Traitor Savant (Second Seal of the Duelists) (21 page)

Wekshi and Paat exchanged an eager look. Bayan suffered a moment of uncomfortable realization. He and his hexmates weren’t the only ones hoping they did well on their Avatar exams. Even the teachers had pinned their hopes on his hex.
We really do need to get cracking on our Savantism.

He
paired with Kiwani, while Taban and Eward teamed up. Calder and Tarin, as always, stood together, ready to begin.

Instructor Paat rubbed his hands together as he stood on the frosty sand.
“Hexmagic is combinatory magic at its finest. It’s the highest level of magic prowess that any duelism student can reasonably hope to achieve, barring miracles such as Master witten Oost. The basic premise behind hexmagic is that the six elements can be combined in various ways, to produce vastly superior magic. One form of combination is simply the exhibition of more than one element or avatar at the same time. You know this as hexing.” With a few gestures, Instructor Paat brought forth his Wind avatar, a misty fountain of rising air, and his Earth avatar, a snakelike ripple of pebbles that blended incredibly well into the arena floor.

Bayan admired the instructor’s clever Earth avatar. Seeing the man control both avatars, Idling them around him in lazy circles, reminded Bayan of Breckan, who had seemed so strong only to shatter under the strain. A pang of sorrow shot through him.
Why must it always be all or nothing with us? We’re pushed until we fail, and sometimes our failures ruin us. The empire could have so many more duelists if it didn’t shred our sanity during training.

Instructor Paat held his avatars in existence as he continued. “
Truly powerful duelists can manifest all six avatars at once. But this feat only allows the duelist to perform hexmagic with himself. It’s impressive, don’t misunderstand, but hexmagic’s true scope is far greater than one duelist’s skill. The true power of hexmagic emerges when duelists merge their magics. Six duelists, six elements. This perfect blending of six individually powerful minds is the ultimate goal of duelism. A hex of Hexmagic Duelists can create anything they can imagine. With such perfect power, hexmagic can literally change the world.

“The only difference between
the extreme power of a Hexmagic hex and the inherent power of a Master Duelist is that the Master Duelist is six duelists in one. Otherwise, their power is essentially equal. What Master witten Oost can do single-handedly, an ideal hexmagic hex can perform together. Do you see now why we are so excited to have your entire hex so close to passing your Avatar tests? Your strength is impressive, and we want to encourage and help you to get as close to that perfect hex as we can.”

As Instructor Paat
let his avatars disperse and detailed the blending motions that would allow two duelists to merge their magic—a complex new invocation move, directed toward one’s partner—Bayan’s mind remained stuck on the instructor’s words. Was the rank of Hexmagic Duelist where Sint Koos had been directing Bayan all along? Was hexmagic a given, or at least far more likely an achievement, when one was a Savant?

How far
will the sint’s Savantism take me? How far will it take us?

Bayan was so deep in thought that he nearly missed Instructor Paat's next words. “—a
sked one of the few hexmagic students on campus to help me out with a demonstration of what’s possible with hexmagic.” Paat waved over a slender Shawnash student from the edge of the arena. “This is Tamawka. He’s been training in hexmagic for nearly a year. I think you’ll find his talents impressive.”

Bayan exchanged an eager look with Kiwani as Paat and Tamawka backed away, creating
plenty of space around them. Wekshi moved to stand with the hex. The pair of duelists invoked the elements together, then Paat invoked Wood and Tamawka chose Water. Their respective avatars appeared next: a weeping willow and a watery woman with exaggerated curves. The two duelists performed the blending invocation at each other, a waving of arms, a gesture of joining. Bayan took a surprised breath. Their motion looked somehow familiar this time, and not just because he’d seen it a few minutes ago.

The two avatars moved
into the same space. In their place, a squat, greenish tree formed. It grew upward from the arena’s pebbly floor, its fat limbs curling, reaching, seeking to squeeze. The limbs exuded glittering, icy thorns that spiraled out from trunk to tip, giving the tree the appearance of a sinister, upside-down octopus.

Bayan’s jaw hung open in admiring awe.

“Aye, that’s the way!” Calder cried in excitement. Murmurs of agreeable excitement rose from the others, including Instructor Wekshi.

The vicious tree spell faded
away, but the show wasn’t over. A wooden floor formed in the middle of the pebbles, five strides square. A wooden man rose from it and stood still on its surface. The floor lay dormant and innocuous for the length of a few bated breaths, then its surface bogged into marsh beneath the wooden man. He fell in, scrabbling for purchase on the mucky wood. The floor closed over his head, resuming its former solidity.

Bayan gaped in uneasy amazement. Taban, nearby, shifted his feet closer together, eyeing the
pebbles underfoot. Bayan didn’t blame him. He’d already had an encounter where the ground tried to kill him.

The
avatar floor faded from view, and was replaced by a floating wooden sphere. Its surface grew rings of sharp spines. The two hexmagic duelists exchanged a coordinating nod. Not sure what to expect next, Bayan took a step back from the floating sphere.

A
high-pitched hissing, like steam escaping a kettle, reached his ears a split-second before the wooden ball exploded. Its dagger-like spines flew in all directions. With time only for a panicked Wood block, Bayan swept a scraggly bamboo shoot across their path, but the spines vanished an arm’s length from him. Sheepish, Bayan looked around and saw that his friends had all tried some defense maneuver or another too. Eward, still wearing a look of panic, toppled dramatically into the pebbles like a wooden sculpture of himself, before relaxing into a self-deprecating laugh. “That was frighteningly impressive,” he said as Kiwani offered him a hand up.

As the two performing duelists closed out their magic with revocation motions,
Tarin clapped. Bayan and the others joined in. He took a deep breath to calm his panicked heart. He had assumed he knew what magic was capable of. Hexmagic was a whole new level of power, and his teachers thought it would soon be his. He couldn’t help grinning.

Instructor Paat noticed. “I see at least one of you is eager to begin. We’ll start with blending invocations, then, and work our way up to paired spells. Welcome to the world of hexmagic,
duelists.”

“Your supp
er, compliments of the kitchens. Just don’t tell them that.” Tala offered a plate laden with fried turkey wings and spiced squash. Doc reached through the portal and accepted it with alacrity. Tala picked up her new crystal supports—glorified candlestick holders, Alton Bessia called them—and, carrying them carefully so she didn’t ruin the resonance in the horizontal black crystals that rested among the brass prongs, stepped through her own portal. “Portable magic! Aren’t we singers clever?” Doc Theo nodded and smiled, though his mouth was already full of turkey. She closed the portal and sang up a roomful of light. It made Doc Theo wince. “Sorry. I always forget.” She hummed the light down to a dim glow. She watched him dig into his food like a starving man. “She is feeding you, isn’t she?” Tala demanded.

“A dry crust, once a day.”
Doc Theo pointed to a tiny plate with a shriveled slice of bread.

Tala smiled. “You’re so certain I won’t
forget you, you won’t even eat it? Won’t she suspect?”

“I also trust
you to whisk away the evidence.” Doc Theo handed her the First Singer’s meager sustenance, then indicated her brass stands. “Got yerself a new pair of crystal supports, I see.”

Tala grinned
and looked over at Doc’s gifted crystals in the delicate grip of the brass. She’d liberated the crystal holders from a storeroom after watching a duet class learn to use a crystal as a substitute for a second voice in duet magic. The little stands had four tiny feet each and could support and balance variously sized crystals on the floor, tables, or anywhere. The brass was so thin that she barely noticed the added weight if she held them while she sang. “They make my illicit songwork so much easier. Strange how my solo classes are starting to feel like a lawful exception in my daily activities.”

“You still getting on in them?”

Tala shrugged. No need to burden him with the knowledge that she’d become a virtual pariah again since her chanter mentor had vanished. “Has she come down to see you? Is there any hope she’ll let you out soon?”

Doc Theo
’s thin shoulders slumped. “No. She means for me to stay here, out of her way, until her plans, whatever they are, have come to fruition.”

“Then tell me why I shouldn’t break you out
.” She leaned forward. “I don’t understand why you have to stay here.”

“She needs to think that I’m trapped. That she’s won. Then she won’t be expecting what happens next.”

Tala paused. Did Doc Theo have yet another secret plan he wasn’t going to share? “And what does happen next?”

Doc Theo
sighed through his nose. “I don’t know yet. I cain’t let you return to her office. If she catches you, it’ll ruin the illusion I gave her—that her own coterie is turning against her. Not to mention the trouble you’d be in, your ownself.”

“I can handle trouble
.”

“I’ve no doubt that you can,
anakna
,” Doc Theo said. “But I cain’t let you ruin your future by helping out a doomed old chanter.”

“It’s
my
future. I can do what I—what did you call me?”

Doc Theo
stopped chewing. The startled look in his eyes told her he hadn’t realized what he’d said.

“
Anakna
?” Tala repeated. “I didn’t know you spoke Bantayan.”

“You didn’t? I’m sure I must’ve mentioned it.”

“I’d have remembered. Why didn’t you tell me?”

Doc Theo
’s busy chewing seemed to be all the answer she was going to get. His hedging on such a small issue made no sense… unless it wasn’t trivial to him. Dark suspicions suddenly took wing in her mind. “Doc Theo, what’s going on? Why are you really here? Are you spying for the emperor on the First Singer? Is this all some kind of elaborate scheme? Are you really sick, or are you pretending? Why did you drag me into all of this? You need to tell me what’s going on—
all
of it this time—or I’ll… I’ll stop bringing you food.”

The stricken look on
Doc Theo’s stubbly face brought all her worst fears to the surface.
He’s some kind of spy, and I’m just his pawn in some grand scheme—

“I should have told you earlier
.” Doc Theo wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I should have told you the moment I knew. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I just… I wasn’t prepared. I… you see, I had no idea my ownself… ”

His words
didn’t sound like the confession of a conspirator. “What is it? For Bhattara’s sake, just tell me!”

Doc Theo
flinched in the face of her frustrated anger. “I spent almost a year in Balanganam, fifteen years ago. I hadn’t planned on falling in love. She could sing more beautifully than a full choir of sints, and she didn’t care that I couldn’t. We were ecstatically happy together. When I received my transfer notice, I nearly ran away with her, but she wouldn’t let me abandon my service to the empire. She told me she loved me too much to see me rip my soul out for the sake of my heart. I didn’t know—I swear to you, she never told me she was pregnant.”

Tala couldn’t have moved if her life depended on it. “Tell me her name.”

“Liwaywa Salunga.”

“
Mother
?” Tala’s remaining breath abandoned her in a confused rush. “No… she told me he could sing! That my father could sing! They’d sing duets… he taught her exotic songs… ” Hot tears of memory and sadness filled her eyes.

Doc Theo
reached toward her, but pulled back before touching her hand. “I did teach her songs. I just couldn’t sing ‘em worth spit. But she had an ear for tunes; she allus got them right. She allus believed, deep down, that someday I’d sing like I was meant to: like a singer. I loved that about her.”

Tala blinked away her tears.
“You’ve just been using me. That’s not something a father does! You lied to me, and you used me to get things you wanted—”
Hiccup
. Tala’s eyes widened in shock. She clapped a hand to her throat.

Hiccup
.

S
he stumbled to her feet, fumbling for her crystal holders.

Doc Theo
reached for her again. “Tala, please forgive me. I hain’t handled this well at all. I never meant to hurt you—”

“Yes—”
hiccup
“—you did!” She tried to sing the portal song and escape his presence, but those infernal hiccups kept interfering with her rhythm.

Doc Theo
remained blessedly silent as she tried again and again to open a portal out of the oubliette. On her fifth try, her anger finally overcame her hiccups enough to let her shrill out the notes. The portal flung itself wide before her. Turning back to Doc Theo, she kicked the dry heel of bread toward him. “You’ll need that.”

Another step, and she was safe in her own room. She slammed the portal shut by clenching her crystals against her chest, then hurled them
—Doc’s first, best gift to her—onto the soft quilt atop her bed. Her hands wormed into her hair and her fingers knotted as she slid to her knees. Tears blurred her vision, and she squeezed the world into darkness.

“
Ay, Bhattara! Why did it have to be
him
? I don’t
want
him to be my father!”