Chapter Twenty-Four

“Congratulations on your date,” Elaine said.

“Thank you,” Johan said, nervously. He’d not managed to get much studying done, not after she’d said yes. He’d spent too much time fantasising about the date or, alternatively, about just how many things could go wrong. But his father had often told Charity that she couldn’t go out until she had finished her work. What would Elaine say? “I know, I should have studied more ...”

“Probably not, in your case,” Elaine said, eying the pile of books. “The problem is that much of the basic knowledge is useless to you. We can and we will work on exercises, but additional knowledge may hurt instead of help. And at least you got the packing done.”

Johan nodded. They were supposed to be leaving tomorrow, unless something else came up to stop them from going. He’d packed carefully, but he couldn’t avoid the feeling that he’d missed something. Elaine would have to inspect his work later.

Elaine scowled, her mind clearly elsewhere. “But there are more important matters to discuss,” she added. “Where are you going?”

“Joan’s Grill,” Johan said. “Why ...?”

“I’ll be there too,” Elaine said. “And an Inquisitor or two, if I can swing it.”

Johan blanched. “You can’t be there,” he started to protest. “I ...”

“I won’t be sitting at the table with you,” Elaine said. “But you do realise that you are a target? And you will become more of a target as the news continues to spread. Your protection is my first priority.”

“That’s why you attacked the terrorists,” Johan mused. The thought left a warm feeling in his heart. No one had ever placed their life on the line to protect him before, not even Charity. “But I should be fine.”

“You don’t know that,” Elaine cautioned. “Your date won’t know that you’re not alone, I promise.”

She stepped backwards and looked him up and down. “I went to Joan’s Grill once with Daria,” she said. “It isn’t very pretentious, so you don’t need a fancy suit or finest robes, but make sure you take a large napkin. You don’t want to get food on your clothes.”

“Thank you,” Johan said.

Elaine picked a vial off the table and passed it to him. It was unmarked, but contained a greenish liquid. “That’s the potion,” she added. “It takes effect immediately and lasts for roughly two days. I’d take it just before you go, if I were you. But don’t take her for granted.”

“I understand,” Johan said, fighting down his embarrassment. “Are there any books on dating?”

“Not in this library,” Elaine said, ruefully. “I could have used them too.”

Time went by faster than Johan had expected and, almost before he knew it, it was time to get ready. He pulled on a simple pair of black trousers and a white shirt, which – Elaine assured him – would be sufficient for where they were going. She gave him a pair of napkins, checked the bag of money she’d given him earlier and then watched as he drank the potion and passed her back the vial. Surprisingly, it tasted good.

“They don’t want to discourage people from taking it,” Elaine commented, when he asked. “If a mundane woman becomes pregnant, the pregnancy could be terminated with no ill effects, but a magician would suffer greatly if they killed their own child.”

Johan nodded. He’d been looking up family magic in some of the older books and, while the authors never seemed to state anything for certain, they had been clear that intentionally harming or killing other members of the family tended to result in disastrous consequences. He wasn’t sure how seriously to take it – Jamal never seemed to suffer for what he’d done to Johan – but killing a helpless unborn baby had to be far worse. Drinking the potion seemed a small price to ensure that the magician didn’t have to abandon her studies or career to raise a child.

“You won’t see me,” Elaine said, ruefully. “I don’t think Jayne will be happy to see her boss at the next table. But I will be there.”

She passed him a small amulet. “Joan’s Grill is on Westlake Street,” she said. “If you speak the street name out loud, the amulet will guide you there. Do the same for the Great Library when you want to come home. I’d suggest walking her to her apartment block, but not going inside. You will be asked questions by her roommates.”

Johan scowled, then nodded. “And I’ll see you later this evening,” he said. “Thank you for everything.”

Surprisingly, Elaine flushed “You’re welcome,” she said. “Just be careful.”

Johan was still mulling over what she’d said as he stepped out of the Great Library and looked around. Jayne was nowhere to be seen. An icy fist clutched his heart as he wondered if she’d been deliberately winding him up, then he felt a sensation of pure relief as he saw her walking towards him, wearing a white dress that fell to just above her knees. Her black hair seemed to fan out around her dress, drawing his attention to her face. It seemed paler than usual, almost perfect. And her smile was so warm that he felt himself melting.

“Thank you for coming,” he said, as she clasped arms with him. They were on an actual date! “I hope you have a good time.”

“I’m sure I shall,” Jayne assured him. She felt very warm pressed against his body. He felt his heartbeat speeding up inside his chest, so loudly that he was surprised that she couldn’t hear it. “Do you know the way?”

Johan shook her head. Before he could pull out the amulet, Jayne gently tugged him down the street, away from the Great Library. The massive halls of academia gave way rapidly to the streets of pleasure; she led him past bars, eateries and places that were completely unmarked, yet seemed to be heaving with customers. There were still fewer people on the streets than he remembered from his trip to the zoo, but at least they weren’t completely alone. He wanted to show off a little ...

Idiot, he told himself, crossly. Why do you think anyone would care?

Joan’s Grill wasn’t bigger on the inside than on the outside. It seemed to have only thirty tables in all, about half of which were occupied by customers. Johan wondered just how many of them were magicians, before deciding that it hardly mattered. None of them seemed to be students, people who might know Jayne. It was rare, Charity had told him, for a magician to date a mundane. Such relationships were almost always mocked relentlessly by their peers. What would they think of Johan?

He felt a flash of the old resentment, for he knew what they would have thought of a Powerless. They would have pitied him or they would have mocked him; either way, Jayne would have been strongly discouraged from seeing him again. Who knew? The flaw in his body that had rendered him powerless might be passed down to his children.

Angrily, he pushed the thought aside as an olive-skinned woman showed them to a table in the corner. Instead, he looked around, wondering which of the customers was Elaine and her escorts ... if, of course, she hadn’t been pulling his leg. But there was no way to be sure, not without being able to see glamours. And even if he could see them, he couldn’t be sure what they were hiding. Charity had admitted that glamours were in common use by just about every magician in the world.

“So,” Jayne said, as they inspected the menu, “tell me about yourself.”

Johan hesitated, unsure of what to tell her. He didn’t want to lie, but he also didn’t want to admit that he had been a Powerless. The gods alone knew how she would react.

“My family used to be titled nobility outside the Golden City,” he said, finally. They’d still been aristocrats, but they’d never been high aristocrats. “Now my father has ambitions to push himself to the very highest levels and dragged the family here.”

“In the wake of all the chaos,” Jayne said. She shivered. “I was out of the city at the time, but I heard tales ... terrible tales. They say that many of the injured will never recover completely.”

She met his gaze. “Why didn’t you go to the Peerless School?”

Johan swallowed. He’d anticipated that question, but he knew that his answer wouldn’t hold up to careful scrutiny. And yet he really didn’t want to tell her the full truth.

“My father insisted that I have private tuition,” he said, finally. It was true enough, if one discounted the fact that his lessons hadn’t included magic. “He didn’t want to expose everyone to the Peerless School.”

“My father felt the same way, but in the end he sent all of us to the school,” Jayne commented. “Your father must have been very stubborn.”

Johan nodded. It was true that some of the older families preferred to send only their eldest children to the Peerless School, knowing that the school taught loyalty to the Empire and the Grand Sorcerer as well as magic. When they came home, the children might no longer put the family’s interests first. It was worse for the students who came from mundane households, he knew; they tended to have little in common with their families when they came home. They rarely stayed for long after knowing what life could be like.

It was easy to see why magicians looked down on mundanes. Healing spells could save lives; mundanes had to set bones and sew up wounds the old-fashioned way. Magical households were clean, even the poorer ones; mundane households were often dirty and smelly. Hot running water was easy to produce with magic; harder to produce without it. Why would anyone want to live in the filth if they could live in a clean home?

And the price was merely giving up their former families.

“He is the most stubborn person I know,” Johan admitted. “But I don’t feel I’ve missed out on much.”

The waitress returned, took their orders and vanished back into the darkness behind the counter. Johan smiled after her, then looked back at Jayne. If she asked questions about his life, he could ask questions about hers.

“Tell me about yourself.”

“Not much to tell,” Jayne said. “I’m the fifth child and second daughter of House Rendang, which makes me effectively useless. Father just wants to maintain his current position, not try to rise higher, so I don’t have to worry about an advantageous match. Instead, I want to be a Potions Mistress. I have the marks to seek an apprenticeship after I leave the school.”

“I’m awful at potions,” Johan confessed. “What about yourself?”

Jayne gave him a droll smile. “I was brewing at a third-year level when I was in first year,” she said. “The Potions Master – a kindly old soul – put me in with the fourth years when I was in second year, then gave me private tutoring when I needed it. Right now, I’m three years ahead of the rest of my class in potions ... but not in anything else. I doubt they’ll let me graduate early.”

Johan considered it. “Can you become an apprentice while you’re still in school?”

“Perhaps,” Jayne said. “But most apprenticeships demand complete focus and concentration, not someone who is easily ... distracted. And I will be distracted by my other schoolwork.”

“Good luck,” Johan said, trying to remember what Jamal had said about potions. He’d been much ruder about the Potions Master, calling him a doddering old fool more than once. The tutor had committed the unforgivable sin – in Jamal’s eyes – by being more concerned with ability than breeding. But Jamal had never had the patience to be good at potions. “I wish I could do something to help.”

“Let me know if you know any masters who might take on an apprentice,” Jayne said. “But if I can’t get in before I complete my schooling, I will just have to brew on my own and wait.”

She shook her head. “What do you want to do with your life?”

The food arrived, saving Johan from actually having to answer. It was strange to his eyes, a combination of meat, cheese, fried bread and raw vegetables, the sort of thing he would never have been allowed to eat at home. But it tasted very nice, he discovered, as he took a bite; the only downside was that they were expected to eat with their fingers, rather than knives and forks. Jayne dug in as though it didn’t bother her; Johan hesitated, remembering his father’s lessons. Eating with one’s fingers was not a good sign.

Hell with it, he told himself, and dived into the food.

“You never answered,” Jayne said, as she took a break between bites. “What do you want to do with your life?”

Johan considered the question. As a child, he’d wanted to be a great magician; as a Powerless, he’d wanted to go into one of the careers that didn’t involve magic. But now ... he just wanted to prove himself, if only to himself. He needed to know what he could do.

“I want to prove myself,” he said, out loud. “I could be great.”

Jayne smiled. “I’m sure you could be,” she said, “but how do you intend to become great?”

“I wish I knew,” Johan said, after a long moment. What could he do to become great? If he caught the remaining three terrorists ... assuming, of course, that there were only three of them left ... would that make him great? Or would it just make him more of a target? “I’ll just see what happens.”

“My father was fond of saying that real heroes go out and find opportunities to make themselves great,” Jayne said. “They didn’t just sit on their buttocks and wait for opportunity to come pass them by.”

Elaine did, Johan thought. But Elaine hadn’t wanted to be a heroine. Indeed, she’d managed to bury the truth behind a wall of mystery and a deliberately cultivated appearance of being nothing more than a simple librarian. Or was she really the mask and the heroine something she’d had to be, for a time, then discarded when it was no longer necessary?

“I’ll just have to see what happens,” he said, drolly. “But if I do become a great hero, you can be my Potions Mistress.”

Jayne giggled. “I think I will be making the latest discoveries that will change the world far more than your heroism,” she said, dryly. “You can kill a monster; I can come up with a potion that prolongs life. Which of us will change the world more?”

Johan smiled, then took another bite of his food while studying her. She was gorgeous; he wanted to take her in his arms and kiss her, then slip his hand into her shirt ... angrily, he pushed the thought aside as he felt a stirring in his loins. He didn’t want to blow his chances by moving too far, too fast. Who knew how she would react to his touch?

They finished their dinner, paid – it was a very reasonable price – and then headed out of the door. Johan looked around, wondering who would follow them, then turned his attention back to Jayne as she led him back towards the Peerless School. The night seemed to have grown darker, with fewer people on the streets; even the streetlamps seemed to have dimmed, somehow. Or perhaps he was just imagining it.

“Thank you for being a gentleman,” Jayne said. Johan felt a flicker of relief, suddenly realising that if he’d pushed her, the results would have been bad. Even if he didn’t wind up being turned into a slug or an earthworm, he would certainly never have had another chance to go out with her. “I really appreciated it.”

“I never go too far on the first date,” Johan said, trying to sound experienced. By her smile, he suspected he hadn’t succeeded. “And I had a lovely time too.”

They stopped outside the apartment block. Before Johan had more than a few seconds to feel awkward, Jayne pulled him into a hug and pressed her lips against his. Johan froze, then somehow forced himself to kiss her back. The feeling moved rapidly from awkward to enjoyable and, again, he felt a stirring in his loins. She was pressing her breasts against his chest ...

She stepped backwards, breaking the embrace. “I’ll see you again,” she promised. Johan, who had been having wild visions of inviting her home to the Great Library, felt a mixture of relief and disappointment. “Tomorrow, in fact.”

Johan watched her go, then turned to walk home. If anyone had seen him, he knew, the big grin on his face would tell them exactly what had happened.

***

Duncan hadn’t expected much from the spies he’d placed in and around the Great Library. Johan was with the Head Librarian, which meant that he was under the protection of the most powerful set of wards in the city. But the gamble had paid off; one of his spies had spotted Johan leaving the building, accompanied by a young girl of roughly the same age. The spy, familiar with all of the Great Houses, had even identified her.

Interesting, Duncan told himself. House Rendang was fading fast, having lost most of its clients years before the previous Grand Sorcerer had died. Was this a power play on their part or was it a genuine relationship? Either way, it was something he could use to his own advantage.

Picking up a piece of paper, he wrote a note. It was time for him to start taking House Rendang seriously. And that was all they wanted from the Golden City.