Chapter 3 #2
Celia nodded. “As hard as it is to get into the Order, it’s even harder to stay in.
That hierarchy I was taking about? Imagine it like a pyramid: Members are expected to pay their dues every year, tithing a tenth of their magic to the magician who sits above them.
Those with extra-powerful offerings may get the opportunity to move up a rung—knocking others down.
The competition can get fierce. If you fail to deliver enough relics, you can fall out of the Order altogether.
Your fortunes fade and your name becomes ruined…
” The young woman swallowed, her fingers dancing back to the chain around her neck. “Everything gets taken from you.”
Ezra waited a moment before continuing. “If all the power travels upward, then who sits at the top of the pyramid?”
“That’s the question, isn’t it?” Celia’s grip went even tighter around the chain. “He’s called the Apex. He’s the most powerful magician in all of Britain, but no one seems to know his true identity. He hides it well.”
As Ezra threw the cape on, its feathers began to move, shifting and weaving through the fabric of his tweed.
Then he felt the prickle of quills against his skin as the garment became a part of him.
A fifth limb. It felt just the way it had in his childhood dreams, when he’d soared over the blue-green quilt that was the Nile.
“No room to fly in here, I’m afraid.” Celia glanced up at the gilded ceiling, where a monkey was swinging from a purple umbrella. “But they do suit you!”
Ha! If only he could show Professor Blythe—but, Ezra supposed, if he marched into that Oxford office and flapped his arms around, he’d sound just as mad as he always had…
given the fact that Blythe wouldn’t be able to see a thing.
“In the war, I met a number of soldiers who claimed they saw the Battlefield Angel.”
“I’m sure they did,” Celia said. “It’s the same concept as children glimpsing magic, but the reverse. People can see the supernatural when they’re close to death.” She bit her lip. “You’re not dying, are you?”
“I should hope not.”
“Hm.” Her hand danced back up to the chain around her neck. “Do you wear any jewelry? Sometimes objects can be enchanted without the wearer knowing. A ring? A pocket watch? A family heirloom?”
Ezra shook his head. “I have no family.”
None who’d claim him, anyway. And he highly doubted Lord Blackwood had plans to usher him into the Order… Why Enlighten your bastard just to convince them they were unhinged?
It made absolutely no sense.
It also made Ezra more than a little bit angry.
“What about your mut? She didn’t leave you anything?”
“Just stories…” Ezra paused. “She used to talk about Egypt’s old gods as if she knew them.”
Celia’s eyes widened at this. Her wings stiffened too, as she looked over both shoulders. Ezra gripped his satchel, feeling a sudden shift in the weight of the books beneath. Wait… had his mother known the old gods? No. That was impossible. They’d lived thousands upon thousands of years ago.
But they’d lived.
Here was the answer he’d been searching for…
the singular commonality between all the world’s mythologies.
Magic. If it originated in human souls, then it stood to reason that the most ancient of Assyrians had practiced it.
Their genies and the swan maidens and the Harpies and the Valkyries and the peri…
All those wings had been just as real as his…
The magnitude of this thought was staggering. It wasn’t anything Ezra could put to paper—he’d get laughed out of the Egyptology department quicker than you could say Cleopatra—but what did that doctorate matter when there was so much else to learn?
“Those gods… They were magicians?”
Again, Celia’s eyes scattered about the room. Her wings gave another nervous flutter. “We shouldn’t be talking about any of this here. Perhaps we can go to the Windmill and grab a cup of coffee.”
“Is the coffee magical?”
“Only in the sense that it wakes you up. They make some cracking eggs and bacon too.”
Ezra looked back down at the golden feathers coming out of his sleeves.
He wasn’t quite ready to part with them yet—if he left now, this would all feel like a dream.
He wanted to try a cocktail, at least. To not only see magic, but taste it: swallow it whole and know that this wasn’t just his mind playing tricks.
“Maybe in a few minutes…”
Celia’s knuckles clenched around the chain of her necklace, but she gave a quick nod. “No more questions. No more talking about your mother.”
“Why?”
“Did I not just say no more questions?”
His jaw tightened—all too used to the silence.
No one at Thornhill had wanted to hear much about his mother either.
She’d stayed wedged like a grain of sand between his teeth.
There, just barely. He’d been so terrified of forgetting her, for so long, but that did nothing to stop the memories from softening around the edges, eroding a little bit more with every calendar day.
This was the reason he’d decided to study Egyptology. Not because the subject came easily to him—as those bitter classmates suggested—but because the opposite was true.
He and Celia made their way to the bar—a drink was always good for washing these things down—but a high, clear voice called out from one of the alcoves in the mirrored wall.
“Yoo-hoo! You! Yes! You, Ezra! We need your help again!”
He halted to find Rose seated at a long booth.
The flowers in her hair were shedding petals everywhere—on the tabletop and over the suit of the man whose lap she was sitting in.
Everett. There were others seated at the table as well—the original three men who’d walked through the mirror.
They all had a polished look about them.
Their magic was much more subtle than the rest of the raging room.
None of them sported wings or tails, but Ezra couldn’t help but note the glowing gold rings each man wore on his pinky.
Their shadows, too, sat wrong. Just a little too long…
“This is the gentleman I was telling you about! Ezra Bright!” Rose told the magicians excitedly. “He can read the picture-glyph things!”
Everett shifted in his seat so that both Rose and her petals started to slide off his lap. “You read hieroglyphs?”
“I do. I—” In the mirror Ezra could see Celia standing just behind him, giving the slightest shake of her head. “Well, I try my best. It takes years to become fluent.”
“Oh, I know,” Everett said with a wave of his hand.
“Papa has been trying to learn ever since Lord Carnarvon had that misadventure with Tut’s tomb.
Rumor has it he could have avoided the curse if he’d translated everything right.
A shame there’s no special tea for Ancient Egyptian—I feel as if I’m gambling every time I grab something from Papa’s desk.
Here. Perhaps you could tell me what this says.
” From his suit he pulled out an object wrapped in old linens.
It made a heavy clunking sound when it landed on the table and started to unravel.
Ezra’s heart seized when he saw what lay within. “Where did you get this?”
“Somewhere in Egypt, I reckon. Papa brings loads of trinkets back every time he travels there.”
But this? This wasn’t a trinket. It was made of weighty gold—from the general size and shape and the chain it was attached to, Ezra guessed it was an amulet.
Ornaments the ancient Egyptians believed would grant them powers if they wore them…
Professor Blythe had taught this in a textbook tone, but as Ezra leaned over the object, he knew there was more than a bit of truth to it.
The very air around the piece felt knotted.
At the center of the amulet sat a scarab made of glass-blue faience.
The color reminded him of the light he’d always seen around his mother’s eyes—her halo.
Ezra struggled to push this thought away as he studied the rest of the relic.
Much of it was inlaid with precious stones: black onyx, rusty carnelian, turquoise, lapis lazuli.
All detailed various symbols of the afterlife: lotuses, cobras, and the like.
But there were certain discrepancies that gave Ezra pause.
“That’s odd,” he murmured, pointing at the golden circle held up between the scarab’s jaws. “Usually this is meant to symbolize the sun, being pushed across the sky like a ball of dung—”
Rose made a curious squawking sound.
Everett raised his eyebrows.
“Not the most poetic metaphor, I know, but the ancient Egyptians were trying to explain wonders in terms they could understand.” Not that his old lightning theory held much weight now. Zeus probably had wielded bolts… “Like I said. This circle is usually a sun, but here it’s—”
“A star!” Rose offered eagerly.
“Not just any star,” Ezra countered. “This is the hieroglyphic symbol for night. But it can also symbolize the Duat. That’s what the ancient Egyptians called the realm of the dead.”
“So what does it mean, that the beetle is pushing it?” Everett shifted in his seat again. He had the air of a restless schoolboy, waiting to be handed the answer. “What can this relic do?”
“Why don’t you put it on and find out?” a brassy voice called from behind them. Hugo had appeared, a tray of drinks floating on a sparkling cloud at his side. There was a glint in his eyes as he regarded Ezra. “Who’s this?”
Everett offered a careless shrug.
“Ezra is a scholar. In Egyptology.” Rose said the last word with an uncertain extra syllable. “That’s what it’s called, right?”
“So you can read the damn thing.” Hugo gave an appreciative nod and moved one of the floating cocktails over to Ezra’s section of the table, before sliding into his own seat.
“By all means, be my guest. Celia, dear, stop hovering like a mayfly and sit.” He patted his lap with an expectancy that made Ezra bristle.