The Alchemists Academy: Stones to Ashes Book 1 Read online

  The Alchemists Academy

  Stones to Ashes

  Book 1

  kailin gow

  The Alchemist Academy

  Published by THE EDGE

  THE EDGE is an imprint of Sparklesoup LLC

  Copyright © 2011 Kailin Gow

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the publisher except in case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  For information, please contact:

  THE EDGE at Sparklesoup

  P.O. Box 60834

  Irvine, CA 92602

  www.sparklesoup.com

  First Edition.

  Printed in the United States of America.

  ISBN: 1597489727

  ISBN: 978-1597489720

  DEDICATION

  This is for the parents/teachers who approached me at a book signing and ask if I can come up with a series featuring a male main character in my typical fantasy adventure, educational mode that can be used for class discussions. So here’s the first of my series featuring a male main teen character and his adventures. If you like action, fantasy, and Arthurian magic, I present The Alchemists Academy.

  Prologue

  The streets of Mersea Island hardly seemed like the roughest in the world. It was a nice area, a safe area, or at least it was supposed to be. Compared to London, or even nearby Colchester, the town was so small that Wirt had hardly expected trouble when he moved in with his latest foster family. Yet somehow, he had managed to find it, his high top trainers scuffing on the tarmac as he ran to get away from the three older boys chasing him.

  At fourteen, Wirt was pale, his dark hair currently hidden by the hood of his gray top, but usually falling in a tangle of waves to shoulder length. He was good looking, at least his looks had always helped him gain the attention of girls at school, and felt that he would probably remain so just as long as he didn’t stop running for the boys behind him to catch him. He probably should have known better than to insult three boys older than him, but when they had started making fun of his name, picking on him just because they could, it had been only too easy to react angrily. He had called the leader of the trio a fat slug, and wondered aloud how he managed to walk and talk at the same time without falling over.

  Now, of course, he was probably going to be pummeled for that decision. The boys behind him were looking angrier by the second, the exertion of having to chase him apparently not doing much for their tempers. Wirt was faster for the moment, thanks to the years of practice when it came to this kind of thing that came when you had a talent for getting into trouble, but he didn’t know his new home very well yet, and it would take a minor miracle to find a route that would get him to safety.

  Wirt scrambled over a patch of rough ground between some houses where the inhabitants would probably be safely inside, eating their dinner, stumbling briefly but regaining his footing with the speed of the truly terrified. There was a chain link fence ahead, and Wirt clambered over it, hoping that the others would not be able to follow. Sure enough, they stopped at the foot of the fence, crashing against it and arguing about who was squashing whom, and about whose fault the whole mess was.

  Wirt slowed a little then. He knew from experience that it was probably a good idea to conserve energy at times like this, just in case you had to run away later. Besides, he needed time to think about what he would tell his latest foster parents when they demanded answers about his ripped jeans and muddied clothes. Dissembling about the state of his clothes was another art Wirt had acquired. It was one he found especially useful when it came to foster parents.

  It was not that they weren’t nice enough people. Joan and Peter, the current pair, were probably the kind of people that Wirt should have been happy to be staying with. They were kind, and generous, and the kind of foster parents any orphan like himself would be grateful to have. They also happened to be soft and pliable as a marshmallow under a blowtorch, which made it easier when Wirt wanted to ignore them.

  It was just that, wherever he ended up, Wirt could never escape the feeling that he was not theirs, presumably for the simple reason that he was not. Whatever they were, they were not his family, and Wirt did not see why they should get to tell him what to do. Even the endless rounds of social service workers and talks about working on fitting in seemed only to highlight exactly how much he didn’t fit in. Was it any wonder that he got into trouble so much?

  Wirt was still thinking about that when a large shape stepped out from between the nearest houses. Wirt recognized it too late as the boy he had insulted, and in fact, it was all he could do to keep from running straight into him. Skidding to a halt, Wirt looked over his shoulder, trying to work out if it would be a good idea to simply run back the way he had come. No, that way was blocked too, because the other two boys had obviously found a way over the fence, and were even now bearing down on him at a slow walk. Wirt suspected that it was probably intended to be a menacing reminder of the inevitability of what would happen next. In fact, it just made them look out of breath.

  “Scared now, are you?” the first boy asked. This close, he was bigger than Wirt remembered, dressed in a dark hooded-top of his own and with hair that had been buzz-cut short.

  “Is there a right answer to that?” Wirt asked, and winced. Why? Why did he always have to say things like that at moments like this? The older boy shoved him back towards the other two, who grabbed an arm each without being told. Apparently, they had done this kind of thing before. The leader of the trio regarded Wirt as the others restrained him, cracking his knuckles pointedly like a cliché villain.

  “The right answer would have been yes, and then you will give everything you have on you to me, if you know what’s good for you. Guess we’ll have to teach you a lesson.”

  “Oh come on!” Wirt said. “Do people actually talk like that?”

  And again, he thought. He really did need to stop doing this. The bully in front of him went a shade of red that reminded Wirt of a boiled lobster, before drawing back his fist.

  “I’m going to enjoy this.”

  Wirt strongly suspected that he was not though, so he stamped down on the foot of the boy holding his right arm. The shock of it let him rip his arm free, and panic lent him the strength to pull free of the other one too, along with more speed than Wirt had managed before in his life.

  Now, if only it had lent him a sense of direction to go with it, Wirt thought as he crashed up against the chain link fence. He turned, looking for a way out, but the three older boys blocked the way. Wirt considered shouting for help at that point, but would anyone hear? Would anyone care? As the three of them bore down on him, Wirt started to suspect that he was going to have to stand there and take whatever beating they dished out. He hated when that happened.

  “Let’s just get this over with, then,” he said, pressing back against the fence and raising his hands in some vague semblance of protection. The leader of the three bullies smacked his fist into his palm with deliberate menace.

  “Oh, this isn’t going to be over for a long while.”

  Wirt was not sure what was going to hurt more, being hit, or having to listen to someone who had clearly watched too many bad movies and decided that was the way someone tough should talk. Well no, actually he was fairly sure it was the first one, but having to listen to him as well was just adding insult to what was very definitely going to be injury.

  Wirt screwed his eyes shut, wishing f
ervently that he was somewhere, anywhere else. Right now, being back with Joan and Peter was looking an awful lot more appetizing. First, though, he had to find some way to get out of here…

  Wirt doubled up as his stomach suddenly cramped. For a moment, he thought he had been hit, but that hypothesis went by the wayside as the feeling spread to every muscle in his body at once. As far as Wirt knew, and thanks to some of his earlier misadventures he did know, not even three people could manage to hit you everywhere simultaneously. Wirt forced his eyes open, and then quickly shut them again, because the golden radiance surrounding him was simply too bright to look though. Around him, the gasps of the three bullies were clearly audible.

  “He’s glowing, Rich. Why is he glowing?”

  “How should I know? Look, just grab him.”

  “You grab him. He could be radioactive or something, the way he’s glowing.”

  “Oh, so it’s all right for me to grab radiation boy, is it?”

  The sounds of a scuffle came to Wirt, but they were quickly replaced by silence. He didn’t really care, because by now the unpleasant sensation running through his body had reached unbearable levels, feeling as though every scrap of him were being pulled in a different direction.

  As suddenly as it had come, the sensation passed. Wirt had to concentrate just to breathe, and he stood like that for long seconds. He didn’t dare open his eyes, at least until it occurred to him that the three older boys might still be there waiting to hit him. That made his eyes snap open so quickly that for a second he couldn’t make sense of anything around him. When he did, Wirt took a step back, and that itself was surprising enough, given that there should have been a chain link fence in the way. Instead, he was standing in the middle of a field, with no sign of any fences anywhere in sight.

  There was a tree, though, but it was not like any tree he has ever seen before. It was huge, gargantuan, a true titan among trees. It was not just bigger than a house; it was bigger than a tower block, a skyscraper, sporting leaves that could have served as parachutes for elephants. Worse for Wirt’s sanity, there appeared to be stairs running in a great spiral around it, and doors cut into the side of it wherever a knothole appeared.

  There were also three people watching him, staring at Wirt like he was the odd one, when it was them who had just appeared from nowhere, along with their tree, their field, their collection of small outbuildings, their… all right, so maybe it was Wirt who had appeared. What was going on? Where was he?

  Two of the three were girls about his age. One – the dark-haired girl caught his attention first despite her school girl clothing. She was naturally pretty with flawless skin and high cheekbones. Her large bright dark eyes studied him curiously, and he suddenly felt self-conscious of his street clothes under her gaze. She was dressed in a dark skirt and white blouse. The other was dressed far more elaborately, in a dress that made her look like she had just raided a costume shop that mostly supplied historical dramas. Her blonde hair spilled around features that were carefully made up, and her blue eyes watched Wirt with something close to fear.

  The third figure was a woman who was probably in her thirties, dark-haired and green-eyed, with the kind of beauty that the girls would probably grow into given time. Like the blonde-haired girl, she wore a dress that had probably been the height of fashion a few hundred years ago. She watched Wirt with obvious caution.

  “Alana, Priscilla, get behind me please. You, I think you had best explain how you got the magic to jump in here, right now.”

  There were so many things that Wirt wanted to say at that point. He wanted to argue with the tone the woman was taking with him. He wanted to point out to her that magic was nonsense. He wanted to ask her how she had managed to grow a tree that size out of nowhere and why were they standing in the middle of a field instead of an alleyway. For the moment though, Wirt didn’t say any of that.

  “I don’t… I don’t feel…” was the best he could manage, before the strength went from his legs and he collapsed. He found himself caught by gentle hands, and looked up into the eyes of the woman who seemed to be in charge here.

  “You’re fine,” she said. “Just a little drained. For now, I think it is best if you sleep. Sleep now.”

  The last words were delivered in a voice that seemed to bypass Wirt’s brain entirely, talking directly to his eyelids. As much as he wanted to protest in that moment, Wirt slept.

  Chapter 1

  Wirt woke to the sound of an argument. With the instincts of someone who was used to that kind of thing being directed his way, Wirt kept his eyes closed. Besides, he was comfortable. Whatever he was sitting on was softer than feathers. One of the arguing voices was familiar as that of the woman who had told him to sleep. The other was a man’s, and he did not sound happy.

  “Ms. Lake, I do not care if he simply appeared. That does not mean that we should take him in like some stray puppy.”

  “That’s not what I’m suggesting, headmaster.”

  “Is it not? I believe you used the phrase “we can’t just leave him outside”. I note, however, that you provided no reason for that. Incidentally, boy, I am perfectly aware that you have woken up.”

  Wirt’s eyes opened, revealing a large, almost circular room lined with bookshelves. There was a circular desk to match it in front of him, covered in papers. On the other side of it sat a man in a tuxedo and white gloves, dark-haired and sporting the kind of goatee that always made Wirt wonder why people didn’t shave it off completely. As with the woman, he looked to be no more than thirty. The woman from before stood to Wirt’s left side, smiling gently.

  “I’m glad you are awake,” she said. “Now, what’s your name?”

  “I’m Wirt. Wirt Newton.”

  “I am Ms. Lake. This is Ender Paine, our headmaster. Sorry, acting headmaster.”

  Wirt wondered why the woman would bring something like that up, especially when he saw the bearded man glower at the addition of the word. On the other hand, he was not generally someone to care what head teachers thought, as the ones at the schools near his past three foster homes could probably testify.

  “Look,” Wirt said, “I don’t know what’s going on. I just want to get…” he tried to think of a better word than home, and failed, “home.” Were they even in England still?

  Ender Paine looked him over. “What is happening is that I am having to sit in my office listening to the story of how some young delinquent showed up on my school’s lawn, scaring two of my students before passing out in a most unhelpful manner. What I would like to know is how you got there. Who sent you, and where did you come from?”

  The tone of voice was enough that even Wirt huddled back in his seat. The woman made a tutting sound.

  “I have told you what I think about that, Ender. Really, must you be so fierce with him?”

  “Must you always play at being so kind, Vivaine? We both know how it works out in the end. You… Wirt, how did you get here? Who performed the magic to send you?”

  “Magic? There’s no such thing as magic.”

  Ender Paine stroked his tiny beard, and Wirt decided that was probably what it was there for. He’d been dragged along to see one of Shakespeare’s plays once, on a school trip, and the actors there were forever stroking their beards in an effort to make it clear that their characters were thinking deep thoughts.

  “Interesting.” The Headmaster stood and went over to one of the bookshelves, pulling a circle of felt from between two weighty tomes. A quick snap of his wrist and it unfolded into a top hat, which he placed on the table, reaching into it. He started to draw things from the hat. In the order they appeared, these were: five black candles, a rolled up carpet, a string of expensive looking rings clipped together like paperclips, a toad, and finally a monocle that glinted as Ender Paine wiped it on his sleeve.

  “Still don’t believe?”

  Wirt shook his head.

  “There could have been a trapdoor.” A really big trapdoor, admittedly, Wirt ad
ded, in the privacy of his own head.

  Ender Paine held out one hand, muttered something, and then snapped his fingers. A globe of light mixed with smoky darkness appeared above his hand, spinning slowly as the threads of brightness and shadow played through it. He gave Wirt a challenging look.

  “Better?”

  Wirt pressed back into his chair so hard that he thought for a moment that the thing might swallow him up. He thought back to the sight of the giant tree before, not to mention his sudden arrival. Between them, they amounted to something that made Wirt want to leap up from his chair, run for the door, and not stop until he was well and truly lost.

  Magic.

  “Easy, Wirt,” Ms. Lake said. “Try to remember to breathe.”

  Wirt took a few huge gulps of air, and it helped. Not much, but it helped. While he was busy doing that, Ender Paine was looking through his monocle at him. The man… the wizard, Wirt corrected himself, made a hmm sound.

  “Hmm… not what I expected at all. You were right, Ms. Lake, the boy did perform the spell.”

  “Spell?” Wirt said, the word escaping automatically. “Me? What are you talking about?”

  Ender Paine ignored him, going back to tending his beard. “Still, talent is one thing, but without the proper school fees…”

  Wirt saw Ms. Lake raise an eyebrow.

  “Are you sure, acting headmaster?”

  “That is the second time you have brought that up, Vivaine. To what end I do not… oh. Of course.”

  The Headmaster glanced downwards before smiling. Wirt was glad that one of them understood it.

  “It seems that I have spoken too hastily,” Ender Paine said. “You clearly have great magical potential, young Wirt, and we would be lax in our duties if we did not offer you a scholarship to the Alchemists Academy at once.”