Nocturna (A Forgery of Magic #1)(38)

His spiraling mind found Paloma’s voice and clung to it.

To perform the most powerful magic, you must stop calling the magic to you. Instead, you must approach it on its own plane.

If he couldn’t help Luka with rudimentary healing spellwork, then he would need to reach for more complex magic. He needed to focus, to reach a state where he and the magic were one and the same. If magic were a pool, then he was merely wading in the shallows; the most potent magic was found in its depths.

Luka started to shake again, his body convulsing against the ground, foamy spittle stained pink with blood gathered at the corners of his mouth.

“Please,” he said to the thief. “Just keep his head on your lap. I don’t want him to hurt himself while he shakes, and I need to concentrate.”

She hesitated for a moment before shuffling behind Luka and pulling his head and shoulders onto her lap. Alfie placed his hands on his chest and did as Paloma always told him to do before performing advanced spellwork—ignore his fears, his anxieties, and let himself fall into the magic, reach a state where it was only him and the magic working as one. Alfie calmed his shaking breaths, closed his eyes, and let his mind fall blank and clear.

The noises around him—the girl’s fidgeting, Luka’s whimpers—disappeared. He couldn’t feel his hands on Luka’s chest, couldn’t feel the tiled floor under his knees.

When he opened his eyes, the Blue Room was gone. Luka and Finn were gone. All around him were colorful streams of magic and the shimmering colorless, free magic that swirled through the air, waiting to be pulled into a body and colored in its image. When bruxos were erudite enough to reach this realm, they could see the color of magic too, but Alfie was the only one who could see it outside this plane. He’d only ever heard of due?os and philosophers being able to reach this place after years of study and meditation. Alfie stood in the ever-present nexus from which everyone drew their magic. One used magic, coloring it with their touch, then let it go back into the ether. It returned here to turn colorless once more for someone else to use.

“Por favor,” Alfie heard himself say. “Please help me save him.”

But the more he begged the magic, the more he tried to grip it in his shaking hands, the more it bowed away from him, skittering away from his touch.

Alfie knew what this meant.

If magic shies away from your touch, your intentions are not the right ones. You must let it go. Paloma’s words echoed in his mind.

But he couldn’t leave this place until he found a magic that would help Luka. Against every lesson he’d learned, Alfie concentrated harder, forced himself further into the magic. He moved through it, trying to grasp at streams of free magic that slipped out of his hands like eels. He was swimming against the current of the magic he’d been taught to respect. But he didn’t care. He couldn’t respect what would not save Luka.

Chasing after the currents of magic, Alfie found himself face-to-face with a wall, a barrier of sorts. It looked like a wall of adobe brick, but each brick was a different color.

Bricks of magic.

Whatever was beyond this wall could help, he knew it.

Alfie banged his fists on the barrier. “Let me in! Abrir!” he shouted weakly. Nothing happened. The wall stood silent and unwavering.

Alfie pressed his forehead against it, his eyes wet. “Please,” he begged. “I need help. I’ll do anything, please.”

A glimmer of light caught Alfie’s eye. He turned toward it, and there at the center of the wall was a keyhole ringed in white light. The keyhole was the size of his hand and was level with his chest in the brick wall. Something powerful was hidden here. It had to be. Perhaps this was a test. Maybe he needed to prove himself worthy to get to whatever powerful magic lay behind the brick.

Alfie leaned close and ran his finger along the outline of the keyhole built of magic.

A spark lit in Alfie’s mind.

The wall was made of magic. It must need a key of magic.

In this realm where magic could be built into a solid wall, then perhaps it could be made into a key too? It was all Alfie could think of. It wasn’t as if he had the time to search through this vast network of magic for a key, if it even existed. He would need to press his magic into the keyhole and shape it to fit the lock, which was easier said than done.

Paloma’s voice echoed in his head. The finest bruxos are so intertwined with their magic that it’s as if their magic has nerves. As if they can feel the world around them through the flow of their magic. Magic becomes an extension of themselves, their very flesh.

After much practice, Alfie had felt that level of connection only a few times. He’d spoken a spell and briefly felt his magic zip through the air, as if it were an extension of his own skin. But those moments were few and far between. Now he would need to feel through his magic entirely. He needed to feel every edge of the lock and mold his magic to it before turning the key.

His hands shaking with nerves, Alfie guided a stream of his dark blue magic into the keyhole. He leaned forward and tried to look into it, hoping he might be able to spot its shape. But he was too nervous to feel anything. He let the magic fizzle out. He paced before the keyhole, his palms sweating.

“Focus,” he said to himself. Magic needed to be guided with confident hands. Hands that trusted it. He tried twice more, nearly pressing his eye against the wall to try to see the lock’s inner machinations, but nothing happened. His magic was moving blindly. They weren’t connected. Alfie could not feel the grooves of the lock, couldn’t feel anything but his heart pounding in his chest. He let his magic fall away.