A Practical Guide to Sorcery (Books 1 & 2)

Chapter 30 - (A Rather Poor) Rescue (Part 1)

Siobhan

Month 11, Day 28, Saturday 4:30 a.m.

Sebastien bolted upright before she could stop herself, but then froze, opening her mouth to breathe so that her panicked gasps would be less audible.

She slid off her bed, pressing her feet to the cold stone floor with careful, deliberate movements. Turning to the bed, she cast the spell to disintegrate fallen hairs or other remnants from her body. Now would be the worst possible time to neglect that safety measure.

'How did they find me?' she wondered frantically. Still, that answer wasn't the most important thing at the moment. 'I have to escape.'

She moved to the chest at the foot of her bed and pulled out her things, most of which she kept organized within her luggage bags, and so required very little preparation to simply pick up and leave.

She dressed as quickly as possible, slung her school satchel over her shoulder, and slipped from the room, carrying both her boots and her luggage. She put her boots on when she reached the hall, then picked up one bag in either arm and hurried out of the dorm building. Outside, the wind had picked up, clearing away the night fog and whipping hair into her face.

Her student token bounced against her chest beside her warded medallion and the transmutation amulet. 'Should I get rid of the token? They might be able to track it.' She decided to ditch it after she had escaped the grounds. It would be fastest to go down through the tubes, but she didn't want to do so without anything to slow her descent, not again, and she needed the student token for the tube system's magic to recognize her.

She was panting by the time she reached the glass tubes, but Fekten's training in Defensive Magics had deepened the well of physical energy she had to draw on, and she didn't slow. Her bags went in first, and then her legs, and she was off.

Only then did she have the horrible thought that her student token may have been compromised, and the tubes would trap her within till the authorities reached her—though she didn't know if such a thing was actually possible. To her great relief, the tubes worked as normal, simply setting her and her luggage down on the bouncy surface below.

She grabbed both bags and was struggling off the absorbent landing pad toward the street when the sound of a horse's hooves clopping to intercept her cut through the wind. She dropped the larger bag, the one with her clothes and more unimportant belongings, and turned to sprint away, when Dryden's familiar voice called, "It's me! Get on the horse, it's an emergency."

She stopped running and turned as he drew the panting beast up beside her.

His eyes flicked between the bag in her arms and the one she had dropped. "They haven't discovered you, but I had no other way to get your attention. Stash your bags somewhere no one will find them and climb up behind me. There's no time to wait, lives are at stake."

His urgent, low voice cut through the fog of panic in her mind. She ran back, picked up the bag she had dropped, and then found a half-broken wooden crate in a nearby alley to stash her things underneath. She took off her student token, too, just to be safe, leaving only her school satchel and her clothes on her body. "What's going on?" she asked, panting as she climbed up behind him on the horse. It was saddled for one, which made it less than comfortable.

"The Morrows attacked a building of mine, downhill. Workers were inside, on an early shift. My people called for one of the emergency response teams, but the Morrows were prepared for that," he said, pushing the poor horse hard. He tossed a bundle of cloth back to her. "Wear your cloak and change forms. The Morrows are trying to take the building down around the workers' ears. We have injured, maybe dead, and the emergency response team cannot get in to help. The other two teams are being roused from their homes, but it may be too late by the time they arrive. Katerin sent me a message, and I triggered your ward immediately. I hope you will forgive me for the fright."

She tossed the red-trimmed cloak around her shoulders, pulled the hood down, and pressed a hand to her chest to settle the stolen artifact against her skin. With a tingle, her body shifted, and her skin darkened like the blush of a desert rose. "Why did you trigger my ward? What is it that you think I can do about this?" The sound of her old voice was almost startling, and she clutched at Dryden's waist to keep herself steady as the horse's muscles undulated under her. Its hoofbeats thundered off the stone around them, distorted by the wind, and the shadows were barely pushed back by increasingly sparse streetlamps.

"Katerin and the reinforcement teams are being deliberately delayed. I have no other options. They have magic-users, Siobhan. And you know how to heal."

She gaped at the back of his head. "What? I told you, I don't know any battle magic! And I can only heal small wounds! You would be better off transporting the injured to a healer!"

"I will do the fighting. I fear it may be too late to reach the healers, especially if we cannot break the Morrows' siege quickly." He turned his head slightly, to see her out of the corner of his eye. "The workers are innocent, Siobhan. They're in desperate need of help. Will you not at least try? You will be paid." His voice broke a little on those last words.

Tingles went up her spine as her back muscles clenched too hard for comfort. She considered refusing, demanding that he stop and let her return to the University, but the words wouldn't leave her mouth. 'I am already on my way there,' she thought with a kind of dry resignedness. Her memory flashed to the moment she'd pressed her bloody thumb against the magical agreement with Katerin. 'And I cannot refuse repayment in favors unless they are morally objectionable. Not unless I want to bear the consequences.' The thought of releasing her blood for Katerin to use against her led to a shudder that wasn't just because of the cold. Katerin was kind, but she was in no way soft. Siobhan belonged to the Verdant Stag.

"I just want to make sure you are aware, fully aware, that I am not a licensed healer, and I'm not just saying that. I don't know what I'm doing. I shouldn't be the first one you go to in an emergency. I should be the absolute last resort."

"You are." He paused. "I don't know what you're imagining, but I don't have some sort of secret underground battlefield-healer on retainer. Any legal healer won't come to a still-ongoing gang fight. I hope—I hope you aren't needed. And I hope that if you are, you can be the stopgap, to buy just enough time till a real healer can be had. Emergency response, right?"

'What does it say about me, that I'm rushing into this when a real healer would refuse?' Still, she didn't ask him to turn back or let her off.