The crowd ooohhed, gazing over to see Anjita’s reaction. Her smile was fixed, eyes narrowed to dangerous slits.
“Oh, I see. This from the girl who screams and runs away from every snake curled in the sun.”
“At least snakes exist,” Munayair returned. “They bite horses’ legs.”
“What a saint, worrying about the horses.” Anjita clutched at her heart, sending her audience into stitches once more. “And debasing her affinity, even though it is one of the hardest and most sought-after. Unlike archery. I suppose you’d rather your affinity were soulwalking, or something equally impossible. Anything to elevate the oh-so-perfect Munayair Sarem-ori another step above the rest of us.”
Munayair stiffened. That last barb had hit its mark. The gentle voice in her head said, She’s baiting you. Measure your words.
Before she could speak, Anjita continued in a louder voice, rising to her feet. “Tell us, Naya. Instead of sitting on the right hand of kings and queens as a glyphmaster, what fate would you pick?”
Any but the one waiting for me.
Munayair opened her mouth—and remembered she could not lie. So she closed her mouth again. Her eyes flickered away from Anjita’s earnest gaze to her own hands. At the hard-earned spells etched over her skin, each a memory as much as the belongings inside her saddlebags. She flexed her hands, forming fists, watching as the skin tightened over her knuckles. Turning her arm away from Anjita’s gaze, she rubbed at the inside of her wrist. The mark burned over her pulse point.
The crowd fell silent, sensing the mood had shifted. Anjita sat waiting with folded arms.
“Come on, Naya! Answer!” a voice called from the periphery.
Munayair sighed, finally settling on a safe truth. “There’s nothing I would change my affinity to—I only would like our wishes to be taken more into consideration. There are many skills I am unable to pursue because of the focus on affinity.”
Anjita scowled. “So let’s change the tradition! Just because something is old doesn’t mean it is right.”
Munayair groaned and rolled her eyes. “Please spirits don’t let’s talk about the Andustavan revolution again. I shall scream.”
Anjita glowered. “Democracy is the future,” she said. “Mark my words, the other monarchies will either have to give the power to the people, or find it taken away by force.”
“We’re in Unendee.” Munayair hid a grin. “I can’t pretend interest in politics. Please, spare me.”
The glyphs flashed and the pressure eased at the same instant. They looked around in surprise. The crowd cheered one last time, and several blues began jumping with hands in the air, calling out for a turn.
Anjita’s scowl relaxed into a smile. “I feel closer to you already.”
Together they stepped out of the circle. Adept Sanrizu nodded. “Lady’s luck for initiation, prentices.”
“Thank you, milady.” They curtsied in unison and headed out through the crowd in silence, not looking at one another. Munayair swallowed back nausea. A side effect of the spell, she supposed.
“I should have known better than to try and outflank you,” Anjita said, shaking her head. “You’re defended on every side.”
Munayair frowned, still strangely unsettled and angry. “I’m your friend. You don’t need a truth spell to ask me things.”
Anjita took her hand and squeezed it. “And I’m your friend. Always.”
Her head lifted. Munayair stiffened, stopping in her tracks. Both heard, in the same instant, a bell ringing from deep in the bowels of the Marble Hall. Every other purple on the rooftop also rose, moving towards the sound with slow, measured pace.
“It’s time,” Anjita whispered. Munayair nodded as another wave of nausea nearly overwhelmed her.
They pulled up the hoods of their cloaks. Clutching hands under their billowing sleeves, they threaded through the milling, whispering crowd. When prentices saw the purple cloaks, they moved aside to let them pass. A strange, reverent fear shone in the younger girls’ eyes, like those watching the condemned walking to their doom. Munayair recalled this moment during years prior, watching purples vanish into the dark maze below the Marble Hall. Never to return.
Munayair glanced at her wrist, where the curve of the mark peeked over the top of her sleeve. She took in a ragged breath.
You’ll have to do as you promised.
She must have dragged behind, because Anjita’s fingers tightened on hers. Munayair met her friend’s steady, brown-eyed gaze, and her back straightened. Together they descended the stairs towards the sound of the bell.
Chapter 6: Call of the Bell
Down and down they went, deep into the forbidden tunnels winding through the bedrock under the Marble Hall. Always, the sound of the bell drew them on, goaded them forward. No one knew where they were going, but none could deny the pull of the bell.
The crowd had been walking for a long time in the dimly lit tunnels when they halted, milling in confusion. A set of huge doors shone in the flickering witchlight, blocking the path. They were at least twenty spans high and carved from dark wood. The bell rang from behind those doors, louder than ever, pulling, demanding.
“How do we get past those?” Munayar shouted over the deafening peal. “A spell?”
Anjita eyed the doors. “I doubt Adept Kasebi’s strongest fire spell would get through those. Maybe—”
A cold and emotionless voice rang through the chamber. “You have come to the Hall of Testing,” it said.
Frightened prentices cried out, casting around for the source of the sound.
“Once you have passed through the door, there can be no turning back. Any who cannot dedicate everything must leave now.”
The ranks of prentices stirred, but no one left.
The voice spoke again. “To pass, you must prove the skills you have learned. Remember, mastery of basic principles is greater than clumsy execution of great mysteries.”
The voice fell silent, leaving only the distant bell and the murmuring crowd of prentices. Gora Kinian pushed to the front and cried, “Well! Are we prentices, or aren’t we? Look at you, trembling in your boots!”
She ran her fingers over her arm, and a gout of fire exploded against wood and stone. Purples jumped back, shielding their faces. The door vanished, and Gora cheered and raced through. The moment she passed, the door reappeared as solid as ever, with not the slightest trace of soot or charring.
One by one, prentices approached the door and performed a spell. They turned themselves invisible. Crushed rocks into powder. Created vast noises to fill the room. Caused mists to wreath around the room. Started rocks dancing. The everyday miracles of the adepts.
As the ranks of purples passed, Munayair and Anjita neared the door. Munayair racked her brain for a spell. Something impressive, but not overreaching. A freezing spell? The illusion of an army, roaring as they charged headlong towards their enemy? But she had no ash ...
“My turn,” Anjita said, releasing her hand. She strode towards the door, tall and confident, and planted her feet in a familiar stance. The watching prentices murmured among themselves. She stepped through an attack sequence, jabbing at air and ground with lithe grace, and came to a halt with a cry. She bowed to the door as to a master and glanced around at the skeptical faces. “What?” she shrugged. “It never said magic.”
The door vanished, and she was gone.
Munayair’s turn. She crept forward and pressed her hand to the door. The prentices’ eyes bored into her back, and the looming presence they could not see also watched.
The voice spoke again, but only in her ear. “Well, prentice? What have you learned?”
Her mind was blank. Years of training fled her mind, roaring white noise in its place. Learned? Have I learned anything? She wiped sweating hands on her tunic and paused. With a sigh, she touched a spell and watched as Tel clambered out of her pocket, glyphs bright in the gloom.
“Interesting choice,” the voice observed.
The
door vanished. Blushing, she stepped through. Darkness lay thick beyond. Witchlights lit the sloping corridor for a short way, but the end vanished into blackness. As Munayair moved through the crowd, a hand slipped into hers and she met Anjita’s steady gaze. She nodded, hoping to mask the fear twisting at her stomach.
Anjita saw the chelka clambering up the front of Munayair’s robes and grinned. “Excellent,” she said. “Did Eng see? I bet she went purple.”
Munayair stuffed Tel back in her pocket and called her witchlight into being, and Anjita did the same. Together with the rest they flowed along the corridor. The walls, floor, and ceiling gleamed in the light, magically smooth. The purples moved together, a silent and watchful group. Colorful lights bobbed over their heads. After only a few moments they halted, filling the hallway with shifting shadows.
“What now?” Gora Kinian whispered.
The bell called faintly, tugging like a fish hook caught in their breastbones. In the flickering light dozens of paths forked away, each as dark and featureless as the last.
“Which is the right way?” someone shrieked.
“The bell is coming from that direction.”
“No, you’re wrong,” someone cut in. “It’s definitely coming from over there.”
A scuffle broke out as purples argued. Munayair noticed others slipping away down different corridors, one at a time or in small groups. She nudged Anjita. “It calls different ways to everyone. Which way would you pick?”
To her, the sound rang from a nearby hallway. Anjita nodded towards it and Munayair sank in relief. Still gripping hands, they edged around fighting purples towards the sound. Their lights glimmered, illuminating rough-hewn steps falling into darkness. The sound of the bell echoed from there.
Only hesitating for a moment, they plunged into the dark. Down and down, boots scraping unfinished rock, hands tracing the walls. Their witchlights, dancing ahead, never lit more than a few paces at a time. The stairs dove into stone, ever steeper, until they were puffing with exertion.
Munayair glanced up. “Jita,” she hissed, “what’s wrong with our lights?”
Anjita opened her mouth, but words died in her throat and she frowned. They were growing smaller and dimmer with each step. Together they halted, and the lights with them.
“Maybe we’re getting tired.” Anjita called hers to her palm.
“No, it’s this place.” Munayair cupped her hand around her light. “This can’t be right. We should go back.”
Anjita leaned toward the bell. “This is another test.”
“Forcing us to walk through this maze in the dark?” Munayair clutched her witchlight. Panic choked her.
“Seems so.” Anjita teetered, then lunged forward, dragging Munayair behind her.
Munayair watched darkness creeping into her palm to swallow the hovering light. As they descended, it shrunk to a pinprick. A spark. The darkness pounced, devouring them. Munayair walked accompanied by her pounding heart, Anjita’s hand grasping hers, and the stones under her fingertips and boots.
The wall she had been touching vanished, and the stairs leveled out. She stumbled with a cry. Anjita’s grasp slipped, but she clutched at it. They stood frozen before Anjita finally ventured to speak.
“I think we’re in a cave now,” she whispered. “It echoed when you yelled.”
Munayair pressed a hand to her heart. “Which way now?”
For all its noise in the stairs, the bell rang softer here, more distant. It called to Munayair, drawing her on through the pitch blackness.
“This way.” Anjita pulled Munayair right.
“No, it’s this way,” Munayair said as she tugged towards the left.
They halted, confused.
“Are we meant to split up?” Anjita’s voice quavered.
Munayair choked as panic threatened to overwhelm her. “No!” She struggled for words. “I ... I must have heard wrong. The sound is this way.”
She started off towards the right, hand outstretched. Anjita followed, and they picked their way through the dark. Their footsteps echoed in the emptiness. Apart from the occasional vast stone pillar they had to skirt around, their searching fingers felt nothing but cold, still air.
Munayair cocked her head, listening hard. Was it the fearful pounding of her heart, or were footsteps approaching from behind? She pulled Anjita to a halt. “Did you hear something?”
“What?” Anjita’s voice boomed, absurdly loud in the stillness.
A squeak escaped Munayair and she clapped a hand over Anjita’s mouth. “Don’t talk so loud!” she hissed.
“What did you say?” Anjita cried through her fingers. “That blamed bell is so loud I can’t hear anything.”
Silence deafened Munayair. The bell faded behind her, almost inaudible by now.
Anjita squeezed Munayair’s hand. “We’re going to be fine,” she cried. “Just follow my lead.”
Munayair nodded. She clung to Anjita, bowed her head, and followed closer than a shadow at noon. They had begun to move with more confidence when their boots splashed into icy water. They stopped again.
“Is it a lake?” Munayair wondered.
“A lake, a pond, a puddle ...” Anjita bellowed. “We can’t tell without light.”
“We’ll have to go around.”
“Well, hold tight.”
They edged along the water, feeling ahead with their boots, soaking the hems of their skirts. It soon became plain the water was much larger than a pond.
Munayair pulled at Anjita. “Did you hear something? A splash?”
“That was me, my foot slipped,” Anjita yelled, tugging.
Munayair didn’t budge. “It came from further out.” She stood listening. Silence shouted in her ears.
Finally, Anjita cried, “We must be almost there. I’m going to be deaf soon otherwise.”
Munayair heard the bell as a fading echo, almost too faint to distinguish. She tightened her grip on Anjita’s hand. “You lead,” she said.
They both heard the next splash, loud and close. Munayair gasped, heart hammering under her tunic.
“Keep moving!” Anjita screamed, dragging Munayair forward. “It can’t b—”
Something heavy and cold cannoned into Munayair, jerking her hand out of Anjita’s. As soon as they lost contact, Anjita’s voice cut off mid-syllable. Munayair stood alone. She let out a cry, groping through the dark.
“Jita! Jita!”
No reply. Silence lay on her face, cold as the hand of a corpse.
She broke into a run in the direction Anjita had been going. The bell faded behind her. Then she tripped and fell headlong onto cold stone.
Hot tears ran down her face, and she stifled sobs with both hands. Fear crushed her with coils like a snake. She never knew how long she lay there, trembling and sobbing. Eons of terror and loneliness.
Gradually, she became aware of the sound again. The shimmering bell. Distant, but still calling. Pulling. Demanding. Wiping her nose, she clambered to her feet. Swayed on the spot. Waited for punishment, instruction. Anything. Nothing happened, except for the mark burning like a brand on her wrist.
With a sense of inevitability, she turned her leaden feet to follow the distant peal of the bell.
Chapter 7: Initiation
Darkness swallowed her whole, transforming her from flesh and heartbeat into a shadow moving among shadows. The rocks, the thick air, and the things moving around her were all darkness grown thick and dense as the world she had left behind.
She stiffened. Her heartbeat quickened. Had she heard something close behind? So soft was the sound she could not be sure.
For a moment she wavered, afraid to move but desperate to follow the bell. Finally, she hurried on, and ended by tripping. The black ground hit hard, scraping her hand and banging her knee. She rubbed her hurts, listening. The sound was louder now, a stealthy fluttering like a shiver on the spine. Her heart jolted like a terrified horse and her fingers shook as she ran them over her useless witchligh
t tattoo. If only she had some light, even a spark! She could bear anything but this endless dark.
Longing choked her. Couldn’t she collapse on the cold stone and give up? Apart from Anjita, who would even notice? Her father hadn’t come.
No. The voice in her mind was as quiet as ever, but harder than steel. The mark burned. Get up.
Wearily, she obeyed, rising on shaking legs. She shuffled across slick stone, holding out trembling hands. The bell pulsed with the pounding of her heart.
The tip of her boot hit something, and she felt it with her hands. A loose stone. Large, but not too heavy to lift. Relief flooded through her. With a weapon at hand, no matter how crude, she could hold terror at bay. Hefting the rock with both hands, she screamed into the blackness.
“Show yourself!”
For a moment, she trembled from head to toe in silence. Then a blinding ray of light edged into view from behind a nearby pillar. She blinked away tears from dazzled eyes and gasped in astonishment. The rock clattered to the ground.
It was her own chelka, Tel. Creeping towards her, he took hold of her skirt like a lost child finding its mother.
She let out a shaky laugh. Relief felt like warm water trickling through her numbed limbs. “Did I drop you? I’m sorry.”
Tel bent to tap a message against the rock. Many enemies all around. Keep moving.
The bell rang louder and more urgent. Despite herself, she turned, shuffling along the slippery stone floor. Tel turned, too, towards the sound.
“You must feel it because I do.” She smiled shakily. “Very well, little one. Lead the way.”
He leaped to obey, scurrying at such a clip she was forced to jog to keep up. Luckily, the glyphlight kept her from any more falls.
By Tel’s light, she discovered the cave held only one body of water. An enormous lake, black and depthless, cold and still as death. The sound of the bell urged them around the shore. After a while, they found a thin spit of land, little more than a slippery line of rocks. It led out into the center of the lake. Munayair’s heart sank. The voice of the bell called from across the water.
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