DARKLIGHT

- 24 -

As soon as I incanted the spell, I realized exactly what I had done and my heart dropped. As Kaces had explained to me earlier, Hareket Burada Kohtar was a teleportation activator, meant to alert a predetermined set of mages and assist them in teleporting near you if they chose to. "Hareket Burada," Kaces had incanted earlier, forming a wavy disc of magic in front of him. "Now you say it."

I had lit my symbol rather hesitantly, unsure what the unfamiliar magic was capable of. "Hareket Burada."

Kaces had actually smiled, although briefly, as my magic connected to the disc. "And now, I'm just a couple of words away," he had said.

"But how will I know when to use them?"

"Use your good judgment. You know what's at stake."

I remembered how Kaces had used the spell a month ago to call a swarm of Dark mages into the Council room. As far as I knew, he could have set up the spell with the entire Kirevean army and linked it to me knowing that I would use it out of fear. He warned me that trust was dangerous.

And yet, something in me stubbornly insisted that Kaces was on the right side. I knew that was why I had agreed to set up the spell in the first place, and why I had cast it despite my past misgivings. Either way, it was too late. All I could do was hope that I had guessed right.

Magic rushed past my ears, and Zephion appeared at my side with his claws up, ready to attack. He was alone, and I breathed a sigh of relief. When the dragon saw Atles cowering in front of me, he sighed and pressed a massive foot against the sentry's chest, easily knocking him to the floor. "Didn't I tell you to only use that for emergencies?" Kaces spat through the dragon. "Surely a single-"

Then Kaces seemed to freeze in place as he noticed where he was. He glanced around the room at the Councilors, who were in ready positions but petrified in fear, and then locked eyes with Councilor Blaine. The Councilor broke down sobbing. The other Councilors turned to him in surprise, though Councilor Vuhmal was still stern. "Kaces," Blaine wept, "is that really you?"

Kaces murmured, "Merus," and shifted back to his human form, stepping away from the sentry.

Blaine blanched as he stared at Kaces's scars. "I'd know that dragon's face anywhere," he said, voice catching in his throat. "I don't know how I didn't-"

"I- it's okay, Dad," Kaces stammered. "I know I must look different now."

As the gravity of the situation hit me, time seemed to grind to a halt. The Councilors slowly lowered their hands as tears of Kaces's own slid down his face.

Nobody could break the silence.

Finally, Councilor Vuhmal began to sneer at Kaces, and the Kirevean stared up at him in vague remembrance. "Vuhmal, right?" he said. "Dad used to tell me about you."

Councilor Vuhmal scoffed. "Councilor Blaine, this is clearly absurd. Your son disappeared over twenty years ago. This man must be a fraud."

Kaces pondered this for a while and told him, "The backup keys to the Council chamber and Order buildings are hidden behind the third brick to the right of the science department's back door."

I nearly laughed out loud as he said this, because I knew he was right. My mother had once stumbled upon the hiding spot, and she had told us that the Council nearly wiped her memory of it before deciding that as the senior science officer, she deserved to know.

Vuhmal glared at Kaces, but everyone knew that he had lost ground. "We cannot simply allow Kireveans to undermine our decisions," he told the Council pointedly. "We would be breaking Order law. I say they must be exiled or killed, and given how they got here, exile isn't going to work."

Blaine stared at Vuhmal in disbelief. "That's my son! I would know him anywhere!"

"You didn't know this man in March when he was standing right in front of you." The Council murmured in agreement. Vuhmal tossed Atles a pair of red shifter discs that the guard gingerly caught. "Sentry, take both of these traitors into custody. I may have a few words with them this evening, but they'll be executed at dawn."