Heroes at Odds (26 page)

“No.” Other than that Mother had mentioned him.

“He wanted to marry Kaaren.”

“All right.” Why hadn’t I been told? That was important, wasn’t it?

“He was an ass.”

“Ah.”

“Kaaren isn’t really a keen judge of character. It’s a good thing she’s going to be a holder. If she were a trader the whole family would be wearing bedsheets.”

“All right,” I repeated. Why was he telling me this?

“But Kaaren was enamored, and our parents were impressed. His family were prosperous suppliers. Everyone thought an alliance was a grand idea.”

“And you didn’t?” I asked. “Just because he was . . . What? Pompous?” An annoying but not unforgivable flaw.

“Because he hired a prostitute and beat her almost to death.”

I stared at him. “And no one would believe her?”

“His father and brother vouched for his appearance elsewhere.”

“But you believed her.”

“Unlike our sister, I’m an excellent judge of character.”

“What did you do?” Taro asked.

“You didn’t beat him almost to death, did you?” The idea made me sick, even if the man deserved it.

“No, much as I would have liked to. That would have made him a figure for sympathy. No, I broke into their solicitor’s office and read their books. I sent correspondence to every connection they had, other suppliers, holders and traders, a few politicians and some relatives. Anonymously, of course. I told them that the family business was absolutely riddled with debt and that their finances were being examined by a royal auditor, that their product was poisoned, and that Deacon violated animals. I knew enough of their details to be persuasive, apparently.”

“He destroyed the entire family in a matter of weeks,” Dias added proudly.

I was breathless for a few moments. I didn’t know how to feel. I was impressed and horrified all at once.

“Kaaren became disgusted with them, of course. As did Mother and Father. So that was the end of that.”

“And no one ever found out?” I asked.

“Not yet.” Mika squeezed my shoulders. “The point is, sometimes we have to do underhanded things to protect the people we love.”

I understood what he was trying to do, I really did. He told me something that he had done, something illegal with enormous repercussions should others know, to make me feel comfortable about performing an illegal act of my own before him.

Mika gave me another squeeze. “Where are we going?”

Taro took the decision out of my hands. “Kent’s estate,” he said. “You know those rumors that we can create events as well as stop them? They’re true. At least, they are for us.”

My brothers didn’t appear to be surprised.

“What are you going to do?” Dias asked.

“Won’t know until we get there. But I’m aiming for something dramatic. A warning. It’s less than he deserves, but right now I just want him to stop. It’ll be up to Fiona to decide what the long term consequences for his actions should be.”

“It’s always good to start small,” Mika agreed. “No need to kill a fly with a sledgehammer when a news circular will do.”

This comment made me wonder if breaking into a solicitor’s office was the only nefarious stunt Mika had ever performed. Right then wasn’t the appropriate moment to ask, but I would keep it in mind.

Though we kept a brisk pace, it took longer to get to the border between Westsea and Kent than I was comfortable with. And stepping over that border was a little disconcerting, because the ground changed, almost immediately. There was a sort of roll to it, and it felt harder beneath my feet. And then, after a while and out of nowhere—or so it seemed—a large rock outcropping appeared. It was ragged and high, and I could see us ripping our hands and clothes to shreds attempting to climb it. We didn’t have to climb, though, as a narrow passage had been chipped through it. Created by human hands, I was sure, not by water, as had been the breach through the rock behind Fiona’s manor.

That would have been a nasty job, cutting through all that rock. And moving through the very narrow passage was disturbing. I couldn’t get rid of the unfounded fear that it could easily fall together and crush me.

It wasn’t much longer before we got to the manor. It was an ugly mixture of a handful of ill-suited architectural styles. It was also smaller than Fiona’s. By a lot. Maybe that was part of Kent’s problem.

At the back of the manor was a garden, more elaborate than Fiona’s and sprinkled with statues of nudes that were, to my untrained eyes, grossly exaggerated. It was closer to the manor than I liked. What if someone saw us?

“This will do,” Taro whispered.

“In what way?” Dias asked.

“You’ll see.”

“Do you need us to do anything?”

“No. Oh, well, possibly. If someone comes running, it would be good if you could let us know. We’ll be distracted.”

“Yes,” said Dias. “I remember.”

“Lee?”

“I’m ready.”

Rearranging soil had become the easiest form of channeling. There was something wrong with that, I was sure, given that we weren’t supposed to be able to do anything like that. But it was almost effortless. He lowered his shields, I raised mine, I felt Taro pull in the forces, and the ground began to tremble. I heard exclamations—though quiet—of shock from my brothers.

The ground didn’t tremble much, though. Taro had become adept at keeping the movement of the ground very precise. I was sure there was nothing happening beyond the confines of the garden.

The noise could have been a problem, though. There was no hiding the faint rumble as the soil broke apart and heaved, the crack of the stone paths as they were pressed into pieces, the splintering of the trunks of the trees. I was sure someone was going to wake and come running.

But no one did, and I wondered at it. How could they not hear this?

It was quickly done. Most of the garden was well beneath the ground when Taro stopped. All except the heads of the statues. Taro kept them in view, little white globes gleaming in the moonlight.

“That is strangely disturbing,” Dias murmured.

I agreed.

“Is that it?” Dias asked.

“Unless he’s a complete idiot,” Taro whispered, “he won’t be able to dismiss this as something natural. He’ll know someone did it, in retaliation for his actions. He’ll know it’s a warning. At the same time, he won’t be able to blame Fiona for this. It’s an accusation that will sound too ridiculous to too many people.”

“What if he doesn’t perceive this as a warning?” Mika reached out and touched a stone head. “Or what if he doesn’t care?”

“Then we’ll have to come up with something more drastic,” Taro said grimly. “Let’s go. Kent is supposed to know I’ve done it, but I don’t want anyone to see me doing it. If he can say he saw me, it will give whatever accusations he may make more veracity.”

So we left, apparently unnoticed. Once more, Mika put an arm around me. It felt nice. I didn’t experience the instant relaxation inherent in Taro’s touch, but it was fortifying nonetheless. This was my brother. He knew one of my secrets. I knew one of his. There was an odd sense of safety about that.

All the casters—except the casters from Kent—met in the predawn in Farmer Biden Netan’s barn. This was not a place where the circle had met before, and that was why it was chosen. They were hoping to avoid another attack with the new location and an earlier than normal date. I hoped there were no casters within the circle secretly communicating with one of the Kent casters. No one, within my hearing, had addressed that possibility, but I hoped they had when I wasn’t around. It was an obvious problem.

On our walk over, Browne had said she had informed the rest of the circle of Radia’s request, and they had spent the last couple of days thinking about it. I had spent those same days practicing my levitation spells on ever larger objects, from candlesticks to platters to the furniture in our suite, locking the door so no maid could swan in without notice. At first, I noticed no difference in the level of concentration and effort required, but when I moved from the vanity to the bed, the pull on my mind was much deeper. I also had to be much more careful about the manner in which the bed rose, making sure it didn’t hit anything on the way up or down. It required a precision of focus that almost approached that which I needed for Shielding.

The first time I raised the bed, it exhausted me and brought on a faint headache. I left it for a couple of hours and raised it again. That time, it was easier and less draining. I left it for the day. The next morning, I did it again, and it was easier still. So I moved down to the dining room, locked all the doors, and raised the dining table. That also required a leap of concentration and raw effort, but as I did it again and again, it became easier and easier.

Maybe I could work up to raising the rock on my own.

What would happen if I dropped it? Could it possibly crack? It hadn’t, as far as I knew, in the original collapse of the arch, but that didn’t mean damage was impossible. I didn’t want to be responsible for that. At least, not all by myself.

As before, the members of the circle hummed while the sun rose. As before, the humming was a little eerie but also appealing. The shivers along my upper back were almost pleasant.

“All right,” Mitloehner said once they had finished. “What have we got?”

“I can probably estimate the weight of the rock,” said Mason Lamine Hefez. “We can find items that together approximate the weight of the rock. We practice levitating the objects, and then we practice raising them all together, each item raised by a different person. And then, when we raise the rock, each person will focus on a different portion of the rock.”

That seemed complicated.

“It is more logical to lessen the weight of the rock,” Tanner Cheon Thatcher suggested.

“How the hell do we do that?” Berlusconi demanded incredulously.

Thatcher sniffed. “There’s no need to be obnoxious.”

“I’ve never seen or even heard of a spell like that. Have you? Has anyone?”

“That doesn’t mean one doesn’t exist.”

“I don’t know that we have time to look for one,” said Browne.

“My suggestion suffers from the same flaw,” said Carpenter Iyad Coulter. “I’m wondering if we could shrink the rock to a more manageable size. But I’ve never heard of a spell like that, either.”

“That doesn’t mean we can’t create one,” Chandler Danith Thaksin suggested.

Mitloehner glared at her. “We’re not addressing this.”

His tone was hard and almost angry. I gathered they had discussed the possibility of creating a spell before, and it had been a contentious subject.

“I don’t know that we have time to create a spell, either,” Browne said loudly in a clear attempt to divert them from an argument.

“What’s the rush, anyway?” Thaksin asked.

“The Wind Watcher feels the sooner it’s accomplished, the better it is for everyone.”

I was inspired to add, “Wind Watcher Radia is healing quickly. I understand her mind is turning increasingly to her duties. I believe it weighs on her that she hasn’t been able to meet her obligations.”

These seemed to be sufficient motives for everyone to make raising the rock a priority.

“Any other suggestions?” Mitloehner asked.

No one had anything further to say.

“Then we’ll try Lamine’s suggestion.”

There followed a search for items that, in combination, would weigh the same as the rock. This meant pretty much ransacking the house and the barn. Looking over the results, I didn’t think we had nearly enough.

It became clear that I was the only one prepared to use the shortened cast for levitation, so I tripped everyone up on their first attempt.

It didn’t matter. There were far too many objects. No one could concentrate on more than one item at a time. We tried again and again, until tempers started getting really short, with no success.

“I think we’re going about this all wrong,” Miyoung declared. “Maybe we shouldn’t try separating the weight of the rock between us. To be honest, I can’t even be sure how that would work. But maybe if we all worked together to lift the rock as a whole, we’d be more successful.”

I couldn’t see how that was noticeably different from all of the casters working together with each caster focusing on one part of the rock, but I had virtually no experience in casting, compared to the others. And I wasn’t exactly the most creative person ever born.

“It would require speaking the spell in perfect unison,” Thatcher mused. “We have no practice in this.”

“It’s impossible,” Berlusconi protested.

Of course it wasn’t impossible. Just a little difficult, maybe, considering how many people were involved. “Not necessarily,” I found myself saying.

“You have some wisdom on this matter the rest of us lack, do you, Shield?”

Berlusconi’s voice was laced with bitterness. There were some issues there. I didn’t care. “Shields are exposed to a whole lot of music, different instruments, different voices, different styles, while we’re at the Academy.” Because Shields could be sensitive to music, driven to acts that we would never even contemplate in our right minds. So exposure was considered the best way to learn to deal with it. “People don’t seem to have trouble using words in unison when they’re singing.”

“Singing spells,” Berlusconi scoffed. “That’s ridiculous.”

I shrugged. That people could more easily articulate words in unison while singing was a fact. Whether it would lead to an effective spell was something someone more experienced than I would have to decide. “You all hum together. That’s what made me think of it.”

Browne smiled wryly. “I don’t know that any of us have the skill to compose a song, especially in the course of a few days.”

“Well, no, take the melody from another song.”