“Oh no, my ancient is horrible,” she says. “My pronunciation is all wrong.”
“I very much doubt that’s true,” the Professor says.
“It isn’t,” I say.
“You read it, Professor,” she says.
“Clare,” he says in that booming voice that usually has her knees knocking together, “you copied it down. You’re more likely to say it correctly.”
I offer her the paper back. Looking a little nervous, she takes it from my hands, clears her throat, and says the first few words.
“Wait,” Professor Cornelius says before I have a chance to repeat them. “I think you should call your magic forth, Miss Storm. Demonstrate to this ancient place that you really are a lumomancer.”
“Doesn’t it already know?” I ask. “I showed the library, and I used my magic out there when Fly was…” I trail off.
“It wouldn’t hurt,” Professor Cornelius says with a kind smile.
I nod, close my eyes, and let my light magic swim from my hands. Maybe it’s my imagination again, but it does feel easy here. Like the light is welcome. Like it belongs. It hums in the air, lighting the Great Hall with even more warmth.
“Can you say those first few words again?” I ask Clare. “Slowly.”
“Okay.”
Clare wets her lips with her tongue and says the first few words clearly and precisely. Clearly and precisely, I repeat them, my magic flaring in the air of its own accord, like a flame fed fresh fuel.
Clare says the next line, and once again I repeat it. Then the next, and the next, each time my magic flaring momentarily.
Then she comes to the final line. Despite not understanding the ancient language at all, I seem to comprehend it nonetheless, its meaning clear as I let it slip from my tongue – an invitation, a request, a plea to this ancient place to protect us.
This time, my magic doesn’t flare. It hangs in the air, still as a statue. I hold my breath, my heart seeming to forget how to beat.
“It doesn’t seem to have worked.”
And then – beneath my feet – a light ignites, like someone has struck a match. It spreads from where I stand, across the stone slabs of the Great Hall floor – the dark stone suddenly gleaming like marble.
The light races beneath the feet of Fox, Professor Cornelius, and Clare. They spin around to watch it surge to the walls, where floor meets stone, then climbs upward, illuminating the walls, racing along the vaulted ceiling above our heads until it meets in the center directly overhead.
We stand there, staring upward, heads tipped back and then I let my gaze sweep the entirety of the Great Hall. The dark stone glows a brilliant white. It’s never looked like this before. It has always seemed gloomy, shadowy, frankly menacing. But now it’s transformed into somewhere worthy of the palace in Onyx Quarter; light, radiant, elegant.
Was this how it was once upon a time, when this place belonged to light wielders?
I look back towards Fox’s face, illuminated by the light, more handsome than ever, and I’m struck again by the color of his skin and the blue that seems to shine in his amber eyes. He looks more human than ever.
“Did it work?” I ask. “Did I do it?”
Fox nods, then looks to Professor Cornelius. “What do you think?”
“I’m not sure we’ll know for certain – not unless the academy is attacked,” he says, chuckling, “but this little light display does seem to suggest we were successful.”
Clare can’t help bouncing on her toes, clapping her hands. “You did it, Briony!”
“Me?” I say, laughing. “Clare, that was you!”
“Oh no,” she says, pushing her glasses firmly up her nose. “It wasn’t.”
“It was,” Fox contradicts. “You found the location, and you found the words. Professor Cornelius and I did very little.”
“You would have found it without me,” she says dismissively.
