The Rise of Ren Crown

by Anne Zoelle

  He nodded to the group, then nodded again at someone speaking in his head. “Yes. Yes. Alternately, there will be at least three group activities tonight in every dorm quadrant for those who cannot think or talk about the events any further. The rec center in Dorm Thirty is already setting up for sports activities.”

  He shook his head again at someone mentally. “No, Lorraine is leading, not Jaxon.”

  His lips tightened for a moment before he took a breath. “He lost his roommate and best friend. He's on the immediate attention list—we'll have someone to him in the next hour. The rec center in Dorm Thirty-three is setting up for parlor, board, and card games later tonight. Magical Meditation will be available on Top Track. An all-around meeting to discuss logistics and scheduling for the next few days will take place in the open space in Dorm Twelve in ten minutes. Ronnie is bringing the updated emergency procedures document. People, it’s time to execute recovery plans. Campus is counting on it. See everyone in ten.”

  The students who had been whispering to each other in line and vibrating with anxious energy during announcements were the ones leading the charge on the Magiaduct. They had looked over their fellow students and simply thought, How can I help?

  I noticed a bright blonde head weaving between students. My hands twitched, their deadened nerve endings trying to reach and form a connection to the magic blazing from her.

  The girl I had healed.

  Recognition hit twice, then realization. There was a familial relationship between the boy who had preceded me through the arch—the one who had deliberately taken the hit intended for me and the girl I had saved on the battlefield. Siblings or cousins.

  She hurried onward, with a visible energy aura blazing around her like a beacon, toward Dorm Twelve. My hand covered my mouth shakily. At least my magic would help someone to somehow, piece the campus population back together. It didn't alleviate the crushing guilt and shame, but it made my determination stronger.

  I started moving again, my steps a little shaky.

  Will, Mike, Delia, Trick, Saf, Dagfinn, and Lifen were somewhere in the Visiting Center with thousands of others. Their parents, like all parents in the Second Layer, had to be absolutely mad with terror.

  I'd seen it on the adults' faces, in the projections that Godfrey had displayed on the battlefield.

  I was so tired of seeing terror.

  I made it back to my dorm room, drawing only a minimum amount of attention—people were too concerned with getting somewhere themselves. Once they weren't concerned with that, though...

  Shutting the door behind me, I leaned heavily against it. The silence was overwhelming.

  I stared blankly at the walls of our room.

  Though extremely active in her legal communities, Olivia had usually been here when I arrived home. Elegantly hunched over a giant tome or drafting a statement to take down a worthy opponent.

  I ran my fingers along her desk and swallowed. Her scarf felt heavy in my hand.

  It had only been three hours. Three hours since I had first initiated the Red Alert. It felt like three days—every minute experienced in frame-by-frame high definition.

  Meeting with our Dorm Guide—whoever that was—in order to assess my mental health and stability to last through the night, was the last thing I wanted to do.

  I lifted the scarf to my mouth.

  “Olivia?” I whispered into the threads. A cool fleeting touch whispered back against my skin. A desire more than an actual sense.

  Magic twisted within me, the corrupted channels letting nothing out.

  I closed my eyes, clenching them. I couldn't pull Olivia out of the threads. I could only lament.

  Too close. Too close to Christian.

  I had to get my magic back. I had to get off campus. I had to rescue Olivia.

  The scarf suddenly wrapped around my hand and squeezed so tightly that I would have dropped it, if it hadn't been strangling in the intensity of its hold on me. A silken constrictor.

  I stared at it, then jerked forward. The silencing spell. I gripped the scarves and rubbed a shaking hand against my chest. Did I have enough magic left to do it? What if I messed up something and the locator to Olivia that I had captured in the threads was altered or ruined?

  A sudden whoosh of sound blasted from the vents. Tipping my head back, I could see the hazy white magic puffing out like unfurling steam.

  I clutched Olivia's scarf tighter.

  I shied away from the first touch of magic, and willed myself to relax at the second. Calm quickly overtook my limbs.

  I remembered Will's quip about Mike keeping track of the level at which we were being doused with calming magic. That it said a lot about the Administration's emotional state.

  This level had to signify that they were very concerned.

  I let the pumping spell calm me, just a little, before I touched the wall at my side. Although magic wasn't pumping through me, I could still affect spells that were already in place. I didn't need to fit a key into a lock. I could just turn the dial. Left two turns, right two turns, left.

  I smiled without humor and dialed back the calming spell. But unlike weeks ago, I couldn't turn it off completely.

  I'd have to ask one of the others what I was doing wrong, but at least the motions had given me enough hope to try affecting the silencing spell in the scarves. Closing my eyes, I focused on the spells in place—pinching the one in my scarf that visually connected to my mouth, then rippling it through the control scarf.

  It should stop anyone from talking about Plan Fifty-two with anyone outside of the plan, or communicating in any other way. The mouth visual was just what the spell showed me, tailored to how I saw the idea of it at present. I loved magic.

  But I couldn't use it incorrectly again.

  I shut my eyes.

  Chapter Five: Explanations and Confessions

  I stood under the hot spray of the shower. I had chosen the First Layer kind of shower, complete with nearly scalding water. The bathroom was fully equipped with the magical kind of “showers” too—ones where you could just be whooshed clean, others where you would get doused or coated with anything you wanted—skin and sun protection, a layer of magical protection, a rehydrating charm, a light spray of a thousand different skin and hair colors, makeup charms.

  None of those would allow me to see the blood swirling down the drain and feel the blistering heat against my scalp and shoulders. Maybe I was far too rooted in the First Layer, but there was something soothing and calming in watching the swirl of the drain carry away some of the day—the dirt, grime, sweat, and blood. The pain and heartache.

  I stepped out and allowed the bathroom’s instant drying charms to keep me warm and slightly on edge. Slinking around with wet, bedraggled hair seemed the opposite of what I needed.

  Exiting the bathroom brought the reality of the situation back into view. Olivia wasn't normally very loud, but the steady turn of pages—of one piece of paper sliding against another—or the even hum of magic as she extracted information or performed a deft maneuver, were deafeningly absent.

  I touched the open tome on her desk.

  Knock, knock.

  Startled, I threw out both arms and the tiniest bit of recovered magic followed painfully. The book I'd been touching smacked one wall with a heavy thud, while Olivia's crystal inkwell was propelled against the wall above her bed. It shattered into glistening, inky shards. Black ink ran down the wall and onto her bedspread like fresh, splattered blood.

  It was far too reminiscent of my bedroom walls at home in the First Layer after I'd tried repeatedly to resurrect my brother.

  My hands shook, and I flexed my fingers like an arthritic with gnarled and twisted joints.

  “Ren?”

  At hearing the voice in the hall, relief and a new panic swallowed the alarm.

  I quickly fumbled with the door, unlocking it, surprised that I had even thought to lock it. My first term need to break and enter the room repeatedly had left m
e with a habit of leaving it unlocked.

  As I whipped the door open, I blurted, “I had a key, so I locked it.”

  Olivia had given me the key so that we could be true roommates.

  Dare stared at me for a long moment, and if I didn't know better, I'd think there was a look of sharp relief on his face. He took a step forward.

  I shoved him back a step. Relief at seeing him mixed with alarm. “No,” I said. “You are in danger. You cannot be around me anymore.”

  Nearly a foot taller, and far broader, he could have easily stopped the action. He raised an eyebrow, looking down at me, as I tried to push him back another step.

  I growled and pushed harder, completely forgetting in that moment to try magic.

  “Ren.” My name sounded like a sigh.

  “No.” God, wasn't that just it too? The obviousness of my feral position. Not even remembering to try magic, even if it likely would have ended in agonizing pain and failure.

  I could see people slowing down in the hall, decelerating to a snail's pace in order to observe the exchange.

  “Why are you risking this?” I whispered, pleading.

  His gaze was piercing, his position immovable. “Some things are worth risk.”

  My shoulders sagged and my hand fell from his chest as I leaned into the doorjamb. “I'm not okay.”

  He nodded slowly. “I know. May I come in?” He stayed where he stood, allowing me the choice.

  “Yes,” I said in defeat, stepping back and awkwardly shuffling to the side so that I could close the door behind him. And lock it. That seemed important. Olivia always liked the door to be locked.

  Dare's gaze took in every facet of our room as he walked over to my side. I felt conflicting urges to cover up my disorderliness and to show him some of the items in the storage paper affixed under my bed.

  He'd never been in our room.

  “How did you find me?” I asked.

  He'd been so cagey about meeting in his room—caginess that I hadn't realized was due to the fact that Constantine Leandred was his roommate—that I'd never invited him to mine.

  “You aren't in the directory, but it's not hard to find you. Many people are aware.”

  People who were likely watching me even more fiercely now. Stavros and Kaine's people, maybe. Definitely Bellacia's. And Raphael's.

  “My roommate—”

  “Helen Price's daughter. I know.”

  “Olivia,” I stressed quietly.

  He tipped his head. “Olivia.” He examined me. “When I looked into everything about you months ago, I'll admit to being surprised at your roommate choice.”

  “Choice” was an interesting word. More likely it was “fate.”

  I waved a hand around in a vaguely uncommunicative motion. “Mine makes more sense than yours.”

  “Neither Leandred nor I would have chosen the other. You, on the other hand, had a choice.”

  I blinked. “Not really. It was a rather happy accident. She would have tossed me out otherwise. We just happened to be highly sympathetic.”

  He stared at me for a long moment. “I forget how new you are sometimes.”

  He looked down at my desk. Notes that I had taken on his fighting style and tactics in the practice rooms were scattered on the top.

  I hastily ran over and pushed everything into a pile. “Why aren't you at the Visiting Center?”

  His gaze raked me. “I'm exactly where I need to be. Julian and Nick are taking care of family matters.”

  “Don't you have to get ready to go back to the competition?”

  “Not if I'm not returning.”

  I fumbled the papers. “What?”

  He lifted the sheets from my unresponsive hands. “I actually anticipated that you'd be gone already, and that I'd have to chase you down somewhere outside of campus tonight.”

  That would explain his relief at seeing me, then.

  He looked down at the pages in his hand. “You think I could be tricked with a three-strike projection?” he said, reading the top page of the stack—all notes on him. “I'm offended.”

  I grabbed the papers out of his hands and stuffed them into a pile in the corner, then put a book on top. I crossed my arms and tried to stop the heat that was broiling my face from within. “What do you mean, chase me down? And what do you mean not returning? You can't miss your competition.”

  “Why not?”

  I stared at him. “Because the tournament is...important?” It had been the most talked about thing for months. It was the event of the year, the one that earned all of the accolades. The one that had earned Dare the lofty reputation he had.

  “It's a competition. A game. A sport.”

  I stared at him.

  “You didn't think I was just going to let you break through the perimeter ward and wave good-bye, did you?” He looked unimpressed with me.

  I processed his remark for a few long moments, then nodded slowly. “Okay.”

  He looked distinctly amused. “Okay?”

  “Having you along will be quite helpful, when I flee,” I said. I didn't have the first clue about what I would find when I located Olivia, other than that Raphael would be waiting for me.

  Dare smiled, the edges of his eyes crinkling in genuine amusement. It was a smile I had gotten used to seeing, but it always made my heart rate increase.

  I smiled tentatively back.

  “Tell me about Emrys—or more accurately Raphael Verisetti.”

  And just like that, my stomach dropped to stone.

  “How...? You know?” I asked woodenly. Raphael hadn't been wearing his own face in the golem. The golem had worn the face of the real Emrys Norr—though I had no idea where the real Emrys was—then when Constantine had broken through some of the spells, it had worn the face of my brother.

  Dare gave me an unimpressed stare in answer.

  “Did you know before today?” I asked, feeling drained again.

  His eyes narrowed with an edge of cold anger. “I would never let Verisetti remain on campus.”

  I wiped a shaky hand across my face, unable to look at that expression; still I held firm in response. “Yeah? I have a bad habit of being the last to know around here. Aren't you going to ask me if I knew before today?”

  “I know that you did not.”

  I looked back at him. None of the anger remained on his face. Instead, there was a sort of casually dissecting regard.

  “You show your emotions freely,” he said. “No one could have faked that level of distress. And, you don't have it in you to kick in with a terrorist. Not even with your bad taste in 'business partners',” he said, referencing the conversation we’d had the night I'd found out Alexander and Constantine were roommates.

  “Besides, I heard a small part of your conversation while I was trying to dismantle the dome he erected,” Dare said.

  Exasperation swept through me, which was a relief in the wake of all the other coiling emotions.

  I collapsed on my bed, drawing my feet beneath me.

  “You could have led with that statement, you know.” From my bed I had a clear view of the emptiness on the other side of the room. Instead of dwelling on it, I focused on Dare.

  “Raphael was present when I Awakened. He tricked me. Took advantage of my grief. Over...” I ran a hand over the photo near my pillow—the edges of the photo soft and distressed. “Over my brother.” My twin who Dare had seen dead on a street in the First Layer.

  “Raphael's been haunting me ever since,” I finished.

  Dare drew my desk chair forward, and sat with his arms on his thighs, leaning toward me.

  “Verisetti was with you when you Awakened?” Dare's gaze was piercing. “What did he make you create?”

  “How did you...? Marsgrove asked me the same thing.”

  “Awakening magic is stolen more often than most people think.” He kept his gaze steady on mine. My brother had been murdered for exactly that reason.

  It had been less than a week since
I'd found out that Dare knew I was the girl he had saved in the First Layer the night my brother died. It felt like far longer. This past day felt like a year's worth of time alone.

  “It explains the weirdness between the two of you. You and Emrys,” Dare said, staring at the protection enchantments disguised as art that I had drawn directly on the wall—enchantments I had learned in the Library of Alexandria. “There was something strange between you two from the beginning.”

  “I...I made a golem.” I flinched. “When I was trying to bring my brother back to life. I made lots of things. But the golem—I spent a lot of time on it. Made it out of professional-grade blob matter.” Which I had gotten from Constantine—that part was going to remain secret.

  “And I made it with my brother in mind. Raphael stole it from the Midlands during the—” I gripped my fingers together—“the whole bone monster incident. Then he came here—” I indicated my room “—and taunted a bit. Froze Olivia. Told me about the true potential of the picture I made during my Awakening. Other stuff,” I finished lamely.

  “What picture?” Dare leaned forward, intent.

  “One that I could have resurrected my brother with.” By sacrificing Will.

  “Where is it?” His gaze drilled into me.

  “In the First Layer. Marsgrove came to collect us when I nearly blew up my parents' house again.” I winced. “And I left it there, hidden.”

  Dare narrowed his eyes. “Where is your house?”

  I stared at him for a long moment. “I'm not telling you.”

  I trusted Dare with my life, but I thought on Constantine's words—that due to Raphael's magic, my house was protected against detection unless I specifically gave up the address. With my parents' lives at stake—I wanted as few magical people to know their location as possible.

  He smiled. “Good.”

  Whether he was being truthful or not, I felt relief. I would do a lot for Alexander Dare.

  Currently, only six mages knew the address. Of those, one of them, unfortunately, was Marsgrove, and another was a psychopath. But Olivia and I had spent most of winter break shoring up the base wards Raphael had put around my house to act against Raphael instead.