Page 9 of Reluctant Witch (A Course in Magic #2)

9

Prospero

In a wobblier than usual lurch, Prospero tried to teleport to the barrier, but… nothing happened—which made no sense. She’d popped there on more occasions than she could dare count. The barrier was one of the markers that she used when she went between Crenshaw and the Barbarian World. It was her landmark.

Why can’t I teleport to the barrier?

She tried again, feeling for the unique magic that rippled over the edge of their world. Nothing. The well of magic she usually could call upon did nothing at all. Prospero was standing exactly where she had been a moment prior.

Although there was a magical repulsion on the barrier, causing nonmagical people to turn away, Prospero, of course, was not affected by it. She should have been able to transport herself to it. She’d done so literally hundreds of times. She couldn’t transport to a person in this world, but she could transfer her presence between landmarks. It was a magic that she was especially adept at. She had only to visualize the space around her focal point and will herself to it.

And the barrier was a spot as clear as her own home.

Today, though, she could not move herself to the barrier. Prospero’s alarm built closer toward panic as she stayed exactly where she was. It made no sense.

Visions of the dead witches who had been found in the woods and in the fields over the prior weeks crept into Prospero’s memory, accompanied by snippets of Mae’s panicked words over the way the poison from the rift had stolen their lives. Had Scylla fallen ill? She was the head of her house, the strongest illusionist in Crenshaw. Surely the illness couldn’t strike her.

If it could fell her, they were all looking at imminent death.

Prospero tore toward the barrier, unmindful of the trees lashing her face and arms as she pushed saplings and new branches aside. She stumbled over large, fern-hidden rocks, and she slammed to the ground at least twice. She continued forward, though. Somehow, the forest undergrowth seemed thicker today, although logic said it was simply impatience because Prospero had to run rather than transport herself there. Thorned branches snatched at her cloak; leaves crunched underfoot as she moved faster and faster.

“What good is teleporting when I can’t get to where she is?” Prospero muttered, scanning for her missing friend as she got closer to the barrier.

Wisely, Prospero slowed her pace in case of alerting anyone or anything with her crashing noise. Could there have been a predator? A bear? That made more sense than a sudden sickness. Prospero kept her mouth closed as she approached where the barrier—and the witch who maintained it—ought to be.

And of all the possibilities, what she saw had not even been the possibility of a thought. The barrier was simply not there. The space where the illusion of rock and bramble had been for over a century of Prospero’s life was wide open, as if the door of a house had been torn away.

Now, instead of the illusion that hid Crenshaw from nonmagical gazes, there was nothing but air. Beyond their home, the road they took to the town was plainly visible—which meant that anyone standing there could walk right into their hidden home.

I need to tell Walter!

Before she could leave, a sound drew Prospero’s gaze away from the vast nothingness. Someone or something was cloaked by the tangle of shrub and fallen leaves to her left. She followed the noise. There, Scylla was motionless on the blood-soaked ground. Her eyes were closed, and her chest did not appear to be moving. Her hands were clutched on her belly where a mound of bloody moss was.

“Scylla!” Prospero dropped to her knees, feeling for a pulse in Scylla’s throat. Nothing. “No, no, no. Witches aren’t to die this young. Come on, Scylla. Please…”

Prospero scooped her into an awkward embrace and transported them directly into the infirmary. She’d done so for plenty of new witches, including this one once upon a time. It had never been quite as terrifying.

“Mae! I can’t find a pulse.” Prospero stumbled toward a bed, but she didn’t know how to lower Scylla to the bed without falling on her. “Mae! Help me!”

Dr. Mae Jemison appeared almost at the same instant as Prospero called for her. She was well used to remedial witches arriving in sorry states.

“Are we expecting a—” Her words died abruptly. “ Scylla? Bring her here.”

“Trying,” Prospero bit out.

Mae took a deep breath, steadying herself before launching into whatever medical magic she controlled. In the next moment, sparks rippled over Scylla’s body as Mae gathered her own information from Scylla’s state.

“How? Who would hurt Scylla?” Mae helped Prospero lower Scylla onto the bed, as if the magic radiating out of her in a glittering shower required no effort.

“No pulse,” Prospero started.

“It’s still there. Faint. She’s alive, not by much.” Mae continued to run her magic over Scylla. The sparks were now illuminating the whole room like an invisible fire burned and flashed, leaving behind only the waterfall of shimmering magic.

The simple truth that Scylla was not dead was enough to make Prospero feel like some weight fell from her shoulders. It didn’t fix the barrier, but once Scylla was healed, she could fix it. Everything will be fine. Scylla will be fine. Prospero stared down at her oldest friend. She has to be.

“If you hadn’t got her to me now…” Mae let the words dangle, not giving voice to the fate that could have befallen the unconscious witch. Sometimes when she was healing, Mae seemed to be only half-aware that she was speaking. It was one of her many charms. She stared at her patient, magic zinging around her like a stellar show.

“But you can fix her…?”

“I can try.” Mae looked up at Prospero briefly and demanded, “What do you know? Who did this? Where? With what? Tell me.” The doctor made a gesture as if she could pull the very words from Prospero’s mouth.

“Her abdomen. There’s moss on a wound.” Prospero wasn’t sure of the who or why. She had theories, but theories wouldn’t help Scylla. “I don’t know what they used. Maybe a—”

A scream ripped through the room.

Scylla, even unconscious, flinched and yelled as Mae removed the moss from her stomach without an audible word.

“Bullet.” Mae paused, glaring at Scylla’s abdomen. “Get water. Hot enough to hurt.”

Prospero flinched in empathy, but she knew that Mae’s magic was guiding her. They’d been in such places more often than Prospero wanted to recall. Strangers, new witches, had bled and vomited and screamed as Mae repaired them well enough to stabilize them.

And Prospero had assisted her too often.

Most of them survived.

Scylla will survive.

Medicine wasn’t her magical strength, but she was adept enough to be useful. And as the proximity to death seemed to be the spark that awakened a witch’s magic, Prospero had carried in plenty of witches who were approaching death’s door. A handful were beyond recovery, but most of those witches were patched and spackled and medicated to the point of health. Then the magic took over.

Scylla has to survive.

Prospero opened one of Mae’s cabinets and unerringly retrieved the purified water. Things were in the same places they’d been for years, although the water wasn’t always bottled. Familiarity created expediency, and speed was essential in such moments.

Prospero’s hands shook as she poured purified water into a vat and heated it as she carried it over to Mae.

“She’s going to be unconscious a while with the blood loss and pain,” Mae said, as if the jerking of Scylla’s body weren't already proof of that. Mae tipped a sachet of various herbs she’d drawn from one of her apron pockets into the vat, and the scent of boiling tincture made Prospero’s stomach clench.

The vat visibly cooled under Mae’s touch, and then she poured the water over Scylla’s stomach. It sizzled like acid, and Prospero reminded herself that she could trust Mae.

Mae heals, not hurts.

Still, when Scylla’s eyes opened briefly, locking with Prospero’s, it took effort not to shove the doctor away. Prospero’s hands balled into fists when Scylla lurched sideways, as if to escape the agony. The look of rare betrayal was one Prospero hoped never to see again on her friend’s face, especially aimed at her.

“Mae will fix you,” Prospero promised. “I brought you to Mae. You’re safe. Safe, Scylla.”

But Scylla still tried to escape.

“Grab her!” Mae ordered. She was shaking from whatever magic she was still using, and Prospero hoped that she was strong enough to fix this. Once or twice, Mae’s magic was not enough.

The battery. We need Monahan.

But Prospero couldn’t go get him. Not yet. Right now, Prospero’s hands were firm on Scylla’s shoulders, and she bodily blocked her from escape as she took a wide-legged stance and braced. Scylla was taller and stronger.

“Your magic,” Mae snapped.

And Prospero felt a fool for not thinking it sooner. She slid into Scylla’s mind, looking for the emotions for this moment, plucking them from terror to calm. She let her friend see her, know that it was not an enemy’s arms that held her still, and as she did so, she felt Scylla relax. In the privacy of her friend’s mind, she selected a long-ago conversation between them and pulled it forward.

The two women sat in Scylla’s home. A bottle of wine that Prospero brought as a birthday gift sat on the low table to Scylla’s side.

“You’re not as much of a coldhearted thing as Sondre warned me,” Scylla said mildly. She glanced over the rim of her half-filled glass and held Prospero’s gaze.

“Says you. I make an excellent enemy if I am inclined.”

“Indeed.” Scylla’s expression shifted into a wide smile. “I don’t think you want me as an enemy.”

Prospero sighed. “I suppose we’d best be allies then.”

“The word is ‘friend,’” Scylla corrected, lifting her glass.

“Call it what you will. I have your back, Marie.” Prospero still slipped and used her birth name, her before-magic name. “I had it when you arrived, and I have it now that you are head of House Scylla. I will always have it unless you betray me.”

“Same, girl. Same.”

As Prospero nudged the memory forward, reminding her friend that she was protected, Scylla opened her mouth and said, “Never betray you, P. Look. ”

Prospero went back into Scylla’s mind, diving toward today’s memories. Prospero saw her walk into the woods, saw the capture, saw her free herself.

Scylla pressed her hands against her belly, as if she could keep the blood inside.

“It’s not personal,” Jaysen whispered. “We were just getting you out of the way, dude.”

“This wasn’t the plan,” Jenn muttered.

“It was a hope of mine, though.” A man’s voice was close enough that Scylla could smell fetid breath, a mix of vomit and alcohol. “Never did like you. That felt good. ”

Him . He was the one with the gun.

As Prospero shoved through the memory, noting that Aggie was there, she tried to see the other faces. Who did this? Who was he? Who shot Scylla? She recognized three of the witches desperate enough to take a life, to tear down the barrier, to destroy everything. Jaysen. Jenn. Aggie. Someone would have answers. Unfortunately, the New Economists believed that they should be allowed to be in the Barbarian Lands, so finding the villains to get any answers or stop disasters from coming was a lot harder now that they were in a place with billions of nonmagical people.

Then Scylla went limp, knocking Prospero toward the floor as she was forcefully shoved out of Scylla’s memories. Prospero caught herself on a nearby stretcher, scraping her arm as she slid past it, and hit the hard edge of a rolling cabinet. A glance up revealed Mae jabbing two fingers inside the wound on Scylla’s belly.

“She passed out,” Mae said through gritted teeth. “Come here, you bastard.”

Prospero’s eyes widened. They weren’t friends, but that was an uncharacteristically harsh thing to say. Then Mae jerked her hand out of Scylla’s belly.

“Got you.” She held up a tiny piece of metal. The bullet. Mae’s hand was blood-slick, and she was wavering on her feet, but she was smiling in victory. “Now, I can heal her. Her heart kept trying to stop, and the bleeding wouldn’t.”

Mae wobbled and muttered, “Sorry. All out of juice.”

Prospero leaped up as Mae started to crumple. “Shit!”

Then she was standing with a bloody doctor and an unconscious patient. She hefted Mae onto the next cot over and then she yelled, “Hob!”

One of the castle hobs appeared, glanced at the witches on the cots, and said, “They aren’t dead. I only take dead bodies.”

Prospero swallowed the words that wanted to escape her mouth and instead ground out, “I need witches from Dr. Jemison’s house, ones she trusts, to look after them. Please, fetch them now.”

The hob gave her an unimpressed once-over. “You have a bit of blood just there.…” He gestured at her from foot to face. “You might want to fix that.”

Then the hob popped out, still scowling, only to return and leave repeatedly in less than a minute until Prospero was left with four witches.

She wiped her hands as they watched.

“Keep them alive and safe. No one enters unless I’m with them.” Prospero straightened her shoulders, resisting the urge to touch her hair in case there was still blood on her hands. “Dr. Jemison’s depleted herself. Lord Scylla was shot.”

Grim expressions came over them.

“The door will be warded,” Prospero added. “Should anything befall either of them, badgers won’t be your fate.”

“The law for infractions is badg—”

“Do I look like the law is my priority today?” Prospero asked softly, marking each of their faces in her memory. “Keep them safe or die. Those are the options.”

The witch nearest to her backed up a step.

At least one of the witches responsible was Agnes, House Grendel’s head. Hers was a house of violence, and Prospero had no doubt of the odds of successfully facing such a witch.

And the witch who shot Scylla.

There will be blood.

There were currently at least two dangerous witches in the Barbarian Lands. A lot more than Prospero’s own safety was at risk now. Everything would be lost if they were exposed, their safety, their home. If nonwitches invaded Crenshaw with their guns and machines, the violence could be dire.

Would I die for Crenshaw? It had never been a question, but for the first time, Prospero thought there were reasons to try to stay alive. One reason, actually. Ellie.

“Keep them safe and alive” was all Prospero said abruptly before leaving the infirmary in search of the headmaster.

Crenshaw Castle had to be locked down. The students needed to be made safe, and they weren’t the only ones. Ellie would need to be looked after. And, of course, the two unconscious witches in the infirmary. Plans swirled in her head as she stomped through the castle, mindful of the gasps of those she passed.

Bloody.

Furious.

Exhausted.

And it wasn’t even midday.