The Prof Croft Series: Books 0-4 (Prof Croft Box Sets Book 1) Brad Magnarella (ink book reader txt) 📖

Arianna’s footsteps receded, I felt the cocoon-like shield around me expand to the walls of the room. My head swam as I threw my legs over the side of the bed. The expenditure of energy in my attempt to break through the shield earlier had left me weak. Being down for five days didn’t help.

I sat for a moment, my gaze edging over to the bowl of broth on the bedside table. I lifted the bowl and brought it to my nose, its rich smell making my stomach quiver again. But I couldn’t trust it.

It’s something vile, I decided, setting the bowl back down.

When I pushed myself to my feet, the ends of a gown I was wearing fell to my knees. My shins looked thin and pale. I checked my chest, not surprised to find my coin pendant missing. My cane wasn’t anywhere to be seen either. Ditto Grandpa’s ring. I walked, using the wall for support—a wall of clean, solid stone—until I arrived at the window Arianna had been sitting beside earlier.

Squinting against the sun, I peered past the energy field and out into the world.

The courtyards inside the palace wall were handsome. The wind-blown plain below shimmered golden. The forest that ringed it appeared lush. I peered more closely at the plain. It was being patrolled, but not by wargs. The creatures looked like … common mastiffs?

I grunted. The illusion was impressive, I’d give them that.

I completed a circuit around the room, which included a small corner bathroom. The room’s other window as well as the door were covered by the shield—a defensive system I lacked the power to break through. I made my way back to the bed and sat, disturbed by how exhausted the short tour had left me. I leaned forward, hands dangling between my knees.

What was I doing alive? Why hadn’t the Death Mage killed me?

Because the Whisperer wants to use you, I answered, remembering what Chicory had said. And that’s what this is—one big mind fuck to get you to believe that they’re the good guys.

I peered around, considering the magic at work. Just as powerful as my mentor had warned me it would be. But though the Front could make me see, hear, and smell whatever they wanted, I still had my beliefs. I would be damned if I was going to let them crack those open.

The first step to resisting them would be knowing the Front’s strategy. I began cycling through Connell’s suggestions. My original impulse had been to block them out, but I needed to analyze his words, get a better grasp on how the Front would try to influence me.

There are no more Elders, he’d said. There is no Order.

They were trying to chisel cracks in the foundation on which my concepts of wizarding and my role in it were based. They were trying to challenge my identity.

My thoughts turned to Connell’s questions. Who had I encountered in the Order besides Lazlo and Chicory? The answer was no one, but so what? That was how the Order operated. Absent more often than they were present, taking forever to respond to correspondences—or ignoring them all together—giving confusing directives. It wasn’t like I didn’t have my marching orders, and I’d been reprimanded more times than I could count. If there was no Order, then who in the hell was doing the threatening and punishing?

Assume for a moment that everything to this point in your life was an illusion and that this is the reality, Connell had said. Assume that we’re not the enemy, but the ally. Assume that the Front isn’t opposing the Order, but fighting in its memory.

More attempts to undermine my identity, only now planting the seeds of a replacement identity, one that included the Front and whatever the Whisperer had them working toward.

And finally, the coup de grace:

Assume for a moment that your mother was helping us.

Bringing family into it, making it personal.

Taken together, the Front’s strategy was to merge my identity with theirs. Join us. Join the cluster. Become one. I wouldn’t let it happen. Would they resort to torture? A mind flaying?

Hopefully the cavalry would show up before then.

I caught myself listening for them, but all I could hear was bird song. My fingers began to fidget with the hem of my robe. It was strange no one from the Order had come. But knowing how absentminded Chicory could be, he might have neglected to tell them that I had crossed into the Refuge. I mean, the guy almost forgot to cast a bonding spell before sending me in.

“The Order knew he was preparing to send me,” I said quietly, urgently. “I’m here at their mandate, after all. If it’s been five days, they’ll know he’s fallen off the map. Will probably send someone to the safe house to check on him, someone who will talk to Tabitha, see the circle in the basement, put it all together.” I stopped to listen again. “Help will be here soon.”

Unless there is no Order, an insidious voice in my head whispered back.

“They’ll come,” I insisted, my fingers ditching the hem and digging at one another. “It’s just a question of when.”

Days? I wondered. Weeks? I could attempt to escape, but getting out of the room and palace weren’t the issues. Getting out of the Refuge was, and that required advanced magic. Meaning I needed to figure out a way to send a message to the Order, something that would spur them to act now.

A grumble from my stomach interrupted my thoughts.

I eyed the bowl of broth again.

I didn’t see Arianna or Connell for the rest of that day or the next. Instead, I was tended to by a pair of what appeared to be automatons. Young men and women who looked part mannequin, part robot. They were pleasant in appearance and manner, leaving me to guess at their true monstrous forms. Probably something similar to the two creatures I’d slain with my sword.

I ate the