Modern Magick

The Wonders of Vale: 1

Betrayal.

It hurts when your enemies do it, but at least you expect them to stab you in the back at every available opportunity.

It's six times as bad when it's your friends. Miranda being approximately my least favourite person on the planet at this time, I... am not in any hurry to work with her again.

Unfortunately, Milady insists.

This is why she's the boss and I'm the lackey. She was no more impressed than the rest of us when Miranda defected to Ancestria Magicka, indulging in a spot of espionage (at our expense) on her way out. As far as I'm concerned, Miranda's dead to me, whatever her skills may be, or however useful her particular brand of expertise.

But Milady sees opportunity, and takes it. The job must be finished, progress must be made, and if we need Miranda then we need Miranda.

I just wish she'd sent someone other than me to arrange it.

Ah well. If wishes were unicorns, lots of people other than my good self would ride them, and that's just a messy prospect.

As for her probable location, well, I did some subtle asking around. And when I say "subtle" I mean I put posters up in all the common rooms and corridors at Home, emblazoned with Miranda's picture and the words: HAVE YOU SEEN THIS WOMAN?

Hey, I'm taking leaves out of Milady's book. Whatever gets the job done.

Anyway, it didn't take all that long to establish that I am in fact the last member of the Society who's known to have had contact with Miranda. I'd suspected as much.

I'd last seen her on the fifth Britain, in the halls of the transplanted Ashdown Castle. It hadn't been an easy conversation, but fortunately it hadn't been a lengthy one either. Miranda had brought my pup back to me, which had won her back one or two measly points of my esteem (current balance: minus nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-eight).

And that was that. Where she had gone afterwards, I simply had no idea. Had she been part of the group of Society and Ancestria Magicka members we'd forcibly hauled back to the sixth? Had she made it back here, somehow, on her own?

Or was she still there?

I felt in my heart that she was still on the fifth. The allure of the place affected all of us; I'd practically had to drag Jay back by his hair, and I don't know anybody more devoted to his family than he.

Meanwhile, we've reason to believe that the fifth is absolutely crawling with magickal beasts — the kind that are, at best, highly endangered in our Britain, and at worst outright extinct. The kinds of creatures Miranda would sell her grandmother to gain access to (or her friends, allies and employer, because sure, what are we worth anyway?)

Ahem. As I said, Miranda would want to stay.

So said my heart. Course, my heart has a bad habit for talking utter crap, so what do I know?

'How do you feel about gut instincts?' I said to Jay.

He looked up at me, blinking with the dazed look of a man so deeply engrossed by a book as to be having trouble finding his way out of it again. We were in our favourite spot in the first floor common room, tucked into chairs by the longest window. I had a stack of five books balanced on the arm of my chair. Jay had twelve.

'Context?' he said.

'Detective work.'

'Aha, you mean a good old-fashioned hunch.'

'I've a hunch Miranda's still on the fifth Britain.'

'I've a hunch you might be right.'

'Two hunches make a...'