Wedding Hells (Schooled in Magic Book 8) (2 page)

No, the
real
problem lay with the commoners.

His father, King Alexis the Great, had played the commoners off against the aristocracy, using the former to regain the power
his
father had ceded to the barons. And it had worked, at a price; the commoners now had their Assembly and believed they should have a say in how the country was run. Even that wouldn’t have been a problem, were it not for the flood of new ideas pervading the country. If he’d realized just how much trouble the printing press alone would cause, he’d have banned it on the spot instead of allowing it to spread. Now, even a Royal Edict wouldn’t be enough to stop printers printing their damnable pamphlets and distributing them around the country.

And all because of a single girl
, Randor thought, looking up at the portrait of his barons hanging from the fall wall. It had been painted a year after the coup and the artist had worked from preliminary sketches, but the images looked surprisingly realistic. Baroness Emily looked young, her face showing character rather than good looks; she certainly looked out of place, next to the other barons.
She’s turned my kingdom upside down
.

In hindsight, he admitted privately, it might have been a mistake to ennoble her. But it had seemed a good idea at the time. He had
needed
to find her a reward commensurate with what she’d done for him, saving the lives of the Royal Family and preventing the plotters from seizing the kingdom. A barony had seemed the obvious solution. Baron Holyoake had left no heirs - at least, no
innocent
heirs - and the execution of everyone involved in the plot had left the barony vacant. And it had, he’d thought, the advantage of both keeping his hands off the barony and leaving it under the control of someone he could influence.

But she makes no sense
, he thought, ruefully.

He’d tested Lady Emily, when they’d first met, and nothing quite added up. The official story claimed she was the daughter of two servants to a sorcerer, but someone who had grown up in that sort of environment would bend the knee to anyone she considered her superior. Rumor had it that she was actually the daughter of a powerful sorcerer, yet she seemed to lack the upbringing any such child would have been forced to endure. Even if her father was powerful enough to ignore the interplay of politics in the White City, his daughter should have known better than to invite both the Ashworth and Ashfall families to the Faire. Indeed, if Emily
was
Void’s daughter, Randor couldn’t help wondering if the sorcerer had neglected his daughter just as badly as
Randor
had neglected his own. Had he been disappointed in the girl? Or had he merely seen her as an unwanted burden?

It was a bitter thought. Randor knew his duties to the kingdom; his first duty, one he’d started even before assuming the throne, was to sire an heir. But, for all his fornication, he’d only managed to produce a single daughter. He’d left Alassa in the care of innumerable nannies and governesses for nearly fifteen
years
, while struggling desperately to sire a son; by the time he’d finally swallowed his pride and admitted he would probably not have another heir, his daughter had turned into a spoiled brat. Sending her to Whitehall, despite the risks, had seemed the only way to turn her into a suitable heir.

And it had paid off! Alassa had grown into a fine young woman, a capable heir to the throne...but it wouldn’t have happened if she hadn’t befriended Lady Emily. Randor had interrogated his daughter closely, the first time she’d returned to Zangaria; Emily simply didn’t make sense. There were just too many oddities surrounding her. One moment she was a timorous little girl, the next she killed a combat sorcerer in a honorable duel.

He sighed inwardly as he tore his gaze from the portrait. Emily didn’t realize it, he was sure, but she was causing problems for him. Her hands-off attitude in Cockatrice had spurred the development of printing presses and other industries; hundreds of thousands of peasants were leaving the land and moving to Cockatrice in hopes of making a better life. She hadn’t started that problem, he had to admit, but she’d certainly made it worse! The gods alone knew how many people had left the lands, yet every single peasant who quit weakened society still further. The ties that bound the state together, ties that ensured that everyone knew their place, were snapping. His barons were already pressing him to do something about it.

And, if that wasn’t bad enough, she’d snubbed him publicly. Her decision, apparently, to seek a courtship threatened to undermine his relations with the other barons. She hadn’t even bothered to ask his permission before starting her courtship! And he was her liege lord!

Alassa’s wedding comes first
, he reminded himself.
There will be time to discuss Emily’s conduct with her later.

Gritting his teeth, he looked down at the parchment. Thousands of guests, thousands of security problems...and a warning from a demon that chilled him to the bone. He wanted to simply hold a private wedding, but he knew he didn’t dare. It would be taken as a sign of weakness and the barons, who had assassins on their payrolls, wouldn’t hesitate to start planning something. Randor had no illusions about them - and, for that matter, of the difficulty of securing the castle when hundreds of guests would be staying and thousands of guests would be flocking through each day.

And those fools who think a king can do anything need to sit in the throne for a day
, he thought, sourly.
The more I push in one direction, the stronger the reaction I get from the other.

The wards shimmered, once. He touched them with his mind and realized that Alicia, Heir Presumptive to the Barony of Gold, was waiting outside. No doubt she intended to petition him, again, to grant the rights she should have inherited from her father. After all, she
was
the only surviving member of her family.

And the aristocrats are pressing me to confirm her
, he thought, as he lowered the wards.
And
that
would mean finding her a suitable husband
.

He shook his head at the thought. There were just too many demands on his time...

...And the more he concentrated on one problem, the more likely it was that another would explode in his face.

T
HE MAGIC FELT...
ODD
.

Emily braced herself; power sparkled around her fingertips and surged out of control. A glowing ball of light, ominously bright and dangerously hot, appeared in front of her, already shimmering into an unpleasant red glow. Emily cursed under her breath and fought hard to regain control, throttling back on the flow of magic until the light globe slowly flickered back to normal. It was a simple spell, one she’d mastered quickly, but now there was too much power at her disposal for it to work properly. She focused her mind, locking the spell in place, and let go. The light globe drifted into the air.

“Not too bad,” Void said.

Emily scowled at him. “It’s shabby,” she protested, crossly. Her head throbbed as she canceled the spell, allowing the magic to drain into the ether. “And it could have turned dangerous.”

“But it didn’t,” Void said. He rose to his feet and held out a hand to Emily, inviting her to stand. The rune she’d carved into her chest heated as it sensed the subtle magic protections surrounding him. “You’re doing better than I expected, under the circumstances.”

Emily felt her cheeks heat. “Thank you,” she said, as she took his hand and allowed him to help her to her feet. “But it still feels frustrating.”

“Your magic has expanded,” Void said, “
without
giving you the time you needed to learn to handle it. The spells you cast by instinct are now massively overpowered. You just need to learn to control the flow of magic again.”

He turned and walked through the door into the next room. Emily followed him, shaking her head in private amusement as he motioned her to a chair and picked up a large jug of Kava from the sideboard. She knew he had servants - she’d met them when he’d rescued her, so long ago - but he hadn’t brought any of them into her house. Instead, they’d split the cooking duties between them. And he’d never complained about her food.

She studied him as he turned to take the seat facing her. His appearance had changed, several times, since they’d first met; this time, he was tall, with long dark hair that flowed down to his shoulders and an angular face that reminded her of the hunting hawks she’d watched in Zangaria. His dark eyes were easily the darkest she’d ever seen, so dark she sometimes fancied she could fall into them and never climb out. And the aura of power, which hung around him like a shroud, warned anyone who met Void that he was a very dangerous man.

“You have been doing well,” he said, as he passed her a mug of Kava. “How are you feeling?”

“Tired,” Emily said.

Void frowned. “No nightmares?”

“Not really,” Emily said. She
had
taken potions every night for a week, but even after that she hadn’t had many bad dreams. She’d expected to revisit the duel again and again in her sleep, yet she’d seen almost nothing. “Is that a bad thing?”

“You tell me,” Void said.

Emily frowned. She’d killed a man, personally. It wasn’t the first time she’d killed, but it was the first time she’d done it with her bare hands. Master Grey had wanted to kill her, but she’d killed him instead...and she felt almost nothing, as if she’d lost the ability to care. She’d snuffed out his life to keep him from taking hers...

She looked down at her hands. They were shaking.

“I don’t know,” she said, finally.

Void cocked his head. “And how are you feeling physically?”

Emily took a sip of her Kava before answering. “I have a slight headache,” she said. She rubbed her eyes with her free hand. “And it feels like my skin is on fire. Is that normal?”

“Very little about this is
normal
,” Void said. “Most magicians tend to shy away from the kind of exertion that boosts one’s powers - or burns them out completely. I think your
mana
reserves have swelled past the point you can store them comfortably. You need to spend more time in the spellchambers, casting spells.”

Or draining the magic into a battery
, Emily thought. It hadn’t been too hard to set up another couple of batteries, once her magic had renewed itself.
But what happens if this carries on
?

“It’s a muscle,” Void added, seemingly unaware of her thoughts. “The more you practice spells that require large amounts of
mana
, the more your ability to store and concentrate
mana
in your body increases.”

He shrugged. “But you can handle that, I think,” he added. “You haven’t gone mad, thankfully.”

Emily gave him a sharp look. “Is that why you stayed? Did you think I would go mad?”

Void met her eyes, unapologetically. “The possibility needed to be considered,” he said, firmly. “And...”

“And someone had to be there to...
handle
me if I went mad,” Emily interrupted. She couldn’t help feeling a stab of betrayal. Void was the closest thing she had to a
real
father now, but he’d stayed with her out of fear she’d go nuts. “Did you plan to kill me?”

Void held her gaze. “Would you rather leave a possible necromancer to her own devices?”

Emily shivered. Void had saved her life...but Lady Barb and the Grandmaster had
both
warned her that he shouldn’t be taken for granted. He’d done a great deal of dirty work for the White Council in the past, trampling roughshod over everything else just to get the job done. She had no doubt he would have killed her if she’d gone mad...

...And he would have been right. A maddened magician with her level of control - and her knowledge from another world - would have been
very
dangerous. But the thought didn’t make her feel any better.

“No,” she said, finally. She put the mug down on the table. “But I haven’t gone mad, have I?”

“No,” Void agreed. “And the more you practice with your magic, the easier it should become to handle it.”

He cleared his throat, loudly. “There are, however, a number of matters we should discuss,” he said, changing the subject. “For starters, Mistress Irene informs me that you will need to be back at Whitehall within the week if you wish to take your Fourth Year exams. Under the circumstances, Emily, I have no doubt you could redo Third and Fourth Year if you wished, instead of trying to take the exams now. I suggest you think about it over the next day or so and then let me know what you want to do.”

Emily didn’t need to think about it. “I want to go back,” she said. “I can’t leave Caleb in the lurch.”

Void smiled. “Missing him already, are we?”

“Yes,” Emily said, feeling her cheeks warming again. She’d wanted to invite her friends - and her boyfriend - to the house, but Void had cautioned her against it. “Is that so wrong?”

“No,” Void said. He smirked. “I
would
advise you not to discuss your expanded powers with him, as he might get a little jealous, but that’s your choice. You might also want to warn him that you’re not entirely stable right now. There’s a good chance you’ll say something to him you’ll both regret.”

Emily colored. The first few days in the house had been bad, very bad, as her magic slowly returned. She’d found herself crying for no reason, then screaming her rage to the heavens, unable to keep herself under control. Void had been immensely patient, she’d come to realize slowly; she doubted there were many tutors at Whitehall who would have put up with her for longer than a few hours. She’d probably have been expelled several times over by now.

Void shrugged. “That does lead neatly to a
second
pair of issues we need to discuss,” he added. “The first is
this
.”

He reached into a pocket, produced a small wooden box and passed it to her. Emily opened it carefully, after casting a handful of spells to check it was safe, and blinked in surprise as she realized it contained a ring. There was a faint hint of magic surrounding the gold and silver band, but it didn’t feel
hostile
. In fact, it felt almost welcoming.