The Breaker (The Secret of Spellshadow Manor #2)(22)

“If we get caught, we get caught. That’s it,” Jari replied with growing determination.

“No, Jari. I don’t think you quite understand how high the risks are. If I get caught and they decide to lash me with some magical whip, don’t you think the blizzard that will undoubtedly spring from my back will be a dead giveaway?” Alex asked, trying to make his friend see the problems in such a dangerous scheme. “And there’s no telling what they’d do to the both of you. It’s too risky, Jari. Surely you see that?”

“I don’t mind taking the risk,” Jari said desperately. “Our friend needs us. I don’t care what the risk is.”

Natalie glanced at Alex. “How about we all wait until tomorrow, when it is our first lesson, and we speak with Aamir afterward—we make sure he is all right then, when it is much safer?” she suggested calmly.

Jari shook his head. “I have to know he is okay tonight,” he snapped, keeping his voice low as he narrowed his eyes at Natalie and Alex. “If you had seen the state he was in, we wouldn’t be having this conversation! We would already be making a plan.”

“But the risks are—” Alex repeated, but Jari interrupted.

“Aamir would come for any one of us if we needed him. You know he would.” Tears sprang to Jari’s eyes. He wiped them away furiously, his voice thick with emotion.

It was hard to acknowledge, but both Alex and Natalie knew Jari was right. Aamir had been one of the first to befriend them and make them feel welcome at the manor, with his easy manner and his quick humor and his endless warmth. He had made them all feel safe. If what Jari said was true, then their friend was in real trouble. They owed it to Aamir to at least try to check on him, though none of them knew what state they might find him in.

“Then I suppose we are going to help.” Natalie smiled tightly, the dread evident on her face.

Alex nodded, his throat going dry. “I suppose we are.”





Chapter 9





The clock in the hall was sounding midnight when Alex and Jari stole out of their dorm room, slipping from shadow to shadow as they made their way through the familiar corridors of the boys’ section, pausing at each corner to listen for the sound of footsteps on the flagstones. In the silence, all they could hear was the distant rumble of other boys snoring, safe inside their rooms, and the steady tick of the clocks.

They moved quickly in socked feet, having left their shoes behind in favor of quieter fabric soles. Around the bottom half of their faces, they had wrapped black scarves, hoping it might make them less conspicuous, though they realized that, if they were caught, they’d have the scarves ripped from them regardless. Still, it made them feel more comfortable—stealthier somehow—as they tiptoed through the sleeping manor, toward the intersection where the two dormitories met. Natalie was supposed to be waiting for them on the corner, but neither of them could see her as they approached. Camouflaged in the darkness, Natalie startled the two boys slightly as she emerged, soundlessly, from the shadows. She, too, had socked feet, but no scarf around her face. She frowned at their rudimentary balaclavas.

“What are those?” she asked.

“Scarves,” Alex whispered.

“To hide our faces,” Jari added, muffled behind the fabric.

“You must take them off—they look ridiculous!” Natalie said. The two boys shuffled the scarves down, exposing their faces. They couldn’t deny it felt nicer to breathe properly than to have their faces covered.

Faces fully visible, they began the stealthy journey toward the blue line of the teachers’ quarters. They moved slowly through the dark hallways, the dimming torches barely shedding any light on the path ahead of them. They could have done with some moonlight, but the worlds and lands beyond the shifting hallway windows were having none of it; they refused to offer up any glimmer of light, giving only dark storms and savage tempests, clouds thick and furious, smothering any sunlight or moonlight that might have helped the trio find their way. It was as if the manor itself were angry at their disobedience.

Suddenly, Natalie’s voice whispered back to the other two as a dim blue light appeared in the distance.

“There it is,” she breathed, pressing herself flat against the wall. “We should check for any teachers.”

They crept closer to the glow of the blue line and stopped beside it. Natalie peered around the wall and looked up through the darkened corridor beyond, squinting to try to make out any shapes lurking in the shadows. It was empty—as silent as the rest of the manor.

“It is all clear,” she said. Alex shuffled past her to get to the blue line. He knelt on the ground, the stone cold beneath his knee, even through the fabric of his trousers.

Taking a deep breath, he found the energy coiled within him and felt it course through his veins as he willed it into his hands, the familiar sensation of it twirling around his fingers as he conjured a mass of anti-magic between his palms. Seeing the raw ball of anti-magic, rippling black and silver, he focused his thoughts upon it, manifesting it into something more useful. With a slight turn of his wrist, the anti-magic stretched out into a blade, the edge thinning to a point, as it pulsed and sparked with icy energy.

He lowered the blade toward the blue line, surprised to see the weapon holding its shape more easily as he focused his mind more intensely on what he wanted to see, using the turn of his wrist to build the definition of the long knife. As he touched the edge to the blue line, it cut through the stream of sapphire light as if it were butter, severing the connection as the two ends broke apart. Alex felt the push of the magic against his hands as he held the blade of anti-magic against the ground, but it did not creep through him or try to attack him. In fact, the blue line seemed to have very little effect at all on Alex, barely bothering him as he deflected it elsewhere. He moved the severed ends away, leaving a safe gap for the others to pass through.