Jinx by Sage Blackwood Page A

bird.
    “You just opened those doors with magic .” She made it sound dirty.
    “I didn’t break anything. Yet. Give me the boy.”
    “We certainly don’t intend to let you harm an innocent child.”
    Simon surged down the aisle. The scribes drew back and pulled the hems of their robes close about them as he passed. “He’s my boy.”
    He grabbed Jinx’s arm, not hard enough to hurt but quite tightly. The Preceptress’s fingers dug into Jinx’s shoulder, and that did hurt. Neither of them was looking at Jinx: they were both staring each other down, their foreheads wrinkled, their eyebrows lowered, their eyes boring into each other. Jinx had a feeling they might rip him in two without even remembering he was there.
    Jinx didn’t much like Simon coming in and claiming Jinx was his , but he definitely wasn’t the Preceptress’s. On the whole he thought he was his own.
    There was a heavy thud of footsteps from the covered walkway, and half a dozen men with swords in their hands clattered into the hall and stopped. They looked from the Preceptress to Simon and didn’t seem to know what to do. Then expressions of alarm appeared on their faces, and Jinx realized Simon had frozen their clothes.
    “Your guards can’t hurt me,” said Simon. “Let go of the boy and I’ll take him and leave.”
    “You think you’ll be allowed to leave?”
    “If I don’t leave, many people will regret it.”
    Simon sounded really menacing. The Preceptress’s grip on Jinx’s shoulder slackened just enough that Jinx was able to shrug, duck, and wrench himself free. He and Simon started running at the same moment. The guards came to life behind them—the clothes-freezing spell worked only if you could see the people you were freezing. Jinx and Simon cascaded down the steps and across the courtyard into the marketplace, where the brawl now seemed to involve everybody.
    “Let go of me,” Jinx panted.
    Simon said nothing but ran around the edge of the crowd, and Jinx was yanked along after him, his feet managing to hit the ground about two steps out of every three. Shouts came from the edges of the fighting crowd—
    “Simon! Simon Magus! I told you I saw him!”
    “Faster!” said Simon.
    The pounding feet of the guards were right behind them. Out of the corner of his eye Jinx saw people from the crowd running toward him and Simon—and a lot of the crowd was ahead of them. In another moment they would be surrounded.
    Then Simon fell.
    Jinx was too dumbfounded to do anything at first. Simon falling was as unthinkable as a mighty tree falling. More. Simon was vanishing under a pile of guards, and Jinx stood there. Simon had let go of Jinx’s arm, but Jinx didn’t run away. He couldn’t, and leave Simon.
    “Get me out of here, Jinx!”
    The guards were in a helpless heap, their clothes frozen again, their hands struggling to control the swords that flopped in their unsupported hands. It was a waving mass of swords. Then one by one the swords dropped to the ground as the guards’ wrists gave out.
    “They’ve killed him!” someone in the crowd yelled. “The wizard’s dead!”
    Jinx grabbed an immobilized guard and tried to haul him off of Simon. The man glared furiously at Jinx and tried to bite him. Hands in the pile tried to grab him. Jinx recognized Simon’s long, thin hand amid the bodies, grabbed it, and pulled.
    There was a lot of flailing, groaning, and kicking, and finally Jinx fell backward on the stones with Simon beside him. Simon was still staring at the guards, unblinking.
    “There’s people all around us, Simon,” Jinx said, getting to his feet.
    “They’d better stay back or I’ll turn them into lizards!”
    Simon lifted his head slightly so that his gaze included part of the crowd, and Jinx saw that their clothes had been frozen too. But he could hear the angry mutters of the people behind them, and when he turned around, he realized that Simon was dealing with only a quarter of the people surrounding