Trudi Canavan - The Magicians' Guild

The magician now brought a candle with each meal, but it only lasted a few hours. When darkness came again, Cery slept or paced the room to keep his blood warm, counting the steps so that he did not bump into the walls. He hugged the water bottle to his chest to prevent it freezing.

A soft sound caught his attention and he stopped, sure that he had heard footsteps behind his own. Only silence followed. Sighing, he returned to his pacing.

In his mind, he had rehearsed countless conversations with his captor. After his unsuccessful attempt at killing the magician, Cery had spent many hours considering his situation. Breaking out of the cell was impossible, and he was no threat at all to his captor. His fate was entirely in the magician’s hands.

Though it brought a sour taste to his mouth, he knew his only chance of escape lay in gaining the magician’s good will. It seemed an impossible task—the magician was not inclined to talk and obviously regarded Cery with disdain. For Sonea’s sake, Cery thought, I have to try.

Sonea. Cery shook his head and sighed. It was possible she had been forced to tell him that she needed the Guild to teach her to control her powers, but he doubted it. She hadn’t been tense or frightened, only resigned. He had seen how her powers had reacted to her emotions, how dangerous they had become. It was not hard to believe that her magic would have eventually killed her.

Which meant that taking Sonea to the Thieves had been the worst decision he could have made. By putting her in a situation where she was forced to use magic every day, her powers had been encouraged to grow, perhaps speeding her toward losing control of them much sooner.

She would have reached that point eventually, no matter what he had done. Sooner or later, the Guild would have found her—or she would have died.

Grimacing in the dark, Cery thought of the letter the magicians had sent, claiming they did not intend to harm Sonea and offering her a place among them. Sonea hadn’t believed them. Neither had Faren.

But Cery had an old acquaintance among the Guild servants. The man might have been able to confirm the truth, but Cery hadn’t asked.

I didn’t want to know. I wanted us to be together. Sonea and I, working for the Thieves ... or just together...

She was not one for the Thieves—or for him. She had magic. Whether she liked it or not, she belonged with magicians.

He felt a twinge of jealousy then, but he pushed it away. In the dark he had begun to question his hate for the Guild. He could not help thinking that, if the magicians had gone to so much trouble to save her—and many of the slum dwellers—from her powers, they could not be as indifferent as the dwells thought.

And what better future could he imagine for Sonea? She could have wealth, knowledge and power. How could he deny her that?

He couldn’t. He had no claim on her. The knowledge brought an ache like bruising after a blow to the chest. Though his heart had leapt the moment she had appeared in his life again, she had never expressed anything more than the fondness of friendship.

Hearing a faint noise, he stilled. In the distance, he could hear the faint but growing slap of shoes against stone. As the footsteps drew closer, he moved back to allow room for the magician to enter. From the quick pace, it sounded as if Fergun was in a hurry.

The footsteps did not slow as they reached the door, but continued past.

Cery took a step forward. Was it his captor, merely walking past on the way to another destination? Or was it someone else?

He rushed to the door and raised a fist to hammer on it, then froze, seized by doubts. If he was right, and Fergun was using him to blackmail Sonea, would he endanger Sonea by escaping and ruining Fergun’s plans?

If Fergun had told Sonea too much, he might kill her to hide his crime. Cery had heard many stories of kidnapping and blackmail gone wrong, and he shivered as he remembered the unpleasant endings of some of those tales.

The footsteps had faded beyond hearing now. Cery rested his head against the door and cursed. It was too late. The stranger was gone.

Sighing, he resolved to keep trying to befriend Fergun, even if only to learn the magician’s plans. Once more, conversations ran through Cery’s mind. When footsteps reached his ears again, he almost believed he had imagined them.

But as they grew louder he knew they were real. His heart began to race as he realized he was hearing two sets of footsteps. The owners stopped outside the door, and Cery heard Fergun’s voice, muffled by the door.

“Stop. We’re here.”

The lock clicked, and the door swung open. A globe of light hung over Fergun’s head, dazzling Cery’s eyes. Despite the brightness, Cery recognized the silhouette of the other visitor. His heart leapt.

“Sonea!”

“Cery?”

Sonea reached up to her face and pulled a blindfold away. She blinked at him, then smiled and stepped into the cell.

“Are you all right? You’re not sick or hurt?” Her eyes roved over him, looking for signs of injury.

He shook his head. “No. You?”

“I’m well.” She glanced at Fergun, who was watching them with interest. “Fergun hasn’t hurt you?”

Cery managed a wry smile. “Only when I asked for it.”

Her brows rose. Turning, she regarded Fergun with narrowed eyes.

“Give me some time to talk to him alone.”

Fergun hesitated, then shrugged. “Very well. A few minutes, no more.”

He gestured and the door swung shut, leaving them in complete darkness.

Cery sighed. “Well, we’re trapped together.”

“He won’t leave me here. He needs me.”

“What for?”

“It’s complicated. He wants me to agree to join the Guild so he can have me break a law and get kicked out. I think it’s his way of getting revenge for me knocking him out in the Purge—but I’m guessing it’s also about convincing the Guild that they shouldn’t take in dwells. It doesn’t matter. If I do what he says, he’ll let you go. Do you think he will?”

Cery shook his head, though he knew she couldn’t see him. “I don’t know. He hasn’t been nasty. Thieves would’ve been worse.” He hesitated. “I don’t think he knows what he’s doing. Tell someone.”

“No,” she replied. “If I tell someone, Fergun will refuse to reveal where you are. You’ll starve.”

“Someone else must know about these passages.”

“They might take days to find you, Cery. We walked a long way to get here. You could even be outside the Guild.”

“It didn’t seem far to m—”

“It doesn’t matter, Cery. I wasn’t going to stay, so there’s no sense in risking your life.”

“You weren’t going to join the Guild?”

“No.”

His heartbeat quickened. “Why not?”

“Lots of reasons. Everyone hates magicians, for a start. I’d feel like I was betraying the people I know if I joined them.”

He smiled. It was so like her to see it like that. He took a deep breath. “Sonea, you should stay. You need to learn how to use your magic.”

“But everyone will hate me.”

“No they won’t. Truth is, they’d love to be a magician if they had half a chance. If you turn the magicians down, everyone will think you’re mad, or stupid. They’d understand if you stayed. They wouldn’t want you to give it all up.” He swallowed hard, and forced himself to lie. “I don’t want you to give it all up.”

She hesitated. “You wouldn’t hate me?”

“No.”

“ I would.”

“The people who know you wouldn’t think it was wrong,” Cery told her.

“But... I’d still feel like I’d changed sides.”