Nothing.
Her power was gone, again. But this time it had happened abruptly and without warning. No slow draining of strength, just there one second and then gone.
Because it wasn’t her magic at all. She had borrowed it—no, stolen it. And so of course, it had betrayed her.
A swoop of green to her right, of white to her left, and her fellow students were all around her. Cyn took her wrist and, with a push of magic, righted her.
There was no mockery on Cyn’s face. Only sympathy. Which was worse.
“Are you insane?” There was nothing sympathetic in Lis’s voice. Her hair blew wildly across her face and around her shoulders. “You didn’t say you were powerless. You can’t fly without a lodestone! If Evin hadn’t moved so fast, you would be dead right now.”
“All right, Lis,” Cyn snapped. “I think she noticed that.”
Lis surged forward so that her face was only inches from Ileni’s. “There are only two collections of lodestones students can access. In the testing arena and on the training plateau. If you’re very skilled, you might be able to access the testing stones from your bedroom, and you might be able to store enough to keep you going for a while. But you can’t depend on it. Don’t you know anything?”
“Right now,” Evin observed, “she knows exactly what your breath smells like. Back off, Lis.”
Lis snarled at him, but when Evin swooped closer, she floated backward.
Ileni swallowed hard, closed her eyes, and concentrated on not crying. The bickering washed around her, meaningless noise.
Even worse than her almost-plunge—at least, now that it was over—was the emptiness within her, the gaping ache the magic had left. In the caves she had become accustomed to that emptiness, slowly—still always aware of what she was missing, but able to bear it. Now the wound had been gashed open again. Once, she had wanted to die rather than live without magic.
If not for the empty chasm beneath her, the still-fading terror, she might have thought she still wanted to die.
A hand closed around her wrist. She opened her eyes. Evin hovered in front of her, his broad forehead creased. Behind him, the gray mountainside stretched upward, patches of weeds growing from cracks in the rock.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
It was such a stupid question she didn’t bother to answer. After a moment, Evin let go and flew upward, his magic pulling her along like useless cargo.
Karyn was waiting for them on the plateau at the other end of the bridge, wearing a flowing white gown, her mouth pressed into a grim line. Her voice snapped across the windy surface of the plateau. “Where have you been?”
The plateau was large and irregularly shaped, about fifteen paces across, with spiky mountains forming a jagged gray line against the sky behind it. Its surface was unnaturally smooth and gleamed in the sunlight. As soon as Ileni’s feet touched the ground, she reached for the power, and it rushed back into her. Lodestones were embedded in the plateau’s stone floor, in regular intervals around its edges. This time she recognized them instantly.
“Sorry,” Lis said. “Lost track of time.”
“By which she means,” Evin said, “that she and Cyn had a little impromptu flying contest.”
Karyn didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to.
“I tried to stop them,” Evin added virtuously.
Cyn rolled her eyes. “Not very hard.”
Karyn tapped her foot on the ground, an angry staccato. “This isn’t a game. Cyn, I expect better from you.”
Cyn flushed—though Lis, Ileni noticed, flushed darker.
“All right.” Karyn’s voice was cold and clipped. “Let’s get back to the exercises we were practicing last class. Ileni, you can observe, until you become familiar with—”
“No,” Ileni said. “I’m ready to start.”
Her fellow students all gave her startled looks. Karyn shrugged. “As you wish. Did you learn the invisible knife technique, back where you’re from?”
“No,” Ileni said. The power was rushing through her and the ground was solid beneath her, and she wanted to wipe that supercilious expression from Karyn’s face almost as much as she wanted to wipe the sense of hopelessness from her own chest. “But don’t hold back for my sake. I’m sure I’ll catch on.”
“Are you? Very well. Then we’ll move on to sparring.”
More startled glances, this time directed at Karyn. Ignoring them, the dark-haired sorceress gestured at the twins. “Cyn and Lis, why don’t you begin?”
“Oh, good,” Evin murmured. “That’s always entertaining.”
Cyn swaggered to the center of the plateau. Lis stalked to a spot five yards from her sister, her hair hanging heavily down her back. The two faced each other.
“Forearms,” Karyn said, and each girl held up one arm. Their flowing white sleeves fell around their elbows, leaving their forearms bare but for a thick metallic bracelet around Lis’s wrist.