"Why do you need my magic?" said Jane.

Nikolay tapped his fingers against the spellbook he'd been reading and sent it sailing back into place on the bookshelf. "Fighting the Oath-spell and keeping the tsar healthy drains my powers. If you want me to cure Phillip, I need to borrow some of yours. I won't completely drain your magic stores, don't worry."

For Phillip she would give up her magic; she would give anything. And yet, alarm bells tolled in her head.

"What if we ask Casimir? He's got more magic than I do." And he's also more experienced at magic, so Nikolay won't be able to abuse his power...

"Casimir spends reams of his magic each day on the tsar and Phillip. He's almost run dry. You have more power right now. Why the hesitation?"

"Well," said Jane, nettled. "I'm pretty sure every idea you've had recently has involved using me in some way."

He raised an eyebrow. "That's not true. I've definitely had ideas that didn't involve you in the slightest."

"Like spying on the castle for the enemy?"

To her surprise, he laughed. "Good heavens — is that what they're saying now? Who started that rumor? Olesya? I always knew she hated me." He frowned at her. "The reason it's best to involve no one else is because the spellwork needed to save your brother will be dangerous... and — hmm — slightly illegal."

"Slightly?"

"Illegal enough that we shouldn't discuss it with Casimir until after the fact. Not so illegal that anyone would die."

"So you want my magic... so I'll go to jail in your place?"

"Nonsense. You are the avtorka, and I am the most powerful sorcerer in the kingdom. Neither of us will go to prison."

What arrogance, Jane thought.

She studied his face. It was pale as ever, with a gray sheen around the edges that spoke of pain and late nights and poor sleep. Nikolay probably wasn't lying about the depletion of his magic.

Still.

This was a bad idea.

Jane knew this was a bad idea.

But the problem with bad ideas was that it was easy to accept them, if the cost of not accepting them meant someone you cared about would die.

"Well?" said Nikolay.

"You can have some magic."

She didn't know what to think about the look in Nikolay's eyes as she said the words. He seemed almost... relieved. Somehow, this unsettled her more than anything.

"Come here," he said.

He summoned a glass of water, and to Jane's bemusement, dipped his fingers in it, then took her hand.

"What...?"

"Transferring power between people is not easy. When it must be done, magical transfer is most easily performed via a liquid or metal conduit."

Jane nodded.

She felt an odd sensation, a kind of tugging at her insides, which intensified, tightening, constricting, until Jane nearly gasped with pain. She tried not to move — she didn't want to mess up whatever spell Nikolay was using — but it was hard to stay still when the room spun and the floor buckled like a boat at sea. Unsteady, she swayed and might have fallen, if not for the grip on her hand.

The sensation faded. Jane felt dizzy, hollow and tired, like the spell had stripped away part of her essence.

"Sit," said Nikolay.

She knew it was not concern that made him say it, but practicality. He didn't want to have to heal her if she fell and hit her head.

She sank into the armchair. "Was that all you needed?" Black spots still punctuated her vision. She rested her head on her knees, trying to swallow her nausea.

"It'll do."

"When will Phillip be well again?"

He tilted his head. "It'll be at least a week before he wakes. Maybe two, depending on how potent your magic is, and how intractable his curse turns out to be."

A week. "And he'll be..."

"If the curse is what I think it is, he'll recover. If not — well, at least he'll be better off than he is now."

They stared at each other for a moment. Then —

"Thank you," said Jane.

Perhaps it was her recent encounters with Casimir that made her say it, perhaps it was the memory of Casimir's kindness, his wish for a better world. Jane did not know. She stared into Nikolay's face and saw — again — that briefest flicker of uncertainty in his eyes.

The emotion — whatever it was — vanished as soon as it had appeared, leaving only indifference. He shrugged. "I don't see why you have any reason to thank me. We made a deal. I'm saving your brother for a Writing in the Book of Truths."

"Right," said Jane.

She turned and left, hurrying from Nikolay's office with surprising briskness. Only after Nikolay's solar was a few flights behind her did she slow in her walk and pause, frowning.

She would never understand him.

-v-

Exhausted from the depletion of her magic, Jane fell asleep early that night. When she woke, it was just before dawn, and she lay on an unfamiliar floor.

Her first instinct was to panic. She leaped to her feet, blinking sleep from of her eyes, and frantically took stock of her surroundings.

She was in a tower room, which — judging from the view — was somewhere inside the castle. The room was round like Nikolay's solar, but with fewer dead creatures hanging from the ceiling. On one side of the room stood a wide oak desk. Opposite the desk were seven pentagrams, elegantly inked onto the marble floor.

The only other object in the room was a mirror. It stood floor-to-ceiling, but it did not reflect the room. Instead, reflected in its surface, Jane saw a massive fortress sandwiched between two peaks, with layers of walls rising up the cliff face.

Jane recognized the view. It was the fortress of Dalnushka, the same fortress where she had appeared through the portal several months ago.

The same fortress Zakhar had threatened to invade.

There didn't seem to be an invasion going on right now. In the pre-dawn light, the fortress gleamed — innocent, peaceful, untouched by intruders.

Unease prickled across Jane's spine.

She turned to the desk.

A signet ring lay in the center of the table. Beside it stood an inkwell and quill, a stack of parchment, and several wax wicks of various colors. A photocopier — Jane blinked, but it was undeniably a photocopier — sat below the desk, along with staples and reams of loose paper.

Jane turned back to the topmost piece of parchment and realized it was addressed to her. It read, Your second godstest has begun.

No shit, Jane thought.

A second piece of parchment lay beneath the first. Nervously, Jane picked it up.

Beneath this problem were two addenda, in a slightly larger typeface:

You can transport up to seven things (including messages or people) to any location using the pentagrams. Put the item in the pentagram and say where you want the item sent.

The mirror will show you what you need to see.

Jane sighed with relief. This was more like it! A math problem was something she could deal with, despite her lack of magic.

She looked back at the mirror. If she squinted, she could make out the familiar lines of the temple where she had appeared her first day in Mir. She frowned and said experimentally, "Can you show me Lanskoye?"

The image in the mirror flickered, and Jane found herself looking at a small hamlet embedded in a mountainside.

"Cool," said Jane.

She turned back to the paper.

She still felt nervous, but also giddy with relief. A math problem, a logic puzzle —how manageable this was, compared to marching through fields of glass and poison gas. Perhaps, Jane thought, the gods were trying to make up for the horrific unfairness of the first godstest.

She began calculating.

Ten minutes and a copious amount of scribbling later, she had her answer.

The people of Lanskoye would never make it to the fortress without help. The sudok traveled faster; they would catch up to the villagers long before the villagers reached safety. If Dalnushka didn't send help, the villagers would die.

The best way for Dalnushka to send help — according to Jane's calculations—was if the townspeople began traveling toward the fortress, while wyverns flew back and forth between the fortress and the townspeople. The wyverns could transport extra soldiers to hold off the sudok and also carry townspeople back to the fortress.

The total cost of lives — if her math was correct — would be around 80.

She turned to the problem of conveying her strategy to the appropriate people. Suddenly, the signet ring made sense. She could write notes to Lanskoye and Dalnushka, telling them what to do, and then use the tsar's seal to sign the messages so they believed her.

She grabbed parchment and scribbled two notes. The first note she addressed to the head of Lanskoye, explaining that all the villagers needed to evacuate to Dalnushka. The second was to the head of Dalnushka, explaining the plan. She dithered over how to end the letters and finally signed them 'From Sengilach' before placing the first letter into a pentagram.

"Lanskoye!" she said.

The letter vanished.

She glanced at the mirror. It now reflected a cozy row of houses, a church, and a meeting hall. In the center of this tiny hamlet, on a small patch of grass next to a posse of goats, Jane saw her letter materialize in a whisper of gold fire.

She peered closer, hoping someone would notice her letter, but there were no humans in sight. As she watched, biting her nails, the nearest goat — a big-eared buck with a massive wattle — eyed the letter beadily, and then, with a delighted grunt, leaned closer and took a bite.

Ack! she thought.

Anxious now because she was wasting time, she scribbled a second letter. This time, she told the pentagram to send it to the village leader's house — "Put it into the village leader's hand, so somebody reads it!"

But it seemed Fate was not with her today, for the mirror now showed a bedroom and a sleeping old man... who yawned as Jane's letter materialized in his hand and then batted it away, sending it spiraling beneath the bed...

For the love of...

"Send this next letter," Jane said desperately—panic was setting in—"into the hands of the most alert and competent person in town. They have to be awake, and be able to read, and also be capable of rallying the townspeople to go to the fortress."

And at last, at long last, someone took her message seriously. It was a woman, possibly the daughter of the sleeping village headman, for after reading the letter, she leaped from her chair and raced to wake him.

Jane nibbled her fingernails. She had already wasted three pentagrams on a task that should have taken one. If she failed this godstest...

Phillip was relying on her — an entire country was relying on her —

She tore herself away from her spiraling thoughts and sent her next letter to Dalnushka. Here, at least, Jane's letter found a willing recipient on the first try. The leader of Dalnushka frowned at the letter, turning it over, staring at the tsar's seal, and then Jane's messy 'From Sengilach' at the end. Then she summoned a servant.

"Tell Irina to take her scouts and fly north into the mountains. I've received a report of Kanachskiy monsters, but we need to verify its validity."

"What?" Jane moaned.

Scouts would waste time, time they could ill afford. Hadn't her message in the letter made it clear? The sudok were nearly at Lanskoye; Dalnushka needed to send its troops to defend the villagers.

Jane scribbled another letter, this time explaining that the letters were coming from her, the avtorka — that this was her godstest — that Dalnushka had to pay attention to her, because if they didn't, dozens of people would die —

She sent it, biting back terror.

She was on the fifth pentagram now.

Only two left.

Again, the mirror showed her the town. The villagers were mobilizing almost as badly as Dalnushka's army. Some villagers loaded wagons. Others carried children — or in some cases, goats. At least these villagers seemed prepared to move out soon.

But other villagers were mobilizing in the town center, men with pitchforks and shields and shovels. There was considerable arguing and waving of hands. From their shouts, it sounded like the shield-bearers were trying to convince the others to stay and fight.

"There's no time," Jane moaned. Sunlight crept across the mountains, lighting the aspens like golden flames. The sudok would reach the town soon.

She hesitated, then wrote 'YOU HAVE TO LEAVE, NOW!', sent the message to the village chief, and returned to the scene at Dalnushka.

Riders mounted wyverns along the fortress walls. It seemed her last missive had done the trick — or perhaps the scouts had returned faster than she thought. Jane's heart leaped wildly. For a moment, just a moment, she thought they might still have a chance.

That hope faded when she saw the wyverns were only carrying one rider, instead of two.

Jane fought the urge to shout at the mirror.

Does no one read? I specifically wrote the leader of Dalnushka that she needs to send extra soldiers with each wyvern to stay with the townspeople!

She grabbed another sheet of parchment and paused. Only one pentagram remained. After this, she wouldn't be able to send any more messages. She wouldn't be able to do anything at all...

As she dithered, the image shifted back to Lanskoye, where the platoon of villagers was finally moving out. Feeling sick, Jane watched them start down the road. She estimated there were 200, maybe 300, more than half of the villagers. Many among them were children.

Jane's nails were bloody from nibbling, her throat tight with panic.

She turned back to writing the leader of Dalnushka again, only to realize that in her moment of inattention, the wyverns had already taken off. Dammit! They weren't bringing nearly enough reinforcements to help fight the sudok. And the villagers were still so far from the fortress — they would never make it —

She twisted her hands, paralyzed with indecision, fighting the urge not to cry. How had everything gone so wrong?

At least the villagers will get some help, she told herself hollowly. At least it's better than nothing—

Phillip wouldn't have messed up like this.

Phillip wouldn't have let things get this bad...

Darkness moved in the mirror.

Jane froze.

A sudok, leather-skinned and hideous, peeled away from the shadow of a boulder and slithered toward the village. Jane watched, barely breathing, as its forked tongue flicked the air, crimson eyes scanning the surroundings. Slowly — deliberately — it made a beeline for the town hall. Another sudok followed, then another, each bigger than the last.

The smallest sudok reached the town hall first. It hissed and charged at the door, which broke in a shower of splinters. Other sudok followed. Screams tore at Jane's eardrums—piercing, terrified cries from the villagers left behind. There were old people inside, Jane realized sickly — elders, and the men and woman who'd stayed behind to defend them —

Jane bit back a sob. She tried to look away, but it was impossible to tear her eyes from the horrors in the mirror. The townhouse interior was awash with blood, limbs scattered at odd angles on the ground, torn clothing and shards of flesh —

Jane grabbed a piece of parchment, hands shaking now, desperate. Perhaps there was still some way to salvage the situation, to save the villagers on the road — there must be some way — must be something she could do —

Her heart thundered in her chest; her face was awash with sweat.

Think, Jane, think, think, think — you have to do something — you have one more pentagram —

But it was like her brain had turned to stone. Nothing came to her. Her mind remained dreadfully, hideously blank.

And the sudok were moving, were leaving the townhouse. Their forked tongues tasted the air. One sudok seemed to scent the remaining villagers. It shrieked and hurried toward to the stone path the villagers had taken.

The others followed.

And still Jane sat, paralyzed with terror and indecision, unable to think.

Unable to move.

The train of villagers came into view ahead, wending their way along the rocky trail. A scream rose from the sudok, high and wild. The villagers barely had time to turn around before the leading sudok raced up the path, and with a vicious swipe, decapitated the woman at the rear of the train.

Shouts filled the air — screams of villagers, wails of children, panicked braying of goats. And then — Jane's heart leaped — a different scream echoed through the mirror: the louder, wilder scream of a wyvern.

Dalnushka's riders had finally arrived on the scene. They fell on the sudok in a crash of steel and scales.

Hope rose in Jane's chest. Battle mages volleyed magefire from the wyverns' backs, driving the sudok away from the villagers. A rain of arrows followed.

For a moment, Jane thought they might have a chance.

But the sudok seemed more surprised than injured. Hissing, they surged forward with renewed fury. One sudok leaped from the ground and sank its teeth into a wyvern's throat, in a spray of crimson. The remaining riders wheeled back, alarmed and confused, as the sudok charged.

Ten battle mages, Jane's mind offered numbly. They need to combine their magic to kill one sudok. But the fight was too chaotic for that. The mages didn't seem capable of coordinating their attack. In fact, she wasn't even sure if ten battle mages had come to the scene.

She had known she was sending riders to their deaths, but it hadn't hit her, until that moment, what that would mean.

As more and more wyverns fell, the captain of the riders seemed to realize they were outmatched. "FALL BACK," he shouted. He swooped down, picked up the nearest villager, and launched into the air.

A mage teleported amongst the villagers and disappeared, two children in his grasp.

Unable to stomach more, Jane turned away.

A chime echoed through the tower. Sick, despairing, Jane watched a scroll materialize in front of her.

She plucked it from the air with trembling hands. She didn't have to read it to know what it said, but she read it anyway, wishing this was a dream — a nightmare —

Evaluation for Jane Constance Huang's Second Godstest

Score: 55/100

Verdict: FAIL

-v-

So... that happened. Heh heh heh! What will Jane do now? Things just keep getting worse for her and Phillip!

Huge thanks to my husband for basically writing the battle scene because I don't understand how battles work...

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