Glittering Shadows Read Free Page B

the neighboring country of Irminau. Now
she said, “When we came to Urobrun, we were promised a land without magic.”
    “But,” Sigi said, “is that really better? I used to walk the streets taking photographs of people. I remember—” She tapped her left temple impatiently. “My
memories are still coming back. It’s almost there. I think I’d hurt myself. Twisted my ankle, maybe. This old man was on the street and he healed me, but he looked panicked the whole
time, and as soon he was done, he ran away. As if I was going to go tell the police or something.”
    “It would be painful, I’d think, to be able to heal people but feel like you were forbidden to do it,” Thea said.
    Sigi nodded. Thea didn’t really know Sigi—she had come out of the underground with Nan—but Thea felt an affinity with her. Sigi was just another ordinary girl, albeit a wealthy
one. She was short and plump and likable-looking, with a head of wild brown curls and a few faint freckles. “My mother was Arabella von Kaspar, the leader of one of the revolutionary groups.
She talked about it all the time, how magic should be free.”
    Mother twisted her loose hair into a coil. She still wore it unfashionably long. “Magic should be a gift. But shortly after I got married, King Otto called for all the magic users in the
country to register at the palace, and they didn’t leave. I couldn’t have children in a place like that. Magic didn’t run in our families, but sometimes it appears out of
nowhere.” She opened a drawer, scrounged a couple of pins, and put her hair up.
    It’s been so long since I’ve seen Mother fix her own hair
. With the bound-sickness that tied her by magic to Thea’s missing father, she forgot the simplest things. Thea
had to remind her to put on stockings before leaving for church, or how to make eggs.
    “I shudder to think of Irminau’s response to this,” Mother continued, her hand now moving to the photograph of Father in his army uniform. “When they hear how much
trouble this country is in, King Otto will surely take advantage.”
    “What can you tell us about King Otto?” Nan asked. “How much of a threat do you think he poses?” Her fingers twitched like she wanted to take notes.
    “The papers make him out to be rather foolish,” Thea said. “They say he just builds models of his castle and has portraits painted of himself in costumes.”
    “Well,
papers
,” Sigi said. “They’ll say anything that sounds entertaining.”
    “King Otto was no fool when I lived in Irminau,” Mother said. “Conniving and eccentric, yes. But a lot of people in Irminau love him. He can seem like a father figure, and has
built a strong national pride. But then he began taking steps to round up the magic users, and all of us with our eyes open left if we could.”
    “How many kinds of magic users are there?” Nan asked.
    “Healers and garden witches,” Mother said. “Nearly every village had those. Then there are elemental powers, also fairly common, and witches that handle basic connective spells
like binding magic. But I have no idea how many types of rare magic, like reviving, might exist.”
    “Why didn’t the magic users rebel,” Freddy asked, “if that’s where Otto’s power comes from?”
    “Some of them have favored positions at his court,” Mother said. “And magic users are such a small section of the population. They are appreciated, but also feared. Many people
back home saw King Otto’s tough laws simply as keeping magic under control.
    “But to answer your original question,” Mother continued, “Urobrun once belonged to Otto’s kingdom, and all the wars this nation has fought since trace back to the
original battle for independence.”
    “If Otto decided to march his army in here, would Urobrun be able to fight back?” Nan asked.
    “The military is already stretched thin,” Freddy said. “And who knows what will happen here after today.”
    Nan’s eyes darted