Bookworm (35 page)

They ran through a series of corridors, almost crashing into a trio of maids. The girls were advancing on them, carrying a handful of knives and brooms that they intended to use as makeshift weapons. They wouldn’t have a choice, Elaine knew; the collars they wore would push them into intercepting the intruders even if the odds were badly against them. Millicent cast a spell that sent the maids falling limply to the ground, rather than killing them outright. Elaine was surprised, and impressed. She had never thought that Millicent had any concept of restraint.

She could feel the wards flickering around her as they sought to counter her spells and lead the guards directly after them. Another group of guards appeared in front of them and Elaine knocked them down, just before allowing Millicent to pull her down a thin corridor that was used by the servants to stay away from the upper-class guests. Elaine was surprised that Millicent even knew about it, before remembering that Millicent’s family probably spied on everyone else in High Tory with as much interest as the Inquisition. Knowledge was power in the Golden City and whoever got to it first had an advantage over everyone else. How long would it be, Elaine wondered, before they altered the wards to bar their exit? A normal sorcerer would have had to do the work himself – and Prince Hilarion and Count Lucas were still out on the town – but there was nothing normal about either of them. What if they’d given one of their subordinate magicians the key to unlocking and reshaping the wards?

They stumbled down a flight of stairs and emerged into a dining hall large enough to seat half of the nobility comfortably. It looked as if the maids were cleaning up after an orgy – a type of party that even Daria considered disgusting – but the moment they saw the girls they turned and advanced on them, throwing leftovers and cutlery with deadly intent. Elaine felt tiredness grabbing at her – she’d used too much of her power already – and stumbled; Millicent cast a spell that knocked away most of the incoming missiles and smashed the tables for good measure. A door burst open at the far end, revealing a line of guards who ran forward, carrying deadly weapons. Whatever plans they’d had to take the intruders alive had been cancelled.

Elaine felt a very complicated spell pushing at her mind and cast it before she could think better of it. For a long moment, nothing happened...and then the swords the guards were carrying came to life. Millicent stared at her in disbelief as the guards screamed and dropped their swords, unable to keep them from slicing away at their arms with their charmed blades. Some of them were from Caitiff, Elaine realised; a line of alchemists who boasted that their charmed swords could cut through anything. It looked as though that included the sword arms of anyone unlucky enough to be carrying them when the swords were hit with an animation spell.

Millicent came to her senses and pushed Elaine towards the other exit as the spell – feeding on the loose magic in the room – started to get out of control. Smashed tables came to life, lashing out at the maids and knocking into the guards. Knives and forks started to move, almost as if they were running, towards their targets. Some of the maids dropped to the ground, their hands clutching at their collars. The spells keeping them loyal and faithful – making them property, their lives completely out of their control – had been drained away and failed, freeing them. Elaine hoped that some of them would be able to escape before Prince Hilarion and his friend came home from their midnight revels. Slavery might be legal, but it sure as hell wasn’t moral.

“How...” Millicent began, and then caught herself. “How long will that spell last?”

The words of a very ancient warlock, who had written a single volume before vanishing under mysterious circumstances, echoed in her mind:
Take a simple kinetic spell and shape it so that it keeps going as long as there is magic in the area,
the warlock had said.
Eventually it will suck up all the magic and fall apart, but first it will neutralise all the other magic within reach. And what happens if the magic doesn’t come back?

“I don’t know,” Elaine admitted. It would take vast amounts of power to animate the entire room for more than a few seconds; no wonder her uncontrolled spell had started to drain all the sources of magic it could. But draining a ward was such an obvious trick that almost all wards had protections built in to stop someone trying, which suggested that there would be very definite limits to what she’d unleashed. She pushed the thought aside as they turned the corner and looked towards the main doors. Nine guards – and a man wearing the black and red robes of a combat magician – stood there, waiting for them.

She nodded to Millicent and they ran back up the stairs, sharply. It might give them some more time, particularly if the guards hadn’t realised that Daria had gone her own way. They’d concentrate on sealing off the exits first, and then search the rest of the mansion floor by floor. How many men did they have in their private armies? Dread had implied several hundred at the very least. Prince Hilarion could probably call upon the entire Ida Royal Guard if he’d felt that he needed them.

Millicent shaped a spell and tossed it back down the stairs as a band of guards started to give chase. Elaine felt a flicker of envy for the obvious power reserves at Millicent’s disposal, even though there was nothing particularly subtle about her spell-casting. Another pair of half-trolls appeared in front of them and Millicent knocked them down, while Elaine concentrated on casting diversion spells that would confuse the defenders and make it much harder for the wards to track them. But their eventual capture seemed inevitable.

“This way,” Millicent said, leading her up to the third floor. Elaine glanced at her sharply, wondering what Millicent knew that made her so confident – and yet so reluctant. The third floor housed the more trusted servants, the butlers and particularly elite servants who were paid in gold rather than forced to serve through compulsion spells. Millicent walked ahead as though she knew precisely where to go and opened a door that led into a small smoking room. It was empty, yet surprisingly comfortable, without the gaudy luxury that marked so much of High Tory. “Follow me.”

She opened up a large cupboard, revealing a solid wall. Before Elaine could say anything, she pressed her hand against the stone and it clicked open, revealing a secret passageway. Elaine stared at her as she stepped inside, urgently beckoning for Elaine to follow her into a tiny flight of steps that led down towards the basement. The secret passageway hadn’t been on the plans Elaine had memorised; the Inquisition clearly didn’t know about them...and yet Millicent
did
?

“We should be able to get down into the tunnels from here,” Millicent muttered, as they kept walking down the stairs. The only light came from a globe Millicent summoned into existence and held in front of her. “I don’t know if Prince Hilarion knows about this or not – we tried to keep it a secret from just about everyone.”

Elaine nodded, remembering some of the legends she’d heard. The Golden City was
old
, with more than two
thousand
years of history – and buildings piled upon buildings as building techniques improved over the years. It was supposed to be riddled with secret passages, some under the mountains and leading outside the city, others linking various mansions together and allowing for secret deals to be struck. Officially, they didn’t exist; people who ventured in without invitations tended to vanish in the darkened catacombs. No one had ever
considered
the possibility that one might lead to Randor Mansion. Or maybe Dread had felt unable to tell her that the tunnels existed.

“There’s so much stray magic around here that it’s very hard to be sure that the tunnels remain the same,” Millicent said, more to herself than to Elaine. “But this should be the right way home. My Aunt will want to talk to you, again.”

She hesitated. “I have also been ordered to apologise to you,” she added, bluntly. “My aunt feels that I acted badly in...teasing you over the years.”

Elaine looked at her, sharply. All the old bitterness was still there, even if she had...matured.

“You did,” she agreed, finally. “And I really think that you need to grow up.”

Chapter Thirty

“I must confess that I am surprised to see you,” Lady Light Spinner said. “I would not have expected you to raid Prince Hilarion’s mansion.”

“And I didn’t expect to see Millicent there, either,” Elaine snapped. Lack of sleep and a growing awareness of her own abilities gave her confidence. “Do you have any idea how much you ruined?”

“No,” Lady Light Spinner said. With her face hidden behind the veil, it was difficult to tell if she was telling the truth. “Millicent was acting on instructions from me.”

“I’m sure that would have saved her if Prince Hilarion had caught her in the act,” Elaine pointed out. She was tired and weak and she didn’t have time for games. “Wasn’t there a case only a few months ago when a sorcerer turned a burglar into a chicken and had him for dinner?”

She shrugged. “Enough games,” she continued, angrily. “What was Millicent doing in Prince Hilarion’s mansion?”

Millicent snorted, even though her eyes looked fearful. “What were
you
doing in Prince Hilarion’s mansion?”

“Presumably the same thing,” Lady Light Spinner said, coolly. “We were looking for evidence to prove that Prince Hilarion is unsuited to becoming Grand Sorcerer.”

“Cheating has always being part of the contest,” Elaine commented. Lady Light Spinner seemed to nod behind her veil. “And did you find anything of interest?”

“I was studying his books when you arrived,” Millicent said, after exchanging glances with her aunt. One way or another, a reputation for stealing into houses owned by sorcerers wouldn’t help her social standing. “If I’d touched one of them...”

Elaine nodded, remembering the look on Cat’s dead body. He’d frozen in an expression of agony as every cell in his body died an awful death. The pain would have been so bad that death would have been a relief. Even Millicent didn’t deserve to go the same way.

“It would have been the end of you,” Elaine said. She stood up, ignoring the glass of water offered to her by one of the maids. “I need to go back to...”

“To the Inquisition,” Lady Light Spinner said. Elaine stared at her, wondering how she knew...before dismissing it as a silly question. The Inquisition had assumed that her powers had been boosted beyond their natural levels; why couldn’t Lady Light Spinner have assumed the same? And she’d already tried to convince Elaine to join her once. “They seem to have...quite an interest in you.”

“They do,” Elaine agreed, tonelessly.

“And they have a habit of...terminating people who push at the edges of what is permissible,” Lady Light Spinner said. Her eyes lifted and looked directly at Elaine. “I could protect you from them.”

Elaine had to smile. “Protect me from the Inquisition?”

“The Inquisitors are not all-powerful,” Lady Light Spinner said. Her head cocked to one side, but her eyes never left Elaine’s face. “And I may become the next Grand Sorceress. I will be able to order the Inquisitors to leave you alone.”

“You might,” Elaine agreed.

“I will,” Lady Light Spinner countered. “Prince Hilarion is likely to...face justice for his actions.” She’d already heard about the dark spellbook, rigged to kill anyone who touched it without permission. “Count Lucas may withdraw if there are suspicions around his role in the whole affair. Deferens has left the city after accidentally exposing himself to the watching crowds; he hasn’t bothered to announce his withdrawal, but leaving the city is practically an admission of defeat. That leaves me, Administrator Mentor and Wizard Kane. Kane is not a serious contender...”

Elaine smiled. “Are you sure of that?”

“And that leaves me and Mentor,” Lady Light Spinner said. “He has a great deal of support from magicians he has mentored over the years, but I have political support and deals with various magical families. And I have a great deal of magic at my command. It should be an even fight.”

“Assuming you’re right,” Elaine agreed. “You seem to be counting Kane and Count Lucas out right from the start.”

“Lucas will be tainted, like it or not,” Lady Light Spinner said. “And Kane is a nobody. He has very little support, even from the radicals who believe that changing the government is the best way to move forward – which means moving power into their hands. No one takes him seriously.”

No one took me seriously before I became a bookworm
, Elaine thought.

“Consider it,” Lady Light Spinner said. “I would be happy to have you working for me – and I would keep the Inquisition from taking you away. Freaks like you are
always
dangerous to their beloved status quo.”

Elaine nodded, remembering how the Star Council had reacted to her...and they’d
known
that her magical talents hadn’t been enhanced. They’d merely known that she possessed enough magical knowledge to make whoever gained possession of her the most powerful – and dangerous – wizard in the world. It was quite possible that the next Grand Sorcerer would order her killed – and the Inquisition would have no choice but to carry out the order. She might be better served finding a place to hide well away from the Golden City.

“I will certainly consider it,” Elaine said. The clock on the wall said that it wouldn’t be long until dawn. “I have a question. How did you know a way out of Prince Hilarion’s mansion?”

Lady Light Spinner laughed. “The Duke of Randor hired a sorcerer to design a series of pocket dimensions that would merge with the loose magic running through the catacombs and allow him access to the tunnels, without allowing anyone else to get into his house. But the sorcerer he hired to construct the network had a prior claim on his loyalty. He could tell me everything, even though he was oath-sworn to secrecy, and he did. I just kept it in reserve until I needed it.”

Elaine nodded, thoughtfully. Millicent had sneaked in, rather than use the catacombs, because the secret entrance was a secret without price. If it got out that Lady Light Spinner had managed to gain access to a sealed mansion, there would be political upheaval throughout the Golden City. Sorcerers and aristocrats had several things in common, but the most important one was that they both enjoyed their privacy. Lady Light Spinner would instantly become the most hated person in the city as the families struggled to check all of their wards and links to the underground catacombs.