«Necromancy,» clarified Zenomir.
Zorian blinked. Necromancy? Well, it sort of made sense for the lich to use that sort of spells, but what did necromancy have to do with time travel? Nothing. This was pretty much a definite confirmation of Zach as a primary cause of his predicament.
«So, wait, what is that language anyway?» asked Zorian.
«Hm? Oh! Yes, the language… it’s old Majara language, spoken by many of the cultures that shared the continent of Miasina with Ikosians before their rise to prominence. Many of the ruins in Koth are written in it and, sadly, it is the language in which many of the blackest rituals and necromantic spells are formulated. You won’t find any books about it available in public circulations, I’m afraid. But let’s return to the matter of this assailant. This is the darkest of magic they used, and they can be up to no good if they’re throwing spells like that on academy students.»
Deciding he couldn’t just backpedal now, Zorian nonetheless decided against mentioning time travel in any way and settled for making something up. He told Zenomir about him overhearing a plan to invade the city during the summer festival. At first he dismissed it as some kind of prank because of its ludicrous nature, but when the two cloaked figures noticed him eavesdropping and started throwing spells he didn’t recognize at him, he grew concerned. Zenomir took him a lot more seriously than Zorian thought he would, and told him to go home and leave everything up to him from now on.
Huh. That went surprisingly well — at least Zenomir hadn’t dragged him off to the police station to give a statement right away, though he suspected something like that might be in his near future. He paced nervously around in his room, unable to sleep and steadily losing the fight to keep his growing apprehension in check. Smart or not, the deed was done, and now the only thing he could do was wait and see what the consequences of his decision would be. For him and for everyone.
A knock on the door interrupted him. Strong, confident knocking that nonetheless only lasted for a second or two — completely unlike the knocking of anyone he knew.
«Coming!» Zorian called out, suspecting it was someone coming to talk to him about the story he told Zenomir. «What can I- urk!»
Zorian stared dumbly at the blade sticking out of his chest, his mouth opening in an unvoiced scream. He had just enough time to look at his assailant — a short figure dressed in loose black clothes and a faceless white mask — before the blade was painfully wrenched out of his body and then immediately inserted again into his chest cavity. Again and again and again…
When darkness consumed his vision he was actually glad he was dying. Being repeatedly stabbed in the chest hurts.
Zorian’s eyes abruptly shot open as sharp pain erupted from his stomach. His whole body convulsed, buckling against the object that fell on him, and suddenly he was wide awake, not a trace of drowsiness in his mind.
«Good m-!»
Kirielle was cut off as Zorian shot upright, eyes wide in fright, gasping for breath. He was killed! They killed him! He told someone about the attack and he was killed that very evening! How the hell had they even found out that fast!? Was Zenomir in on the attack or were they just that well informed!?
«Nightmare?» Kirielle asked.
Zorian breathed deeply, ignoring the phantom pain in his chest as he did so. «Yeah. Definitely a nightmare.»
Zorian knew he should focus on what Ilsa was saying, but for the life of him his mind wouldn’t stop dwelling on what had happened. In retrospect, he shouldn’t be so surprised at that particular turn of events — an invasion of that scale cannot be kept secret without some hefty inside help, so of course they’d find out about anyone raising an alarm about them! And besides, if stopping the invasion had as simple a solution as notifying the law enforcement, surely Zach would have already done it and Zorian wouldn’t be repeating this month for the third time.
Although, he was starting to develop a healthy dose of respect for these… restarts. This was the second time he died and he only went through this month thrice. He seemed prone to dying. Didn’t Zach say something about him always getting blown up in that initial barrage unless he did something about it?
He snapped back into the real world when he realized Ilsa had stopped talking and was looking at him intently. He gave her a questioning look.
«Are you quite alright?» she asked, and Zorian noticed her glancing at his hands. Why would she-
Oh.
His hands were shaking. He was probably quite pale too, if the skin on his hands was of any indication. He rubbed his hands together a few times and then balled them up into fists to reassert control over them.
«Not quite,» Zorian admitted. «But I will be. You don’t have to worry about it.»
She stared at him for a second longer and then nodded.
«Very well,» she said. «Do you want me to teleport you to the Academy? I can’t imagine riding the train in the state you’re in is going to be very pleasant for you.»
Zorian blinked, at loss what to say. He disdained train travel at the best of times, so an offer like this was a godsend at the moment, but… why?
«I don’t want to inconvenience you…» he tried.
«Don’t worry, I was going there anyway,» she said. «It’s the least I could do for getting to you so late and taking the choice of your mentor away from you.»
Well, that much was true. Xvim really was a horrible, useless mentor.
Zorian excused himself to tell mother he was leaving — which took way too long in his opinion, since mother wouldn’t stop bombarding him with questions about teleportation, suddenly concerned about his safety — before picking up his luggage and following Ilsa outside. He was actually a little excited, since he’d never teleported before. He’d have been even more excited, but the memory of being stabbed to death was still uncomfortably fresh, dampening his enthusiasm somewhat.
«Ready?» she asked.
He nodded.
«Don’t worry, the rumors about the dangers of teleporting are mostly exaggerated,» Ilsa said. «You can’t get stuck inside solid objects — the spell doesn’t work that way — and if something goes wrong I’ll immediately know it and collapse the spell before dimensional ripples tear us apart.»
Zorian scowled. He already knew that, but saw no point in pointing that out — she obviously heard his little exchange with mother.
Ilsa started chanting and Zorian stood straighter, not wanting to miss-
The world rippled, then changed. Suddenly they were both standing in a well lit circular room, a large magical circle carved into the marble floor they stood on. There was no disorientation, no flash of colors, no nothing — almost disappointing. He studied the room they were in a little more closely, trying to understand where they were.
«This is the teleport redirection point,» Ilsa said. «The academy wards shunt every incoming teleport into this place for security reasons. Of course, that’s assuming you’re properly keyed in and have sufficient authorization to teleport in at all.» She fixed him with a penetrating gaze. «Teleporting into a warded space is just one of the many dangers of the spell. Don’t experiment with it on your own.»
«Err… I’m pretty sure teleport is far above my access level,» pointed out Zorian.
She shrugged. «Some students are capable of reconstructing a spell after seeing it performed only once. Once you know the chant and gestures, 80 % of the work has already been done for you.»
Zorian blinked. Now why didn’t he think of that?
«Would you mind casting that spell one more time?» he asked innocently. «Strictly for academic purposes, you see…»
She chuckled. «No. If it makes you feel any better, I doubt you have enough mana reserves to cast the spell even once.»