“But they did limit us to staying on school grounds, which means no more midnight trips to Magical Australia.” Valerie threw a stick for her elkhound. “Rachel, why did you cut me off just now, when I was speaking to Mr. Gideon?”
“And let you ask what constituted school grounds?” Rachel arched her eyebrows and kicked the next batch of leaves extra hard. “Are you bonkers? Right now, we can still follow the rules, so long as we don’t leave the island in dreamland. But what if they had said, just the physical campus? We would be forbidden to enter dreamland!”
There was also the question of whether “school grounds” constituted the whole island, which technically belonged to the school, or the area within the school’s wards. Rachel preferred to use her own interpretation.
She also was the only one in the group who had not given her word. Once again, she had merely stood looking very attentive, and Mr. Gideon had taken that as assent. He had not made her repeat his words, the way he had done for Sigfried.
Disobeying adults no longer troubled Rachel, so long as she acted in a good cause. She knew so many secrets that she could not share with the grown-ups around her, that she could not rely on their judgment as to what was important and what was not. However, she did not wish to give her word and then break it.
“Ah. Got it.” Valerie nodded once.
All the girls gave a shout of surprise as Lucky swooped in and set fire to the latest batch of red and gold leaves Rachel had kicked into the air. The colorful foliage blazed and crisped. The fire glowed brightly against the mist, smoke curling upward. Only a few embers were left by the time the ashes floated to the ground. The smell of burning leaves filled the air along with the ozone-like odor of Lucky’s flame.
“Lucky,” exclaimed the princess, “you could set the whole commons on fire!”
“Sorry,” growled Lucky. “Couldn’t resist. I mean they were just flying there…like tiny chickens. Who could be expected not to want to annihilate them utterly with super-hot flame?”
Siggy merely nodded sagely.
“As to the matter of what constitutes school grounds, we should err on the side of caution.” Nastasia recovered her aplomb, though she gave the dragon a stern look. “When we are in dreamland, there is a chance we could fall out elsewhere. We must avoid this danger.”
“I may have found a solution to that,” Rachel said, recalling the Elf’s parting words. “I’ll let you know as soon as I find out.”
• • •
At dinner that night Rachel noticed the proctor Mr. Fuentes on duty in the cafeteria. She had not spoken to him since the day he had ordered her dragged to the Watch Tower, after she turned in the whip that had killed…er, injured…Enoch Smithwyck. As her lingering sense of disappointment resolved itself into particular objections, she marched up to him.
“Mr. Fuentes,” she stood before him, her expression sad and a little resentful, “next time a thirteen-year-old approaches you and says, ‘Hey, here’s something I found in my pocket that I didn’t know might be important,’ you might consider just believing her—rather than dragging her off to undergo the Spell of True Recitation.”
Carlos Fuentes was a handsome young man of Spanish descent with thick, curly hair and a ready smile. Now, however, he gave her a thoughtful look. “Where, in how I acted, was I mistaken, Miss Griffin? Was it because I was concerned that a murder weapon, ‘found’ right after the murder, had not been turned in until days later? Or was it because a young woman, whom I felt was extremely trustworthy and intelligent, seemed baffled by why I was wondering how she could ‘forget’ she was carrying it? If you wish, I will go out of my way to not forget that you are thirteen in the future.”
Rachel blushed, caught by her own stratagem. She bit her lip. “I-I don’t understand why there was anything suspicious about it. I wasn’t concealing a murder weapon. I just hadn’t thought about the whip. After the battle against Dr. Mordeau, my boyfriend got turned into a sheep, and then I had a huge row with my brother—whom I greatly admire, and now we’re not speaking to each other. So, the whip was not the thing in the forefront of my mind. Besides, if I were under a spell, would I have turned it in?”
“Miss Griffin,” he replied seriously, “I have been told that you have an intellect far, far beyond your years. Yet, you seemed confused. I thought you might be turning the whip in, even though geased not to. This would have made you act strangely. That’s why I wanted you checked. I didn’t mean to harass you or, er, make you fight with your brother?”
“Oh!” Rachel exclaimed softly. Only now did it occur to her that Mr. Fuentes, who had been ensorcelled himself and nearly killed a student while in that state, might be extra nervous about geases. She admitted truthfully, “I was scared when you brought me to the Watch Tower. I didn’t know why I was there. But if you were looking out for me, that’s all right.”
“Honestly, sweetie, I was trying not to say anything that might trigger the spell…that might force you to act even more against your will. The geas on me was quite complex. We still don’t fully understand it.”
All this made sense, yet she still felt slightly betrayed. “If something like this should happen again, couldn’t you stay with me? Send some other proctor to get the Agents?”
“Last time, I was ambushed and geased. This time, I wanted to make sure the message got delivered.” He leaned closer, a kind smile creasing his face. “If something like this happens again, sweetie, I’ll stay with you, and send someone else.”
“Thank you,” Rachel murmured, her feelings of having been ill-used evaporating. She gave him a smile as she sought for something else to discuss, so she could depart on a happier note. “Do you like it here, working as a proctor?”
He grinned sheepishly. “Like most of us, I’m what we in the business call an embryo-Agent. Working as a proctor at Roanoke is one of the best ways to get into the Wisecraft. It gives us a chance to learn the ropes, strut our stuff. That kind of thing.”
“Can’t you just join the Wisecraft right out of school? Sandra did.”
Mr. Fuentes threw back his head when he laughed. “Sandra Griffin is one classy lady. She gradated with five Rings of Mastery. I, alas, only achieved three.” He held up his hands, upon which he wore three black rings etched with arcane runes. One bore an amethyst, one an emerald, and one a polished chip of jet. Rachel knew these represented mastery in enchantment, canticle, and Enochian magic—warding and obscurations. She also knew that, Sandra aside, three rings of mastery was no mean feat. “Also, her father’s a duke and an Agent. Mine works as a canticler for a company that makes talismans. Not a lot of strings to pull there.”
They grinned at each other. Out of gratitude, Rachel shared with him the last of the sweets from home that her father had brought her during the first week of school, after her fight with the wraith. He gave her a big smile as he finished off her Smarties.
They chatted a while longer, mainly about his favorite Flying Polo team, the Windcolts. Rachel knew very little about sports. As they were speaking, however, she noticed out of the corner of her eye that, over at the central table near the fountain, Gaius, Locke and Dread were watching her closely.
A plan had formed in her mind.
She knew from Gaius that Von Dread was curious about where she was getting her information. He believed she had a contact among the Wisecraft. Most students knew that many of the proctors were Agents-in-training. If she seemed on friendly terms with a proctor, maybe Dread would think that was where her secret information came from, and he would not look farther. She did not want him to discover Siggy’s amulet.
Rachel decided to make a show of her friendship with the handsome young proctor, talking to him in the dining hall and the like. However, she made a promise to herself as well. The idea of pretending to be someone’s friend appalled her. If she was going to use her friendship with the proctor for her own benefit, she was going to do her best to actually be a good friend!
When she left the dining hall, she w
ent down to the mail room and sent off a subscription to a popular news glass. The glass used for viewing the issues was in her mailbox the next day. She began the practice of memorizing the sports page. Sports turned out to be surprisingly boring. She could not actually get herself to read what the page said regularly, but if she looked at it once, she could pull it up in her memory while she was speaking to Mr. Fuentes. This allowed her to sympathize with his joys and agonies as his team faced victory and defeat.
It was the least a friend could do.
• • •
The dreary weather continued Sunday. Rachel and her friends spent the day in Dare Hall, reading and doing homework, except for Valerie, who went home for a few days to celebrate her father’s return with her mother. Rachel wondered why Peter and Laurel did not come by to make much over her, as they had after the battle with Mordeau. Then, she realized that neither of them had been informed that she had been missing.
Not that Peter would have come anyway. She sighed.
Monday dawned bright and clear, with a brilliant display of fall reds, oranges, and yellows. The smell of autumn greeted her during her morning flight. The foliage was even more brilliant than at home in Devon. The sugar maples glowed apple red. Some trees had two-tone leaves, yellow-orange toward the outside, orange-red towards the center, so that they appeared to be aflame. Rachel flew over a tree like this in the midst of dark green hemlocks. The maple rose like a burning torch amidst a sea of green.
Back on campus, fresh leaves covered the brick paths between the buildings, so that everyone’s footsteps made a swooshing noise as they walked.
The week went quickly. Thursday evening, Nastasia and Sigfried accompanied her to their first Knights of Walpurgis meeting. They swung by the mailroom after dinner, before heading for the gym. Rachel found a padded envelope from home addressed in her mother’s looping script. She frowned for a moment, wondering when she was finally going to hear from her father. Wasn’t he going to come and find out how she was after her—he believed—kidnapping? She could not wait to tell him what had really occurred.
She took the package with her, running to keep up with the others, who had already started up the long spiral staircase that led from the basement of Roanoke Hall to the main level. The sky was already dark as they headed across the leaf-strewn Commons. Arriving at the gym, they entered the open door leading into the large room used by the Knights, with the long table on one side and dueling strips on the other. As they approached the table, Rachel realized that she had a problem.
With whom was she going to sit?
It was one thing to forgo sitting with Gaius in the dining hall, much as she really wanted to join him each day. It was another thing entirely to not join him during the Knights meeting. Gaius was her sponsor. This was their activity, which they did together. Did she go up to the head of the table and sit with Gaius and Dread’s crew? Or did she sit with Sigfried and Nastasia, who were currently heading for a spot beside the cheerfully-waving Salome Iscariot?
She was rescued from this horrendous dilemma by Gaius himself. He rose from beside William Locke and crossed the room to bow before her, offering his arm. Rachel accepted, delighted. He then accompanied her and the others to sit next to Salome, Carl, and Devon Iscariot.
The other two immediately launched into a conversation with the Iscariot siblings. Rachel turned to her boyfriend, smiling gratefully.
“What do you have there?” he asked, seeing the envelope.
“No idea,” Rachel held it up and shook it. “Shall we open it?”
“Most definitely,” Gaius replied with a gallant smile.
Rachel tore open the envelope and held it upside down. A narrow cedar box with rounded edges slid onto the table. Rachel gasped, her heart humming with joy.
She knew that box.
“What is it?” Gaius asked curiously.
“Look!” she cried.
She pried it open and held it toward him. On the pale peach velvet lining within lay a slender length of silver about the size and shape of a chopstick. It was ornately inlaid with mother-of-pearl and tipped with a glittering diamond. There was a note, written in her father’s hand, that read merely: We thought you might need this.
“Grandmother’s wand!” she breathed.
Gaius’s brows shot up. He grinned in delight. “A wand! Now you can be a real duelist! But I thought your parents turned down your request for a wand?”
“That was before I ended up in a spell-flinging fight with Veltdammerung,” Rachel replied, her eyes sparkling. “Perhaps, they have finally faced the inevitable and accepted the truth…that, whatever this is that is happening in our world, I am on the front lines.”
“You certainly seem to be. First tangling with Egg, and now this other demon. I wonder why?” Gaius asked slowly. “I mean, no offense! I think you’re amazing. But that doesn’t explain why you seem to be at the epicenter of so many of these disturbances.”
Rachel glanced at her friends, who were deep in conversation, and then moved her head closer to her boyfriend, lowering her voice. “I think it’s Sigfried and Nastasia. Whatever this Keybearer business is, it makes them important. So important things happen around them.”
Gaius was watching her face carefully. He lowered his voice as well. “And was it some magic Keybearer destiny that was responsible for you being involved in the battle against Mordeau?”
Rachel blushed slightly. “No, I did that myself.”
“What about facing Veltdammerung?”
“They were there because of the Keybearer prophecy.”
“True. But you?”
Rachel smiled like a pixie. “You mean, I am only in the midst of trouble because I stick my nose into dangerous places?”
“And a very pretty nose it is, too,” Gaius leaned closer and briefly rubbed his nose against hers. “But that wasn’t what I meant. I mean, yes. You were only there because you chose to be there, but you seem to have an uncanny talent for finding trouble. Believe me, Vlad and William and I would be in the thick of things every time, if we knew where the thick of things was. We have all of the resources of Vlad’s entire group at our disposal. And yet you were there, and we were not. Impressive, Griffin.”
Rachel giggled.
Von Dread opened the meeting in his usual crisp, business-like manner, the fingers of his black leather, dueling gloves steepled before him. He described the incident of the plane nearly striking the school and led a discussion on what could be done to defend Roanoke from such dangers in the future. As he covered this and other topics, he spoke with such confidence about protection and law that Rachel felt that she had no doubt he would someday be a great king. But he spoke so fiercely, especially on the subject of duty and loyalty, she could not help wondering whether his intensity would result in his becoming a just man or a merciless one?
She recalled her thought that Dread was like a fortress in need of besieging. If someone could touch his heart, teach him the meaning of love, of mercy, he might become a great man indeed! But who could do such a thing? Out of the corner of her eye, she examined Nastasia as she sat upright listening intently. Her blond ringlets fell around her shoulders, making her look like a girl from an earlier century. Her robes were perfectly creased, her hands calmly folded in her lap. The more familiar Rachel became with both of them, the more the idea that had initially amused her and her friends—of a future match between Nastasia and Vladimir Von Dread—seemed like a bad call.
A tiny voice whispered to her, you could reach him. That voice came from a part of her mind that felt she understood Dread the way she had understood her grandfather. Rachel ignored this as impractical. How would someone like her befriend such an intimidating boy? And why would he pay any attention to her?
Maybe Dread’s future as an evil tyrant was inescapable.
As he continued with matters of business, Rachel turned her attention to her cute boyfriend. She noticed that other girls were watching him as well, especially Tess Dauntless and Co
lleen MacDannan, the cousin of Ian and Oonagh. At the beginning of the school year, both girls had watched him with active interest. Now that a month had gone by, and he was showing no sign of breaking up with her, the expressions of the other two girls had changed to lovelorn wistfulness, and, in the case of Tess, petulant envy.
Von Dread closed the meeting section of the evening with a reminder of the upcoming election for the position of his assistant during the next year. Currently, the nominees were Gaius and Freka Starkadder. When no other names were volunteered, Dread pronounced the nominations closed and reminded them that elections would be held during the winter.
Rachel wondered how she could help Gaius win the election. She was eager to meet the other members of the Knights. She pictured herself chatting with various members and casually mentioning some aspect of the Knights that Freka hoped to change, and thoughtfully exclaiming over how she felt that particular aspect of the club was perfectly good the way it was. The longer she thought about it, the more she felt certain this approach would work. Especially, if she could mention the matter in passing, without even mentioning Freka or Gaius or the election, before Freka had a chance to talk to the person about her plans. All she needed now was to discover Freka’s platform for her candidacy.
The meeting broke up, and the dueling portion began. Gaius took Sigfried and Nastasia aside to teach them the basics of dueling. Rachel squared off with Wanda Zukov and then with Salome. She lost her first duel and won her second one.
As she was waiting for her next opponent, Rachel paused to watch the March siblings, Evelyn March and her younger brother Joshua, square off against each other. She recalled Nastasia’s description of her vision of Joshua being vivisected by the being with the smoky wings. Rachel felt a sharp jab of guilt as she remembered how she had urged Nastasia to ignore Xandra’s warning not to touch young Mr. March. Mrs. March had looked so frightened when she heard that this being had visited Nastasia’s dreams. Rachel bit her lip and turned her face away.
Rachel and the Many-Splendored Dreamland (The Books of Unexpected Enlightenment Book 3) Page 20