The Broken Academy 2 : Power of Magic

by Jade Alters

  That’s it! Mother - that’s the key! It’s not over. I wish I could tell Helena, but for now jamming a bag with a few days’ supplies is all the satisfaction I’ll get. Mother, or rather her mission for me, will save Helena. Darius Jecks.

  Road Trip Buddies

  Darius,

  San Francisco, Hidden Corner

  It’s been a dull slew of days since the last time I saw Emery. Wake up. Find some poor, drunk sap. Sap them. Head home. I even stooped to playing Monopoly with my roommates on a board one of them salvaged from a dumpster, one night. It was pretty entertaining to watch them flinch every time I landed on one of their hotels, like each one might be the last die they ever rolled. Needless to say, when I noticed a presence surge down through the light of the Tether on my daily stop by the Academy training zone, I was thrilled. Even if it was just another brawl, at least it’d be a break in the monotony. This time, though, I make sure to hang near the edge of the illusory curtain around the training zone. Wouldn’t want loose fingers putting mirror-shards somewhere final, after all. But, when Emery rounds the corner to find me, malice is about the only emotion absent from her eyes. She seems otherwise entirely overwhelmed.

  “Good, you’re here,” Emery says. Something wiggles across her lips almost like a smile, but it’s crossed intensely with needing to take a wicked shit. That’s perfect, I think to myself while I wait for her to arrive. That’s just what Emery needs, to take a massive emotional dump. And it looks like she’s almost ready.

  “Good so we can try to kill each other again? Or good so you can help reconnect me with the world I belong in?” I prod her. Emery continues straight towards me. She shows no regard for threats, or intention to make one herself.

  “That depends on how well you travel,” Emery says. She stops just outside my reach, just inside the illusory curtain where she could trick me into a literal eternity of smoke and mirrors.

  “A road trip?” I tease her with a spike of childish glee. “Where to?”

  “Six Rivers National Forest,” Emery tells me with sudden seriousness. It pulls out the inverse in me. I can’t help but laugh.

  “Now tell me exactly how I won such favor in the eyes of the great Emery Dalshak. Last time you visited me here, it was to put mirrors through my guts. Now you want to be travel buddies?”

  “What you did was become useful,” Emery tells me. “A friend of mine was taken to Six Rivers. I’m fairly certain sure she’ll die there, if someone doesn’t get her. I, however, can’t exactly go parading across California using tricks to solve the problems this is going to cause.”

  “So you need a little hired muscle with nothing to lose?” I fill in the blanks for her. “Except to hire me, you’ve got to pay up. Tell me: what’s on the table here? Why in Hell’s nine circles would I want to drive across the state with you?”

  “So you can reconnect,” Emery says. It doesn’t help that I can’t decide if she’s the best or worst liar I’ve ever met. She seems to mean the words on her lips now.

  “Oh, at Six Rivers?” I laugh. “It might have slipped your mind that Witches and Warlocks aren’t the biggest fan of my kind.”

  “Which is why I thought you might enjoy sticking it to them,” Emery counters. I tilt my head at her. Go ahead, I dare her, silently. Go ahead and try to convince me. “I’m going there to break my friend out. She’s been kidnapped-”

  “Nice try. The Witches and Warlocks of the Grotto don’t kidnap students of the Academy,” I wave her off. Emery’s undeterred face doesn’t so much as wince, even as I start to turn to go. Either she knows I’m just testing her, or every word is true.

  “They do when Core Line business is concerned. When one of the families threatens the others’ way of life,” Emery tells me. I turn back, just intrigued enough to humor it, to sample the bait she’s dangling.

  “So you need me to disrupt some Witchy politics. And I get…what, out of this? Besides the kick of messing with the tree-huggers?” I prompt her. Now she knows there’s a pot in play, maybe she can sweeten it a little.

  “You can imagine the Council isn’t too thrilled about one of their students being dragged away. The good word I could put in for you gets much better if you help me bring my friend back,” Emery tries. Weighing it on the scales behind my closed eyelids, it’s a solid arrangement, if not for one minor detail.

  “What’s the Council doing about the missing girl? You’re out here going renegade, so it can’t be much. But I’d hate for my situation to worsen, if we cross paths and they discover me aiding your unauthorized desperado mission,” I test her. It should take no more than a second to formulate a true answer. Any longer than that and the truth will come out one way or another.

  “The hell do you think they’re doing? Same thing they always do,” Emery bites back, with just the right dose of hesitation to be authentic. “Talking. That’s why I’m here, talking to you. Which I’m about sick of, by the way. You want back in with the Council or not?” I squint at her. From the outside, it looks like I’m trying to focus on a blurry image. Actually, I’m using what’s left of my supernaturally sensitive hearing to listen. I count the drums of her pulse, muffled, but steady. Her breathing is even.

  “Come with me,” I say. I turn my back to her as a sign of good faith, and Emery steps through the illusory curtain.

  Emery,

  San Francisco, Hidden Corner

  Come with me, he said. Then he has the audacity to lead me on this ridiculous trek through alleys and back streets without so much as a word. I’d ask him about it if I didn’t already know his answer would aggravate me more than not knowing. If he wasn’t going to take my deal, the sheer volume of his vulgarity would have clued me in. Darius didn’t have to know that half of what I’d told him were lies. No matter his ridiculous tough guy act, I know Darius hasn’t been feeding since he didn’t catch the skip in my heart when I told him Helena was kidnapped. I don’t even know why my heart skipped. After he serves his purpose, it’s not like Darius will be my problem anyway. I’ll turn him over to Mother. I’ll be in the clear again, at long last. Right.

  I follow about three paces behind him, to one of the worst streets I’ve ever seen. The chipped sidewalk is lined by plywood and sheet metal fortresses. Eyes flit through rotting wooden shutters as we walk by. I’m tempted to ask if Darius is messing with me when he turns toward one of the ramshackle doors and walks through. I loom in the doorway like a ghost, which is exactly how I must look to the three vagrants inside. A man and two women turn pale faces to me as Darius crosses the room to a little jar. From inside it, he plucks up a handful of cash.

  “I thought you didn’t panhandle,” one of the scrawny women in the corner says to him.

  “I don’t,” Darius lashes back in a viler tone than even the way he spits at me. “This is from saps who passed out when I fed on them. And I thought I told you, Lisa, Not to get personal with me.” His tone warns her not to test him, despite the confusion of his guest. I feel an odd kind of shame at the way they eye my clothes. Mine were bought new for the term and I hardly spared it a thought. Theirs look like they’ve done everything in them for the past few years.

  “So-so-sorry,” the woman named Lisa stammers. Darius doesn’t address her directly. He doesn’t even look her way, though his tone takes a shocking turn for sincerity. He sounds almost somber when he says:

  “I won’t be back for a while. I…might not come back.” A strange silence befalls the one-room shack that tells me so much more than words ever could. The three vagrants just stare at Darius, forlorn, until he takes a deep breath to ask, “Those guys that gave you shit about working the park…what kind of car were they in?”

  “A gray sedan…maybe a Camry,” the man says. Darius nods and turns for the door. He’d have charged right through me if I didn’t move. I’m left with nothing to do but follow in his brisk wake.

  “Honestly…I didn’t think you had a friend in the world,” I prod him. “I couldn’t have been more wrong.”r />
  “My roommates are nothing more than glorified bloodbags,” Darius answers. He leads us down a narrow street between two shoddy rowhomes on the opposite side of the street. “Were. Fat chance I ever see them again, now.”

  “Funny…I didn’t see any puncture holes on their necks,” I point out, just to test the waters. They run ice cold. Darius plants his heels to glare at me over his shoulders. His face always had sharp features, but just now it’s like a whole knife block flicking out at me at once. His cheeks, his chin, his nose. I can’t make out if his eyes are more brown or maroon, but they sure look thirsty.

  “All the more reason for you not to irritate me. Out here, I can use my abilities. You can’t. And I’m hungry. Don’t fuck with me, Emery,” Darius warns me. For once, I take it to heart and tail him in silence. We stop at the side of a Toyota Camry with ugly gray paint peeling off the top of it. Glass sprays across the front seats just ahead of Darius’ flying elbow. I wince in wait for the alarm to follow, but the quiet weighs down the air after the shatter.

  “Are you nuts?” I hiss at him.

  “If the alarm went off, I could have gotten out of here in no time,” Darius shrugs, “Besides, no one living in this shithole has an alarm. It’s all you’d ever hear. Get in.” Darius takes the wheel and waits for me to plop in the passenger seat. My walk around the car gives me just enough time to think what the hell am I doing? before I slam the door behind me.

  Emery,

  Dunnigan, California

  Gas Station

  I see the reason Darius needed his feeding-spoils cash stash about three and a half hours into the trip. Since I waited until classes were done for the day to come find him, it’s nearly dark as we pull into the gas station. I was beginning to think Darius might run the tank dry with how long he pressed on after the gas light came on. He finally turns off the main highway at a dingy little gas station. Someone’s name is on the sign but I can’t quite make it out before he whips in next to the pump.

  “Be a sweetheart and give me a few pumps?” Darius says, intentionally seductive to get under my skin. I hate myself for how well it works.

  “You kidding?” I snap back.

  “You might want to fit a comedy class into your next term at the Academy,” Darius laughs, like the answer is so obvious. “I drove the first leg of the trip. You pump the gas. Even trade.”

  “Really? This is the first thing you want to talk about since we left the city?” I ask. Darius looks my way with goofy, idiotic bunched up lips.

  “No. I just want you to do it,” he teases. It’s one of the few times in my life where I let out an audible ugh, before I climb out of the car to do the deed. I feel like popping the premium nozzle to drain Darius’ cash, but I didn’t bring any myself. I’m a bit ashamed to admit how much my frantic need to track Helena overpowered my usual planning instincts. I grab the regular nozzle instead and shove it down the hungry throat of our ride’s gas tank. The unexpected slide of the driver’s side window sends a shiver down my spine. “So what other races have your family tricked into serving their bigoted cause?”

  “What the hell is wrong with you?” I sigh back at him. I can hardly believe it, but it’s actually too exhausting to keep getting upset at him. I can’t see myself making it to Helena and back without killing my only help if I do.

  “You wanted to talk. This is what I want to talk about,” Darius says. There’s a curious lack of malice in his voice when he says, “I think it’d help you to talk about it anyway.”

  “What…do you mean?”

  “You’re different. From the last time I saw you, I mean. Something’s changed. You don’t want to kill me anymore, for one,” Darius counts out on a raised finger. “Now you’re out on some suicide mission to save your friend? That doesn’t sound like a Dalshak family order.”

  “Damn,” I say in the flattest tone I can mumble. “You’ve got me all figured out.”

  “I happen to know, from experience with Serge that you should be getting crazy migraines from working outside the family plan. Unless, of course, you broke your connection with them,” Darius goes on. Shit. The depth of his insight shakes me to my core. I never expected that, behind that conceited smirk, he was digging so deep.

  “We’ll go more into that when you can show me your P.h.D. in psychology. What the hell were you talking about, tricking other races?” I ask, to throw him from my trail. The cock of his eyebrow hints to me that he isn’t entirely off it, more that he’s on to a new one.

  “The Kyrie,” Darius tells me. “Who else has joined the Kyrie?” I hate to give him the satisfaction, but he really does say it like I should know.

  “What?”

  “Man…they really don’t tell the kids anything,” Darius marvels.

  “Tell us what? Agh!” I cough when gas overfill spurts out onto my wrist. I ungrip the pump trigger, just too late to prevent the dousing of my sleeve. “Damnit.” I slam the pump back in the nozzle, squeeze my sleeve out and wrench cash from Darius’ fingers. I feed it to the machine while he chokes his laughter, then round the car and plop in the passenger seat. “Alright. What’s the Kyrie? Now.”

  “You might want to change out of your gassy clothes before you put your business pants on,” Darius laughs, pinching his nose for effect. Were he at full strength, the scent would be thrice as potent to him now. “The Kyrie is the alliance of races opposed to the ways of the Broken Academy Council. They’re separatists in favor of independent research and community management. They see the way things are as…integrated but biased.”

  “So what… They want us all on our own? No Academy?” I can’t believe I hear myself ask him this. He’s talking about my parents. My family. If it were true, I’d know about it, I tell myself. But if I believed that, I wouldn’t have asked.

  “More like Academies for everyone. Each race left to manage their own communities, set their own guidelines. The Council’s power would be reduced to a relay center for information. Separate but equal kind of deal,” Darius tells me.

  “You…you said who else. Who’s a member of this Kyrie?” I stress the word to make the point I don’t quite believe him. It hardly seems to matter to Darius. Even if it is true, why share all of this with me? What does he stand to gain for dislodging my family loyalty? Somewhere inside, I know that he’d never be able to do something so extreme on his own. Part of it is me, buried beneath leagues upon miles upon layers of conditioning.

  “Me, for one. Or I used to be. I was the VampKing’s ambassador to the movement. He’s an old and cautious man. He wanted an insider’s view of the Kyrie before he pledged our kind to them,” Darius tells me while he pulls the car back out onto the highway. The last ray of dusk shrinks back behind a distant mountain range outside. For a minute, the road is painted blood orange.

  “And then…the incident last term happened. With Cece,” I say, more to myself than Darius.

  “Bingo,” Darius sighs, “I assume they wanted to please Dorian, bringing a Dragon into the cause. But…your Dad was so willing to sacrifice me to do it. I couldn’t believe it. How many years have I been a friend to your brother? Your family?”

  “At least twenty years,” I mumble before I catch myself. Great. Now he’s got me feeding into the delusion.

  “If Dorian knew…man, he’d be pissed. But I haven’t been able to get word to him. Or the VampKing. Someone keeps intercepting my letters - I wonder who?” Darius plays dumb.

  “Yeah, I wonder,” I chuckle along with him. Mother. Father. The slew of my cousins - pawns in their familial army. “Who’s this Dorian?”

  “I wish I could tell you,” Darius says, “Far as I know, he’s this badass Dragon. They tell all kinds of stories about him, but who the hell knows if they’re true. Fire hotter than the heart of a volcano. Wings wider than a jet - you know. He’s the idea man. He hatched the concept of the Kyrie, and approached your family about it.” I run through it all again in my head. My family… Dorian… Cece… The VampKing… The Kyrie…
It would be an awful amount of detail for Darius to invent right here, on the spot.

  “Hey, where are you going?” I ask when he turns our car off onto a dark exit ramp. It’s the easiest escape for my mind from the doubt flowering there. “We’re supposed to stay on this road for-”

  “Tomorrow,” Darius interrupts.

  “Tomorrow?” it’s only a seven-hour drive to Six Rivers! We’re halfway there - why in the hell would we stop?” I demand.

  “Hunger,” Darius tells me.

  “We were just at a gas station, why didn’t you…” I trail off from my shout when I realize what he means. “Oh.”

  “I’m a growing boy, Emery. If you want me to be useful at all when we get there, I need to drink. And unless you’re offering…” Darius looks over at me with a haunting level of seriousness.

  “No,” I tell him. My hand slides up instinctively over my neck, where makeup covered the two punctures from our last meeting. Somehow, though, I doubt I’ll ever feel those fangs again. After everything he’s told me…everything he’s risking, when really I had nothing to threaten him with…it’s almost like he’s trying to help me. It’s almost like he’s the same charming older-brother’s-friend I remember being too cool for me to talk to in my younger years.

  “Then we’ll find somewhere in Dunnigan to camp out for the night. Tomorrow, we’ll close the gap,” Darius says.