Page 167 of Spark of Sorcery

“Where’s the Empress?” I hear one of the Slate students beside me whisper to her friend.

“No idea. Maybe she doesn’t turn up to every trial,” her friend whispers back just as Thorne’s name booms over the field.

I watch as he strides calmly towards the giant fence, everyone else watching him too. There is something about the shadow weaver that is mesmerizing. His entire body seems to crackle with energy and power. It radiates from him in pulverizing waves. Thorne Cadieux, the most powerful shadow weaver in the academy. Probably one of the most powerful shadow weavers in the realm.

Over the distance it’s harder to see the burden that places on his shoulders. The burden that costs him daily. When I’m with him, it’s all I see.

Beaufort and Dray follow soon afterwards and then all the other shadow weavers in quick succession.

The snow turns heavier, beginning to land on the ground and covering the field in a blanketof white.

My teeth rattle as the Iron Quarter kids step forward, then Granite and then us.

Stanley goes first, being sure to knock right into me as he pushes through our group.

And then it’s just me again waiting for my turn.

I glance over at Fox but he’s not watching me. His eyes are locked on the Madame, sitting in the Empress’s chair at the front of the stand, laughing and flirting with the men sitting around her.

Disappointment gurgles in my stomach. I could have done with one last nod of reassurance, possibly even a thumbs up. Anything would do. But nothing comes my way from the professor and before I know it, my name is called and my legs move automatically towards the door in the giant fence.

Twin one is there waiting. Whistle swinging around his neck.

He opens the door, pushes me through and slams it behind me.

And I am no longer at the academy.

I am in Slate Quarter.

Chapter Sixty-Two

Briony

I blink.

My eyes are deceiving me. They must be. Because it’s not possible to be at the academy one second and here in the yard of our house the next. I am not a shadow weaver. I cannot displace. This has to be an illusion. Except, it’s so real, so vivid.

The wind blowing through the yard and into my face, the same bitterly cold wind that always blows through Slate, chilling me right through to the bone. And the smell, the smell is the same too. Rancid, the air full of that thick choking smoke that gets into your eyes and mouth, sticking to your tongue, the taste of decay.

I stare down at my feet and it’s the frozen mud of our yard, covered in a fine dusting of dirty frost. I stampmy foot hard on the earth and it doesn’t shatter into a thousand pieces, doesn’t melt away into ash. It’s solid ground.

In the distance, I can hear the chug of the factories, the creak of machinery, the battering of the mining drills. The same as always.

There is no doubt about it. Home.

And when I lift my gaze, who do I find waiting for me on the far side of the yard? My step-mother.

Muriel.

Muriel right there, apron tied around her waist, gray shapeless dress beneath, brown stockings pulled up to her knees, old ratty boots on her feet. Her graying hair hangs limply and unwashed on her shoulders and she’s tied an old rag around her head, and there is dirt in the tired creases of her face.

She observes me with her cold blue eyes and the permanent scowl on her face grows more pronounced. She reaches for the old broom resting against the tatty fence and grips it with both hands like a weapon.

“You brat,” she snarls, and her voice is so loud, so real, this can’t be an illusion, some misfiring of my brain. I’m back home, back in the nightmare.

Or maybe I’ve awoken and everything else was a dream. Maybe there never were any Princes, no friends – no Beaufort or Dray, Thorne or Fox, Fly or Clare. Maybe I invented it all in my sad lonely brain.

Fear spirals down my spine, because I’m back here, where I belong, where every moment is painful and so very lonely.