~19~
Maman was here?Nic’s heart simultaneously leapt with joy and crashed with terror at her father’s words.He’d kept Maman from Nic thus far, rather than bringing her with him, as Maman would’ve begged to do.Therefore, this was some new twist in the game her father played with them both.Indeed, Lord Elal watched her with a smug smile dancing on his lips.
She took refuge in revealing nothing, standing in polite expectation, keeping her expression calm and serenely pleased to be seeing her mother again.Pretending that her abused heart wasn’t fluttering against her ribs, uncertain whether to break or fly.
Sergio, seeming oblivious to how easily he did Lord Elal’s bidding—her father had a knack for turning everyone into a servant—returned quickly with a cloaked Lady Elal, locking the tower door behind them again.
Lord Elal held out a proprietary hand.“Come here, precious.”And Maman went to him immediately, without even glancing in Nic’s direction first.She laid her hand in his, then turned, using her free hand to sweep her voluminous hood back.
Nic gasped, unable to contain her shock, and her father’s smile widened in satisfaction at her reaction.Maman gazed at her with vacant eyes, the pupils feline, as they would be in her alternate form of a cat.And they held no human intelligence to speak of, only bright curiosity.
“Maman…” Nic whispered, her uncertain heart settling on grief, charring to ash.“What has he done to you?”
“What she did to herself,” her father snapped, finally revealing the vicious anger that had driven him to such an extreme, “was betray me, her house, and you.”
“Maman never would!”Nic fired back, her magic, untapped for days and days, billowing up and burning the inside of her skin.“She loves me,” she added, searching Maman’s face for any evidence of the mother who’d cherished Nic and taught her everything she knew about being a familiar, worlds of wisdom the Convocation Academy could never teach.
“Did you think I wouldn’t discover how she helped you?”her father ground out, his carefully banked fury finally burning through his façade.“Not only was that a profound betrayal of my trust, she nearly irreparably harmed our future.She could’ve ruined all of my plans, and for what?A moment of caprice.If you were smart, if you’d truly absorbed what I attempted to teach you when I thought you still might amount to something, then you would hate her.”
“Youare the one I hate,” Nic whispered, fisting her hands at her sides, unable to continue her pretense at idiotic obedience.
Her father smiled thinly, then lifted a hand to caress Maman’s cheek, turning her head so she gazed at him.She did so with perfect obedience, but without reaction, much like one of those El-Adrel automatons.“I have you to thank, in truth, kitten,” her father murmured, still stroking Maman’s cheek.“If you hadn’t enraged me so, I’d never have kept my precious in alternate form for so long.When I finally brought her back to human form, she was… changed.And compliant as never before.I’m writing a paper on it for the Academic Society of Wizards.It’s quite the breakthrough in control of familiars.And all because of you.”
Nic had difficulty mastering the illness oozing through her.All of this because she hadn’t had the courage to face what Gabriel represented.Unbelievable now that she’d thought she’d wanted a Sergio.Instead she’d been so afraid of how Gabriel opened her heart, how he so easily found and slipped through the cracks in the tough hide she’d developed under her father’s tutelage.Terrified of the change he represented.Change she now embraced—and would continue to fight for, even if he was parted from her forever.
“I have complete access to her magic now,” Lord Elal continued, still stroking Maman’s cheek in a parody of affection.Or, perhaps, in the very real affection of a madman for a prized possession.For her father was crazed, that was clear to her now.Maybe he always had been, or he’d been growing more twisted over time, but he’d tipped over some threshold and become the monster Gabriel had so feared becoming, and never could be.
“Which is why she will be useful to me here,” her father said, dropping his hand and leading Maman to her.“Though I have little psychic magic myself, at least of the sort suitable to thought-seeking, precious here has significant scores in it, from the Hanneil side, you know.I’ve discovered, with my increased access to her mind and will, that I can use that magic, amplifying my abilities considerably.I hope you understand how truly important this breakthrough is.We stand on the brink of a new society.We will usher in an exciting era of bolder magic use.”
Nic tried to evade them, but she hit her back against the curved stone wall.
“And you’ll teach me this?”Sergio asked eagerly.“You promised that I’ll have access to Nic’s abilities as well as mine.”
“Yes, yes,” Lord Elal answered with some irritation, not bothering to look back at Sergio.“As we agreed.Though you’ll have to find a way to contain her in alternate form long enough.It requires tremendous self-discipline to forgo your familiar’s magic long enough for their will to entirely dissolve.”He eyed Nic curiously.“Is the proctor’s report accurate, that your alternate form is a monstrous bird?”
“You are the monster,” she whispered, trapped, unable to look away from her mother’s blank and alien gaze.
“And you are my progeny,” her father answered with a gentle smile.“As such, you will be a credit to House Elal, no matter how much of your mind and will we have to break in order for you to be properly reshaped.Leave us, Sergio.”
“But I—”
“Go.”Her father cracked out the command, power shivering through the little room.“And lock the door.I’ll summon you when I’m ready.”
Sergio grumbled but obeyed.Her father focused on Nic, and his wizardry hit her like a vise clamped over her skull, clumsier than any thought-seeker she’d experienced.But then, he’d never trained in these skills.Only his megalomania made him believe he could do this without training.“Tell me where the House Phel arcanium is located.”
Ham-fisted or not, he did have considerable power behind the command, and Nic fought the urge to tell him everything.The best she could do was a bit of side-stepping.“Sunk,” she answered.
He frowned.“Sunk where?”
“Under the water.”With her obedience and truthfulness, the pressure on her skull eased.“Lost,” she added, which was also true.It had been lost for ages, until she and Gabriel found it.
“That can’t be,” her father growled, wizard-black eyes going depthless as he exerted the thought-seeking command upon her.“How was it lost?”
“The wizards died out, the family moved away.The house sank into the marshes.”It was getting easier to offer a partial truth, though she was grimly amused that she was forced to use the correct term “marshes,” instead of “swamps,” as she’d intended.Gabriel would be proud, and the thought made her feel like she was bleeding inside.“Why do you want it?”she asked, more hoping to lessen the pressure on her mind for a moment by distracting her father than because she believed he’d tell her.
But he looked thoughtful.“Why does anyone want anything?Power.That’s the only thing that matters in this world.”
“That’s the only thing that matters inyourworld.”With the truth compulsion still on her, she spoke aloud what she’d intended to keep to the silence of her own thoughts.