‘What the–’ he began.
A wave of pure, unimaginable, existential terror washed out across the room. Courtney had started moving toward Kyle, around the sofa, and she came to a sudden and complete stop, flinching visibly. Kyle staggered back to end up leaning on the back of the sofa. His concentration gone, Petra was released from the grip of his spell. She dropped to the floor and stepped out of her imaginary bookcase, a broad grin splitting her blood-drenched face.
And then Nava vaulted over the sofa and punched Petra in the chest. Nava’s punches were nothing to write home about, but the Push spell she often stacked on top was another matter. Petra was slammed backward and into the wall at considerable velocity. Her head hit first and there was a grunt of pain before she dropped to the carpet, unconscious.
The illusions vanished in an instant, revealing the apartment as it actually was. Blood smeared the wall where Petra had been standing, the seat at the desk where she had used the terminal, and the sofa where she had, presumably, been sitting. There was no bookcase, but there was something standing up, out of Petra’s fallen body, where the bookcase had been. Nava stared at it and it stared back for a second or two before turning and rushing away through the wall. Bolting for the apartment door, Nava yanked it open and rushed into the corridor, but there was no sign of the thing which had been controlling Petra and the sensation of its presence was gone.
Once again, the Harbinger had got away, but this time it had left a corpse behind it.
~~~
‘We have an issue,’ Rochester said as he put his tray down at dinner.
‘Straight to the point, I see,’ Mitsuko said.
‘Sorry. Good evening, President. How has your day been? Mine has been fruitful and yet frustrating. By the way, we have a problem.’
‘I think I preferred it when you used to stammer every time you looked at my chest.’
Without thinking – and possibly as Mitsuko intended – Rochester’s eyes flicked down. His cheeks flared red. ‘I-I-I–’
‘That’s mean, Suki,’ Melissa said. ‘What’s this issue, Chess?’
Rochester sat down beside his girlfriend, his cheeks still burning. ‘I… That is to say… Well, you see…’
‘Calm down. Deep breaths. I’ll let you look at my chest all you want later.’
‘And that’s supposed to make him calmer?’ Nava asked.
Strangely, Rochester did seem to recover his composure rather quickly. Maybe the thought of breasts he could actually make contact with was easier to handle than ones he had to look at from afar. Well, about a metre. ‘With Lambert Stenger’s assistance, I was able to produce a good schema for the Ascend spell,’ he said when his breathing had steadied.
‘That sounds more like a good thing,’ Mitsuko said.
‘It’s excellent news as far as it goes, but the schema suggests a spell complexity of two hundred and twenty to two hundred and thirty Tammys.’
Melissa and Mitsuko both winced. ‘My biggest spell is only sixty-seven Tammys,’ Melissa said.
‘Seventy-five,’ Mitsuko said.
‘Sorcerer’s Eye is sixty-five,’ Rochester said. ‘We’re talking about something three times as complex. We’re going to need–’
‘It won’t be a problem,’ Nava said. She was looking down, concentrating on her food in the kind of studious fashion she displayed when she was having to reveal something she did not really want to.
‘But–’ Mitsuko began, cutting herself off. ‘What is the complexity rating on your highest spell, Nava?’
‘I’d rather not–’
‘If you’re saying that two thirty isn’t an issue…’
‘Two hundred and fifty-two.’
Silence.
‘I-is that your Magic Burst?’ Melissa asked.
‘No. None of you have ever seen me use that spell. And I’d rather none of you ever did. Most of my spells are less complex, though that’s partially because I’ve never taken the time to enhance some of them. Magic Burst is a hundred and fifty-seven. Third rank Gather Quintessence is a hundred and thirty-five.’
‘You’re incredibly powerful. I mean, that kind of potential and you can hold four active spells.’
‘I can manage two,’ Mitsuko said. ‘What are you even doing here, Nava? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m glad you came to SAS-squared. Really glad.’
‘You just want me for my body.’
‘Yes, but you could have done anything with that kind of power. Why are you here?’
Nava lifted her head and looked around the table. ‘I wanted a normal life. A normal life at a relatively normal school. With friends and learning and all the other stuff young adults normally have. And I have that. And I don’t want to lose it, so I’d appreciate it if you all avoided mentioning what I can do.’
‘Our lips are sealed,’ Mitsuko said. The others nodded.
‘Okay, so, I’ll take a look over this schema. If I know what I have to do, hopefully I’ll be able to implement it. And then comes the actual problem we have. The Harbinger has killed, but I doubt it plans to stop after a success and it’s Friday night. It could basically get a free pass to spend the next couple of days slaughtering students. We need to find it and stop it. Short of quartering the campus until I can feel it nearby, I can’t think of a good way of doing that.’
‘I’ll speak to Courtney after dinner,’ Mitsuko said. ‘She’s the aspiring detective. Perhaps she can come up with a plan.’
‘You saw it, didn’t you?’ Melissa asked of Nava. ‘The Harbinger. You used that See Spirit spell Chess came up with, so you saw it.’
‘I saw it,’ Nava replied. ‘It’s big. Two metres tall at least with long limbs. It moves on its toes. Its hands had two long fingers and
