Bran could hardly believe the words he was hearing. He was smart enough to know what Baslyn was asking of him. He wanted him to be like his mother, to take her place and help him bring the Farfield Curse back.
Baslyn took a sip from the glass.
"But…I’m not a Dormaysan," Bran said slowly. "Adi said I’m free from the curse."
Baslyn turned his gaze away, as if he had heard something repulsive.
"It doesn’t make any difference to me or your mother," Baslyn said. "If you’re free from the curse, then so be it, but the powers are still alive within you."
"But I won’t do it." Bran said strongly.
"Maybe you should think before you make your decision." Baslyn hissed.
"I’ve already thought," Bran hissed back. "I will not be a part of something that kidnaps people and locks them in cages to make an army to overrun the Council."
"So you would make the same mistake your mother did?" Baslyn asked. "Let your heart get in the way of what you should do—get in the way of what’s right?"
"But it’s
not
right," Bran said. "You killed people to make the Farfield Curse."
"It all ends up right in the end," Baslyn said. "A few must be sacrificed for the good of all."
Bran shook his head. "I don’t care what happens or what my mother did. My loyalty is to those who are my friends, and their loyalty is to the Mages Council."
Baslyn slammed his fists onto the desk.
It made Bran jump, and Baslyn leapt to his feet, seething with anger.
"
The Mages Council!
" Baslyn burst. "What if I told you that the Mages Council has lied to everyone, even Adi, and they did
not
destroy the Project, but kept it, and hid it for their own use if ever they should need it?" He hit the desk again. "And what if I told you that I once followed the Mages Council, and was
used
by them in secret? And once they were through with me, my name was erased, and my research destroyed…" He bent closer. "What if I told you that someone very close to you is part of all of this, and that the research of the Farfield Curse itself was
started
by your accursed Mages Council?"
Bran hardly knew what to say, shocked at Baslyn’s fury. Bran could do nothing but stare back at him, until finally Baslyn turned away.
"Believe what you wish," Baslyn said angrily. "But you’re too smart of a boy to hide it from yourself. The Mages Council is but a fantasy, and all the good people who serve under it are nothing more than well-meaning pawns…"
He curled his fingers into fists. "…each doing what they think is right, but combined, working for an evil they struggle so hard to fight off."
"That can’t be true," Bran said. "The Mages Council works for good."
"Do they?" Baslyn shot back. It took Bran by surprise how quickly he had responded.
"Do they really seem to work for good?" Baslyn asked again. "It seems to me your city still doesn’t allow mages, gnomes are still being killed, and the world is at its deepest point of unrest." He raised his chin. "Seems like there’s a slow, unseen war going on, Bran—a war between what is right, and what many mistakenly believe is right. How can you be sure that
you
are on the right side? How are you so sure
you
are not being deceived?" He lowered his voice even further, "It’s a war, brewing and stirring right underneath our feet, ready to break at the slightest tipping of the scales. Can’t you feel it?"
His voice sounded ominous, and what terrified Bran most was that Baslyn’s voice seemed to hold no lie.
What does he know?
Bran wondered.
"But you are just a child," Baslyn said, sliding away. "You do not realize how short life is."
He dropped his voice. "And you are not as valuable to me as you might believe."
With that, Baslyn reached for an intercom button on his desk.
"Bring her in," he said, and Bran heard the door open behind him. He stiffened and heard Astara struggling in the doorway. Marcus escorted her in, and Craig caught Bran by the shoulder. Baslyn arose, and Bran was roughly shoved to the other side where Baslyn had been sitting. He was forced down into a hard chair, and he felt another slammed to the back of his. He looked over his shoulder, and he saw Astara being pushed into it, her back to him.
"What’s going on?" she whispered to Bran, as Joris stepped into the room. His face was grave though he said no words, and in his hands were two pairs of magecuffs.
"This," Baslyn said, "is called
creative disposal.
"
Joris clicked magecuffs over their wrists, binding them to the chairs though he didn’t yet turn the power on.
"It’s actually quite simple," Baslyn replied. "It’s much like killing two birds with one stone. See, with all the time I have been kept here, we are sure to leave tracks behind, through which the police might find us."
Marcus had begun to carry in a set of small black boxes. He set them around the room, one near the corner, the next halfway, the next beside the desk, until he had gone all the way around and out into the hall. Baslyn watched him, then turned back to Bran.
"And, since you have refused every offer I have presented you," he went on, "you leave me with no choice but to cover up the tracks I may have left with
you
as well."
"You’re going to kill us then," Astara said.
"It’s war." Baslyn shrugged. "Some people die."
Marcus connected wires between the boxes. Baslyn gestured at them. "These boxes contain powerful explosives, not enough to bring the building down but quite sufficient to destroy this room and both of you, no matter how strong your powers are."
Bran pulled against the handcuffs, but they were tight and unmoving, and his arms were pinned behind his back. Craig handed Baslyn his pistol and a remote.
"This is what will happen." Baslyn said. "First, I shall kill each of you myself. Then, I will press this remote."
He pointed to a larger box, to which the others were connected. "Once the button is pressed, there will be forty seconds for me to take the stairs down, and while everyone below is panicking, we will escape the city." He turned. "And this floor will be destroyed, leaving nothing behind to track us by."
His words were smooth, icy. Gone was the anger Bran had seen on his face; there was no emotion at all. Baslyn was through with him, and he was just finishing the job.
Baslyn looked to Joris. "Go ahead and turn them on. Then I will finish here."
Joris nodded, and he leaned toward the magecuffs. Bran heard a click as they were switched on, but for some reason, he felt no different than before. It was oddly disturbing, so much that when he lifted his wrists to turn them, the handcuffs almost felt as if they weighed less than he remembered from the van, though he dared not test it by pulling for magic. With one last glance in Bran’s direction, Joris turned for the elevators.
When Bran heard the elevator doors slide together, the room seemed to become empty. He felt sweat beginning to form on his forehead as Baslyn stepped toward his desk.
"Look," Baslyn said, taking something out of a drawer. "I almost forgot: Adi’s wand."
He dropped it to the floor. "How sad," he said with fake regret. "In the fire, her wand might never be found."
Bran felt anger boiling up inside. Baslyn began adjusting things
on the pistol, and Bran forced himself to be very still, trying to clear his mind. He searched for any way to escape, any idea that might free them. He heard the clash of thunder, and rain began to beat down outside the windows on the stone porch.
"You know Bran, I am sorry it has to end this way," Baslyn said. "I had expected you to do things differently than your mother—to finish what she started." He shook his head. "So many questions left unanswered for you, so many things you have not yet discovered about yourself."
"I know enough," Bran said, trying to hold on to his courage, even when he heard the pistol clicking. He felt Astara’s hands next to his, behind his back; they were cold and trembling. Baslyn seemed to be considering something, still clutching the pistol.
"I suppose there’s one thing you should know before I kill you," he said. He lifted his chin.
"The reason Clarence never came to get you," he said, "is because Clarence is
Shambles.
"
Bran stiffened in the chair.
No. It couldn’t be.
But even as he denied it, he knew. He could remember Shambles on the roof, he could hear his voice in the back of his head, saying his mother’s name—it came back to him in a rush. He could remember the horrible images of the creatures, locked in the cages.
"Yes," Baslyn hissed. "Clarence was his name, before he lost his mind, before we made him a host for the Project. It was your mother’s idea to save his life. I thought we should have killed him early on, but for some reason she would hear none of it." He shook his head. "I don’t know why she did it. All that was left was a maddened, torn scrap of a creature, completely out of his mind and hardly anything but a skeleton. She called him by his name, Clarence; Joris called him by the state his mind was left in." He gave a small, wicked laugh. "It was Shambles’s idea of repayment to swear to save her life one day in return. A pity, since he never made it to Dunce—not even in time to see her die."
Bran pulled against the magecuffs, his arms shaking because his fists were held so tightly.
"When Emry ran," Baslyn went on, "Clarence disappeared as well, though Elspeth tells me Joris caught him. And not even his loyalty could stand up to their questioning."
"The bracelet," Bran remembered, trying to stall for time. "She held him prisoner with it!"
"More a pawn than a prisoner," Baslyn said. "The bracelet wasn’t created by us. Your own mother made it for him as a gift. He wore it as a symbol of his promise to her. Elspeth only had to change its powers to speak within his mind."
Baslyn nodded. "Of course Elspeth could not leave to look for you. Every MIP in the world is looking for her. And though Shambles denied it for years, he knew where to look." Baslyn met Bran’s gaze. "He wasn’t the only one who knew where you were, either. Someone else did, and he knew the house."
All of a sudden, Bran saw something out of the corner of his eye: movement, outside of the doors. It was more of a shadow, sliding across the floor, so dark and quick that he barely noticed it. He heard a click and shifted his gaze back to Baslyn. He was readying the pistol.
"And since your mother couldn’t,
I
shall free Clarence from his promise," Baslyn said. "Because once you are gone, there will be no more Hambrics for him to serve."
He began to lift the pistol, and Bran held his breath. He could see the end of it, aimed in his direction. The room seemed to go still, the silence invading Bran’s mind as he looked at the gun, the bullet that was about to end his life. Bran stared into the blackness of the barrel.
"Good-bye, Bran," he heard Baslyn say, and Bran saw his finger move toward the trigger.
But all of a sudden, there was a sound at the door.
Chapter 34
The Battle on Farfield Tower
Baslyn spun around when he heard the scrape. "What?" he hissed, his voice dripping with rage. "Why aren’t you with the others?"
Bran saw someone in the doorway, crouched over and tense. For a moment, the figure met Bran’s gaze, and Bran looked back, unable to say anything.
It was Shambles.
As Shambles looked at him, Bran saw something different in his eyes than what he had seen before. Behind them was something Bran hadn’t expected—determination, as if his mind had been clouded, and in an instant had cleared, listening to the words that Baslyn had spoken. And suddenly, Shambles turned to Baslyn. There was a small knife in the creature’s hand.
"Bassslyn…" he hissed, and in a flash of motion, he leapt.
Shambles’s body slammed into Baslyn full force, taking him by surprise, knocking him to the floor. Bran heard Baslyn gasping, the sound of his fist slamming into Shambles’s skin.
"Bran!" he heard Astara hiss. He tried to turn.
"Look," she said, "the magecuffs aren’t working!"
"What?" he gasped, lifting his wrists, hearing Shambles and Baslyn struggling on the floor. He pulled them against the chair but couldn’t come free.
"Bran, they aren’t
working,
" Astara said quickly. "I think they’re missing their battery cells!"
Bran glanced toward Baslyn, but he could not see beyond the desk. He heard the struggle, Baslyn cursing at Shambles as they fought for control. Bran heard Baslyn attempting magic but Shambles bit him, breaking his concentration and causing Baslyn to shout in pain.
Bran bit his lip, fearing what pain would come if Astara was wrong, though knowing it was their only chance. He grabbed for the magic, and he was shocked to feel it come to his fingers, so that with hardly a thought he pulled at the handcuffs which bound his wrists, and he heard the metal ripping behind him. He gasped, and he heard the handcuffs clatter to the floor as Astara also ripped hers apart. The moment Bran was free, he leapt up.
"Bran!" Astara gasped, but he didn’t have a second to react. He felt someone grab him, and suddenly he was facing Baslyn. Bran lost his balance, and Baslyn threw him forward with fury. Bran’s back hit the windows, glass shattering behind him as his body broke through and outside.
Freezing air and rain slammed into him as he fell against the cold stone of the outcropping. He hit his head on it, blinking, the breath knocked out of him. He could hear cars and sirens, rain and thunder at once. He blinked his eyes open and squinted in the rain. Over him was the night sky, and all around him, shards of glass. The moon was gone, covered by black clouds.
In a second, Baslyn was over him, kicking Bran, pushing him backward, knocking the breath out of him once more. Bran winced with pain, but he was too dizzy to move. He had come to the edge of the porch, and for a moment he could see over, all the way to the streets and cars below. Everything shone in dazzling lights.