Schooled in Magic (20 page)

“MOVE,” a voice snapped in her ear. Sergeant Miles was directly behind her, carrying a baton which he used to aim a swat at her rear. Emily somehow managed to avoid the blow and kept running as he lifted his voice. “THE ENEMY IS BEHIND YOU! RUN!”

The burned oak seemed to stink of dark magic as she ran around it and back towards their starting point. Some of the boys were slowing down, although they were all still moving as fast as they could, well ahead of her. Aloha, Emily noted, was doing very well indeed. The girl would have had plenty of time to practice.

Sergeant Harkin was counting out loud as the runners raced past him and screeched to a halt, several skidding and falling backwards onto the grass. Emily barely managed to outrun one of the younger boys in the class to come in second to last.

“Pathetic,” Harkin said. He seemed to be condemning all of them, not just the ones who had come in last. “Absolutely pathetic. And to think that you are all the great hope of the future.”

His voice sharpened as he pointed into the distance. “Do you know
what
lurks over those peaks?”

Emily followed his finger southwards. Perhaps she was imagining it, but there seemed to be a sensation of doom from where the necromancers were lurking, awaiting their chance to fall upon the Allied Lands like wolves on unsuspecting sheep. It was a reminder that their society was at war, even if the Allied Lands seemed to prefer squabbling amongst themselves for the time being. The book Emily had read, produced by the History Monks, had made it clear that the only thing that had prevented the necromancers from winning already was their own disunity, and their tendency to fight each other from time to time. United, the necromancers would have crushed the Allied Lands a long time ago.

“We are at war,” Harkin snapped. “There are monsters out there that could tear you apart with their bare hands. You have to work hard to develop yourselves so you can stand between the Allied Lands and the devastation the necromancers would bring to your friends, your family and everyone else! Follow me!”

He spun around and marched off in the direction of a dark forest, part of Whitehall’s grounds. “This forest is off-limits to everyone, unless you happen to be taking Martial Magic,” he thundered, still moving. “Do not bring your friends here for fun.”

Up close, the forest looked ominously dark and shadowy. Emily could sense ...
something
within the tangled trees, a hint of magic that might manifest into something dangerous for any unwary travelers. After what Professor Thande had told them, it was easy to believe that some of the countryside had been forced to evolve by
mana
, becoming hideously dangerous. Who knew
what
lurked inside the forest?

“You two, work together,” Harkin snapped, pointing at two of the boys. “You two ...”

He kept assigning partners, assigning Emily to a boy who looked five years older than her.

“I’m Jade,” the boy said, sticking out a hand.

Emily shook it gravely. At least he wasn’t spending time checking out her chest, unlike too many boys on Earth–and her stepfather, when he was drunk.

Jade smiled at her. “I hear that you are a Child of Destiny?”

Emily flushed. “Don’t believe everything you hear. I am ...”

“Am I interrupting something?” Harkin demanded, appearing right in front of them.

Jade and Emily exchanged glances before Jade spoke up. “No, sir?”

“Good,” Harkin snapped. He glared at all twelve pairs. “All you have to do is get from one end of the forest to the other. We will be waiting on the other side to see who comes out first, and who gets so badly stuck that we have to rescue them. Any questions?”

There was a long moment of silence. “First team, then,” Harkin said. He jabbed a finger at Jade and Emily. “In you go, carefully.”

The interior of the forest was dark, so dark that the temperature dropped sharply the moment they were under the leafy canopy. It looked surprisingly normal, yet Emily couldn’t escape the sensation that there were watching eyes all around, following their every move.

When she glanced backwards, the forest seemed to go on forever, with no sign of Whitehall or of their fellow students. She couldn’t even hear Harkin’s bellow as he prepared to send in the next team.

“This way,” Jade said, taking the lead and casting a basic spell into the air. “Watch out for traps.”

Emily flushed. She should have thought of that. The Sergeants might have created a magical minefield just to test their prospective students, rather than simply using a
mana
-tainted forest that might behave in an unpredictable manner. They might want to push the students to the limit, as well as weeding out those who couldn’t hack it, but she doubted that they wanted to
kill
them.

Their surroundings became eerier as they walked further into the darkness. Strange lights flickered in the distance, tiny flashes of lightning that danced at the corner of her eye.

They crossed a stream that made no sound, as if someone had cast a silencing charm over the entire running water–but they could still hear themselves talk. Emily stopped dead when Jade halted, holding out one hand. A moment later, she sensed a spell waiting for them just ahead.

“Stay very still,” Jade whispered. The spell seemed to be moving slightly, as if it were a snake preparing to strike. “We’re going to have to dispel it.”

Emily blinked at him, keeping her own voice low. “Why can’t we just creep backwards?”

“Because any motion will attract it,” Jade said. “We stumbled right into it and now we have to either dispel it or let it strike us.” He scowled. “Judging from all the warnings, it will probably give us a nasty shock even if it doesn’t do anything else. Stay still.”

He held up one hand and started casting charms towards the spell. Emily was impressed. One of them was the standard dispelling charm, but the other three were unfamiliar. The spell ahead of them seemed to pause, and then vanished into nothingness.

Jade grinned at her in triumph and walked forward. A moment later, there was a flash of light. His entire body locked solid.

Emily stared in disbelief, slowly realizing what had happened. The Sergeants had hidden a
second
spell behind the first, knowing that anyone who dispelled the first spell would rush onwards without taking the time to check for a second surprise. Carefully, she cast the analysis spell into the air, praying that it would work perfectly this time. Somewhat to her surprise, it did, revealing that the paralysis spell was simple enough that it could be easily dispelled.

She started to cast the dispelling charm, before hesitating and running a detection charm over the entire area. Two more nasty surprises revealed themselves before she accidentally triggered them. And, she realized, they were designed to ensure that anyone who tried to deactivate them in the wrong sequence would trigger the spells instead.

Devious
, she thought. How much time did they
have
in the forest? Carefully, she picked the spell she thought was the right one and dispelled it. Nothing happened to her, but the next spell was coming to life. Working quickly, she dispelled it too, then removed the paralysis spell gripping Jade.

He stumbled and almost fell to the ground.

“I ... my thanks,” he said, flushing awkwardly. “I should have thought to check for other surprises before I dispelled the first spell.”

“You would have done it for me,” Emily assured him, although she wasn’t sure if that were true. Jade might have been one of the students who resented her appearance in Martial Magic, even though he’d never threatened her before class. “Now ... how do we get out of here?”

“This way,” Jade said. “Or do you want to go first this time?”

The question proved moot. Three steps later, they found themselves in bright sunlight, right at the edge of the forest. Emily glanced behind them in confusion and saw an impenetrable mass of trees and darkness. The noises of the natural world suddenly blared in her ears and she staggered, hearing birds calling to their mates and horses neighing in the distance. High overhead, she thought she saw–just for a single moment–a dragon.

“We’re third,” Jade said, in annoyance. “How did they get ahead of us?”

He’d spoken quietly, but Miles had very sharp ears. “They didn’t waste so much time dispelling spells after stumbling into obvious traps,” he said dryly. “Next time, what are you going to do?”

“Check first,” Jade said, finally. He looked embarrassed. “I didn’t think to check.”

Emily looked over at Aloha, who had managed to emerge from the forest with her partner. Her roommate looked surprised, and then nodded slowly. Emily hoped that meant she’d decided there might be a place for Emily in Martial Magic after all, even though
she
still felt decidedly out of place–and unhealthy.

Sergeant Harkin cleared his throat. “Three teams ended up
stuck
in the forest,” he pronounced, rather like a judge passing sentence. “Why, one person didn’t even help his partner–and ran straight into another trap!”

His voice darkened. “Remember this experience. Take nothing for granted. Watch your back. And help your partner. The next proper exercise will be a great deal worse.”

The Sergeant chuckled. “Everyone who made it through the forest can go wash and then have dinner,” he said, with a grim smile. “Everyone else can wait until we free them.”

Emily nodded, feeling her body aching after one day of Martial Magic. What would the next day be like?

“O
NE WHOLE WEEK OF SCHOOLING,” MISTRESS
Irene said. “You seem to be coping reasonably well.”

Emily scowled. Her body ached. Running so fast during Martial Magic class had left her breathless for the rest of the first day. Then, when she’d woken up the following morning, her legs had been aching and her chest hurt. Aloha had been just as exhausted, but her roommate had had several months to prepare herself for Martial Magic, including doing more exercise on a regular basis than Emily had ever done in her life. In hindsight, deciding to avoid sports because most school sports were pointless might not have been the brightest decision of Emily’s life.

“Thank you,” she said instead. The book on Martial Magic said that there would be pain, pain and more pain, and after that some painful pain. Each class would be harder than the last, pushing the students right to their limits. “I’m trying to learn as quickly as I can.”

“Your Basic Charms are coming along nicely,” Mistress Irene said. “You seem to have already made the conceptual breakthrough that so many others fail to grasp. Professor Thande says that you need to be more precise with your Alchemical work, but you only just started. You should master it before you start wasting expensive ingredients.”

Emily nodded and asked the question that had been bothering her for three days. “Who was it who submitted my name for Martial Magic?”

Mistress Irene gave her a sharp look. “Given your ...
circumstances
you should not refuse to learn how to fight properly. There are rumors about you all over the Allied Lands.”

“No,” Emily said.

“Yes,” Mistress Irene confirmed. “The girl who came to school on a dragon, who may be a Child of Destiny...”

“I’m
not
a Child of Destiny,” Emily snapped. “Should I have claimed that I only came on a dragon because it was the quickest way to school?”

“Dragons don’t give lifts to every human who summons one of them and asks nicely,” Mistress Irene said. She shrugged. “But it works out in your favor. A Child of Destiny is supposed to be a little strange–and more advanced than her years. Your presence in Martial Magic will surprise no one.”

Emily shook her head slowly. She’d never wanted to advance through favoritism, even back home when the worst that could happen was failing an exam. Here ... well, there had to be a reason why someone as irritating as Alassa was not permitted to advance in Charms until she had mastered the basics. And what sort of idiot thought that Alassa could fake competence indefinitely anyway?

But Whitehall was hardly a regular school. In this particular place, it was easy to forget that the Allied Lands were under threat, from enemies both within and without, and that they needed every magician they could muster to hold back the necromantic tide. That was why Whitehall taught all new students the basics. Apparently, the second-year classes were optimized for individual success.

Perhaps if more students had started formal study
after
they’d learned to read and write back home, all kids would get a better education.

“I see,” Emily said, after a long pause. It was bad enough that everyone glanced at her when they thought she wasn’t looking, but if it was part of her cover story ... There were gaps in her knowledge that had to be explained somehow, or else the students would realize that she came from an entirely different world. As it was, she hadn’t even realized that she had to turn down her sheet to protect her blanket, as it wasn’t something that she’d learned back home. “Would it really matter if they knew that I was from a different world?”