Infinite Regress (10 page)

Emily contemplated the question for a long moment. Whitehall and Mountaintop had similar curriculums, she knew; their students took the same exams. She knew very little about Laughter, but she assumed it was true of their students too. Stronghold was the only real exception, if only because it was the only school that took mundanes as well as magicians and taught them the martial arts...

“I don’t know,” she admitted.

“The nexus point,” Professor Locke said.

Cabiria shook her head. “There isn’t a school that
doesn’t
have a nexus point,” she pointed out. “How could anyone host a magic school without one?”

That
, Emily knew, wasn’t true. Mountaintop didn’t have a nexus point—and what they’d done instead to power their wards still caused her nightmares. But Stronghold and Laughter probably had nexus points of their own. It wasn’t as if they were
that
rare.

“True enough,” Professor Locke said. Clearly,
he
didn’t know anything different about Mountaintop. “But, you see, our nexus point system is vastly superior to anything known to exist outside Whitehall. The techniques used by Lord Whitehall to tame the nexus point are lost to us. We find it very difficult to replace the Warden, let alone repair the remainder of the older wards.”

“How unlucky for the other schools,” Cabiria mused. “I dare say their tutors get worn out by repetitive arm movements.”

Emily ignored her. The Warden was head and shoulders above any other homunculi she’d encountered, possessing a limited intelligence of his own as well as a strong tie to Whitehall’s wards and internal defenses. She’d read about more advanced homunculi, but almost all of them required incredibly advanced techniques to fool observers. The Warden was definitely in a class of its own.

“Constructing a pocket dimension for a trunk is incredibly difficult,” Professor Locke continued, in a deliberately mild tone. Emily was surprised he hadn’t told Cabiria off for her cheek. “Even experienced enchanters can run into problems—and all
they
have to do is expand a reasonably small region of space. Doing portals is far—far—harder. And yet, Whitehall is far larger on the inside than on the outside, seemingly without any effort at all! There’s nothing like it in the Allied Lands.”

“Curious,” Cabiria said. “And no one has tried to duplicate it?”

“Not to the best of my knowledge,” Professor Locke said. “I believe experiments
were
run at several places, but results were almost non-existent.”

Emily was fascinated, despite herself. “What were they trying to hide?”

“Whitehall itself isn’t the only wonder from the lost ages,” Professor Locke said. “There are references—vague, cryptic references—to works of magic that defy everything we know about the sorcerous arts. The
Lay of Lord Alfred
, in particular, refers to a number of magic spells that have been lost for centuries. But were they
real
?”

Emily cast her mind back to Second Year. “The writer talked about plucking the moon from the sky,” she said. She vaguely recalled reading a fantasy story about something similar, back on Earth, but the heroes had thought better of it midway through. “How is that even possible?”

“It isn’t,” Cabiria said. “And what would happen if you
succeeded
?”

“You’d destroy the entire world,” Emily said. If a relatively small asteroid could tip the dinosaurs towards extinction, she hated to think of what something the size of the moon could do if it hit the world. It might smash the planet as easily as one might shatter an egg. “It would be utter madness.”

“The story could be an exaggeration,” Professor Locke agreed. “Or it could be an allusion, a cryptic reference to something that would have been understood by its readers.”

Cabiria shrugged. “We could argue over it all day,” she said, after a moment. “Are you expecting us to read our way through these papers?”

“No,” Professor Locke said. “I believe I have exhausted everything that can reasonably be drawn from the various collections known to exist. There may be other collections, I suppose, but since I don’t know about them I haven’t been able to consult them.”

Emily leaned forward. “Is that likely?”

For the first time, Professor Locke showed a flicker of irritation, his face flushing red with anger. “The old families—the
really
old families—have vast collections of papers, parchments and manuscript books, often dating back hundreds of years,” he said. “And the short-sighted idiots don’t always know what they have, because some of them are written in long-dead languages and others are pretty boring as far as their owners are concerned. A copy of the pipe rolls from a kingdom or an estate is meaningless to them, but quite useful to an historian.”

He scowled. “There may be a complete record of the founding of Whitehall buried in a collection somewhere,” he added, “
and I wouldn’t know about it!
The idiots who own it wouldn’t even know what they had!”

Emily couldn’t disagree. She’d spent two terms working in Whitehall’s library and discovered just how hard it was to find time to catalog large parts of the collection, particularly the older books and manuscripts. The librarians simply didn’t have the time—or, in some cases, the expertise—to sort out a clear record, let alone decide if the material should be stored, presented to the public, or simply discarded.
She’d
inherited a great many books from the Grandmaster, a tiny collection by Whitehall’s standards, but she’d never had the time to go through them either. It was unlikely there was anything world-shaking amongst the other books, yet there was no way she could be
sure...

“I see,” Cabiria said. “What do you want us to do?”

“I want to open up the old tunnels and explore below Whitehall,” Professor Locke said.

Emily frowned. “I’ve
been
to the nexus chamber,” she said, carefully. “There’s nothing there...”

“Below the nexus chamber,” Professor Locke said.

He leapt from his chair and then started to burrow through a large pile of parchments, his voice echoing back as Emily and Cabiria looked at each other. “The records are clear that there was once a network of tunnels below the nexus chamber,” he said. “Those tunnels were sealed at some point, I believe shortly after Whitehall died. It may even have been Whitehall
who sealed the tunnels, although it’s more probably Lord Bernard who was responsible. He was the first true Grandmaster.”

Cabiria coughed. “How do you know?”

“There are several references to the tunnels in works that postdate Whitehall,” Professor Locke said. He emerged, carrying a large scroll. “After that, the tunnels are largely gone from the historical records. Bernard becomes thus our most likely suspect for closing off the tunnels.”

Emily watched as he unfurled the sheet of parchment. It was a map of Whitehall, judging from the exterior design, although the interior was very different. The person who’d drawn the map had clearly hewed to a different set of standards than anything she recalled from the modern era, the scaling so badly warped that classrooms looked larger than the Great Hall, but it was clear that there were a number of tunnels below the nexus chamber, linked to Whitehall through a pair of gates.

“I see,” Cabiria said. “Were the tunnels simply collapsed?”

“The gates were sealed and warded with powerful concealment charms,” Professor Locke said. “Those charms are actually worked into the school’s wards; they’re so powerful that countless generations of staff and students have walked past the gates without any idea they were there. It took me nearly forty minutes to perceive them even though I
knew
they were there. I took my report to the Grandmaster and he refused to let me investigate further. He believed that opening the gates might be a bad idea.”

“He might have been right,” Emily mused.

“The tunnels interact—somehow—with the spells that make up Whitehall,” Professor Locke said. “If we cannot find the secret of Whitehall from books, perhaps we can find it by studying the tunnels.”

“It’s very old magic,” Cabiria pointed out. She sounded fascinated, despite herself. “Who knows what we would find, under Whitehall?”

We might find a hungry basilisk
, Emily thought.
There were monsters sleeping under Mountaintop...

“Grandmaster Gordian has approved my plan to explore the lower tunnels,” Professor Locke informed them. “The two of you will accompany me. I would have preferred to bring in a much larger team, but the Grandmaster insisted on limiting the number of people involved in the research program. I believe he will change his mind when we find something new and interesting—or
old
and interesting—buried beneath the school.”

Or get killed
, Emily thought. She had no idea if there was
any
validity to Professor Locke’s theories, but she knew what
else
had been buried below Mountaintop. It was quite possible that the tunnels had been sealed up for a very good reason.
We might run straight into a trap
.

“The tunnels might also connect with the outside world,” Cabiria observed. “There used to be quite an extensive tunnel network under the Craggy Mountains.”

Emily shuddered. She’d explored some of
those
tunnels in Martial Magic. Sergeant Harkin had warned them about giant scorpions and other creatures lurking within the darkness, but two of her fellows had still been stung and almost killed. Perhaps the tunnels had been sealed to keep other underground-dwellers—or outsiders—from making their way up into the school and causing havoc. Professor Locke might be disappointed, she thought, when they made their way under the school. They might discover nothing more than a link to the tunnels and hundreds of creatures that wanted to kill them.

But she had to admit the whole project
was
fascinating. She’d researched the history of the Nameless World as best as she could, yet she’d discovered that there was almost nothing definite known about
anything
that had taken place over a thousand years ago. Human civilization had to be far older than
that
, she thought, but no one knew what had happened—or why—beyond that point. And there was a question mark over just when Whitehall Castle had been built, too. The castle itself was far older than the school.

It’s the one thing most of the stories agree on
, she thought.
The castle was not built by the Whitehall Commune.

Professor Locke cleared his throat. “I intend to open the gates and enter the tunnels on Sunday,” he said, firmly. “You two will accompany me. I suggest you wear something simple, something you don’t mind getting dirty. Charm your garments to provide what protection you can, just in case.”

“Yes, sir,” Cabiria said. She sounded less certain, all of a sudden. “Do you expect danger?”

“The tunnels may not have been opened for over seven hundred years,” Professor Locke reminded her. “There’s certainly little chance they’ve been maintained. We should be careful. The prospect of a cave-in should not be underestimated.”

He rose, resting one hand on the table. “I’ll see you on Sunday,” he said. “Before then, I suggest you take the time to read through these papers—I’ll key the wards so you can get access. If you see anything interesting, please let me know.”

Emily sighed, inwardly, as she rose and headed for the door. There were so many papers crammed into the office that she didn’t have the slightest idea where to begin. It would take years, perhaps, to read them all.

“Well,” Cabiria said, once they were outside and heading back up to their bedroom. “That was more interesting than I expected.”

“True,” Emily agreed. She gave the older girl a sharp look. “You’re lucky he didn’t notice your sarcasm. Talk like that to Professor Lombardi or Mistress Irene and you won’t be sitting down for a week.”

“Of course,” Cabiria said. She winked, clearly amused by Emily’s remark. “That’s why I do it to him.”

Emily winced. “And if he decides to expel you?”

“He’s too invested in his project to care,” Cabiria said. “This has been his obsession for decades! All he wants, right now, is to get on with it before he dies.”

“I hope you’re right,” Emily said. “But if you’re wrong, it’s your own stupid fault.”

“T
ELL ME SOMETHING,”
C
ALEB MUTTERED
. He stood beside Emily, one hand wrapped around her waist, as they watched the First Years climbing out of their carriages. “Were we ever that young?”

Emily shrugged. The First Years would all be around sixteen years old, but it was clear, just looking at them, that they were staggeringly inexperienced. They gaped up at the towering castle, they lugged their trunks behind them as if they didn’t know how to levitate them and some of them were even wandering off in the wrong directions. She caught sight of a pale-skinned girl staring at the castle and smiled, reading the girl’s thoughts from the expression on her face.
What the hell am I doing here?

“I can’t remember being that young,” she said, mischievously. “It never happened.”

She shook her head in amusement as the tutors calmly corralled the youngsters, passed their trunks to the stewards and escorted the newcomers to the Great Hall. It was easy, now, to deduce their origins; the youngsters from magical families were clinging together, wearing robes with an ease and confidence that came from wearing them ever since they could walk, while the children from non-magical families seemed uncomfortable in their robes. Even the wealthier non-magical families weren’t used to wearing robes. And yet, it was easy to pick
them
out from the poor.
Their
robes were of better quality.

Changing the uniform policy might have been a mistake
, she thought, as the novices walked past her.
It promotes disunity among classmates
.

It wasn’t the only problem, she noted. The children from magical families, the ones who knew each other already, chatted happily, while those who were new to magic shuffled around, unable or unwilling to look their fellows in the eye. Whitehall had to be hugely intimidating to them, she knew; they probably feared what would happen if they said the wrong thing or touched the wrong item. It wouldn’t take them long to learn to master their magic and cast spells, she was sure, but they would be vulnerable until then.