The Muckracker's Tale

Chapter 7

7

There was no sign of anyone, not even a groupie, as I made my way into the sporting halls directly linked to the arena, but I slowed and tried to be as stealthy as possible just in case. I felt sure unseen eyes were following me, their owners possibly wondering why I — as unsporting a girl who had ever lived — was down here. I’d never felt comfortable in this place. I’d dropped sports as soon as I could. Yet, it was the only way to get to the arena without being spotted. I wasn’t even sure I could get onto the field from the stands.

And someone might stop you before it is too late, I thought, as I inched forward. The dampening spells were strong, but I heard the roar of the crowd echo through the walls. I wondered, idly, if Juliet was winning or losing. The Grandmaster wouldn’t be refereeing this match, not with all the spotters in the stands. If I can’t get onto the field…

Ice congealed in my chest. I did my best to ignore it as I reached the locker rooms. The players had gathered there, drinking water and practicing their spells while running through the game plan one final time. The air stank of sweat, of too many hard-working men and women in too close of a proximity. I felt a twinge of sympathy for the players, even though most of them were jerks. They were going to be asked a lot of questions when the truth came out, and, even though I was sure they didn’t have the slightest idea of what was going on, they were going to be in deep shit. I heard the crowd roar again, jeering a player who’d been sent to the Sin Bin. I wondered, numbly, if they’d cheer for me.

Will they praise me for revealing the truth, I asked myself, or hate me for tattling?

My heart sank. I hesitated. If I kept my mouth shut… I could take precautions, make sure Juliet couldn’t wipe my memory, perhaps even strike a deal with the Grandmaster to keep the truth from coming out. It wouldn’t be that hard… I shivered, despite the warmth. If I did…

The crowd roared again. I swallowed, then braced myself. I had to go through with the plan. Not just for justice. Not just to spite Juliet. Not even for the crowd, cheering loudly for games that had been decided well before the players marched onto the field, but for the truth. The truth had to come out. The world needed to know what was actually going on. And all it would cost me was…

I slipped my hands under my shirt and pulled it off. My breasts bobbled free. I’d never been particularly well-endowed, but… it would draw the eye. I flushed as I pushed my trousers and underwear to my knees — I’d found it hard to undress in front of my roommates, and here I was undressing in public — and stepped out of them. No one would ever be able to forget this day, no matter what Juliet and the Grandmaster and anyone else did. They’d all remember me.

I braced myself, threw open the door and ran onto the field.

There’d been no time to recon the players first. I had no idea who was where. It didn’t matter. All I had to do was get to the referees — and the Grandmaster — before it was too late.

The world seemed to freeze, a moment of total silence, before the noise broke. Boys hooted, hollered and whistled; girls gasped in shock; tutors snapping orders to avert eyes, orders I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt would not be followed. The arena’s wards were designed to block outside interference, even from the teachers. No one outside the field itself would be able to stop me, as far as I knew. They wouldn’t even be able to block everyone else from looking at me. The wards were designed to make it impossible.

I had a series of impressions as I ran. Players scrambled to get out of my way, some gawking at me; team captains scowled while casting spells, all of which missed me… I was fairly sure some of them were deliberately aiming to miss. A flash of light behind me… I later learned someone had tried to hex me, only to be hexed herself by Blair. The bastard wanted to watch my bare ass as I ran… I kept running, ducking a final set of hexes, until I reached the referees. The two outsiders glanced from side to side, as if they didn’t know quite where to look. It would have been funny if it wasn’t so serious.

The Grandmaster was pissed. “Young Lady,” he said, in a tone that would have chilled me to the bone if I hadn’t had so many other problems. “What is the meaning of this?”

I met his eyes, muttering a spell under my breath that would ensure my words carried across the arena without being deafeningly loud. It occurred to me — too late — that the spell might not work inside the wards, but this was no time to stop. I was going to go down in history, either as the brave reporter who’d exposed a cheating ring or the silly girl who’d flashed the entire school. I’d been committed the moment I worked out what Juliet had been doing…

“The game is rigged,” I said. The Grandmaster might want to cover it up, but with two outside witnesses and the entire school watching it would be impossible. I hoped. “They’re playing to lose!”

“I gave her detention this afternoon,” Juliet said. I tried not to flinch. How had she come up behind me without me noticing? “Sir, this is just her petty and spiteful revenge.”

The Grandmaster eyed me for a long cold moment, his eyes never slipping below my neck. It would have been impressive, and amusing, if the situation wasn’t so dire. I couldfeel hundreds of eyes lingering on my rear… one way or the other, no one was ever going to forget me. Juliet could take her final gambit to hide the truth and stuff it up her…

“I have proof,” I said, gabbling out the details as fast as I could. “She’s been betting against her own team and…”

Juliet’s hand darted up. Time seemed to slow down; the world moving in slow motion even as my thoughts raced ahead at lightning speed. Juliet was playing one final gamble. No one would blame her for striking me down for slander, despite the age difference. The curse she was preparing to cast would not just stun me, but scramble my short-term memories to the point I wouldn’t be able to swear to anything. And no one would fault her for blasting me, not after I’d smeared her in front of hundreds of witnesses. She might just get away with it.

I tried to muster a defence, to raise my wards, but everything was moving painfully slow…

Juliet’s body flashed blue and froze. “That will do,” the Grandmaster said. “The charges will be investigated. And the truth will come out.”

He raised his voice. “The game is over. Players are to return to the locker rooms and remain there. The audience is dismissed.”

I blinked in surprise, then reminded myself there were just too many witnesses. The Grandmaster had to make a show of investigating the charges, no matter how much he wanted to bury the whole affair. Hell, the outsiders might want to run their own investigation as a quid pro quo for readmitting Whitehall into the leagues. The last thing anyone wanted was a public cheating scandal. The leagues had quite enough problems already.

The Grandmaster looked at me. I felt his magic shimmer. A dress materialised around me, covering me. I felt a strange mixture of fear at the sheer display of power — conjuring matter from nothingness was a very impressive feat, even though the material felt paper-thin, and I was uneasily aware it wouldn’t last long — and defiance. Just because someone had power didn’t mean they had great responsibility. In my experience, power brought nothing but irresponsibility.

“Go to my office, wait for me there,” he ordered. I guessed I could keep the dress. “And no excursions along the way.”

I nodded, curtly, and stumbled out of the arena. The adrenaline was wearing off, and it was slowly starting to dawn on me what I’d done. I’d shown myself to the entire school… it was unlikely anyone had been considering me potential marriage material, after my father’s rather dubious origins, but if they had, they sure as hell weren’t now. I knew I wasn’t the most attractive girl in the world — Juliet was much more of a classical beauty — and yet I knew boys didn’t discriminate. They’d be teasing me for years. Or selling paintings of my naked body as I ran for justice.

The thought tormented me as I walked up the stairs and into the office. The doors opened for me and shut the moment I stepped through, the wards slipping into place. I felt like a prisoner, awaiting her judge. The Grandmaster couldn’t kill me or wipe my memory — or so I told myself — but he had plenty of other ways to make my life miserable. It wouldn’t be that hard to come up with an argument that proved me guilty of something… probably. Using spells to strip an unsuspecting victim was against the rules, and harshly punished whenever it happened, but I’d stripped myself. Could he punish me for offences against my person? I didn’t know.

I sat and waited. It felt like hours — days, weeks, months — before the door opened behind me, and the Grandmaster stepped into the office. His face was so tightly composed I knew he was angry, although it didn’t seem directed at me. I forced myself to sit up and look attentive as he took his seat and rested his hands on the desk. It couldn’t have been an easy few hours for him, either. The outsiders, I was sure, would have asked a lot of pointed questions about why no one had spotted the pattern sooner.

“Juliet” — I noticed he omitted her title — “was interrogated under truth spells,” he said, slowly. “She tried hard to conceal the truth, but it came out. We know — now — that she was the only sports captain involved. Her accomplice, a first-year student, was bullied into helping her.”

I nodded, stiffly. Juliet was — had been, I hoped — important and powerful. There was no way in hell a mere common-born firstie could stand up to her, no matter what she wanted. If she tried, her life would become a nightmare…

“Please,” I said. “Go easy on her.”

The Grandmaster frowned. “On Juliet?”

“On the firstie,” I said. I knew what it was like to be picked on by someone who thought power or birth gave them the right to boss me around. “Juliet wouldn’t have given her a choice.”

“No.” The Grandmaster studied me for a long moment. I thought I saw a flicker of approval in his eyes. Or maybe it was just a trick of the light. “I will do what I can to keep her name out of the affair. The betting shops knew nothing about the affair and cared less, as long as they got their money. There’s no reason for anyone to know what she was doing and why. She will get a stern lecture, but nothing further. I don’t think she’ll cause any further trouble.”

I nodded, feeling a twinge of relief. “Thank you.”

“And that leaves us with two final questions,” Grandmaster Gordian said. “First, why did you… run naked across the field? Why didn’t you bring the word to me?”

“I…” I swallowed. “Can I refuse to answer the question?”

“I’d really rather you didn’t,” Gordian said, in a pleasant tone that carried a hint of threat. He could use truth spells on me, too, if he wished. “Please.”

“Juliet insisted you’d cover up and bury the whole affair, if you could,” I said, bracing myself for… something. If he took it as an insult… I hoped, desperately, there were people who’d draw the right conclusions, after my disappearance, and asked the right questions. “I wanted to make sure it couldn’t be buried forever.”

The Grandmaster looked pained. “And so we see her essential immaturity. Nothing ever remains buried forever. The truth would have come out, sooner or later, and I would have been disgraced. To admit my choice for Captain-General, and the student most likely to have a successful career in the sporting leagues, had been cheating would be embarrassing, but the consequences for covering it up would have been a great deal worse.”

He sighed. “Still, she is by no means the first person to think authority will put expedience ahead of practicality,” she said. “Or to follow short-term interests at the expense of long-term stability.”

“Why…?” I took a breath and started again. “Why did she do it?”

“Money.” The Grandmaster looked down at his hands. “Money and reputation. She thought she could portray herself as more than just a team captain, but as someone who uplifted all the teams. And she might have gotten away with it, if it weren’t for a meddling student and some bad luck.”

He met my eyes. “And that leads to a second question,” he said. “What should we do with you? Besides, I suppose, a stern reprimand for being improperly dressed?”

I flushed but refused to allow myself to be distracted. “I want my broadsheet back,” I said, firmly. “And I want official accreditation and complete editorial freedom.”

“Indeed?” The Grandmaster raised his eyebrows. “And you don’t think there should be consequences for misdeeds? Deeds like spying on private meetings and poking through private property? Or even printing something that isn’t actually true, or taken out of context, or even deliberately misleading?”

“Yes,” I said. “But those consequences shouldn’t be used to silence the truth, when it is embarrassing or awkward for those in power. And if…”

I took a breath. “If I hadn’t been so devoted to the truth, sir, Juliet would have gotten away with her scheme long enough for it to be a serious embarrassment when it really came out. What would have happened then?”

“Point.” The Grandmaster leaned back in his chair. “And I take it you intend to run with the story of how you exposed Juliet first?”

“Yes.” I looked back at him evenly. “If I don’t, I’ll be remembered as something else instead.”

“Quite,” the Grandmaster said.

He said nothing for a long moment, then leaned forward. “Two conditions,” he said. “First, I expect you to come up with a proper code of conduct, both for what you consider fit to print and how you go about collecting the news. You may not have broken any written rules over the last few weeks, but you broke a number of unwritten rules and that will come back to haunt you if you keep doing it. Second, I expect you to make room for others to join your broadsheet staff or, if they wish, to set up broadsheets of their own.”

“Yes, sir,” I managed. It was better than I’d expected. “I’ll do you proud.”

“We’ll see,” he said. “And I hope, I really do, that you got what you wanted.”

“Yes, sir,” I said.