Page 130 of By the Moonbeam and the Mist
Just then, Rodhi halted in front of us. Dazmine and I snuck to either side of him, crouching and peeking through the dripping fig leaves ahead.
What I saw made my lungs twist with shock.
Embedded deep in a basin that looked like it had been carved of magic, a circular stone platform swam in shadows made of towering pillars and twisting vines. Mr. Gleekle himself stood in the center of this basin, surrounded by a circle of those same students I’d seen before and holding…
A poker.
Sucking in a breath, I strained to listen to whatever he was telling them, but it was as if an invisible film of glass separated us from the basin below. The rain splattered against the barrier and rolled off, and none of their thoughts drifted up to me either.
Dazmine craned her neck, squinting at the strange barrier and leaning forward through the fig leaves for a better look—
She hissed a curse through her teeth as Mr. Gleekle’s head jerked our way.
We all ducked low.
“Do you think he saw me?” Dazmine breathed.
Rodhi shook his head when a spider whispered in his ear.
“Don’t know. The spiders can’t even get in to hear what they might be saying. Whatever they’re doing down there, they don’t wantanyoneto know about it.”
Whatever they were doing seemed obvious to me: Mr. Gleekle was conducting his own private Branding ceremony… but with students who alreadyhadpowers, judging by the boy with the brand on his shoulder who stepped into the center of the circle and raised his left arm, exposing the spot where I thought I’d seen a second brand on Jenia all those months ago.
Is there ever a reason someone would have two brands? I’d asked Dyonisia at the start of the year.
To which she’d only responded with a question of her own:What reason would someone have to get a second one?
Not a no.
Just not an explanation ofwhy. Why give some students extra brands but not others?
“You were right, Rayna,” Dazmine breathed. “Jenia must have—”
We all winced when Mr. Gleekle stamped the poker into the soft part of the boy’s underarm.
“Damn. I’d rather have my own nipples twisted than get branded there,” Rodhi murmured. “That would hurtandtickle.”
Not even two seconds later, the air beneath that invisible film of glass appeared towhooshaway from the boy, knocking Mr. Gleekle and the circle of students onto their asses. One of them in particular fell into a rare stripe of sunlight, and—
Before I could inhale sharply at what I had just seen—atwhoI had just seen—the glass-like structure around them exploded.
Four or five giant fireballs burst from the newly-Branded boy, arcing high up in the air and whistling back down…
One of them toward us.
Rodhi, Dazmine, and I turned and ran just as it came crashing down where we had been moments earlier, blasting ahole into the ground with a flare of heat that singed my skin from behind.
The force sent the three of us sprawling, while the echoing boom of the rest of the fireballs landed in other areas of the jungle around us. If it wasn’t pounding down rain right now, I’d probably worry about the fig trees catching on fire.
As it was, I looked over my shoulder to find the fire already sizzling out.
“Well,” said Rodhi from where he lay in the mud on his stomach, “that was a little more intense than a regular Branding.”
Dazmine and I exchanged glances as we got to our feet. From the sharpness in her eyes, I was pretty sure she’d seen it, too: another newcomer in whatever cult Mr. Gleekle had created.
I’d recognize that glossy sheet of ruby-red hair anywhere.
Quinn.
