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

“Natalie.”

One eye opened slowly, a grin breaking out over her pale lips.

“Got him,” she croaked. “Told you I could do it.”

Alex let out a relieved laugh.

“Yeah,” he said. “You did.”

The room around them was in ruins. Statues lay shattered and broken, bits of bone and marble scattered all over floor. The long strands of gray ivy hung limp now, seeming almost dead in the wake of Finder’s passing. Alex and Natalie huddled together amid the wreckage, taking a moment to catch their breath.

“Aamir,” Natalie said eventually. “We must check on the duel.”

Alex bit his lip. “But we’re already there, remember? We can’t show up twice.”

Natalie shoved her way to her feet, and Alex caught her as she tottered unsteadily to one side.

“Then we will have to make sure nobody sees us. We’ll hide or something. I don’t know…but I can’t stay here.”

Alex, anxious to see how Aamir was faring, thought he understood. He tugged Natalie’s arm over his shoulder, his body aching, and the two of them limped their way from the crypt. Alex’s side continued to stab with pain, but nothing felt terribly out of place. All the same, he grimaced as he walked.

The sunlight of the gardens was almost blinding after the shifting shadows and darkness of the crypt. They both paused as they emerged, letting out twin sighs of relief that the rest of the world was, somehow, still there. The horizon beyond the wall showed hills, speckled with bell towers.

“Where was the duel?” Natalie asked. She sounded tired beyond all reach of rest, but her eyes were hard. She hung heavily on Alex’s shoulder, gripping him tight.

“Main lawn,” said Alex, remembering the words of the second-year earlier that morning. It was almost impossible to believe that a scarce couple hours had passed. They had probably only been in the crypt for fifteen minutes.

Fifteen minutes. Alex tried to imagine how long his longest duels with Aamir had gone. Eight minutes? Ten? Combat was a short, violent thing. Aamir could be…The duel could have finished already. He wrapped his arm tightly around his exhausted companion.

“We need to get going.”

Chapter 39

Alex had expected to hear a tumult of noise as they approached the main lawn of Spellshadow Manor, the very place where Finder and the Head had met on that fateful day all those years ago. However, the grounds were strangely silent. Natalie and Alex apprehensively eyed the gathered crowd as they stuck to the shadows along the wall.

Their clones were standing at the back of the crowd. Clone-Alex was staring back toward the manor, while clone-Natalie was watching whatever was happening on the lawn. On an instinct, Alex ducked out from the shadows to wave at himself, and the clone spotted the gesture, a smile spreading over his features.

The image reached out, tapped clone-Natalie’s shoulder, and both trotted away from the crowd to join their originals. The clones were identical, save for the real Alex and Natalie’s injuries. The crowd of watchers didn’t even notice the two going.

“Hello,” said clone-Alex, in Jari’s voice.

Natalie eyed it distrustfully. “Hello,” she answered.

“We were supposed to wait for you,” said her clone, also in Jari’s voice. “Wait for you, and then allow you to replace us when you arrived.”

Alex nodded gratefully. “We’ll be doing just that, then.”

He almost yelped as his clone gave an all-too-familiar smile, then burst into a little puff of light. Natalie’s clone softly exhaled, then followed suit. In an instant, both had vanished.

Natalie stared at the glimmering residue that was all that remained of their doubles.

“Did that disturb you as much as it disturbed me?” she asked, her mouth twisted.

“Almost definitely,” muttered Alex, tugging her forward. “Come on. It looks like it isn’t over yet.”

They found Jari waiting for them at the crowd’s edge, his face gray and his hands shaking. He didn’t speak as they approached, just gestured them in. The little crowd of the forty or so students of Spellshadow Manor parted for them, letting them go to the front.

A large white box had been drawn onto the wild, twisted grass. The stones and debris had not been cleared, and the iconic gray vines still wove through the battlefield, glistening with the previous night’s snow.

Aamir lay upon the ground, his back against the base of a shattered statue, his chest heaving up and down. Before him, looking as though he was out for an afternoon stroll, stood Professor Derhin.

The man was dressed in a long robe that reminded Alex of the classic images of wizards he had seen in his childhood, vials of alchemical liquids hung across his chest in a bandolier. He wore a wide-brimmed hat that hung low, hiding his eyes, and heavy leather boots that glowed with a quiet magic.

Alex was about to comment on the ridiculous getup when Derhin shifted, and a blazing line of lightning tore the air, striking the ground beside Aamir with a splintering crash. Alex blinked, and then he understood.

In the long robe, Aamir couldn’t see Derhin’s hands. With the low hat, he couldn’t use his eyes to determine where the man was aiming. Aamir, in his long gray jacket, was offered none of the same protection. He made a gesture, but Derhin sidestepped it before it was even completed, giving the impression that the spell fell wide.

“He’s making an example of him,” Jari said, his voice cracking with panic. “I knew he would be strong, but this…this isn’t fair. This isn’t a duel; it’s an execution.”

Another shift of Derhin’s cloak was all the warning Aamir got before two more bolts of lightning ripped the air asunder, sending a roll of thunder through the hushed crowd of students. The earth on one side of Aamir erupted, but the second bolt sliced his cheek, and Aamir screamed as a red cut appeared on his face, little lines of electricity crackling over his body.

With a stab of fear, Alex understood why Aamir and Natalie had only ever fought over a bottle. With Spellbreaker blood, Alex