Mercury Mind (The Downfall Saga Book 1) (28 page)

“You would say that.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing. Have another pastry.”

“Maybe later. What I’d love to do, is take you for a spin on the dance floor.” He extended his hand to her.

She stared at it like it was a venomous snake. “I’ve never danced before,” she said in a quiet voice.

“There’s a first time for everything.” He grabbed her hand, and started pulling her towards an open area near the middle of the room. “I’ve danced many times, but never somewhere this fancy. The key is to ignore everybody else, and focus on having fun.”

Turning to face her, Kort began bouncing around to the music. Ravyn stood there stiffly, watching him.

“Come on. Try it.”

“I don’t know the dance.”

“Fine. We’ll make something up so you’ll be as experienced as everybody else. You’ve spent a lot of time copying stuff onto pieces of paper, right?” She gave a slight nod. “This dance is called the scribe.”

The dance, which Kort made up on the spot, involved the two of them facing each other, an arm’s length apart. They’d then bend over at the waist, intertwine their right arms and pretend to be writing something on a piece of paper, while swaying their bodies side to side to the music. When they finished a page, they’d grab it in their left hand, stand up straight and toss it in the air and clap, before starting on the next page.

By the time they got to the third page, Ravyn was smiling and actually enjoying herself. By the tenth page, the couples around them had joined in.

For the next song, Kort called the dance the glowing orb. They each had an invisible orb in one of their hands that they stared at, transfixed, while they moved it around in complicated patterns and passed it back and forth between their hands and exchanged it with each other.

Kort’s unbridled enthusiasm quickly melted away Ravyn self-consciousness, as they sweated away on the dance floor for the next hour.

***

C
addaric pulled the storage room door closed behind him, leaving it open a crack to let in a sliver of light. The light illuminated stack upon stack of tables and benches which had been removed from the hall for the night.

He’d spent the last couple of hours showing off Katen to all of his friends, and dancing to the occasional song. She’d clung to him the entire time, and now his suit was wrinkled and covered in sweat. She was a pretty enough girl, but he needed a moment alone to breathe. He’d sent her to get drinks for the two of them, before sneaking out of the hall and hiding in one of the storage rooms at the far end of the hallway. He took a couple deep breaths, trying to get the smell of her cloying perfume out of his nose.

He could hear voices. Pressing his ear to the crack by the door, he could make out Clyde’s voice coming down the stairwell to the left.

“Can you believe that prissy prince?” said Clyde. “Buying some bimbo to shove in our faces.”

“I wouldn’t mind shoving my face in her,” said Brutus, which drew a round of laughter.

“She’s as dumb as a mound of dirt, but I wouldn’t mind digging in her mounds, if you know what I mean,” said Clyde.

“He’s just a scared little boy, lost without his mommy,” said Tam.

“You talk nice about his mommy,” said Clyde, suddenly serious. “She’s going to be my family’s meal ticket. With her on my side, my parents can swindle anyone they want, and who’s going to do anything about it.”

“Nobody, that’s who,” roared Tam. “I’m going to tell him that if his family pays my tuition for next year, then I’ll come back here as his bodyguard to keep him safe.”

“I know,” said Clyde. “Could you believe what would have happened to him if we hadn’t been threatening the other kids to be nice to him?”

Someone would have knocked his teeth down his throat a long time ago,” said Tam. “Heck, it would probably have been me who did it.”

Their laughter echoed down the hallway as they passed the room that Caddaric was hiding in, and headed back to the ball.

Caddaric quietly closed the door. Pressing his back against it, he slid to the floor. He sat there thinking for a long time before returning to the ball.

***

D
onovan sat on the roof looking up at the stars, his lute case lying beside him. Glad to avoid the bustle of bodies and noise in the basement, he had opened the window to their room and found a way to climb onto the roof. The way back down looked tricky, so he tied a spare sheet around a gargoyle sitting above the gutter, and left it hanging down beside the window.

The night was clear, and quiet. The stars shone brightly, and even the brisk east wind couldn’t dampen his spirits. He ran his hand over his head, feeling the stubble that was slowly growing back and hummed a quiet tune. Kort and Mama B had taught him many songs. A jaunty one about a pirate who couldn’t handle his drink was stuck in his head. Giving up any pretense of quietly watching the stars, he sat up and removed his lute from its case. After a few seconds of fine tuning, he began to play the song in earnest.

He lost track of time, sitting up there with his eyes closed, playing whatever song came to mind. When he opened his eyes, he saw a second dark silhouette crouched beside the gargoyle at the edge of the roof. He motioned for the figure to come forward, then started playing another song.

Delaney cautiously crawled up the roof. She reminded Donovan of a squirrel coming to take a nut from your hand, clearly interested in the nut, but jumpy and constantly looking for an escape route.

After the next song, she was halfway up the roof, and by the one after that, she was sitting beside Donovan. She hummed along to each song that he played, occasionally even swaying with the tune. When he stopped playing for a minute to give his fingers a rest, he saw that she was shivering in the cold. Holding open his cloak, she nestled in beside him. After spending many months together, this was the first time that she’d been this close to him for more than a couple of seconds.

“Do you like the music?” he asked, and she nodded. “Is there anything you want me to play?” She looked up at him with wide glistening eyes, but said nothing.

He started another song, and immediately saw excitement on her face. He played the first part alone, but when he reached the chorus, she joined in. Her voice was magical, yet haunting. It flowed like a river, and was so warm and comforting that he couldn’t help but smile in response. By the end of the song when the lovely maiden cast herself off a cliff onto the rocks below, her voice became a distant waterfall in the middle of nowhere, alone and small.

Donovan had tears in his eyes when he finished playing.

“C
areful, you’re making a mess,” said Professor Moncha.

“Sorry,” said Kort.

Donovan and Kort were sharing their usual table in Professor Moncha’s class. Six tallow candles were standing on the table in front of them. They had spent most of the class attempting to light the candles with their magic.

“Remember, it’s all about focus,” said Moncha. “If you focus on the entire candle, then you’ll end up melting it, like you have been doing. Just the tip. Focus on just the tip and you may actually surprise me.”

“Right,” said Kort, as she walked to another table. “Your turn to try.”

“Don’t get discouraged,” said Donovan. “At least you’ve managed to light it a couple of times. I’ve yet to light one on fire.”

Through his many attempts, Donovan could consistently heat up only the candle’s wick, but never enough to ignite it.

“So, today’s the day,” said Kort, nudging him in the ribs. “You ready to take down Severn.”

“Of course. No doubts in my mind.”

“How do you plan on doing it?”

Donovan focused on the candles in front of him. Trying something different, he split his attention and attempted to light all six candles at once. Holding his breath, he poured everything he had into it, but didn’t even get a wisp of smoke. Finally he gave up and exhaled.

“It’s really quite simple,” said Donovan, nearly burning his fingers when he felt each of the wicks. “Step one, convince Severn to let me use something other than a staff.”

“You may be awful with the staff, but Severn’s a fully trained War Wizard. He’ll be better than you with any weapon that you choose.”

“I’m counting on it.”

Kort attempted to light the candle in front of him, but after a few seconds the top half threatened to topple to the side. Donovan reached out to keep it from breaking in two. Drawing the heat out of the candle, it solidified once more. A thought struck him, and he reached out to pinch a wick between his thumb and forefinger. A moment later, a pitiful flame appeared.

“It’s all about using the proper tactics,” said Donovan.

“Come on,” said Kort. “You’ll get whipped if you fight fair. How about I find something shiny and reflect the sun into his eyes during the match?”

“That’s unnecessary. I told you, I’ve got things in hand.”

“Right,” said Kort dubiously. “So you change the weapons you’re using. Then what?”

“I win, of course.”

Donovan turned to watch Ravyn and Delaney. Delaney could successfully light the candles in front of her, but was struggling to snuff them.

Ravyn had mastered their lesson almost immediately and Professor Moncha had allowed her to move on from heat transfer and start practicing with light. She currently had a walnut sized ball of light floating in front of her. Every few seconds she changed its color, red one moment, then orange, to yellow, and so forth. The light kept shifting through the same pattern of colors but Donovan couldn’t figure out the relevance of the sequence.

“Tell me the plan,” said Kort. “I want to help. You won’t stand a chance otherwise.”

“Perfect,” said Donovan. “That’s what I want everyone to believe.”

“Is it some complicated plan? Are you afraid that I won’t be able to remember everything, and I’ll mess it up? I can assure you that my brothers and I have pulled off some elaborate pranks.”

“It’s not that at all. In fact, it’s a simple plan. Only three steps”

“Swap out the staffs for other weapons, then what?”

“That’s the first step. The final step is me winning. The middle one ... well ... you’ll have to wait until this afternoon to find out.”

By the end of class, Kort had managed to light a couple of candles, but still failed half the time. Ravyn had managed to create two balls of light, both the same color, and slowly move them around the room, independent of each other.

They were just sitting down at a table for lunch, Donovan’s plate heaped high with food, when Caddaric sat down with them. Since the ball, Caddaric had sat with them during meals and spent more time in their room at night. He wouldn’t tell them why he had suddenly changed his habits, but they welcomed his presence nonetheless. He still sat with his cronies during class and was doing his best to not let them know what he’d overheard.

“Nervous, Donovan?” asked Caddaric, starting on a meat pie.

“For what?” asked Donovan in mock surprise. “Right. The match with Professor Severn. I’ve already proven myself to be the best in our class, so why should I worry about him.”

“You know that you got lucky,” said Ravyn from across the table. “You couldn’t repeat that performance if you tried.”

“It was bad enough hurting your knee the first time. I’m not about to do it again just for sport.

“Plus, you know that I would win next time.”

“That too.”

Donovan looked away from his food for a moment to look around the room. Many students who had been staring at him lowered their gaze when he looked their way. He saw many students snickering to their neighbors and more than a few motioning in his direction. Clearly everybody expected him to get his comeuppance, and were actually looking forward to Severn’s class for once. Donovan smiled down at his plate, and continued to eat as if nothing was bothering him.

“If I was you,” said Caddaric, “I’d throw caution to the wind and try to end things quickly.”

“Don’t you believe in me?” asked Donovan.

“I believe that a trained warrior will win more often than not.”

Donovan focused on his food and didn’t respond. Ravyn spent most of the meal giving Kort advice on how to empty his mind so that he can better focus his Gift. Kort didn’t take any of it seriously, and spent most of his time telling jokes to lighten the mood. When Caddaric finished his meal, he wished Donovan luck before heading off on his own.

“What’s going on with him?” asked Kort.

“I know,” said Ravyn. “First, he acts like he’s better than everybody else and only spends his time with the people who keep telling him that, and now he’s suddenly hanging out with us. What happened?”

“I think he finally realized that we’re the only ones who’ve been straight with him,” said Kort.

“I don’t care why he’s doing it,” said Donovan. “I’m happy that he’s smiling at us instead of sneering.”

“One thing hasn’t changed,” said Ravyn.

“What’s that?” asked Kort.

“I’m going to show him who is tops in the class.”

They all had a good laugh before heading off to class. Rather than heading off to the library as he usually did, Donovan headed up to their room. He removed his lute from its case and set it on the table. Pulling out a rag, he spent several minutes wiping down the leather on the case. Next he checked over the lute itself to make sure that it hadn’t been damaged. Finally satisfied, he started strumming on the lute to clear his mind. He’d done his best to act confident, but he was well aware that Professor Severn was a dangerous man. Losing the match would hurt his pride, but he feared that winning would end up costing a whole lot more.

A half hour before the start of class, he put away the lute, wrapped himself in his cloak, and headed out to the courtyard. He headed over to inspect the rack of training weapons. Most of it was filled with the staffs they been using in class, but there were a few styles of swords, some daggers and even a couple of bows with blunted arrows.

He debated for a moment making Severn choose his weapon first and then taking a bow for himself. He’d never used a bow before in, what he remembered of, his life, but how hard could it be to hit a target as broad as Severn. He discarded the idea because it lacked style. This showdown wasn’t about tricking Severn into making a bad choice. It was about letting Severn set the rules, then beating him at his own game.