Things were a bit… difficult now.
Difficult was probably the best word for it.
Lines had been drawn. There were sides. There was uneasiness. It wasn’t quite animosity, but there were definitely stress fractures.
It hadn’t been obvious last night, in the aftermath, but in the morning light it was clear. The camp had split, and it hadn’t even split in two. On one side, there were the Romani, who kept doing what they always did, but who were quieter now. On another side, some of the Spanish teenagers, including Isabel, Maria, and Rafael. A third side was simply Ana and Luis, who seemed to be the only person willing to be near Ana. Selene, Kannika, and Kusi Sisa made up the last side, and were the only ones willing to move between the other three.
There was a circle with a ten feet diameter of dead grass that Ana hadn’t left since last night. She’d even slept outside. The Romani cooked for the teenagers, but they wouldn’t take the food to them, and they wouldn’t let them come get it. Kannika and Kusi Sisa delivered the breakfast. The Romani children were subdued. Quiet. Eleni, who seemed to be physically fine, would not leave Elena’s side, clutching onto her skirts.
It was awkward. It was annoying. It was like a plate with a crack in it, the slightest tap would make it shatter.
Mihai and Toma demanded some of Selene’s time, and she gave it. Mihai looked concerned, Toma furious.
“A different kind of magic, Selene?” Mihai asked, repeating the words she’d told him two nights ago.
“Perhaps. We do not actually know what it is,” she replied evenly.
“It’s a curse,” Toma said, his voice harsh. It had been his daughter paralysed by Ana’s venom after all. “A curse for Spaniards, a curse for Unholy Spain.”
After the fall of the Holy Spanish Empire and the end of the Second Aetherium War, some had taken to referring to Spain as Unholy. It was never a sign they felt good things about that country. Toma and Farnika’s eldest brother, Sandor, had died fighting the Spanish, so he had a reason to hate them.
Selene had a reason, too. It was their fault her husband was dead, after all.
Simon Maris had been a good man. She could never forgive what the Spaniards had done, but Stella had been three years old when he died. Those children were the same age as her. They didn’t have any responsibility for Simon’s death, and they didn’t for Sandor’s death either.
“We do not know,” Selene repeated her words. “But I can tell you what I do know.”
“I’ll listen,” Mihai said.
Toma spat on the ground, but he didn’t move away.
“It appears to have begun around the start of this year. We do not have an exact date for it, but definitely January. So far, it has only affected sixteen year olds. It starts on their birthday. Some of the youths receive a kind of magical power. Some of them are changed physically. For some, both.”
“Magic is the manipulation and control of the natural energies of the universe,” Mihai replied. John Dee’s definition of magic was fairly famous. Everyone knew it, at least.
“Do we know that?” she asked. “Eight hundred years of magic, but Britain has not been at the forefront of magical research. The Royal Society named it Magnetism of the Flesh and moved on. The whole reason the Holy Spanish Empire existed was stamping it out. Even places where they never reached, like here, it is not common. Europe has no existing magical traditions. Everything we know about magic we have taken from other countries, and even if that were not true, the most common theory of magic is that there was none, and then there was some. It just changed, one day to the next. It didn’t exist, and then it did.”
Mihai nodded. “Agrippa’s theorem on the origin of magic. I really never liked that one. One day, there was no magic. The next day, there was magic. It lacks… everything.”
Selene nodded. Agrippa’s De Origine et Progressu Magiae Natura was widely read and held to be one of the best early works on magic, even centuries later, but his De Origine Magiae lacked any kind of substance, which was essentially the point he was making. There were records, sources, detailing magic dating back about four centuries before his time, and then they just stopped. Completely. Worldwide. Not one trustworthy historical source had been found from an earlier point, and every earlier mention of magic seemed to be folklore or myth.
“Exactly. Maybe this always existed, and we didn’t know, or maybe it’s some new stage in magical evolution. It could be magic, and I cannot think of anything else it might be instead.”
“Heaven’s curse on the Spaniards,” Toma muttered.
Selene rounded on him. “Then heaven cursed my Stella, too, and if you tell me she deserved that, you’ll lose teeth.”
“Peace, Selene, peace. Let us say it is magic; it hurts nothing to start there. Tell us more. Tell us about Stella, please. Is she alright?” Mihai the peacemaker, as always.
She understood Toma’s anger. She still wasn’t going to let it go unreplied to, but she’d said her piece and he’d held his tongue. “Stella is good,” she told them. “Scared me no end when she grew six inches overnight, but she seemed to think it was puberty. She has the power to control any silk she touches, moving it, reshaping it, changing the colour.”
Mihai frowned. “I can’t think of anything it could be other than magic, either.”
“Someone gathered almost two hundred children from across Europe, through the aftermath of a world war, in countries falling apart from economic disasters and famines, within a day or two of their powers activating.”
Both Toma and Mihai were frowning now. There weren’t many organisations that could pull off something like that, and the fact those children had been brought to London was the final proof Selene had needed. The British government could do something this huge, and they were the one most likely to bring them to Britain. SIS would be behind it.
“Your enemies have teeth,” Mihai said.
“Those children are still dangerous,” Toma muttered.
“Bears are dangerous,” Selene replied.
Toma blinked. “That’s why we don’t take bears in our vardos.”
“Bears are only dangerous if you poke them. Refrain from touching Ana and you will be fine, as long as you are not a plant.” She really had no idea how they were going to get both Ana and Rafael in a wagon. “Those children are children, and they need your help.”
“We help children,” Mihai said. “Even gorger children. Even… magical Spanish gorger children.”
Toma stalked off, scowling.
Mihai frowned at his back. “I will talk to him.”
“He might need some time.”
“He will come around.”
“I know, he is a good man, and perhaps they shall both hate me for saying so, but Toma and Farnika have one personality copied between both of them.”
Mihai barked out a laugh. “Oh, he will definitely hate you for saying that.”
He walked off and Selene stood there alone for a moment, then moved over to where Ana was sitting on the dead grass. “Hello, Ana,” she said in Spanish.
Ana didn’t reply or look at her.
“Ana, I need to ask about your Abilities, alright?”
“I didn’t mean to hurt her,” she whispered. “She was behind me. I didn’t even see her until she grabbed my hand. I didn’t mean to.”
“I know you didn’t, Ana.”
“I’d never hurt a child.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t mean to.”
“Ana, listen to my voice, please. Hear my words. I do not blame you. It was an accident. I need to know about your Abilities so that you and I, together, can make accidents less likely to happen. Alright?”
“I could just leave.”
“Pardon?”
“I could just… live in the forest. I’m… what even am I? A plant. A plant person. I should just live in the forest.”
Selene breathed. She took a moment, away from the world. There was just her breath and, maybe, Gaia, if her mother’s beliefs were true. They likely weren’t true. The world hadn’t ended. Gaia had not struck humanity down for trains and pollution and war. Humanity thrived instead of humanity endured.
Selene had believed it herself, once upon a time, when she’d been learning to be a warrior in John Kismet’s army.
She came back to herself, at peace with Gaia and everything around her. “No, Ana. That will not do. Not you, nor Rafael. Not anyone is leaving here to go live in the forest, not when you are still hunted and I haven’t taught you to protect yourself yet. Understood?”
“I understand.”
“Alright, perfect. Where are you from, Ana?”
“I’m from Salamanca.”
“I’ve heard of the golden city. What was that like?”
“It was fine.”
“You enjoyed growing up in there? I bet you loved the sunsets.”
Ana finally smiled. “The city is so beautiful when the sun sets. The stone glows like gold.”
“I would love to see that one day. Maybe we could go together, in the future.”
Ana’s breath hitched in her throat. “I can never…” she broke as if she was going to cry but then choked back the sob. “I can’t go back.”
Selene reached out a hand, touching her fingertips to Ana’s skin. She was careful of the spines, but there were inches of space between each one and the girl seemed desperate for some kind of human contact. “Why don’t you tell me what happened, sweetheart?”
“I… changed. Into a plant person. I was excited, it was exciting. I love flowers. My parents love flowers. They are both florists, good ones, the university always wanted their flowers. I thought they would…” she stopped again, the tears rolling down her face. She shuddered, then continued on as if she wasn’t crying. “I thought they would still love me.”
“Any mother with half a heart would love a daughter as wonderful as you, child. I am so sorry you have gone through this, it must have been very difficult. You are safe now, I will protect you, but I need you to help me protect the others, Ana, alright? You need to tell me about your Abilities.”
Ana nodded. “I have six. Two from my birthday. Two when we woke up after getting to the Church. Two from when my parents… they had a broom they kept poking me with until I ran away.”
Selene’s fingers drew out little circles on Ana’s hand as the girl described her powers. After a few minutes more conversation, Selene rose and went to the last group.
“I heard some of that,” Maria told her. “It was very sad. She can’t come in the wagon.”
“She’s going in the wagon,” Selene replied.
“She’s not going in the wagon with Rafael,” Maria said.
“Both Rafael and Ana are going in that wagon, Maria.”
“But-”
“I’m not arguing. I’m informing. Ana’s powers are mood dependent. When she’s sad, plants die. When she’s happy, they thrive. So if she affects Rafael, which I doubt she will because he is a person, not a plant, then as long as she is happy everything will be fine.”
“Happy?” Maria asked, looking stunned.
“Keeping her happy is your job,” Selene said.
“Wha-why me?”
“You’re the healer, Maria. Go heal her soul or something.”
Maria huffed a breath. “Did you use up an entire day’s niceness quota talking to Ana?”
“More like a month’s,” Selene replied. “I have too much to do, and this is something you need to do. It will be healing for both of you.”
“I can’t heal myself.”
Selene shook her head as she walked away. “Never tell people your weaknesses, child.”
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