The Girl Without Magic Read online

  The man in black turned to the woman and smiled. Rage filled Maggie’s chest. Without thinking beyond wanting to stop the man from smiling as he made threats, Maggie walked to the edge of the docks and slipped silently into the water.

  The water was cool and calm.

  “Maggie,” Tammond hissed, but Maggie didn’t wait to hear what he was saying. Taking a deep breath she dove beneath the surface.

  The water was clear enough to see her way as she swam toward the shore, aiming behind the man in black. Hours spent fishing in the Siren’s Realm had made holding her breath easy, and before her lungs burned from lack of air she had reached the shore.

  Peeking up above the surface, she could see the man still facing the Wanderers.

  “You have been given two days to surrender,” the man said, his voice loud, clear, and full of confidence that not taking Jax’s terms would mean certain death for the Wanderers. “Those not guilty of crimes against the Enlightened will be reeducated and allowed to join society. Those who have fought against the Enlightened will be tried for crimes against the great people of Malina.”

  The eyes of the male wanderer caught Maggie’s, widening as she raised her head above the water. Maggie pressed a finger to her lips, hoping it was a universal enough sign for him to know to be quiet.

  “You―” the Wanderer began, haltingly, “You! How dare you come here and threaten the Wanderers? We are the true teachers of Malina. Our ways are older than yours!”

  Maggie pulled herself silently onto the bank, feeling the eyes of everyone in the village on her back.

  “If you were so wise, old man,” the man in black spat, “perhaps you would know when your time had passed.”

  A spell. One quick spell and the man in black would drop to the ground unconscious. Or a flower would grow. Maggie cursed to herself, wishing any of her sparring training were useful now. But it didn’t matter.

  “Two days, old man. You have two days to get your people in order.”

  A branch lay on the ground, smaller and lighter than Maggie would have wished for but she didn’t have time to look for anything else.

  “When the Enlightened fight, they fight to kill,” the man said. “This is the only mercy you will see from us.”

  Raising her arms high, Maggie sprinted toward the man, bringing the stick down on his head with an almighty crack before he could turn to see what the noise was. The man crumpled to the ground, a look of surprise etched in his face.

  “I’ve never liked other people’s mercy,” Maggie murmured as shouts rose from the village. “It always comes at too high a cost.”

  “Maggie!” Tammond leapt into the water, swimming quickly to shore.

  “Miss Trent,” Bertrand called from his spot on the docks. “You must be careful when doing such things.”

  “I really don’t get a ‘nice aim!’ or anything?” Maggie shouted back.

  “Oh, your aim was excellent, Miss Trent, and I agree: stopping his incessant threats was a valid choice,” Bertrand said as Tammond emerged from the water and ran toward Maggie. “I am merely urging caution.”

  “Well, thanks for appreciating my valid choice,” Maggie said as Tammond took her face in his hands.

  “Are you all right, Maggie?” Tammond’s eyes searched her face for some kind of harm.

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” Maggie said, looking toward the man on the ground. “He’s the one who might not be okay. Is he still alive?”

  The male Wanderer who had been shouting at the man in black knelt down next to him.

  “Even if he is dead, you must not blame yourself,” Tammond said, taking Maggie’s hand as she leaned over the body.

  “I wouldn’t,” Maggie said simply. “He threatened the village, and he threatened the kids. If I broke his head, it’s no more than he deserves.”

  “He’s alive,” the Wanderer declared.

  “I’ll try harder next time.” Maggie’s voice was so cold, it nearly shocked her for a moment. But the moment was brief. There was no time to cry over a hurt person who wanted to hurt you. Her family had taught her that a long time ago.

  “Get him in the boat.” Abeyla had arrived onshore in a tiny boat rowed by Bertrand. “We need to get him tied up in the village. He may have information.”

  Tammond nodded and dragged the Enlightened to the boat, letting his head hit the rocks on the ground along the way.

  “Sorry if I bonked him too hard,” Maggie said as Abeyla turned her severe eyes to her.

  “Don’t be,” Abeyla said. “You were brave and protected my people. We are not used to violence or conflict. It is not a thing we have resorted to in many years. But it would be impossible to argue that the time has come to fight. I will not begrudge you drawing first blood. Perhaps we needed someone from the Land Beneath to show us how very close that time has come.”

  “So what do we do now?” Maggie asked, following Abeyla back to her boat. “You aren’t going to surrender, right?”

  “We have been given two days,” Abeyla said grimly. “We will move the village to the safest place we have and deliver the children to their refuge. When the Enlightened come, we fight.”

  “Great,” Maggie said as Bertrand rowed Abeyla back to shore, leaving Tammond with Maggie. “I guess I should find myself a bigger stick.”

  “Maggie, you could have been killed,” Tammond said.

  “I’ve never been good at hiding when bad people come knocking at the door.” Maggie shrugged. “We could all be dead in two days anyway.”

  “But I don’t want you to be hurt,” Tammond said, taking Maggie’s hand and pressing it to his chest. “This isn’t your fight.”

  “So you want me to leave?” Maggie asked, pushing away the hurt that flared inside her.

  Tammond leaned down and gently brushed his lips against hers. Hoots and cheers sounded from the children on the dock. “I don’t want you to leave. You are brave, Maggie. But bravery might not be enough to keep any of us alive. I don’t want to see you hurt.”

  Maggie smiled and kissed Tammond again, leaning in so his body pressed against hers. This time sounds of disgust were mixed in with the shouts from the children.

  “I can take care of myself,” Maggie said when she finally figured out how to breathe again, “and if I’m going to be here when the Enlightened come, then I’m going to fight. I’d rather get hurt than watch the people around me suffer.”

  Tammond smiled sadly. “I suppose it would be too much to ask for you to be so brave and willing to hide.”

  “Way too much.”

  “Miss Trent,” Bertrand’s exasperated voice shouted from the dock, “could you please come back to the village? Battle is now imminent, and we have more pressing matters to attend to.”

  Bertrand’s words froze the children in place. As though threats from the defeated man in black meant nothing, but Bertrand saying danger was coming meant it was real.

  “Shit,” Maggie muttered, letting go of Tammond and wading out into the water. After about two feet of shallow shore, the water dropped off into blackness. Maggie stepped off the edge, letting herself fall for a moment.

  The cool water surrounded her. No noise. No threat of battle. Only water. The water didn’t care if she breathed or cried. The water wouldn’t care who won the coming battle. Maggie loved it for its indifference. The water wouldn’t even care if she decided not to find her way back to the surface.

  “The magic is already in your mind. Magic runs deep in your blood as it does in ours. Feel it pulsing through you.”

  Maggie closed her eyes against the pressing darkness, ignoring the sting in her lungs. There it was. That hum she had felt her whole life. The essence of magic that flowed through everything she was. But it was different now. Without the crackling brightness that threatened to break her. A gentle part of her now, flowing softly with each beat of her heart. Unable to break her as she let it drift out of her hands, warming the water. A dim light shone around her, and instinct made it clear all she needed
to do was let go. Let the light work its will.

  With one tiny kick, Maggie flew through the water, bursting out into the fresh air and landing with a gasping breath on the dock.

  Maggie stumbled, and strong arms caught her.

  “Miss Trent,” Bertrand said, steadying her, “I’m glad to see you haven’t given up.”

  “Me?” Maggie panted, bending over to catch her breath. “Never. Just trying to figure out this whole magic thing before the big bad wolf comes knocking.”

  “Maggie.” Tammond pulled himself from the lake up onto the deck. “That was amazing! I knew you could find your magic.”

  “It was easier in the water than with a bunch of kids watching.” Maggie wrung the water from her hair as a whistle sounded from the front of the village.

  “It’s time to move again,” Tammond said, moving swiftly toward the raised walkways.

  “We won’t get where we’re going before dark.” Maggie followed him, dodging the others who were running to their positions. “Can’t we wait until morning?”

  “We have to get to the safe place,” Tammond grunted as he hoisted one of the heavy support poles from under the walkway.

  Maggie helped him lay it on the ground before he moved to the next pole.

  “But what about this safe place is so safe?” Maggie asked, pressing herself into the wall of a house as a group of four men ran past, carrying a boat. “And if it’s safe, why haven’t you been there this whole time?”

  “Safe doesn’t mean we can’t be attacked,” Tammond explained. “It just means there will be only one direction for Jax to attack us from. And the dark place for the children is nearby. We have to leave the children in safety before we can go to the overhang.” He moved to the edge of the raised walkway and began untying the ropes that bound it to the top of the dock.

  “The overhang?” Maggie asked, moving to the other side and digging her fingers into the ropes. The rope was warm, and the magic that flowed through it pulsed in her fingertips.

  “The overhang is the safe place.” Tammond leapt aside, pulling Maggie with him as two women pushed a long walkway into the water before binding it to the sides of the houses, making a solid ramp that bordered that section of the village.

  Tammond ran toward the front of the village and, without pausing, leapt into a boat that waited in the water.

  Seconds after he lifted his paddle, another whistle split the air, and, as one, the rowers began dragging the village.

  “So what can I do?” Maggie asked, widening her stance to steady herself as the village surged forward.

  “Nothing,” Tammond said. “There is nothing any of us can do until the children are safe.”

  aggie sat with Bertrand in the Fireside. The children weren’t running around or playing while the village traveled this time. Even the smallest among them seemed to know something terrible was coming.

  “I hate feeling like this,” Maggie said, tearing her hunk of bread into tiny little crumbs. “I hate not being able to help. I wish we could at least row.”

  “We aren’t as skilled as they are,” Bertrand said. “They will move more quickly and safely without our help.”

  “Then what exactly are we supposed to help them with?” Maggie shouted, banging her fists on the table. A tiny little boy whimpered. “Sorry,” Maggie muttered, “but what exactly are we supposed to be doing to help? I’m just figuring out how to use magic here, we don’t know how the Enlightened are going to attack, we can’t even help row the damn boats!” Maggie rammed her fingers through her hair.

  “We help them to see the holes in their defenses,” Bertrand said. “They’ve been planning to hide at the overhang for years. They might not see if it is a flawed plan.”

  “So we’re just going to make sure the walls hold?”

  “Miss Trent―” Bertrand leaned across the table, speaking barely above a whisper “―the village was threatened, and it took you with a stick to defend it. Like it or not we have both seen more fighting than most of the Wanderers ever have.”

  “I’ll just run at Jax with a stick and hope he’s caught unawares.” Maggie took a bite of fruit, more to have something to do than because she was actually hungry. Something about knowing the time before battle was drifting quickly away made things like food seem irrelevant. But she would need food in her stomach when the battle came, even if she didn’t know how she was supposed to fight.

  A whistle from the front of the village made all the children freeze.

  “I think we may have arrived,” Bertrand said, standing up and striding to the door as Maggie scrambled over the bench she had been sitting on.

  The air outside the Fireside had changed. It wasn’t only the fear of the people who were scrambling out of the boats and back up onto the raft; there was something palpable in the breeze that moved slowly by.

  They weren’t in an outlet of the main lake this time. They were stopped alongside a high and jagged cliff. Trees coated in layers of vines grew from the vertical surface, making it look as though someone had tipped the ground onto its side and forgotten to right it.

  Parents of the children from the Fireside had come to the deck that surrounded it, hugging and kissing their children as though they would never see them again. The sun had already sunk low in the sky. Soon it would be too dark to allow the village to move at all.

  “Quickly,” Abeyla’s voice called over the crowds. “Get the children into the boats.”

  “But Abeyla,” a young woman said, holding a crying little girl tightly in her arms, “we will have to stay here overnight. Let us keep the children with us tonight. They can leave in the morning.”

  “I will never be fool enough to trust Jax Cayde to keep his word,” Abeyla said. Every face in the crowd turned toward her. “We cannot trust he will not attack before morning. The children will go to safety tonight. I will not risk their lives on the promise of a murderer.”

  The woman looked at Abeyla, her face stricken. But she nodded, kissing her little girl on the forehead before moving to the left side of the docks.

  The largest of the boats Maggie had seen waited along the side. One by one the children were passed into the waiting arms of the rowers. Some screaming and crying, others resolute, knowing tears would make no difference.

  “Maggie,” Abeyla said under the noise of the departure. “You are going to the dark place with the children.”

  “What?” Maggie said, shocked and hurt by Abeyla’s definite tone. “I’m not going to hide with a bunch of kids.”

  “Not to hide.” Abeyla held up a hand to halt Maggie’s protests. “To learn. The dark place has magic hidden deep within its walls. Magic the Wanderers have spent many years exploring and molding. That is why the children will be safe there. The darkness itself will protect the innocent. What you did today was brave, Maggie, and you have clearly shown you have magic within you. We normally don’t send one who has so much yet to learn into the darkness, but there is no time for you to wait. And you do not seem like one to shy from pain or fear.”

  “Sounds great,” Maggie muttered.

  “Go into the darkness, and you will come out capable of more than we could teach you in years of books and gentle magic.”

  “Trial by fire.” Maggie nodded. “If that’s the way it has to be, then Bertrand and I will get through it.”

  “I won’t be joining you, Miss Trent,” Bertrand said. “I’ll be staying to help in guarding the village.”

  “But you’re not from here either,” Maggie growled, feeling as though she might be getting the short and painful end of the stick. “Shouldn’t you have to go through the fear-and-pain suffering training?”

  “As I’ve said, Miss Trent, I’ve learned the language of many types of magic.” Bertrand held out his palm, and a funnel of dark air formed instantly. Within seconds, lightning blossomed from the storm, lighting the dimming night.

  “Nice party trick,” Maggie snarked.

  “Effective magic in this land,”
Bertrand said.

  “Fine, so you just want me to go into the dark place with the kids and hope I find some suffering I can learn from?” Maggie asked. The boats carrying the children had cast off from the village and were rowing toward the cliffs. “Sorry, my mistake. I’ll swim to the dark place and hope I don’t drown.”

  “I’m taking you Maggie,” Tammond said, appearing behind his mother’s shoulder, his face covered in sweat from rowing. “Surviving the journey into the dark place is impossible without a guide you trust. So―” Tammond paused, his face flushing for a moment “―I thought it should be me.”

  The idea of being trapped in the darkness with Tammond made all the anger at being sent away fade.

  “Sure,” Maggie said, pleased her voice came out stronger than it felt. “Let’s go.”

  “Abeyla,” Tammond said, “if the Enlightened come, don’t let us stay hidden in the dark. I would rather fight for my home than wake up in the morning to find I have no family.”

  Abeyla took her son’s face in her hands. “If Jax comes for us, it will sound like thunder in the darkness. No matter what I want, you will know when the battle begins.”

  “Then I’ll be waiting for the thunder.” Tammond hugged his mother before turning to Maggie. “Let’s go.”

  Maggie followed him to the edge of the deck where one, small wooden boat waited, bobbing in the gentle ebb and flow of the lake. Tammond held his hand out to help Maggie down into the boat.

  Maggie paused, turning back to Bertrand. “Do me a favor. Make sure you live until morning, okay?”

  “Have you grown attached to me, Miss Trent?” Bertrand asked, smiling.

  “No.” Maggie grinned. “But I don’t know the way back to the Siren’s Realm.”

  Maggie climbed down into the boat, and as soon as she sat, Tammond began rowing toward the cliffs not forty feet away.

  aggie stared at the sheer face of rock Tammond rowed them quickly toward, his eyes fixed at a point near the base of the cliff. Maggie narrowed her eyes, trying to see what he was seeing in the shadow.

  The darkness at the water’s edge had depth, and the blackness seemed much thicker than any shadow she had ever seen.