Soon the madwoman would have Iolanthe sealed in a vacuum. Her fingers shook. She looked out of the peephole, searching frantically for something she could use to help herself.
There! On a shelf in the recesses of the attic, among dusty metal instruments, stood one lone statuette of stone.
She could not manipulate ceramiccooking the earth changed its propertiesbut she did have power over stone. She elevated the statuette. It hovered a few inches above the shelf. She swung her arm. The statuette smashed into the back of the womans head.
The woman cried. Her wand clattered to the floor. She did not, however, lose consciousness as Iolanthe had hoped, but only stumbled until she banged into crates piled against the wall.
Iolanthe hesitated. Should she attack the woman again in the latters
weakened state?
But the woman already had her wand back in her hand. Exstinguare.
The stone statuette turned into dust. Now what are you going to use? said the woman, with a chilling smile.
Suddenly the air inside the trunk was so thin Iolanthe became light-headed. It felt as if someone had pushed her face into wet cement. Try as she did, she could not draw a single breath.
Faintly, very faintly, she became aware that something burned against her left thigh. Then everything went black.
As he arrived below the open trapdoor, Titus heard Lady Wintervale speaking.
What have you done? Her voice was low yet frantic. Never again, remember? You were never, never to kill again.
A blade of fear plunged into Tituss heart. Lady Wintervales paranoia ran deep, and her sanity was not always reliable. Was he too late?
He wrapped a muffling spell about the rickety steps and climbed up. The moment he had Lady Wintervale in view, he pointed his wand. Tempus congelet, he mouthed, not wanting her to hear his voice before the time-freeze spell took effect.
If the spell took effect. He had never used it in the real world.
Lady Wintervale stilled. He darted past her to the trunk.
Are you there? Are you all right?
The trunk was as silent as a coffin.
He swore. The chains did not respond to the first few spells he tried. He swore again. If he had more time, he could coax the chains. But there was no time: the time freeze spell lasted three minutes at most. And the girl, if she was still alive, must be let out right away.
He looked about. There was nothing he could use. A moment later, however, he saw that the chains did not go around the trunk all the way, but were instead fastened to plates bolted to the side of the trunk. And the magic that anchored the plates to the trunk was ordinary enough that a stronger-than-usual unfastening cant did the trick.
He flung back the chains, but the trunk lid lifted only a fraction of an inch. What more obstacles stood in his way?
Aperi.
The sound of something unlatching. He hoisted up the lid. The girl was slumped over, her face invisible beneath her still-wild hair.
His mind went blank. She could not possibly be dead. Could she?
Reaching inside, he lifted a limp wrist and searched for a pulse. His heart thudded as he encountered a feeble throb in her vein.
Revisce!
No reaction.
Revisce forte!
Her entire person shuddered. Her head slowly rose. Her eyes opened. Highness, she mumbled.
He was weak with relief. But again, no time to indulge. Hold still, I will get you out. Omnia interiora vos elevate.
Everything in the trunk floated: the girl, who gasped and thrashed to find herself airborne; her wand; her satchel; and a great many items of clothing that must have been packed before the trunk was closed the first time. Not a single piece of clothing was nonmage. If the trunk had been entrusted to the Wintervales, it would have been before their exile.
He caught the girl, her wand, and her satchel, and let everything else fall back into the trunk. A quick swish closed the trunk. An undo spell set the plates and the chains back into place. Then he was easing the two of them out the trapdoor, with an Omnia deleantur tossed behind him to erase his footprints and any other traces he might have left in the dust of the attic.
Did she hurt you? he asked at the first stair landing.
She siphoned all the air from the trunk.
He looked down at the girl in his arms. Her breathing was labored, but she hung on to her composure remarkably well for someone who had just endured an attempt on her lifeor perhaps she was simply too breathless for hysteria.
Why did she want to kill me? she rasped.
I do not know. But she is disturbedshe lost her father and her sister in the uprising. Her husband also died young.
Back in Wintervales room two stories below, he sat her on the bed and opened the opposite window. Fog rushed in.
Whats that smell?
London.
London, England ?
He was glad that she had some knowledge of nonmage geography. Yes. Here. Let me
The unmistakable sound of someone arriving in the wardrobe. Lady Wintervale must have come out of the time freeze, found the trunk empty, and summoned her son. Titus shut the window, yanked the girl off the bed, and pushed her flat against the wall in the blind spot behind the wardrobe.