Chapter Nineteen

The streets surrounding the Imperial Palace, the Great Library and the Peerless School were deserted, save for the soldiers, combat sorcerers and a pair of Inquisitors. Charity, who had attended the Peerless School as a younger girl, had been used to seeing the streets filled with students and those who served them; now, she couldn’t help feeling, as the sun slowly rose in the sky, that something was dreadfully wrong. It just felt odd.

She turned her attention towards the Peerless School and sighed. The school had been placed into lockdown by the new Administrator, Light Spinner’s personal appointee to the building, while he waited to see what happened. He would have no choice, Charity was sure, but to swear loyalty to the Emperor soon enough. The Peerless School had served the Imperial Bloodline long before the first Grand Sorcerer had taken up the post and it was still reflected in the oaths.

Light flared around the Great Library as the wardcrafters kept pounding on the wards, poking and prodding at defences that had been old when the first Grand Sorcerer took power. The wards were tough, the sorcerers had noted, but nothing lasted forever. Charity smiled to herself as she sensed the magic crackling through the air, only to fade back into the wards surrounding the building. It looked as though the Head Librarian would remain trapped indefinitely, along with her companions.

A grim-faced Inquisitor eyed her darkly as she stepped up to stand beside him, then turned his attention back to the wards. Charity took the hint and kept her mouth shut, merely watching as the wards shimmered in and out of visibility. She was no expert, but it looked as though the wards were resisting everything the wardcrafters did to weaken them before attempting to break the protections down. They were definitely much more complex than the wards she’d had to take over, when she’d become the Family Head. Her father hadn’t been capable of producing anything as powerful and complex as the wards surrounding the Great Library.

She cursed inwardly, wishing she’d been smart enough to flee the city, just like Jamal and her father. The Emperor owned her now, body and soul, and she had no choice but to obey his orders. And he’d ordered her to stay with the men until they broke though the wards. She shivered – sun or no sun, it was still cold and snow was lying on the ground – then cast a warming charm around herself. All she could do was follow orders and hope the Emperor didn’t recall her to the palace. If nothing else, she had more latitude when she was away from his presence.

There was a sudden flicker of light around the building, followed by a flare of magic. The wards shimmered into view, then started to shatter. Charity blinked in disbelief – the wards shouldn’t have fallen so quickly – then stared as the sorcerers started to run forward. The Inquisitor caught her arm before she could join them, clearly suspecting trouble. But it was too late. There was a brilliant flash of light – Charity covered her eyes, too late to do any good – and then darkness descended like a thunderbolt. Panic gibbered at the corner of her mind as she sank to the pavement, one hand grasping desperately for her wand. She’d been blinded and was effectively helpless. Anything could be out there in the darkness, anything at all.

“Stay still,” a harsh voice snapped. The Inquisitor, she assumed. “Don’t move, whatever you do.”

Charity obeyed, helplessly. Magic spiked around her – she could still sense magic, thankfully – and then it faded away. But she couldn’t see anything but darkness.

***

It was odd, but true that most magical protections were geared to resist magical threats. Any sorcerer worthy of the name knew a hundred wards capable of stopping a punch or a thrown rock, yet few would admit to using them. Sorcerers never brawled with their fists, while their power kept mundanes from being willing to challenge them to fights. It was a poor sorcerer, Elaine had been taught, who could be killed by a mere powerless mundane. His death would serve to improve the breed.

She plunged her mind into the wards, then generated a powerful flash of light, bright enough to do real damage to anyone watching without custom protections. The view through the wards showed the wardcrafters and some of the red-robed men stumbling backwards in disarray, suggesting that they hadn’t been smart enough to include protections against blindness. She smirked to herself, then thrust out a wave of raw magic that disrupted or destroyed the spells they were using to try to crack the wards. They’d been primed for limited feedback, not a shockwave that overfilled their reservoirs and shattered the containment fields. It struck her, suddenly, that she could keep doing it indefinitely, if she didn’t mind risking cracks in the wards. But with a team of skilled wardcrafters on the other side, there was too great a chance of disaster.

Instead, she focused her mind on something else. The stone surrounding the Great Library was already charmed, serving as part of the building’s defences. She churned it up with the wards, then forced it outwards as a wave of dust, propelled by the wards themselves. Anyone smart enough to protect themselves against flashes of light would find themselves blinded by the dust, forcing them to concentrate hard on saving themselves from breathing in all kinds of poison. The stone alone would be hazardous to their health. She grinned unpleasantly, then turned to run, resetting the wards as she moved. It was time to leave the Great Library for good.

She couldn’t help feeling a pang as she ran down into the entrance hall, where Cass and Daria were already pushing the moving statues out into the streets. They’d been glamoured to look like escaping fugitives, something that would hopefully cause more confusion as the forces outside gathered themselves and started banishing the dust. Cass winked at her, then tapped the first statue with her wand. It broke into a run and headed towards where the largest group of sorcerers had been standing, before the first flash of light. The others followed, one by one.

“Come on,” Cass snapped. “They won’t stay shocked for long.”

Elaine nodded, glancing back into the Great Library. She had known she would have to leave, but not like this, not leaving the building open to her prospective enemies. Part of her wanted to tell them to leave her and make their escape ... she shook her head, then sent one final command to the wards. She might not be able to lockdown the library completely, not from the outside, but she could make sure that no one got their hands on the Black Vault without her assistance. The wards responded, perhaps sensing her urgency, although she hadn’t thought they could think for themselves. One by one, powerful wards dropped into place, hiding the Black Vault. Even Vane would be unable to find it without Elaine’s presence.

Good luck, she thought.

The dust was still billowing outside, held up by hundreds of light charms that would have to be cancelled, one by one, if someone wanted to get rid of the dust. Cass caught her arm and pulled her onwards as the dust swarmed closer, threatening to blind her too. Elaine hastily checked the protective charms she had cast around her face, then followed as the dust started to blow around them. It wouldn’t be long before the charms started to fail ...

***

Charity flinched as she felt a wand touching the spot between her eyes, feeling old memories bubbling up inside her. The last person who had touched her with a wand had been her father, casting the charm she’d asked – demanded – that he cast on her. Because she’d been young and foolish and ... there was a flash of magic and she could suddenly see again. But there was still something wrong with her eyesight. She – and the Inquisitor – were surrounded by a protective bubble ... and, beyond the bubble, there was a growing storm of grey dust. It was so thick she couldn’t see anything beyond the bubble.

She gripped her wand tightly in one hand, unsure what to do. A banishing charm should have been sufficient to get rid of the dust – it smelled funny, part of her mind noted absently – but the Inquisitor could have done it himself, if he’d thought it was a good idea. Her skin crawled as the dust pressed closer, right up against the bubble of air. It seemed somehow uncanny to her gaze, as if it wasn’t quite right. But there was nothing right about a storm of dust blocking her view.

“Idiots are multiplying the cloud,” the Inquisitor muttered, as magic rippled through the air around them. “The charms holding it in the air are sucking material from the pavement below our feet.”

Charity looked down. The Golden City’s streets weren’t paved with gold – rumour to the contrary – but they were among the best-kept in the Empire. A thousand cleaners brushed them every day, according to her father, scooping up everything from waste paper to human litter and the occasional sleeping drunk. It was considered a major scandal to have even a single paving stone out of place. But now, the stones looked decayed and rotting. As she watched, a line of dust broke free and drifted into the swarm surrounding them.

She gulped as the implications struck her. “What’s to stop them sucking material from us?”

The Inquisitor gave her a sharp look. “They used modified prank spells,” he said. “I don’t think they left out the safety precautions.”

Charity gulped again. What sorcerers considered a prank was considered a nightmare by anyone else. Prank spells might prevent permanent physical harm, but they did nothing to stop the mental trauma suffered by the victim. Jamal had used similar spells on her, more than once, but Johan – the only one who couldn’t fight back – had been his main target. And Johan had spent most of his time plotting to leave home for good. It was hard to blame him, really.

And if he’s still alive, she thought, what is he doing?

A shape loomed out of the dust and came right at them. Charity had only a moment to cast a protective spell to shield her eyes, nose and mouth as the bubble snapped, then stared in horror as the Head Librarian walked right into her. The impact threw her to the ground, hard enough to make her cry out in pain. Moments later, the Head Librarian also fell, her hands and feet bound by a powerful spell. Charity pulled herself to her feet, giving silent thanks to the household gods that Jamal had never learnt that charm, then peered down at the stricken girl. Elaine No-Kin looked different, somehow. There was something odd about her face ...

The Inquisitor bit off a curse. Moments later, the face snapped out of existence, revealing an angelic stone face that smiled at them both beneficently. Charity stared, then shuddered – she’d heard stories of stone angels that moved when no one was looking – as the Inquisitor straightened up. Despite the howling of the storm, growing stronger and stronger, she could still hear people shouting and cursing. Everyone caught out in the open, it seemed, thought they’d captured the fugitives. Instead, they seemed to have caught more damned statues.

“They’re the ones from just inside the library,” the Inquisitor said. “Crafty bastards, definitely.”

He waved his wand and cast a series of cancelling charms, one after the other. Charity hesitated, then joined him. The dust might not be so easy to remove, but the charms that kept it in the air – and sucked more material out of the ground – were easier to banish. Slowly, the dust started to fall back, then drop to the ground as the sorcerers cast more and more spells to rid themselves of the nuisance. And Charity found herself looking out on a scene from any of the innumerable hells.

The pavement looked rotten, as if a team of workmen had dug up hundreds of randomly-selected paving stones and discarded them somewhere out of sight. Indeed, it had been totally destroyed in places. Water was spurting up from burst pipes and mixing with the dust to produce a form of mud that seemed suspiciously sticky, clinging to clothes and starting to set. A careful glance revealed a handful of very tiny spells, each one largely harmless in and of itself, but working together to produce a very odd effect. Charity would have been impressed if she hadn’t been sure, as the last of the dust faded away, that the Head Librarian and her friends had made their escape.

“I caught her,” a voice shouted, in a thick accent that reminded her vaguely of the Emperor. “She’s here ...”

“She’s another statue,” the Inquisitor snarled, looking down at the prone girl. He waved his wand and the illusion shattered, revealing a stone face. “They’ve got clean away, you moron.”

The sorcerer gritted his teeth. “You don’t get to talk to me like that,” he snapped. “I am a trusted servant of the Emperor ...”

Charity turned away, leaving them to their argument. She shook her head in disbelief as the wardcrafters pulled themselves up from the ground, some rubbing at their eyes and cursing as the mud started to set around their clothing. Giving the cursing men a wide berth, she walked towards the Great Library, up to the doors she’d once entered every day of her student life. A ward should have blocked her access, but there was nothing. She pushed at the stone door and forced it open, stumbling into the building. It was as dark and silent as the grave.

They’re gone, she thought. The lights were out, the magic that should have protected the building against cheaters and thieves alike had faded ... although she knew better than to try to take something out of the building, even if the magic seemed weaker than before. They’ve left this place for good.

She stopped in the centre of the entrance lobby as the Inquisitor followed her in, ordering the wardcrafters and the combat sorcerers to remain outside. Charity was almost relieved. The Emperor had given her no orders concerning the stockpile of knowledge in the Great Library, but she was sure he wouldn’t want just anyone walking in off the streets and taking a few irreplaceable books. Sorcerers who hadn’t gone to the Peerless School – and she was sure they hadn’t, because some of them were young enough to have shared classes with her if they had – would want the books, very badly.

“They’re gone,” she said. “But where?”

“We will find them,” the Inquisitor said.

Charity swallowed. It would be her task to bring the news to the Emperor. Her father had never taken bad news very well, even if it had been something as minor as her marks not being as high as he’d expected. Unless it had been Jamal bringing it, of course. His marks had never been as high as hers, but he’d somehow managed to avoid the lectures and humiliating punishments that had been piled on her. Not for the first time, she cursed her wretched brother under her breath. If her father had held him to account for his misbehaviour, he might not have grown into such a monster.

“Summon the Deputy Librarian,” she said, carefully. “I will have some good news, at least, to present to the Emperor.”

She found a chair, then sat down and waited. It was nearly thirty minutes before the Deputy Liberian – a woman she recalled seeing behind the desk, when she’d been a student – was escorted into the lobby by two uniformed guards. She looked strong and confident, very much the opposite of her superior, and yet there was something about her that indicated she was nervous. But it was hard for anyone to blame her, Charity reminded herself. The Golden City had been turned upside down.

“You will swear loyalty to the Emperor, then assume control of the wards,” she said, once the woman was sitting facing her. “Or you will never work in the library again.”

Vane eyed her for a long moment, then closed her eyes in surrender. Charity listened, without pleasure, as Vane submitted herself to the Emperor, then reached out with her mind to the wards. Magic flickered and flared through the building, but the lights refused to come on. After a long moment, Vane opened her eyes and peered fearfully at Charity. It took Charity several seconds to realise that Vane was actually afraid of her.

Or what I represent, she thought, grimly. The Emperor who claimed the Golden Throne.

“The wards have been altered,” she said. “I can’t take control.”

Charity blanched. “You can’t? Or anyone can’t?”

“I think they’ve been programmed to reject anyone assuming ultimate control,” Vane said, quickly. “It wasn’t my fault!”

“I’m sure it wasn’t,” Charity said. She wasn’t blaming Vane for anything, but she was uneasily aware that the Emperor might think differently. “What sort of link do you have?”

“I had a limited link from the Head Librarian,” Vane said. Her voice turned pleading as she willed Charity to understand. “That link is still there, but it won’t expand into a full merge without her permission.”

Charity cringed, her mouth suddenly dry. The Emperor was not going to be happy.

“Work out what you can and cannot do,” she said. At least they could give the Emperor a full report. Maybe that would please him enough to spare their lives. “And then we will take it to the Imperial Palace.”

And continue the search for the Head Liberian, she thought, bitterly. Because, without her, the Great Library is useless.