The tall figure of Drake emerged, striding into the courtyard with all the authority of his age and position. Following only steps behind was a small crowd comprised of his apprentices, other elements mages they had gathered on the way, and a number of servants in blue and gold livery.
Zeke tensed, his eyes running over the people pouring out the door, ready to spring when the intruder appeared. But after a moment, he looked back at me with confusion in his eyes. There was no one out of place.
I frowned, equally bewildered. “He’s there! But I don’t…” I trailed off, concentrating. The milling crowd made it hard to match the view before my eyes with my sense of the many abilities.
One of the men in blue and gold took a step in our direction, and I clutched Zeke’s arm.
“That’s him!” I hissed. “He’s dressed as a servant!”
Zeke didn’t hesitate. The man’s eyes came up to meet mine, and he broke into a sprint. But Zeke moved equally quickly.
They collided in the center of the courtyard, long before the man could reach either me or the nomad delegation. Zeke tackled him around the middle, sending them both crashing to the ground.
The intruder—who couldn’t possibly be a servant with an ability that blazed that brightly—swore loudly. Chaos erupted around us as several people in the crowd screamed.
Some fled back to the building while others rushed toward the two plants mages struggling in the dirt. Already vines had sprung from the earth, wrapping around one and then the other as they fought for supremacy.
Drake, who had almost reached the nomads, turned back to identify the source of the commotion. At the same moment, Annora stepped forward, anger and determination making her even more formidable.
Neither of them spoke, but a strong wind sprang up, rushing toward the combatants, while simultaneously, a single, thick vine sprouted from the ground and lashed toward the intruder. The wind was Drake’s, so the vine must belong to Annora. Clearly Zeke’s mother was also a plants mage.
The intruder shouted, somehow slipping out of the grip of the clinging vine. With one desperate spin, he turned them both, thrusting Zeke into the brunt of the wind, so that Zeke’s body created a small windbreak for his attacker.
Once again, the intruder’s eyes met mine across the distance. The determination in his had been replaced with resignation as he thrust a dramatic hand toward us.
Only a single deep rumble gave warning before the ground beneath us split, sending Annora, Drake, and me tumbling down into the newly formed chasm.
Chapter 2
Cadence
“Cadence!” Zeke screamed my name as I fell.
My stomach dropped, my mind scrambling to function as my body began to tumble. All around me power flared. Reaching out for it was as easy as breathing. But how could I use it to break our fall?
For a horrible half-second, my mind went blank. Then my instincts kicked in, fueled by months of study with Zeke. The details around me came into focus, and I sucked in a shuddering breath.
Invisible lines, like a network of roots, spread through the earth, thrusting it apart as the chasm cracked open deeper and deeper. A different root system—one that glowed with the similar light of a second plants mage—attempted to bring the earth back together. Annora was fighting to wrest back control of the ground. And all around us, noticeably different from the roots of plants mage power, bright vines of elements power snaked through the chasm, gathering air around each of us to slow our fall.
I didn’t need to work out how to use the power on the world around me. Far more experienced mages were already doing it. All I had to do was help them.
I seized the power in the first root network and yanked it away from the earth beneath us. Thrusting it toward the power of Drake and Annora, I shaped it to mimic theirs, strengthening their efforts.
The earth creaked and groaned, the crack no longer growing beneath us. For half a breath, my feet brushed against the bottom of the chasm, and then Drake’s newly strengthened bubble of air sent me soaring upward.
Racing at our heels, the earth closed again, Annora’s power now bolstered by that of the intruder instead of fighting against it. But as we neared the surface, our progress slowed. The intruder had withdrawn from the battle which meant I was no longer receiving a stream of new power to augment the efforts of the other two.
We continued to rise, however, a gentle cushion of air propelling me the final distance and depositing me in a crushed garden bed. A last rumble from the earth sounded as the ground closed back together, leaving only a jagged line of disturbed dirt to show where the chasm had been.
I gulped, dropping slowly to my knees and then to all fours as I took deep, gasping breaths.
“Cadence?” Zeke knelt beside me. “Are you all right?”
I nodded wordlessly, fighting against my heaving stomach. When it settled, I glanced up at him, nodding again in response to the half worried, half proud look on his face.
At first Zeke had struggled with teaching me. Without any idea how power mages were supposed to function, he had been at a loss when I couldn’t understand how to use the power I so easily gathered. For a while, we had been forced to focus on my most basic ability—sensing the people around me and the vines and roots of power that sprang from them. It had been an important first lesson given my secret role surveilling the Guild.
But eventually it occurred to me that I didn’t need to work out how to shape the power myself if I used someone else as a guide. In the weeks since then, I had spent many hours practicing the trick with Zeke. He had performed every type of feat he could think of while I augmented his efforts using leftover power I could seize from around the Guild. It didn’t matter what he did—as long as I could follow his pattern, I could mimic it.
Unfortunately I had yet to manage any of the feats on my own, but at least I was able to harness my power for something useful. With my help, he had performed acts he could never have managed on his own due to the limits of his strength. I was like a second pair of arms coming in to help him move his bed—except the amount of leftover power in the Guild made me more akin to the strongest weightlifter ever known. While Zeke seemed sure there must be a limit to my strength, we had yet to find it.
But this had been my first attempt to suck away power as another mage expended it, instead of merely skimming up their leftovers. It had been surprisingly easy, although that might have been due to the intensity of my need. Most people could perform unexpected prodigies when their life depended on it.
I glanced across at Annora and Drake and winced. If their appearance was anything to go by, I must look completely disheveled. But they, at least, were upright and calling commands. Groaning, I forced myself onto my feet.
Zeke put a steadying hand under my elbow.
“Did it work?” he whispered. “Did you help them?”
When he had shouted my name as we fell, it probably sounded like concern to everyone else. I just hoped his mother had been too occupied to notice and didn’t resent that his first thought was apparently for me. She had no way of knowing he had actually been shouting for me to remember my training.
I nodded. “Thank goodness Drake and your mother were there. Helping them was easy, thanks to all our practice.”
“See!” He grinned broadly. “I told you it was a useful skill.”