An important briefing was occurring in the house of the Societie Royale, but Jessamine di Cadenza was too far lost in her thoughts to have noticed.
I wish I could see you once again.
I remember the way you laughed when you held me.
Your joy, your warmth, your love—they filled my heart in a way words cannot express.
But now, there's only an emptiness where you used to be.
Father…
Why?!
Why couldn't you have stayed away from those devils?
Let them have their fun! Let them murder, plunder, terrorize! Let them seize all of Britannia—let them do whatever they want, just stay away from them!
If you were here, everything would be so much better.
I wouldn't be dealing with the sins of the world alone.
I am strong because of your name, and because you weren't there to protect me. If you had stayed home… I wonder who I would have become.
I won't allow something like that to happen again.
Mother has a different kind of power than ours.
I need both.
I will have both.
I will tame those bastards, force them to submit to me, take from them everything they've stolen from this country.
Everything they've stolen from me*.*
I will grind my heel upon the grave of Richard Blackstone and force Elisabeth to heed my commands. I will break their vile House with both politics and magic. I will rule this Kingdom from the shadows, and I will make sure no one else needs to lose a father as I have.
At least…
…that's what I thought.
Though I am a Master magician, I'm still so far below Caspian that I may as well be a Novice. He knows secrets which nations would kill for, and which magicians have died to protect. Important secrets, dangerous secrets. Apocryphal knowledge which shouldn't be given to petty world leaders and small-minded fools.
Knowledge which I need in order to protect everyone.
I'm strong, but I need to be stronger.
I need Caspian as an ally. I need to be able to rely on him for the short term while my power grows. I can't fully trust him, but neither do I have the strength to oppose him.
His strength—
—no, stay focused. Don't imagine anything.
There are threats all around me. They are nothing. As if a silly little spy organization could do anything to the di Cadenza family. As if politics could hurt the ones who control every single byte of information in this kingdom.
I will obliterate this spy ring.
I will rise above Caspian.
I will rise above the King himself.
I will become the protector this country needs me to be.
I will wipe the House of Blackstone from the face of the earth.
"Ms. di Cadenza?"
The sound of her name on the Chairman's lips was enough to snap Jessamine back to the present.
"I'm sorry?"
"Would you give us your thoughts, Ms. di Cadenza?"
Jessamine looked around. Most of the Societie's Executive Board were present, with the unwelcome addition of Elisabeth Blackstone, whose presence seemed to be the origin of the growing animosity and hostility flooding the room.
Her gaze darkened as she studied the Blackstone daughter and her contemptuous attitude.
Yes.
I will destroy her.
"I'm sorry, there's a lot on my mind as of late," said Jessamine, regaining her composure. "We were discussing repercussions for students who have allied themselves with the infiltrators, correct?"
"…an effort which Ms. Blackstone has now stymied," Henry continued. He glanced over at his subordinate out of a slight concern—Jessamine rarely allowed her mind to drift during Societie matters—before staring once again at Elisabeth. "She's refusing to provide any information on their identities."
Elisabeth's menacing grin was on full display.
"Really, you can just leave them to me," she purred. "I am more than capable of handling this affair, and I doubt anyone here has the stomach for this kind of work. Well… except for our little absentminded puppetmaster here."
Thus, disrespectfully, did Elisabeth refer to Jessamine's role in backstage management of both the Societie as well as the Academy itself.
Jessamine didn't appreciate the gesture.
"Ms. Blackstone, seeing as how you are a member of this Societie and an heir to a Blessed House, I should hope you understand that you require a better reason for withholding information."
"Oh?" Elisabeth had been reclining in her seat, one leg draped obnoxiously over the other, but now she leaned forward and clasped her hands. "And why is that?"
The raven-haired princess scanned the room.
"Is there someone here who will hold me accountable?"
Her eyes met the steadfast glare of the Duke of Cahill.
"You, Chairman?"
He did not look away. He did not seem to be intimidated in the slightest, though the same couldn't be said of the rest of the Board.
"Yes, I," he replied. "This world seems to have forgotten that I am a Master-ranked magician in my own right. Someone has to keep the House of Blackstone in check, and if that role falls to me, then I will execute it to my best ability. And let me say…"
Henry slowly rose from his seat.
"…I have utmost confidence in my—"
"Sit down," Elisabeth commanded.
Henry found his body instantly moving of its own accord, and the room was paralyzed with fear. Elisabeth calmly stood and circled the table, stopping directly behind the Chairman and placing a small letter opener in front of him before returning to her seat.
Jessamine sensed the woman's intent.
She's going to… !
"Take the letter opener," ordered Elisabeth, "and jam it into your carotid artery."
Jessamine watched as Henry's arm moved forward, as his fingers clasped around the blade, as he brought the tip to the side of his neck; though his hand was steady, the quiver of his eyed betrayed the fear gripping his very being in that moment.
"Stop this!" cried Jessamine, slamming her fists on the table as she stood. "We understand! You don't have anything to prove!"
Elisabeth looked over at her fellow Societie member with undisguised malice.
"You, who lie to yourself—stay."
What… ?!
I can't move…
…this shouldn't be possible.
—Henry!
Jessamine looked back at her closest ally just as the short, dull blade entered his neck.
…no…
…not again… !!
"Now, when I return your freedom of movement, your first impulse is going to be to take that thing out of your neck," said Elisabeth matter-of-factly. "However, if you do that, you'll begin losing blood at a fatal rate."
"Ms. Blackstone, please," pleaded Jessamine, voice shaking with self-loathing. "Please let him live. I beg of you, please…"
Quiet sobs and muffled screams began to fill the room as the Board came face-to-face with reality.
"Silence," Elisabeth commanded. "Puny, sniveling, whining cowards, the lot of you. No sense of gravitas. No respect for true power, true authority."
"What do you know of true power?"
Elisabeth turned to face Jessamine, whose face was now contorted in rage. Her rage only doubled when she saw Elisabeth's smirk.
"Oh, the pup wants to play?"
"I'm going to—!"
"Silence," said Elisabeth once more, and Jessamine's words choked in her throat. "You're like a child. So emotional, no awareness of the bigger picture. I guess it's time you received some discipline."
Elisabeth's eyes narrowed as her smirk vanished.
"Use the letter opener to slice open his throat."
It was like a dream, a nightmare from which there was no waking—her hands moved on their own accord, silent and surgical and savage, until the deed was done.
Her hands were drenched in Henry's blood.
Her hands…
The blade clattered to floor.
Henry was slumped over in his seat, having passed out from blood loss minutes earlier. He was probably dead.
Jessamine fell to her knees, strength suddenly vanishing from her legs as her mind struggled to rationalize her actions.
She'd killed people before, and in ruthless, brutal ways, too—but never a friend.
It was…
…strangely exciting.
No!
I can't think like that.
It's all her fault—Elisabeth Blackstone.
Once again, the Blackstone family has taken something from me.
I am sure…
They deserve to die, every last one of them.
"…you," she whispered, barely audible. "I'll kill you, if it's the last thing I do."
"Perhaps," replied Elisabeth with her characteristic smirk. "But at this moment, you have a more pressing concern, which is deciding how the Societie will respond to this tragedy… Chairwoman."
Jessamine's head snapped up, her eyes alight with fury.
"You have the audacity to call this a tragedy?!"
"Oh, but surely it is a tragedy most tragic," Elisabeth mocked. "To have the Duke who led much of this Academy assassinated by the same fiends who targeting the King, and who have now infiltrated the campus? Indeed, a tragedy…"
"Are you taking credit for the assassination attempt, whore?"
Elisabeth chuckled.
"I'm merely suggesting an explanation for the Chairman's death, Ms. di Cadenza. Or would you rather tell the investigators that your hand held the knife?"
Jessamine's scowl only darkened, and Elisabeth's eyes narrowed.
"If you won't listen to my advice, you've missed the entire point of today's lesson," she coldly stated. "You cannot touch me. You can only sit there and obey my commands."
Elisabeth rose from her seat and walked slowly towards the door as Jessamine struggled to stand.
"You… you were never planning to help us, were you?"
"On the contrary, Chairwoman. Our goals are currently aligned. I just had to make an example of Duke Henry so that nobody here thinks that I am easily manipulated. Also, with the Cahill patriarch gone, the Blackstone family will be able to grow in influence even further."
We were fools.
We've only helped the Blackstones in their twisted game of thrones.
"And…" continued Elisabeth, "shouldn't you be thanking me, Jessamine? You're now the de facto leader of the Academy, and you were able to get away with murder. Not many people can say the same."
"Go to hell, Blackstone."
Elisabeth didn't respond as she continued walking towards the door, only pausing on the threshold to offer one final warning:
"Once I've left, your freedom of movement and speech will be restored. Do take this time to think over my proposal. And know that I'll be watching you wherever you go."
As if on cue, the loud din of ravens squawking filled the room. The Societie leadership, still paralyzed in their seats save for Jessamine, could barely make out the flock of dark-feathered birds which had gathered by the windows.
It was her! Jessamine realized.
This is bad. We can't fight her if we can't strategize, and we can't strategize if she's always watching.
It's not like we're strong enough to fight her, anyway…
…we'll need help.
"One more thing," said Elisabeth, "you need to prepare for the coming conflict, otherwise the Duke won't be the only Societie member you lose this semester."
As Elisabeth departed the Societie clubhouse, so too did the ravens, except for a single watcher who remained by the windows.