Infinite Regress (20 page)

“That sounds about right,” Emily said. Mistress Irene—and later, Void—had hammered it into her head. “You need to learn to channel the magic through the spellwork.”

Julia looked frustrated. “It just doesn’t work right!”

“It will come,” Emily said. “There are exercises you can do, if you speak to Professor Lombardi. He
will
help you.”

She looked at the other four students. “This is a basic protection ward,” she said, holding out a sheet of paper. She’d written out the notation last night, then convinced Caleb to check it for her. “See if you can cast it.”

Adana didn’t look impressed. Emily rather suspected she’d
already
mastered the ward. Her family would have wanted her to have some protections when she went to Whitehall. And yet, whatever protections she knew hadn’t protected her from Tiega’s spell. It had to be very—very—powerful for her age. Her anger had probably given the spell additional power.

“I can do this,” Adana said. “It’s useless.”

“You have to learn to walk before you can run,” Emily said, firmly. “Now, try and cast it.”

She passed copies of the paper to Julia and Dulcet. “Try and cast it yourselves,” she ordered, calmly. “See how you do.”

Julia nodded and cast the spell. The ward sparkled with power, then came apart in a shower of sparks. Emily scowled. Too much power, definitely too much power. She could remember some of the exercises Void had taught her, but she didn’t dare teach those to Julia without Professor Lombardi’s blessing. She’d have to have a word with him. There were so many students in his classes that Julia might just have fallen by the wayside.

“Try again, with less power,” she said, gently. “Dulcet?”

Dulcet cast the spell. The ward shimmered for a long moment, then settled down. Emily reached out with her senses and smiled, openly, as she sensed the ward protecting the younger girl. It wouldn’t last longer than a day, she suspected, but it was definitely a step forward. Dulcet gave her a shy smile in return. She looked as though she couldn’t believe her own success.

“Lucky,” Julia sneered.

“Be quiet,” Emily snapped.

She took a breath to calm herself, then nodded to Julia. “Try and cast the spell again.”

Julia obeyed. This time, the ward shimmered into existence and stayed there. Emily tested it lightly, then nodded in approval. Julia looked relieved, despite herself. Being the last to master the ward—the very basic ward—had clearly embarrassed her. Emily would have been more sympathetic if Julia hadn’t clearly been trying to put Dulcet down.

“Very good,” she said. The other four had all cast the ward easily. “Now, a handful of basic spells...”

She ran through five different prank spells, ranging from the freeze spell to a basic transfiguration spell. They’d find more—many more—in the library, including ones she had no intention of showing to anyone. Meddling with a person’s body was bad enough, but messing with their minds was far worse. If it were up to her, such spells would be added permanently to the forbidden list, with dire punishments for anyone who dared break the rules. Convincing someone they were a dog was only funny as long as it happened to someone else.

“I need to point my finger at someone to freeze them,” Adana said, thoughtfully. She’d frozen Jasmine almost as soon as she’d learned the spell. “Why can’t I cast it without pointing?”

“Because the pointing finger tells the spell where to go,” Emily said. It was a little more complex than that, but it would do for the moment. Advanced magical theory would be covered in Third Year. “Without it, the spell might freeze you instead.”

She unfroze Jasmine, then ducked as Jasmine hurled a transfiguration spell towards Adana and missed. It struck the wall and splashed off, harmlessly. Adana snorted rudely, then threw a spell of her own at Tiega. The girl let out a yelp as her body morphed into a tiny statuette. Emily couldn’t help feeling a chill run down her spine, even though she’d grown accustomed to magic after four years in Whitehall. People could be changed into inanimate objects and just abandoned, unless they managed to muster the skill to turn themselves back to normal. And no one would ever find them...

Unless they knew what to look for
, Emily thought, as she undid the spell.
But even then it would be chancy
.

“That will do, for the moment,” she said. “Remember what I said the last time we were all together. If you do something that keeps one of your fellows from attending class, you
will
regret it.”

Adana gave Tiega a smirk. Emily resisted—barely—the urge to roll her eyes. Clearly, the trauma of being transfigured and then locked in a cupboard hadn’t lasted. She sighed out loud, giving the younger girl a warning look. It might be better to separate Adana and Tiega, instead of swapping Jasmine and Julia, but she didn’t
think
she could order them to change rooms. She’d have to check the rules, just to be sure.

Lillian muttered something under her breath. Tiega whirled around, one hand raised in a casting pose. “Enough,” Emily said, sharply. “Lillian, you can apologize for that or you can go see the Warden. Which one do you choose?”

“I’m sorry,” Lillian said, shortly. “I...”

“Good,” Emily said. She hoped Lillian would have the sense not to pick a fight when Emily wasn’t around. It wasn’t as if any of the other mentors would discourage Tiega from doing something unpleasant to Lillian. They’d consider it a suitable lesson. “Tiega, stay behind with me. The rest of you can go enjoy the rest of your day.”

She waited until the others had departed before turning to Tiega. “Try not to make her late for class.”

Tiega shrugged, listlessly. “Who cares?”

“You might, if you are sent to the Warden for the same offense,” Emily pointed out. “He will not be gentle.”

“He wasn’t gentle,” Tiega said. She rubbed her forehead. “Would anyone care if she missed class?”

“If she missed it on her own, everyone would consider it her fault,” Emily said. Whitehall believed that if a student didn’t want to learn, they didn’t
have
to learn. They’d fail their exams and get absolutely no sympathy at all. “But if you make her late, it will be
your
fault.”

“It always is,” Tiega said. She rose and started to pace the room. “Everything is always my fault.”

“Not always,” Emily said. She cleared her throat. “I want you to teach me the spell you used on Adana.”

“I don’t know how to write it out,” Tiega said. “My mother hammered it into my head and made me cast it over and over again until I could do it on demand.”

“And you don’t know how to alter it,” Emily guessed. Tiega nodded, shortly. “I wonder... cast the spell on me.”

Tiega stared. “Are you mad?”

“No,” Emily said. She’d rebuilt her protections after visiting Mistress Danielle. “Cast the spell on me, now.”

The younger girl hesitated, perhaps remembering Emily’s warnings about starting fights with older students, then lifted her hand and cast the spell. It was powerful, Emily realized as it struck her protections, powerful enough to be a problem for a student two or three years older than Tiega. And yet, it was also a very blunt spell. There was little hope of using it as anything other than a hammer, rather than a scalpel. It would have blasted through the basic wards she’d taught her charges, but it couldn’t worm its way through her more advanced protections. She studied it for a long moment, then pushed it away from her wards. It crackled out of existence a moment later.

“Mother said it would be enough protection for a while,” Tiega said.

“She was right,” Emily confirmed. No
wonder
Adana hadn’t been able to block or reverse the spell. “It’s a very powerful piece of work.”

She frowned as a thought struck her. “Can you undo it?”

“Mother always said I should never try to unravel it without taking its victim to her,” Tiega said. “But I
think
I can undo it.”

“Don’t use it again,” Emily said. She thought better of it a moment later. “Don’t use it unless your life is in very real danger.”

Tiega looked unhappy. “Why...?”

Emily sighed. “When I was your age,” she said, “I cast two spells simultaneously and mangled them together. The result almost killed... almost killed the target. I would have become a murderer, simply through carelessness. At the very least, I would have been expelled from Whitehall and handed over to her family for judgement.”

“They would have killed you,” Tiega breathed.

“Probably,” Emily said. King Randor, staring absolute disaster in the face, would not have been
merciful
to the silly little girl who’d killed his daughter and sole heir. The very idea was absurd. “You need to be careful casting spells you don’t understand.”

She dismissed Tiega, then sat back in the chair to gather her thoughts. Julia and Dulcet would require more training; the other four, at least, were well on the way. She just hoped she hadn’t unleashed a nightmare on the school. It was easy to imagine the four of them hexing their fellow students relentlessly until their victims learned how to fight back.

The door opened. Caleb stepped in. “Finished?”

“Yeah,” Emily said. She made a show of glancing at her watch. “There’re still at least two hours before lunch.”

“Then we may as well make the most of it,” Caleb said. He held out a hand to help her to her feet. “Tomorrow, your real work starts.”

Emily nodded, slowly. Part of her looked forward to exploring the tunnels under Whitehall. But the rest of her remembered, all too well, the horror she’d found under Mountaintop. Was Whitehall built on a similar secret? She wasn’t sure she wanted to know.

But Professor Locke wants to know
, she thought.
And he won’t hesitate to tell the world
.

“Y
OU SEEM TO HAVE EVERYTHING YOU
need,” Sergeant Miles said. “I must congratulate you.”

Emily concealed her wry amusement at Professor Locke’s flustered face. It had been
her
suggestion to prepare properly after Caleb had pointed out some of the possible dangers they might face. Professor Locke had just wanted to walk into the tunnels;
Emily
had talked him into preparing for a long expedition. The knapsacks Cabiria and she carried contained everything from rope to chalk and several days’ worth of food, drink and magic-less candles to provide light. If something went wrong, deep below Whitehall, they should be able to last long enough for help to arrive.

“The lower levels will remain sealed, once you have passed the nexus chamber,” Gordian said, sternly. The Grandmaster was ignoring both of them in favor of talking to Professor Locke. “In the event of you failing to return, Sergeant Miles will lead a recovery team down to the gates.”

“That’s good to hear,” Professor Locke said. “But I’m sure it won’t be necessary.”

Emily was far from sure. There had been almost nothing in the source materials about the lower levels, true, but her imagination had provided all sorts of details. Lord Whitehall might have rigged dozens of traps, tying them into the nexus point to ensure they remained active... or the gates might lead them straight into tunnels that weren’t truly part of the castle. If the tunnels under Mountaintop had been filled with deadly creatures, who knew what might be lurking under Whitehall?

“Very good,” Gordian said. “May the gods go with you.”

Emily kept her thoughts to herself as they slowly descended the stairs to the very lowest level of Whitehall—the very lowest
accessible
level, she reminded herself. She could feel the nexus point thrumming in the distance, sending out waves of magic that pulsed through the school before fading back into the ether. It was rare for her to sense it on the higher levels, but here it was impossible to ignore. The nexus point called to her and, at the same time, repelled her. She glanced at Cabiria, wondering if the older girl had the same problem, but there was no trace of any internal struggle on her face. Maybe only people who had touched the nexus point could sense it.

“This is as far as I go,” Sergeant Miles said, when they reached the second-last level. His gaze passed over all three of them, lingering for a long moment on Emily. “Good luck.”

“Thank you,” Professor Locke said.

The thrumming of the nexus point grew stronger as they descended the final set of stairs into a network of stone corridors. Emily wanted to cover her ears, but she knew it would be pointless. The entire school seemed to vibrate with power. Gritting her teeth, she followed Professor Locke down the corridor towards a blank stone wall. There was nothing there, nothing at all. It was quite ordinary...

Emily stopped, dead, as she sensed the spell billowing around them. One hand went to the rune on her chest, but it remained dormant. The spell wasn’t subtle magic, she realized, as she closed her eyes against its effects. It worked along the same lines, but it was vastly more powerful—and dangerous. She was aware of its effects now—she could
feel
it plucking at her thoughts, trying to erase all knowledge of the gates—yet her awareness wasn’t enough to stop the spell from doing its work. It was trying hard to push her away.

She gritted her teeth, then opened her eyes and stared. The wall wavered, as if the illusion was on the verge of coming apart and melting back into nothingness. And yet the spell still fought, still tried to convince them that there was nothing there. Emily struggled, holding the line desperately as she took a step forward, then another; the spell only redoubling its efforts to hold her back. She’d wondered how the gates had been forgotten for so long, but now she knew. The spell guarding them was so powerful that there wasn’t a hope of seeing them unless one already knew they were there.

The Grandmaster should have known
, she thought, as the gates finally shimmered into visibility.
And yet he forbade all exploration
.

She’d expected something fancy, but the gates were nothing more than stone and iron, covered in runes. A number were completely unfamiliar to her, even though she’d been studying and memorizing runes for the past three years. Professor Locke let out a cry of excitement and stepped forward, pressing his hand against the gates. They opened smoothly, revealing utter darkness. The spell stopped trying to drive them away at the same moment, as if it had given up.