Sorry guys—had a crazy couple of days and plumb forgot to post!
53 Danger at School
After Midwinter things returned to normal, with a deluge of new requests and decisions for the princess. Mirta had to write letters of appreciation for her gifts, at least, for the ones from important people. For the commoners, a form letter drafted by Amanda with the royal signature added would do. Mirta disagreed with this, and wrote as many personal replies as she could before her hand started to hurt. She also had to decide what to do with all the gifts, which to keep and which to give away. At least some people had given her things that could be donated to the poor.
There were also council meetings on issues important to Coventry: whether a town should expand or a factory should be built, or who should be chosen to lead some plan or other.
Mirta's plan to clean up the worst part of town was going forward, a fact that made her both delighted and worried. It was wonderful in a surreal sort of way to watch witches and laborers dredging the river and setting cleansing spells and repairing the buildings. There were patches of bare earth along some of the roads, overgrown with weeds. You couldn't walk through them without getting stickers in your socks. Keith took care of those, using magic to pull every weed up, roots and all, leaving them floating in the air before sending them flying down the street to waiting wagons that would deliver them to the dump.
One bush remained. It looked at Mirta.
Keith said, "This bush is alive, Your Highness. Er, more alive than the other ones."
Mirta stepped closer, cautiously. It was a bush. With blood-red berries and tentacle-like branches. And eyes. She didn't want to get too close, and neither did any of the workers who were gathering around curiously.
Amanda picked up a rake and poked at the bush. A thin branch whipped the rake from her hand.
Mirta's brain finally caught up and presented a memory of one of Professor Palladium's classes. "I think it's an elderbury bush. They catch their own fertilizer if the soil's poor, and the berries are deadly to nonwitches."
"But tasty to witches!" Someone said.
"It can't stay here! It's a risk to the local pets!" Said another of the workers.
Amanda said, "Let's replant it in the palace garden. Your mother will be thrilled; she loves elderbury pie. And it'll keep things exciting for visitors. Wizard, uproot it gently and put it in the next cart."
Keith, a look of profound disbelief on his face, raised his hand and made the bush slowly rise from the ground, trailing its roots. It squirmed a lot more than a bush should and Amanda had to drive the wagon to the palace since nobody else would do it.
Mirta stayed to help plant trees along the road. Midnight pear trees, which were hardy and had a long fruiting season. She'd purchased the saplings by trading some of her Midwinter gifts. It was a good idea, a way for the princess to show care for her people—only it had been Amanda's idea. Amanda had lots of good idea. Mirta felt for a moment that she should have been taking care of the walking plant while Amanda oversaw the workers.
When the planting was done Mirta thanked everyone and they shook muddy hands since they'd all been digging, and the city planner drove Mirta and Keith home in her car, which smelled like the herbal cigarettes some witches smoked. The woman was thrilled to have the real live princess with her and talked about architecture all the way back to the palace. Mirta didn't know a thing about the subject, but Keith had built most of Homestead singlehandedly so he could more than hold up the conversation.
"Mother, I'd like to go to school." Mirta announced at dinner.
"Certainly daughter. I'll hire a tutor. What would you like to learn about?"
"Actually I'd like to go to the Academy. The students are the same age as I am, they'll be my subjects so I'd like to get to know them. Just one day a week maybe."
The queen put her fork down and frowned. "Miranda, you're a princess. I hate to have you mingle with the common element more than necessary. I'll bring any scholar in the realm here to teach you."
Well that sounded good, and Amanda had had a suggestion what to say next. "Let's bring them to Coventry Academy! We'll have a lecture series, they do that in the schools in Magix."
The queen chuckled. "Miranda, you are so dedicated to our people. You're… just like I thought you'd be."
Mirta flinched a little, wondering what that meant. The queen sounded so proud, but Mirta wouldn't have cared about any of this while she'd been under the spell. What did Ravenna truly want?
But Mirta had gotten permission to do something good and headed back to her room with a light heart and Hex trotting behind her. "Amanda! Your idea worked, we can invite scholars here to lecture. Who do you want to get? I've always wanted to meet Professor Willow, she wrote this amazing book on herbal medicines. You know… she was really proud of me for wanting to do things for the realm, but I'd never have thought of this while I was enchanted. I didn't think of it now—you did. You're doing as much of the work of being princess as I am."
"Do you like being the princess?" Amanda asked, her pen pausing in midair as she waited for an answer.
Mirta had not expected the question and turned away, hiding her face as she fumbled with the buttons up the side of her dress. In truth, she didn't. But that wasn't important, not compared to being able to make things better. The city was nicer than it had been, Coventry had allied with Domino and other fairy realms thanks to Mirta's votes, and Keith had taken piles of notes on the books in the Queen's Library. "I'm happy I can do important things." That was what Nerys had wanted to do.
Amanda didn't answer. Just put her pen down and closed her notebook. Her notes on upcoming political issues were much neater than Mirta's. "Well Your Highness, compose a letter of invitation tomorrow and we'll decide who you want to invite. Good night."
Mirta bid her servant good night and went to bed. She was still thinking about being happy, and doing important things. All the adventures she'd had at Alfea felt more real.
Drifting off to sleep Mirta heard, Are you real? You're not just a dream are you? But she was too asleep to answer.
The invitation from the princess brought four famous scholars to Coventry Academy to lecture on their topics of study. Professor Klien spoke for five nights on the topic of insect magic. The adventurer Silvertongue presented a guide to the wildlife of the Silamar islands. Lady Lolamoon talked about the Magic of the Night in language so flowery Mirta didn't know what she meant. The lectures were well attended, with most of the student body coming and plenty of witches from the city too. Mirta sad with Keith and Amanda, in a section of the lecture hall marked off with gold rope. Mirta had found a pair of old opera glasses in her closet, and brought them.
It was the last lecture when the disaster happened. It was a damp evening, heavy clouds hanging so low they met the fog in the street. The speaker was called Lady Beatrice and she was speaking on the wild magic, or rather, expounding her theory about the wild magic.
"…wild magic is not evil! It is merely the chaotic manifestation of positive magic! Does it not occur in nature, just as positive and negative energy do?"
Mirta glanced at Keith, who shrugged.
Megara, who was sitting in front of the royal section with her grandmother, turned around and whispered, "Crackpot!"
Mirta had read about wild magic, but never seen any. All she knew was that it could change living things and it was dangerous, and that the textbook writer called it 'the opposite of fairy magic.' Lady Beatrice clearly disagreed.
"I've discovered that positive and negative magic are merely two forms of the same power! Thus the wild magic fits into the scheme of things…"
Keith whispered that the 'two forms of the same power' thing was an old idea. Magical theory was interesting but this particular theory seemed to be just words with nothing real attached. Now Mirta sort of wanted to see some wild magic, just to find out what it was.
She was listening to Lady Beatrice, along with everybody else in the hall, when there was a loud sound and a sudden feeling of weight in the air. Amanda said, "Thunder?" just before the roof blew off.
The ceiling peeled away, upward, a few stray tiles falling to the floor. People ducked and screamed. Lady Beatrice fled the stage. Looking up, Mirta saw nothing but clouds, but she could sense a source of negative energy above them. Something huge. And… familiar.
Something loomed into view, a huge pillar of stone floating in the air. The size and the angle meant that it was a long moment before she realized what it was. "That's Cloud Tower!"
"It flies?"
"Your Highness, move! You have to hide!"
That sounded good. Mirta let Amanda drag her out of the lecture hall, but stopped her once they were out of immediate view. "Wait, I want to see!"
Amanda must have been curious too, because she stopped, putting herself solidly between Mirta and the action. Keith, not looking worried at all, leaned on the wall nearby and stuck his hands in his pockets.
Icy dropped down to the height of the missing ceiling, flanked by her sisters. Above them hovered half a dozen young witches with wild hair and stylish clothes. First-year students.
"Coventry Academy." Darcy savored the name.
"School for losers who couldn't get into Cloud Tower." Was Stormy's opinion. "But you all are witches—at least most of you—so we'll give you a choice. Join us, or we'll just drain your magic. You have, oh, half an hour to decide. We'll wait."
Icy gestured and a thick dome of ice spread over the part of the sky they could see. Mirta had no doubt the whole Academy was fenced in. Icy sat down on top of the broken wall to watch the panic.
And panic there was. Not everyone freaked out, but enough did. A few students shouted that they wanted to join the Trix and flew up to Cloud Tower, but most of the audience yelled a lot and tried to flee or threw spells.
Mirta had an idea. "If I could get to the headmistress' office, maybe I could change the spell that's controlling it—take it away from the Trix!"
"Too dangerous, Your Highness."
"Go for it. I'll hold the fort down here."
Amanda glared.
Mirta launched herself upward, her magic carrying her towards the bottom of the floating school. Whatever the Trix had done had torn Cloud Tower up like a plant by the roots; the bottom was all dirt and rocks, even the school's dungeons had been lifted. Mirta could smell the soil, and get hints of the magic making the school fly, a nasty spell with a reek like spoiled fruit. She nearly banged into the dirt, and grabbed for it with both hands to steady herself. She didn't expect the sudden blast of unhappiness from the building itself. Cloud Tower was a living structure, and it was not meant to be flying from realm to realm. It was sick, and wouldn't be healthy until it was back where it belonged, on the ground, a solid part of a solid realm. Mirta got hit with all this at once and nearly lost control of her flying spell in shock. Witch flying was hard when you were used to having wings!
The base of Cloud Tower shifted a little, sending a few stray pebbles falling, and a crevice opened up. Gratefully Mirta pulled herself inside. She found herself in a narrow drippy tunnel barely big enough for her to squeeze through. She knew Cloud Tower had secret passages; she'd been in some of them, but this looked new. It led up so sharply Mirta had to climb with both hands and feet. She climbed for a few minutes then came out through a crack in the dungeon wall.
The dungeon monsters swarmed out of their holes and gathered around her, gibbering happily. Mirta patted their ugly heads. "Has anybody been feeding you guys?" She refilled their water trough and saw a pile of snack wrappers and bits of fruit rinds, so they seemed to be feeding themselves. Mirta had a brief notion of bringing them home, keeping them in the stable with Willow, but how would she get them down? How would she explain them to the queen? She didn't even know what kind of animals the dungeon monsters were. But after they drank the fresh water and accepted more head scritches the monsters went back to their holes so Mirta decided to let them stay here for now.
Her mission was to find a way to break the Trix's control of Cloud Tower, maybe from the headmistress' office. But if Cloud Tower was full of minion witches how could she get there?
She put her hands on the wall and tried to communicate with the spirit of the building. "Come on Cloud Tower, help me help you get back home…"
For a long minute nothing happened, but Mirta imagined she felt the school thinking it over. Or whatever a building did instead of thinking. Then all the dungeon's torches flared sideways, illuminating a passageway. Mirta followed the school's subtle promptings, mostly movements in the torchlight and the shadows on the wall. The passages led her up, but when the last one ended there was no door, just a tiny peephole into Griffin's office. Either someone had dug this just to spy on the headmistress or the building had created it so Mirta could spy on whoever was in the office. Mirta didn't have time to wonder.
There were two girls in the office, a blonde watching Griffin's crystal ball and a redhead in a fancy hat sitting on the edge of the desk painting her nails. She was wearing—a fairy school uniform? Mirta did a double take.
So she was still there when the blonde said, "So can any fairy become a witch like you did?"
A fairy becoming a witch?
"Sure, it's just a spell." The redhead said, not looking up from her manicure.
"But some fairies are really… fairylike."
"Well magic is a matter of the heart so it only works if a fairy's heart is, you know, dark." She wiggled her fingers, showing off dark red nail polish. "What are you even on about, Selina?"
So this was Selina, the witch with the magic book. She didn't look as scary as Mirta had expected, she just looked like a girl. A bored girl, clearly waiting for something to happen on the crystal ball.
"Oh, nothing."
"I'm bored." Said the redhead. "Hey, read me a story."
"We have to wait for Icy."
"I'll read myself one then." She picked up a book lying on Miss Griffin's desk.
Selina looked like she wanted to snatch it back, then shrugged slightly. "Only I can summon creatures from the Legendarium. Read whatever you want."
In her hiding place Mirta shifted, uncertain. She couldn't get into Griffin's office while they were there, and she was getting a feel for the spell controlling Cloud Tower and it was strong. The Trix must have been preparing to steal the school for months, probably since their beast of the depths plan failed. Mirta couldn't steal the school back, she wasn't strong enough.
But if she found out anything useful she could tell Bloom. And she was curious—what was that about fairies becoming witches? The redhead acted like a witch but wore a fairy school uniform and felt, magically, like a fairy.
The crystal ball lit up.
"Selina! Time to drop some monsters on this school, the witches had their chance, now we take their magic!"
Selina snatched her book back, "All right. Let me find something… here's a story from Coventry." The book began to glow and Selina's voice took on an echoing quality. "One night from under the city terrible creatures emerged, the skulkers with the power to sniff out magic and devour it!"
Light flared from the book and Mirta knew she had to get back. She rushed down the tunnels, angry because she hadn't been able to do anything useful, hadn't even learned anything.
Mirta reached the end of the tunnel, the very bottom of the torn-out chunk of earth, and leaped out into space, catching herself clumsily with her magic. She landed hard in the school garden just as the ground bulged and something broke through. They looked like weasels with scales, long thin bodies and pointed heads with strange whiskery growths hanging off them. And they were as big as Willow. And one was right in front of her. Mirta shrieked and dodged back, and the skulker sniffed at her then flinched away. It didn't seem to want to eat her magic.
Then the screaming started. Witches were running everywhere, chased by skulkers, trying to fight back but finding their magic sucked away.
"Mirta! Are you all right?"
"Fine. Think they don't like how my magic tastes."
"Yeah? They love how mine tastes." A skulker got close and Keith blasted it with lightning. Mirta flinched, expecting to hear it squeal in pain, but instead the creature just melted into a splash of—ink?
"They aren't real, but they keep coming. And-" Keith gestured through a door into the auditorium. Skulkers and witches were running back and forth, the chairs had pretty much been demolished and the Trix, still sitting on top of the wall, were laughing their heads off. Megara was laughing with them as her grandmother shouted at her to come down and stop being silly.
"Amanda?"
"She flew off. Mir-Princess, I can blast these things all night but I can't cancel the summoning. Can you?"
The air was full of magic, but the particular tang that had to be the Legendarium's power overlaid everything. It was strong, but it was just one spell and it might have a weak point. "I… maybe… I have to transform."
"Go find somewhere. I'll-" Keith blasted another skulker and turned to throw a shield around a group of cowering students.
Mirta had to duck around a skulker to get outside. A shower of purple sparks shot past her and blew the skulker into ink. Followed by a torrent of swearing. Mirta saw a flash of black-and-violet wings. "Kazia!"
"Princess!" Kazia whirled, hair flying, and bowed briefly. Her wings shimmered like smoky amethyst. "What are these things? They look like skulkers, from the story!"
"That's what they are." Mirta released her magic, pulling fire along her arms and legs, unfolding her wings. Her power burst around her, joyful and angry together. She leaped into the air, hovered and sent her power out. The skulkers, just like in the story, were stealing magic from the students and visitors to Coventry Academy. She threw fire on some skulkers but they just kept coming out of the ground.
Kazia threw a spell and shouted, "Wretched beasts! Get out of my school!"
That gave Mirta an idea. She couldn't cancel the Legendarium's spell by herself, but if enough students were fighting back maybe she could borrow a little of that spirit, just enough to… she caught handfuls of that determination, set it against the power of the Legendarium, and pushed.
The skulkers disappeared.
There was some more yelling, and Mirta saw the Trix rising in the air, going back to Cloud Tower with some new recruits. It sounded like they were arguing. Mirta saw Megara trying to fly after them but Lady Amanita had grabbed her ankle and was holding her back.
Mirta hesitated in the air to watch that, smiling. Kazia was already on the ground, back in her normal clothes, not wanting anyone to see her wings.
Then something made Mirta turn in the air.
There was another winged figure in the shadow of the retreating Cloud Tower. Mirta thought it must be one of the fairies and was glad they'd helped, then the shadow receded and the flier's bright hair flared in the moonlight.
Amanda glanced back and saw Mirta at the same moment. She began to laugh. Her wings were fiery red and orange, and even her transformed outfit had pants. Amanda nodded and sank towards the ground, shedding her wings as she did. By the time Mirta banished her own wings and got inside Amanda was already taking charge, arranging for healers to look over the wounded and getting everybody else home safely. She deftly handed off the spotlight when Mirta appeared, so Mirta was the one faced with hysterical students and angry parents. The students were easiest; Mirta could confidently promise their magic was just drained and would come back normally. The several parents whose daughters had gone with the Trix were harder to pacify. Mirta couldn't bring them back; Cloud Tower had vanished. And even if she could, by law students were allowed to make this kind of choice. They'd gone of their own free will after all. Lady Beatrice was also hysterical, partly at having her talk interrupted. The headmistress of the academy just seemed annoyed by the whole thing and tried to get Mirta to promise that the crown would pay for putting a new roof on the lecture hall. Mirta didn't, and Keith didn't volunteer, but the fairy student Raleigh promised she and her friends would fix the roof. Mirta was lavish with royal praise for Raleigh's offer and when the royal party left Raleigh and her friends were talking about how to do it.
After dealing with so many people on top of a magic battle Mirta was so tired she was really glad they had a carriage to ride home in. She leaned on Keith all the way back to the palace.
Where Queen Ravenna was in hysterics herself with worry that her daughter might have been hurt. And Mirta couldn't say, 'I've done this before, it's no big deal.' Because she was supposed to be enchanted into not remembering she'd done it before. Instead Mirta submitted to being looked over by a healer, who pronounced her exhausted but unhurt, and said she wanted to go to bed early. Ravenna came back to Mirta's room with her and fussed for a while, only leaving when Keith arrived with tea and comfort food and solicitously offered to read aloud.
Which Mirta would not have minded. The thought of curling up in her big chair with tea and Keith's rich voice reading something with no political import whatsoever…
She did get to sit and eat, and there probably would be a good story once they summoned Amanda. Once the three of them were alone Mirta gestures everyone to eat and asked Amanda, "So?"
Amanda, in her usual seat by the desk, chuckled. "I should have guessed, Your Highness. So: my parents, my whole family, are fairies. We were all surprised when I transformed a few years ago. Nobody else knows."
"I won't tell. Wait, how long ago?"
Amanda told her and Mirta did a little mental math—and her eyes went wide. "You were first. I thought I was the first witch to transform since witches started being witches, but it was you."
"Is that important?"
"I…" It felt important. It felt like it should mean something. But… "I don't know."
