Verpax University
With a jerking, forward lurch, our carriage finishes its winding descent into the valley, the city’s lights glittering like jewels through the rain-soaked fog.
We slow down at Verpax’s gated entrance, two stone guard towers bracketing it, and I crane my neck to take in the tops of the towers with their arching, diamond-paned windows. I can just make out two still figures standing inside the window, watching us. They’re garbed in black, but the rain streams down the glass and renders their features wavy and amorphous.
“I’ll be right back,” Lukas assures me. He disembarks to talk with a pair of unsmiling Vu Trin sorceresses stationed at the gates, but my eyes are repeatedly drawn toward the watching figures.
“They’ve warded the border,” Lukas tells me as he swings back into the carriage, his shoulders and hair damp from the rain. “You’ll be quite safe.”
Our carriage makes its way through the gates, leaving the watching figures and the Vu Trin guards behind as we enter the University city.
I’m instantly swept up in the exotic bustle of Verpax, even on this cold, rainy day.
Colorful Guild crests and banners mark the Spine-stone buildings, their designs a bright contrast to the gray sky and stone. The cobbled streets are narrow, which puts my window close to shops, taverns and passersby. On either side of us, knots of cloaked Gardnerians, Kelts, Verpacians, Elfhollen, Urisk and Elves hurry through the rain, some wearing forest green professorial robes, their heads bowed against the weather like the carriage horses’.
I’m wide-eyed over the sheer number and diversity of people.
And the cornucopia of shops and taverns and crafthouses.
There are glass merchants, cheese vendors, a Gardnerian wandcrafter’s shop, cheerful lodging houses and even a swordsmith from the Eastern Realm. My nose bumps the glass as I take in the golden rune-marked, embroidered tunic of the man selling jeweled swords under a sheltering canopy, a green headband marked with more golden runes round his head.
And then I spot it—a gleaming apothecary shop, the Gardnerian Guild crest painted boldly on its front: a white mortar and pestle on a black shield, the mortar marked with a silver Erthia sphere, the image surrounded by a wreath of leaves. Neat bottles line the window, and I can just see the tight bunches of herbs hanging from the ceiling rafters in long rows. A smiling Gardnerian woman, her hair pulled back into a tight bun, talks with a customer.
My spirits rise. That could be me someday. With a beautiful shop like that.
Soon the road widens, we pass through the wrought-iron University gates and we’re there. Verpax University.
We ride down several narrow streets, the crowds thicker here, more green professorial robes in sight. The carriage slows, and we come to a stop before a mammoth, multidomed building hewn from pure alabaster Spine stone—Verpax’s central White Hall.
Craning my neck to take in the huge, rain-splattered dome, a wave of relief washes over me.
“My brothers?” I ask Lukas, turning to him. “They’ll be here?”
“They should be,” he says, then pauses. “I’ll take you to them. And later you’ll come with me. We’ll ride up toward the Northern Spine, away from all this, and I’ll wandtest you.”
He says it calmly enough, but there’s something in his eyes that brooks no argument. I nod in assent.
Satisfied, Lukas pulls his hood over his head, the carriage door opened for him by one of our guards. He steps out into the rain, turns and extends his hand for me to take.
For a moment I hesitate, afraid to expose myself to the open, but Lukas’s aura of invincibility steadies me. I take his hand and pull my cloak tight against the icy rain.
Lukas steers me through the needling rain toward a wide staircase that leads to an arching doorway. Anticipation lifts my battered spirit.
Rafe. Trystan. Gareth.
They’ll be there, just past the doors.
Lukas pulls the heavy door open for me while he gestures for our driver and the guards to continue on. As our carriage pulls away, I slide into the building’s huge, torch-lit foyer and am quickly cast into confusion and deep alarm.
A large contingent of Gardnerian soldiers, Elfhollen archers and Vu Trin sorceresses swarm around me.
Lukas’s hand clamps tight around my arm as he pulls me backward and whips out his wand.
A sickening metallic scrape tears through the air as the Vu Trin sorceresses unsheath curved, rune-marked swords and the Elfhollen nock arrows, all aimed at Lukas’s head.
“Stand down!” orders one of the Elfhollen, his gray uniform marked with a single blue stripe down the center.
“What’s this?” Lukas demands of a stern-faced Gardnerian soldier whose uniform bears the silver markings of our High Commander—a wide silver band encompassing his upper arms and silver fabric edging the bottom third of his black cloak.
Lachlan Grey. Lukas’s father.
Heart racing, I search the older man’s face for something of Lukas, but can find little resemblance, except in the line of his jaw and his identical, fierce green eyes.
“It appears that Mage Elloren Gardner has never been formally wandtested,” Lachlan Grey informs his son with barely concealed anger.
“That’s not true. I have been tested,” I protest shakily. “My uncle tested me more than once.”
Which I don’t remember. And he lied about formally testing me this past year. A thread of dizzying fear worms through me.
Lukas’s hand tightens around my arm.
The Elfhollen commander steps forward. “She is on Verpacian territory, and I am taking her into custody,” he grinds out to Lachlan Grey, ignoring my protest.
Lukas pulls me a fraction closer.
Lachlan stares the Elfhollen down. “She is a citizen of Gardneria,” he counters. “You have no jurisdiction.”
“She is potentially the greatest weapon in the Western Realm,” the Elfhollen insists.
My mind spins in tumult, my heart hammering. This is impossible. I’m no weapon. I have absolutely no power.
“Tell your son to stand down, Lachlan,” one of the Vu Trin puts in as she enters the foyer, her tone conversational. “You’re outnumbered.”
Lachlan Grey is unmoved. “I insist on bringing her back to Gardneria.”
“Not until she is tested,” the Elfhollen demands. “Right now. Under a joint guard.”
A joint guard? To test...me? I look to Lukas imploringly, his hand still vise-tight around my arm.
Lachlan Grey’s eyes cast around, visibly calculating the chances of successfully taking on so many Elfhollen and Vu Trin. “Stand down, Lukas,” he finally relents.
Lukas’s face is fierce as his eyes dart around the room, wand still raised. I begin to feel weak in the knees.
Commander Grey eyes him, furious. “Lieutenant Grey, I said stand down!”
After a long moment of deliberation, Lukas resheathes his wand but keeps tight hold of my arm.
My heart feels like it will pound straight through my chest.
“Very clever, Lachlan,” the Vu Trin comments. “Hiding the girl in Halfix for so many years.”
“Believe me, Commander Vin,” Lukas’s father replies as he glares at his son, “it was completely unintentional.”
“No one was hiding me!” I insist with spiking alarm.
Lukas’s quick look silences me, his eyes a warning.
“If she is found to be powerful,” the Elfhollen puts in to Lachlan Grey, “we will be taking her into custody.”
“No,” Lachlan firmly counters. “What’s to prevent you from killing her?”
Killing me? My gut clenches, and I stifle a cry. I move closer to Lukas and clutch at the side of his tunic.
“We could place her in the High Tower under a joint guard,” the Elfhollen offers, “until we come to an agreement regarding what to do with her.”
“Dismiss half of your guard, and I will consent to the girl’s testing,” Lachlan capitulates.
Commander Vin eyes Lachlan with amused suspicion, then gestures toward Lukas with her chin. “Dismiss him, and I will agree to it. We all know that your young lieutenant is equal to ten of us.”
Lachlan’s eyes flick back and forth from Lukas to the Vu Trin guard. “Very well. Lukas, you are dismissed.”
Lukas makes no move to release my arm.
“Please,” I beg them, the word bursting out. “I just want to see my brothers.”
“Silence, Gardnerian!” Commander Vin snarls. Her hostility sends me inwardly reeling.
“Lukas,” Lachlan says firmly, his eyes belying a steely confidence, “you will accompany the Vu Trin guard to their western base.” He raises his brow at Commander Vin. “Agreed?”
Commander Vin nods.
Lukas stares hard into his father’s eyes. His hand loosens from my arm.
I hold on to his tunic, heart racing. “No, please. Don’t leave me!”
He turns to me and places both hands on my arms. “Elloren, they’re going to test you, and then they will talk. There’s enough of our Mage Guard here to ensure your safety.”
“No!” I try to cling to him, but firm hands pull me back.
There’s a flash of indecision in Lukas’s eyes, but then his face hardens and he turns away. I watch, despairing, as he strides out of the room flanked by ten Vu Trin sorceresses and a contingent of Elfhollen.
Desperation takes hold. I struggle against the hands that restrain me, tears stinging at my eyes. “Let me go!” I insist. “My brothers are here. I need to find them...”
And then Commander Vin is before me. She stares me down, her eyes narrowed to hostile slits.
I stop struggling and shrink back from her.
“Elloren Gardner,” she says, steel in her eyes, “you will come with us.”