The Secret of Spellshadow Manor 2 by Bella Forrest (top ten ebook reader .TXT) 📗

of a war that had raged, seemingly, since Mages and Spellbreakers had been placed on opposite sides of an invisible line. This was one last field in countless fields, playing host to the final gasp of his people. The place Leander had made his last stand with those who were left, backed into the corner of this wretched, scorched piece of earth, knowing everyone else was dead across the other battlefields. Alongside the burning anger for the murder of his people, he felt a sudden sadness for the loss of his friend, who had shaped so much of his first year at the manor.

“Why did Mages hate… the Spellbreakers so much?” asked Alex in a whisper, the word ‘us’ almost slipping from his lips.

Ellabell shrugged. “Natural-born enemies, I suppose. Magic and anti-magic, good versus evil,” she said evenly, her expression thoughtful.

“Maybe you’re right,” sighed Alex, though he couldn’t say for sure which side was which.

Chapter 16

Alex was in need of distraction after Ellabell’s storytelling. His mind was overwhelmed with what she had told him, and it was proving difficult to sift through it all to focus on any one fragment in particular. There was so much to take in. He had all but run from her dorm room, his head foggy with confusion and sadness. Pain and anger had made his sudden departure from Ellabell an awkward one, but he hoped she would forgive him. He had stood up quickly, his eyes misting, making his excuses as kindly as he could through gritted teeth, claiming he was overdue at a private tuition. But he wasn’t sure he had convinced her. He at least hoped she wouldn’t bear a grudge against him for his sharp exit.

The knowledge that Malachi Grey had been the last on the battlefield with the mysterious warrior Leander Wyvern haunted Alex, a shiver running through him as he thought of the gray ghost in the flesh and what he had done to Leander. The ambush dashing Leander’s last hope. Alex knew it couldn’t be coincidence that the notebook Elias had given him bore the same lettering as Leander’s name, and he wished the shadow-guide would stop being so elusive so that he could ask a few blunt questions and get some straight answers for once.

It seemed a sick tribute to have the battlefield itself behind the school, for all the young wizards to see. At least it wasn’t used as a method of teaching—to march the students up the hill and make them look at the devastation as they basked in the victory of the Mages and the death of an entire race. At least there was that, Alex thought; the old Mages had the decency not to gloat. It reminded him of history lessons back in the world beyond the manor, whenever World War II came up in the curriculum. Students had stared wide-eyed, shifting in their seats with discomfort as the teacher showed grainy pictures of yellow stars, striped clothing, and concentration camps, horrified that the scenes had once been reality.

Alex was frustrated and in need of somebody to talk to, but he could find neither of his friends anywhere. Pacing the corridor outside Renmark’s classroom, Alex waited, but Natalie never appeared. He checked the library, the dull study hall, and the empty mess hall, but could see no sign of Jari. By the time he had done two laps around the manor, he was at the end of his tether. He needed to speak with them, vent his pain and get their opinion, but his friends had all but disappeared from the face of the earth.

At a loss as to what to do with himself, Alex stormed through the hallways toward the mechanics lab. It was the only place he could think to go, to try to blow off some of the steam gathering fiercely inside him. He recalled Lintz’s words: “There’s nothing like clockwork to calm the mind.” That was exactly what he needed—something to calm his racing mind. There was so much he wanted to say, and nobody to say it to.

He burst into the lab, unsurprised to see the place empty. Since the curfews and extra sessions had been in place, the other students had been unwilling to spend their free evening hours doing even more work. Alex had been the same, until that moment.

Moving over to one of the workbenches in the far corner, out of sight of the door, he scooped the five mechanical mice from their dusty shelf and placed them on the wooden tabletop. Checking his pocket, he realized, much to his dismay, that he had left the damaged sixth one back in his dorm room. Still, he figured five clockwork mice would be enough for him to practice on.

His hands were shaking as they held the miniature screwdriver he needed to get into the clockwork of the small golden creatures. Adrenaline still pulsed through his system, making his heart thunder as he struggled to calm himself down. With some difficulty, he managed to remove the mechanisms from the first mouse and began to plot how he would reinsert them so each piece was an inversion of its previous form. On a scrap of paper, he wrote instructions and sketched the design. Just the focus of that minor task steadied the tremor in Alex’s hands as he lifted the first few pieces of sleek metal clockwork with a pair of tweezers and reinserted them into the mouse’s body. The methodical nature of it permitted a blanket of calm to settle slowly over Alex as he fixed the mechanisms to his anti-magical requirements, piece by tiny piece.

When the mouse was suitably whole again, Alex held his palm over the delicate arch of its golden back and let the icy anti-magic flow from his fingers into the clockwork. He watched it ripple fluidly, like oil, and moved his fingers gently to try to manipulate the energy within. The mouse’s back legs twitched, giving Alex