But Natalie remained where she was, her eyes lingering on the gates. “We will see the other side of them again.” She whispered so softly, she spoke more to herself than Alex. Her gaze hardened, anger sparking. “They cannot keep what is not theirs.”
A few more seconds passed, and then she stepped away, letting out a breath—her eyes still not meeting Alex’s as they trudged back.
As dangerous a time as they had ahead of them, Alex felt that blowing off some steam had done him good. His head felt sharper, clearer, now. He even felt his spirits lifting a little as he returned to the conversation he and Natalie had been having before he broke away. That skull…It was very possible that it was Finder’s.
His mood stopped lifting abruptly, however, as he spotted a figure leaning in the manor’s doorway. Jari. He wore a bitter expression as he watched the two of them approaching him, his hands stuffed sullenly into his pockets. He was chewing on his lip, his clothes tattered and streaked with mud, his hair slightly on end.
“Having a nice walk?” he asked as they drew closer.
Alex regarded him cautiously. “What is it?”
Jari grunted.
“How’s Aamir?” Natalie pressed.
Jari shook his head. “Not strong enough,” he said. His eyes narrowed. “But he tells me that you know some interesting techniques. Both of you.”
Alex smiled. “Natalie sure does.”
Jari shoved himself off of the doorframe, coming to stand in front of the two of them.
“He also tells me,” he said, his eyes sliding away to rove over the gates behind them, “that I am being a bad friend to the both of you. That you shouldn’t be blamed for his encounter with the professor.”
Alex remained quiet, watching the short boy.
Jari let out a long breath, running a hand through his golden hair and rocking from foot to foot.
“I’d meant to start practicing with him sooner,” he said. “It’s just…life got in the way. I thought…”
“You thought you had more time,” Alex and Natalie finished for him in unison.
He smiled weakly. “Something like that.”
The three of them stood there, uncomfortably regarding one another as the snow continued to drift down among them.
“Long story short,” Jari said, “I’m sorry. Not only that, but I’d like for the two of you to join me in training Aamir. I’m getting worn out doing this day in and day out.”
Alex stretched, still feeling the aches and sores from when he had last dueled with Aamir. “It takes it out of you, doesn’t it?”
“No kidding,” Jari chuckled. He shot a pleading look between the two of them. “So you’ll come?”
“Of course we’ll come!” Natalie replied, giving him an affectionate squeeze on the shoulder.
Jari sighed and led them through the grounds toward the cellar, and for a moment it almost felt like the early days at the manor. Everything seemed fresh and new somehow, the falling snow casting a cold, white shadow over the familiar scenes. The abandoned gardens. The disused statuary. The gnarled trees, their spidery branches hanging heavy with the winter’s ice.
Jari kicked the trapdoor twice before entering, and Alex felt the familiar warmth of the place rush up to greet him. Aamir’s fire practically turned the place into an oven at all hours.
Aamir himself was sitting against the far wall, looking anxiously down at his hands. His head shot up as he heard them descending the ladder, and a smile broke out over his face when he saw Alex and Natalie.
“You came,” he said.
Natalie grinned. “Still have to teach you to grab, don’t I?”
Aamir was on his feet in an instant.
“Yes,” he said, “you do. Show me the form of it now. I want to get started.”
He all but dragged Natalie away, leaving Alex and Jari standing awkwardly by the ladder.
“Well then,” Jari said.
Alex watched as Natalie began to walk Aamir through the forms, her hands in the claw-like positioning that Alex had seen so many times before. Aamir was nodding, his own hands mimicking the motions.
“He’s going to be fine,” Jari said, staring at their friend.
Alex continued to look on as Aamir’s brow furrowed with concentration, his hands moving in intricate patterns. He didn’t want to tell Jari how powerful Derhin was. How the touch of the man’s magic had felt like having the breath crushed from him.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Jari said. “Derhin’s a teacher, and Aamir, for all his talent, is a student. I know.” He kept watching his friend, and a little smile slipped onto his lips. “I know all of that is true,” he said. “But still. He’s going to be fine.”
Natalie summoned a ball of fire, lifting it into the air between her and Aamir. Aamir thrust out his hand, his fingers grasping, then closing. The fire wavered, slipping an inch or two toward Aamir. Natalie smiled, saying something with an encouraging nod.
“He’s going to be fine,” Jari repeated.
It was as though the words were a mantra, and repeating them would make them true. Alex thought again of Derhin. Of the power the man wielded. He thought of the feeling of having his neck crushed by the man’s magic, then looked at Aamir again.
Alex joined in the prayer. “He’s going to be fine.”
Chapter 37
The days melted by in a snowy wash as they trained. All four of them stopped attending class, a fact that earned them stern looks from their teachers in the hallways, but other than that garnered no repercussions. Each of them threw themselves into their practice with vigor—Alex and Natalie trying to continue formulating a solid plan for Finder on the side.
Alex’s anti-magic conjurations were getting better, but they were still far from perfect. He had to focus too much, and it inevitably came down to a choice between concentrating on his enemy’s hands and holding his own energies together. He was pleased to note his improvement, but frustrated that he still ended up losing.
With her curse hanging heavy around her shoulders, and Aamir having developed a firm grasp on the basics of grabbing, Natalie’s success against the older student dwindled to almost nothing. Her endurance was poor, and her magic was weak. She spent most of their practices sitting against the wall with Alex, who was glad she was finally resting a little.
Then there was Jari. Aamir had always said the small boy was good, but Alex had never fully appreciated the statement until he saw him spar. Jari stood, his body held sideways to present the smallest possible target, one hand slotted behind his back and the other held out like a fencer’s foil in front of him. His hair glowed with crackling power as his fingers snapped one way then another in a blur of magical signs, sending spell after spell raining down on the bottle, and Alex noted with surprise that Aamir struggled to keep up.
A crack of glass, and the bottle at the center of the room spun, a small hole in its side burbling with fizzing wine, the sickly smell of scorched grapes floating into the air. Aamir smiled weakly, then slumped down to a sitting position, panting. Jari flicked a couple stray bolts of lightning from his fingertips.
It was the night before the duel. So far, none of them had actually mentioned the fact, but it hung heavy over the room. They had been talking less, concentrating more. Now, however, it was growing late and they would soon be forced to sleep, or face the dawn unrested.
Jari made a hand sign in Aamir’s direction, and the boy’s hawk-like eyes caught it, squinting in the gloom of the cellar.
“Anima, strong, ground to my left.”
Jari smiled, then changed the sign.
“Lightning, straight to the face.”
There was a chime that seemed to roll through the room, and Jari’s watch began to emit a faint light. He didn’t even look down, flipping his hand into a new position.
Aamir, however, did not answer. He was staring at the watch.
“Jari…”
“What’s the sign?” the younger boy responded.
Aam
ir sighed, then looked at the hand. He blinked, a smile sliding over his face as he saw what the other boy held toward him: a thumbs-up.
“Time for bed,” Jari said.
On the way back, Jari drew Aamir ahead by the arm, and the two of them spoke in hushed whispers that were masked by the wind as it whooshed through the bare branches of the toppled trees. The two boys walked, their long gray coats tumbling behind them in the wind, and for a moment Alex thought they were the very picture of modern magicians.
Beside him, Natalie was muttering to herself too, her hands making signs he didn’t know. Alex noted with interest that the spells she was practicing took both hands, one fluid and wavy, the other stiff and harsh.
“Necromancy?” he asked.
Natalie shot him a small smile.
“Have to make sure I have it right for tomorrow.”
Alex nodded. “Did you get enough practice? I was worried that you wouldn’t have time, what with training Aamir.”
Natalie shrugged. “There is no way to know, is there? We’ll find out tomorrow.”
They walked in silence for a time, Natalie continuing to mutter and flex her hands.
“So,” Alex said as the wind cut a cold line across his cheek, “what’s our plan tomorrow?”
“We have already gone over it at least a dozen times.”
“Humor me.”
Natalie sighed, but she settled into the discussion with an ease that would have been impossible for someone who hadn’t already been thinking on the topic. “We go to the crypt,” she said. “Odds are very good that the source will be in there, possibly the skull. We sneak in, locate it, disenchant it, and get out.”
Alex nodded. “For my part,” he said, “I’ll take care of any traps and wards set on the crypt. My anti-magic should be able to dismantle spells rather than trigger them, so if we’re careful, we won’t sound any alarms…Should be a clean trip in and out.”
As they walked, Alex tilted his head back, staring up at the mess of stars that washed over the sky. He picked out constellations, slowly building a map of the cosmos high above.
Natalie looked up as well, her brown eyes soft in the moonlight.
“It is like they are putting on a show for us,” she said.
Alex frowned. His complex web of patterns and lines wavered, and for a moment he saw the stars.
“A show?”
Natalie smiled and moved a little closer to him, wrapping her arms around herself in an effort to keep warm. “They look a little like fireworks, do they not?” she said.
Alex squinted, and then he saw it. Like a thousand fireworks exploding in frozen water, deep and distant, halted in mid-blast.
“I was just mapping them,” he said with a frown.
Natalie laughed. “Of course you were.”
He helped her over a large tree that had been thrown across the path, her hand soft and warm against his palm, and led the way back toward the manor.
“Do you really think we can do this?” she asked in a quiet whisper. It was the first time she had allowed herself to show true doubt in a while.
Alex looked back at her, studying her face. For a moment, all he could see was her eyes, sparkling in the night. She seemed taller than usual, her dark hair tied back in a bun that left only a few long locks to hang loose over her face. They fluttered in the wind, the wooly coat around her neck ruffling.
He smiled. “Only one way to find out.”
With all the anticipation, stress, and worry churning his gut, Alex had a horrible time getting to sleep that night. He stared up at the ceiling, where Jari’s New Year’s fireworks had never quite faded. He found himself making constellations of the swirling sparks as they fell into place, his hands moving from one anti-magical position to the next, until he finally drifted off.
By some quirk of fate, all three of them woke at the same time. Jari rubbed at his eyes, and Aamir just stared at the ceiling with a distant expression. Alex sat up, propping his back against the wall. He felt stiff, but wide awake.
They dressed in silence and made their way to the mess hall. Everywhere Aamir walked, the conversations died as students stared at him. Whispers followed him like the wake of a plague boat coming in to harbor. When they reached the buffet, Aamir took only few pieces of toast with a single sad dollop of jam. Jari, on the other hand, mounded a plate so high with food that Alex had to wonder what the small boy was planning to do with all of it, because it certainly wouldn’t fit in his stomach.
They ate in silence until Natalie walked up, practically dropping a half-full plate onto the table. She had deep shadows under her eyes, and she fell into her chair in a way that suggested she had died and resurrected herself, mostly. He knew how she felt, and gave her a weak smile.
Their meal continued uninterrupted for a little while until a boy that Alex recognized as a second year named Ryan Cross scurried up to them. He had a thin face and gangly arms, and he seemed to vibrate as he stood before them, his hands smashing together in a nervous series of movements as his eyes carefully locked on everybody except Aamir.
“Excuse me,” he said in a cracking voice.
Aamir’s head swiveled toward the boy, who swallowed audibly.
“I, uh,” said Ryan, his mouth working furiously, his teeth pulling his upper lip into his mouth. “I’m supposed to tell you that you’ll be needed on the main green in thirty minutes for your d-duel.”
His voice tripped over that last word with a mixture of fear and excitement. Aamir, still staring at him, only nodded.
The boy nodded back, the motion swift and sharp, then hesitated.
“Uh,” he said.
“Go on,” Natalie encouraged him, her voice kind but firm. “It’s okay.”
Ryan looked gratefully at her, then finally locked eyes with Aamir. He gave a short but respectful bow. “Good luck,” he said. Then he turned and skittered off out of the dining hall door.
The whole room had gone quiet as the conversation took place, and now the other students in the room were openly watching Aamir.
“All right,” said Aamir under his breath, and turned back to his toast. He had only finished one slice, but he made to shove the plate away from himself. Jari caught it, holding it in front of his friend.
“Finish it,” he ordered.
“I’m not—”
“Finish. It.”
Jari’s voice brooked no argument. Natalie swallowed a mouthful of cereal, then looked at Alex.
“Should we go get ready?”
Alex nodded, and the two of them rose.
“We’ll walk out to the grounds with you,” Alex promised as they went.
Aamir gave him a stiff nod.
Their preparations were short. Alex retrieved his screwdriver and slotted it into a pocket while Natalie shoved Nobilitum Mortem into her coat. They both donned dark cloaks, and Natalie even slipped on a pair of black gloves.
“If you’re going to commit a crime,” she said, “you might as well look the part.”
She put on a dark silk scarf, drawing it up over her nose, then giving a little twirl.
“How do I look?”
A little laugh forced its way from Alex’s mouth.
“Beautiful,” he said, then returned the spin. “And me?”
Natalie gave an approving nod. “Very dashing. The image of a criminal.”
They met Jari and Aamir outside Alex’s room. Aamir was dressed as normal, and Jari stood at his side with a nervous expression on his face. As Alex and Natalie approached, he gave a little wave.
“Come inside for a moment,” Aamir said.
Puzzled, Alex and Natalie followed him into the room. Alex let out a strangled yelp when he nearly ran face first into a mirror image of himself standing in the doorway. Natalie gasped in surprise as she encountered her own doppelganger.
“What—” Alex began.
Aamir smiled at him.
“You’ll waste time walking with me,” he said. “And people will notice if you dis
appear. You need to be present at the duel. Jari agreed to make these two to come with us. You’ll go straight to the crypt.”
Alex frowned. “No, Aamir, we’ll—”
Aamir made a firm gesture that cut Alex off mid-sentence. “No,” he said, his lips twisting in a sad smile. “No. I appreciate the offer, but this is how it needs to be.”
The two young men stared at each other for a long time. Alex could see the fear in Aamir’s eyes, the tremble in his hands. He stepped forward, putting his arm around Aamir’s shoulders, and pulled his friend in for a hug.
Aamir tensed for a moment, then relaxed, his own arms encircling Alex to pat him on the back. Alex could feel Aamir’s heart fluttering against him like that of a bird, his lean body tight.
“I want to hear all about your victory afterwards,” Alex said with assurance as he stepped back, a hand still on Aamir’s shoulder.
Aamir smiled. “I’m sure Jari will do it better justice than me.”
Then Natalie slipped her arms around them both.
“We want to hear it from you,” she said.
Aamir, his eyes glittering, nodded.
They parted ways, Jari and Aamir walking in one direction with the clones, and Alex and Natalie taking off in the other. Natalie drew her scarf up over her face again, and they set off at a brisk pace, toward the hallway that would exit the manor near the cemetery.
A silence fell over them as they made their way through the hallways. Any students who would normally have been in this part of the manor had long since vacated it, heading toward the lawn in an effort to get the best view of the action. The teachers’ offices were located at the front of the building, so they wouldn’t encounter any of them either.
This was no place for students; this was the Head’s realm. Soon they would be over that golden line once more, into the eerie magic of the man’s private space. Alex slowed their pace slightly as they approached a small wooden door carved with the images of trees laden with vines.
She looked over at him, her eyes sparkling over her scarf, and he nodded. Natalie shouldered the door open a crack, then spilled herself out onto the grounds.