The house started to crumble as they smashed through the walls and fell into the kitchen, a whirlwind of magic tearing through the cabinets and shelves. Emily sensed sparks of magic as potion jars shattered, jars that shouldn’t have been there... Nanette had clearly been very busy, all the time she’d been cooking. Emily remembered the poisoned wells and shuddered. Nanette was certainly capable of brewing poison - it wasn’t that hard, even without magic - and sneaking past the guards. Perhaps she’d posed as a serving girl or a rebel soldier or... she could be anything. She’d fooled Emily over and over again...
Nanette glowered at her as her magic crackled around her. Void hadn’t spent quite as long on teaching her to fight, Emily thought, but she was good. Less power, perhaps, yet she knew how to use it. And she wasn’t already drained from the earlier fights. Emily sensed a new string of attacks, trying to render her harmless... perhaps even put her to sleep. Low trickery, part of her mind thought, but effective if it caught her by surprise. Her lips twitched in grim amusement. Nanette would never win a dueling contest like that.
“You...” Nanette tumbled back, magic spiraling through the floor. “You think...”
The roof caved in. Emily raised a shield, instinctively covering herself as piles of rubble crashed to the floor. She saw a bed and a bathtub, the latter tipping over and dumping a ton of water on their heads. Steam filled the air as Nanette launched a fireball at her, followed by what felt like most of the floor. A hail of stones and pieces of wood crashed against Emily’s defenses. She had to admit it would have worked against almost anyone else. But she’d tightened her defenses since she’d been shot.
She punched through the debris, crashing down on top of Nanette and pressing the snake-bracelet against her neck. The girl’s eyes widened. Emily grunted in pain as a force punch detonated under her chest, blowing her up and away. She thought she heard her ribs crack as she crashed to the ground, briefly stunned. That was her trick, one she reserved for desperate moments. It had to have hurt Nanette just as badly, if not more, than it had hurt her.
Emily rolled over and stood. “Give up,” she said. Blood dripped from her mouth, staining her dress. It hurt to talk. “Give up and I’ll let you live.”
Nanette snorted. “If he hadn’t insisted you remain alive...”
Her hand dug into her shirt and came out carrying the amulet. Emily blinked in shock, then stumbled forward. Too late. She felt the wards scream in agony as Nanette triggered the spell, teleporting through protections that should have cancelled the spell or scattered her atoms over the entire continent. There was a brilliant flash of light, followed by a thunderclap as air rushed in to fill the empty space. Emily stared, shaking her head in numb disbelief. Her body hurt, aching so badly she wanted to collapse until the pain faded. She heard the remainder of the house creaking and knew she couldn’t stay. It was just a matter of time until the entire house collapsed.
Aiden, she thought, numbly. Nanette had turned the other girl into a frog. Petty spite? A distraction? Or something else? Emily didn’t have the time to worry about it. Where is she?
The house shook, again, as she half-climbed, half-crawled into the living room. She sensed a flare of magic, followed by a wave of heat. The house was burning... Emily wondered, just for a second, if Nanette had planned to destroy all evidence of her presence before she realized the truth. She’d left her chat parchments, as well as her potion supplies, in her bedroom. The flames were already burning through them. She cursed Nanette - the bitch had clearly been one step ahead of her all along - as she looked around, trying to find Aiden. Emily hoped she hadn’t hopped off to hide somewhere. There was no guarantee the spell would wear off, not if it had been cast by someone who’d been declared outlaw long ago. Aiden might remain a frog for the rest of her life, which might be quite short. The city had been running out of food well before the bombardment began. Someone might see her and...
Emily felt sick as she called for her friend, trying to ignore the creaking overhead. The flames were spreading rapidly, the air growing thick with smoke. She saw something moving and breathed a sigh of relief as she spotted the frog, then cast a summoning spell and yanked Aiden into her hands. The frog looked panicked - Aiden probably wasn’t used to finding herself in another body - and tried to escape, but Emily held on tightly as she wrapped wards around herself and ran for the front door. Pieces of flaming wreckage crashed down around her as she fled, Councilor Triune’s expensive house coming apart at the seams. She wondered if Aiden had grown up there as she threw herself through the door and out onto the streets. A moment later, the house caved into a pile of flaming rubble. The flames were already spreading to the rest of the street.
Shit, Emily thought. The other houses were empty, she’d been told, but the flames would continue to spread until they were stopped. The rebels had too many other problems to allow them to concentrate on putting the fire out. What spell did she use to start the fire?
She heard a croak and put the frog down, then knelt beside her and muttered a counterspell. The frog’s
