The Secret of Spellshadow Manor by Bella Forrest (classic english novels txt) 📗

strange absences of endings. He thought about them, and he thought of a house, burning.

The sun slipped below the horizon, and the hills vanished with it, replaced by a blank expanse of nothing.

Chapter 31

In training the next day, Alex was sore and stiff. Aamir, however, seemed every bit as energetic as he had the day before, and it only took a few moments for him to floor Alex again. He let out a wheeze as Aamir sighed.

“You might need a few more days to recover from last time,” Aamir said. “This won’t be good for either of us.”

Alex struggled upright, his limbs aching, his shoulder covered in icy crystals where the other boy had struck him.

“One more try,” he said.

“Alex…”

“What?” Alex said, trying to force the warble from his voice. “You scared?”

Aamir’s lips thinned. “You know I am,” he said quietly.

He took his position opposite Alex again, and the two boys locked eyes. Fires began to spark around Aamir as he focused his magic, little glimmers of heat popping from thin air all about him. He raised his hands, opening his mouth, and Alex braced himself for the cold.

There was a crack as a bolt of fire snapped against the ground between the two boys, and they both jumped in surprise. Natalie stood nonchalantly at the base of the ladder.

“Alex has already been beaten up,” she said to Aamir. “But I figured you and I could both benefit from sparring too.”

They both gawked at her. Her hair was done up in a bun, and she wore loose-fitting exercise clothes and a pleased grin. She planted her hands on her hips, although Alex knew that was probably also an effort to hide the shake in her arms.

Aamir scowled. “First Alex, who does not know his own limits,” he said. “Now Natalie, who is almost too sick to stand.”

Natalie waved a hand. “No, I am fine. I have been sick for weeks now. I am used to it.”

She coughed, and Aamir glared at the both of them.

“You two—”

Natalie, standing by the ladder, was already closer to Aamir than Alex had ever managed to get. She stepped forward, and a whip of fire uncoiled from her hand to slap at the ground in front of Aamir, sending sparks flying up into his eyes. He cursed, throwing a hand over his face and staggering back a step.

“Sorry!” she said quickly.

“It is all right,” said Aamir a little breathlessly, looking her up and down. “Okay. We will all train together. But I would rather not spar with someone so ill.”

Natalie paused, then walked over to the ancient wine rack that still covered one wall, pulling a dusty bottle free and tossing it into the center of the room, where it landed in the dust with a dull clunk. Alex stepped away from it, slumping against the wall and wincing from his icy burns.

“Whoever destroys it wins,” Natalie said, pointing at the bottle. “Is this acceptable?”

Aamir rolled his eyes. “We both use fire. How are we supposed to know who hit it?”

Natalie opened her mouth, then paused, her brow creasing.

“Aamir,” Alex called from his spot against the wall, “you’re supposed to be training. Get creative!”

Aamir glared at Alex, then sighed. The fires around him flickered, then slowly shifted to a shade of deepest blue. Natalie hummed appreciatively.

“You must teach me that one,” she said.

“You must teach me that trick with the mouse.”

Natalie’s eyes brightened. “Did you like him? Alex says he was—”

Aamir acted without announcing himself, jabbing two fingers toward the bottle on the ground. Blue fire tore through the air, and for an instant Alex braced himself for the sound of shattering glass.

Swiftly, Natalie drew in her breath and extended one hand toward not the bottle, but Aamir’s fire. It shuddered, grew orange, and halted just short of bottle. Then, jerkily, it began flowing to Natalie, and pooled into a ball over her hand. She smiled at Aamir, whose eyes had gone wide.

“To hell with the rat,” Aamir said. “Teach me how you did that.”

Natalie gave him an innocent look, then tossed the ball of flames over her shoulder, where it burst upon the floor.

“Break the bottle,” she said, her tone teasing, “and I will consider it.”

The two quieted as they fell into the competition. While Natalie was able to move Aamir’s magic against his will, she lacked much force of her own, and her own magical attempts to break the bottle were quickly slapped aside by Aamir’s. Alex watched as the blue flames tore at the orange, a shining, shifting mass of color and heat.

It took Alex what he considered an embarrassingly long time to figure out what was happening. He watched as Aamir’s blue fire turned orange and spilled away from the bottle, and Professor Lintz’s words filled his mind.

Necromancy is wrong on two levels, he had said. The first is that it taps on a school of magic which is devoted to ripping the essence out of another person.

Alex watched as sweat glistened on Natalie’s brow and she shoved her hands through the air with rough motions, and Aamir’s magic abruptly became hers. He smiled.

With an irritated huff, Aamir changed tactic. He drew his arms wide, then slammed his palms together. A bolt of lightning erupted from thin air just over his left shoulder, tearing the bottle in half before anyone else could so much as blink. There was a spray of red as glass and ancient wine showered the air, and Natalie’s eyes twinkled with amusement.

“Tell me how you’re doing it,” Aamir said, breathing hard.

Natalie grinned through her sweat and fatigue.

“That was my win, no?” she said.

Aamir glared.

Over where he sat, Alex’s hand formed the same rough, claw-like position he had seen Natalie using. She was doing something other than using magic. She was reaching into someone else’s magic and manipulating it. He knew that he had no magical potential himself, but Alex wondered briefly if his Spellbreaker blood was capable of something similar. He thought