The Rise of Ren Crown (30 page)

“Thank you,” she said graciously. “I've worked hard to be where I am.” A harder glint entered her gaze. “And I am good at what I do.”

It reminded me of Camille, who had said something similar about her own abilities once. Both extremely confident, and even though I wasn't much of a fan of Bellacia's views or tactics, I could respect her strength.

I looked at the other work room. Technically, it was mine now. But did I want a place where Bellacia could snoop to her heart's content when I wasn't around? Or where her previous roommate had been?

Who knew what sorts of traps Bellacia's roommate had left in there. Dare might be able to give me some pointers on securing the room—heaven knew he had his own locked down like Fort Knox. But tonight my magic wasn't up to it, even philosophically.

No, better to continue schlepping my bag. Or just put everything in Constantine's room. He already knew all of my secrets. He could poke all he wanted.

“I'm going to bed,” I said.

I hauled my bag toward the bedroom and bathroom. I tried not to be unnerved by the lock clicking into place on the main door, locking us both in.

When I got back, Bellacia was stretched out on her bed in her black, white, and green tank top and shorts, looking over reports.

“There hasn't been a curfew in years. The Department is going to be going over all of the records and disturbances on campus,” she said, as if we were continuing some conversation. “The decisions that the administration has made. Decisions concerning your enrollment and your little outburst at the Shangwei Art Complex.”

I winced, as I placed things on the nightstand. She'd been following me for so long, she'd probably learned of it fall term after it happened. Those students who had followed me at the party ready to enact whatever social control punishment they'd intended, were probably there on her orders, searching for the mage who had destroyed the building.

“Such an interesting firework burst during the show. The man you were fighting looked just like that lovely one in your photograph. Did you two have a falling out?”

Her voice was lazy.

“I told you. There was a familiarity enchantment in place.”

“Ah, yes. The mysterious enchantment. Who was underneath the enchantment then, Ren Crown?”

“Some terrorist.” I lined everything up next to my pillow—Chapstick, my photo, magical ear plugs. The last, I desperately wanted to pop into my ears, but I was afraid of what would happen if one of my senses was dulled.

“It looked very personal, that fight between you. I fed all of the information about it and a recording of it to the mage on staff who tackled the article. It's up to fifty million views already. The recording stopped so abruptly, though, that all of us watching it felt cheated. There's a reward for anyone who supplies the rest of the footage.”

Everything in the room seemed to be closing in. I pulled back the covers, keeping her visible in my periphery.

She twirled a lock of hair around her fingers. “You were just absolutely covered in paint, dear. What was that all about? And where did it all go? I saw no evidence of it on Top Circle.”

They weren't questions. They were taunts.

“Maybe it was just hidden under the blood,” I said tonelessly.

“I do so wish you would just let me scrape through that brain of yours. Make it easy for both of us.”

I touched the scarab in the interior pocket I had quickly, magically, attached to my sleepwear. It had taken almost no magic to secure it, but it had felt agitated since I'd pulled it from my bag.

The scarab had possessed too much active magic to be hidden under the shadow cloak—and even Neph had reluctantly agreed it would be a red flag pointing right at her as two otherwise unidentifiable individuals illegally jetted across campus.

The small stone beetle was hot under my fingers. I wondered if Bellacia was trying to do something to me, even now.

“Good night, Ren.” Bellacia's lilting voice was smug.

“Good night,” I gritted out politely. I hopped in bed and turned toward the window. The view was all wrong.

And with Bellacia's light laugh in the background as she turned off the lights, all I had left was to think. We had all agreed that it was too dangerous to use any communication in Bellacia's room, even the armbands. After seeing her setup, I thought that wise.

But that left me very much alone.

Thoughts ran through my head like water overflowing an already full cup.

Olivia. Constantine. Raphael. Kaine. Dare. Julian. Marsgrove. Greyskull. Bellacia. Stavros.

Marsgrove had left campus already. While I was in the bathroom, Bellacia's audible feed had been playing the news of which officials had returned and which had left. She had been letting everything come through audibly. Taunting me with the knowledge she had access to.

A banner of news tickertaped the top of our room, like a soft blue nightlight. I couldn't take my eyes from the words, as they magically changed from reporting on the student status of Excelsine to reports on Raphael Verisetti, his plans and access to alternate magical technologies. Twins and death were next and I followed that rabbit hole for a moment until I shook myself and looked at another headline. Next were words on Stavros and Kaine, then on Dare. A stream of reports appeared about him and in the midst of “breaking news” I worried for a moment that he had left his room and gone back to the competition.

A report on how Dare had “escaped defeat” in one round of the competition heats made me narrow my eyes at the words.

Then horror took me and I shut my eyes.

Bellacia's laughter followed.

The tickertape was magically changing to report on whatever topic I was
thinking about
. Automatically projecting the news I was interested in. I kept my eyes locked tight and breathed in deeply. An insight into my thoughts was
not
something I wanted Bellacia to have.

“Oh, Ren, you aren't being any fun. That is a highly advanced piece of tech you are ignoring.”

“And the fact that I'm a highly unstable mage is what
you
are ignoring.” My magic, recovering more now that we were both in here and resting, sparked.

She laughed again, but it was a much shorter sound. When I peeked up again, the tickertape was still going, but it was in some sort of code. Whatever Bellacia wanted to see, then.

My fingers clenched carefully around the deflated paper and tucked it half under my pillow. Close enough for comfort and for keeping it concealed from my new roommate.

I was too wired at first to fall, then stay, asleep. Waking nightmares plagued me with the standard fare of Dare dying and Olivia slipping away and all of my friends calling out for help with me being unable to do a thing as I slowly lurched toward them in nightmarish fashion. Too late, always too late. One dream followed another, jolting me awake.

But my thoughts soon turned sluggish, the exhaustion from a day of overwhelming emotion and physical activity taking its toll.

I breathed in the magic of the balloon as I fell asleep—the tendrils slipping into my mouth. Worlds turned in my mind. Then blackness descended.

Chapter Twenty: Nightmares and Consequences

Perched high above—as if I was a spider in a corner crack—I looked down inside a bright, vibrant room that was edged in the same blackness that had overtaken me. Two very familiar people were facing off below.

I opened my mouth to shout, but nothing escaped my throat. Locked in nightmare status—like with Marsgrove's ball, it was as if I was separated from what I was viewing by a clear shield of glass.

Below, Olivia coldly examined Raphael. “I think not,” she said, continuing some argument.

He gave her a smooth, nearly mischievous smile. “You will.” His expression abruptly changed to mirror the coldness of hers. “Or I will physically extract your magic through your fingernails. And such lovely ones, they are.”

Olivia curled her fingers into her palm. “Your threats mean little.”

“Of course they do,” he said, voice taking on a cajoling quality. “You are the daughter of Helen Price. And action is everything.”

Even in a dream, my heartbeat sped up.

“I knew her, once.” Raphael's eyes glittered. “And once again. And I can see her magic, her marks all over you.”

“Impossible.” Olivia's voice was dismissive, but not entirely capable of hiding her unease.

“No? 'Helly' was such an adept student at figuring out how to take protection magic and turn it the other way. You forget that not only do I know exactly what to look for in her magic, but I devised most of the spells she uses.”

He leaned into her space and pressed a finger into the hollow of one shoulder. Olivia stiffened, and her leg jerked uncontrollably, pain overriding her control.

“She made sure to watch each spell I performed,” he said casually, twisting his finger just a bit and making her other leg spasm as well. “And she made sure to test each back upon me. Do you know what it's like to have a nearly limitless pain threshold, but the sensitivity of those with the least allowable amount? You feel everything, but never pass out. The pain just keeps going and going and going.”

Olivia lifted her chin, pain obvious in the motions as her legs continued to jerk.

“But you aren't the one who should suffer.” He lifted his finger. “Are you?”

“Go to hell,” Olivia said in her crisp voice.

He leaned forward and whispered in her ear. “I've never left.”

His gaze lifted and met mine, and he smiled at me, then lifted his finger back into position.

Panic rocked me and I tried to launch myself forward. The dream immediately began to shatter. I felt a foreign excitement that was not my own. It made me pause long enough to stem my panic. I drew back and looked at the shattering cracks of the dream. Olivia and Raphael were still moving inside, the jagged lines making their movement jerk from one shard to the next. I took a deep breath and carefully patched the glass shards together, shaking hands working feverishly to put each back in place, then smooth my hand along the cracks.

The foreign excitement had dimmed, and I wondered at my strange, splitting brain.

Raphael was prowling around again inside the dream, but Olivia was now released from the chair. Whether this was the same dream, or a new one, I didn't know.

“Do you think while you have that, that you will be safe?” he said.

Olivia's fingers curled more tightly around the creation I had given her—it had bloomed into a butterfly when she'd used it to sacrifice herself for me. “I think that it gives you pause.”

Raphael smiled. “Origin Mages are such interesting creatures. They suck in the powerful like magnets too forcefully attracted.”

“You are trying to make light of our friendship.”

“Yes.” Raphael prowled around her. His gaze lifted to meet mine again and he smiled. He could
see
me
. “I could kill it. That seed of trust you have in her. Crush it like a grain beneath a pestle.”

If he could see and speak to me, then maybe—

I called out for Olivia, but one of the shards immediately started to crack again.

Olivia looked down at the butterfly for a long moment, then up at Raphael. Her smile grew slowly. It was tinged with darkness. Knowing. “No, you can't.”

But she was speaking to
him,
she couldn't see me. I paced the edges of the vision, trying to figure out
how
to access it without breaking it.

Raphael laughed, suddenly and incongruously, like so many of his actions. “Delightful.” He crouched in front of her. “I had that once, you know, that
knowing.
That someone would always be there. It was even truth, for a bit, but time savages all things.”

“Or maybe you put your trust in the wrong person.”

“Perhaps.” He moved suddenly and touched a finger to her forehead. “But if I plucked out some of you, replaced it with something else. Would you still be you? Would you want to be someone else, Olivia Price?” His voice was low and hypnotic.

Her fingers curled around the butterfly and she swallowed with difficulty. “Before, yes.” They were playing some dangerous game of bravery chicken and she wasn't moving as he lightly tapped her forehead. “Now, no.”

“You wouldn't invoke that same debilitating loyalty from my Butterfly, if you were someone else. I could break that link.”

“I don't think it would matter. Not to her.” Fierce emotion underscored her words.

I was nodding wildly and my hand was pressing against the barrier. Another shard gave an ominous crack.

“No? What if I plucked out some of her? Made her into something
more
.”

Olivia's eyes narrowed and her breath started exhaling faster. “I would pluck it right back.”

“Oh,” he smiled and moved back. “So you want to keep her stagnant? Unchanging? But nothing stays the same. One can never go
back.
” His voice was mesmerizing and I could see Olivia fight against it.

“That is the beauty of loving chaos, then, isn't it?” she said. “It's always changing, always fluid and unpredictable. You never have to just
be,
do you, Verisetti?”

Raphael smiled, eyes dark. “Clever girl. Clever, clever girl. I'm going to enjoy pulling you apart.”

He reached for her and I shouted. One of the shards flew forward and my voice echoed through. Olivia turned toward the sound and her gaze met mine. She opened her mouth, but the edges of the dream had cracked, a tunnel sucking it backward, sweeping the edges away into the vastness of space. I grabbed for the shards, arm shooting forward. A shard went tumbling from the center, the pressure pulling it all. My hand went through the opening.

Pressure pulled at my hand.
Pulled my hand
. I set my feet, prepared to follow my hand through.

“No, Ren!” Olivia's voice yelled. Her horrified gaze was looking at something to my left. Raphael's splintering gaze was narrowed on my ear.

It was enough to stop me for a single moment.

Something slithered faster than my eye could see down my extending arm and launched itself at them through the hole.