Derek Landy - The Maleficent Seven

When the steps had done enough sinking, they came to a floor, and it was as good a floor as any, she supposed. It was flat and solid and wide, even if it was just as cold and old as the steps had been, and the walls, and the low ceilings that kept the whole place from caving in around them. The girl didn’t like being underground. Already she missed the sun.

Her father led them through a passage, turned right and walked on, then bore left and kept going. They walked on and on and turned one way or the other, and the girl quickly lost track of where they’d been. It was all sputtering torches in brackets, feeble flames in the gloom.

“Remain here,” her father said once they’d come to an empty chamber. She did as she was told, as was her way, and watched her parents leave through another passage. Her father held himself upright and seemed suddenly so frail. Her mother didn’t look back.

The girl stood in the darkness, and waited.

And then she waited some more.

Eventually, a man wandered in, dressed in threadbare robes and broken sandals.

“Hello,” he said. Even with that one word, he didn’t sound English. The girl had never met a foreign person before.

“Hello,” she answered, and then added, “pleased to meet you,” because that was what you said to strangers upon first making their acquaintance.

He stood there and looked at her, and the girl waited for him to say something else. It wouldn’t have been right for her to speak. She was a child, and children had to wait for their elders to initiate a conversation. Her father had been very strict about that, and it was a lesson she’d learned well.

“Do you have questions?” the man asked in that strange accent that clipped every word.

“Yes. Thank you. Where am I, if I may ask?”

“You do not know?”

“I’m here with my parents. They—”

“Your parents are gone,” said the man. “They went away and left you here. This is where you live now.”

The girl shook her head. “They wouldn’t leave me,” she said.

“I assure you, they have.”

“My apologies, but you’re wrong. My parents would not leave me.”

“They got back on the boat an hour ago. This is your home now.”

He was lying. Why was he lying? The girl had inherited her manners from her father. From her mother, she had inherited other attributes. “Tell me where they are or they’ll be very cross,” she said, using a voice that brooked no argument. “My brother will come looking for me, too. My brother is big and strong and he’ll pull off your arms if he thinks it would make me smile.”

The man sat on a step. He had an ordinary face. Not handsome, but not ugly. Just a face, like a million others. His dark hair drew back from his temples and was flecked with grey. His nose was long, his eyes gentle and the corners of his mouth turned upwards. “Did they give you a name?” he asked. “They didn’t? Nor a nickname? Well, that might get annoying in the next few years, but you’ll pick a name for yourself sooner or later and then we’ll have something to call you.”

“I’m not staying here for the next few years,” said the girl, firmly acknowledging that the time for manners was at an end. “I’m not staying here at all.”

The man continued like he hadn’t heard her. “My name is Quoneel. It’s an old name from a dead language, but I took it for my own because of what it means, and what it meant, and it is my name now and it protects me. Do you know how names work?”

“Of course,” she said. “I’m eight, not stupid.”

“And you have magic I take it?”

“Lots,” said the girl. “So tell me where my parents are or I’ll burn you where you sit.” She clicked her fingers and flames danced in her hand.

Quoneel gave her a smile. “You are indeed a fierce one, child. Your mother was right.”

“Where is she?”

“Gone, as I have said. I have not lied to you. They have left you here, as they once left your brother.”

The girl let the flames go out. “You know my brother?”

“I trained him. We all did. As we will train you. You will live here and train here and grow here, and when your Surge comes, you will leave as one of us.”

“Who are you?”

“I am Quoneel.”

“But what do you mean? Who will I be when I leave?”

“Who you will be, I do not know. But what you will be... If you survive, if you are as fierce as you seem, then you will be a hidden blade. Invisible. Untouchable. Unstoppable. You will be as quick and as strong as your brother, and as skilled and as deadly. Do you want that, little girl?”

It was as if he could see into her dreams, into her most private thoughts. She found herself nodding.

“Good,” said Quoneel, and stood up. “Your training starts today.”

They called her Highborn, the other children. They used it as a weapon to wound her. One of them, a girl with dull brown hair, but a sharp cruel tongue, was too vindictive to cross, so the others flocked to her side. The cruel girl was the first one of them to take a name, and she chose Avaunt.

Quoneel took the girl for a private lesson one day. “Do you know why they call you Highborn?” he asked.

“Because they don’t like me,” the girl said. The practice sword was heavy in her hands.

“And why don’t they like you?”

“Because Avaunt doesn’t like me.”

“And why doesn’t Avaunt like you?”

The girl shrugged, and attacked, and Quoneel stepped out of the way and struck her across the back of the knees.

“Avaunt doesn’t like you because of the way you speak and the way you look and the way you walk.”

The girl scowled and rubbed her legs. “That seems to be a lot of things.”

“It does, doesn’t it. You are well-spoken, and that points to breeding and education and privilege. You are pretty, and that means men and women will notice you. You walk with confidence, and that means people will know to take you seriously. All of these are admirable qualities in a lady. But we do not train you to be a lady here. Attack.”

The girl came forward again, careful not to fall into the same trap as last time. Instead, she fell into an altogether different trap, but one which was just as painful.

“We are the hidden blades, the knives in the shadows,” said Quoneel. “We pass unnoticed amongst mortals and sorcerers alike. The privileged, the educated and the beautiful cannot do what we do. You must lose your bearing. You must lose your confidence. You must lose your poise.”

His sword came at her head and she blocked, twisted, swung at him, but of course he was not standing where he had been a moment ago. He kicked her in the backside and she stumbled to the centre of the room.

“They call you Highborn because that is what will get you noticed,” Quoneel told her. “You must learn to mumble your words, to shuffle your feet, to stoop your shoulders. Your eyes should be cast down in shame at all times. You are to be instantly forgettable. You are nothing to the mortals and the sorcerers. You are beneath them, unworthy of their attention.”

“Yes, Master Quoneel.”

“What are you waiting for? Attack.”

And so she did.