Dee raised his hand for the tenth time, wiggling his fingers in the air for extra attention. Magnus sat up and answered, finally interested.
“Admiral Ethermane believes we must freeze the creature in its web. Ice magic on such a massive scale is difficult, but they’re attempting it. The goal’s to keep Nemneris from taking the war to the rest of Europe. Not that the rest of Europe cares what happens to England, of course.” He swatted his papers against the back of Cellini’s head.
“How can you say that, you bastard?” Cellini laughed. “I’ll return to Rome to complete my education and let you all rot.”
Agrippa cleared his throat. “Very good, Julian. Now, who can—steady on, Arthur, don’t wave your arm like that—who can tell me what…”
His voice trailed away. We gazed in horror at a new section of the Cornwall coast. Several ships lay wrecked and impaled along the rocky shore. Their masts had been snapped in half, their hulls ripped apart. Webs covered them like a ghostly shroud. Nemneris’s lice, her Familiars, scuttled along the smashed hulls. We got to our feet and crowded toward the water glass. “Look,” Magnus said, pointing to a ship with a blue flag still raised in the air. I recognized that ship. It was the one we’d watched sail out of the docks while the crowd cheered. But it couldn’t be the same vessel. Those sails had been white, and these sails were a pure…
“Why are the sails red?” I asked. Agrippa put his stave to the water glass and stirred in a queer little figure eight. The ship grew larger and more detailed.
Hanging from the masts like ghastly ornaments were the bodies of the men. They were masses of dark, mottled crimson. I wanted to turn away, but if I were to be a sorcerer and not a magician—not a magician—I would have to take in grisly scenes just like this one. The bodies had been stripped of all skin, the sails stained with their blood. We realized what we were looking at before Agrippa spoke the words:
“That’s R’hlem’s handiwork.”
“You’re not focusing,” Agrippa said as I listed off to the side of the obsidian room. He clapped his hands. “You have to pay attention.”
“Yes,” I said, staring at the wall. In the shining reflection, I could just make out the dark circles under my eyes. I didn’t sleep anymore. All I could hear in my dreams were the frantic cries of Charley and the other unfortunates dragged into Korozoth, of those sailors as R’hlem flayed them alive. I was supposed to help them.
I had been chosen to help them. Hadn’t I?
You are a magician. It had been one week since I’d gone to see Hargrove, and his voice wouldn’t leave me. We’d reached the end of April and made no progress. Agrippa was now officially worried.
“Now then. We start at the beginning of the earth maneuver. Prepare,” Agrippa said, pointing at the large rock in the center of the room. He was right to sound irritated. We were massively behind on the day’s lesson. I was supposed to be breaking the rock and putting it back together, and I hadn’t even begun.
I turned, bent my knees, and burst into flame by accident.
“Watch out!” Agrippa cried as I nearly scorched his jacket. He beat at his sleeve. I stopped burning and cringed with embarrassment. “What is the matter with you today?”
“I don’t feel well,” I murmured.
“That’s no excuse.” His voice was firm. “You have to fight through pain. There will be times in battle where you will feel decidedly unwell.”
I centered myself and prepared again for the maneuver. I lunged forward, spinning the stave above my head. The rock should have split apart into ten different pieces. Instead, it rolled once, twice, and then stopped. Nothing I did worked properly.
Nothing would ever work properly, not if I wasn’t the girl in the prophecy.
“Something’s wrong,” Agrippa said. He came up behind me. “You’ve been scattered this entire week.”
“I just don’t sleep well.” I bit the inside of my cheek.
Agrippa’s voice grew soft. “You can say it if something’s troubling you.”
I turned to him, to tell him about my visit to Hargrove…and kept silent.
I couldn’t lose my position. Not for anything.
Not even for the sake of the truth.
—
AFTER LESSONS THAT DAY, I WENT to the drawing room and curled up in the window seat, the book on the Seven Ancients open in my lap. I studied the picture of R’hlem, his muscles and veins disturbingly exposed to the world. He’d one hideous yellow eye positioned at the center of his forehead. Even in the drawing, I felt that gaze cut to the heart of me. Shuddering, I turned the page to the chapter regarding Korozoth.
Light and flame are the only known deterrent, I read, for what is a greater ally against the unstoppable force of shadow and darkness? There is, however, still no example of light or fire strong enough to eradicate the beast. That massive black cloud glared up at me.
I shut that book and picked up another, very slowly. It was titled Heresy: The Great Magic Schism of 1526. Inside, I read of battles between sorcerers and magicians. There were pictures of the two armies: the sorcerer side was armed with staves and accompanied by a choir of heavenly angels; the magicians rode into battle on herds of swine, the devil himself at their backs. I didn’t think it was historically accurate, but the picture was memorable. I read descriptions of how one murdered a magician so that his soul might grow closer to God in its final moments. The procedure involved cutting off the magician’s arms, legs, and tongue while he was still alive. I read until I could read no more, until my heart was thundering in my chest.
Closing my eyes, I shut the book and leaned against the sun-warmed window. I didn’t hear him enter, and I jumped when Magnus knelt before me.
“Did I startle you?” he said, smirking in that devilish way of his.
I fluffed my skirt out over the copy of Heresy, hoping he hadn’t noticed. “What do you want?”
“To give you this.” He offered another book. Henry V, Shakespeare. “I thought, since you’re so fond of history and I’m so fond of theater, we might bring them together.” He took a seat beside me, the sunlight catching in his hair. “I always wanted to play Henry.”
“You wanted to wear armor and make grand speeches with thousands of men hanging on your every word.”
He gave a dramatic sigh. “My one childhood dream.” He took the book and opened to a page near the end. “?‘Fair Katharine, and most fair,’?” he said, his voice deep and soft and almost pleading, “?‘will you vouchsafe to teach a soldier terms such as will enter at a lady’s ear and plead his love-suit to her gentle heart?’?” He closed the book and looked at me with an appraising eye. “On second thought, you wouldn’t make much of a Katharine.”
“No? Too sullen? Too dark?”
“Too bold. You’re more of a Henry. You’ve the name, sort of. What if I called you Henry from now on?”
“What if it rained in your bedchamber throughout the night?”
“You’re finally learning how to be a true sorcerer!” He gave me Henry V again. “You should read it and tell me what you think.”
“?‘Your Majesty shall mock at me,’?” I said in a bad French accent. “?‘I cannot speak your England.’?” Stunned, Magnus grabbed the play and found that I had spoken the next line perfectly. I rather liked seeing him surprised.
“You’ve read it before?”
“Mr. Colegrind had a copy of Shakespeare’s histories.”
“Well, they’re nothing to his tragedies. We’ll have to start you on a strict diet.”
“Don’t I have enough work already?”
“It won’t be work. It’ll be fun.” We opened the play back to the scene, and continued. “?‘O fair Katharine, if you will love me soundly with your French heart, I will be glad to hear you confess it brokenly with your English tongue. Do you like me, Kate?’?”