“Yes.” My skin tingled at the mention of it.
“Magicians have many unique and strange talents, my girl, and several of them can be passed down in families. Some magicians take the form of animals, some allow the souls of the dead to enter their bodies and speak through them.” His face brightened. “Care to see mine? Haven’t got a hankie on you, eh?”
I handed him my linen handkerchief, disgusted as he took it with bloody fingers. Hargrove examined it, murmuring and pursing his lips. Exasperated, I began to feel he was toying with me. Shaking my head, I reached out to reclaim it. “Now, what on earth did you do?” I said, looking up.
He’d vanished. I checked the corner of the room, underneath the table, even outside. The children giggled as they watched my confusion. Finally, one of them piped up and said, “He’s in your hankie.”
“What?” It was impossible. I unfolded the smallest crease and found a great black eye winking up at me. With a scream, I dropped the handkerchief, and Hargrove spilled out of it and onto the floor. “How?” I gasped.
“Magicians violate all natural order. Of course you’re one of us. Your father could burst into flame and never harm himself. It’s no wonder you’ve got the ability, too.” So that was the secret. I was a magician’s daughter with an abnormal talent. I sank into my chair.
“Aren’t magicians descended from sorcerers?” The prophecy had called for a girl-child of sorcerer stock. He recognized my real question.
“Sorcerers like to pretend they’ve no connection with us. The Speakers might be a druggy bunch of fools, but they’d never be so vague about an important detail. If the prophecy calls for someone of ‘sorcerer stock,’ they mean a sorcerer parent.” There was my last hope, gone. I closed my eyes. “That prophecy is a lot of blather.” Hargrove’s voice softened. “Dictating who can and can’t be important is a waste of good brainpower. Give anyone the juice of the night-blooming Etheria, and they’ll tell you hedgehogs are coming out of the woodwork and there are clouds of grapes hovering on the horizon. Now, wake the stave.” I did as he asked. “The sorcerers want you to add your power to theirs, like pouring a bucket of water into a pond. Differences between sorcerers and magicians, chapter one, section one: our instincts are opposite. What do I mean by this? Let me answer with a question. What is the difference between a bird and a fish?”
“One flies and one swims?”
“No, the correct answer is: everything. Sorcerers conduct the earth’s energy from one place to the next. We magicians are creators. Do you understand?” He tapped a finger to his forehead in emphasis. “We generate, we don’t manipulate. Your Master Agrippa surrenders himself to the power of the elements; he’s a mere conduit for them. Meanwhile, your feelings, thoughts, dreams, ambitions, all build your magic. How do you feel now?”
Fearful. Angry. My throat was tight, and my head pounded. The blue flames ignited and swirled about me.
Hargrove cried out, “You’ll burn us all! Calm down.”
The anger released itself, and the fire died, until it was only a thin shell that clung to my body. With a thought, I stopped burning. “What does it mean?”
“It means, cherub, that what you think and feel directs your ability.”
I took a chair and placed it in the center of the room. Facing the chair, I used both arms to lift my stave, employing the earth’s magnetic force. I didn’t clear my mind. I imagined lifting it. Above all, I wanted to lift it. I felt something build inside me, a kind of pressure. After a few wobbly tries, the chair rose three feet and hovered without the slightest waver. I lowered it to the floor, giddy with relief.
“Can I work with sorcerers?” I asked, tension draining out of my body.
“Yes, as long as you focus on yourself. They can feed on your power, but never tell them what you really are.” He returned to cutting open the intestines, inspecting them carefully. “You’re a cuckoo in the nest. If they learn the truth, they’ll push you out and break your neck.”
“Master Agrippa wouldn’t do that.”
“Everyone has a limit. Aha!” He held up a coin, covered in blood. He wiped it and flipped it into the air. “Two-faced, just as the man said. How nice to know there are still trustworthy people on the black market.”
“What else can you teach me?”
Hargrove shook his head. “I don’t think I should show you any actual tricks. The less you know, the less you can slip up and reveal to the sorcerers.”
“Mr. Hargrove,” Billy said, standing on his tiptoes and gazing out the window, “come look at the birds!”
“Yes, nice birdies,” Hargrove said absently.
“How much do magicians know about magic?” I asked.
He puffed himself up. “We’ve forgotten more than Master Agrippa could learn in a lifetime.”
“Mr. Hargrove, the birds!” Billy called again. I peered through the window to where the little boy pointed. A ring of ten ravens sat on the street below. The passersby skirted around them.
“Why are sorcerers so afraid of magicians?” I said.
“Because of our potential for power. We could wipe out the sorcerer Order with little effort.” He gathered up the rest of the intestines and dumped them out the open window. Below us, someone gave a disgusted cry.
“If we’re so powerful, why haven’t we done that already?”
“Because magicians don’t like order. We enjoy our freedom.” He shuffled to a bowl of water and washed his hands. “We make our own mistakes.”
I was about to ask what he meant when screams started outside.
The ten ravens began to swell and change shape, like a child’s balloon in the hands of a carnival worker. They hopped into the center of the circle and melded together into a fat, feathery mound. The blob grew, and a moment later one large black shape remained. It rose in the center of the street, a tall human-esque figure with dark robes and a cowl covering its face. Ebony feathers coated its long, vaguely winglike arms.
It was one of the ravens, the Familiars of On-Tez the Vulture Lady. With one swift, terrible motion, the monster swung out a claw-tipped hand and sliced off a man’s head.
Chaos erupted below as people trampled one another to get out of the way. The bird creature flapped its arms and struck a woman, knocking her to the ground.
“Why would On-Tez send one of her ravens? She stays in Canterbury,” I said, horrified.
“Attacks don’t only happen at night, my ducky. Old R’hlem’s fighting a war, and he means to win it.”
“Why don’t the sorcerers do something?”
He glared at me. “Because the Familiars don’t attack the ward, dear heart, and that’s all the Order cares about.” He grunted as he looked out the window. “This is the fourth time in two months. I should move. It’s not fair to the area.”
“Why should you move?”
“The magic,” he said, as though it were obvious. “The Ancients and their Familiars are drawn to the scent of it like ants to a sticky bun.”
London was filled with sorcerers. Was the city under constant attack because of us?
“Come,” Hargrove said. “I’ll show you a way out.”
“If our power called these creatures, we should be the ones to put a stop to it.” I grabbed his coat sleeve as he brushed past me.
“I don’t have to do anything. If it’s between them or me, I choose me.” He yanked himself from my grip. I looked back out the window.
The Familiar sliced its way through a man’s chest, leaving him to bleed out on the ground. The street turned a roiling crimson as the thing threw back its head and screamed in triumph, arm-wings bristling. My hands felt hot. When I pulled open the front door, Hargrove slammed it shut. “You’ll get yourself killed!” he snapped.
“Help me. I know I can’t fight it on my own.” I grabbed Porridge from its sheath.
“You want to throw a little wind and rain at it? It’ll take more than weather play, you stupid thing.”