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  “It’s done,” he said, wiping at his forehead even though Tianne could see it was dry. “The scar will disappear very soon.”

  Even Scarface, who had no magic of her own, seemed sceptical. She raised an eyebrow and tilted her head at Tianne. “Well?”

  “He’s a liar. He can’t heal anything.”

  “This is ridiculous,” scoffed Frohake, but now he was sweating. “You’ve seen my magic. Who are you? Who is this girl to judge me?” he said, addressing the last question at Scarface.

  “Apparently, she’s a mage.”

  Tianne considered a snide response of her own but with no witnesses she decided on something more direct to teach them both a lesson. With an unmanly squeak Frohake was lifted out of his chair and sent towards the ceiling while Scarface’s feet also came off the floor. The Royal Guard was alarmed and when she saw Frohake’s face pressed into the ceiling she turned her steely gaze on Tianne.

  “You’ve made your point. That’s enough.”

  Tianne was tempted to lift Scarface higher but the look on the woman’s face changed her mind. She lowered her to the ground but left Frohake pinned for a moment and then cut her connection to the Source. He fell to the floor and landed on his face, groaning in pain.

  “It’s a light show. Magical sleight of hand,” explained Tianne, summoning a larger light globe which brightened the interior of the room. “I can do similar and with enough practice I could imitate his dramatics.”

  Scarface knelt down next to Frohake who was sweating in earnest now. “Can you do anything useful?” she asked.

  “I help people,” he said. Scarface punched him on the nose and blood ran down his face. Tianne would’ve felt some sympathy for him if not for all the desperate people waiting outside for a miracle cure. To be so renowned as a healer he must have cheated dozens of people out of a lot of money, just so he could live in luxury. It made her wish Scarface had punched him even harder.

  She raised her fist again and he cowered back. “No, wait! Don’t hurt me.”

  “What can you do?”

  “Just the lights,” he said.

  Scarface put two fingers between her lips and whistled sharply. The front door opened and one of the other guards stuck his head around it.

  “Take this one to the cells,” she said, pointing at Frohake. “And ask the palace to send a couple of clerks.” The guard marched into the room, grabbed the charlatan by the arm and dragged him out.

  “What will happen to all of this?” said Tianne, gesturing at all the stolen belongings Frohake had taken.

  “It will be returned to the rightful owners. The clerks will sort it out. In the meantime, we have more names on the list for today.”

  Although Tianne felt a sense of justice in revealing Frohake to be a fraud it was hard to look at all the faces of the people waiting in line. All of them were desperate enough to risk visiting a mage and she had just taken that away from them. As she squeezed past, surrounded by four Royal Guards, she kept her gaze averted.

  The second person they visited was a card shark who people claimed had been using magic to steal their money. As soon as the man saw the Royal Guards he tried to run but they’d anticipated this and blocked his escape route. While one of the guards held the squirming man by the arm, Tianne tested him but found no echo from the Source.

  “He doesn’t have any magic,” she said to Scarface, who gestured at the guard holding him. “It must be sleight of hand.”

  “Told you. I’m clean.”

  Scarface smiled as she approached the man and Tianne felt her stomach lurch in fear. She punched him so hard that he stumbled back and collapsed on the ground. Two of the Royal Guards started kicking and stomping on the man until he was a bloody mess, curled up in a tight ball. Tianne was so shocked she froze. By the time she started to move towards the man the beating was already over.

  As the morning wore on and they encountered only more frauds, Tianne began to lose hope of finding someone like her. It should have been a glorious day of new beginnings where she introduced mages to a new way of living, under the protection of the Regent. Part of her had wanted to build a community of her own, much as Wren had done, but this one would have no need to hide. They would proudly walk through the streets of the capital city, but with each beating of a fraud, she wondered again at her decision to return home.

  By the end of the afternoon she felt numb and had stopped trying to intervene. The first time she’d tried Scarface had pinned her to the wall and put a dagger to her throat.

  “Mind your business or you’ll be next,” she hissed in Tianne’s face.

  Dejected and reconsidering her role, Tianne was finally able to rid herself of the two most brutal guards at the outer palace gate. They had taken great delight in kicking people unconscious while Scarface remained icy and calm throughout. The only outburst from her had been when Tianne had interfered. Perhaps Scarface had been hoping Tianne would attack her so she’d have an excuse to kill her and dump her body in an alley. It was obvious that she hated Tianne and resented having to chaperone her around the city looking for others just like her.

  In desperate need of a bath she was about to head for her room when Scarface placed a hand on her shoulder. “Wait here. I need to report in, then I’ll escort you to your room.”

  She knew it wasn’t a request and leaned against a wall in the entrance hall, idly studying the decorations. The huge paintings that covered most of the walls in this part of the palace were ancient, musty and moth-eaten. They depicted rulers from centuries ago, who she couldn’t identify because they had faded so badly. After two insane Kings in a row Zecorria was looking to the distant past for inspiration.

  One servant had told her the palace had been scoured clean after the death of the Mad King in an attempt to remove any signs he’d ever been there, but she could still see a few traces. Deep scoring on stone pillars that had been badly repaired. A hallway with one dark wall to cover the bloodstains. A bricked-up door where no amount of fresh paint would remove the smell inside.

  It made her wonder about what kind of a legacy she would leave behind as a member of the Regent’s cadre.

  A short time later Scarface appeared, deep in conversation with a palace clerk, a tall woman with an equally icy disposition. She stared down her nose at everyone and her severe grey dress covered any bare flesh that seemed a bit extreme.

  “You’re not done. Someone was brought in. They’re in the cells,” said Scarface, gesturing for her to follow.

  Tianne followed the guard through several narrow servants’ corridors before descending six winding flights of stairs taking them deep underground. As she stepped out into the dimly lit corridor she started to hyperventilate, thinking back to her own time in the cells. It had only been a couple of weeks ago and she was still struggling to sleep at night. Thankfully the cells surrounding her were different, with only plain stone walls, and each prisoner had a straw pallet and even a bucket for waste. None of those she passed looked as if they’d been beaten and there was a strange feeling of camaraderie, with one pair of prisoners even playing cards and another sitting talking to her neighbour.

  “Who are they?” she asked.

  “Petty thieves, pickpockets and the like. They’ll soon be released with a fine or a few lashes. These cells are just for overnighters. The worst criminals are deep underground,” said Scarface and Tianne couldn’t repress a shudder.

  At the end of the corridor they found a teenage Zecorran girl, who looked about the same age as Tianne, huddled in the corner of her cell. One of her eyes was swollen shut and she had a few cuts and bruises on her arms. When Tianne turned accusingly to Scarface the Royal Guard just shrugged.

  “Nothing to do with me. She came in that way. She’s accused of being a witch. Cast a spell on someone.”

  “That’s not true,” said the girl, showing a glimmer of defiance. Her bottom lip had also been split and as she spoke the scab broke open and more blood trickled down her chin.
r />   “Give me some room,” said Tianne but Scarface just folded her arms and leaned against the wall. “Please.”

  They locked stares but Tianne was the first to look away. She didn’t want to challenge the older woman’s authority. She just had a feeling that the girl would open up to her without an aggressive audience. With a roll of her eyes Scarface walked down the corridor to chat with one of the prison guards.

  Tianne knelt down in front of the bars, getting a proper look at the girl’s face. The injuries were fresh but she made no attempt to cover them up, wearing them like a badge of pride.

  “I’m Tianne.”

  “Kalina.” As Tianne studied her she could see Kalina looking at her uniform.

  “What happened?”

  Kalina shrugged, as if her current predicament was normal. “Raslin came into my dad’s tavern with some of his friends. He got drunk and tried to bend me over a table in the back room. I wasn’t interested so I fought him off and broke his arm. His father is someone important in the city, a Minister or something. Raslin told him what had happened.”

  “So why isn’t he in here instead?”

  Kalina grinned. “Because he’s got money. And because I threw him across the room and out of a window. His father claimed I’d bewitched his son, so I ended up here.”

  Kalina wasn’t particularly tall and didn’t look muscular, but even so Tianne had a suspicion she hadn’t done it by hand. She also intuited there was a lot more to the story than had been said. Instead of asking her more questions she decided to try another approach.

  She drew power into herself and embraced the Source, feeling its energy wash away her tiredness and the lingering aches in her body.

  “What did you just do?” asked Kalina, her eyes widening in awe.

  Instead of answering Tianne asked, “How did you throw him across the room?”

  “With my curse. They’re right about one thing. I am a witch.”

  “Oh no, you’re so much more,” said Tianne, summoning a globe of light in her hands. She sent it drifting through the bars and fixed it to the ceiling of Kalina’s cell where it filled the space with pale blue light. “I’m a mage and so are you. And it’s not a curse, it’s a blessing.”

  “Then why am I in here and you’re out there?” she said, gesturing at the cell.

  “I’m here to change that. The Regent wants a cadre of loyal mages, to protect the people of Zecorria. If you join me, no one will ever be able to hurt you again.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “I am. I’ve been recruited to find others like me and chase away the charlatans.”

  Kalina shook her head. “I’m not like you. It only happens when I get angry.”

  “I can help you with that. I promise.”

  “What’s going on here?” said Scarface, coming to stand in front of Kalina’s cell. “Is she another scam artist?”

  “No, she’s like me.”

  Scarface raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

  “I can feel her connection to the Source,” said Tianne, drawing more power into herself. Kalina immediately reacted.

  “I can sense … something,” she said, squinting at Tianne.

  “She wants to keep you here,” said Tianne, stepping back and gesturing for Scarface to do the same. “She doesn’t believe you have any real power. Remember what he tried to do and how it made you feel. It’s your choice. Either you can stay in that cell or you can join me. If you do, you’ll never be that powerless ever again.”

  Kalina gritted her teeth and the veins in her forehead began to pulse. Tianne edged a little further away down the corridor. Sensing something was about to happen, Scarface followed her.

  Tianne felt a build-up of power in the air, and her skin began to tingle like the moment before a storm. With a groaning of stone and a clang of metal all the bars in Kalina’s cell were ripped from the mortar and flung across the corridor. The sound rang in Tianne’s ears and just as suddenly the surge of power was gone. The prison guards came running with weapons drawn and even Scarface was startled as Kalina stepped over the bars of her cell into the corridor. The fierce smile on her face made Tianne grin.

  All day she had been dreaming of a moment like this. Of finding someone like her, who she could befriend and coach into becoming a real mage. The dream of a community of Zecorran mages was still a long way off, but, finally, this was a beginning.

  “And now we’re two,” said Tianne.

  CHAPTER 27

  Garvey let his pony set its own pace as it picked its way down the craggy hillside. He’d been up in the mist for a few hours, enjoying the time alone and the silence of the mountain.

  The fog swallowed all sounds below. The only noises above had been the chirping of birds and the sighing of the wind. At the peak of the mountain, even at such high altitude, he’d found an abundance of life. Scraggly green plants with small purple flowers growing up between slabs of stone. Creeping vines, stubby trees and rich grass covered the mountain like a thick cloak. Dozens of gaping holes in the ground revealed pure white rabbits with red eyes and the steppe cats with flat heads and stubby ears that hunted them. A few of the cats had peered at him curiously from behind some rocks but they didn’t approach. Walking on paths not even he would risk was an old grey goat, mocking his unsteady feet as it scampered up the rocks.

  If only he could stay up here where everything was simple.

  Word had reached Garvey a few days earlier from the chatty mouth of a merchant who hadn’t recognised him. At times he left the others behind and went unseen into large towns and settlements to hear the latest news. Mostly the talk was about his followers and the atrocities they’d committed, but recently people had been speaking about the Regent of Zecorria’s new cadre of mages. It was early days but in time they would be a dangerous force to be reckoned with. Magic needed to evolve beyond the Red Tower. Perhaps this was the start of one pathway.

  With a little coaxing the merchant had also told Garvey about a different storm that was approaching.

  It was long overdue.

  As he came down out of the clouds Garvey thought he smelled smoke. The lower he went the more apparent it became until he could see a thin plume rising up from the village at the base of the hills. He’d left the others only a few hours earlier in good spirits, but it seemed as if the situation had grown worse in his absence. Usually Tahira was able to control the others without him being present.

  The first body he came across was that of a young girl, fifteen years at most, lying face down in the street. His pony shied away from her and he steered it around the corpse with his knees. Garvey noticed the lack of blood and the peculiar shape of her twisted and lumpy spine. The girl’s eyes were such a vibrant green. Like the rich grass at the top of the mountain.

  Further down the street he came across a group of fifty or sixty locals, mostly adults but also at least a dozen children. They were all huddled together on the ground. Many of the children were crying as they stared at the six teenagers standing guard. None of the adults were looking at their captors and did their best to avoid all eye contact. Their eyes were focused on the smouldering ruin of a building further down the street. The fire had been put out but grey ash still drifted on the wind and a faint line of smoke rose up into the lead-coloured sky.

  Half a dozen students were standing not far away from the charred timbers and tumbled stone. Tahira was berating someone in a loud voice and as Garvey approached he saw it was Haig. He didn’t notice Garvey at first and continued to grin at Tahira and ignore her complaints.

  “It doesn’t matter. They’re just peasants,” said Haig, gesturing at the collapsed building. Garvey guessed that he’d brought it down with people inside and then tried to burn the remains. “We have the power to do whatever we want, whenever we want. No one can stop us. When are you going to realise that?” he asked. Haig was without remorse about what he’d done.

  In his mind it was fair and just retaliation for the destruction of the Red To
wer. The people in this sleepy mining village might not have been there in person, but they’d been complicit in their anger towards those with magic.

  Before he’d gone up the mountain the villagers had admitted to exiling one girl of eight and hanging a boy of thirteen for lighting a fire without flint and tinder.

  Haig was talking at him but Garvey just blocked out the words. He kept his face impassive and tried to feign interest, but his attention was on the other students nearby. Several of them were agreeing with Haig’s rhetoric, smiling and making jokes about those trapped inside, as if they’d killed a neighbour’s dog and not humans. As if they were better than everyone else because of their magic.

  “How many?” said Garvey, cutting across whatever Haig had been saying.

  “At least a dozen,” bragged Haig. “One of them was a little boy. He just wouldn’t stop screaming. It hurt my ears so badly I thought they were going to start bleeding.” He laughed and mimed blood running from his ears. Some of his cohorts chuckled.

  Haig’s laughter was cut short when part of his head exploded in a shower of gore.

  Blood splattered onto Garvey’s shirt but he didn’t flinch. It was a relief that someone had finally shut him up. Haig made a strange hacking sound as he sank to his knees revealing an axe buried in the back of his skull. As the other students cried out in alarm, summoning shields and scanning the area for the enemy, Garvey felt a smile lift the corners of his mouth.

  He turned to the west and waited for his old friend to come into view. Garvey had felt him approaching for some time but the others, despite everything he’d tried to teach them, had remained oblivious. It was only when Balfruss stepped out from behind a veil that they finally realised what had happened. They froze in terror and turned towards him for guidance. It was one thing to fight soldiers and kill innocents who had no chance of fighting back. It was something else entirely to tackle a trained mage, never mind a Sorcerer, and a former member of the Grey Council.