Page 20 of Sonnets and Serpents
Until he realized what they were doing to his magic.
Silas shoved back. The sense of magic within him flickered like a candle threatened by wind. He breathed slowly, trying to guard the flame.
Even though she’d been the one to attack, the girl with ocean-blue eyes stared at him with wild panic in her expression, like he’d drawn a weapon on her. A scale pattern appeared along her cheekbones—gray lined with black, just the way Silas’s skin looked when he was in danger of transforming. He was certain the scales hadn’t been there before the kiss. In her hands, she clutched a small box, obscured by her fingers, peeking through in slits of bone-white angles and thick black decorative lines.
Then she bolted away, almost knocking over one of the other students. The few bearing witness gawked at the drama, some laughing, some rolling their eyes.
Silas should have grabbed the retreating girl, but he was struggling to breathe, paralyzed by the feeling that any sudden movement would extinguish the most vital part of him. She’d drawn his magic out like a thread, and he had to somehow wind it around his core again without letting it snap.
Scales flickered on his skin, fleeting as ghosts. Even with fierce concentration, he couldn’t transform, and he began to tremble. Though he stood in a ray of sunlight, he couldn’t feel the warmth, and he finally stumbled forward—not following the girl, just reaching desperately for something to ground him.
“Come,” he rasped. He couldn’t see a ripple in the air, couldn’t be sure he’d sent a command at all.
His knees gave out, and the other students finally took note. One of them ran for a physician. Silas clenched his fists, pulled his knees up, and tucked his head down, like he could hold everything inside by sheer force of will.
A faint hiss met his ears before Tulip slithered up beside him. The python almost never left the Yamakaz, but he was grateful she’d answered. When he extended his hand, she curled once around his wrist, and magic surged through every bone. Warmth returned to the world. He let out a gasp, no longer candle-frail, and his gaze finally searched campus, dreading the view of a girl who was, thankfully, long gone.
Magic stealing. It had been hypothesized for decades but never proven. Iyal Kerem had a volume of extensive research on the subject, documentation of a hundred experiments conducted by Affiliates and Casters alike, all ending in failure.
Yet Silas couldn’t deny the truth screaming to him from every bone, the fear vibrating his chest with every heartbeat.
He was an academic, not a coward. He chased new information, new experiences. He lived far from home in a culture not his own. While witnessing a failed revolution against the Nephew King, he’d stood in a doorway as the street before him was torn between Stone Casters in a living earthquake. While others ran, he’d waited out the conflict, and, the next day, he’d turned in an essay about it to Iyl Yvette.
But this girl was different. She’d been a threat with no warning. The sheer casualness of the encounter made it more callous, more frightening than any impassioned revolution. She’d not torn apart the cobble of streets; she’d reached between his ribs and torn the fabric of his soul. With a single touch, she’d almost unraveled him entirely.
His academic instincts told him he should track down the ocean-eyed girl, chase the discovery that could change the world.
Instead, he did the unthinkable.
He ran.
He boarded the first ship back to Loegria, only to have his home country reject him in the one moment he actually needed it. He should have known. Whether it was his father’s sword or the king’s banishment, all his home had to offer was betrayal.
Now he had nowhere to run.
His terror hadn’t vanished—even the memory of the near loss of his magic held sharp edges. But if proving magic stealers existed stood between him and his future, then he would fight a revolution of his own, and, fangs bared, he would show the world what he was capable of.
One should be very careful about cornering a snake.
Silas worked out an agreement with Kerem for a paid position as his assistant. It was a meager salary—Kerem couldn’t spare much—but it was enough for Silas to secure the university’s cheapest dorm, and as long as he was living on campus, he could use the dining hall for evening meals. The rest of the time, he would make do. All that mattered was that he’d seized his opportunity.
Now to succeed in it.
For the next three months, he would spend his effort in three ways: One, assisting Kerem. Two, tracking down the ocean-eyed girl. Three, attempting his own experiments to steal magic. He didn’t have any insights greater than those who’d already conducted failed experiments except knowing for certain it was possible. Sometimes, knowledge like that was all it took to open new angles of creativity on research.
Although he was tempted to ask for Kerem’s insights, Silas refrained. If he was going to prove himself worthy of aprofessorship, he had to do this project alone. All his study, all his ambition, would serve or fail him now.
He grabbed a few books from the library and settled into his new dorm. The room he’d rented left a lot to be desired, but that was the point. Most people wouldn’t pay for it, so he’d negotiated the cost down to almost nothing. Iyl Myrna, the housing matron, had been generous while bartering, especially after he’d given her one of Baris’s papayas.
The room itself was cozy, furnished with a sturdy bed, a wide dresser, a floor desk, and a washbasin. The biggest trouble was that, while most of the university enjoyed water piped directly to their rooms courtesy of Fluid Casters, this particular dorm did not.
That was because it stood next to the Stone Caster training yard, which suffered frequent earthquakes that would have broken the pipes.
As Silas sat cross-legged on a flat cushion beside his desk, turning his pen in his hand and feeling the heavy flow of ink inside slide from one end of the barrel to the other, the ground beneath him rumbled, signaling the start of Stone Caster training. He leaned one elbow on his desk, which was low to the ground and sturdy enough to anchor him through the tremors, and while the room rattled around him, he kept readingTales of Nightmare Beast.
His other books were all research on magic stealing, but this one was a mythology from Cronith, one of the countries bordering Pravusat. When he’d seen it on the shelf, it had tickled the back of his mind, and Silas knew better than to ignore his instincts.
If he only knew what they were trying to tell him.
