Dangerous Magic

15. Nulls 101

I could not believe the words coming out of Mrs. Diana's mouth.

I also couldn't refute them without drawing additional unwanted attention or giving myself away.

"It is widely known that human women will not be able to carry a child fathered by a mage. This discovery was first documented by Meridian Research and Development Laboratories fifty years after the magical revolution..."

Our teacher continued to lie to the class. I tuned her out; this was the same discourse they approved for public school kids (human kids; most mage children went to magischolas) to keep mages and non-mages apart. It was the same rhetoric used to stop interracial marriages for a long time.

How did I know it was a lie? My parents made it their mission to learn everything they could about nulls. If there was a reason, they'd find it. If there was a cure, they'd find it. My dad contracted to Meridian for years before he disappeared.

On my first day of public school, they told me I had to let the teachers teach, and not to correct them even if they said something wrong. Especially if they said something wrong about nulls. We didn't need the attention.

Whatever school I attended gave the same speech: if you're human, you can have no future with a mage. Apparently, magischolas taught the same narrative.

"In fact, Meridian R&D, and their sister company, Omega Group Labs, theorize that pairings of mages with humans are what results in the birth of a null."

I bit my tongue to keep from shouting. Science had no way of predicting if a person was going to be a null until after they were born. There was no pattern, no discernable reason why it happened. It just did.

And that scared people--scared them enough that they sold their null babies to the labs or abandoned them.

The iron taste of blood coated my mouth. Still, I kept my mouth shut.

Thankfully, I had an ally in the class. Emily raised her hand but did not wait for our teacher to acknowledge her.

"That's not strictly true though, Mrs. Diana. There is little evidence to suggest that nulls are the progeny of one magical and one non-magical parent."

I could have kissed my friend. Relaxing my jaw, I pursed my lips together to keep from obviously smiling.

Mrs. Diana's eyes narrowed in Emily's direction. The corners of her mouth turned down ever so slightly, but otherwise, she did not react. Her tone was unchanged when she made an attempt to correct Emily.

"I'm not sure where you found your research, Ms. Newsome, but the data included in your textbook was released earlier this year, and smarter mages than you or I verified that information for accuracy before adding it to our curriculum."

No further argument came. Mrs. Diana continued her biased, inaccurate lesson.

"Most of the time, a null is sent to a special school so that they can learn to control their special brand of magic in a safe place--"

They were not; nulls were used for experimentation and exploitation, and there was nothing safe about it.

"--but left to their own devices, a null can become quite destructive to themselves and others. Who knows what makes a person classify as a null?"

A student on the far side of the room eagerly raised his hand.

"Nulls don't have magic of their own," he said, pride evident in his voice.

Mrs. Diana nodded, scanning the room with her eyes. "And what else?"

A familiar voice answered next. "Void mages steal the magic from other mages."