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  She looked over at her roommate and felt the old flash of envy. Daria was kind and caring, but she had the kind of life that Elaine wanted. And that hurt more than she wanted to admit.

  “I should stay with you,” Daria said. “You shouldn’t be alone for the first night...and druids don’t count. Do you know that they swear vows of chastity that are bound into the magic? They can’t even get hard...”

  Elaine flushed. “Shame really,” Daria added, mischievously. “I thought that that younger druid was right up your street. Young, educated, bookish...he was lovely. Shame about the vows he took...”

  “But he worked with female patients,” Elaine pointed out. There were female druids, but not that many of them. “Without the oaths, who knows what he might do when he was alone...”

  “But men aren’t animals,” Daria said. She paused in mock consideration. “Actually, they are animals. I misspoke...”

  She broke off as the magic field surrounding the Golden City suddenly twisted, snapping into a new configuration. Elaine felt the sense of loss running through the city, feeling tears prickling at the corner of her eyes as she looked up at her friend. Daria, irrepressible Daria, looked as if she were about to cry. They both knew what had happened.

  The Grand Sorcerer was dead.

  Chapter Five

  Only the very wealthy, or those belonging to an incredibly old bloodline, enjoyed large gardens in the Golden City. The city had always been confined by the Five Peaks, for reasons that had probably made sense long before the rise of the Empire. Some of the knowledge in Elaine’s mind whispered that the city’s founders had tapped vast levels of natural magic below the mountains, using it to protect the heart of their vast empire. Maybe it was nothing more than tradition these days, but it was still forbidden to build outside the mountains, even away from the Blight.

  Maxim, Lord Howarth, had never lacked for money and breeding. From what Elaine had heard during her long stay at the orphanage, Lord Howarth was merely the latest in a long line of inbred aristocrats piling up debts on the gaming tables while protecting his aristocratic rights with a single-minded determination that would have taken him far, had he applied it to anything else. Even the Golden City’s notoriously unmerciful creditors preferred to wait and bide their time rather than try to collect from one of the city’s foremost bloodlines, knowing that attempting to bully him into paying up might earn them the wrath of the entire aristocracy. Elaine found it hard to understand why anyone would choose to squander so much wealth and status on gambling and whoring, not when his name could get him into any establishment in the land. He was little more than a waste of life.

  She halted outside the gates and hesitated. By law, each orphan who remained in the orphanage when they entered their teenage years had to have a guardian from among the aristocracy. It was one reason why the orphanage worked hard to have each child placed in a good home – or at least somewhere away from the orphanage – before they grew up, if only because the aristocrat might have resented the demands on his time. There were stories of some orphans who had been adopted into wealthy families and given a chance to succeed, but as far as Elaine knew they were only stories. Adopted children couldn’t compete with bloodline in the aristocratic world. It was more likely that an illegitimate son would be retrospectively legitimised than an orphan would be brought into the family.

  Lord Howarth had been appointed Elaine’s Guardian when she’d turned thirteen and grown into a woman. She wasn’t sure why Lord Howarth had accepted the position in the first place – given his breeding and general reputation, he could probably have avoided the responsibility – nor why he’d never severed ties between them once Elaine had graduated from the Peerless School. Not that he’d ever done much for her, she had to admit. He gave her one interview per year, asked her a handful of questions that sounded as if he didn’t care...and nothing else. He hadn’t even bothered to mark her graduation with a party, let alone see her after she’d graduated. Elaine had honestly never expected to see him again.

  Bracing herself, she walked up to the gate and pressed her hand against the seal. A man like Lord Howarth had little trouble in purchasing the most secure wards in the empire, even though he was no magician himself. Rumour had it that he kept a small army on the grounds to protect his privacy, including a pair of combat magicians. Elaine should have found out, but didn’t. She cursed her own oversight as the gates slowly hissed open, revealing a long pathway leading up towards the mansion. The grassy field surrounding the building would have been fun to run on as a child, if she’d ever been allowed. Lord Howarth had no children of his own. His line might end with him.

  Knowledge whispered in the back of her mind as she walked up the pathway towards the house. Someone in the Howarth line had played a vitally important role in founding the Empire, and in fighting and winning the First Necromantic War. Elaine pressed one hand to her head as the knowledge refused to congeal into specifics; whoever had written the sealed histories had refused to be too clear on what had actually happened. It was strange – surely they should have expected the records to be sealed until long after their death – but there was nothing she could do about it. Perhaps the writer had had reason to believe that the wards surrounding the Great Library weren’t as impenetrable as everyone had thought.

  The steps leading up to the house were surrounded by statues, strange demonic creatures cast in stone and empowered by magic. Elaine had known, even before running afoul of the curse in Duke Gama’s book, that they were the house’s first line of defence, but now she knew how to create them for herself, if she wanted unstoppable defenders. They weren’t the most dangerous known to magicians, yet they were almost impossible to defeat by anything less than a sorcerer with a great deal of power to spare. A footpad with a sword wouldn’t be able to hold one off for a second. Very few would dare to slip into Lord Howarth’s territory uninvited and only a handful would have survived the experience.

  She put one foot on the steps and felt magic crackling around her, before it slowly faded away into nothingness. The wooden door at the top of the steps – strengthened by magic – opened, revealing a hulking monstrosity of a man. Judd, Lord Howarth’s butler, had given her nightmares from the first day she’d visited his mansion to have her Guardianship formally confirmed, even though he’d never been anything other than polite to her. The knowledge bubbling through her mind confirmed that there had been good reason to fear. Judd was very far from human, a rocky statue granted human seeming and powered by a spellbound demon. Elaine had heard that Judd had been around for centuries – something that should have been impossible, even with the strongest magic – and now she knew why. Her Guardian’s long-distant ancestor had created a servant for his family who would be loyal, obedient – and utterly unstoppable. Destroying the fleshy form wouldn’t release the demon from the spells binding it to the mortal plane, merely allow it to bring more of its power to bear against the imprudent trespasser.

  Elaine shrank back, feeling her mind desperately scrabbling for the handful of rites they’d been taught to banish demons – and the far deadlier rituals stuffed into her mind by the mysterious curse. Judd waited, as always giving the impression of endless patience combined with a certain disdain for her presence. Daria had once commented that servants were, if anything, even more snobbish than their masters. Judd certainly seemed to actively disapprove of Elaine’s presence. But then, who was she really? Nothing more than an orphan girl whose parents were mysteries and whose magical talent was hardly worth considering. If Lord Howarth had hoped that she would grow into something useful, he’d been bitterly disappointed.

  “I’ve come to see my Guardian,” Elaine said, fighting to keep her voice steady. The same laws that insisted orphans had to have protectors from among the aristocracy also insisted that the orphan had the right to see her Guardian whenever she chose, but Lord Howarth had never considered himself bound by the rules. “I trust that he will see me?”

  Judd seemed to co
nsider, and then he bowed, using one great hand to invite her into the mansion. Elaine felt a trickle running down her back as she stepped inside, leaving Judd behind her to close the door, before he walked past her and down the long corridor. The first time she’d visited the mansion, Judd had given her a lecture on how everything in the building was charmed to prevent anyone from taking it off the premises – as if he’d expected her to be a thief! Now, with adult eyes, Elaine could see just how tacky most of the assembled valuables actually were, although that wouldn’t stop them from being worth more than her entire yearly salary. Lord Howarth’s family had been determined to acquire more material goods than anyone else and never give anything up. She paused to study a tiny golden statue of one of the gods, before a cough from Judd drew her back down the corridor. Lord Howarth had never been particularly religious. Elaine couldn’t remember ever having seen him entering a temple.

  The butler paused outside a heavy stone door and knocked once. It swung open, revealing a study that had been designed for Lord Howarth’s father, a man who had been genuinely interested in the books he collected before his untimely death. Elaine had wanted to read some of the volumes on the shelves, but naturally she’d never been allowed to soil them with her grubby orphan hands. They weren’t books on magic, or they would have been examined by the Great Library after the Lord’s death. He’d been more interested in genealogy than magic. But all of his breeding hadn’t stopped him from drinking himself to death.

  “Elaine,” a voice said. Lord Maxim Howarth was sprawled over one of his father’s couches, studying a leaflet from the racing tracks. There were all kinds of magical safeguards built into the fields to prevent cheating, all of which could be subverted with the correct spell. Elaine wondered just what her Guardian would say if he knew that she could ensure that his chosen horses always won, before pushing the thought aside. She’d never been that desperate for his approval. “I was...relieved to hear of your recovery.”

  Tradition dictated that Elaine should go down on her knees before him, but a strength she didn’t know she had kept her upright. Lord Maxim Howarth wasn’t more than ten years older than her, yet he looked almost old enough to be her father. He’d been slim when she’d first seen him, but now even the most expert tailoring in the world couldn’t disguise his growing paunch or the lines on his face. His dark hair was thinning out and his eyes were too bright, a mark of some of the more complex – and illegal – potions he took to entertain himself. Some of them were banned even to people of his rank, which was probably why he wanted them. He’d always considered himself above the law.

  “I am glad to hear it,” Elaine said, with equal insincerity. The law stated that her Guardian should continue to interest himself in her well-being until she married or reached a social position where she could be reasonably assured of a long and happy life, but Lord Howarth had never bothered to show any interest in her ever since she had graduated. She was surprised that he’d even heard that she’d been ill. “It was a most unpleasant experience.”

  Lord Howarth shrugged. He’d probably felt worse after the first drink of narcotic potion. “But you recovered and your medical bills were met by the Great Library,” he said. He’d probably been worried that she’d try to make him pay for it, even though he could have afforded to finance hospital treatment for the entire city without even noticing the cost. “I fail to see what that has to do with me.”

  Elaine felt a flash of hot anger, tempered by a dull helplessness that had been part of her ever since she’d realised that she would always be a victim. “I need to ask you some questions,” she said. Spells danced through her mind, spells that could compel him to tell her the truth – or give her half of his inheritance. Judd’s looming presence behind her wasn’t as much a deterrent as he might have hoped. There were words that banished even the most persistent and deadly of demons in her mind. “Why did you become my Guardian?”

  Lord Howarth shrugged, languidly. “There are...duties that come with one’s birth,” he said. Elaine felt her eyes narrow in disbelief. Since when had he even considered the possibility that his birth brought responsibilities as well as the freedom to enjoy himself into an early grave? “I merely felt that such duties had to be honoured.”

  Something snapped inside Elaine’s mind. “You never showed any concern for such duties before,” she said. “Why now? Why then?”

  “Have a care,” Lord Howarth said, coldly. And yet there was something else hidden under his voice. “I can have Judd take you outside and thrash you for imprudence.”

  Once, that threat would have stopped Elaine from pressing the matter any further. She’d known that Lord Howarth had ordered several of his servants whipped over the years, once for a crime as petty as having his bath water slightly too cool for his enjoyment. And technically he was her Guardian, with almost paternal power over her.

  “Of course you could,” she said, keeping her voice calm, “but that won’t stop me asking the question. Why did you become my Guardian?”

  She heard Judd’s hulking form rustle behind her, but kept her eyes on her Guardian. “Why did you decide to take on my Guardianship?”

  Lord Howarth met her eyes, but looked away first. “It was...pointed out to me that I had a duty to uphold,” he said, finally. “My father had promised to serve as a Guardian when the next child required a Guardian. He was one of the patrons of your orphanage and I believe that he took it seriously. When he died...I was in the position of choosing to renounce his word or taking up the position myself. You were the child in need of a Guardian.”

  Elaine wasn’t sure that she believed him. It was true that an aristocratic family passed clients, favours and debts down the line from father to son, but becoming a Guardian was something different from calling in favours incurred by the previous generation. Perhaps it was why he’d never shown any real interest in her, even after she’d been accepted into the Peerless School, and yet...something about it didn’t quite ring true.

  “Right,” she said. Judd’s presence seemed to loom closer, but she refused to look away from his face. “Who pointed it out to you?”

  “Councillor Travis,” Lord Howarth said, finally. “He said that I should honour my father’s wishes or no one would ever take me seriously again.”

  Elaine felt her knees buckle as she fought to prevent herself from laughing out loud. The thought was absurd! Councillor Travis had made his money in trade, not something that a respectable older family like the Howarth Family would consider respectable. Travis would have gone to Howarth to beg favours, not the other way around. He certainly wouldn’t have had the influence to make a noble lord assume a responsibility he didn’t wish to assume.

  And yet she had the strange feeling that Lord Howarth was telling the truth.

  “That was good of him,” she said. Part of her was astonished that she’d pushed it so far, but there was one more question to ask. “I assume you read my file at the orphanage?”

  “Well, of course,” Lord Howarth said. He seemed to be relieved that they’d moved away from Councillor Travis. Elaine made a mental note to go back to that issue at a later date. Even if her Guardian was telling the truth, there was something about it that didn’t make sense. “I had to be sure that I wasn’t assuming the Guardianship of a thief.”

  “Of course not,” Elaine muttered. Never mind the fact that an orphan would have better reason than most to steal. She cleared her throat. “Do you know who my parents were?”

  “I was told that you’d been passed to the orphanage as a baby,” Lord Howarth said. He shrugged. “The orphanage never bothered to investigate your parentage. You could be the last surviving heir to the Empire for all I know, or the daughter of a scullery maid and a noble-born son. The gods know that such births are rarely treated as important to the families...”

  Elaine nodded. Bastard children were a problem for any noble family, particularly when their sons were raised in a world where lower-class female servants literally couldn’t
say no. Very few families would consider such a child an equal, no matter the circumstances of his – or her – birth. Farming the child out to an orphanage was one of the kinder ways to deal with the situation. Elaine had always considered such families to be heartless. She wondered, absently, if she was actually related to Lord Howarth, before dismissing the thought. If that were true, she would have preferred to forever remain Elaine No-Kin.

  “I suppose they do,” Elaine said. Lord Howarth shrugged, again. He really didn’t care very much about her, she realised, but that was no surprise. She’d never been given any reason to assume he cared. “Could you ask if they kept some records they never showed you...?”

  “They would have shown me everything,” Lord Howarth said. He looked up at her, sharply. “Why do you care, all of a sudden? You might not like what you find out.”

  “I don’t know,” Elaine admitted. She honestly didn’t know where the desire to know the truth behind her birth had come from. It had always been part of her, but it hadn’t been important...not until she’d been hit by a powerful curse. And then she’d dared to ask an Inquisitor about her birth. There had been a time when she would have preferred to die rather than speak to one of the Inquisitors. “I think...”

  Something clicked in her mind. “You don’t have any money left, do you?” she asked. It seemed impossible, and yet Councillor Travis had been in a position to influence her Guardian. And he’d seemed to worry about the cost of her medical treatment. “You’ve finally spent your inheritance...”

  “Throw her out,” Lord Howarth ordered, so sharply that she knew that she was right. “Now.”

  Judd grabbed Elaine’s arm and dragged her out of the room, back down the corridor towards the door. A dozen spells rose up in Elaine’s mind for breaking his grip and freeing herself, or banishing the demon back to hell, but she pushed them down. There was no need.

  She was still chuckling when Judd threw her out of the gate and onto the street.