‘I think it’s a good idea,’ I said.
‘Well, just for the record, I don’t,’ said Petra.
‘Let’s talk about this tomorrow. I’m going to bed,’ I said. I rose and left.
I did not sleep well.
Petra’s words kept coming back to me.
If this plan didn’t work, if this ‘army’ ended up not being able to fight, I had no alternative plan. The war would be lost before it was even fought.
Another thirty days passed. There were some improvements – Sara Bond, a lanky female of thirty-three, performed a perfectly acceptable Embattlemento spell that actually blocked my incantation. I praised her, a comment that brought even more redness to her already rosy cheeks.
Tobias Holmes, on the other hand, was not progressing nearly as well. Tall and broad-shouldered and, I had seen for myself, a bit overconfident in his abilities, he could not seem to grasp the concept of pointing his wand at the actual target. Instead he vaguely waved it here and there, which meant that he ended up being a danger to himself and others around him.
I worked with him until he could at least aim straight.
I had spoken with Miranda Weeks after my conversation with Delph. She took my decision without argument, yet there was something in her look that made me think she was not OK with it. But I knew that Delph was right. She was simply too young. Besides, she had not a jot of confidence in her small bones. She held her wand as though it were a serpent about to bite her. She never looked at the target of her spells. She mumbled the words with no confidence and indeed seemed relieved when no magic was produced. She wouldn’t have lasted a sliver in battle.
I stood in the corner watching her, and others like her, as my own confidence, bolstered a bit by Sara Bond’s enhanced performance, now trickled away. The truth was, there were far more like Miranda Weeks among the fifty.
Several, like Louise Penny and Dom Sadan, didn’t seem to want to fight at all.
I glanced over at Petra’s group, and I saw that the same held for her lot.
When I caught Petra’s gaze, her thoughts were clear for me to see.
This was a growing disaster of enormous proportions.
I quickly looked away.
At dinner that night there was one of us unaccounted for – no one could find Miranda.
We searched high and low. Until I stepped out into the rear grounds and heard the sobs.
I made my way down the garden path until I came to a bench nearly surrounded by large rose bushes.
Miranda was seated on the bench, her head in her hands while she wept.
Two marble statues were next to her, attempting to console her without a lick of success. The magical rake had a hankie poised on its handle, but she wouldn’t look at it.
I told them I would deal with it and sent them off.
I performed a wand wire to Petra telling her that I had found Miranda and everything was fine. They were to continue on with their meal.
I sat next to her and waited until she stopped sobbing.
I was loath to break the silence. Sometimes it was better to let the person in distress speak first.
But when Miranda just sniffled without looking like she was actually going to say anything, I decided to plunge ahead.
‘Things not going well?’ I began.
She shook her head and then broke into more sobs.
I took out my wand and held it in front of me.
‘Take out your wand, Miranda.’
‘What’s the use, Vega? I’m simply all sixes and sevens with this . . . this magic stuff.’
‘You’re just very young. Please, take it out.’
Scowling, she drew her wand and held it in front of her. But she didn’t look at it.
‘Where do you come from?’ I asked.
I had spoken with many of the others about their pasts, but had not done so with Miranda. It was probably because of her losing her mother. She no doubt thought about it all the time, and I didn’t want to unduly add to this burden.
‘Why?’ she said stubbornly.
‘I’d just like to know.’
She rubbed her face and said slowly, ‘I was born in a little village called Drews. Me mum and me lived there. I couldn’t tell you where it is now, but I remember it being pretty, with crumbling stone walls, a small creek running through it with a bridge over it. I caught a fish for dinner. Me mum . . .’ She stopped, and her lip trembled. ‘Me mum was quite proud when I did that.’
‘I’m sure she was. Did you go to Bimbleton Station?’
She nodded. ‘Mum wanted to see where the train went.’
She started to cry again, and I put my arm around her and just let her sob.
When she had recovered, I pointed to the mark on her hand. ‘They took you because of that mark. It shows you’re magical.’
‘So why can’t I do magic, then!’ she exclaimed.
She looked at me with red, puffy eyes.
‘Because magic is hard, and everyone comes to it in their own way. Some faster, some slower.’
‘I bet you came to it fast. I bet you were doing spells when you were born.’
‘I performed my first spell when I was fifteen. Before that I had never done a lick of proper magic. I was incapable of it. It took a very long time and a lot of hard work and many mistakes along the way for me to properly wield this.’ I held up my wand.
This confession of sorts clearly got her attention.
‘Really?’ she said, her eyes wide in wonder.
‘How old are you, Miranda?’
‘Ten, least I think.’
‘I’m nearly sixteen, and I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve messed up. But I picked myself back up and kept going. I’ve been watching you for a while now. Very closely.’
‘Why’s that?’ she said nervously. ‘You’re . . . you’re not thinking of sending me back to . . . to what I was? You already told me I couldn’t fight the Maladons. So I’m no use to you.’
I gripped her shoulder. ‘I would never do that even if you could never properly perform a spell in your life. You are free now. You’re my friend. Friends don’t hurt each other like that. You will remain free regardless of anything that happens here.’ I paused and said, ‘I see a lot of you in me.’
She shook her head hard. ‘Y-you’re just saying that to make me feel better.’
‘I don’t have the luxury of doing that, Miranda. I don’t have time to make you feel better simply for the sake of making you feel better. Do you understand that?’
She sat up straight and looked directly at me. ‘Yes.’
‘When I first used my wand, I had no confidence. Not in it, and not in me. I wielded it like the thing and I were two separate bits of stuff.’
She looked at her wand. ‘Aren’t we?’
‘No! That wand was created from the wand of Bastion Cadmus, the father of us all. It has a bit of him embedded in it. That bit is now your wand, which means it is also embedded in you. Your wand is you, and you are your wand. You are truly inseparable. It will perform for you better and more powerfully than it will for anyone else.’
‘It won’t perform for me a’tall,’ she said miserably.
‘That’s because you have no confidence in yourself, meaning you have no confidence in your wand. It senses that. It feels that, Miranda; that’s why it won’t perform. Because you, as yet, don’t trust it. And so it does not trust you.’
She stared down at her wand again. This time, not like it was a serpent, but with a look of intrigue; with a look of one considering certain possibilities.
‘You . . . you really think that’s the problem?’
‘Did you trust your mother?’
‘What? O’course I did. She always took care of me. Always wanted the best for me.’ Tears leaked from her eyes, but she held my gaze, which impressed me.
‘So does your wand. When you have it in hand, you will never be alone. It wants the absolute best for you, because it wants you to survive.’
/> She looked down at her wand, her mouth open in wonder.
When she looked back up, I said, ‘Shall we go into dinner now, Miranda, or . . . ?’
I let my voice trail off and studied her, awaiting her response.
She stood, holding her wand loosely, as I had originally taught her. Then Miranda turned away from me, pointed her wand at a bush, her gaze set directly ahead, and then, while making the perfect pull-back motion, said, ‘Rejoinda rose.’
The flower was nipped off the bush and flew directly into her free hand. She looked down at it for an instant before her gaze lifted to mine. Both our mouths spread into wide grins, and then she hugged me.
‘I did it!’ She began to sob harder than ever. She was only ten, after all.
I hugged her back, the tears creeping down my cheeks.
‘Yes, you did.’
‘I promise I’ll make you proud of me, Vega.’
‘I know you will.’
Blimey, it was like I’d just inherited a little sister.
But I had one thought firmly in mind as I hugged Miranda.
I hope you never have to cast a spell in battle. I hope this war will be over long before you’re old enough to fight.
And possibly die.
37
ONE SMALL STEP
Sixteen!
I awoke with this thought. I turned sixteen sessions this morning. Or sixteen years. Delph, Petra and I routinely spoke this world’s language now, otherwise our fifty pupils would not be able to understand us.
Delph and I had been gone from Wormwood for an entire year. It was hard to believe, but when I thought back to all that we had experienced, and survived, it felt like ten years had actually passed.
I dressed and headed down with Harry Two. When I walked into the dining room, Delph, Petra and all the others were there.
I made a plate of food and was carrying it over to a table with five of our pupils when I saw Delph waving at me to join him. Mrs Jolly and her kitchen staff swooped around, making sure that everyone was well-fed and taken care of.
When I sat next to Delph he grinned, leaned over and said, ‘Happy birthday, Vega Jane.’
I looked down and saw in his hand a small, wrapped package.
‘Delph, you didn’t have to get me anything.’
I was actually surprised that he had remembered it was my birthday.
‘Remember supper at the Starving Tove back in Wormwood?’ he said. ‘It’s been a year since then.’
‘I know, Delph. I was just thinking about that.’
He looked at the package. ‘Go ahead and open it.’
I did so and held up what was in it.
It was a finely wrought chain with a tiny disc at the end.
‘It’s to wear around your neck,’ he said.
I looked at the disc. On it was the image of the three hooks.
‘Where did you get this?’ I said, amazed.
‘Didn’t get it. I made it.’
‘How?’
‘There’s a little smithy in the back grounds here. Gus, he’s one of them marble statues – a slep, um, horse – showed me. Got a forge and metal and all the tools I needed.’
‘Delph, it’s beautiful. Truly beautiful.’ I put it around my neck. ‘Thank you so much.’
He turned red but smiled broadly.
I hesitated. ‘Delph, about heading off without telling you?’
‘It’s OK.’
‘No, it’s not. You were right. I shouldn’t have done it. And I shouldn’t have spoken to you like that. So . . . so I just won’t do that any more, OK?’
He smiled warmly. ‘Thanks, Vega Jane.’
He gave me a hug. When he sat back, he had a funny look on his face.
‘Delph? Are you OK?’
He nodded, rose and hurried off without finishing his meal, which was practically unheard of for Delph.
I sensed someone watching, and I glanced over to find Petra staring at me. She slowly looked away.
The training had been steadily improving over the last few months. Artemis Dale had mastered the Jagada spell, and Charlotte Tokken hadn’t lost control of her wand in a while. Miranda Weeks had made enormous strides, wielding her wand with skill and confidence. All of them had worked hard and shown true grit and determination. I knew it had not been easy because it had not been easy for me either.
Training was going so well, in fact, that I had an idea. I explained it to Delph and Petra that night.
‘I want to take three of them to Greater True tonight.’
They both looked startled at the abruptness of my suggestion.
‘Why Greater True?’ asked Delph.
‘That’s where we lost the invisibility ring.’
Petra looked down at her missing finger.
I said quickly, ‘Petra, I don’t blame you for the loss of the ring. But I think we need to try to get it back.’
‘How can you?’ Petra asked. ‘You don’t even know if it’s in Greater True.’
‘You said the Maladons jumped you?’
‘That’s right.’
‘And one of the Maladons had your wand. Yet you ended up in the barracks of the Elite Guard and not in the custody of the Maladons.’
Petra looked confused.
‘How did they take the ring and your finger, do you remember? By magic?’
‘It . . . it . . . it happened so fast. I was half unconscious.’
I glanced at Delph. ‘You managed to lift one of them up and throw them against a wall. Unlikely against a Maladon with a wand – especially as you weren’t invisible that night. You said the wind knocked you around and the invisibility shield was thrown off.’
‘That’s . . . that’s right,’ said Delph, looking puzzled.
I asked, ‘What were they wearing? Suits and hats? Black cloaks with red hoods?’
‘Cloaks,’ said Delph at the same time as Petra said, ‘Coats.’
I gazed at each of them in turn. ‘Well, which was it?’
They glanced sheepishly at each other.
‘I don’t know,’ admitted Delph.
Petra shook her head in agreement. ‘I was a bit wonky in the head too, from getting thrown by the wind,’ she said. ‘But I think it was a knife that cut off my finger,’ she added.
‘Let me see it,’ I said.
She held it up and I studied the stump.
‘This was not done by a spell,’ I said, wishing I had examined it more closely when it had first happened. ‘A spell would have been more precise, and it would have burned the skin. This is jagged and there is no burning. I think they used a knife.’
Petra said, ‘They grabbed me, but I can’t remember much more except that it hurt. They didn’t have to cut my finger to get the ring off – it was loose anyway, that’s why it got turned back round.’
‘They did it to cause you pain. I think members of the Elite Guard were the ones who attacked and captured you, not the Maladons. I wondered why you were taken to the barracks and not somewhere else, like the castle. When I used one of the Maladons to get into the barracks, the guard there said, “We’ve got our pair here still.” Then he wanted to know if Dullish had managed to trap me. When I searched the Maladons, I got your wand back but not the ring.’
‘So you think one of them Elite Guards might have it?’ asked Delph.
‘It’s possible. He might have thought it was valuable and he could sell it. Regardless of whether one of the guards or a Maladon has it, I want it back.’
‘Who do you want to take?’ asked Petra.
‘Amicus, Sara and Dennis.’
Delph nodded. ‘Yep, they’re three of the best.’
‘So it’ll be the five of us?’ said Petra.
I shook my head. ‘The four of us. You have to stay here. If anything happens to me, you need to carry on.’
She looked at me as though the weight of the world had descended upon her shoulders.
‘Me, carry on?’
‘We took a blood oath, Petra. For
me it was more than a way to stop our squabbling. It was also an unbreakable bond, so that if one of us falls, the other one will continue on. We can’t count on both of us surviving.’
She slowly nodded, and Delph said, ‘Then I’ll go with you.’
‘No, Petra will need your assistance, Delph.’
‘Why don’t I go with them, then, Vega?’ offered Petra.
‘You will at some point. But the first time, it has to be me, Petra. It just has to be.’
Petra studied me, and I could tell by her expression that she knew I was right. I was the superior sorceress, especially now with my wand fully and completely my own.
I rose and went to tell the others so they could prepare. They were all excited and scared. Exactly what I had expected.
With their magic returned and their being trained up properly, all fifty of the formerly enslaved were now fully branded with the three hooks on their hands. That meant they could be traced by the Maladons once they left the protection of Empyrean. In response to this, I had performed an intricate spell that had produced fifty copies of the glove that Alice had given me. They would wear them whenever we left Empyrean. I was pretty confident they would work, but this night we would find out for certain.
When I went back to my room to get my cloak, Petra was waiting for me.
‘Delph told me it was your birthday today.’
‘Yes, it is.’
She looked at the necklace around my neck.
‘Delph made that for you?’
I smiled. ‘He gave it to me as a present.’
‘Is that what you do on birthdays?’
My smile vanished even as my heart went out to her. Of course; why would she know about presents on birthdays?
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘When is your birthday?’
She shook her head. ‘I’m not sure. I remember my mother telling me it was cold when I was born. And I know I’m seventeen because we would mark off the time when I was young. I would cut a notch in a stick I kept for each one.’
‘Well, it’s cold outside now, so maybe your birthday is coming up,’ I said.
She shrugged, but kept staring at the necklace.
I ended the awkward silence by saying, ‘I need to get ready.’
Vega Jane and the Rebels’ Revolt Page 24