The Killing Grounds Page 12

  She threw the door open, rushed into the room and checked to make sure the bookcase still remained intact. “First things first,” she said aloud she picked as many textbooks as she thought would fit into the locker, and stacked them neatly in the corridor outside of the apartment door. After making sure that she had covered all of her study material she estimated that she had room left for another three books and a few odds and ends from around the room. There were still a multitude of tomes to pick from and she would need to choose carefully. Alara closed her eyes and let her talents scan the books, she traced her fingers over the spines trying to search out any possible texts that were pulsating with magic, but found none. She was about to leave the books and concentrate on the rest of the room when one caught her eye, The Complete works of Rudyard Kipling. She grabbed the book, held it close to her body and remembered the last conversation with Lord Osari. He had been impressed with her knowledge on the subject and had warmed to her presence. If this were to be their only real connection she would treasure it as a memory of him.

  Alara let her mind mentally search around the rest of the room, maybe something else would jump out at her, but there was nothing. Alara was about to give up and leave when she realised that there was something missing. Her mind probe should have picked up the ward on the bedroom door, but nothing resonated. She sent another pulse towards the door, but found nothing barring her way. Maybe the ward had worn off when Lord Osari had been retired, but she knew he had no Artistry. Someone else would have had to put the ward in place for him. She crossed the room as excitement built inside her. She placed her hand on the door and pushed, it was locked, but that wasn’t going to stop her. She examined the lock in her mind’s eye and aligned the tumblers with ease and pushed the door open and walked inside.

  Much like his study the bedroom was decorated in a minimalistic fashion. Only a double bed with matching side tables and a large footlocker placed at the bottom of the bed were in the room. There were no cupboards or mirrors and Alara wondered how the assassin dressed in the morning, considering he looked immaculately groomed when they had met, maybe the answer is in the locker. She reached out with her mind, but found no sign of magic anywhere in the room. The box was locked, but it took no time at all for Alara to open it. She peered inside, but there was nothing except neatly folded fatigues and a small vanity case. She took one of the black cloths that Lord Osari had worn and tied it around her bicep, she would celebrate his life in her own way and the cloth would act as a reminder of him when she was training. She closed the lid and examined the contents of the bedside tables, but found them empty. She stripped the bed and checked the mattress for anything hidden there, but found nothing. It seemed to her that Lord Osari was a meticulously clean man; maybe he was ex-military? She used her skills to scan the walls of the room in search of any hidden doors or cupboards, but came up empty. Feeling disappointed and emotional she left his rooms, halting only to say a silent farewell to her sponsor. She had never had time to thank him before he left, and that irked her more than anything else.

  It took four journeys back and forth from the dorms to Lord Osari’s rooms to get all of the books back and packed into her locker underneath her fatigues. She kept her demeanour businesslike on the outside so the rest of the class couldn’t see that she was upset, no point in showing them that she was vulnerable at the moment. The Quartermaster said that the game was now on and she couldn’t afford any lapses in concentration. The thought of Lord Osari being dead depressed her, but the thought of having to live in the dorm with the rest of the apprentices depressed her even more. Luckily her exploits on the common meant that the herd was thinning and so there would be more room in the cramped barracks. She looked around at the remaining twenty-four apprentices who were busy preparing themselves for the upcoming lessons, and couldn’t help but think of them as the walking dead. The only one doing nothing in particular was Black, he lay back on his cot with his eyes semi-closed tossing the blade and catching it with nonchalant ease. She looked closer and noticed his eyes were moving swiftly from side to side, he was practicing his Art, which was something that she should be doing in her spare time.

  His eyes flickered back to reality and he jumped up. “Lords in the barracks!” he shouted and stood to attention at the end of his cot. The rest of the room quickly followed suit as Lord Sirap and two other Lords that Alara had never met entered the room. Lord Sirap did a quick inspection of the apprentices as a matter of protocol and then ordered them to stand down. The class relaxed their posture, but stayed in line waiting for instructions from the black-clad assassin.

  Lord Sirap paced up and down the line of apprentices as he spoke, “Ladies and gentleman, I would like to introduce Lord Cavanni and Lord Kingswood of the Guild Council,” he paused to give the apprentices time to digest who the two Lords were. “They have asked to speak to you directly and even though this is in serious contravention of Guild laws I have agreed to this due to the unfortunate early retirement of Lord Osari.” Even though Council members sponsored one or more apprentices, unless they were directly involved in their training they were strictly forbidden to enter the dorms.

  Early retirement? What does that mean? She glanced over at the two Lords quickly to get a mental picture of them. Her eyes moved fast as she didn’t want to be caught watching them. Even though the class had been ordered to relax that didn’t mean you could stare down a Lord. They were very similar in stature, both tall and lithe, their faces gaunt with sunken eyes. The big difference was the hair; Lord Cavanni was bald, but had a large black and grey eagle tattoo that covered the right hand side of his head. Lord Kingswood had a full mane of salt and pepper coloured hair that was neatly tied in a braided ponytail behind his head. Both men stood stock still, their faces calm and composed, but Alara could sense their underlying anxiety. She reached out gently with her mind and searched for signs of the Arts, but before she could sense far enough Lord Cavanni’s head snapped toward her. She pulled back the probe as fast as possible, but she was too late. Damn it! Lord Cavanni crossed the room and stood directly in Alara’s line of sight, only six inches from her face. She wanted to take a step back from the man, but was trapped by her locker that dug into the back of her legs. His gaze seemed to last an eternity, but Alara never met it directly. Instead she concentrated on the wall directly behind him. She could hear her heart beat loudly in her chest and she wanted to gasp for air, but she kept her mouth shut and gritted her teeth.

  Something you wanted to say girl? He spoke directly into her mind.

  No Lord Cavanni.

  Are you sure there is nothing that you would like to tell me?

  She could feel him probe deeper and deeper, violating her mind. She concentrated solely on pushing him back without attacking his probe head on. My mind is an open book Lord Cavanni.

  Indeed, then kindly open it up to me. It will only take a minute and I’ll not bother you again.

  She contemplated letting Lord Cavanni into her deepest thoughts, but that would be as good as an invasion and she couldn’t let that happen. Unfortunately I have to say no Lord Cavanni, please ask as many questions as you may have and I will answer, but I’d prefer to keep my mind to myself. She pushed back his advances more forcefully.

  Sensible answer but we both know that I could push through your weak defence and open you like a tin of peas. He pushed hard into her mind and blasted aside her defences, but stopped just short of invading her innermost level of consciousness. Let this be a lesson Girl, some Artists are more powerful than you can imagine and your weak attempts to scan others can and will be acted upon, should you make the same mistake again. He pulled his mind back until he had left Alara’s head and walked back to where Lord Kingswood stood waiting. Alara took a deep cleansing breath and wiped the sweat from her forehead with the sleeve of her shirt.

  “The Council requests that each of you be interviewed individually,” Lord Kingswood began. “It has come to our attention that someone in this room has know
ledge of the recent retirement of Lord Osari. You can save your classmates this ordeal if you took a step forward now and revealed yourself.” He waited a second, but none of the class made a move. “So be it, the interviews will start tomorrow from zero five hundred hours and this dorm will be on lockdown until then. I suggest that you all get some rest as you’ll need it, trust me!”

  Alara continued to stare at the wall in front of her, but she could feel Lord Cavanni scanning and probing around the room with his mind.

  “The interviews will be conducted in credit level order, with twenty-five first and A1 last. The interviews will last as long as the Council deems fit and an apprentice may be called more than once. Should the interviews prove to be insufficient then classes will be cancelled for the rest of the week and other avenues will be explored!”

  Lord Kingswood and Lord Cavanni left the room without Lord Sirap, who started pacing up and down the dorm again. “I apologize for this course of action ladies and gentlemen, during normal situations you would not be expected to go in front of the Council before your acceptance day, but these are far from normal circumstances and I have been instructed to hand you over to the Council immediately. Be warned, they will use any method they choose to extract the information they seek, you will be tested and found wanting if you try to hide anything from them. Twenty-five step forwards.” Alara watched Lord Sirap place a hand on the boy's shoulder, and for the first time she saw pity in his eyes. “Don’t be late boy. Class dismissed.”

  Alara fell backwards onto her cot, the mental probe from Lord Cavanni had been painful and she had felt it physically and mentally when he’d broken her defences. At least whatever it was wouldn’t take them long to find, Lord Cavanni would be able to break any of the apprentices in seconds if he chose to. She felt physically ill after he had played with her brain, it had never happened before and she was in a state of panic to think that she could submit to his will so easily. At least she’d learned that Lord Kingswood had no Artistic powers that she knew about, and that was some sort of relief. As she reflected on her ordeal she found the similarities between Lord Cavanni and Lord Kingswood and Gideon and Black interesting. Both pairs were made up of Artist and mundane, both seemed to be the same age and both seemed to look alike. She tried to imagine Lord Cavanni with hair; he would be the spitting image of Lord Kingswood, brothers with different names? Maybe the same mother but different fathers, yes that has to be it. Her assumptions about male bonding might be truer than she first thought.

  Time was ticking by slowly and she was getting bored, maybe she could use her skills to do some snooping on some of the mundane members of the class. The problem was that if she found something out she wouldn’t be able to deny the fact when she was questioned by the Council. No, she would keep her mind to herself and play the situation by ear. There would be nine boys interviewed before her and she would be able to gauge from them what could happen to her and prepare accordingly. She looked over at Twenty-five who was pacing up and down the dorm, obviously distressed that he was first in line for the inquisition. For the first time she felt truly sorry for the boy. She knew that he had no mental skills to arm himself with, and even if he did she doubted that they would be any use to him with Lord Cavanni in the room. The dorm was silent except for the thud of blades hitting the practice target. Alara closed her eyes; she was exhausted and fell into a fitful sleep.

  ***

  The sound of a blade hitting the floor startled Alara awake, she sat up sharply but realised it was just two boys practicing their blade skills on the target in the dorm. Her sleep had been full of dreams about Lord Osari, but she was grateful that she had at least managed a few hours before the inquisition was to begin. She checked the clock and found that she’d slept for seven hours straight. That was the most sleep she had had in weeks, and her body thanked her for the down time. She’d dreamt about The White Man’s Burden and remembered the Kipling book she’d rescued from her Lord's rooms. The words of the first stanza were still crisp in her mind, but she wanted to read further into the poem to look for clues to its meaning. She retrieved the book from her locker and carefully replaced the protection spell. Sitting on the end of her bed with her feet on the locker she traced her fingers over the drawing of young Gunga Din the water carrier and the British soldiers that took pride of place on the cover. The book was in pristine condition without so much as a crease or crack in the spine. The first page felt thin under her finger as it ran down the index until she came across the page number for The White Man’s Burden, but as she attempted to leaf through the pages she found that the book was just an empty shell. Each of the pages had been carefully hollowed out from the centre, leaving only a twenty centimetre border around the edges. In the middle of the void was a death stone similar to hers that had been placed face down. She felt her own slowly pulsating against her chest. This must be Lord Osari’s death stone!

  She scanned the stone looking for any connection to Lord Osari, but it just sat there dormant. She slammed the book shut and looked around the room to make sure no one was taking any notice of her. She opened the book and pulled the stone out to examine it, when six mind probes hit her all at once and she struggled to throw up a barrier around herself before they found out what she was doing. Each probe bounced harmlessly away from her shield, that’s the last time I do anything here without protection, no more mistakes girl!

  Alara sent out probes all around the room trying to find the source of those six scans, but even though she could sense them, it was impossible for her to accurately know who mentally attacked her. At least her mistake had worked to her advantage; she now knew that at least six of the remaining twenty-four were Artists, seven if she included herself. She only knew of Black’s talents for certain, but she had reason to think that Lucinda and two other boys had Artistic skills, but that left another two hiding somewhere in the room. Happy to find out some new information she considered who the others may be. If her guess was right one of them was a member of the A’s, and the other was a lower ranking to her. The probes had been of various intensities, the only attempt she recognised was Black’s probe and his had been the most intense, but there were two others that were close to his strength. She reinforced her shield and added a haze to stop any prying eyes, the rest of the class would still be able to see her, but their view would be hampered. She cupped the stone and lovingly polished the outside with the cloth she had taken from Lord Osari’s locker. Dread filled her mind at the thought of turning it over and seeing the dead crystals, but she needed to get some sort of closure on Lord Osari’s death. Maybe she could scan the crystals and they may give her some sort of clue as to what had happened to him, thoughts of vengeance played with her imagination and she toyed with the stone, but there was no point in putting off the inevitable and she turned it over in her hand.

  Eleven:

  The crystals inside of the stone were pale blue and vibrated gently in her hand, Oh, thank the gods. A wave of relief washed over her and her heart skipped a beat. Lord Osari was still alive. The crystals were nowhere near as animated as they should have been, but that didn’t matter to her, he was alive, somewhere. He had surely known that she would find it in the book since Kipling had been their only real connection. Doubt and paranoia started to play tricks with her mind, telling her that it was just coincidence, but she fought back the negative feelings and concentrated on staying positive. Lord Osari had meant for her to find the stone and it was up to her to solve the riddle of his disappearance.

  She cupped the death stone in both hands and kissed it, the stone pulsated gently against her lips. Now if she could just make sense of Lord Osari’s reference to The White Man’s Burden then she would really be getting somewhere. She thought carefully about the poem and its reference to the British, and how Kipling had spoken of the need to pass on knowledge to the native nations that they conquered for the good of the world’s economic growth. The British had colonised half of the globe at the height of their power and h
ad a foothold in all of the continents. Maybe the picture of Gunga Din on the cover was a clue that she should approach Singh. She dismissed the thought as the Artistic side of her nature told her that wasn’t the right course of action, and she always listened to that side of her being.

  Why are you making this so difficult Lord Osari? The stone pulsed twice in her hand. Did you do that on purpose? she mentally asked the stone. It pulsed once. Once for yes and twice for no? It pulsed once. She stared at the crystals in amazement; the stone could communicate with her. She quickly asked it where Lord Osari was, but the stone lay dormant in her hand. Only yes and no answers? The stone pulsed once. Is Osari alive? The stone pulsed once and then twice. Does that mean you don’t know? Two pulses. He is neither alive nor dead? One pulse. What the hell does that mean? No pulse came and she felt stupid for expecting one. She needed to calm down and think. The White Man’s Burden speaks of more than one person; does that mean I can find help? One pulse. Is that person in the room? One pulse. Can I trust them? One pulse followed by two more. If I say the name of each apprentice will you tell me who it is I should speak to? Two pulses. She would have to work the riddle out on her own, the question wasn’t difficult, maybe she was just overthinking the issue. Who would a white man pass on information too? The answer came to her immediately, a black man. Her eyes flew to Black who was lying on his cot tossing the blade into the air and catching it as he always did. The stone pulsed once. So far her dealings with Black had worked out to both of their advantages, but the stone had indicated that she could either trust in him or not trust him. Black was an assassin and a good one, she’d seen firsthand how powerful his Artistry was and he was either equal to or just behind Gideon in strength. Gideon? She asked the stone. Two very distinct pulses. They both had the same surname and she didn’t want to choose the wrong Black.