24
The Mark
‘Why won’t you tell me what’s wrong?’ I asked again.
We had finally reached the first of the seven wide marble steps that led up to the entrance of my family home. I felt my sense of elation over breaking the breath band fade a little as the thought of the punishment awaiting me behind those thick double doors ahead of us sank in. I had snuck out of my father’s house without permission, set free one of the creatures my people most feared and despised and struck my fellow students. When did I become such a terrible son?
‘I can stand on my own,’ I muttered.
‘Take three deep breaths, kid,’ Ferius said as she set me down.
‘What good will that do?’
‘It’ll keep your voice from sounding thin and whiny when you talk to your parents.’
As if that’ll make any difference. Why hadn’t I just run to find one of the city guards when I’d come upon Tennat, Panahsi and Nephenia torturing the squirrel cat? That would have put a stop to it without setting the little monster free and ruining my life. There was a knot in my stomach. Back at the square I’d thought I was doing the right thing, but now I had to explain it to my parents without sounding completely insane, and all I could think was that maybe I was insane. Mages don’t attack other mages to save a creature whose favourite food was probably Jan’Tep babies. But if I hadn’t saved the animal, if I hadn’t fought against my friends, would the breath band have broken? Would my parents balance out my crime against the rewards to our family?
‘Stand straight, kid,’ said Ferius at the sound of footsteps from inside the house. Someone was coming to the door. ‘If you can’t be tough, look tough.’
I thrust my shoulders back and immediately felt like an idiot. The problem with Ferius was that she confused things that mattered – like being able to cast a shield spell – with things that didn’t, like standing up straight. Who cared if I looked confident? I’d already brought shame on my father when my magic had failed, and now I’d compounded it by helping the nekhek escape. Even if Panahsi and Nephenia stuck to the story, Tennat would tell his father and Ra’meth would demand that I be prosecuted for my actions. My father was going to have to humiliate himself in front of the council and invoke his prerogative as a master mage to have the punishment lessened. Saving me was going to hurt his chances of becoming clan prince. Against that, how much would it matter to him that I’d sparked a single band?
I glanced over at Ferius, searching for something clever to say that would let her know just how badly she’d screwed up my life, but her eyes were still fixed on the doors to my house. ‘You sure about this, Kellen?’ she asked.
It was one of the few times she’d ever used my name. ‘What do you mean?’
Ferius turned and knelt down a fraction so that we were eye-to-eye. She was only an inch or two taller than me, so it annoyed me that she’d bothered. ‘My horse is tethered about a mile from here. She can carry both of us a ways, and there’s a place a few miles down the road where I can get us another. Say the word, kid, and I’ll get us out of here.’
‘Are you joking? I just sparked my first band! I’m going to be a Jan’Tep mage like my father! Why would I ever …’
The doors creaked open; light from inside cut through the night. Ferius nudged me over a few feet. ‘Stay in that patch of shadow,’ she said.
Spirits of our ancestors, I thought. I must really look terrible.
It would only get worse. Chances are I was facing house arrest coupled with a public flogging. The latter wouldn’t be so bad so long as my mother was allowed to heal the wounds right away. But if I was stuck inside, how was I going to take my mage’s trials? For the first time I had an actual chance of passing them for real.
My mother’s face appeared, lit from behind like one of the goddesses our ancestors used to worship. Even with the look of concern on her face she was beautiful. And powerful, I thought, feeling the soft movement in the air from the magical energy crackling around her.
‘Kellen, is that you?’ she asked, her eyes not yet adjusted to the darkness. She looked around but I was in the shadows. Her eyes fell on Ferius.
‘Lady Ferius, where is—’
‘I’m here, Mother,’ I said, trying to step out but Ferius put a hand on me and kept me where I was.
‘Oh, thank the ancestors,’ she said, turning back for a moment to shout into the house. ‘Ke’heops! Kellen has returned!’
A moment later my father emerged from the house, his silver-and-blue robes shimmering from the light behind him. He was holding a small scrying mirror in his hand, and when he caught sight of me he placed it into one of the pockets of his robes. ‘Where is she?’ he demanded.
At first I thought he must be referring to Ferius and had somehow missed her standing a few feet away. ‘It’s not her fault, Father. It was my idea to …’ I couldn’t finish the sentence. Of course it’s her fault, you idiot. Ferius is the one who convinced you to help the squirrel cat.
His eyes narrowed and then he glanced over at Ferius before setting his gaze back on me. ‘I don’t care about the Argosi card player. What have you done with your sister?’
My father’s face was a mask of anger and frustration that scared me more than the hideous black-and-red lacquer ones worn by the men who’d attacked Shalla and me in the forest.
‘Father, I swear, I haven’t done anything with Shalla. I haven’t even seen her since—’
‘Oh,’ my mother said, her voice equal parts frustration and fearful resignation. I knew that tone, or at least a small part of it. She’d been scrying for hours, trying to find my sister. The spells used for scrying are dangerous, draining a mage’s power as their mind searches further and further afield. My mother looked exhausted. How far had she pushed herself?
I started towards the stairs, but Ferius put a hand on my shoulder again and stopped me. ‘When was the last time you saw the girl?’
My father’s jaw clenched and I knew he was rightfully outraged. This was our household’s business, and to have an outsider ask the question was unseemly. My mother answered. ‘Shalla woke up hours ago, largely unharmed, but … her falcon was dead. It had sickened in the night and nothing we did helped it. Her spells wouldn’t work. She was terrified that she might be like …’ She hesitated as she glanced over at where I stood in the shadows. ‘We told her it was far too soon to fear a permanent loss of her magic, but Shalla just became more and more agitated. She was inconsolable and eventually I had to give her a light sedative to calm her. She should have slept for hours, but—’
‘Shalla snuck out sometime this afternoon,’ my father said, his voice grim. ‘We thought she must be with you, Kellen, that the pair of you had hatched some further foolishness to restore your magic.’
I felt suddenly disgusted with myself. While I was busy bringing yet more shame to my family, something terrible had happened to my sister. I was almost too ashamed to show my parents that I’d sparked the breath band.
My father rubbed the back of his hand against his forehead, looking more tired than I’d seen him in a very long time. ‘We must attempt the scrying again.’ He turned to my mother. ‘I do not have the magic of silk, Bene’maat. We must risk more of your strength if we are to find her.’
My mother returned his gaze. ‘Husband … I will try, but—’
‘Or you could just go look for the girl,’ Ferius said. The casual, almost dismissive tone of her voice instantly angered me. I turned to say something, but stopped when I saw her kneeling on the cobbled street, the fingers of one gloved hand tracing patterns in the dirt and dust. ‘I could track her,’ she said, then looked up at my father. ‘I can do it quiet too, since I reckon the reason you haven’t gone yourself is that you don’t want the wrong folks knowing your daughter’s missing.’
I tried to imagine how you could search for someone without using scrying spells. It seemed preposterous. But my parents’ panic was beginning to infect me. ‘Can you really do it, Ferius? Can you find my sis—’
‘Be silent, Kellen.’ My father’s voice brooked no dissent. He started down the stairs, slowly, methodically, until finally he stood towering over Ferius. ‘And what will it cost me, Argosi?’
He made the word Argosi sound like something mean and dirty. ‘Father, Ferius is my friend. She would never—’
Before I could finish, Ferius Parfax replied: ‘A pardon.’
Everything went still. My father looked confused at first, but then he crossed his arms across his broad chest. ‘A pardon for whom, Argosi? For your Daroman king?’ It wasn’t the first time someone had accused Ferius of being a spy rather than a simple trader, but it surprised me that my father would believe such a ridiculous rumour. Ferius was … well, nothing like how I imagined a spy would be.
But Ferius didn’t answer, and so my father went on. ‘Perhaps your fat king wishes for absolution for some new crime he has committed against the Jan’Tep? Has he betrayed us once again to one of his allies and now fears our retribution?’ My father let the allegation hang in the air, his eyes never leaving Ferius, as if he expected her to crack at any moment under his scrutiny. Again she said nothing and again my father probed with more questions. ‘Or perhaps you wish to purchase this pardon for yourself. Perhaps you’ve betrayed your masters in the capital and hope to find sanctuary here, in the only place the Daroman army fears to tread.’
Despite my father’s ominous words and overwhelming presence, Ferius seemed unruffled, but I noticed she pretended to brush dust from her waistcoat. When she was done one of the pockets was open. She wants to make sure she can reach her weapons, I realised. When she finally spoke, her voice was colder than the ice spell used to preserve the bodies of the dead for burial under the hot sun. ‘No need to be so coy, master mage. If you want to accuse me of something, why don’t you go ahead and see where it leads you?’
‘Would you threaten me, woman?’
‘Long past time somebody did,’ she replied.
Flat-soled sandals clacked against the marble steps as my mother ran towards them. ‘Stop this!’ she commanded. ‘My daughter is missing! She may have been taken!’ My mother knelt down in front of Ferius and placed her hands on the other woman’s boots. ‘Please … I know something of the Argosi ways … I know you don’t mean to be like this.’
Ferius knelt down until her face was at the same height as my mother’s – the same way she’d done to me earlier. ‘Sister, the fact that you’re on your knees tells me you don’t know spit about the Argosi.’
‘Please, Lady Ferius, Shalla is my—’
‘I’m still not a lady,’ Ferius said, cutting her off, ‘and that won’t change no matter how many times you …’ She broke off and shook her head. ‘Ah, forget it, sister.’ She rose up and pulled my mother to her feet. ‘I’ll find your little girl for you.’
‘And the fee?’ my father insisted. ‘To whom must I grant this pardon?’
‘To Kellen,’ Ferius replied.
I felt a stab of shame. Ferius was trying to purchase my safety at the cost of threatening to leave my sister out there alone. ‘No,’ I said. ‘I won’t—’
‘Don’t move,’ Ferius warned. I hadn’t even realised I’d started towards them.
My father looked over to where I still stood in the shadows. ‘What shameful acts have you brought upon our house now, Kellen?’
‘I …’ I lied to you. I freed our enemy. I fought my own people. I hit the girl I love. Suddenly I was too ashamed to speak.
My father started to walk towards me, but Ferius grabbed his wrist. ‘It don’t matter what he’s done. You want me to find the girl, you grant him your pardon right now. When I get back, if he wants, he comes with me. Out of this town and out of your hair. But either way, you give him your pardon.’
Even in the unlit street, I swear I could see my father’s blue eyes burning the darkness away. I thought for sure Ferius had pushed him too far. My mother must have thought so too, because she got between them and put a hand on his chest. ‘Our daughter is out there, Ke’heops. Our Shalla. Alone. The men who attacked her could be hunting her even now while we stand here arguing.’
My father didn’t even bother to turn to look at me when he said, ‘Fine. I pardon you, Kellen.’ He made it sound like a verdict. Then he turned back to Ferius. ‘Now go, Daroman. Show us these tracking skills you Argosi claim to have.’
‘I want to help find Shalla,’ I said.
‘Sorry, kid,’ Ferius said, her eyes still on my father. ‘You’re too injured and I need to move too fast.’
‘Injured?’ my mother asked. ‘Kellen, what’s happened to you? Come here now!’
I obeyed, feeling like an idiot. My sister might be in danger, but my mother was going to fuss over a few bruises. As I walked into the light streaming from the doorway, I held up my right arm in a desperate bid to win a moment of my father’s approval. ‘Look. I broke the breath band.’
‘By the ancestors … what is that on his face?’ my father demanded.
‘It’s just blood,’ I said. ‘I got hurt, all right? It’s not—’
The forefinger of my father’s right hand gave the slightest twitch. The glow-glass lanterns all around us flared bright as the sun, banishing every shadow, except one that I couldn’t see.
‘No!’ My father’s shout split the night in half.
My mother ran towards me and started rubbing at my left eye, making the bruise on my cheek hurt even worse. ‘It’s all right, mother. It’s just—’
I hadn’t even seen my father move, but now his strong hands lifted my mother out of the way and set her down behind him. He reached out with his left hand and took hold of my jaw so hard I could feel my gums squeezing against my teeth. He leaned over, staring into my left eye.
‘I can see fine,’ I said. ‘It’s not damaged or anything.’
My father didn’t reply until my mother tried to take his arm. He shrugged her off. ‘This cannot be wished away,’ he told her.
I tried to pull away from his grip. ‘I already said it’s just a little blood and dirt.’
With his free hand, my father reached into the pocket of his robes and pulled out the small round scrying mirror. He held it up in front of me. There, in the mirror, I saw my face. As expected, I was bruised and battered, with blood caked on my swollen cheeks and forehead. At first I was so focused on my wounds that I almost didn’t notice the thin black lines curving around the outside of my left eye. They looked like twisting vines, almost like an illustration drawn by a master artist. You might almost have called them pretty if you’d never seen them before, in the picture books meant to scare children and the manuscripts old Osia’phest kept to show initiates the perils of dark magic.
All at once I understood why Ferius had kept me standing in the shadows, why she’d forced my father to forgive me before she’d agreed to look for Shalla. Ferius had been trying to protect me. What a stupid thing to do, I thought. Everybody knows there are some things you can’t protect against. I just kept staring into that mirror, horrified by what I saw, because in those creeping black lines around my eye I finally saw what was wrong with me.
I had the shadowblack.