Hidden Island Chapter 46, part 2 of 4

Hidden Island
Chapter 46, part 2 of 4

Janie looked pained. "We do not have time. It is irrelevant to your mission."

"If this inquiry helps us decide whether to continue to wait or seek other solutions, it is very relevant," Sister Victoria said.

"If she doesn't know how she cast a spell that affected someone else, it is our job to figure out if there is danger," Sister Mercy added.

"What's going on," Tonya asked.

"They want to know about your connection with Caine," Janie explained.

"I can just tell them," Tonya shrugged.

"No, they want to know what you don't know," Janie said insistently.

"So do I," Tonya said, throwing her hands up.

"You don't understand," Janie pleaded.

Tonya took Janie's hand. "I appreciate you looking out for me, but Caine and I have no idea what's happening with us. This whole plan hinges on me being able to blow a hole in that wall, so if they can tell me more about this weird thing between me and Caine, maybe it will help me control the magic when I need it."

The Sisters exchanged glances again. Caine's plan had been deliberately vague, and suddenly, they had a suspicion. "That's why he wanted the structural wards," Sister Mercy said.

"He said as much," Sister Victoria agreed.

"I had assumed we were going to be digging out a portion of the collapse that might bring the basement down on us," Sister Mercy said.

"I thought maybe a mining charge," Victoria added.

All the different ways an explosive magic reaction could go wrong jumbled together in Mercy's mind. "This is madness."

"It could work, though," Victoria reassured her.

"We have to be sure," Mercy said firmly. "I want to recheck the wards. There may be ways to reinforce them further."

Victoria nodded once and turned her intense gaze on Tonya. "We'll help you figure this out, but if you've done something against your oath, even accidentally, we must break the spell and bind you to our custody. You understand?"

Tonya's expression started surprised, then transitioned into amusement. She gestured around. "Custody?

We've been holding off a fucking siege all night. Where do you think you're going to take me?"

"It would be our duty to take you to an Inquisitorial Hold, where we can perform an Inquest on the spell you cast," Mercy explained.

Janie winced. This was precisely what she'd been afraid of. "Caine would view that as a threat," she said carefully.

Victoria hesitated. She hadn't considered that. "That's honestly not how I meant it. An Inquest is not like a Questioning."

"It was not a threat. We just wanted to be sure the apprentice understood," Mercy added.

"It's our duty," Victoria said firmly, unsure how to address the apparent issue of being trapped and relying on unknown magics to get them out. "This entire situation puts us in a challenging position."

"I know," Janie said with a sigh. "That is why I have been trying to avoid the topic. He wouldn't even like it if you were insisting on this discussion. You've seen how he is."

"If it turns out he's protecting someone who used dark magic-" Sister Mercy began.

"And cast it on him," Sister Victoria added," I think he would be thankful to us for discovering it." Sister Mercy continued.

"You think he would be angry?" Victoria asked, skeptical but also worried.

"You've seen how he is," Janie repeated.

The Sisters exchanged another long look and, without another word, walked upstairs away from Tonya and Janie's ears.

"Seriously, what's going on?" Tonya asked after they left.

Janie looked worried. "I wish you hadn't mentioned your connection to Caine."

"Why?" Tonya asked.

"Because you don't understand it," Janie explained. "The Magistrate classifies unknown magic as a kind of dark magic. They have to investigate it. That's quite literally why their order was founded."

"How could it be black magic? Bella said for magic to be black, it has to be deliberately harmful. This was an accident," Tonya said nervously.

"Not black. Just dark," Janie explained. "Dark magic doesn't require intent—just harm. Sometimes harm is justified, which is what Questioning and Inquests are about. Their job is to learn why magic was used to hurt someone."

"That doesn't sound so bad," Tonya said.

Janie shook her head bitterly. "In theory, it isn't. The problem is that it's possible to work dark magic entirely by accident, and the Inquisition's methods can be brutal. So sometimes they hurt people who never meant to hurt anyone."

"That's awful," Tonya said. "No wonder everyone's scared of them."

"My biggest concern is, you didn't cast the spell that created the connection between you and Caine," Janie said.

Tonya's face went white. "Bella wasn't trying to hurt us! She would never do that!"

"The ritual that brought about this connection between Caine and yourself was intended to be a hex," Janie said, her voice full of worry. "That's a kind of curse. Hexes are a bit of a gray area since they can be used for defense, but they can easily turn black if the caster's intentions aren't pure. Also, the energy was being transferred through the Ways. Again, not necessarily bad, but from what I understand, the Ways are invoked in many necromantic practices. It's suspicious and dangerous. Not to mention that before the spell fully dissipated, Caine and I had lost a lot of blood. I was in no condition to tell at the time, but if that blood entered the ritual circle before the spell finished failing, that might be enough to qualify as an unwilling sacrifice. The Inquisition is not very forgiving of that sort of thing."

Tonya suddenly looked terrified.

"So you see how there are many ways that the spell could have become dark, even if it was never intended to be," Janie finished sadly.

"I didn't know," Tonya pleaded.

"I know you didn't," Janie said gently. "But I did."

"Why didn't you tell me!?" Tonya demanded.

"I did not want to worry you. If I could have taken you to Fort Deliverance, we might have been able to learn
more about this residual connection, but that would have invited a great deal of scrutiny," Janie explained. "I was in hiding."

"Yeah, alright. That makes sense," Tonya said quietly.

"Even if involving the Magistrate was possible, I doubt Caine would have agreed to it," Janie sighed. "I had hoped to speak with Prelate Alexandra directly once the situation had become less dire, but everything kept spiraling out of control. I'm sorry."

Tonya put a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Yeah, our luck's been pretty awful lately. It's alright. Thinking I might have some dark magic in me wouldn't have helped anything. I wish I'd known so I could have kept my mouth shut."

"When it comes to the Inquisition, keeping your mouth shut is generally the best course of action," Janie said gently.

"What do we do now?" Tonya asked.

"There are two ways for magic to be dark," Janie explained. "One is by intention, the other is by source. Intention is the first and easiest part of an inquest. They'll look at the spell with some divination and see if it is harmful. If it isn't, they're done. If it is, they must determine if the potential harm is deliberate. That's done through questioning, usually assisted by truthtelling magics. If the harm isn't deliberate, they'll do their best to eliminate the spell and lecture you."

"Great," Tonya scoffed.

"If it is deliberate, they will try to find whoever cast it and put them to justice," Janie said grimly.

"You mean kill them," Tonya clarified.

"Usually," Janie said.

Tonya looked angry but shook her head. "What about the other half? The source?"

"That's harder to figure out," Janie said. "Once a spell has been cast, it can be difficult to tell what energies were invoked to create it. For short-lived spells, it's impossible. The effect ends, and all trace of the source is gone. Different kinds of analysis can be done for a lingering aura, like the structural wards we just put up or your connection with Caine, but they aren't always reliable. It depends on how strong the aura is."

"Seems like an awful lot of ways for them not to know what they're trying to figure out," Tonya snarked bitterly.

"Yes, which makes them very hard to convince and leads to more and more invasive ways of learning what they want to know," Janie agreed. "Usually, the easiest way to determine if a source is dark is to put the caster in a
Truthtelling circle and force them to answer. That wouldn't work in your case because you don't know. So they'd have to take you to an Inquisitorial stronghold, where they have special ritual rooms built to find out."

"They can't do that! We're supposed to take them to Will and Bella!" Tonya protested.

"No matter what, they are going to insist on reading your aura and looking at whatever magic is connecting you to Caine," Janie said, sounding unhappy but resigned. "All we can do is hope that whatever they discover is less important than finding Will."

Tonya shook her head firmly. "It won't matter what they discover. They need you to get to Will so they won't drag us out of here. Their best bet is still to help us escape. So either way, I'll learn more about what's going on, and if they don't like what they find out, they'll have to deal with Caine."

"Hopefully, it won't come to that," Janie said.

"I don't know," Tonya shrugged. "I kinda like watching him make them squirm."

Janie smiled shyly. "Me too."

In Will's mostly empty library, Mercy sat down in Will's oversized chair, and Victoria began pacing.

"This is a problem," Victoria said tersely.

"I can see why Miss Castilian was trying to hide the apprentice when we arrived," Mercy agreed.

"And why she tried to steer the conversation away from this issue," Victoria admitted. "She's right that the connection between the apprentice and Caine is irrelevant to our primary mission."

"She also knows that doesn't matter. We are bound to investigate now that we are aware," Mercy said, rubbing her eyes in exasperation. "If it turns out to be heretical, we cannot overlook it."

"No," Victoria agreed. "And we cannot let them perform a ritual that relies on it, even to save ourselves and our mission."

"If the apprentice hadn't mentioned the connection, we would have no reason to suspect," Mercy said, letting her thoughts meander through the issue. "So even if the ritual Caine has planned turned out to be dark, we wouldn't know in time to stop it."

"And if the apprentice didn't know what she was doing, she could not be accused of malicious spellcraft," Victoria added.

Mercy pursed her lips. "So the consequences could have been put off until after we were free."

"Or at least until it had been attempted," Victoria said. Their words ran into each other like uninterrupted thoughts, one barely finishing before the next began.

"All of this indicated that Miss Castilian knew the ritual relied on unknown magic," Mercy pointed out.

"Or at least suspected and did not report it," Victoria said, pained. "I suppose we can add that to her list of apostasy."

Mercy went from pursing her lips to gently chewing on them. "No wonder she was so uncomfortable when Caine brought up his plan. I had assumed it was merely discomfort from bringing up witchcraft in front of us after such a tense situation."

"Even if we were to discover dark magic, we are in no position to bring her to the Fort for proper Questioning," Mercy continued.

"There's no telling when the pirates outside will try to organize again. Tactically, we cannot afford to weaken our position by starting a potential conflict now," Victoria added.

Mercy held her holy symbol like a worry stone. "There is also no telling when, or if, Caine will return."

"Every time we have doubted them tonight, it has not turned out well for us," Victoria reminded her partner. "I'm inclined to believe the apprentice. She seems very confident that he is alive."

"He could be captured," Mercy posited.

Victoria chuckled. "I would pity his captors."

Mercy's mouth twitched involuntarily, but another loud gunshot from upstairs cut off her thoughts. They both tensed for a moment, looking intently at the front door. Two shots from outside rang out, and they heard the faint clicking of bullets against a stone. No yells or impacts against the door came, so they relaxed. The standoff continued.

"This situation would be a lot easier if we didn't have to factor in the reactions of a madman," Mercy groused after the tension had passed. "In my opinion, he is the real problem."

"He certainly complicates everything," Victoria agreed.

"More than complicates. It feels like having a tiger on a chain," Sister Mercy growled. "Working with him feels like a mistake. Our job would become a lot easier if he never makes it back,"

"According to the Prelate, he is an agent of the church," Victoria countered. "Assuming that is true, we should pray for his success."

"I am not going to put my faith into someone who insulted and accosted us only a few hours ago," Mercy said flatly.

"Assuming the apprentice is right, and he is alive, there is no way either of them will leave without him. We would have to use force," Victoria muttered as she paced.

"And he would follow us," Mercy grumbled. "We know better than to let the devil at our backs."

"That seems a bit harsh," Victoria said, trying to reason with her partner. "True, I wouldn't want him following us for taking his charges into custody, but we both know we aren't going to do that. Even if we could, it's a bad idea. Miss Castilian is willing to work with us right now, and despite his attitude, Caine has helped us. Throwing away those advantages would be foolish."

Sister Mercy gave her partner an accusatory look. "You sound like you like him."

Victoria rolled her eyes. "I cannot stand the man, but you're taking it too far. It's clouding your judgment."

Mercy was humble enough to listen when Victoria said she wasn't thinking clearly. Victoria was usually far more volatile, so Mercy did her best to hear when the roles were reversed. "How so?"



To be continued