The Zero Equation (The Zero Enigma Book 3)

by Christopher Nuttall

  Rose flew across the room, propelled by a locomotion hex. She barely managed to cancel it, a second before it would have slammed her into the rear wall hard enough to turn her into jelly. I turned around, searching for Isabella with my mousy eyes; it took me too long to spot her, casting hexes and protective wards in all directions as she ran for the door. I tried to warn the others to stop her before it was too late, yet the only things that came out of my mouth were squeaks. She ran through the door, slamming it closed behind her. I knew it was just a matter of time until she returned with reinforcements.

  “Cat,” Rose called. She sounded badly shaken. “Where are you?”

  I inched my way out of cover and looked up at her. Rose cast the counterspell, snapping me back to normal. I hugged her, trying to keep my feelings under control. Just for a second, I’d been helpless ... a grim reminder of the way things had used to be. I promised myself, grimly, that I would never let myself fall so far again. And yet I knew I might be unable to keep that promise.

  Alana walked forward. “Cat, start from the beginning,” she ordered. “What happened?”

  I fought down a flash of rage at being ordered about as if I was a lowly servant. “Great Aunt Stregheria has taken over the school,” I said, flatly. “And the Crown Prince is planning to take over the kingdom.”

  Gayle didn't look convinced. “But why would he do that?”

  I shrugged, then hastily told the rest of the story as Rose and I pulled the makeshift box out from under her bed. Someone snickered behind their hand as I put my finger to the clasp, then opened the box to reveal the Objects of Power I’d made. The pieces of Whirlpool were wrapped in cotton wool, to try to keep them from being contaminated, but I motioned for everyone else to stay back anyway. I might have to replace some of the components in the workroom before I put the Object of Power together and prepared the spellform ...

  And it might be the only way to save the city, I thought, as I tucked the pieces into my rucksack. The Crown Prince’s men will be skilled magicians as well as warriors.

  “But what can we do?” Amber sounded scared. I didn't blame her. One of Isabella’s cutting hexes had come far too close to slicing her face in two. Someone had cast a healing spell, but Amber really needed medical attention. I dreaded to think what curses might have been woven into the hex. “We’re firsties!”

  “These bracelets will protect you from spells,” I said. It wasn't entirely true - I had no idea what Isabella had done to me, a few short hours ago - but it would suffice. “As long as you wear them, no one - not even the strongest magician in the world - can use magic on you.”

  “But we can't use magic while we wear them,” Alana pointed out. She sounded intrigued, rather than contemptuous. I supposed it was a nice change. “They’ll just beat us up.”

  I smiled at her. “Here,” I said, producing the spellcasters. “These will work even if you’re wearing the bracelets.”

  Alana looked nervous. “Frogmaker? Frogmakers?”

  “Freeze spells,” I said, with a wink. “And stunners.”

  We shared a faint smile, just for a second, as she realised I’d been bluffing earlier.

  “The spells will wear off, mostly,” I continued. “They’ll be difficult for them to counter, but not impossible. And ... and Great Aunt Stregheria has some of my protections. It won’t take her long to figure out how to use them to cancel the spells.”

  I passed out the bracelets, then the spellcasters. They might not be as versatile as we might have wished, but they were the only way for us to stand against adult magicians. Alana was skilled, yet Mum and Dad had never had any trouble showing her that she still had a long way to go. I wondered, grimly, what would happen if they were struck by one of the spellcaster spells. Would their defences be able to handle it?

  And where are they? I couldn't think of an answer. Where would I hold a bunch of hostages who also happen to be dangerously powerful magicians?

  “You’ve left the sword in the box,” Rose said, lifting her eyebrows. “What do you want to do with it?”

  “Leave it out of sight,” Alana said, sharply. “If Great Aunt Stregheria had known it was in the box ...”

  “... She would have insisted on giving it to Isabella,” I finished, although I didn't know if that was actually true. Great Aunt Stregheria had plenty of reason to fear that Isabella might bite the hand that fed her - again. And the sword was a dangerously powerful weapon. “We’ll give it to Akin.”

  Alana held up a hand. “Cat ... what if you’re wrong about him?”

  “She hasn’t been wrong so far,” Bella pointed out. “And Akin has every interest in saving his parents too.”

  I saw a shadow cross Alana’s face. If we saved Akin’s parents, the House War would resume once the immediate danger had passed. But we might need them to survive ... Shallot needed them. And if Isabella wound up the only true heir to House Rubén, Great Aunt Stregheria might not need to make her domination obvious to make it effective. Better to have the appearance of dissent than the reality.

  “Akin is my friend,” I said, firmly. “And I trust him.”

  Alana and Bella exchanged looks. I frowned. “What?”

  “Nothing,” Bella said.

  “And the sword is a powerful weapon,” I added. “We need it on our side.”

  I closed the box and picked it up, silently grateful I’d put so much effort into weaving charms and spellforms into the wood. The box might look as if it had been made by a drunken carpenter, but it practically floated in the air. If nothing else, I could shove it at someone, confident that any blocking charms they used would be ineffective. And once we got to Akin’s dorm, he could take the sword and we could find a way to save our parents.

  “Here’s a different thought,” Clarian Bolingbroke said. She pointed at Ayesha and Zeya McDonald. “What do we do with them?”

  “Kill them,” Alana suggested. “They’re traitors.”

  I blanched. “You can't kill them!”

  Amber rubbed the mark on her face. “They were trying to kill us!”

  “It needs to be sorted out afterwards,” I said, choosing my words carefully. I couldn't force them to do as I said. I had to talk them into doing what I wanted them to do. “Ayesha and Zeya might not have known what Isabella was doing. Do you really want to start another House War?”

  “They’re on the wrong side of the House War,” Alana pointed out. “The House War we were already fighting!”

  I dug through my toolkit and produced a piece of Casting Chalk. “Draw the right set of runes around them and they’ll stay out of it until everything is finished,” I said. Great Aunt Stregheria had taught me one useful trick, after all. “They can be interrogated after the fighting is over.”

  Alana took the chalk and went to work, levitating the McDonald sisters into the backroom and dumping them on the floor. I kept a wary eye on her, just in case she intended to work something nastier into the runic circles, but I needn’t have worried. Alana did a good job, without including any curses that would bite the girls when I looked the other way. I didn't know what would happen to them, afterwards, but I doubted it would be pleasant. Their families would disown them if there was the slightest hint that they’d been willingly involved in Great Aunt Stregheria’s plans.

  “What about the other dorms?” Bella asked, as we went back into the main room. The girls were practicing with their spellcasters, alternatively praising their power and cursing their limitations. “Shouldn't we be trying to alert everyone?”

  “Joan and Whisper can go to the rest of the firstie dorms,” Alana said. “They’re good at alerting people.”

  I looked at the two girls. Alana’s cronies looked very unsure of themselves. They were good at spreading gossip, not at sounding the alarm. I felt a moment of pity, which I pushed aside ruthlessly. The other firsties wouldn't have spellcasters or bracelets, but they would force Great Aunt Stregheria and the Crown Prince to waste time recapturing them. It might give us time t
o do something more effective.

  “Rose, Alana, Bella and Gayle will come with me,” I said. Gayle was a competent spellcaster and I wanted Alana where I could see her. “Everyone else, try to rouse the other dorms. Just remember, Sandy was under a geas. The other upperclassmen may be in the same state.”

  Clarion snickered. “You mean we can hex them without having to write a million lines?”

  I had to smile. “I suppose,” I said. The thought was amusing. “Just remember, they’re not in their right minds. They might throw something very dangerous at you. Don’t play games - just stun or freeze them and then move on.”

  “Ouch,” Amber muttered.

  “This will be fun,” Alana said. “I’m going to enjoy it.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Alana, can you bring Sandy inside,” I said, nodding to the door. “I want to make sure she’s safe before we go.”

  “Ah,” Joan said. She had a nasally voice that put my teeth on edge and a sloppy appearance that made her look oddly washed out. It was very easy to dislike her at first sight. “And who put you in charge?”

  “She’s the one who told us what’s going on,” Alana said, before I could think of a reply. “If she hadn't come here, we’d still be unwitting hostages!”

  She turned and walked to the door, leaving me staring at her in amazement. I’d often thought Alana would sooner shave her head than say anything nice about me, let alone back me up in front of her cronies. But then, I suppose she couldn't let her sister get cut down too. It would have weakened the family. I tensed as Alana opened the door, half-expecting her to get hexed by a squad of guardsmen. Isabella wouldn't have needed long to summon help, would she? But there was nothing ...

  Alana returned, levitating Sandy in front of her. Sandy looked smaller, somehow, as she was lowered to the bed. I felt a stab of guilt, mingled with the grim awareness that there had been no choice. There had been no other way to deal with her. But if I’d hit her too hard ... I could have done real damage. Healing skull fractures was well beyond any of us. I promised myself, grimly, that I’d cheerfully write lines until my wrist fell off if Sandy suffered no ill-effects. It would be worth the suffering.

  “She’s alive,” Alana said, curtly. “But is she still bespelled?”

  I pulled out the dispeller - Great Aunt Stregheria had one of those too, I remembered - and ran it over Sandy’s body. In theory, any spellforms clinging to her should have been dispelled. In practice ... I remembered the book about geas spells Dad had told me off for reading and shuddered. The effects might linger even after the magic itself was removed.

  “The geas itself has been destroyed,” I said, after I checked Sandy with the spare set of spectacles. There was no magic lingering on her body at all. “But I don’t know if she’s still feeling its effects.”

  “Then leave her here to recover,” Alana said, practically. She examined Sandy’s head gently, pushing her hair aside to check the bump, then shrugged. “We don’t need to take the risk of waking her up.”

  I nodded, lifting the spellcaster in one hand and steering the box with the other. “Good thinking,” I said, as I led the way to the door. “Let’s go. And be very, very, quiet.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  The school was eerily quiet.

  I listened, carefully, as we slipped out of the dorm and made our way down the corridor. The dorms were arranged in a haphazard manner that suggested they had originally been parts of different buildings, before the interior had been torn apart and rebuilt. The corridors were a jagged maze, making it impossible to guess where an enchanted upperclassman - or a squad of guards - might have been positioned to keep us under control. It was possible, I supposed, that the armoured guards had put the fear of terrible punishment into us for the last couple of days, but I doubted Great Aunt Stregheria would count on it. She’d be watching for someone sneaking around out of bounds.

  The lights brightened and dimmed, seemingly at random. Shadows jumped in all directions, making us grab our spellcasters and take aim before realising that it was just a shadow. The power distribution network must have really taken a beating. Surely Great Aunt Stregheria would be smart enough to realise it was failing. She’d probably counted on it, to some extent. A Great House’s wards could be - and often were - programmed to take out any intruders if they lost touch with the Patriarch. Jude’s wards didn't have that sort of power.

  A terrible oversight, I thought, wryly. I’d have to fix that, when I had a chance. Perhaps a more distributed network will save us from losing our magic.

  We reached a corner and stopped, then peered around it. A pair of upperclassmen stood there their faces utterly blank. They were both under a geas. I lifted my spellcaster and nodded to Alana, silently counting down to zero. We moved around the corner as soon as I reached zero, jabbing our spellcasters at the upperclassmen. They both lifted their hands to hex us, then froze as the spells took effect. There was no time to knock them on the head, so we just left them there and walked on.

  “Akin’s dorm should be just past the crossroads,” Alana muttered. “They’ll have guards there, surely.”

  I nodded in grim agreement. The crossroads - the massive stairwell that ran right from the very lowest level to the highest - was how most students got down to breakfast every day. There was no better place to catch someone trying to sneak around, particularly a girl who wanted to sneak into the boy’s dorms or vice versa. I tightened my grip on the spellcaster, feeling sweat beading on my palms. It had been so much easier when we’d been trying to escape the ancient building, rather than trying to retake it.

  We reached the corner and peered around. Four men, wearing armour rather than tutor robes or school uniforms, were standing by the entrance to the stairwell, looking around with wary eyes. One of them saw me and glared, snapping out a command in a language I didn’t recognise. Another looked up and muttered a spell. I felt the bracelet grow uncomfortably warm against my skin. I wasn't sure what he was trying to do, but it was strong.

  I stepped around the corner and jabbed the spellcaster at the nearest man. He froze instantly, toppling over a moment later. The others barked oaths - including several words that were entirely new to me - and aimed spells at us. I smirked as the bracelets absorbed the magic, then froze the rest of them before they thought to jump us. Even the smallest was big enough to tear me apart with his bare hands.

  “I don’t recognise their sigils,” Alana said. She sounded disturbed. “And what language was he speaking?”

  I frowned. I hadn't recognised it either and I knew three of the six major trade languages. It made no sense. The Crown Prince would hardly have recruited his household troops from the border, where loyalties could change on a daily basis. Even if he had, they’d have spoken our tongue ... wouldn't they? I found it hard to believe they wouldn’t. The Crown Prince would certainly not want any room for misunderstandings when he issued orders.

  “I don’t know,” I muttered back. “But we have to hurry.”

  There was another upperclassman - I vaguely remembered him as one of my customers, back when I’d been making Objects of Power freely - standing in front of Hawk Dorm. We froze him on the spot, then left him standing there. Hopefully, no one would look closely enough to realise that he wasn't even breathing. I muttered an apology as I walked past, feeling a twinge of guilt. Leaving him frozen would give the geas a nice opportunity to really sink into his mind.

  It can't be helped, I told myself. We can't risk letting him stop us.

  Alana giggled, faintly. “We’re going to the boys' dorm!”

  “Mum will not be pleased,” Bella agreed.

  “As long as we see her again,” I reminded them both, sharply. “And this isn’t fun and games.”

  I knocked on the door and waited. A moment later, it was opened by a boy I vaguely recognised as one of Akin’s friends. He gaped at us - it occurred to me that we must look a sight - and then waved us inside. I tensed, half-expecting a charm to stop us in our tracks, b
ut nothing happened. The boys' dorm looked pretty much the same as the girls' dorm, save for fewer mirrors and more bookshelves. A handful of boys were sitting on the floor, playing a game that looked to be a combination of Chess and Campaign. The remainder seemed to be lying on their beds.

  “Akin,” our escort called. “You have guests!”

  Akin looked up and stared at us, then jumped off his bed and hurried over to the door. I felt a moment of pure relief - he wasn't a traitor - even though I knew I’d have to tell him about Isabella. He wasn't going to like it. I didn't blame him. I wouldn't have liked to hear that my sister was a traitor.

  “Cat,” he said. He sounded pleased to see me, although he was clearly also trying to hide it. “What are you doing here?”