Over the next hour, Jack was forced to mingle with the nobles and invited commoners. He kept his smile sharp, his answers vague, and his distance polite.

  He found himself drawn into a quieter conversation near a fireplace with two scribes, a librarian, and an archivist. All from the Royal Library. All drunk. They were deep in a heated argument.

  “I’m telling you,” slurred scribe Hadlin, raising his wine glass, “ancient dwarven is the most elegant written language in history. It’s all angles and symmetry! Pure logic!”

  “Elegant?” scoffed librarian Wyth. “It’s a glorified masonry chart. Everything’s square! Square letters. Square meanings. It’s the language equivalent of a brick.”

  Archivist Donn chuckled into his wine. “At least dwarven has consistent conjugation. Try reading ancient drow.” He took a gulp of wine. “Where was I? The drow. One misplaced accent and suddenly your declaration of peace becomes a ritual challenge to the death.”

  Jack laughed.

  Scribe Elaith, half a head taller than the others and very drunk, flapped his hand to get everyone to listen. “Sh, sh, shhh…” There was a long pause. “What was I going to say?”

  “You were going to agree with me,” Hadlin slurred and then burped.

  Making everyone laugh but Elaith, who looked at him with confused disdain. “I was not,” he said. “Those are fighting words, Hadlin. Pens at dawn, I tell you, and trust me, I have a very big pen.”

  They all sniggered like teenagers, and Donn spat his expensive wine back into his glass.

  Elaith glared at them with hawkish eyes. “I’ll have you all know that ancient elven is the most sophisticated language ever penned. Ever. It’s musical, it’s flexible, and.” He sloshed wine from his glass as he gestured. “And most importantly, it’s impossible to translate without poetry.”

  “That’s not a virtue,” muttered Donn. “That’s a nightmare.”

  “Exactly,” Elaith said, swaying. “If a language doesn’t make your soul ache and your teeth hurt, then it’s not worth the ink.”

  Jack grinned. “Is that the criteria now? Toothache and heartbreak?”

  “Both are symptoms of greatness!” Elaith declared, raising his glass in triumph.

  Wyth rolled her eyes. “We’ve lost him.”

  Elaith raised his glass even higher. “To ancient elven. The only language where you can insult a man’s mother, praise her cooking, and seduce her in the same sentence.”

  They all groaned. Jack laughed. For a moment, he wasn’t a blood mage in training. He was just a Novice Scribe meeting fellow academics at an awkward work party. A boy in a new suit that didn’t feel right, pretending he belonged. And then he remembered the elven chant in his pocket. The kill to come. The warmth drained from his smile.

  Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

  ***

  After dinner and drinks, Jack had retrieved his belongings and was amongst a group of a dozen nobles walking through Viscount Tides’ forest estate on their way to a blood magic ritual. The forest behind the manor was quiet, save for the slow venting of aether-steam from hidden pipes beneath the moss. Moonlight filtered through skeletal trees.

  The cold sank through Jack’s thin shoes as he walked behind the others, quiver on one shoulder, white oak bow on the other. Twelve of them now. Six older nobles at the front. The six younger nobles trailed behind their elders like dogs on velvet leashes.

  Greaves walked at the head of the column, his cane tapping with hollow certainty. The other older nobles flanked him. Vampese, Idrisa, Quill, Argil, and Trefin. The six monsters behind polite smiles and impeccable tailoring.

  There were two guards for each of the older nobles; most of them were beastkin, whose keen eyes and low, measured steps spoke of constant vigilance.

  Jack’s thoughts rattled like loose bolts in a pressure pipe. He knew a blood magic ritual would begin tonight. He would have to chant, and someone would die in front of him. Whether he was under duress or not, he’d at least in part be responsible.

  The copper veins running through the ground pulsed with aether. Somewhere ahead, pipes hissed, regulating flow through this part of the estate. Magic and machinery laced together like the branches overhead; enchanted runes kept this forbidden place safe from prying eyes.

  His knees felt stiff, like they were trying to prevent him from following the nobles. Nothing about where he was being led felt safe. His spine tingled, and his jaw was tight as he followed behind the blood mages, like an obedient dog.

  They reached a slope, then passed through a ring of old trees. A dome of stone and a hint of old, oxidised green copper rose before them, half-hidden, a ruined temple. Faded glass windows, long since shattered, revealed a skeletal frame of exposed stonework and rotting beams. A false ruin built to look like a real one.

  How long have they been operating here? Jack thought as he examined the intricate deception. From a distance, it would appear nothing more than an abandoned ruin, patrolled by a dozen vigilant guards.

  Inside the fake temple, a ruined stone arch loomed ahead, thick with moss and overgrowth. Runes had been carved into the foundation, hidden beneath layers of false decay. The illusion of age cloaked what was, in reality, a concealed doorway.

  Quill approached and laid her palms on the stone. A low pulse rippled through the ground. The hidden door groaned open, a sound of grinding stone and aged mechanisms.

  Jack couldn’t believe what he was seeing. This must have been here for decades. Maybe centuries!

  Warm air spilt out, heavy with the scent of copper, spent aether-steam, and an unmistakable undercurrent of despair. The lingering stench of rituals long past.

  He shuddered at the thought of how many victims must have died here.

  The nobles entered first. Their guards stopped outside without a word and joined those already on watch.

  Jack followed, his heart hammering against his ribs at the implication of a blood cult that might have existed for centuries, right under the nose of the Inquisition. Are the entire Inquisition under their control?

  The long corridor led downward, stone and brass beneath his feet. Aether-lanterns lit the stairwell, each flickering on with blue light as they approached. He stepped into a large subterranean chamber and blinked against the soft blue glow. Aether-lanterns hovered above, tethered to pipes that branched like mechanical ribs across the ceiling.

  Before him was Viscount Tides and the other five older nobles. Beside them were five more young nobles.