“But I don’t—”
“You have power; you must be trained,” Headmistress Hanna said sharply. “You are a danger to yourself and others if you aren’t. This is true whether you become an heir or not.”
I’ve survived this long without any training, she thought. She’d been fine and her family safe until Ven had showed up. Until now—until Renet’s idiocy—she’d never even been tempted to use her power. “I don’t want my power.”
“And I don’t want a knee that aches in the rain,” the headmistress said crisply. “It’s a part of you, and you must learn to cope. Refusing is a child’s act. It is hiding under the covers and hoping the monsters don’t notice the lump in the bed. Summon a spirit, Mistress Naelin.”
Naelin drew in a breath. “My mother was killed by spirits, for summoning them.” She hadn’t said the words aloud in a very long time, not since she’d shared it with Renet late one night before they’d married. She didn’t like to drag the memory out into the light of day.
“Then you must not repeat her mistake,” the headmistress said. “But her mistake was not in using her power; it was in using her power poorly. Training will give you greater control and greater safety.” The words felt like slaps.
“It didn’t help the heirs,” Naelin said quietly. “I know the story of the Coronation Massacre.” She saw Ven flinch, but she wasn’t going to back down. She wasn’t a child to be cowed by a stern frown—or at least that’s what she told herself. “You aren’t doing this for my own good or my safety. You want to use me, and I don’t want to be used.” She swallowed hard. It wasn’t easy to say words like this to a legend. Clasping her hands behind her back, she hoped they couldn’t tell that she was shaking. She was aware she wore borrowed clothes, pressed on her by the academy’s caretakers, and that her children slept safe in cots above, feeling protected for the first time in days. She was, in many ways, at their mercy. “I am not ungrateful for the attention . . .”
“You see your power as a disease?” the headmistress asked. “Then think of me as the doctor performing a test to assess how sick you are. Cooperate with your healer, and we can work together for a cure. If your power is minimal, then we will find a way to distract the spirits from you. You can proceed with your life as planned, and the queen will never hear of you.”
Yes! That was exactly what she wanted. Dare she hope? “Truthfully? You promise that? I summon a spirit, and then you’ll help me be free of all this?”
“If you are not powerful enough, that would be best for all,” the headmistress said. “If Champion Ven is wrong about you, then we will all help you with what you wish.”
Naelin looked at Ven. “And you’ll agree to this? You’ll help me leave if Headmistress Hanna says so?” Please agree!
His expression was blank. Finally he said, “I will.”
She studied his face and decided she believed him. He wouldn’t lie to her, she felt certain of that. She had a chance to end this right now, return to her life . . . or start a new life, with her children, far away from where everything went wrong. Maybe in the west, a small outer village near the unclaimed lands, someplace no one had ever heard of her. All she had to do was show the headmistress she wasn’t anything special, and then this whole nightmare would be over. She’d never have to convince the queen she wasn’t worthy.
“Now, Candidate Naelin.”
Taking a few more deep breaths, Naelin closed her eyes. She stretched her mind out as she’d been practicing and felt the crinkle in the air of tiny spirits: fire spirits that writhed within the lanterns, air spirits that flitted through the clouds above, tree spirits that crawled up the walls of the academy, and earth spirits that burrowed with the worms beneath her feet. She settled on the earth spirits—they felt closest—and did as the headmistress had instructed. She shaped the command in her mind and pushed it out, imagining herself calling her children home:
Come!
And they came.
Little spirits clawed their way through the soil, pushed aside the moss, and sniffed around the practice ring. They looked like moles, with pointed noses and soft black fur, but their eyes and hands looked human. Behind them, busting through the holes they’d made, were larger spirits. These looked like clumps of rocks, with rock faces, arms, legs, torsos. Rock grated together as they moved, creeping closer to Naelin.
Voice even and calm, the headmistress asked, “How many did you call?”
“I don’t know,” Naelin said, backing toward the stairs as the spirits shuffled toward her, sniffing the air and pawing the ground. “I said, ‘Come.’”
More continued to pour through the holes in the ground. Reaching into the folds of her robes, the headmistress produced a silver bell. She rang it sharply. “It’s customary to begin with a single spirit.”
“Untrained, remember?” She hadn’t meant to call so loudly. She hadn’t even known there were different ways to call, or a way to call only one. There was, as Alet had pointed out, a lot she didn’t know. She felt her heart sink. This wasn’t the act of someone with minimal power.
“Ask them to return to the earth.”
Leave, Naelin thought at them.
“With conviction, please,” the headmistress said. Above, from the stairs, Naelin heard the pounding of footsteps, but she couldn’t make herself tear her gaze from the spirits, who kept clawing their way out of the holes. She hadn’t known there were so many. She’d only ever seen one or two at a time, but here . . .
She tried again. Leave!
A few of the smaller ones scampered back into their holes. Emboldened, she walked toward them. Leave! Quailing from her, the spirits retreated, pulling the moss in after them. By the time the other masters had poured into the practice ring, every spirit she’d called had vanished again, retreating into the earth. Her head buzzed. Her blood buzzed. Smiling wildly, she turned back to Ven and the headmistress—
And then it came.
Tentacles burst through the soil on either side of her, and she felt the ground shift, knocking her onto her knees. She felt the spirit beneath her, as broad as the entire practice ring, its tentacles reaching beyond. It felt hungry, a vast yearning emptiness beneath her.
The headmistress yelled, “Earth kraken!”
It flexed its tentacles, and the academy walls began to shake and splinter.
Leave!
Lea—
Chapter 14