Work Experience (Schooled in Magic Book 4) (25 page)

The Death Viper hissed – somehow, the sound was no longer so threatening – and slid off her chest. Emily let out a sigh of relief and, despite her exhaustion, stood upright. The Death Viper looked up at her with a curiously biddable expression, insofar as it could
have
an expression. It took her a moment to realize that she was reading its emotions through the familiar bond.

It felt...strange. Every work of fiction she’d read concerning familiars suggested that they could talk to their pet humans. Instead, all she received from the creature were impressions, half of which didn’t even make any sense. The ground was warm, she was warm, the rest of the world was not...she shook her head, unsure what to do. Most familiar bonds were forged under controlled conditions. But she’d never heard of anyone trying to bond with a Death Viper, ever.

She looked down at her shirt and gasped. There was a dark mark on her chest where the snake had sat, its poison slowly oozing through the material. Emily gritted her teeth, then carefully – very carefully – pushed the shirt away from her body and disintegrated it into dust, acidic poison and all. There was an odd resonance in her magic – it was linked to the snake now, she realized – which faded away almost as quickly as she noticed it. Her undershirt felt thin and revealing against her chest, but there was no alternative. Rudolf had hardly given her time to snatch up her bag before she’d run after him.

Shaking her head, she looked down at the snake, which looked back at her. The waves of snakelike sensations grew stronger as she met the golden eyes. It loved her, she realized dimly, even though part of it realized that the feeling wasn’t natural. But then, what sort of idiot would try to domesticate a Death Viper? The snakes were so lethal that nature hadn’t even bothered to provide them with any form of camouflage.

“So tell me,” she said, out loud. “What should I call you?”

There was no response. Emily rolled her eyes at herself; of
course
there wouldn’t be any response. The snake wasn’t human, and it wasn’t even intelligent in its own right. She suspected it hadn’t even been touched by wild magic or deliberately altered to be intelligent. It was just a snake, even though it was now bonded to a human. It didn’t make it automatically intelligent enough to hold a conversation.

“Maybe I should call you Voldemort,” she said. The thought made her snicker. A snake called Voldemort. It sounded like a piece of fan fiction. “Or maybe Scales.”

The snake didn’t seem to like either of those names. It moved, curling up and uncurling with astonishing speed. Emily couldn’t fear it any longer, but she still felt a cold shiver as she realized just how quickly Death Vipers could move. She’d never had the impression snakes could actually chase humans down, yet now...there was an odd sense from the Death Viper, an impression that there were dead humans nearby. Emily hesitated, then followed the snake as it plunged into the undergrowth. It seemed to want to show her what it had seen.

She half-expected to see Rudolf. She had no idea how Death Vipers mated and bred, but she was sure that where there was one, there would be others. Maybe Rudolf had run into a Death Viper, too, and been killed. Surely, someone who lived near such creatures would know better than to be caught by one, but the snakes were lethal.

She had a vision of a snake dropping down from the trees to land on its target and realized, a moment later, that it came from her new familiar. Reluctantly, she looked up and saw...nothing.

The bodies came into view a moment later, lying in a hollow off the beaten track. Emily gagged at the smell...and gagged again when she realized just how many animals had taken bites out of the corpses. Several of them had been so badly gnawed that it was hard to tell just how many of them there actually were, but there were at least three reasonably-intact bodies. All three were children – and all three had died from multiple knife wounds to the chest.

It’s trying to show me what it thinks I want to see
, she thought. The snake was interpreting her desires in ways that made sense to it.
I wanted to find a human; it took me to human bodies.

She felt her senses shiver in response to magic as she stepped closer, fighting to keep herself from throwing up. The bodies were coated in magic, magic that reminded her of the feeling that had surrounded Shadye. It had to be the residue of a necromantic rite. She looked closer, feeling an odd sense that something wasn’t entirely right. Two of the three children had been stabbed in the wrong place. Their
mana
, if they had
mana
, couldn’t have been drained properly.

Odd
, Emily thought. It looked as if the necromancer – and she had no doubt there
was
a necromancer – had wanted life energy, rather than magic. Would
that
be enough to drive him mad? She wondered just how long the bodies had been lying there and received a handful of impressions from the snake, but none of them made any sense to her. The Death Viper didn’t keep track of days or weeks, not like a human. All it could tell her was that the bodies hadn’t been there for longer than a season.

The snake hissed. There was another bizarre sense of impressions, followed by a sudden terrifyingly fast movement. Emily turned, just in time to see a rat-like creature swallowed whole by the Death Viper. She stared at the sudden bulge, wondering just how long it would take the snake to digest its meal. The impressions she was receiving suggested that it wanted to sleep now. She yawned in sympathy, and shook her head. Who knew what
else
was lurking in the dark forest?

“Come on,” she said, taking a look up at the sky. She’d been away for hours. Lady Barb would have to be getting worried. “Let’s go back to town.”

She cast a glamor over herself, hiding her undershirt, and started to walk. There was a reluctant hiss as the snake started to move, sliding along behind her as if it were perfectly natural. Oddly, Emily felt reluctant – no, unable – to leave the snake behind. It was
hers
now, no matter what it had been in the forest. Besides, it could navigate the interior quicker than she could. It would have been hard to get back to the town without it.

“Don’t do anything to alarm anyone,” Emily instructed the snake. She wondered if she could pick it up safely, then decided not to take the risk. Familiars couldn’t harm their owners, not directly, but the rotting touch could be unintentionally lethal. There were plenty of cautionary tales of magicians who’d bonded with horses and then fallen off at a gallop. “I don’t want you dead.”

She slowed as she reached the outskirts of the town, then walked towards the guesthouse. A handful of soldiers stood outside, surrounding a large carriage that reminded Emily of the carriages she’d seen in Zangaria, only less elegant. The soldier looked at her before staring in horror as they saw the Death Viper slithering after her. Emily had never seen grown men panic before, not outside a handful of group exercises in Martial Magic. They seemed torn between running and finding something to throw at the snake, hoping to drive it off.

Emily held up her hands in supplication. “It’s perfectly fine,” she said. They looked at her as though they thought her insane. “Really.”

She walked past them, the snake following her like a tiny dog, and pushed open the door to the main room. Inside, the woman lay on a mattress, a baby lying next to her, while a grim-faced man was speaking quietly to Lady Barb. She’d erected a privacy ward, Emily saw, as she closed the door behind her. All she could hear from her mentor was gibberish.

“Millie,” Lady Barb said, cancelling the ward. “I...”

Emily had to smile once Lady Barb saw the snake. Her mouth dropped open, and she lifted her hand, preparing to cast a spell that would reduce the snake to raw materials.

Emily stepped between her and the snake. “It’s my familiar,” she said, hastily. She knew it would hurt badly if something happened to the snake, now they were bonded. “I had to bond with it to save my life!”

“We shall discuss this later,” Lady Barb said, finally. The snake hissed at her tone, then crawled over to the fire and curled up in front of it. “What happened to Rudolf?”

The man looked over at Emily. “What happened to
my son
?”

Emily looked at him. He was older than Rudolf, with more lines on his face, but otherwise very like him. There was something about him that bothered her; he reminded her, she realized slowly, far too much of her stepfather. His hands twitched, as if he were restraining himself from jumping up and beating answers out of her physically. She wasn’t sure what she wanted to say.

She knew that aristocrats weren’t often given a choice in who they married. Even Alassa had been expected to make her choice from a shortlist her father had composed, all princes and all second sons. Somehow, it was worse to hear about a girl being forced into marriage than a boy, although she had to admit that there was little real difference. But perhaps there was; a man could go out and enjoy himself, even start an affair, while a woman wouldn’t have the same license. She had to carry the legitimate heir, after all.

But there are spells to ensure fidelity
, she reminded herself.
Was Rudolf threatened with one
?

“He vanished into the countryside,” she said, carefully. It was true enough, although she suspected that Lady Barb would see that she was leaving part of the story out. “I couldn’t follow him.”

“You could have used magic to stop him,” Rudolf’s father snapped. He rose to his feet. “My son has to be found.”

“Sit down,” Lady Barb ordered. “Lord Gorham...”

“I will not permit him to be hidden from me,” Lord Gorham said. He glared at Emily, fists flexing violently, then he turned on Lady Barb. “I want her to talk.”

“She
has
talked,” Lady Barb said. There was a cold note running through her voice, one that would have made Emily think better of whatever she was doing, if it had been aimed at her. “She was certainly not ordered to bring back your son.”

They stared at each other for a long moment. “She should have known better,” Lord Gorham insisted, finally. “I will not have her...”

“But you don’t have to have her,” Lady Barb snapped, cutting him off. “I will deal with my apprentice, if necessary.”

“It
is
necessary,” Lord Gorham said, subsiding slightly. “She let my son escape.”

He looked over at Emily, then back at Lady Barb. “I expect you to handle it.”

“I will do so,” Lady Barb said.

Emily swallowed. She knew from Zangaria that innocence wasn’t always a defense, if the local aristocrat took a dislike to someone. Her predecessor as baron had been a very nasty man.

“And you’re both invited to dinner tonight,” Lord Gorham added. “It would be my pleasure to host you. You can tell me much about the Allied Lands.”

The sudden change left Emily feeling oddly disconcerted. Lady Barb’s face showed no reaction.

“We will be...occupied this evening,” Lady Barb said, throwing an unreadable glance at Emily. “But we will be happy to join you tomorrow.”

Emily lifted an eyebrow. She might not be as versed in aristocratic etiquette as Alassa, but she did know that turning down a dinner invitation was insulting. The aristocrats of Zangaria carefully kept each other informed of their plans, making sure that there was no opportunity to deliver an accidental insult. They might cut each other dead in public, but even the worst of enemies were prepared to cooperate long enough to prevent social disasters.

Lord Gorham stood, bowed to Lady Barb, then turned and strode out of the door without looking back. Lady Barb watched him go, then walked over to Jeanette and checked on her and the baby. Emily followed, marveling at just how tiny and fragile the baby seemed to be. It was impossible to believe that he would grow up into a large man...

“Don’t worry,” Lady Barb said, softly. She picked up the baby and cradled him for a long moment, then put him back down beside his mother. “Your child will be fine.”

There was a knock on the door. Emily opened it, bracing herself for more surprises, but it was merely Jeanette’s father, husband and sister. The men assisted the tired girl to her feet, then helped her out the door, while her sister took the tiny baby and carefully carried him after them. Emily wondered, absently, what happened to mothers who had just given birth. Aristocratic women were expected to go into seclusion, but could a peasant woman afford to take so much time away from work?

“The birth went well,” Lady Barb said, once the door was closed again. “Mother and son are both doing fine, though I had to give her a little extra potion midway through the birth. The additional excitement didn’t do her any good.”

Emily winced. Most townsfolk, she suspected, wouldn’t want to draw the attention of their lord. Jeanette had been giving birth when Lord Gorham had stormed into the building. If he blamed her, no matter how irrational it was...

“Someone must have told him his son was here,” Lady Barb continued. “He came here barely twenty minutes after you left, demanding answers. You may have made yourself an enemy today.”

Emily sighed. There were at least twenty necromancers in the Blighted Lands who hated and feared her, thousands of guildsmen whose livelihoods had been upset by her innovations and half the remaining aristocrats of Zangaria, who resented her sudden elevation over their heads. Enemies were the one thing she wasn’t short of. It was part of the reason she’d agreed to be Millie for the summer. No one would connect a shy apprentice with the Necromancer’s Bane.

Lady Barb looked over at the snake. “I think it’s time you explained yourself,” she added, sharply. “What happened to you and where did you get...
that
?”

Emily swallowed and started to explain.

“O
NLY YOU, EMILY,” LADY BARB SAID
, when Emily had finished. “Only you.” The older woman shook her head in disbelief. “A Death Viper as a familiar. I don’t know if you’ll be allowed to keep it at Whitehall.”