The Awakening of Ren Crown (22 page)

Perfect.

I looked over at Olivia buried in books with eight inch spines. Why didn't she have a reader? A reader was a poor substitute for a reading room, but far superior to both regular books and electronic, seeing as it combined the two aspects.

I yawned, scrubbed a hand over my eyes, and fished through the cards to find
Time Lines of Death.
I quickly consumed the text, which was full of alarming opinion. No one had ever been successfully resurrected after four months. Mages were arrested and imprisoned if they were found practicing resurrections at
thirteen minutes
post death. Everything from heavy fines to imprisonment was given for eleven and twelve minute time frames.

Seeing as my brother had been dead for nearly two months now, none of this was good news. But I had anticipated such roadblocks, and they were merely words on the page.

“
Ren, I need help.”

“
Help, help, help!”

I curled up into a ball on my bed and pulled my journal with the massive to-do lists against my belly. I would do whatever it took.

My eyes immediately started to close and I vainly tried to keep them open—what if Marsgrove showed up?—but exhaustion pulled me into the abyss where Christian hung in chains.

Chapter Eleven: Pain...ting...

I woke abruptly, hand reaching for Will's sketch. Olivia was in her chair, working, as if she'd never gone to sleep. Marsgrove wasn't standing over me. No handcuffs circled my wrists.

I wiped the back of my hand over my eyes. I had made it through the night unscathed. A little notch of hope peered out from my Pandora's Box of emotions.

Breakfast consisted of unexploded Magi Mart food—burritos and muffins, since the faux-Cheerios hadn't survived the magical unpack. It all tasted...normal.

My after breakfast activity consisted of sketching—each draft becoming easier to animate than the previous one. Hopefully, I could get these working, then I could move ahead and activate the snare I had planned for Marsgrove. I attempted to place paint on a sketched gopher that was prowling and sniffing a patch of sketched grass. The paint was from a store-bought tube from the First Layer, so I wasn't expecting much, but I needed to see if paint brought into the magic world became magical.

So far, it had just stuck to the hindquarters of the gopher, who was vainly trying to lick the Phthalo Blue off.

Knock, knock, knock.

Olivia didn't make any move to answer, so I walked over to the door. A girl with three ponytails stood on the other side holding a tablet and wearing a pressed uniform. Not good.

“Florence Crown?”

“Yes.”

“Level One Offense. Illegal substance use.”

I stared at her. “What?”

“You triggered a Level One Offense.” She shook her head. “Drugs are bad for you and there are mages who can help. Now—”

“What are you talking about? I'm not using drugs.” That was the last thing I needed in this world.

She frowned at her tablet. “You are telling the truth. Hmm... What were you doing a minute ago?”

“Drawing and painting. With...paint.” No. No way. “Paint purchased legally at a store!”

The girl looked apologetic. “I bet someone put a hex on you. There are a few going around that mimic administration spells. Get yourself checked at the clinic. Unfortunately, the justice magic still needs to balance the infraction with a punishment, as it is insisting you are guilty. But I can make it painless this time, I think. Do you have any suggestions?”

“Er, I could run?”

“Great! Run aimlessly for a half hour. You can have until the end of the day to do it.”

Aimlessly?

I nodded, but she continued looking at me expectantly. What was it the boy had made me say? “Er, I will run aimlessly for a half hour, by my magic I so do vow?”

The magic wrapped around me, squeezing.

“Great! And get checked out, ok?” She tossed over her shoulder, three ponytails swinging as she walked down the hall.

But a clinic wasn't going to do me any good—some mischievous student hadn't put this spell on me, an official had. Marsgrove had put some sort of spell on me so I would get in trouble if I
painted.
I remembered his muttering, though I hadn't paid much attention at the time, absorbed with the visual world around me.

He had made it so I couldn't even use store bought, non-magical paint?

I closed the door. Maybe...maybe he had just cursed the stuff in my bag? Yes, that had to be it. I walked quickly to my bed and unearthed the campus map. I needed an art supply store. I was brimming with intent and the map zoomed to a building on the third circle.

Twenty minutes later, I entered the main art building, which looked as if it had been half-constructed with tongue depressors, twine, and crystals—held up entirely by dream magic. The other half was constructed using some sort of melted stone and bulged pods. Winding pathways suspended by magic, and bridges that spiraled as they stretched from one side of the building to the other made up the atrium.

I wondered if Gaudí had been magical. Seemed likely.

At the far end of the atrium, the art store brimmed with light and energy. My feet moved faster. I could feel the pull from here. Lovely magic that spoke of creation and promise. My hand curled around the serpent handle and pulled. I stepped forward.

Wiewiewiewie!

I jumped back. Everyone in the store turned in my direction. The door shut, and the alarm stopped ringing. It took a few moments for people to turn back to scanning shelves. Someone walked from behind me, opened the door, and walked through. Nothing.

Taking a deep breath, I opened the door and stepped through.

Wiewiewiewie!

I turned and strode quickly away, shoulders hunched, cursing Marsgrove with each step.

My steps slowed as I noticed an older art student painting the winding suspension bridges above us. He was squeezing paint from a near empty tube. I hurried over.

“Pardon me, can I buy that tube from you?” I pointed at the one that only had a few drops left.

He blinked again, then screwed the cap back on and held it out silently.

“Thank you,” I said fervently, relieved beyond belief when no alarm sounded. I held out a munit.

“Seriously, kid, keep it.” He was looking at me with pity. I was ok with that at the moment.

“Thank you again.” I stuffed the munit back in my pocket. “Does this do anything...specific?” I was going out on a flyer here.

“It's light-induced paint. Brightens and twinkles.” He pointed up. “Great for interiors.”

“Did you make it?”

“No.”

“You don't make your own supplies?”

He shrugged, but thankfully didn't find the question odd. “Don't need to. Store grade supplies work well for me. I'm not working toward a mastery.”

I nodded, putting it on my mental research list. “Ok, thanks.”

“Sure, kid.”

I hurried from the building, just in case I tripped off another alarm. I walked down a level, just to make sure, then sat on a patch of grass. There was no view here, the grassy area was surrounded by buildings tightly clumped together, but I didn't need to draw anything special. I quickly sketched a pond and a starry sky, perfect for twinkling and reflections.

My fingers shook as I uncapped the tube. I touched my finger to the lip, and the barest bit of milky paint transferred to my finger pad. I touched it to one of the stars, willing it to spread through the sky and reflect onto the pond.

Nothing happened. I lifted my finger and a dot of milky white remained stagnant on the page. There was a vague twinkle in the drop, but no spreading. No magical connection of lines.

What—?

“Florence Crown?”

The tube tumbled from my hand and plopped on the grass. A boy wearing a uniform stood in front of me. No. “Yes?”

“Level One Offense. Illegal substance use.”

I shut my eyes.

Two hours later, I finished cleaning the entrance hall to the biology building near the grassy valley.

I flexed my back. The magical grime stripper I had been “issued” chased dirt around. At first it had seemed fantastic, like watching frames of the Sorcerer's Apprentice in real life. But after two dozen squirts, I had quickly comprehended that fantastic was relative, since I had to corral and contain the dirt that my squirts were freeing. And since I had no clue how to do magic, I had chased dirt for two hours, while mages had walked around me snickering and doing little effortless whirls of magic to sidestep the mess. At the twentieth snicker, my cuff had nearly vibrated off my wrist and I'd abruptly blown the entire swirl of filth through a vent in the floor.

Grumpy and pissed didn't quite do justice to the violence of my current thoughts. I decided to do my running punishment to work off some of the rage, but even thirty minutes later, dodging nuts thrown by some kind of weird tree monkeys on the third circle, a little growl still escaped.

Painting was the only way I knew how to bring anything to life. I had
felt
Christian. I sure as hell had watched that butterfly fly away. With art, I could focus, concentrate, intend, and
do
. It fulfilled those stinking cornerstones of magic, and everything.

And it had been taken away from me.

I could sketch, sure. But for me, so far, paint was the life-creating medium in this world.

I was stuck with zero knowledge of anything else magical, working from the ground floor up. I narrowed my eyes as I marched into the dorm, looking like a sweaty chimney sweep. Well, I would be learning magic extra quickly now, wouldn't I?

I managed to undo the dorm room lock in quick and precise fashion. Olivia didn't look at me as I walked past, but I saw her nose wrinkle.

A long, hot shower—while only touching the two knobs that I could identify as hot and cold—made me feel a lot better. I sent a quick note to my parents in the journal, noting details about the magnificent landscape and architecture in the Second Layer Depot, how a mage enters the Depot and school, the interesting things mages could do—like making magical fields for specific purposes—and how I was looking forward to telling them all about it in person. I kept it brief, and tried to leave out anything alarming. On the other hand, if needed later, they had some basic information to put together.

I stuck in a little note at the end asking Mom to find out how I could finish high school, either doing assignments that I could turn in or getting a GED. My parents would approve. It would give Mom something to focus on. And I might need it, if I ever found my way out of here.

I quickly accessed the books I had on death and death magic, looking for alternative plans. My time was ticking already.
Dealing with Magical Loss
and
Grief and Grieving
were quickly put aside as they contained information for coping, not action
. Pain of the Black Arts, Why the Soul Separates,
and
Guide to Resurrection
were more promising.

The latter was by far the most explicit, as it provided actual instructions on how to raise someone within a ten minute time frame post death—although most of the instructions required other knowledge, like “locate magic nucleus” and “create a spinning enchantment.”

All of the authors agreed that customary techniques didn't work after fifteen minutes of death. They hotly debated the moral repercussions of the time frame between ten to fifteen minutes.

No one debated the two to three month time frame.

“
Ren.”

“Shh, it's ok,” I whispered quietly.

I read through the books quickly, putting the important pieces into the mental map I had created to remember everything. The mental black paint bucket labeled “Consequences for Christian” now contained the following information based on the books—bringing souls back hurt them, once a soul separated it was at peace, and souls that
were
brought back didn't always come back right.

In the mental forest green bucket labeled “Consequences for Ren,” I had a significant main item—black magic demanded a physical price on a scale starting at fatigue for the least of the rituals, moving to blood and body parts, then ending with soul death for the truly abhorrent. In addition, there was a magic sacrifice commensurate with the ritual. This meant that successive rituals performed immediately were magically impossible and needed to be separated by a minimum of three days to ensure personal safety. I chewed my plastic cap, then noted in the margin, “Plan for one day between rituals.”

The contents of the red bucket labeled “Time Line” that I had started to populate last night had grown larger.

“
Ren...don't do it.”

“
Ren, help me!”

Christian's splitting personality was a concern I didn't need. I shakily tucked my hair behind my ear and drew two stars next to “plan for one day between rituals.” I would do what needed to be done, because my brother was not at peace.

In fact, maybe the books were wrong about other warnings as well. I made a note to locate the story details on the failed four month resurrection.

But even if everything the books said was correct, it didn't matter. My brother needed me.