The Magic Trick (The Card Game #2)

Ch 1 - Saint Demetrius Academy

CHAPTER I

SAINT DEMETRIUS ACADEMY

15 Years Later … 1840

“Wake up! If we leave soon we can get there by sundown.”

Viktor’s reoccurring dream of the hanged man and the Brassard alleyway melted away under the late-morning sun. Now he squinted and saw Romulus, who was already packing up their camp. The boy of the forest was taller, stronger, and tanner than he had been before. His tangled blonde hair hung a little longer and his face was a little harder. All of these changes combined to make him look a great deal older, as did the great bearskin that he had fashioned into a coat. As ever, his father’s St. Benedict medallion hung around his neck, glinting in the sun.

Viktor, also fifteen, rose up and stretched his solid frame, standing but an inch in his blood brother’s shadow. He had a bleaker look about him, with short dark hair and a face sharp from years of measly portions. As of late though, that was changing. Having a friend like Romulus offered many opportunities, like hunting in the forest, passing time in secret hideaways, and—like they were doing today—going on far-off journeys.

 “Grab some food, and then let’s go,” Romulus grunted, throwing their traveling bags atop two black horses, courtesy of their Gypsy friends.

 Nodding, Viktor went over to the smoldering fire and scarfed down a steak beside Romulus’ gray-white wolf, who was gnawing on leftover bones. Blizzard had saved both of their lives many times over, yet as strange as their bond was, even stranger was Blizzard’s bond with the Gypsy steeds. Viktor would never become accustomed to seeing a wolf trot alongside horses, and the sight startled him again today when he and Romulus saddled up and headed west toward civilization.

Great Perm was their destination, but the metalworking city interested the blood brothers for only one reason: It was home to Saint Demetrius, a school for privileged students. Most importantly, it was the school that the Leopard—or rather, Nocktayl—had attended as a boy.

Summer was nearly over, but Viktor was still in disbelief at how the school year had ended. On the night that he had broken into Staryi Castle with Romulus, Evenova, and Charlotta, everything had changed. Beyond the experiment rooms full of plants and animals and stones, they had learned the horrible truth about Aryk’s ruler. The Leopard and Master Molotov were the same man, the wicked creation of Nocktayl, a boy who had sunk too far into darkness. On the surface it seemed Nocktayl’s multiple identities were tools used to gain power, but Viktor had begun to ponder over the deeper implications of his enemy’s fractioned psyche.

The Leopard’s secret seemed obvious after rereading Maksim’s Memoirs. The journal that Romulus’ father had penned as a boy detailed his upbringing as a castle servant, and it also shed a great deal of light on the boyhood version of Nocktayl, who back then was simply the nephew of Aryk’s landlord. Still, large segments of Nocktayl’s childhood were shrouded in mystery, which was why Viktor had agreed to make the trip to Saint Demetrius with Romulus.

Relax. It’s just a school, Viktor reassured himself as he rode, even though he knew it was not so. Saint Demetrius was more than an academy. It was the place where Nocktayl had begun his transformation into the Leopard, where he carried out his first three murders. According to Maksim’s Memoirs, Timofey, Ambrosii, and Daniil were the first of Nocktayl’s peers that he had made disappear, or as Nocktayl himself once said, “had turned into ghosts.” What Nocktayl had really done to those classmates Viktor could only imagine, but with any luck the Saint Demetrius teachers might have valuable information. Perhaps they knew the secret goal of the Leopard’s experiments. Better yet, maybe they had evidence linking the Leopard to his childhood crimes.