just her plans. You have told them of your partner, hain’t you, Liselot?”

  “Silence!” the First Singer called. Koen, Harmaas, and Gennadios stood and breathed deeply. Tala paled. Were they going to sing at her and Doc Theo?

  Cedric, first among the Octet, said, “Nae, let us hear. We have that right. None of us could have broken this man out of his cell. We’ve all been right here.”

  Doc Theo spoke quickly. “Liselot is receiving her instructions from Master witten Oost at the Duelist Academy. She’s his love-puppet.”

  Universal outcry burst forth. Most of the Octet’s outrage was directed at Doc Theo, who backed away from their aggressive shouts and pointed fingers, keeping Tala behind him. Some of them, however, turned their questions on the First Singer, whose face was rigid and white with anger.

  The First Singer put her hands on her desk and leaned forward. “It’s a partnership, you fools! Together, we can change the empire! Together, we will sculpt the future! This isn’t a lopsided master-and-slave relationship—I will not answer that personal question. It has no bearing on—no, I will not!”

  Doc Theo shot Tala a worried glance. The room was dissolving into two sides of an argument, neither side of which had or would provide proof. “Sing.”

  Tala took her crystals out of her belt, balanced them in their delicate stands, and began to sing a portal. The shouting receded, her fears faded. The song was all, for a brief, glorious moment. No one aside from Doc Theo even seemed to notice her spell until her portal opened before her. The room suddenly went quiet. Everyone turned to stare at her.

  “Where did you get those illicit crystals?” the First Singer demanded. “You haven’t even taken your competencies for Solo yet. How do you know that song?”

  Tala met the tall woman’s outraged gaze. “If you hadn’t noticed, this is the Temple of Ten Thousand Harmonies. Sound carries here. I have a very old book that will show all of you how the First Singer has been deceived by a man she trusts.” She shot a glance at Doc Theo and added, “What you do about it is your affair.”

  As she faced the open portal and refreshed its crystals, a young boy’s voice called out from far below. “The
re she is! I told you I wasn’t lying!”

  ~~~

  Mindo pointed up at the top of the rock pillar that supported the pitcher plant his family had named Gamay. “I told you there was a girl in the air.” Mindo’s father, Datu, looked up with a gape of surprise.

  “Bhattara. So it is.” His father, stocky with middle age, bearing snapping dark eyes and long black hair pulled into a crown tail, turned to his guest. “I am not imagining her, am I, Isagani?”

  The wealthy merchant from downtown Pangusay peered up at the girl, who looked down at them in confusion. His lips twitched in amusement. “She is comely, for an air dweller. Perhaps she is of Bhattara’s realm?”

  “Don’t joke, Father.” Imee rolled her eyes. Ever since she’d slapped Mindo’s brother, Bayan, and let the imperials take him away without a fight, Mindo had harbored a tight ball of resentment toward her. Out of respect for his brother, he’d even managed to keep it to himself, though he really wanted to stomp her into the Mambajao’s muddy banks with his bare feet. Imee continued in her airy voice. “You’ve heard of the Singers just as I have. Now, can we please get back to business? I don’t see why we even need to tell Datu that Dakila and I want to be married. I was never betrothed to Bayan, so there’s no promise being broken here.” She took Dakila, Bayan’s best friend and Mindo’s defensive arts teacher, by the hand with a coy smile, but Dakila looked troubled.

  “You all know Bayan?” asked the strange girl in the ring of light.

  “We do,” Mindo’s father said. Mindo heard longing in his voice, and felt it echo in his own heart. If Bayan could come home, maybe Mindo could stop learning how to run the farm. “He is my eldest son.”

  “Then ask Bhattara to watch over him. He’s in danger, fighting a subtle enemy at his Academy who used lies to gain power he did not deserve.”

  Without another word, she reached into some secret hollow and withdrew a wrapped object through the glowing circle. Then it closed, leaving everyone to stare at each other.