The Traitor Queen (The Traitor Spy Trilogy #3)(97)

Smoke or light, it seemed easy enough, but it took Lilia a few attempts before she was no longer detectable by Bokkin’s mind. He must have sensed something in her approach changing, because by the time she did manage to enter his mind he was worried about her succeeding.

It’s not right, he thought. She broke a law. She shouldn’t be allowed to learn these things.

A memory rose. A face. Lilia instantly knew it was Bokkin’s father. “Someone will always grow stronger than you – if you let them. You have to sort them out while they’re weak. Stop them getting strong.” Bokkin caught himself, forcing himself to stop remembering, but not before Lilia caught three quick flashes of emotion-laden images. Love and hurt. Beatings. Anger. Grief.

She understood, then, that Bokkin believed this fiercely and completely, and thought it the best piece of wisdom his father had taught him. After all, his father had proven it by beating his own son into obeying and fearing him. Then his father had been killed by a man he had admitted he should have been harder on.

That’s what he’s trying to do to me, she realised. He is thinking about the future. I’m going to be stronger than him, so he’s trying to weaken me now. She shuddered at the thought of the kind of magician he would become. By then he’ll be stronger than most people. It’s only other magicians he’ll be threatened by. Like me.

—Lilia? Kallen spoke.

She moved out of Bokkin’s mind.

—Yes?

—You have done well. That is enough for now.

She felt his hands leave her head, so she opened her eyes and released Bokkin. Kallen moved around to the chair and sat down. The door behind him opened.

“You can go now, Lord Bokkin. Thank you for your assistance. Tell one of the others to be here tomorrow morning, at the same time.”

“Yes, Black Magician Kallen.” Bokkin bowed and hurried out of the room.

The door closed behind him. Lilia leaned against the back of the chair, delaying sitting down. She didn’t even want to feel the residual warmth of Bokkin from it.

“What did you learn?” Kallen asked.

Lilia grimaced. “That he believes anyone who might grow stronger than him is a threat, so he has to find a way to dominate them before they dominate him.” Then it occurred to her he was probably asking about mind-reading. “Which is the opposite to how mind-reading works. You don’t succeed by trying to dominate.”

Kallen nodded. “Yes.” He shook his head. “Magicians like Bokkin are the reason we do not teach this level of mind-reading to all magicians.”

“Wait … you mean anyone can learn to do this?”

“Unfortunately, yes. High Lord Akkarin was the first Guild magician to learn how to read the mind of an uncooperative person, so it has always been assumed that it was a skill that required black magic. He revealed to Black Magician Sonea that this was not true by teaching her how to read minds before he taught her how to take and store magic. Sonea agreed to keep that fact to herself. You must do so as well.”

“Oh. Definitely.” The thought of what Bokkin might do with such knowledge sent a shiver down Lilia’s spine.

“You have a fresh and interesting way of approaching things, Lilia,” Kallen said. “Like this idea of using a quick, strong stab of forcestrike as a substitute for a knife when performing black magic. It is ingenious. I have described it to Lady Vinara, and we have discussed ways we could experiment safely.”

She felt her face warm at the praise and looked down. “Well … I hope it works.”

“Even if it doesn’t, it’s worth trying. Well, that’s all for today. You had best get to your first class.”

As the door opened again, Lilia bowed and murmured his name. She made her way to her first class of the day feeling alternately cheered and worried. I’m learning so much from Kallen, and he seems to approve of me more now that our lessons aren’t all about Warrior practice.

Yet while she now knew why Bokkin was harassing her, she had no idea how to stop him. He’s always going to be working against me. I’m always going to be stronger than him, though, and he’s too stupid to ever be a threat in other ways, so it could be worse, I suppose.

But she was going to have to keep a constant eye on him, and that was going to get very, very annoying.

Once Anyi’s footsteps had faded from hearing, Gol stood up and retrieved his tools from under his mattress. As he got back to work, Cery inspected the holes his friend had drilled into a section of wall earlier, each one piercing mortar and the earth beyond. Anyi hadn’t noticed them. The bricks were rough and cracked in places, and Gol had chosen positions where the lamplight cast heavy shadows.

He had to bend close to see the end of the tubes Gol had inserted in each hole, each with a little tongue of oily paper protruding.

“How many more do you want to do?” Cery asked.

Gol had moved to the opposite wall. “Depends how quick you think we can light them. You don’t want the first lot to go off while we’re lighting the rest. If I do five in each wall and we do a wall’s worth each, we might get them all lit. Bring me a tube, will you?”

Moving to the box of fruit Lilia had brought them the night before, Cery emptied it and lifted the sacking at the bottom. He’d stored the minefire underneath, relying on Anyi’s dislike of fruit to keep her from discovering it.