Confessions of the Magpie Wizard Book 3: Dissolution (Chapter 81, 82, 83)

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Chapter 81

“In and out, Malthus,” I said to myself. “Nobody’s looking for you. They have absolutely no reason to suspect you. In and out. Easy as pie.” I could practically taste the doom in the air, but sometimes the comforting lie is all you have.

I slipped into the library, finding it still abandoned. That was one hurdle cleared, but I would have to pass by the AV Club’s room to get to where I had left Mariko. I held my breath, tiptoeing carefully past the door. If I listened carefully, I could just make out Maggie’s voice, though I couldn’t tell what she was saying.

The Sewing Club room was as I had left it, and Mariko still lay on the beanbag chair. I detected a whiff of smoke in the air; I hoped the stubborn woman hadn’t tried to cast any magic. If she had, those shackles would have already shown her the error of her ways. “I hope you’re ready to move, Mariko. There’s absolutely no time to waste.”

The brunette twisted to face me, panic written all over her face. “Who are you?”

“What? Oh, this disguise. It’s me, Soren.” I flipped up my mask to break the spell.

“Soren?” I supposed I deserved that scornful look. “What do you want? Haven’t you done enough today?”

“You’d think so, wouldn’t you?” I said with an awkward chuckle. “I’m full of surprises today.”

“Finding out you were a Holy Brother was surprise enough. Don’t bother lying to me again; I know that uniform, and I heard the broadcast over the loudspeakers. How could you help them do this?”

“Listen, I’m not… we don’t have time for this. We can have our little reparteeonce you’re safely out of here.”

“I… what?” She narrowed her eyes, as though hoping to see some hidden truth. “No, what are you really here for?”

“I assume you want to make it out of here alive,” I said. “If you don’t, I can leave. It would be a lot less work for me.”

Mariko once said I was forever stumbling upon her at her worst moments. I could add another to the pile; I had never seen her so completely flummoxed. “You showed me those pictures of Ms. Edwards, captured me, joined with terrorists who are out to destroy the Tower… and now you want to get me out of here?”

“That’s not a bad summary.” It sounded a tad circuitous when she said it like that. “My quarrel isn’t with you. I think Ms. Edward’s scheme is doomed to failure, and the Tower is going to come down.” I carefully left out that I was the one who would scupper the plan. “I don’t think you deserve to go down with it.”

“No, I won’t go! Not without Headmaster Tachibana, and not when they’re about to destroy the school!”

“You’re in no position to make demands, my dear,” I said. “And you need to stay quiet! I didn’t exactly run this by the Holy Sister. It’s only a matter of time before somebody wonders where I’ve wandered off to!”

“Wait, they don’t know you’re here?” Her expression softened.

“To them, you’re a demonkin. If Ms. Edwards thought about it, she’d have you hauled into the AV room and…” I trailed off. Mariko was an imaginative girl, and I figured she would conjure up something more awful than I could. “Well, it wouldn’t be pleasant. She wanted to kill you before, remember?”

“I haven’t been able to think about much else,” she replied in a quavering voice.

“Then will you see sense? I can get you free and out of the Tower. I just need you to cooperate with me.”

“What’s going to happen to you?” she asked.

“Don’t concern yourself with that.”

“But-”

“No, I must insist that you don’t. It will be easier for everyone involved. Now, do you agree?”

Mariko’s expression brooked no argument, like an exhausted mother dealing with an unruly child. “Soren, look me in the eye. No, right in the eye. Is this another trick, like with the phone?”

“No,” I said. I wanted to flinch away from her intense look, but I held her gaze.

“Why are you here?”

“I felt shabby about what I did to you before, and I couldn’t live with myself if you were harmed.” It was bad enough having such weak ideas bouncing around in my head without having to voice them. How humiliating. “There, are you satisfied?”

“Yes,” she replied.

“Do you promise to come along quietly?” She nodded, thank the Dark Lord. I undid her bonds with an enchanted key and helped her to her feet.

I noticed her rubbing her wrist. “Please tell me you didn’t try casting any spells after I left.”

“I had to try,” she said as she fetched her purse. I noticed for the first time that the metallic shackles were pitted along the inside.

“You tried to use your disintegration affinity, I take it?” She nodded. “You always were a stubborn one. That must have been terribly painful.”

“I’ll live.” Her brusque demeanor seemed unlike her. Then again, I’d never been her enemy before. “Why are you asking about me? I thought there wasn’t any time to waste, Mr. Holy Brother.”

I couldn’t help but sigh. “I suppose there isn’t. Follow my lead.”

I glanced around the corner, relieved to find the hallway abandoned. “Zone of Silence.” A flickering, yellow aura surrounded the AV Club’s door.

“Why are you casting that?” Mariko whispered. “You can’t move it once it’s set.”

“No, but it might just keep them from hearing us.” I took her hand, forcing her along behind me. It was shaking like a leaf, of course. Oh, well; there wasn’t time to have her pop a nerve pill.

“Is that where they’re keeping Headmaster Tachibana?” she asked as we passed on by.

“What’s it to you?” I hissed. “What, are you going to launch a one woman rescue mission? Even if you were a fighter, you’d never make it.”

“Somebody has to try,” she said.

“No, quite frankly, they don’t. Who would ‘they’ even be? There is no they.”

“There’s you and me,” she said, dragging her heels. “You could take them by surprise. If we did it right, we could-”

“My dear, how much do you weigh?”

“What? Why would that matter?”

I summoned my most demonic expression and looked over my shoulder. “You aren’t so heavy that I can’t knock you out and carry you to safety. I’d rather not, but it’s entirely up to you.”

That shut her up. I didn’t like the horror in her eyes, but I could live with it. More importantly, so could she. I put the mask back on, though. It was the only barrier I could put between us.

As we descended, I chanced a look at her wrist. “That’s a nasty burn.”

“So what? It’s not like I can make my hand more useless.”

“Let me see.”

“Or what, you’ll knock me out and make me?”

I couldn’t help but wince. “Don’t be like that.”

She planted a hand on each hip. “How am I supposed to be?”

“Please? Let me put your tutoring to work one more time. It’s not much, but it’s all I can do for you at this point.”

With a sigh, she presented her wrists. “There, finally some cooperation,” I said. “We’ll have you patched up in a jiffy. Light Heal.”

She hissed as my hands came close to her old scars.

“Sorry,” I said on reflex.

Mariko shook her head, withdrawing her hands. “You said one more time. What do you mean by that?”

“I won’t have much cause to use it after today,” I replied.

“You aren’t… you’re talking like you’re going off to die.” The worry in her eyes hit harder than her earlier coldness. Our Father Below knew I didn’t deserve it.

“Oh, I’ll be fine,” I said. “I always land on my feet.”

The elevator had other ideas, suddenly wrenching to a halt. Our destination was in the basement near the garage, so we had been descending at a high speed. Mariko and I were both bowled over, and I just saw her head clip the edge of a handrail as she fell.

I was at her side in an instant. “Mariko?”

Her pained murmur told me she was alive, though probably regretting it.

“Of all the times for this damnable thing to fail!” I felt justified in distrusting the elevator all those months, though this was a Hell of a time to be proven right.

My tirade against technology was interrupted as I noticed two things. One was that the elevator’s walls almost seemed to sparkle somehow, and I detected a whiff of sandalwood, with just a hint of lavender.

Chapter 82

Sandalwood and lavender? I didn’t have long to act. “Svalinn’s Mercy!” A red tower shield as tall as me popped into existence an instant before an unseen force ripped the doors off the elevator. I recognized the hallway leading into the boys’ living quarters, and my stomach sank as my fears were confirmed.

“It’s one of them!” shouted Rose. “And he’s got Mariko!”

Yukiko didn’t respond. She was a tad busy holding the elevator in place with nothing but her Gravity Shift.

Luckily for her, but less so for me, Lucile was there to do the speaking for all of them. Kiyo’s aim was true; the rubber bullet would have pegged me square between the eyes if I hadn’t raised the shield.

Rose shouted again, but after the deafening report of the rifle, I couldn’t make it out. Yukiko must not have expected the noise right in her ear, since the elevator shifted a foot down.

“Lovely Fireworks!” I threw my gut into it, creating a dazzling display that filled the air around us with multicolored sparks.

My plan had been to dash past them, but I’d been a bit too dazzling, as always. I went weightless as Yukiko lost her focus and the elevator car dropped by like stone.

And to think, I’d been so close to getting over my fear of heights. I was sure it was the end until the elevator lurched to a halt, the walls of the car sparkling again, just barely stopping us.

At least I was right about one thing; Mariko wasn’t too heavy to easily move. I cradled her as I leapt off the elevator, just before Yukiko lost her grip, sending the doomed elevator car to its fate.

“Mariko?” She gave no response. I cast a Trivial Heal on her, which was all I had time for.

“Hey!” Hiro’s voice sounded distant from inside the nearest door. “Is somebody there? Help! I’m trapped! Hey, whoever’s out there, do you hear me? Help!”

I bolted down the hallway, wanting to put as much space between myself and Hiro as I could. “I’m in the bloody batting cages?” I chose not to think about how far we must have plummeted before Yukiko caught us again. I had more immediate concerns.

What in the name of Our Father Below were those three doing in the Tower? How were they walking around under their own power, for that matter? Had the maneuver with the Peace Bond completely failed?

No, that didn’t make any sense. If the students weren’t trapped, Mr. Maki would have already busted down our door, with the non-Brotherhood part of the staff backing him up to boot.

I had heard the elevator go off before. We must have just missed each other.

“But that still makes no sense, they should be completely trapped! They… oh my.”

My stomach churned as I realized just how close I’d come to bringing down the Tower with Kiyo inside. My hand flew to my mouth to cover my horrified scream. All of those maneuvers and months of effort to keep her out of trouble, and I’d nearly brought the whole Nagoya Tower down on her head!

Not that she’d been shy about taking a potshot at me! I forced my indignation aside; they hadn’t seen Soren Marlowe; they had seen Brother Mockingbird. I focused my Mimic Sight and glanced up. The mass of magical batteries on the rooftop was like a golden cloud above us, which must have been why I missed them before. As it was, I could just make out three shapes making a beeline for the stairs. I took the tallest to be Rose, since she was in the lead. I couldn’t tell Yukiko and Kiyo apart, but I was about to have bigger concerns.

“Brother Mockingbird, do you copy?” Brother Ratte’s harsh voice was loud enough to make my pocket vibrate.

“Brother Mockingbird, do you copy?” Maggie’s voice assaulted my ear through an ivory fabricata communicator.

My cell phone rang again, this time with Rose’s ringtone.

I chose the lesser of the evils. “I copy, Ratte! We have…”

I hesitated. Did I want to tell him about our guests? He wasn’t going to show the same restraint I would.

“A dang elevator just flew past us at terminal velocity! What’s going on up there?” The Norwegian wizard’s voice wasn’t doing my ringing ears any favors.

“We have company,” declared Maggie over the earpiece. “Somebody’s been using the elevator! Mockingbird, where the heck are you? You’re AWOL! Report!”

Was it too late to answer Rose?

“Come again, Mockingbird?” asked Ratte. “You cut out.”

I quickly weighed my options. I’d burned all my bridges as Soren Marlowe, at least with Mariko alive to finger me as a Holy Brother. I supposed I could just flee and blow the Tower. With those three on the loose, they would be able to evacuate just as well as Maggie’s group.

…I would never be sure, of course. At least not until the report came in from Dante or another of Fera’s agents. What if I heard that a few students had tragically died in the collapse? Or, what if they ran into Ratte’s trained soldiers? Could I live with that?

No, I knew what I needed to do. As far as Maggie’s crew knew, I was still a loyal Brother. I could use that to mitigate an awful situation. My friends could hate me all they wanted, as long as they were still alive to do it.

I engaged both comms at the same time. “We have company! Cooper, Sato, and Jones are all on the loose in the Tower!”

“What?” Maggie and Ratte were often at each other’s throats, but shrieking in my ear was something they could both agree on.

“Sister Shrike, remember our deal! Nothing happens to any of them! We need to take them down gently.”

“Our deal only covered that Kiyo brat,” spat Maggie.

“We should capture them alive, though,” I replied. “If only to find out if there’s anybody else in the Tower. If they got three students in, there could be more.” Perhaps I could even spare Hiro, as long as I was indulging my weaker side.

“Wait, Kiyo Jones?” Brother Maus’ voice came through more faintly, thank the Dark Lord. “One of the group that brought down Brother Gyrfaclon in Taiwan?”

“The same,” said Maggie.

“Jesus Christ, Sister Shrike!” Ratte’s voice switched from the commlink in my hand to the earpiece, much to my dismay. “You didn’t tell us your recruit was tied up with those interlopers!”

“That predated him seeing the light of the Brotherhood,” she replied, defensively.

“Regardless, Brother Ratte, I have my deal with Shrike. I’ll lead them to the shopping center, a few floors up from where I am. That should give us some room to maneuver.” It wasn’t ideal with Rose’s weather magic, but I figured that was less dangerous than Yukiko’s gravity manipulation would be in a tight hallway. “And again, we take them alive, or so help me, I’ll lead them out of the Tower myself. I want to hear those words, Sister Shrike.”

An oppressive silence filled the air. “Fine. Have it your way. Ratte, I’m sending some of my group down. They’ll meet up with your group in the shopping center.”

“Very well,” said Ratte. “We’re going to have a long talk when this is over, Sister Shrike.”

“I imagine we will,” she said in a resigned tone.

“Mockingbird out,” I said. Thankfully, things went quiet on their end too.

I held up my hands, demonic runes filling the air. “Lechtar.” Electricity danced between two of my fingers as I fished my smartphone from my pocket. I called Rose back, holding the sparking fingers as close to the microphone as I dared.

For the second time in as many minutes, the name of the Enemy’s son was shouted in my ears. “Soren, where have you been? Yukiko thinks you’re dead, and Kiyo’s worried sick!”

“My head wouldn’t hurt so much if it did,” I said.

“Soren, what’s wrong with your microphone? You sound awful!” Rose was panting lightly.

“Magpie? Is that Magpie?” I could just make out Kiyo’s voice in the distance.

“Rose, the mall,” I said, trying to sound as pained as I could. “You have to get up to the mall, I’ll explain… No! No, get away!” And with that, I shut the phone off completely.

Reaching the opposite end of the hallway, I arrived at another set of elevators. Good. I needed to save my energy for what was to come.

Chapter 83

As I jogged into the three-level shopping center, I couldn’t help but shudder. The Nagoya Tower often felt half-abandoned, but the shopping center was usually an exception. It seemed utterly wrong to hear my footsteps echo. Unless it was exceptionally early in the morning, there were always at least a few students milling around. It was the most reliable source of entertainment in the Tower, especially after they had put us on security lockdown after the attack on Mr. Maki.

There was some irony that they had locked us Holy Brothers in with them, but I wasn’t in the mood to analyze that. I didn’t see any sign of Rose or the others. I had to consider my approach carefully. I wouldn’t get another chance if I made a false move; all three girls were dangerous in their own ways, especially since I was out to bring them in peacefully. Wizard duels tend to be messy and short, which is why a smart wizard puts so much thought into his defenses.

I came to a stop in front of a water fountain near the creperie on the first floor. First, I fired a Magic Bolt through the glass storefront of the neighboring ice creamery, completely ripping the locked door from its hinges and showering the inside with a rain of razor-sharp shards.

Next, I created two Svalinn’s Mercy shields and willed them into position. One I slipped under the water line of the fountain and the last I plastered to the roof above me. Magical energy trickled out of me to support the shields. Most wizards considered Svalinn’s Mercy an expensive spell to cast, but I had the reserves to throw around. I made these structures thick and rounded. I knew how terribly sharp they normally were, and I wasn’t going to take any chances.

Speaking of which, it was time to load my trap. I swapped memory cards in the disguise wand. With an act of will, I became the Indonesian accountant. I’d managed to stitch together enough clothed pictures of him to preserve his dignity. I removed the fabricata mask while I was at it; I wasn’t eager to field test how the two magics would interact.

As I predicted, Rose arrived first. Thank the Dark Lord Yukiko had killed her elevator, or I’d have never beaten her. The baser parts of me thought she looked fetching in her white and green cadet uniform, though I noted that she had lost her beret somewhere along the line.

The diehard runner didn’t even pause to catch her breath before she was on high alert. I couldn’t help but be jealous of her endurance. Her green eyes locked on me. “Hold it right there! Who are you?”

I pasted a smile on my borrowed face. I had never gotten the voice files to load properly, but I had heard him talk about barely legal tax evasion in his SatoTube videos often enough to do a decent impression. “I’m Fadhlan. I work in the ice cream shop. You’re Rose, right?”

Nodding slowly, the blonde wizard came closer, her hands still ready for the casting. Smart girl. “You do seem familiar. Are you alright?”

“I am, but that boy isn’t,” I said, pointing through the ruined glass. “I think he’s a student. He stumbled in and passed out.”

The color drained from Rose’s freckled cheeks. “Soren?” She edged over to the door, more cautiously than I would have liked. She was understandably on edge, but that would make her harder to ambush. “I don’t see anything in there.”

“He’s in the back,” I said, stepping closer. “Come along, my dear, I’ll lead you right to him.”

A concentrated burst of wind sent me sprawling before I could say another word.

“There’s no Fadhlan who works at the ice cream shop,” she said. “And I know what you sound like when you’re putting on an accent, Soren. What are you doing?”

Our habit of imitating the Headmaster and other non-native English speakers with each other had come back to bite me. There was something to be said for tolerance or some such rubbish, but I didn’t have the mental energy to consider it too closely.

I didn’t let the disguise slip right away, since I was still dressed in my brotherhood uniform. “I couldn’t be sure it was you, Rose. Not after what happened at the Serving Wizards House.”

“So, what were you going to do, try and knock me out to check?”

“No, that would be absurd,” I said with a nervous chuckle. “What do you take me for? I was going to make sure you smelled like lavender.”

She lowered her hands. “Well, that just confirmed who you are. You’ve always been obsessed with that.”

“A simple observation is not an obsession!”

“If you said so,” she said with a fleeting grin. She was back to business soon enough. “What’s going on here, and why do you look like that?”

“There’s no time for that! We need to get moving!”

“Of course there’s bloody well time for it! Soren, your apartment was a disaster. There was broken glass everywhere, and everything that wasn’t nailed down was gone!”

“I suppose I was overdue for a good spring cleaning,” I said. “The Brotherhood apparently saw me as a threat after my performance before, and they wanted to make sure I wouldn’t be around to oppose them. I got away in the struggle, which is where I got the wand, but then the damn Peace Bond caught me! I only just got free. Now, what are you three doing up here? I thought I was by myself.”

There were some obvious holes in the story, but I knew I could count on Rose to give me the benefit of the doubt. As she rushed in and seized my hands with a relieved giggle, I almost wished I had been wrong. I certainly didn’t deserve it.

“You and Hiro went missing, you dummy! Of course we came looking! We got stuck in your room, but Yukiko was able to rip our uniforms with her Gravity Shift.” She took a step back without letting go of my hands. “Hiro! I almost forgot! Have you seen him?”

I shook my head. “The Holy Brotherhood must have gotten him, too. They’re sneaky like that. Do you know where the others are?”

She glanced back towards the stairwell. “They must have fallen behind. Kiyo’s not much of a runner, even without Lucile, and Yukiko’s been running herself ragged with her gravity magic, especially after that…” Her eyes flew wide open. “Soren, they have Mariko too! One of those slimy Holy Brothers knocked her out, and Lord knows what he was planning!”

“There’s nothing they won’t stoop to,” I murmured. The still-dripping Svalinn’s Mercy floated behind her head. With a thought, I could club her in the back of the head and take the most unpredictable opponent off the field.

Lucile objected again. A bullet smashed the magical structure into a sparkling powder. Bloody Hell, was that what one of her rubber bullets could do at close range? At least she wasn’t so damned loud in the shopping center’s open air.

“L-look out, Rose! He’s gotta be one of them!”

It was cold comfort, though. Kiyo’s chest visibly heaved from where she stood, even as she desperately worked Lucile’s bolt to clear the spent cartridge. The effort would have floored her when we first met. I might have been proud of my little Angel’s progress with her fitness if she hadn’t just spoiled my ambush.

Rose stood frozen in place, trying to piece together what she had just seen.

I wasn’t going to get a better chance. I could deal with Kiyo and her rifle much more easily if Rose wasn’t up and about. That’s why I had the spare Svalinn’s Mercy, after all. Not that I was eager to zap my first human friend into unconsciousness, but I had my duty. Still, I felt a leadenness in my limbs, as though my body revolved against the cowardly attack.

Wait, there was that scent of sandalwood again…

Blast it all, it wasn’t my imagination! Yukiko had finally caught up, an imperious scowl on her face as she grabbed me with her Gravity Shift. I always counted her as the loveliest human I knew, on a purely technical level, though her intense scowl ruined the effect.

Seeing that Rose was still startled, and Kiyo was still loading, I sent the blunted shield straight at Yukiko. Her eyes widened in shock, and the feeling returned to my limbs.

Shouting something that wouldn’t do the Sato family proud, she rolled out of the way. I had long since learned that her affinity wouldn’t affect energy constructs, and my magical bludgeon hammered her right shoulder. Her white cadet’s uniform flashed red at the point of impact, the magically powered armor likely saving her from a broken collarbone. I still bowled her over, which was enough for my purposes. Gravity weakens with distance, so I dashed towards a nearby set of stairs.

“Stop right there!” I had a moment of hope when I didn’t feel an impact. Unfortunately, Kiyo was a crack shot. She wasn’t about to miss her mark. My world was thrown into chaos as a Flashbang went off over my head. It wasn’t the first time I had been the victim of the spell; it was a popular way to soften us up in England. That didn’t make the blast any easier to cope with, though.

Annoyingly, I’d charged the stupid thing for her. I hadn’t expected her fabricata rubber bullets to see any action, but it had been an excuse to hang out with her a few nights before.

I stumbled blindly. “Focus, focus!” My Mimic Sight snapped into place. Even though the chaff of the disintegrated bullet, I could clearly make out their shapes. Rose lay prone near where I’d left her. Good; she had been caught in the crossfire, and she didn’t have my experience.

Yukiko was back on her feet, and the outlines around her arms flashed a moment before something solid struck me in the back. My hidden uniform’s chest plate creaked in protest, and I felt the fabricate-enhanced armor draw a fraction of my magical reserves away. “Probably a Magic Bolt,” I muttered as I clambered up the stairs. “It’s the textbook response, and that girl is the textbook.” That would be a nasty bruise in the morning, assuming I saw the morning.

I cast a Trivial Heal on my face, which undid enough damage that I could make out my pursuers. They weren’t far behind me, reaching the bottom of the stairs as I cleared the top.

“Who is he?” demanded Yukiko.

“Heck if I know, man,” said Kiyo. “He’s a wizard, and he was about to brain Rose. Figured it was safe to start blasting.”

“We want him alive,” replied Yukiko. “We need answers.”

“If he’s a Holy Brother, he’s lucky these are all rubber,” growled Kiyo, punctuating her words with the familiar clunk of Lucile accepting a new bullet.

The world had stopped spinning, which meant I had to stop stalling and come up with a plan. I was outnumbered, but at least we were all pulling our punches. In the worst case, I just had to wait for Ratte’s reinforcements to enter the fray.

Not that I wanted to give them the chance. They weren’t likely to be as gentle as I was.

I realized that was an ironic sentiment as I slipped on the fabricata brass knuckles I had procured earlier, but I didn’t have time to dwell on it. Besides, I still owed Yukiko for my first War Game.

The second level had the same row of shops, park benches, and decorative plants as the first, though it was narrower. The three levels of the shopping center would have a triangular shape from the side, tapering towards the top to give more open air to the lower levels. Another waste of space, but I didn’t mind; I would rather deal with Lucile at melee range.

I managed to lose them for a moment, ducking into the open door of the uniform shop. A row of girls’ vests made fine cover, though the long-sleeved winter uniforms would have been better.

I couldn’t make out what they said, but it sounded argumentative. Probably bickering about which way I had gone. Their footsteps passed me by at a methodical pace. I hadn’t realized I had been holding my breath. It had seemed like a small eternity. After all, if they had spotted me, another Flashbang bullet in those close quarters would have been game over for me.

I wished I had mastered Tachibana’s knack for silent spellcasting. I wasn’t about to announce myself, and I didn’t much care to light either of them on fire with my newly mimicked spell. Oh, well; I always liked to boast about my improvisational skills, though I was drawing a blank. Still, I didn’t like my odds in a close-range fight, especially when I knew my heart wouldn’t be in it.

I stood up, noticing a rack of hanging men’s uniforms, and the one at the end looked about my size.

In a moment, I was doffing my Holy Brother uniform, though I kept the mask and my other backup fabricata. “You might have gone soft, Malthus, but at least you’re still quick on your feet.”

*******

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