The Awakening of Ren Crown

by Anne Zoelle

  “Don't you go learning any of that filth. That's black magic.” He spat into the bucket.

  “Er, your sign says—”

  “Real black magic. Not gray-edged magic tricks for the elderly, the thrill seekers, and the susceptible.”

  “But you bring people back to life. Even if it's for five min—”

  “Those that haven't been dead a day. A week at most. Two months? No. You are dealing with a whole 'nother level of dead. And at sixteen weeks? It becomes magically impossible.”

  “Then at seven—”

  “Listen, little lady, you give up a piece of your own soul for the kind of magic The Twelve promotes. And it doesn't work out how you think it's going to.”

  I watched how he said it. I looked carefully at his face, the brittle cracking look to his skin. “You have done it.”

  He didn't confirm my thought verbally, but he didn't have to. I could read clearly in his body language that this establishment was a dead end for me and that our conversation was over. I had no power or money or abject charisma to wheedle further.

  But there would be other shops. And even though my disappointment was harsh, I had more knowledge now. Anything that increased that knowledge was time well spent. If I gained one piece of knowledge from each endeavor, from each bloody hour I spent, it would all be time well spent.

  “Ren...I think you need to abandon this plan.”

  “Free me however you can! Please!”

  I had lost seven precious weeks, but the remaining nine started ticking a countdown in my head, overlapping whatever time I had until Marsgrove's return.

  “Ok.” I nodded, my gaze sweeping the items for sale. There were two books on black magic rites and rituals. “Do I need to give blood or magic to buy those?”

  “We are required by law to ask for blood.”

  I chewed on my lip, then looked out the window and into the street which surprisingly was almost fully re-formed. A few people were poking their heads out across the street. The sweeper was nowhere to be seen. “Ok, hang on.”

  I ran outside, swiped my finger through a puddle of blood on the walk, then dashed back in.

  “I'll take both.”

  He stared at me for a long moment, and I stared stonily back. Then he put both books on the counter and turned around. I pressed the blood from the street onto the paper and put more munits than the purchase required on the countertop. “Thanks.”

  “Don't thank me, kid,” he said harshly, and thumbed toward the door. “And don't come back.”

  The bell thudded dully behind me.

  I struck reanimation from my primary list and put it in a secondary classification. I might be able to elongate reanimation time through experimentation. Or maybe figure out how to get in a quick session with Christian, while I was experimenting on other things. Get him to say more, so he could help me.

  But I needed to reorder my experimentation list based on the need to exhume a body.

  In my excited mind I had figured magic could solve any problems. That somehow Christian could just be magicked back and voila be normal again.

  But he was buried in the First Layer in a graveyard that I was pretty sure was not a magical site. That meant that if I didn't figure out how to pull him out of a painting, I really would have to exhume him the manual way. Shovels and dirt and digging. And I would have to do it myself, in the dead of night, if I didn't want to get into a whole host of trouble. I wasn't sure how one hired clandestine grave diggers. It didn't seem like the Better Business Bureau would be involved.

  People were dragging bodies toward Black Magicks Unlimited again. I sprinted across the street, watching for flashing lights. But the town air and magic felt sluggish now, and people were starting to walk about again.

  I walked quickly, listening carefully for any sirens and rapidly checking out the stores as I passed. One proclaimed itself a purveyor of “chemical potions and magical herbs” and another sold magical weapons. There was an art store and a...I stopped. An art store?

  My feet detached from the authority of my brain. The uppity tinkling of three bells sounded as I entered the shop. I stared in wonder for a few long moments. For being located in such a crazy town, the paintings were incredible. Full-featured figures were running and jumping and dancing and flying in their frames. One was even singing a dark haunting melody. It was like watching small, gorgeous videos on the walls.

  I wondered if they sold storage box spaces here.

  “May I help you?” A middle-aged man with a receding hairline was watching me disapprovingly from behind the counter.

  “I am just admiring your lovely shop.”

  But he had that displeased look of a shopkeeper who disliked teenagers, so I moved to the side.

  I hated being watched like I was going to shoplift, so I wandered over to a wall filled with art supplies. Maybe I could purchase magical paint here. A smile lit my face. Maybe I would be able to use paint here.

  A sign ran along the top of the display in bright red letters: SECURIMAGE Anti-Theft Enchantment Activated. The enchantment or company must stink if I was still being watched by the shopkeeper, though—unless it was one of those “I have a dog/alarm” yard signs where the person really didn't have one.

  Wanting desperately to believe that maybe Marsgrove had just cursed paint already on campus, I scanned the tubes hanging on the wall. There were dozens of different kinds. “Fast acting,” “quick release,” “multidimensional,” “chaophonic,” “added texture,” “moving pieces.” Fascinated, I wondered which one my electrified ultramarine would be labeled as. Some uses were obvious, others not as much. Chaophonic? I suppose it was too much to ask for one that read “reanimate the dead!” on it.

  The bells tinkled and a lady in high heels and a stiff business suit strode into the store. She smoothed her skirt and perched a pair of tiny glasses on her nose. “I'm looking for something of exceptional quality. A signature piece. I was told that I could find one in your establishment, even located in such a reprehensible town.”

  The store owner straightened up. “You have come to the right place, my good lady. The tremors are regrettable, but the magical benefits are keen. We boast the finest collection in the Second Layer. We even have a piece by the last origin mage, Sergei Kinsky. Very rare!”

  Sergei Kinsky? That was the Mad Mage guy featured in my reading room grid. I peered over my shoulder trying to see where the owner was pointing. My eyes followed the direction to the edge of a gold frame on the far wall, but I couldn't see the canvas from my position.

  The woman looked over her tiny glasses to examine the piece. “Extraordinary. But they should have kept Kinsky in a testing facility permanently. You can't trust people with those kinds of abilities and that type of temperament. Look at what happened to the Third Layer. Such mages must be controlled by others. I carry around a leash device, in case I encounter such mage types, or out-of-control ferals. They tend to go hand-in-hand, more's the pity.”

  The owner nodded along with the woman's increasingly alarming opinions, murmuring his agreement as I stood there frozen, with my hand raised to touch a tube of paint, and my chest absent of a heartbeat. Leash device?

  “I can't deny the quality of Origin works when created under control. Our layer system is a testament to Origin design and power after all. But that was long ago when people knew their place. It is a relief to all that there is no origin mage in existence presently. Thirty years ago, the best thing Kinsky did was to blow himself up. He had started making things freely...” She shuddered. “It's not one of those works, is it?”

  The man shook his head rapidly and uttered a loud, “No, never one of those! This was created while he was at the Zantini Institute, under the direction of Mussolgranz.”

  “Ah, excellent. I will indeed look at the provenance. But at the moment, I am in dire need of a piece for my niece's thirteenth birthday.”

  The colors around me had started to tessellate, and I was unable to draw enough breath. Th
ey didn't know I was feral, they couldn't know. Besides, I was cuffed. That was good enough, right? I repeated the mantra to myself, trying to restart my heart. I needed to get out of here. My eyes pulled in the direction of the Kinsky piece, then toward the door—where I received another shock.

  Marsgrove stood outside looking at his device. A mere fifteen feet away from me, separated by a pane of glass.

  My breath and heartbeat whooshed back in double time. I ducked my head and pulled my hair forward. Trapped. I looked around for another exit.

  “Wonderful, ma'am,” the owner said boisterously. “We have a lovely children's storybook art piece over here. Perfect for a budding mage. A master artist mage and master mage storyteller collaborated on it. Very rare. The figures inside make up new adventures and grow and change whenever the enchantments are activated, and they take direction from the activator, if desired. Your niece will feel that she is in on the adventure too. There is a record spell and a reset spell, so she can experience an adventure again or start completely anew. Unless it is requested, the same story is never repeated. Family friendly fare and adventures are also guaranteed.”

  Such a piece of art as he was describing would normally fascinate me, but self-preservation focused my attention elsewhere. I looked back to the window. Marsgrove was slowly stepping along the walk in front of the shop.

  As the owner and customer began haggling over the price, I moved around the displays, hiding myself farther from view. My feet moved to the Kinsky piece without my explicit consent. His portrait of a beautiful woman was Mona Lisa-esque. She appeared to be quietly observing me, no matter the angle of my approach.

  Drawn to it, I examined the piece carefully as I moved. My own works were stick figures compared to this artist’s Da Vinci scale. The portrait possessed depth and dimension and reality. A little too much reality, perhaps. The woman looked...lifelike. Like Will inside my sketch, but with colored texture and movement. She looked as if she would step from the frame at any moment and emerge in glory. The colors shifted with her movement, catching and reflecting interior light as she moved inside her painted world. Shadows cast behind her, shrinking, growing, and morphing. A living diorama, where this woman was trapped inside. Unnerved, especially after Will's imprisonment, I was unwillingly drawn to the painting.

  She put one finger to her lips and urged me forward with her other hand. I drew closer, spellbound, and she smiled. Her hand reached into a fold of her dress and the material moved, rippling the canvas along its path. She withdrew a piece of paper from her dress. The paper grew sharper, and I could almost see the words on it, as she held it out toward me. My heart thumped madly in my chest. The canvas pushed outward as the paper pressed from inside, almost like a finger or object was pressing against the barrier, and I reached forward—

  “Stop! Move away from that!”

  I flinched at the yell and turned to see both adults watching me. The shop owner was frowning and had taken a step in my direction. “What do you think you are doing? Do not touch that!”

  “I'm sorry. She...” No. Everything in me screamed that saying that the woman had something for me would be extremely unwise. I looked back at the painting. The paper was gone and the woman gave a resigned smile, then smoothed her dress and looked off to the left, her face freezing again in profile. I wondered if the First Layer hid safes behind paintings as a reflection of this layer being able to hide things in them. “...she is very pretty. Sorry.”

  I returned to the supply wall and kept my head down, but my eyes active. Marsgrove was across the street now, thank God, still frowning down at his device. Keep walking, I urged him mentally. I could hear the man and woman muttering.

  “The intoxicating threat of an Origin work.” The woman tutted. “Do you have anything hidden in there? You said it was a safe painting.”

  “Nothing hidden, and yes, it is safe.” His glare hardened—I was damaging a future sale. And I was exposing myself—making myself memorable. I tried to breathe normally as he continued talking. “I only demonstrate the security measures and properties if someone past puberty is keen to buy. It is an empty canvas right now.”

  It wasn't empty. I was sure of that. The cretin just didn't know how to access it. I quietly examined the paint tubes without really seeing them. Marsgrove's storage space, the painted woman's paper, Will's body...could I store Christian's soul in a painting? Was that what was missing? The reason I had been unable to retrieve him, even though I had felt him before?

  My eyes skimmed the cover of a book on creating 3-D spaces. A discordant note rang in my head, but I couldn't connect the warning to anything tangible. Maybe those bold block warning letters in the textbooks were affecting me.

  The customer shook her head, muttering about leashing teenagers too, and handed over some sort of credit card.

  “A villain is in for a nasty shock if she touches that painting without the owner's permission. A nasty, nasty shock.” The man projected his voice in my direction.

  The lady and her leash left, and on the other side of the street, Marsgrove was moving away. I grabbed the “multidimensional” tube of paint and the book and hurried to the counter. As long as Marsgrove continued in his current direction, I could slip out and go the opposite way back to the antique shop. Better to get out of here while I had a chance.

  The owner looked at me through narrowed eyes, peering at my pockets, obviously trying to deduce how many things I had stolen.

  The sign over his head said the establishment took First through Fourth Layer currencies. I put the items on the counter. “I would like to purchase these please.”

  “They are not for sale.”

  I stared at him hard. “Then why were they on the wall of supplies?” I wasn't playing this game.

  His lips thinned and he snatched the items and rang them up. I had just enough for the purchase. Magical paint wasn't cheap.

  Marsgrove shoved his device into his pocket and disappeared into a portal pad across the street. Relief swept through me in a painful way.

  The street was becoming packed with people again, as if it had never been anything but.

  “So, this will make my paintings three dimensional?” I asked, as the owner put the tube and book in a bag, then thumped the bag down on the counter.

  He snorted. “I'm sure your parents will be pleased by your attempts.”

  I nodded and stuffed the bag into my pack. They would be pleased when I brought back their son. And when I became a famous artist, I was going to make sure this guy never got any of my pieces.

  As I pushed through the door, my eyes strayed to the Kinsky. The woman was watching me again.

  The bells chimed behind me as the door closed, and I stood for a moment on the walk, undecided. No. Nothing good would come of me re-entering. The owner would never let me near the piece in his customer-free store.

  I took a quick view of my surroundings and joined a pocket of foot traffic. I tried to keep my pace to those around me, not wanting to attract attention.

  I was a dozen steps from the store when I realized the pocket had dispersed, and only one person was striding along in step beside me. And that that someone was Mr. Verisetti. I stopped dead. People moved around us, but my heart had stopped with me.

  He turned smoothly and smiled. “But why have we stopped, Butterfly? You haven't yet reached your destination.”

  I tried to get my heart to restart—surely it wouldn't survive this day—as I quickly checked to make sure I still had the light glow of gold on my skin. Picturing paint and liquid gold, I chanted channel, focus, channel in my mind. The gold grew brighter. “How did you know I was here?” I asked aloud.

  His smile turned Cheshire. “You wouldn't ask a mage to give up his tricks, would you?”

  “Oh my Magic! Terrorist!” Someone screamed two storefronts beyond us, but she was pointing to the opposite side of the street, away from us.

  Mr. Verisetti's left hand reached into his pocket. He shook his head and sighed as
the identified man across the street starting shooting beams. “They simply do not make minions like they used to. But a little birdie did mention that he would like a favor. This town will make a good demonstration.”

  He pulled out a handful of marbles and a familiar ornate box, and I started sprinting. I wasn't going to let him dust me a second time or do whatever he had done to make me forget those lost minutes in the classroom. Better to take my chances being blown up.

  A bomb exploded in the middle of the street, blowing me into a wall. I crumpled to the walk, ears ringing, vision wavering.

  “Now, now,” his voice sounded odd through the hollow ringing. “Wait for me, Butterfly, or you might be hurt.” He crouched down and easily lifted me, setting me back on my feet. Magic coursed from where his fingers touched and with the sudden sound of a ringing bell, my vision completely cleared. With a sideways flick of his wrist, he tossed a marble into the street and the pavement blew high enough to touch the top of the dome. Two more flicks cleared the street in front of us. I saw other men throwing spells and causing mayhem. Some of them had marbles too.

  The thought that Will would like those marbles registered oddly in my dull haze.

  A swirling black-and-white patterned circle appeared suddenly in the middle of the air, then burst open. Animals burst from it—hybrid animals, like the sweeper—but these hybrids were tumbling out in rage as if they'd been forcefully rounded up, then ejected. Two sweepers flew out, their single wings unfurling and holding them in the air only one foot from their heavy half-elephant bodies impacting the ground. Their beak-trunks opened, and a horrible sound filled the air. A tiger-crocodile snapped its terrible jaws and leaped. The hybrids ran, jumped, and flew in every direction, mowing down people—or doing worse—as they went.

  “Beautiful,” Mr. Verisetti said, tossing the box in the air, then stroking it.

  People fled, and street chunks fell around us. And the screaming...

  I tried to run too, but I was the lone being in the nightmare who couldn't run no matter how hard I tried. I pushed forward, foot by agonizingly slow foot—forcing my way through air too dense for me to move, with muscles that barely responded to my commands.