The Mage's Grave: Mages of Martir Book #1 (7 page)

“Jumpy one, aren't you?” said Durima to Junaz, even though she knew he couldn't understand a word she said. “Do you teach the students here how to run and hide from big scary monsters that could rip their heads off their shoulders?”

“Katabans, be quiet,” the Magical Superior said, a hint of a threat in his voice. “I will not have you scaring and threatening my teachers. I do not tolerate that kind of behavior from anyone in my school.”

Durima rolled her eyes, but said nothing else to Junaz. As much fun as it was to threaten and scare the dumb mortals, the Magical Superior's power level was so high that she knew better than to go against whatever he said. Any mortal who wielded that kind of power was the kind of mortal worth listening to, even for a katabans like her. She knew enough about power thanks to her relationship with Master to respect anyone who had more than her.

“Fine,” said Durima. “But that doesn't mean I have to respect him.”

“I'm not asking you to respect him or anybody else,” said the Magical Superior. “I am only asking you not to threaten him in my presence.”

“And why do you care?” said Durima. “The idiot can't even understand what I'm saying.”

“Because he is one of my teachers and I do not tolerate threats against my faculty,” said the Magical Superior, his voice hard. “Now, let's move on. What are your names?”

“Why do we have to tell you that?” said Durima. “Our Master told us not to tell anyone who we are or what we're doing here.”

“So you have a Master,” said the Magical Superior. “Who is this Master of yours? Why does he want you to keep your reason for being here a secret?”

“I will not tell,” said Durima, folding her arms across her chest. “I will never tell. I shouldn't have even told you that much.”

“No, keep talking,” said Yorak, gesturing at Durima to continue. “We're perfectly fine with you voluntarily telling us all about your Master and his plans. It suits our designs perfectly.”

“That is exactly why I am not going to talk about it anymore,” said Durima. “I fear Master more than you.”

“Your Master must be very powerful if you fear him more than us,” said Yorak. “The Superior and I are the two most powerful mages in the world. If we wanted, we could annihilate both of you without even thinking about it.”

“But you won't,” said Durima. “Otherwise, you would have done that already, rather than toss us into a couple of tiny cells deep beneath the earth.”

“Don't push your luck,” said Yorak. “I am
not
in a good mood right now and I am more than willing to do whatever I need to in order to find out who is threatening the lives of my students and the Superior's students.”

“Calm down, Yorak,” said the Magical Superior, putting a hand on her shoulder. “The katabans is correct that we are not going to kill her. While I am no fan of either of these two, killing them would undoubtedly bring the wrath of their Master upon us, their Master who in all probability is a god himself.”

Durima saw an opening and went for it. She wrapped her claws around the bars of her cell and said, “Yes, Master is a god. A powerful god, too, one who could easily crush you mortals underneath the heel of his boot. I will not reveal his identity to you, but I will tell you that if you respect the gods at all, you will let me and my friend go free so we may complete the mission that we came here to do.”

She said that because Durima understood that these mages, more than any other kinds of mortals, respected the gods. Magic flowed from the gods like water from an underground spring. The only reason these mages could use magic at all was because they had devoted themselves to this god or that god. Mages were not known as the People of the Gods for no reason. By playing on the mages' inherent respect—and by extension, fear—for the gods, Durima was practically guaranteed to win her and Gujak their freedom without much work.

It's such a brilliant plan,
Durima thought.
Why didn't I think of it earlier? Would have been far more effective than insulting and threatening a dumb mortal who can't even understand what I'm saying.

Her grin faded when the Magical Superior shook his head. “No.”

“No?” said Durima, her grip on the bars lightening. “But … you respect the gods. Aren't you afraid of displeasing my Master? He will not be at all happy to learn that you are getting in the way of his will.”

“I understand exactly what might happen if I continue to refuse to let you go,” said the Magical Superior. “But this is not the first time I have defied the gods. I feel like too much has happened with too few answers to trust that you two are not up to any wrongdoing.”

“By accusing me and my friend of being up to no good, you are accusing our Master of being up to no good as well,” said Durima. She brought her face closer to the bars, glaring at the Magical Superior. “Are you sure you want to imply that a god could possibly be at fault? That's dangerous territory, you know.”

The Magical Superior returned her gaze with a strong one of his own, despite his weak human body, and said, “My loyalty is first and foremost to the students of my school, who I have sworn to protect and defend at all costs. If your Master truly is a good god and has no ill intentions for us, then I will free you two personally. For now, you must stay there.”

“We still won't talk,” said Durima. “Neither of us will. You cannot make us.”

“I won't,” said the Magical Superior. “Neither will Yorak or Junaz. Instead, I will go and find out myself who your Master is and what he is planning to do here.”

“And how, may I ask, do you intend to do that?” said Durima. “Ask every single god in the Northern and Southern Pantheons until you find him? Seems awfully impractical to me, even for someone as magically-talented as you are.”

“Of course I am not going to use such an impractical, time-consuming method,” said the Magical Superior. “Instead, I am going to return to my study, where I will contact the only god who knows exactly what is going on at all times in every part of the world. Including who your Master is and what he is doing at this very moment.”

“Who is that?” said Durima.

“That is not information you need to know,” said the Magical Superior. “Though to be perfectly honest, I thought you would know, seeing as the god I am thinking of is by no means an obscure one.”

Durima took her claws off the bars of her cell and sat back. “So is that it? Just going to leave us here to rot until you find out who our Master is?”

“You are hardly going to rot,” said the Magical Superior. “You will simply remain down here until I get the information I need. Then I will decide whether to free you or not.”

Durima huffed. “Fine. But when Master comes here, looking for the mortal stupid enough to defy his will, I will make sure to point in the direction of your study.”

The Magical Superior opened his mouth, likely to say something stupid, but then the ceiling shook above their heads. The three mortals looked up as dust fell from the ceiling. Durima also looked up, as she had no idea what was causing the ceiling to shake.

“What's going on out there?” said Yorak. “Superior, is this normal or is it another explosion?”

“I don't know what it is, Yorak,” said the Magical Superior as the ceiling shook again. “We must return to the surface immediately. If it's another attack, then we have to make sure that our students are safe.”

The Magical Superior looked at Durima with hard eyes. “You and your friend stay put until we return.”

Durima held up her hands as another layer of dust fell and landed on her shoulders and head. “It's not like I can open the door and waltz on out, although rest assured that I would like to do so.”

The Magical Superior didn't seem happy about what she said, but he didn't push the subject. He went walking back in the direction they had came, with Junaz and Yorak following closely behind. Soon the entire catacombs was engulfed in the darkness from before, only this time, the ceiling shook and dust continued to fall with every tremor.

Oh, Master,
Durima thought, wincing at a particularly violent shake.
I just hope that whatever you've done, that it will not cause the ceiling to fall in on and kill us.

Chapter Five

A few minutes prior to the tremors …

D
arek and Aorja sat on either side of Jiku's bed, looking at their friend, who still lay unconscious in the medical wing of the Arcanium. He lay underneath heavy blankets, which were white as snow, with the sheets pulled up to his chin. His chest rose and fell under the blankets, a sign he was breathing, that he was still alive, that he would survive.

It had only been minutes ago that Eyurna, the head panamancer and doctor of the medical wing, declared that Yorak's magic had done the job and that Jiku was indeed going to be fine as long as he got enough rest. She had allowed Darek and Aorja to stay by his side because they were his friends and because she had some other work to attend to that was more urgent.

Neither Darek nor Aorja had spoken much since then. They had been too busy worrying about Jiku, although Darek had from time to time occasionally wondered who had started the explosion and whether the other mages had yet found any clues pointing to the identity of the bomber. For that matter, he wondered how the Magical Superior's interrogation of the two intruders was going.

So much has happened just within the last hour,
Darek thought.
I wonder what it all means.

Mom had stayed just long enough to make sure that Eyurna was going to confirm Jiku's health. Then she left, telling him and Aorja that she was going to go see the progress of the other mages. She said she would be back if she had any news, but since that had been about ten minutes ago already, Darek assumed that she was probably not going to return any time soon.

Darek looked around the medical wing again, just to get his mind off the stressful events of the day. It was a long room with about two dozen beds on each side, with tall, curtained windows between each bed. The ceiling and floor were white, while the curtains had flowery designs that were supposed to calm the patients. Eyurna's office was located at the end of the room, while thick chandeliers hanging from the ceiling illuminated the place during the night. Currently, the open windows offered an excellent amount of daytime illumination, the sunlight reflecting off the white sheets, but not in a way that hurt Darek's eyes.

Then he looked at Aorja. She had her guitar at her side, but it was still inside its case. She had said she was going to play it the minute Jiku woke up, but she looked so worried about his health that it seemed unlikely that she would remember to do that even if Jiku awoke soon.

That wasn't surprising. Aorja was always worrying about him and Jiku and their other friends. She wasn't training to be a panamancer—she always said that she couldn't handle working with sick people all the time—but she was so compassionate that she might as well have been one.

I'm glad we're friends,
Darek thought.
Me, Jiku, and Aorja. It certainly makes it easier to handle events like what happened today.

At that moment, his thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door to the medical wing opening and closing. He looked in the direction of the door and almost started when he saw who was walking up the path between the beds.

It was two of the Institute students. One was manta-like in appearance, with thick goggles strapped over his eyes and an armband wrapped around his right arm, which had a glowing green stone in it. He walked extremely awkwardly, lifting his feet too high and bringing them down too fast, which made him look like he was stomping. He seemed unused to walking on land, which made sense, seeing as the Undersea Institute was located underwater.

The other student had a goldfish-like head and a deep black stone embedded in the anklet on her left ankle. Unlike her fellow student, she walked across the stone floor with ease, though as she sometimes almost tripped, it was pretty clear that she was not exactly used to walking on land, either.

Of the two, the goldfish-headed one looked the most familiar to Darek. He remembered that she was called Auratus, the silent pupil of the Grand Magus Yorak. What these two were doing here, Darek didn't know, although neither of them appeared hostile.

Still, he stood up when they approached and said, “Hello. What are you two doing here?”

Auratus said nothing, but the manta-like mage said, in broken Divina, “Here to see student. Want to make sure he is okay.”

“Oh, he's going to be fine,” said Aorja, brushing her long blonde hair out of her eyes. “He just needs rest is all. It's thanks to your headmistress, actually, that he's going to be okay.”

“That's good,” said the Institute mage. “Grand Magus very smart and talented. Of course.”

He said that with obvious pride, his chest puffed out. Auratus, standing next to him, looked proud of her headmistress as well, although it was hard to tell because she was so quiet and her goldfish-like face made it difficult to read her facial expressions.

“Say, what are your names, anyway?” said Darek. He held out a hand. “I'm Darek Takren and this is Aorja Kitano. You are—?”

The two Institute students stared at Darek's outstretched hand like they had never seen such a thing before. It confused Darek for a moment before he realized that aquarians might not greet each other with handshakes, but he had no idea how they greeted each other and he felt too embarrassed to ask them.

So, lowering his hand, Darek said, “Just a human way of greeting someone new. Anyway, you can just tell us your names.”

“Okay,” said the male student. “I Kuroshio. Botamancer. And this Auratus, personal pupil of Archmage.”

“I already knew her name,” said Darek. “She was there when I rescued Jiku here. Why doesn't she introduce herself, though?”

Auratus looked down at her feet, almost like she was embarrassed, while Kuroshio said, “She … what's the word. She is mute. Can't speak.”

“Oh,” said Darek. “I'm sorry to hear that. Has she always been that way or—?”

“Been that way for long time,” said Kuroshio. “But not forever. Not subject she like to talk about.”