Knight Rising

by T. Mikita

  “Midnight is after curfew,” said Dorren. “And the Gate is dangerous.”

  “I don’t care,” said Asher.

  “You have a sorcerer that wants you dead, Asher. You can’t go wondering around the grounds at night,” said Galina. “Especially near the Gate.”

  “Well, we certainly aren’t going to let Asher go alone,” said Kenny surprising them all.

  “Ken’s right,” Joel agreed.

  “Don’t worry, Asher,” Phoenix said. “We’ve got your back.”

  Their support made him feel good, but he wasn’t going to let them get involved. This was his fight. Still, it was nice to have friends. For the first time in a long while, Asher relaxed and smiled. He supposed he hadn’t really felt safe since his parents died, but here at Whitehall, he had begun to feel at home. Whatever Lacey did, Asher didn’t care. He was ready. Bring it on, he thought.

  The group went their separate ways, planning to meet in the dining hall shortly. Asher wanted to make a quick trip to pick up a book at the library. He was finally starting to be able to find his way around and told the others they could head back to the dorm, but Joel stuck by his side. “We won’t let you face Lacey alone,” he said. “Friends are more important than a bunch of stupid school rules.”

  Asher smiled at him. He was glad that he had found a few friends so quickly. Friends are forever, he thought, and a stray nagging notion of a friend left behind crept into his mind.

  23

  Keepers of History

  After dinner, the group settled down together to try to get their homework done. “Because if you are going to break curfew, you should always do your homework first,” said Dorren dryly.

  “You don’t have to come,” said Phoenix testily. She had borrowed Dorren’s library book with the more concise list of all the names and properties of the crystals they needed to memorize. She was chewing on her pencil as she looked at them. She had tried to make flash cards for all of them, but the paper kept lighting on fire.

  Joel thought it was a spell. Something to keep students from making crib-sheets.

  “None of you are coming,” said Asher. “This is my fight.”

  “Like hell,” Phoenix said. Asher thought she was excited about the whole thing, treating it like an adventure. For his part, he wanted to kick Lacey’s ass, but he didn’t want to get any of his friends in trouble.

  “Of course, we’re coming,” said Dorren. “I just don’t have to like it.”

  “We could all flake. Or we could tell on them,” Galina suggested. “Then they’d all get in trouble for breaking curfew.”

  “Snitching doesn’t sound very chivalrous,” said Asher.

  “You think Lacey is going to be chivalrous?” Phoenix scoffed.

  “He will bring his whole crew and if you go alone, they will pound you, Asher,” Dorren said.

  “Yeah, you need us,” Joel added.

  “Or they might not show up at all. They might just tell on us,” Galina added. “Plus going to the Gate alone is dangerous.”

  “Asher’s not going alone. He will have all of us with him,” said Phoenix.

  “You don’t have to come. None of you do,” said Asher. “I can take care of Lacey myself.”

  “You are going to get caught,” Galina predicted.

  “I’m not worried about curfew. Pounding Lacey is totally worth it,” said Asher. “But like I just said. None of you need to get in trouble.”

  “And if he brings his goons?” said Joel. “We’re coming. But I think we should go early. Try to suss out if Lacey is setting a trap. If we see teachers, we get out of there pronto.”

  “I’m sure that will work,” said Galina sarcastically. “All six of us sneaking around. Asher, think this through. Best case scenario, Lacey comes alone and you beat him. Then you both get in trouble when you have to explain your bruises tomorrow.”

  “They will blend right in with my other bruises,” Asher said.

  Galina gave him a look. “And if he really hurts you? Or if you hurt him? Going to the healers means you are caught. Lacey telling means you are caught. Just being seen means you’re caught.” Her voice was rising with intensity. “It’s the Gate. For fuck’s sake, Asher, it’s guarded. Plus, your aunt is the actual Guardian of Whitegate. She will know if there is any magic done there.”

  “I’m not going to do any magic.”

  “And you can be sure Lacey isn’t either?” she scoffed.

  There was that. Everything Galina said made sense, but Asher couldn’t bring himself to back out. It would look too much like cowardice. Besides, he could beat Lacey.

  “All right fine,” Asher said, giving the appearance of defeat. “I give up. You are right. I’m tired anyway and I still have my essay on this Knight’s journal to do. Then I’m going to bed.”

  “So you are not going?” Galina asked, sounding hopeful.

  “Not going,” Asher agreed. “Let Lacey show up and be the one to look stupid.”

  “Do we at least tell on him?” Joel asked.

  “No,” Asher said. He was adamant. “Just because Lacey is a dick doesn’t mean we should stoop to his level.”

  “It’s your decision, Asher.” Phoenix said, although Asher thought she looked disappointed.

  “Good,” Galina said. There were nods all around, and then they went back to homework, but Asher had trouble concentrating. He was thinking about what Galina had said about the Gate.

  He paused in writing the summary of the Knight’s journal he was working on for Professor Palmer. The thing was packed with information and it seemed to make a jumble in his head. He didn’t want to miss anything. Asher had always been able to remember enough of a lecture to at least pass, but here, where his practical application still left much to be desired, he needed to actually do well on the theory. Luckily, both Kenny and Dorren were willing to help him with that part.

  “Do all of the Guardians write journals like this?” Asher asked the group in general. But Dorren and Joel were engaged in explaining what Kenny had missed today in class while the healer had been stitching up a gash in his leg. Phoenix looked decidedly bored.

  It was Galina who answered. “Most Knights have something they want to pass on to others, but the Sentinels are required to keep the history.”

  “I’m still not sure I really have a clear picture of the difference,” Asher added.

  “Me either. I’ve only been here a couple of months longer than you.”

  Asher had forgotten that. Galina already seemed to have a grasp on many of the concepts that escaped him and he told her so.

  “My mother taught me,” she said. “She was a Sentinel. She had volumes and volumes. She read them to me first as fairytales.”

  “So you learned about this stuff before you came to Whitehall?” Asher thought of how he had assumed that all the stories his father had told him were fairytales too.

  “Yes.” Galina smiled. “Mom hated the cold weather and she didn’t want to send me across the country to school when I was younger. We lived in California for much of my life. And she thought, if anything, I would be a Sentinel like she was. She never thought I would present as a possible Knight.”

  “And your dad?” Asher asked.

  Galina shook her head. “He wasn’t really in the picture. Mom said he wasn’t a Guardian at all. Or at least it didn’t show. Perhaps he was one of the recessives. Perhaps he just didn’t tell her. I don’t really know. I grew up with just my mom.”

  “No brothers or sisters?” Asher asked.

  Galina shook her head again. “No. Just me and my mom.” She got a wistful faraway look in her eye.

  The fact that she lost her mom had to be horribly lonely, Asher thought, and yet he had lost his family too. He considered asking Galina if she wanted to get coffee sometime, but nixed the thought as he looked at the others who were clowning around, their homework forgotten. They were all friends now. Asher didn’t want to make things weird when he was just starting to feel like he fit
in.

  “So did your mom write one of these diaries?”

  “Not exactly,” Galina said. “She had one from my great gran, but Gran was actually a Knight, so she recorded everything she well…everything she killed. She had volumes with notes and pictures. My mom didn’t write her own journals in quite the same way. As a Sentinel she documented things that other people did, and what she observed.”

  “Do you still have your gran’s journals?”

  Galina nodded. “Actually, I have hers and both of my aunt’s. Mom had sisters, but they both died before I was born.”

  “I’d love to see them sometime,” Asher said curiously. “The journals, I mean”

  “Okay,” Galina said. Her hair fell to hide her face and she nervously tucked it behind her ear. She was back to being shy, and Asher wanted to get that cup of coffee more than ever. “We could try to find out more about what attacked you. About the basilisks, I mean. We could go look now.”

  Asher was tempted. Really tempted.

  “I should get this done first,” he said gesturing to his homework.

  “Yeah. Me too.” Galina nodded.

  Asher finished his essay and leaned back closing his eyes for a moment before attempting to go over his notes on which crystals did what for Professor Stark’s exam on Friday. He still had a little time for that but there was a fuck-ton of different types of crystals and gems. When he complained, Dorren sang a little off-key song.

  “What?” Asher said.

  “Dorren has devised a mnemonic to help remember the crystal properties,” said Joel. Kenny tossed Asher a piece of paper with a bunch of letters on it. Apparently, Dorren had also devised a shorthand way of writing the mnemonic which got around the no crib-sheets spell.

  Phoenix frowned as she looked back at her current assignment. “What did you guys write for this one?” She asked the general group. “It says this book for infections and sicknesses was banned. Does anyone know why? Was it false information?”

  “Which book?” asked Asher. “Is that Professor Palmer’s class?”

  Phoenix nodded and held it up for him to see. “It says, it was called: A Treatise on Pros-for-e-a and Apples. What the hell is prosphora anyway?”

  “It’s a temple offering,” said Joel without looking up from his own work. “More specifically bread, and it’s true. Toast and apples are good to eat if your stomach is upset.”

  “So why was it banned, then?” asked Phoenix.

  “Someone probably didn’t like who wrote it,” said Kenny. “That was the witch-hunt century.”

  “Witches and apples have a bad rep,” Galina suggested.

  “Just regurge what the book says,” Asher said. “Don’t expect it to make sense. “

  Phoenix threw her pen across the room. “Can we just stop all this busywork and get back to killing the dumbass motherfuckers?”

  “Speaking of dumbass motherfuckers,” said Dorren. “It’s after eleven. Do you think Lacey is on his way to the Gate yet?”

  “If we are lucky, something will come through it and eat him,” said Kenny.

  Asher gave an exaggerated yawn. “Well guys, I’m finished and I’ve studied those damn crystals as much as I’m going to. If I look at this anymore, I’ll go blind. I’m going to bed.”

  Most of the others nodded and started gathering up books. Asher waited for the rest of them to disperse to their rooms before he returned to his dorm. He quickly redressed in a hoodie and jeans, tucked the golden talisman in his pocket and headed out towards the Gate. There was no need for him to get his friends into trouble, but he was not going to let Lacey call him a coward.

  24

  Necromancer

  Asher was not even out of the Legacy Wing when he heard voices. He froze, thinking of Galina’s insistence that he would get caught. He slipped into an empty room. To his horror, instead of passing by, the voices came closer.

  “He was out of his room,” said the first voice, a man’s.

  Asher recognized his aunt’s voice as she answered. “Did you ask him why?”

  “Of course not. Short of reading him, he wouldn’t have given me a straight answer.”

  “Merrick, the council already has enough questions about your reappearance without you making things worse.”

  “Pfaw,” Merrick said as he entered the very room where Asher had taken refuge and flopped on the sofa. “Do we need a silencing charm on the room for this?” He asked.

  Asher quickly backed himself into the closet in the corner. He pulled the door almost closed and hoped he would not be discovered. He barely breathed.

  “I doubt anyone is awake,” Evelyn said. “It’s nearly midnight and there are no students housed on this floor.” She perched on a chintz armchair and folded her hands in her lap. “There are far too few of us Merrick.”

  Niles, raised both hands and for an instant, Asher felt his ears clog as if he was in a quickly decelerating plane. Then the strange feeling of pressure subsided. “You’re still too trusting,” Niles said to Evelyn. “Now, what did you want to tell me? Any indication what it is? At the Gate, I mean.”

  “I’m not sure it is a what. I think it’s a who.”

  “The sorcerer who killed Michael?”

  “No,” his aunt was shaking her head. “It couldn’t be. The sorcerer must be on this side of the Gate for that. Physically at least. He or she or they…” she shrugged. “Someone here is in league with whatever I feel. The entity on the other side. I don’t know who to trust, Merrick.”

  And you are trusting Niles? Asher thought, entirely appalled.

  “You think they want the sword,” Niles said.

  “It has to be. You don’t make a consolidated attack like this accidentally. Evelyn stood and started to pace, counting on her fingers. Asher watched from his hiding place with bated breath. Something has been trying to break through since the night Michael died. They killed my brother and his wife. They tried to kill Asher.”

  “The law of threes.”

  “Exactly.” Evelyn said. “They might have thought that Michael gifted the sword to his son and that with his passing Asher would be easy pickings.”

  “He would have been,” Niles said.

  “I can’t think these are unrelated events.”

  “Of course not. Whoever is aiding the dark on this side of the Gate obviously killed Michael for the sword.”

  “But they didn’t get it.”

  “Are you sure?” Niles asked. “How do we know that whatever wants the sword doesn’t already have it? It can be won in combat, you know. That is a transfer method. If the sorcerer killed Michael...”

  “No,” Evelyn said. “Asher saw it after his father’s death. It was still in Michael’s hand.”

  “Asher saw it?” Niles said, shock evident in his tone.

  “I was surprised too,” Evelyn said. “He said he saw it but when he went to pick it up it vanished. So at least we know it wasn’t taken. It’s in the ether now.”

  “Probably the safest place for it.” Niles huffed. “Even if your nephew is worthy to wield the blade. There is no way he is ready to handle that kind of raw power.”

  Evelyn nodded. “But do you know of anyone who ever saw the sword who wasn’t a wielder?” Aunt Evelyn asked

  Niles considered for a moment. “No, not that I can think of. Not without extensive spells to recall the blade and make it visible.”

  “You mean like when Merlin and Gwenivere placed it in the stone?”

  Merrick nodded. Then he whistled softly. “If that’s the kind of magic this sorcerer was trying to work, your nephew is damned lucky he didn’t try to touch it. The sword would have destroyed him.”

  Asher swallowed hard. He hadn’t known the sword was dangerous just to touch.

  “Merrick,” Evelyn whispered. “If the sorcerer was attempting to make the sword visible so that he could claim it, that is legendary magic. Just what are we dealing with?” She appeared just as worried as Asher.

  “It is a dev
ilishly complicated series of spells,” Niles said. “And you must remember, despite the Order’s efforts, all of the unworthy candidates who attempted to draw the sword in the stone died. It is highly doubtful this sorcerer, whoever he is, could accomplish the magical working and then when he is finished safely wield the blade.”

  “We can’t just expect the sword to kill him, Merrick,” admonished Evelyn. “If it doesn’t… If he can actually wield the blade…” She shook her head. “We can’t let that happen. If he truly is that powerful and he claims Excalibur, he will be unstoppable.”

  “Oh, I agree, but you have to admit that it is supremely ballsy of him, to even think that he can pick it up.”

  Asher stood seething at Niles’s flippant tone. His father had died for this.

  “The sorcerer obviously thinks he can wield it.” Evelyn said. “I know the sword is powerful, but it is also deeply dangerous. I wouldn’t expect him to kill Otherworlders with it. Why would he want it, except as a symbol of power?”

  “Perhaps to break through the Gate. To free whatever is on the other side—the thing you said is trying to come here.” Niles suggested.

  “Could the sword do that?” asked Evelyn.

  “I think so. There are number of items that exist both in the corporeal world and within the Gate. The sword is one of them.”

  “Like Merlin’s staff,” she said.

  Merrick nodded.

  “Well, that makes more sense than anything the Council came up with.”

  “What did they think?”

  “That I am worrying for nothing. That the sword will stay safely in the ether and the Otherworlders will stay conveniently on their side of the Gate.”

  Niles laughed bitterly. “So we should just let destiny run its course then, should we?”

  “Oh I wasn’t suggesting that. I’m a big proponent of running my own life. Thank you very much.”

  “Oh, I know you are, Evie.” Niles gave that strange rough laugh.

  “Thank you, Merrick.” she said, reaching out to take his hand. “Despite everything that has happened. I am glad you have returned.”