Page 125 of The Tribes of Magic
The wind was wild and rough up here, so none of us bothered to talk. Kato pointed toward a window about twenty meters down. Conner and I nodded, then we all started the slow descent. We were at the windowless peak of the Black Obelisk. There were no offices, rooms, or indoor space of any kind way up here at the top. We had to go down to reach the General’s office.
The going was slow, but I was in no danger of falling, or so Kato had assured me as we’d put on our magic bodysuits. Hanging here from the Black Obelisk by nothing but my hands and feet, it was hard to feel wholly confident of that, but for now at least, the magic seemed to be holding.
We’d made it about halfway to the General’s office window when an ear-splitting screech cut across the sky. I froze. Looked. Listened.
It came again, closer this time. And then I saw them, black beasts flying in on the wings of death. Ravens. Alone, one of them wouldn’t have been a problem, but there wasn’t just one or two or ten or twenty. There were hundreds of them. It wasn’t a flock. It was a swarm.
The birds swooped in, scratching and clawing, pecking and piercing. I rolled to the side. Only my magic suit kept me on the building. Like a black river, the swarm streamed past, screaming, then they came around for another pass.
Conner had his bow out. Sizzling arrows shot toward the birds, but they hardly did anything at all. The swarm had a lot more birds than Conner had arrows. Kato moved super-fast,slashing his sword at the incoming attackers, for all the good it did us. Black feathers rained down from the sky. New ravens appeared to replace the fallen.
I felt a buzz in my fingertips. It started subtle and soft, but quickly escalated into a heavy percussive beat that rocked my whole body. The building was shaking too. Electric tendrils poured over the top of the obelisk, slithering down the black glass toward us. I didn’t know whatthatwas, but I knew one thing: we did not want to be here when the rivers of lightning reached us.
I allowed myself to slip lower down the building, closer to Kato and Conner. I pointed up at the encroaching lightning, then down at the General’s window. Safety was just one big slide away. They nodded at me. We all joined hands and let loose. We slid down the smooth glass, fast and furious, picking up more and more speed. We were faster than the birds, faster than the lightning, faster than…oh, crap. The window was coming up fast. And we still weren’t slowing down.
Then, suddenly, we came to a hard stop, so abrupt that I fell forward, my head hitting my legs before slamming back against the glass. I grunted in pain. I was still mostly stuck to the building.
Conner’s head came into view. “Are you all right?”
“No.” I groaned again. “Not really.”
“Kato put on the brakes a little hard there, didn’t he?”
Kato’s head appeared next to Conner’s. “Sorry about that.”
“You can apologize later,” Conner told him. “Let’s get inside before we get eaten by birds or struck by lightning. Come on, Red. Let’s go.” He offered me his hand.
So did Kato, and between the two of them, they managed to peel me off the glass. Conner made quick work of the lock on the General’s window. He swung it into the building, then we all tumbled into the office.
Unfortunately—but not unexpectedly—the General’s floor wasn’t covered in soft, plushy carpet. It was concrete, hard and unyielding, painted over in black paint. I got to my feet, slowly and painfully. I was going to wake up to so many bruises tomorrow morning. Conner and Kato were already snooping around the office. I limped over to the General’s chair and sat down with a heavy plop. They might be used to putting their body through the blender, but I was not.
“What was with the birds? And the lightning?”
“Magical defenses,” Conner said.
“I thought there weren’t supposed to be any magical defenses on the outside of the building.”
“Yeah, what’s up with that, Kato?” Conner slid him a look.
Kato just shook his head. “There weren’tsupposedto be. I don’t know how they got there. I certainly wasn’t told about them.”
“I guess the General doesn’t trust you now that I have you enthralled.” I tried to roll my eyes, but it hurt too much.
Conner stopped foraging for evidence. His gaze slid between Kato and me. “What are you talking about?”
“The General thinks I’ve put Kato under a spell. He thinks Kato’s mind is no longer his own because I’m controlling him.”
“Of course you have, Red. You’ve put us both under a spell.” Conner winked at me.
Then he and Kato went back to searching the General’s office. It was a good thing too because I wasn’t sure how to respond to that statement. I mean, I was pretty sure he was teasing me, but I wasn’tcompletelysure.
“Those defenses were way over the top,” Conner was telling Kato. “I wonder who made them for the General.”
“I would like to know the same thing.”
My head wasn’t spinning so much anymore, so I joined in the search. We went through every filing cabinet, every desk drawer,every folder. Kato even hacked into the General’s computer. But we didn’t find anything of interest, except that the General played a spaceship battle game. And from the high scores, he was frighteningly good at it.
We thought the whole thing was a total bust—until Conner found a folder with all the General’s notes on the Apprentices.
