The Rise of Ren Crown (34 page)

“There was a good system already in place, which usually worked.” I shrugged. “This was really more of a...panic response to being teamed with, er, Axer.”

People kept giving me weird looks when I referred to him as Dare. Like only strangers did that. It was hard to change, though. He was Dare in my head.

Even though he'd made me a peanut butter sandwich an hour ago.

I was still processing that.

“But you could have set up that panic response with us,” someone blurted out.

Deliberately and slowly, I looked around the room, meeting all of the gazes staring back at me. “Could I have?”

A few gazes turned away.

“Let's face it. I don't belong on this squad,” I said frankly. “And many of you have felt that way about me from the beginning. It's not a secret.”

“You've been a very productive member of the squad, Ren,” Isaiah said, voice slightly chastising.

I gave him a strained smile.

“Listen up, everyone. I won't tolerate any breakdown in the squad or rotations,” Isaiah said, expression grave. “If there is anything that yesterday has taught us, it's that we need to work together as a community.”

No one said anything, but I could feel the enormous weight of their gazes on me.

“Schedules are on your feeds or tablets. Go forth and bring peace.”

Chapter Twenty-four: Dog Day Afternoon

Leaving the meeting, I was able to take a better look at my surroundings, since I wasn't juggling five things. Gazes peered back everywhere I went—solemn and questioning. It was worse than it had been last night.

“Did you see that spell she shot through the roots?” one murmured. “What was it? Who was the boy?”

Everyone had seen the firework—the recording of me fighting “Christian” under the dome. I hadn't reviewed the footage. How much of the fight had been recorded? How much had Saf and Trick shown?

“Just the beginning.”
Trick's mental voice was reserved.
“And there was no sound. Sorry, Princess. It was the only thing that would grab
everyone's
attention.”

I swallowed. “It's okay,” I murmured. It was going to have to be, at this point. “Are we still meeting?”

A meeting time had been thrown out in the flurry of communications I had been fielding on the way to the Justice Squad meeting.

“Yes. Come over any time.”

Trick and Saf's room was unofficial headquarters at this point.

Most of the members were already inside. They caught me up on what I'd missed.

“The crowd went crazy after the firework, yeah, but Nephthys was brilliant with your double's physical responses and we herded around you. Even watched the rest of the memorial in full view of Bailey and her ilk. Eight thumbs up, on our end. Had a little trouble when we didn't think you'd make it back, but, luckily, we held off on Plan B.”

They'd
waited.
They should have dumped my double and all the trackers and markers attached to it, erased their memories, and disavowed further involvement. But, now that we were back safely, I couldn't say that I wasn't relieved they hadn't.

I couldn't tell them
exactly
what had happened on our midnight trip, or what had happened with my dream and Kaine, but I let them know that Marsgrove had Olivia's location and that he was chasing after her at this exact moment.

Trick turned on a feed.

“Violence continues in the Third Layer, as the Legion, praetorians, and terrorists engage in active warfare.”

Most of the news outlets were reporting on the Third Layer violence that had been occurring all day. Many speculated that the attacks were direct retaliations to Bloody Tuesday.

“Some of the attacks have to be simple retaliation without deeper meaning,” Dagfinn said. “Plenty of Second Layer folks are foaming at the mouth with the desire to dirty their hands in some vengeance. But if even some of those I've identified in the wires are Marsgrove and Verisetti and the praetorians—they are jumping all over the Third Layer in a mad version of a child's game.”

“Marsgrove will rescue her,” I said, a little desperately. “I'm so
sorry
.”

Looks were exchanged.

“Princess, you made the right call. We were all in a bit of a tailspin last night after you went off grid with Axer Dare. It really brought it home. Hearing that Marsgrove is getting her back was a massive relief.”

I closed my eyes. It would have been a solidly served plan, too, if Kaine hadn't used me to muck it all up.

“Dean Marsgrove is a right prick about a lot of things,” Dagfinn said. “But he's a fighter and tracker. And he's always favored Price.”

Olivia's familial relationship to Marsgrove wasn't a secret.

“Dean Marsgrove has a better chance than we do,” Saf said bluntly. “You did the right thing giving him her location.”

The others murmured their agreement. Their uniform accord that giving Olivia's location to Marsgrove had been the best option was unexpected.

I couldn't let them think that I was blameless for the current mess, though.

“Kaine used me to track them too,” I blurted out.

More looks were exchanged.

“Ren.” Mike sighed. “Kaine was going to track you to the ends of each layer of the Earth. What do you think was going to happen if you were the one to leave campus?”

They all exchanged looks again, and I felt very outside the loop.

“What happened?” I asked, dread coiling.

“They caught two students leaving last night, Crown,” Saf said. “It was a good plan the two cooked up. We had it on our list.”

I looked around the table, stomach dropping as I read their solemn expressions. “And?”

“No one's heard from them since the Legion nabbed them. Not a frequency exchange, not a peep. They took the two of them under the guise of worldwide security.”

I looked down at my hands.

“They can't keep them for long. But with you? They'd find a reason,” Mike said grimly. “Easily and quickly.”

They'd test me. Properly this time. In the basement of the Department where they could manufacture any results they wanted.

Neph pressed her palm to my skin. Tension dissipated like a balloon freed from its knot.

The entire room seemed to take a deep, calming breath.

“Word has it that they are going to open the Magiaduct before dinner—get all of us rotating through the cafeteria,” Lifen said. “Public spaces north of the seventh circle will be open.”

“I don't know about you, but I'm not all that keen on getting out,” Loudon said, rubbing a hand over his short curls. “The Legion is going to be scanning us at every turn. This isn't like the office stooges and scientists who were here before. The Legion is ruthless. And they have tagged every one of us from recorded feeds—identifying the scarf wearers, if nothing else.”

Hyped up as we'd all been on the adrenaline from yesterday, today more rational heads were in play.

“That reminds me, we made this for you this morning.” Will smiled and handed me a small, square jewel. “It doesn't stop people from knowing who you are, but this will absorb all the tracking and marking spells anyone tries to place on you. Like tracking spell flypaper. The jewel inactivates them, but keeps them inside.”

He shrugged. “The capture allows you to go over them later, if you want, to see who tagged you—there's a brilliant spell decoder that Adrabi put in there. We're all planning to tailor and use them,” he said frankly.

I examined the flat jewel, then tucked it into my armband—the interior lining had been made for just this type of addition. “It will absorb all the spells?”

“All the ones that can be scanned for.”

Not shadows, then. But getting rid of all the spells that random—and not so random—students were placing on me was a boon.

“People will be scrambling to come up with better trackers before the day's out.” Adrabi smiled, all flashing teeth and bronzed skin that looked far better today than the mottled look he'd sported due to a flaying spell cast on him the day before.

“Luckily, we know most of the makers on campus personally. We'll be having a challenging time staying a step ahead of the crowd.” Adrabi looked like that suited him very well.

“Nothing we can do about Administration Magic, but I looked into the Department's permissions on campus. They can't hook into tracking individual students yet through Administration Magic. And their 'mission' here is to secure campus. So they are legally restricted to student help in tracking us.”

As I knew well, they had plenty of those.

“They'll be trying to pin us. Hard. The Department not only wants to pin the blame on the Administration, but they want all of us under their thumbs, and
some
of us under their dissecting scopes.”

I pressed my lips together. The Department wanted powerful tools, but anyone connected to me was most at risk. “I don't want any of you caught in the crossfire. There
will
be crossfire. And it will be my battle to fight.”

Adrabi didn't break eye contact, and he didn't hesitate. “Nephthys
Bau
resurrected me four times yesterday,” he said frankly. “Four times. And we all know she wanted to be at
your
side—she was leaking magic like a mother bear full of rage and purpose—yet she hunted each of us down, repeatedly, to make sure we survived the day.
All of us
. Other than Price, and that was an extenuating circumstance, every single one of us connected to the Plan made it to see sunset, and we were in the
thickest
parts of the battles in
separate
circles of the mountain. Bau waded into every one like a wraith and plucked us each from the eversleep.”

Neph studiously didn't look up, busy as she was manipulating the emotions of the room. Keeping us all on even keel. I could feel the tight knot of emotion inside her, though, that she was trying to hide.

Guilt, shame, and fierce gratitude all wrapped together again inside of me. “I, uh, accidentally whammied her.”

“Yeah,” Adrabi said dryly. “We know. Obviously with instructions to save us all. Listen, Crown. You let us take care of things around campus for a bit, got it?”

Neph looked up and pierced me with her gaze. It wasn't hard to decipher what she was trying to convey.

I looked back at Adrabi and swallowed. “Yeah, okay.”

“And don't worry about your muse. I've already got some things in the works for protecting her. We've got her back in the days to come.”

Frowning, I started to ask, but the conversation mysteriously switched direction and I blinked for a second. What had I been about to say?

The thought slipped free of my mind as we started to discuss what could be done when we were released from lockdown. Loudon continued to fret.

“Think positively, lad,” Patrick said. “Location protection charms and eavesdropping interference devices are a
hot
market right now. And the steady traffic wanting to ask us about Bloody Tuesday is only increasing those sales as they buy devices in an excuse to meet and ask questions. We are selling out across the board.”

Patrick winked at me. “I'm keeping a log. Price will want to know all about it when she returns.”

I nodded slowly at him. It was a foregone conclusion to them that Marsgrove would get her back. I wanted to believe it too.

“Chin up, Crown,” Patrick said.

~*~

During my first round of calls, more than one person sputtered, stuttered, and dropped what they were doing, when I showed up. I was also nearly blasted four separate times in reaction. By the end of the hour, though, I was receiving far more considering looks and far less
accidental
blasts aimed my way. The news had spread that I might answer a Justice call.

I had my hands full with a slew of grief calls too. And those...those were both easier and harder to bear.

I made a side trip to Medical halfway through my first rotation and shakily whipped up a dozen more roses, this time using Christian's orb as the focus for my feelings and limited magic. I dosed each paper flower with a liberal swipe of the healing wards. It helped that when Greyskull passed me, instead of chastising me, he plucked a ward from the wall and draped it over my hand without breaking stride.

The ward, and the inherent permission within the action, had been similar to Marsgrove's device—and it made it easier for me to get past my blocks, allowing me to direct some of the Administration Magic instead of using my own.

I used all twelve of them within twenty minutes. Tucking them into the room when the Justice offender was looking elsewhere, or simply handing it to them, if their grief was especially fierce.

As each minute ticked by with no positive news about Olivia or Marsgrove, though, the feeling inside of me darkened as well.

I clicked out of service and opened the door to Bellacia's suite, determined to spend one of my mandatory hours logging reports and searching for any scrap of information on Olivia or on Marsgrove's location. Maybe I'd luck out and Bellacia would be out.

As luck had it, not only was she
in residence
, but five of her magicist cronies occupied chairs around a table in the main room.

Bellacia smiled sharply at me. “Ren, welcome back.”

I nodded and walked quickly to bypass the table and get to the bedroom. There was no need to wonder about the tracking spell blocker Will, Adrabi and the others had made. I could see the panic in some of the faces around the table as they indiscreetly checked devices, wondering why they hadn't been alerted to my presence.

“Outrageous that she walks freely,” someone said, jerking in the opposite direction as I passed.

“Her magic is up,” Oakley said, making a note. “Too far up.”

“Her magic can hear you,” I said, without breaking stride.

“Don't antagonize the Origin Mage, Oakley,” another chastised. “But I do agree it is suspicious. The lack of tracers could be due to a visit to her little friends. But, she should only be recovered twelve percent with the room's magic. Where is she getting the extra? What if she's pulling it from the earth or grounds? What if we are about to suffer an event? Or she's Rising?” He shook his head. “Record her levels and check them against the readings from this morning and yesterday. We'll need it in our report.”