The Grandmaster's Tale

I bowed to conceal my amusement. Boscha was a consummate bureaucrat, the type of person who could be quite useful in a supporting role, but he didn’t have the mindset to cope with a sudden emergency. He’d make a good logistics officer, better than most, yet trusting him with command … I put the thought aside as I hurried out of the chamber, motioning for the rest of my little cabal to follow me. Boscha could have sent others, including tutors I didn’t dare trust, but … he didn’t. I suspected he wasn’t thinking very clearly.

But we have to act fast, before he realised he has one thing up his sleeve, I thought, grimly. If we’re not in place …

“I have everything in place, in the spellchamber,” Mistress Constance said. “Pepper?”

“I’m with you,” Pepper said.

I nodded, watching them hurry into the servant corridors so they could make their way down to the wardchamber without being seen. I hoped the real servants were smart enough to get the hell out of the way, when the students started hexing and cursing each other. I’d considered trying to convince some of the servants to join me, after Walter and the rest started being even more unpleasant to them, but there’d been no point. They couldn’t do anything more than soak up spells and that wouldn’t be anything like enough to tip the balance in our favour. Better they stayed in their quarters and kept their heads down. Or so I told myself.

The corridors were in absolute bedlam, bad enough to make the Great Apprentice Riot look like nothing. Prefects were being chased by students, young and old, hurling all sorts of curses and hexes after them; classrooms were being ransacked, bedrooms belonging to aristo students were being stormed … it was going to take weeks to clean up the mess, let alone locate everyone who’d been transfigured into something and undo the spells. I hoped no one would get seriously hurt, or killed, but …

Walter ran towards me, his eyes wide with fear. “Sir, sir …!”

I looked past him. A small horde of students—some had painted their faces to resemble orcs—were chasing him. I saw Alan in the crowd, but most of the rest were younger students … too young, I was sure, to pose a real threat if Walter used his mind. I couldn’t see any sign of Adrian, let alone Jacky or the rest of their cronies. It was hard to keep my contempt off my face as Walter hid behind me, as if he expected me to save him. Fucking coward. He was brave when it was four on one, but when he was badly outnumbered he ran faster than a rabbit being chased by a hungry fox.

“Every man for himself,” I told him cheerfully. “Run along to daddy, and quickly!”

Walter fled. I held up a hand to slow the crowd, just long enough to give the bully a fighting chance to get to his father. The board would not be amused when they saw Walter—he looked as if he’d wet himself in fear—and they’d demand Boscha Do Something. Boscha didn’t have many cards to play, not now his prefects were losing and losing badly, and that meant …

I nodded to Alan as the mob rushed by me, then made my way down to the wardchamber. The rioting was growing worse. A bunch of students were partying in the hall, another bunch were chasing a pair of snooty girls down the corridor … I put a stop to that before it could go any further, glaring the rioters into submission. I understood, all too well, just how badly hatred and resentment could curdle into something truly nasty, when the poor bastards were denied any chance to express it, but there were limits. It was going to be hard enough to calm everything down, afterwards, without aristocrats screaming their daughters had been debauched and deflowered.

The spellchamber unlocked when I touched the door. Mistress Constance was bent over a cauldron, stirring her brew as Pepper kept a wary eye on the spellwork forming around the foaming liquid. I gritted my teeth, bracing myself. Boscha had only one real option, if he wanted to keep his post. He had to take it quickly, too, before the board decided he was useless and fired him on the spot. Or did something else, something I couldn’t predict. I’d done my best to plan for everything, but there were limits to that, too. Boscha wasn’t a skilled fighter or general. He might accidentally come up with something right out of the box …

Magic flared. The castle heaved. Mistress Constance let out a gasp of pure triumph.

“Got him!” She looked up and grinned. “It worked!”

I smiled back. The castle’s wards were bound to the grandmaster … but we had samples of his son’s blood. Right now, the wards were unsure who was their actual master. We couldn’t take over directly, not yet, but we could keep him from using the remote wards to crush the riot and nip our coup in the bud. And Boscha couldn’t go back to the board and demand help, not without exposing himself as a failure. He had only one option left. I hoped it wouldn’t take him long to realise it.