Chapter Twenty-Six

Elaine had thought that she was used to roughing it – she’d lived in a roach-infested apartment before her promotion – but the Inquisition’s cabin gave a whole new meaning to the word. It was larger than her former apartment, yet it was primitive; food was cooked over a fire, there was no such thing as hot running water and the toilet was unspeakable. If it wasn’t for magic, she knew, she would have headed back to the city as quickly as possible, regardless of the risk. Even with it ...

Johan seemed delighted, she saw; it might not have been luxurious, but it was somewhere away from the city. The Inquisitor showed them the bedding – and the stockpile of food, held in stasis by a spell – and then headed back to the city, leaving them alone. Judging by the rapidly darkening sky, it was about to start raining at any moment. Elaine knew little about living in the countryside, but she was surprised that he hadn’t wanted to stay the night. Driving back in the darkness would be terrifying ...

But he would have to put the horses somewhere, she thought, as she turned to look out of the window. The view was impressive, she had to admit; towering mountains, endless trees and – in the distance – the faint blue shimmer of another lake. But it wasn’t the Golden City ... it seemed to stretch out as far as the eye could see.

“This place is wonderful,” Johan said, coming back into the main room. “Which bedroom do you want?”

Elaine smiled. There were two bedrooms, one with a pair of bunk beds, the other with two separate beds. The Inquisitors wouldn’t care if four of them were stuffed into the same room; Elaine would have found it unbearable. She’d had enough problems sharing an apartment with Daria, even though they’d had separate bedrooms. But it honestly didn’t bother her which room she took for herself.

“Either one,” she said, softly. She had to fight down a yawn. “Which one do you want?”

“The bunk beds, I think,” Johan said. “You can have the other one.”

Elaine nodded and went into her room to make the bed. She had to show Johan how to do it, something that reminded her of Millicent and the other high-born girls at the Peerless School; they hadn’t known how to take care of themselves either. The orphanage had been far less kind to its inhabitants, teaching them everything from sewing to cooking. And girls who forgot to make their beds in the morning wound up with the worst chores.

“You’ll have to change the sheets in a few days,” she said, once she’d set up basic insect-repelling spells and a handful of other protections. “But until then, just make sure that you make the bed every morning.”

“Yes, mother,” Johan said. “I won’t forget.”

His tone was light, but Elaine could hear bitterness underneath it. Johan’s mother had only taken a vague interest in her children at the best of times, particularly after discovering that Johan was powerless. Elaine had seen enough society dames to know that it was far from uncommon, but it still tore at her. She would have given her eye teeth for a mother.

Elaine nodded, blinking away tears, and walked back into the kitchen. The Inquisitor had explained that the cabin drew water from a mountain stream, then warned them to make sure that they always boiled the water before drinking it. Elaine filled a small kettle with water, then cast a spell to make the water boil before picking up two mugs, pouring powdered chocolate into them and adding the water. It wouldn’t taste quite right, she knew, but it would suffice.

“Johan,” she called, as she stirred the chocolate, “are you hungry?”

“Always,” Johan said. “Is that normal for magicians?”

“It’s also normal for teenagers,” Elaine said, dryly. “I’m too tired to cook anything right now, so we’ll have to make do with Inquisitor rations.”

Thunder crashed, high overhead. Elaine glanced towards the windows, just in time to see the first raindrops falling from high overhead. They fell so rapidly that they seemed to fall in sheets, as though an angry god was tipping water over the mountains. Johan took his mug and walked over to the window, staring out at the rain. He would never have seen anything like it in the Golden City.

He might in the future, Elaine thought, as she created light balls to illuminate the room. The weather-control spells were badly damaged by Kane ...

She produced a ration bar and eyed it suspiciously, then broke it in half and passed one part to Johan. Her own half tasted of vegetable mush, a meal she was far too familiar with from the orphanage. Johan made a face as he chewed his bar, but he didn’t ask what went into the recipe. Elaine knew that it included various potions designed to give energy to struggling Inquisitors. Few others ate potions in solid form.

“I’ll cook something proper tomorrow,” she promised, as she examined the stove. It seemed relatively simple, she decided, although she would have to gather firewood in the morning. “For now ...”

Johan yawned. A moment later, Elaine yawned too.

“Bed, I think,” she said. She cancelled half of the light globes, realising that darkness had fallen completely outside the little hut. “Do you want a light in your room?”

“I could make one,” Johan said. “If I didn’t use the spell ...”

Elaine shook her head. “This building is made of wood,” she reminded him. “And if you set fire to it, the Inquisitors will make you pay to rebuild it.”

She hesitated, then dug a candle and matches out of one of the cupboards. “Use this if you need to go to the toilet in the middle of the night,” she ordered. “Or knock on my door and I’ll make you a light globe. Do not experiment on your own.”

Johan looked rebellious, but nodded.

Elaine checked his room – noting with some pleasure that he’d already started to unpack and place everything neatly on the shelves – and then waved him goodnight, before walking into her own room. It felt oddly cramped, even though it was larger than the apartment she had shared with Daria. Ruefully reflecting that she had grown too used to luxury, Elaine stripped down to her undergarments and climbed into bed. It was uncomfortable, even compared to the orphanage, but she was too tired to care. A moment later, she was asleep.

She was woken by the sound of a chiming bell. Elaine sat upright in bed, reaching desperately for her wand ... someone or something was outside. She pulled herself out of bed, clutching her wand, and slipped over to the window, drawing back the curtain to peer outside. A dozen sheep were milling around outside the hut, escorted by a large dog with disturbingly human eyes. Or was it a werewolf? Werewolves might have been rare in the Golden City – Daria had been an exception – but they were quite common in rural areas.

Feeling unaccountably grimy, Elaine pulled on her dressing gown and headed out into the main room. It was cold, cold enough to make her shiver; carefully, she cast a handful of heating charms and then started to look for the bath. As the Inquisitor had said, it was really a large metal tub and nothing else, barely large enough for her to kneel down in the water. Elaine filled it with water, then had to use magic to drag it back into her room, where she started to heat it. She had the feeling that the Inquisitors simply stripped off and washed in the main room, heedless of who might see. But Elaine had never been able to undress in front of Daria, let alone anyone else. She’d done quite enough of that in the orphanage.

When she finished, she dressed properly in trousers and a shirt – still feeling grimy – and took the tub back into the living room. Johan had awakened, she realised; he was standing on the porch, staring out across the countryside. After the rainstorm, the air was fresh and clear; in the distance, the mountains seemed to glow with light and magic. It reminded Elaine of stories about people who had encountered wild magic in the countryside, wild magic that had changed them – and not always for the better. She levitated the water up and tipped it down the drain, then walked out to stand beside Johan. He looked ... relaxed.

“Thank you for bringing me here,” he said, softly.

“You’re welcome,” Elaine said. It was good to see him so relaxed. “I hope that you’re ready to eat something?”

Johan nodded eagerly and followed her back into the main room. Elaine opened one of the cupboards and produced bread and cheese, followed by a large jug of milk. It was astonishingly creamy, she discovered, as she poured it into a pair of mugs. She honestly couldn’t think why the milk in the Golden City wasn’t so rich.

“So,” Johan said, as he ate his bread and cheese. “What are we doing today?”

“More magic,” Elaine said, reaching for her notebook. She was reluctant to risk experimenting with magic that required a human target – particularly after what had happened to Charity – but there were plenty of other experiments they could run. For one thing, she wanted to know the limits of Johan’s endurance. “Incidentally, have you ever tried casting a spell on yourself?”

Johan blinked in surprise. “No,” he said. “Is that ... I thought that was a bad idea.”

“Depends on the spell,” Elaine said. “Trying to heal yourself or to ... improve your body can have disastrous effects. But trying to fly isn’t so difficult, if you have the power reserves.”

“Improve one’s body,” Johan mused, a wicked grin on his face. “Do you think that Jamal ever tried to improve himself?”

“I doubt it,” Elaine said, tartly. Everything she’d heard about Jamal suggested that he already considered himself perfect. “But others have done, over the years ...”

She shuddered at the memory. She had never felt the urge to try to improve herself, but some of the girls in her dorm had tried. One had warped her face, one had given herself breasts so large that they were bigger than her head and one had done something so terrible – Elaine had never been sure of the details – that she’d had to spend the rest of the term in hospital. After that, they’d all been given a stern lecture and threats of dire punishment if anyone tried again.

Not that it stopped the next generation, she thought. The Privy Council had debated the matter, once. In the end, they’d reluctantly conceded that they should make sure that glamours were taught to students at a very early age, perhaps helping them to realise that they didn’t need to actually change their bodies. But the cynic in Elaine told her that it wouldn’t work. Glamours weren’t real, as she knew all too well.

She finished her breakfast and put the plates in the sink. Surprisingly, after Johan had finished his breakfast, he began to wash the plates. Elaine watched, with some amusement, as he wiped them clean; he hadn’t been taught to do that by his family. But then, he was a good boy ... pushing the thought aside, she found her coat and shoes and waited for him to join her at the door. When he did, she led the way outside.

It was surprisingly warm as they walked away from the hut towards a muddy clearing. Elaine sucked in her breath sharply as her feet squelched their way through the mud, disliking it intensely ... and the sight of the bog, only a few metres away, did nothing to encourage her. It was a small bog, yet she knew that putting one foot wrong could result in her being trapped or worse. Could she actually sink to her death in the mire?

“Can we go walking later?” Johan asked. “I want to explore.”

Elaine sighed, but nodded. “Let me set up a tracking spell first,” she said. “This isn’t the Golden City. It’s far too easy to get lost out here.”

Johan nodded.

They stopped in the middle of the clearing and looked around. According to Dread, the Inquisitors sometimes used it for practicing both spells and unarmed combat, but there was no trace of magic in the area as far as Elaine could sense. It had probably faded into the background over the years, she decided, as she located a large rock at one edge of the clearing. Beyond it, the trees closed in, casting a sinister shadow over the scene.

“You see that rock,” Elaine said. “I want you to make it float in the air.”

“Understood,” Johan said. He concentrated ... and the rock rose up into the air. It was a far steadier movement than anything Elaine would have expected, particularly from such an inexperienced magician. Even if she had cast the spells, the rock would have wobbled badly as gravity fought to pull it back to the ground. “How long do you want me to hold it up?”

Elaine frowned. “Are you concentrating on it right now?”

“Yes,” Johan said. “Should I stop ...?”

“Try and stop,” Elaine said. A moment later, the rock fell to the ground and landed hard enough to send mud flying everywhere. Elaine wiped it off her shirt with a grimace, then looked over at Johan. A normal magician’s spells would have left the rock in the air until they ran out of power. “Would you like to try something risky?”

Johan nodded, although his face was pale. “I want you to try to lift yourself up into the air,” Elaine ordered. “Just imagine that you’re floating about a metre above the ground.”

There was a long pause. Nothing happened.

“It isn’t working,” Johan said, sourly. Like most youngsters – and all magicians - he’d dreamed of being able to fly. “Why isn’t it working?”

“I’m not sure,” Elaine said. If he had been a normal magician, she could have taught him the spells, but she had a nasty feeling that the results would be disastrous. “I want you to ...”

She broke off as she felt herself rising up into the air until she was about two metres over Johan’s head. Her blood ran cold as she realised that Johan had not only tried something without warning her, he’d also endangered her life. What if he couldn’t put her down safely and she broke a leg? The closest druid was miles away.

Good thing I didn’t wear a skirt, the irrelevant part of her mind pointed out.

“Lower me down, gently,” she ordered, fighting to keep her voice level. “You do not want to drop me.”

Slowly, she felt herself being lowered to the ground. Gritting her teeth, she tried to sense the magic holding her, but felt almost nothing apart from the glow of her own wand. It was almost as if Johan’s magic didn’t really exist, which was impossible. There were a long string of near-disasters to prove that it did exist.

“If you had done that at the Peerless School,” she said, once she was back on the ground, “you would have been sent to the Administrator for a caning. If you were lucky! You could have been expelled for that stunt.”

Johan paled. “I just wanted to see if it worked,” he said. “I ...”

“There were ways we could have prepared for it,” Elaine snapped, more rattled than she wanted to admit. What if she’d been flung so high up that she could no longer breathe? “We could have done it over a lake, perhaps. What would you have done if I’d broken a leg?”

“I ... I don’t know,” Johan admitted. “I could have tried to heal it.”

“That’s not a good idea unless you happen to know what you are doing,” Elaine said. “And you can’t cast normal spells. We’d have to have a druid arrange for you to practice on a live patient and most of them would object, strongly. Healing is much more than just melding the bones together.”

She took a look at his face and lowered her voice, slightly. “We will keep pushing the limits,” she added, “but we have to be careful. We’re all alone up here.”

“Apart from the sheep,” Johan said.

And a possible werewolf, Elaine added, in the privacy of her own mind. Most city-folk were terrified of werewolves, not without reason. There was no point in mentioning the possibility to him.

“Come on,” she said, out loud. “Let’s go make some sandwiches, then we can go on a walk.”

Johan remained pensive until they walked back down the path and saw the lake in front of them. A boat was positioned on the shore, tipped upside down to ensure that the rain just cascaded over it and fell to the ground. Elaine had to smile as Johan discovered the sign that identified the boat as belonging to the Inquisitors, then promised that they’d find the paddles and take it out soon. The thought made her nervous – she had never been boating before – but it was worth it if it made Johan happy. They both needed to relax.

“Tell me,” Johan said, when she said that out loud. “What do you do when you aren’t actually working?”

“Read, mainly,” Elaine admitted. “And I’m writing my own spellbook. If it ever gets published ...”

Johan gave her an odd look. “Why ...?”

“I’ve been creating spells that have all of the unnecessary gibberish stripped from them, spells that require very little power to work,” Elaine said. “That means that we will end up with more low-power magicians.”

“And none of the high-power magicians like that thought,” Johan guessed. Elaine nodded. “Is that why they’re scared of me?”

“I’m afraid so,” Elaine admitted. “And that is why you have to be careful not to give them any other reason to be scared.”