Darkest Day (30 page)

Maddie giggled. “Four.”

“Mackenzie, the expression two plus two can be best represented by?” Nahir asked again.

Really?
The questions jumped around a lot, but two plus two seemed a little ridiculous especially since Maddie had already answered.

“Mackenzie? Your answer?”

“A kid.”

“Mackenzie!” Nahir rapped the gavel repeatedly.

A soft laugh came from behind me as Gwen said, “No, no. Explain, Mackenzie.”

Huh?
“Well … when a man loves a woman and they do the deed, out pops the complete representation of their union. So … two plus two equals a squirt, no matter whether it’s human or halfling or immortal.” I assumed the question-changing tactic kept the answers from growing too easy and the mind from preparing an answer to the follow-on.

Throughout it all, Winn remained quiet, and I wished I could see him.

“Mackenzie, were you a witness to the use of magic at a Valentine’s Day party you hosted?” Nahir asked.

“Yeah. I was.” Everyone except Winn and I had supposedly been wiped of the memory, though with Maddie being non-human, I presumed she could remember, too.

“Madeline, from where did the magic emanate?” Nahir asked.

“The magic emanated from Ridge,” Maddie said.

Ridge hadn’t performed any magic. According to Suze, he’d been tested and found he had no connection at all to the magic fireball.

“Maddie’s lying,” Winn said from out of nowhere.

27

Winn

“I’m what?” Maddie asked.

“Miss Parker, you may not speak unless spoken to.” Nahir rapped that stupid contraption in his hand. Mac had been right. Maddie had lied. “Master Thomas, would you please elaborate?”

“In a sec. Ask the same question to Mac.”

Nahir faced me, brows scrunched, confusion running through his eyes.

“Please, just ask her.”

On a sigh, Nahir asked, “Miss Thorne. From whom did the energy ball emanate?”

“I don’t know.” The words slipped from her lips.

Facing me again, Nahir raised an eyebrow. “Explain, Master Thomas.”

“Emanate. The dictionary definition is ‘to issue or proceed from, or as from a source. To send forth. To emit.’ It’s like the source for a creek. Sometimes, you can’t see the creek’s source. It can be feet, yards or miles away. But … you can see the
result
. The stream is
created
from the source, but the stream does not
emanate
the water. Only the source does.”

“Are you suggesting this Ridge person was not the source and therefore magic could not have emanated from him?” Gwen asked.

I nodded. “Yes. The Council has it on record that Ridge was tested on that night and had no known magical connection, which means he was not the
source
of the magic. He was a
conduit
. Someone
else
was the source. So … if Maddie had her mind wiped, as was supposed to happen, she wouldn’t know what you’re talking about. And if she didn’t have her mind wiped that night, her answer could
not
be an affirmative unless she herself
was
the source or knew who the source was. She could not have given Ridge as answer because we all know he could not produce magic. And by asking Mac, we can confirm that Mac did not know from whom the magic emanated because she answered—”

“I don’t know,” Nahir finished for me. “Well done, Master Thomas.”

“Semantics—” Maddie started.

Nahir beat the table with the wooden hammer. “Quiet, Miss Parker.” He rapped the gavel again. “One who cannot tell a lie cannot answer with an untruth.”

“Maybe I didn’t understand. Emanate is a big word.”

Gwen chuckled. Nahir cracked a smile. I gaped at both of them. “Miss Parker, were you, or were you not, the Valedictorian of your graduating class?” Gwen asked.

“I was,” Maddie said.

“Then, it is safe to assume you were fully aware of the definition of the word. In addition, were you not, the draught given would have prevented your answer as stated by Master Thomas.”

“She could have done a spell or something to not have to tell the truth!” The words came out a plea.

Nahir rapped the gavel so loud Maddie slunk back, her cheeks red. He turned to me. “Master Thomas, how can you be sure Miss Thorne is not lying just as much.”

On a sigh, I said, “Because Mac never learned how to do any spells except the fireball in her hand. She never …” I hated saying it because it would make Mac look horrible, but it would save her butt. “… learned much else about magic.”

A hush went through the room.

“But she could have, correct?” Nahir asked.

“Technically, yes. But then, so could Maddie.”

Maddie’s jaw dropped open. She firmed it shut a second later. “That’s not—” Her voice froze.

“Clever, clever girl,” Gwen said. “I believe there is a saying in the human teenage world … ‘the one who smelt it, dealt it’.” Gwen chuckled. “I believe you were the first to suggest a method by which one could get around the truth. Shall I assume your mother had something to do with this? The ability to neutralize the effects, and some practice, perhaps, with how exactly to answer our questions?”

Maddie struggled in her bonds as if she wanted to say something but couldn’t.

“Gwen, would you do the honors for the next phase?” Nahir asked.

“It would be my pleasure.” She rose from the middle seat, walked to the doors and opened them. A second later, two guards entered.

The straps on Maddie’s chair popped off, but she didn’t move. The two guards walked straight to her, helped her to her feet, and held her by her arms so that she faced Nahir and me.

“At this time, your testimony has been deemed unreliable, and extreme measures will be undertaken to ascertain the truth,” Nahir said.

Maddie struggled against their hold, a small but obvious movement; though held tight in their fists, I didn’t expect she’d get free of the brutes.

Gwen walked to her.

Maddie jerked in their arms. “Let me go!”

With Gwen’s back to me, I could no longer see her expression or read into what might come. Gwen reached out, her hands up, palms to the inside.

Maddie turned her head left, right, arched back and straightened.

“There now, child, relax.” Gwen’s voice took on a very regal sound, one I’d expect from a queen more than a princess as she placed her hands against the side of Maddie’s head.

I craned my neck to the left and made eye contact with Mac, who’d gone a pale white, her chest moving in and out but in more of a distressed way than I’d seen before. Getting sick probably had something to do with it.

“Now, Madeline. Let’s begin anew, shall we? I’ll start with the most obvious question and will extract the answers myself. What I find may lead me to dive into the recesses of your mind, to seek answers not related to the claims made against you.”

Maddie remained completely silent and absolutely motionless.

“Let’s begin.”

Mac

Silence filled the room. I never thought before that such deep quiet, where I could only hear the breath from those around me, would be so oppressive.

For a moment, I thought I heard the clock ticking, though one didn’t exist in the chamber, only in the hallway.

Rather than try and see Winn, who I assumed watched everything, I let my head droop, stared at my legs, and willed the butterflies circling inside my stomach to stop.

At a thud behind me, I whipped my head back up. I turned so I could see the tables, and found both Winn and Nahir standing.

After another shuffle behind me, and the thud of bigger feet I presumed were the guards, Gwen said, “Very, very interesting.”

She baffled me. I’d met her at Suze’s—as his girlfriend. She’d told me her ethnicity, even suggested it to me. I’d seen her a few times since, in exactly the same form, yet she’d changed. Her demeanor. Her tone. Her everything.

To be able to extract truth, too? A damphyr did not have that ability.

Gwen walked back around to her seat. “I believe Mahatma Gandhi once said, ‘An eye for an eye will only make the whole world blind’.” With her hands steepled, arms resting on the table, she nodded toward the side of the room.

The thud of feet traipsed toward me. My chair jiggled until latches clicked, though not those holding me to it, and the chairs spun around until they faced the three judges. A moment of vertigo passed through me, sending those butterflies into flight again. Calming them took some deep breathing.

Winn’s lips curved, but he tamped them flat.

The guards took places to the right of me, and to the left of Maddie, who stood, motionless.

Gwen nodded to both of us. “From this point on, you will both answer questions asked only by me.”

My eyes darted between Nahir, Gwen and Winn.

“It seems the two young women sitting here with us today are both at fault.”

I sucked in air as Winn turned to Gwen. She held up a hand at him.

“However, one’s fault comes from greed. The other’s comes from love.”

My heart did that flippity-flop thing it did more and more.

“Mackenzie. Are you aware who set Free upon you?”

I shook my head.

“Have you an idea?”

“I always assumed it was the Council during their testing of me before I selected a teacher. But they said they didn’t do it.”

“And you believe one Ridge Shaw sent Master Thomas into the in-between?”

“I have no idea who did that. Winn just thought he saw Ridge, or someone who looked like him, I think.”

Gwen smiled, giving a small nod toward Maddie. “Do you believe Miss Parker has set her sights on your young man here?”

I firmed my lips, not wanting to show just how irritated Maddie’s blatant actions were. “Yes.”

“Would you also say that you snubbed Miss Parker in favor of spending time with your young man?”

“No.” I had no other answer for that.

“Explain,” Gwen said.

I turned to Maddie. She stared straight ahead, so I refocused and faced Gwen again. “To snub means to treat with disdain or contempt, to ignore, to reject, to rebuke. It’s an affront, a slight. A rebuff even. The dictionary is full of synonyms. I didn’t do anything deliberate until her non-verbals contradicted what she said. And only then, I simply ignored her.”

A glance at Winn showed a small grin on his lips.

“Miss Parker, where is the Changeling history book?” Gwen asked.

Maddie struggled against her bonds before saying, “In my room.”

“So, you did not return it as you so carefully explained before.”

A gasp so silent only Gwen or I could have heard it left Maddie’s lips.

“And why did you call up Free to attempt the kidnapping of a Changeling?”

Maddie’s hands balled into fists. “I just—first, I didn’t know she was the Changeling. She told me that at my house. I just wanted to get her out of the way for a bit, and so I did a little incantation I found in one of my mom’s books. I didn’t know he was a demon.”

“Do you admit to projecting magic through Ridge Shaw in order to gain Master Thomas’ affection?”

The fist action Maddie had going made me wonder just how painful the torture of telling the truth could be. “Yes.” She slumped forward, her butt falling into the chair while her chest heaved.

“Please explain Ridge’s involvement,” Gwen said.

Maddie lifted her head, eyes blazing.

“Can I talk?” I asked.

All three heads, and Maddie’s, turned to me.

Gwen cocked hers. “Quite unusual, but, yes, you may.”

“I think … I get it.”

“Get what, Miss Thorne?”

“When I first caught up with Maddie, she approached me. She … befriended me. I didn’t have many human, or what I thought were human friends, because I didn’t want to get involved with them, but she kind of stuck. Then Caroline. Pete. Winn, of course.” I tried to wave at him, but with my wrist tied down, I only managed a fish-fin wobble. “And Zo-Zoe.” My eyes filled with tears. I dropped my head for a minute, sniffed and sat up straight. “And Zoe. I walked in after years of being an outsider, a non-entity, and took away the little bit that she had when I didn’t stay exclusively her friend.”

A huff came from Maddie.

“I can see where I might have pissed you off, especially when Caroline and I got closer, and Winn and I really hit it off. I can see that. Really. You tried to get Ridge to go after me to break Winn and I up, but Ridge is an idiot.”

I’d have sworn a small chuckle came from within Maddie.

“He’s a guy who thinks with his—well, you know. Is that why he didn’t exactly comply with some of your requests? Why he hit Winn with the energy ball at the Valentine’s Day party instead of me?”

Maddie’s head bobbed up and down, though the muscles in her neck suggested she fought the motion.

“You said your mom talked about me all the time. I’d say knowing you’re the smartest girl in school, but constantly hearing about me, put a third layer on a two-layer, fully-iced cake.”

That laugh came from the crowd behind me.

“So, if I backtrack through my memories and think about all of Ridge’s actions, I can see your intent. Sending Winn into the in-between, though, that was downright stupid. You could have killed him because you didn’t know the rules!”

Maddie whirled, her face the picture of anger.

“Is that why you sent your dad to help at the hospital? Because you knew you screwed up? Or so he could get information for your mom? Why even risk that if you knew he was human and the in-between is for our kind?”

“I didn’t know it was that bad!” Her nostrils flared. “Mom was talking about this place and how it was accessed and how
you
were there and might never come back. I didn’t know why you went there, but I was trying to send you back. I wanted to get away from
you
… for a few minutes. Or a day.”

“And what happened?”

“Ridge was supposed to find you, say the chant and come get me. But when I left to go find him, he was standing at the end of my road mumbling nonsense, and Winn was on the ground, so I just told my mom he’d had an accident because I didn’t know what else to do, and I couldn’t leave him there.”