He moved closer to the bars. “You—”
A sudden crash came from upstairs. Behind him, a body came flying down the staircase, head over heels, wearing the guard uniform of a member of the House of Fire.
“What the—” Harris spun around. “Who’s up there?”
The guard lifted his head, groaning. “The—earth mages.”
Oh, damn. It seemed the House of Earth had finally made their move.
Without looking back, Harris ran for the stairs. I tried to get the door open again, but of course they’d taken my unlocking cantrips. My fire wouldn’t help, either.
‘Hey!” I said to the fallen guard. “Help me out of here.”
He crawled upright with a groan. “Are you serious?”
“Look, I didn’t do anything wrong, but if it’s the House of Earth who’s attacking you, they were compromised a long time ago,” I told him. “They’re buying cantrips on the black market, nasty ones. The same cantrips killed Zade.”
“I heard your friend was the one that killed Zade,” he said uncertainly. He was young for a guard, with light brown skin and dark hair matted with blood.
“Clearly, she isn’t the threat at the moment,” I said. “I can help you fight those earth mages. Trust me, you want me on your side, not against it. Harris arrested me on false pretences.”
“Harris is a dick.” With a nervous look over his shoulder, he ran over to my cell and unlocked the door. “Don’t tell anyone I let you out.”
“Cheers.” I climbed out of the cell, halting when footsteps sounded on the stairs. A lithe figure descended into view, dirt smearing his pale face. Earth mage.
I tackled him, knocking him off his feet and running past him up the stairs. He hadn’t been prepared for my speed, and he toppled straight into the guard’s fist. I left him behind and continued running up the stairs to the surface.
When I reached the main hallway, chaos greeted me. The front door stood open, while the bodies of several guards littered the hallway. I vaulted over the bodies and ran into the room where I knew they’d stashed the cantrips they’d confiscated from me during my arrest. Nobody tried to stop me, but I made a point of knocking down as many earth mages as possible on my way through. Once I had my pendant back, cantrips and all, I was out the door before anyone could get their hands on me.
Outside, more confused fighting littered the streets. While some of the attackers were earth mages, others fought with knives. I only needed to see the uniform of a masked assassin to know who’d sent them. The Family had made their move against the House of Fire, and possibly the other Houses, too. The streets were awash in confusion, bolts of magic flying through the air.
I broke into a sprint around the corner behind the House of Fire, eyes open for the nearest node. An assassin blocked my path, a cantrip gleaming around his neck. His fist shot out, but I ducked, glad that despite the enhancements the Family gave their assassins, my own speed still outranked theirs. A knife flew from his hand, grazing my shoulder, and a fireball sprang to my palms.
“What’re you playing at?” I said. “I thought the Family wanted me alive.”
No response came. The fireball left my hands and blasted him sideways into another assassin, and I ran on, following the route which circled the four Houses of the Elements from behind. The House of Earth was up next, and I skidded to a halt at the street’s end. The entire route was blocked by a tall barrier made of packed earth, which definitely hadn’t been there before. The barrier entirely covered the street’s end, leaving only one path open.
I took that route and ran on, but it became clear that every street entrance I passed was blocked by the same barriers the earth mages had conjured up. The routes to the citadel and the town’s centre were still open, but they would take me directly into the middle of the fighting. Which was no doubt the intention. The mages had blocked off the centre of the city, turning it into a cage. With the Houses warring from within and nobody able to get in or out, it’d be a bloodbath. Gusts of air rippled past, water and fire extinguished one another, while the ground trembled beneath my feet and assassins leapt across the rooftops flinging knives into the melee.
To get out, I’d need to find a way to vault over one of the barriers caging the centre of the city, find somewhere to hide inside one of the few empty buildings—or go to the one node near the square and expose myself in the process. Not good odds.
The assassins made up my mind for me. Two jumped off the nearest roof to bar my path. A fireball flew from my palms, and they ran to the side to avoid being incinerated. I skirted the corner and nearly tripped over the body of a fallen mage. His body was covered in blisters.
Those cantrips again. If anything, they were a more deadly method of killing than using elemental magic, especially if the earth mages had been spreading them around the Houses.
The two assassins rose to their feet again with jerky motions like puppets on strings. I darted to the side, avoiding another knife, and Miles and Shelley ran over to join me, hands blazing with spirit magic. The assassins backed off, sensing they were outnumbered, and our combined attacks took them down.
“How’d you get in here?” I asked the two spirit mages.
“Through the node,” said Miles. “We were on the brink of coming to bust you out of there.”
“I had it covered,” I said. “But—why are they blocking off this part of the city? Did they not remember people could just
