Modern Magick, Volume 3 (Ebook)

Betrayal.

It hurts when your enemies do it, but at least you expect them to stab you in the back at every available opportunity.

It’s six times as bad when it’s your friends. Miranda being approximately my least favourite person on the planet at this time, I… am not in any hurry to work with her again.

Unfortunately, Milady insists.

This is why she’s the boss and I’m the lackey. She was no more impressed than the rest of us when Miranda defected to Ancestria Magicka, indulging in a spot of espionage (at our expense) on her way out. As far as I’m concerned, Miranda’s dead to me, whatever her skills may be, or however useful her particular brand of expertise.

But Milady sees opportunity, and takes it. The job must be finished, progress must be made, and if we need Miranda then we need Miranda.

I just wish she’d sent someone other than me to arrange it.

Ah well. If wishes were unicorns, lots of people other than my good self would ride them, and that’s just a messy prospect.

As for her probable location, well, I did some subtle asking around. And when I say “subtle” I mean I put posters up in all the common rooms and corridors at Home, emblazoned with Miranda’s picture and the words: HAVE YOU SEEN THIS WOMAN?

Hey, I’m taking leaves out of Milady’s book. Whatever gets the job done.

Anyway, it didn’t take all that long to establish that I am in fact the last member of the Society who’s known to have had contact with Miranda. I’d suspected as much.

I’d last seen her on the fifth Britain, in the halls of the transplanted Ashdown Castle. It hadn’t been an easy conversation, but fortunately it hadn’t been a lengthy one either. Miranda had brought my pup back to me, which had won her back one or two measly points of my esteem (current balance: minus nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-eight).

And that was that. Where she had gone afterwards, I simply had no idea. Had she been part of the group of Society and Ancestria Magicka members we’d forcibly hauled back to the sixth? Had she made it back here, somehow, on her own?

Or was she still there?

I felt in my heart that she was still on the fifth. The allure of the place affected all of us; I’d practically had to drag Jay back by his hair, and I don’t know anybody more devoted to his family than he.

Meanwhile, we’ve reason to believe that the fifth is absolutely crawling with magickal beasts — the kind that are, at best, highly endangered in our Britain, and at worst outright extinct. The kinds of creatures Miranda would sell her grandmother to gain access to (or her friends, allies and employer, because sure, what are we worth anyway?)

Ahem. As I said, Miranda would want to stay.

So said my heart. Course, my heart has a bad habit for talking utter crap, so what do I know?

‘How do you feel about gut instincts?’ I said to Jay.

He looked up at me, blinking with the dazed look of a man so deeply engrossed by a book as to be having trouble finding his way out of it again. We were in our favourite spot in the first floor common room, tucked into chairs by the longest window. I had a stack of five books balanced on the arm of my chair. Jay had twelve.

‘Context?’ he said.

‘Detective work.’

‘Aha, you mean a good old-fashioned hunch.’

‘I’ve a hunch Miranda’s still on the fifth Britain.’

‘I’ve a hunch you might be right.’

‘Two hunches make a…’

‘Spectacular lack of evidence.’

I sighed, and slouched deeper into my chair. I’d sent Miranda a slew of messages, of course; I still had her number. She hadn’t answered any of them. Was that because she didn’t want to talk to me, or because she was too far beyond reach to receive any of them?

We were waiting for one of two things to happen: either a summons from the great Orlando, genius inventor, who reportedly had a stash of new toys for us to play with; or the arrival of our promised help from Mandridore, which may or may not include Baron Alban.

I’d had trouble focusing on any of the several books I’d purloined from the library. Good, improving reads, all of them, but I was restless and distracted and it was all I could do to stay in my seat. I’d got up twice and paced about, but trailing aimlessly from window to window doesn’t pass the time as effectively as you might think, considering its popularity as an activity.

When at last I heard footsteps approach, the brisk kind that heralded someone on a mission, I hurled aside my book with a carelessness that would’ve turned Val’s stomach, and launched myself out of my chair.

It was Indira.

‘Yes?’ I said, beaming.

‘Orlando’s ready to see you,’ she said to me, with her customary politeness.

Jay didn’t look up from his book.

‘Hey, big brother,’ I said, poking him.

He looked up. ‘Huh?’

‘You’re up, Jay,’ said Indira, and she more or less meant this literally, since Orlando’s secret lair is in the attics.

‘Right.’ Jay rose with considerably more composure than I had contrived to display, and set his book aside with all the tender care I should’ve employed.

Does nothing rattle this man? Honestly.

I confess to experiencing more than a little excitement. I scarcely exaggerate when I refer to Orlando’s workshops as super-secret. Few people are allowed in there; Indira’s one of the very rare exceptions, and she’s only permitted because she’s a genius too, and Orlando’s training her as his assistant.

Everyone else? Forget it.

Even me.

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