Chapter Nineteen
CHAPTER
NINETEEN
EMBER
Why are our armies Illusionists? Because intangibles cannot be attacked. The battle perceived is not the battle that exists, and by this method, our enemies are always defeated.
— Aurora Gallatine, Echelon to the
School of Illusions
Inumbly moved forward, entering Odessa Hall alone. Two stone-faced marshals escorted me upstairs to the room where I would face the Echelons. And her.
They brought me to a rectangular table set behind a jail of a half wall and told me to wait in the last chair on the right. Aside from the marshals standing at attention in the aisle, there was no one in the audience gallery behind me.
The eight members of the Council entered and took their seats at a grand bench raised on a formal platform a few feet above me.
Jaxan’s lips curled in a smile. Helen, all business, was fully consumed by her papers and the other members of the Council.
Not one look, not a single sign in her rigid body that she wouldn’t vote me Unfit.
The trial room was a light, neutral-colored space, its only adornments a slowly ticking wall clock; white moldings; a high, coffered ceiling; and the bronze, louvered detailing decorating the Council’s bench.
Bright, magical spotlights made the room close to blinding.
Yet it held an enlightened air — grand, traditional, old.
Massive double doors swung wide as Leland entered, striding in with his usual ease, in formal clothes, a sweater and nice pants.
But his jaw was stiff, pits of darkness reigned under his lower lash line, and his stubble had grown long enough to stroke.
He still looked good enough that it was an effort to keep my composure.
Rugged and tired suited him, but in the five days I’d known him, he’d never seemed so spent.
We hadn’t spoken after Aila and Ari disappeared, outside of a few brief messages. I figured he was busy, maybe trying to get Jaxan to break the Dark Deal before the Echelons made their decision about me. He pulled out the chair beside me and sat.
“What are you doing here?” I whispered hoarsely, then immediately had to glance away.
His smell was wrong.
On the surface, it was the same clean smell — mint and pine. Then he moved. He unzipped his backpack and set it on the first chair, and something wafted through the air. Something steeped into his clothes, smoked and sour and rotten.
Mugroot.
“I’m their Truth-Teller,” he said woefully. “Summoned to verify your answers.” He pulled off his sweater, revealing a white, cotton shirt underneath, and stuffed the sweater I couldn’t bear the smell of into his backpack.
My face must have shown my relief because he said, “Stop burning. I didn’t sleep with anyone. I was up all night making a potion.”
The burning ceased.
“The Dark Deal?” I asked. “Is it still on?”
Leland frowned. Still on.
“And you sit with me?” I glanced at the open, ninth seat on the Council’s bench. “Here?” I would’ve preferred to face the Echelons without him.
Leland stretched an arm across the table and turned his body to face me.
“No,” he said. “Not always.” He looked at the bench and subtly pointed to the Council.
“From left to right. Aurora Gallatine, Echelon to the School of Illusions; Ydris Ledoux, Echelon to the School of Healing; Hector Ambrosia, Echelon to the School of Elemental Magic; Velleza Luna, Echelon to the School of Enchantments; Dashell Eldridge, Echelon to the School of Quantum Magic; Charley Starvos, Echelon to the School of Creation Magic. Jaxan D’Oron, no need for introduction there; and — ”
“My mother.” My attention caught on the heavy chain she wore around her neck, which was tucked inside her blouse and seemed to be where all the gravity in the room centered around.
It wasn’t Sinora’s Lens of Intentions, but the antique-style chain was similar.
So were the waves of power pouring out of it.
“Leland.” I gulped. “What is . . . what is that chain around her neck? It feels like . . .” like I should know it from somewhere. “Is it an artifact?”
“It is,” Leland said as he dug through the front pocket of his backpack.
“It’s the artifact of mental magic. It’s called the Ring of Greatest Fear, and if you ever see her reach for it, it’s already too late to run.
” He pulled out a tin of mints and popped one in his mouth, then, stuffing the tin away, he said, “Don’t ask me anything else about it. ”
“Why?”
“Because I won’t answer.”
I let out a quick exhale through my nose, making a mental note to research it, if I somehow survived this trial.
Leland was acting too casual for it to be nothing, but I didn’t want to raise his suspicions, so I pretended to study the Echelons on the bench, as if I didn’t already know all about their beliefs from the texts I’d studied.
Aurora blatantly stared me down. She regarded me like a stain, and regarded me with Leland like there was something unsuitable about us together.
Starvos — based on appearances — was the only Echelon with a heart.
He had a rounded slump to him and one of those warm faces perpetually on the verge of smiling.
The others were imperious. Their eyes were like glass, and they moved stiffly.
Apart from Aurora, if they regarded me at all, it was with glances so fleeting I felt like I was no one to them.
Their dull chatter wound down, and Leland gave me a weak smile before returning his arm — and the rest of his long, lean form — back to his side of the table, situating himself fully in his chair. I wiped my sweating hands on my thighs and straightened.
It was time. Time for them to address the problems I’d caused and vote whether my crimes made me Unfit, a path that would make me ineligible for spellcasting magic and deteriorate me to a state like Sabrina’s.
I needed five votes to make it to Selection, five votes to stop Jaxan from calling in Leland’s Death Bond.
Five votes saying I was fit enough to practice magic in Everden.
Jaxan’s and Helen’s, I assumed, were out.
“Truth-Teller,” Aurora called down in a haughty tone. Her severe cheekbones were diagonal slashes upon her cool, white skin, and her long, black hair fell in waves. She smiled sweetly and it terrified me. “We’re waiting. Come take your seat.”
“Echelon Gallatine.” Leland raised his chin. “That won’t be possible. My magic’s depleted. I can’t perform my role from that distance. You’re aware of how it requires more effort when I’m not near?”
False.
Leland’s gift worked like mine, and distance had no impact, so long as we could speak or, for him, hear. And he wasn’t depleted. Though if I’d only had his appearance to judge by, he certainly could’ve been.
Dashell Eldridge sat forward, his pale turquoise eyes roaming over us as he gestured to the man with short, white hair and dark-brown skin on his right.
“Ydris is here to Heal you, should you find yourself exerted. Don’t think we haven’t seen the papers — you and the girl running around town.
We permitted it. But your place in the trial room is up here with us. ”
“You understand how it looks,” Aurora said bitingly. “You whispering in her ear. You’ve always been fair and impartial, but one can’t expect you to be that from down there.”
“I have something to add,” Jaxan said in his drawl. “The girl is on trial for her Fitness. Does it not” — he paused for emphasis — “add to the case that she requires such close attention from her handler?”
Leland tensed but said nothing.
“Mr. Stray.” Starvos smiled fondly. “A denizen of my jurisdiction. Student of my academy.” His loose jowls wobbled around every word.
“I happen to know firsthand how extraordinarily preoccupied you’ve been of late.
Why, when you’re not studying, you’re lesson planning.
Otherwise, you’re here, shepherding the girl in accordance with our instructions.
Or doing something even more abominable” — he shuddered — “magicless combat.”
He paused to cough into a fist before continuing. The first cough was low and singular, but then it devolved into a lengthy coughing fit, followed by loud, throat-clearing noises.
“Let me assure you all,” Starvos said, rhythmically patting a hand to his chest as his kind eyes apologized to the Council for the interruption.
“Mr. Stray has been in Creatus almost exclusively, not running around with the half witch. If he says he must sit there to avoid depletion, then that is the truth.”
Aurora glanced at the clock. “For the sake of time,” she said, her dark eyes boring through Leland’s, “the Truth-Teller may remain with the accused.”
Leland exhaled softly, a controlled breath I felt on the back of my neck, prickling my flesh.
“Ydris. Please read the charges.”
Ydris spoke, his voice a low, scholarly crackle.
“In regard to the conduct of the Unselected half witch, the Council presents the following charges. One. Vandalism with intent to destroy the Circle of Seven. Two. Trespass upon the Allwitch temple. And three. Affiliation with the disappearances of the Aspirants, Aila Foxcross, Ari Herring, and Trist Yidley.”
Aurora said, “May the accused please stand.”
I scrambled to my feet, holding on to the ledge of the wooden table for support.
From what I’d gathered about Everden, these charges weren’t good.
Maybe I could try to make the Echelons understand how these crimes had happened, but I couldn’t deny I was involved — that whenever I was around, bad things just seemed to happen.
Helen raised her pen. “I’d like to add a fourth.”
“Proceed.”
“The accused committed a theft.” She shuffled her stack of papers.
I held my breath, holding back a glance at Leland.
“A text and a magazine. She walked right out of Briary’s with them.”
“The charge will be added,” Aurora said with finality. “We now address the accused.” She looked to the empty gallery behind me and said, “How do you plead?”
“I . . .”