Page 5 of Joined By Magic

He shook his head. “No. It’s much too far. You can’t imagine the size of Alaria until you travel across it.” He studied me, his face cast into odd shadows in the strange light. “I forget how little you’ve experienced. Alarian culture is . . .” He looked down at the floor, considering. “It’s different to anything you’ll have seen before. You’ll need to be careful.”

So would he. His usual high-handed royal approach to things wasn’t going to work in the outside world.

“So how will we get there?”

He brightened. A little of the animation he showed for topics that fascinated him entered his voice. “The Galath train. It spans the territory. It’s a wonder of engineering—the tracks and carriages are magically charged and work together so a single mage can propel an entire train without draining themselves.”

“Won’t they be looking for us on it?”

“I don’t think so. My other safe houses were all much closer to home. They’ll search within Atar first. I’ll recover some strength, then teleport us across the border before dawn breaks.”

I nodded and sank to the ground again to pick at my food.

The guardian shield stretched out as far as my eye could follow it, left, right, and up. It glittered, making the darkness swirl disconcertingly. I’d seen pictures of it and learned of it at the schoolhouse, but seeing it in person was something else. It stood as a permanent barrier around Atar, right to the Alarian border. Supposedly to protect us.

It also locked us in.

No one could leave Atar without permission from the Crown, and the barrier prevented teleportation. It kept invaders out but citizens in. A safety measure, or a giant prison cell? I shot a sideways glance at the prince. He’d know. He’d created it twenty years earlier.

His frown as he concentrated on the shield told me not to ask yet. We’d spent a few miserable, tense hours in the desert before he announced it was time to go and brought me here.

“I could take it down. That would keep my father busy for a while, fixing it and dealing with defections.”

“But if you do that, won’t it be obvious we’ve left the territory?”

He turned back to the shield. “If Garron hadn’t betrayed me, I’d planned to take down the shield anyway as a distraction, then retreat to a compound deep in the desert. He might assume I had another desert hideout he was unaware of.” His fingers flexed, balling into fists. “I should have. I shouldn’t have trusted him with so much.”

Hesitantly, I stepped toward him and slid my hands under the unfamiliar, scratchy material of his coat. Taut with tension, he relaxed a little as I traced the smooth skin of his back, pressing my body into him. He exhaled as he brought his arms around me.

“You had to trust someone.”

He let out a humorless laugh. “Not in my position. My father was correct in that respect, at least.”

What a lonely, paranoid existence that would be. “I think you should take it down.”

He pulled back to look down at me with interest. “What brings you to that conclusion?”

“Whatever we do, they’re going to be looking everywhere. We might as well cause as much trouble as possible. It could slow them down.”

He nodded. “Agreed.”

Extending his hand, he pressed it to the shining surface of the shield and his fingers sank into it. Eyes closed, purple magic flowed from his fingers into the glittering wall. As I stared, it spread, rippling outwards and up in a wave of darkness, extinguishing the shine and leaving nothing behind. It continued until it passed out of view, consuming the shield as it moved. Unsettling, like a living thing gobbling it up. I shivered.

The prince stepped back with a satisfied nod.

“How did you do that? I thought it was impenetrable.”

“I built a backdoor when I created it. I’d never trap myself in a cell without a key.”

He gripped my hand with new energy. Some of his earlier torpor seemed to have gone. I felt it too. The thrill of doing something, of moving forward.

The world swirled to black.

Chapter Four

Talia

Itriednottostare. Dawn crept over the horizon, dim light filtering into a cloudless sky. It hardly mattered. Giant shining globes hung in the air along the street. They banished darkness and reflected off the smooth black surface we walked on. Tall buildings reared up on either side.

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