The Royal Sorceress by Christopher Nuttall Page A

her hands to cover them anyway, but it was useless. The babble just grew louder and louder until she thought she would be lost in it. She opened her mouth to scream, but somehow she caught hold of herself. And then she remembered who and what she was.
    She opened her eyes without fully realising that she’d closed them. Ahead of her, there were a number of men and women lying on beds, their eyes wide open as they stared at the bare ceiling. She somehow knew that their minds were elsewhere, despite their twitching bodies as they struggled against their restraints. The noise within her head started to billow up again and she recoiled, fighting down an urge to be sick. The sound was overwhelmingly powerful, as if it were trying to jam its way into her mind through every possible orifice. She staggered backwards, struggling against the torrent of diverse thoughts and emotions. There were voices in her mind...
    A strong hand caught her. “Focus,” Master Thomas ordered. A stinging pain appeared on her face and she dimly realised that he’d slapped her. It was almost lost against the roaring in her mind. “Concentrate. Imagine building a wall against the barrage of thoughts. Imagine something that will keep them out forever...”
    Gwen closed her eyes, squeezing his hand tightly. It gave her something to anchor herself in the real world as she concentrated on building her defences. Little girls weren’t supposed to play with building bricks, but she’d played with her brother’s building set as a child before he’d become interested in toy soldiers and then grown too old to play with his little sister. Brick by brick, she built a wall in her mind. It grew easier with each brick and she almost sagged in relief as the torrent diminished and finally faded away into the background. She realised that she was clinging desperately to Master Thomas and let go of him hurriedly. How close had she come to losing her mind?
    “You did well,” Master Thomas reassured her. She could see concern in his eyes, concern that he might have pushed her too far too fast. “There are Talkers and Sensors who can’t come anywhere near this building without risking madness.”
    Gwen focused her mind. Every time she looked at one of the patients, the babble at the back of her mind seemed to grow louder. She wasn’t looking into their minds, she realised grimly; they were projecting their maddened thoughts and feelings into the air, creating an atmosphere where madness flowed from mind to mind. Each of the maddened magicians added to the madness of the other magicians, and in turn fell further into darkness as they absorbed madness from others.
    Her legs felt weak, but she held herself upright through sheer force of will. “What...what happened to them?”
    Master Thomas’s face was grim. “They came into their powers too early,” he said. “They should have been Talkers and Sensors and Seers, but they developed their magic too early and discovered that they couldn’t learn to control their talents. The influx of outside thoughts drove them insane. Some of them could be controlled through drugs, but others...others had to be brought here and left to die.”
    Gwen stared at him, honestly shocked. “Their families just... abandoned them?”
    “No one wants to admit that madness runs through their family blood,” Master Thomas admitted. He looked down at one of the older patients, a man who appeared to be on the verge of death. “That man is twenty-two years old and he looks fifty. There’s nothing we can do for them, except make them as comfortable as possible and prevent them from hurting themselves. Some of them do make it out of the madness...”
    “And how many of them die because they cannot separate their own thoughts from those of others?” Gwen demanded. The building was evil. How could anyone leave people here to waste away and die? “Can’t we do anything for them?”
    “It’s been tried,” Master Thomas admitted. He