Chapter 20. Eloise
Eloise
Maggie and I follow the other first-years into the training room— a giant cavernous auditorium containing any number of weapons stations.
“Well, if that isn’t a thing of beauty,” Maggie says with her hands on her hips, staring up at the thirty-foot rock-climbing wall that isn’t plastic nubs on an angled surface, but wood that mimics rock.
“Not as pretty as that,” I say, gesturing to the wall of blades, my hands itching to hold the double-sided axe and the throwing daggers.
Maggie waves her hand dismissively. “So ye can shave the chin hair off a granny from six yards away. But can you scale your house like a supervillain and illusion a rat onto your older brother’s chest as he wakes up?”
I burst out laughing. “Tell me you didn’t do that?”
“Might have wee’d himself.”
My laugh cuts short, though, because Grayson enters the room. He’s at the tail end of the pack next to Bas, which strikes me as odd, considering he’s been so far up my butt I thought I’d have to surgically remove him. Now all of a sudden, he’s lingering behind? And sneaking out before I’m awake?
His sapphire eyes find me, just a hint of a smile pulling at his lips, making my stomach dip in response. I glare at him.
“For someone you supposedly hate, you do an awful lot of starin’,” Maggie says.
“Just want to know where to point my blades when the time comes,” I say with a shrug, though the motion bothers me because I think I picked it up from Grayson.
“Uh-huh,” Maggie offers, not convinced.
I don’t get a chance at rebuttal, though, because Akari walks through the door with a fourth-year student dressed in dark brown. He wears a black belt, signifying he’s been chosen to train as a Guardian—an honor I can only hope to claim one day.
The entire room goes still.
“I’m not one for coddling and hand-holding,” Akari says in lieu of a standard greeting.
“I’m the head of the University Guardians and in charge of overseeing your combat training.
My name is Akari and you can address me as such.
I’m not going to welcome you with flowery language or tell you something’s good enough when it’s not.
From me you’ll have the blunt truth. You are the descendants of ancient Mage warriors, and I intend to do everything in my power to see that you live up to that potential.
” She pauses, sweeping her eyes across the room.
Some of the students puff themselves up. Others look at their friends, like who is this woman.
“You’ll find that the training here is more rigorous than what you were accustomed to at the Academies,” Akari says, bracing her leather-bound wrists behind her back.
The fourth-year mimics the posture. “You learned hand-to-hand and you learned spellwork but were never asked to kick, cast an illusion, and Alchemy a dagger in one lethal attack,” she says, gesturing toward a large circle patterned on the wood floor.
“Here, there is no mat to soften the blow. No net to catch you. Starting now, when you train you’ll use all your skills to defeat your opponent, just as the Lawless will use everything in their power to kill you. ”
Maggie and I glance at each other, my stomach bottoming out.
“Before I can teach you, I need to know what raw materials I’m working with.
” She pauses. “Pierce,” Akari says, and the fourth-year student steps forward.
“Step into the sparring circle.” She sweeps her gaze over the crowd like she’s looking for someone in particular.
And that someone very unfortunately turns out to be me. “Belrose, join him.”
My body temperature immediately spikes from a rush of adrenaline. Because what are the chances that I’m called first. Is she suspicious of me?
Pierce isn’t a big guy, but that’s the thing about magic, you don’t need to be any particular size to wield it. What he lacks in mass he makes up for in focus and confidence—perfect posture, relaxed shoulders, and a self-assured smirk. I can tell immediately he doesn’t think much of me.
His eyes find mine and he doesn’t look away, like he’s inviting me to fail so he can move on to the next.
We’ll see about that.
Maggie squeezes my arm and I step forward. “What are the rules?” I ask Akari.
“I call the match when there’s a clear winner,” she says, which clarifies nothing. “Do try to make it competitive.”
I cross the circle barrier and face Pierce. He bows to me and I return the respect.
“Begin,” Akari says.
Pierce doesn’t immediately assume a sparring stance the way we always did at the Academy, bouncing on our heels and circling each other.
And his stillness throws me. He watches me, waiting.
I could run at him, I guess, but I suspect I wouldn’t get very far.
I don’t even know what kind of magic he possesses.
“She looks like a terrified bunny,” someone says in the crowd, and I grit my teeth.
I raise my hand to Alchemy a dagger, pulling the handle from the wooden floor and the blade from the light fixtures, merging them together.
But before it’s half finished, Pierce splashes my face with ice water and my spell breaks with my concentration, the would-be dagger rebounding into the floor like a released rubber band.
There are a couple of laughs in the crowd, and I’m willing to bet the loudest one belongs to Naomi. But Pierce breaking my spell told me exactly what I wanted to know. Water—he’s Elemental, which means I need a strong shield at the ready.
Instead of crafting another precise dagger, I Alchemy a rough blade made solely from wood.
A wooden blade isn’t strong, but it’s throwable.
And in less than three seconds I have it in my palm and I’m hurling it through the air.
I don’t bother to sharpen the edges. I don’t plan on slicing him with it. It’s just a distraction.
In the time it takes him to throw up a shield I rush him.
And I strike fast and swift—a punch to his abdomen.
He moves his elbow down to block, leaving his face exposed.
I follow up with a quick jab, and this time, I connect.
I don’t use enough force to break his nose, but more than enough to send him stumbling back a few steps.
Only that’s as far as I get, because instead of retaliating with a hit of his own, he blasts me with a wind spell that knocks me off my feet. I hit the ground on my back, the impact of the hard floor pulling a groan out of me.
I throw up a shield to block his next Elemental attack, but by the time I do, he’s already casting again, and this time it’s an illusion.
Spiders—crawling all over me. Only I don’t bat at my skin or scream; I launch to my feet.
Illusion spiders don’t scare me. I’m not frightened of what I know can’t hurt me.
“Covered in bugs—she looks just like I always pictured her,” Naomi whispers, and Ivy laughs.
As the harmless spiders fade from my body, Pierce launches another wind spell, one that slams me in the gut like an unforgiving fist. The air rushes out of my lungs, and by the time I’ve stood back up, he hits me with another, this one smacking me across the face so hard that the corner of my lip starts to bleed.
Pierce hesitates, probably wondering why I’m not moving to shield or crafting a spell in retaliation. But when he lifts his hand to cast a third time, I gasp, letting my eyes drift past him and widen like I just spellworked something horrible behind him.
It works. He reflexively glances over his shoulder.
As he does, I cast a rough-and-ready spell, one that does nothing more than wobble the floor under his feet—something I’ve done a thousand times by accident while trying to learn to manipulate wood.
His balance falters and he tries to steady himself.
But those few seconds cost him. I close in, and swing for his family jewels—a quick and effective groin kick.
He immediately folds over, his chin jutting forward with an agonized grunt, which is when I grab him by the shoulders and slam him to the ground.
But I don’t get to pin him with the spell I planned. Not because he blasts me or lights me on fire. But because as I reach for him, something wooden wraps around my waist, yanking me backward.
In the time it takes me to register what’s happening, I shoot up into the air, my feet dangling precariously below me.