It goes worse than I expected, but better than I feared. Elsie listens to my story without saying a word and keeps her silence even after I’m done.
“You do believe me,” I say. “Don’t you?”
“Of course I believe you,” she replies. “It’s just… it’s a lot to take in. And… you only told me now, instead of before.”
I only told her now because I was scared she’d believe Mildred’s story otherwise. I would have been quite happy if she never knew. I didn’t want to tell her my secrets.
She’s right.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “It was… I wanted to forget about that time. And I didn’t want to give away the Blackthorns’ secrets. Please don’t tell anyone about this.”
We should have had this conversation behind privacy wards and shut away in a meeting room, like so many conversations I’ve had with Edward. But I don’t know how to create those wards, and I don’t have the dispensation from the Board of Governors that allows me to reserve a meeting room alone.
I probably could get one, if I wanted to. There’s a legitimate argument that now I’m to some extent a public figure I will have need for private discussions, and there’s the argument that Lord Blackthorn could probably request some of the same special measures for me as are already in place for Edward.
But, stubborn fool that I am, I don’t want Lord Blackthorn’s help.
If Edward (let alone his father) found out about this, though, he’d be furious with me for the breach of security. It still feels like a better choice than keeping Elsie in the dark and letting her make the wrong decisions because of it.
I hate the fact that I’m even having to make these decisions. Why can’t I just be a normal person with normal friendships that don’t have state secrets getting in their way?
I know why, and I don’t regret that choice for a second.
Mildred doesn’t try to interrupt any more of our study sessions, thankfully. I’m still on edge wondering what she’s planning and where she’ll appear next. Edward and I spend a while trying to analyse her motivations. Is she seeking revenge, or does she genuinely want our forgiveness?
“Politically speaking, she needs allies if she wants to accomplish anything. And the Blackthorns are… not her worst choice in that regard.”
I stare at Edward incredulously.
“Or we wouldn’t be, if my dad was the kind of politician she expects to deal with,” he adds. “The kind who’d be perfectly happy to give her little scraps of influence in exchange for her vote going the way he wants. That sort of bargain is the only chance she has of becoming anyone of real significance.”
“Your dad wouldn’t offer it, though.” It hardly needs stating: Lord Blackthorn sees Mildred as a threat, and he does not make truce with threats.
“She doesn’t understand that. Play the game for too long and you assume everyone else obeys the same rules.”
That is the least of Mildred’s problems.
I finally manage to put the pieces together and create an enchantment that only works when sufficiently little magic is channelled through it. It’s remembering that moment in Felicity’s lesson that does the trick. If I can do something like that on the spot, why can’t I cast anything I want?
In the end I cast the enchantment on a small glass bead with a hole through it, which will glow a faint starlight-silver if my control is successful. I’ll keep it in my pocket for now, but I like the idea of having a string of enchanted beads for a necklace someday.
Edward is already coming up with ideas for my next project, but I’m not doing anything more until the tests are done.
There’s only one weekend left by now. I’m not quite as prepared as I’d like to be, but the thought of working more doesn’t make me want to curl up in a ball and cry, which is a pretty significant improvement over preparation for Genford end-of-year exams.
After much negotiation, the study group agrees that we’re going to work on Saturday and take Sunday off to rest and do something fun together before the tests begin. We’re all mostly happy with that, though I’d rather work another day and Edward would rather not have to join in with the fun.
“My idea of fun isn’t like most people’s,” he complains. “I won’t enjoy it.”
“How do you know that without trying?”
His only response to that is a death stare, which I take as a victory.
We make good progress, largely, on the final day. There’s just one particularly nasty Magical Theory question that has us all suffering through pages of algebra. Even Robin has to go back through her working twice after getting a negative efficiency coefficient (evidently impossible).
Edward takes one glance at it and pronounces it a stupid question and not the sort of thing we should be tested on.
“Does that mean you can’t do it?” I ask him teasingly.
Being him, he takes that as a challenge, and a couple of minutes of frantic scribbling later he produces the correct answer. “I’m skipping questions like this if they come up.”
The scary part is that I can very easily imagine Edward turning in a test where a substantial portion of his answers involve questioning the purpose and usefulness of the questions and arguing that he has no need to answer them. It isn’t as if he particularly cares about his grade, after all, or about what the teachers think of him.
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And then, of course, there’s the part where I forget a basic definition and spend half an hour on a question that should have taken me five minutes. My new glass bead doesn’t glow when I channel magic into it after that, though I don’t feel any other signs of an episode.
I focus on channelling as little magic as possible into the bead as I recite my list of kings. It’s a more efficient way of helping the episode pass, I think: I only get as far as Eleanor the Bold before the bead glows starlight-silver once more.
It’s fine, I tell myself. I’m not going to forget something like that in the actual tests, and even if I do it’ll only affect a single question. I’m going to do perfectly well.
Sunday is a bright and sunny day, which is a relief: all the plans we’ve made involve going outdoors instead of being cooped up in the Academy’s main building. It’s still cold enough that we wrap ourselves in our thick winter coats before venturing into the gardens, though we shed them before our first activity.
This one is Elizabeth’s choice: running-games, tag and racing and chase-the-hare. I suppose it makes sense that she’s physically fit, since she’s planning on going into the military, but I still don’t expect her to tear around the gardens at such high speed.
She and Edward are the only two of us who are any good; Elsie, Robin and I aren’t even close to their level. I didn’t think I’d enjoy it much when Elizabeth first suggested it, but after finally chasing down Robin and earning a brief rest (no tag-backs) I find myself grinning as I get my breath back.
Elsie is by far the slowest of the group, and after a couple of minutes of her fruitlessly chasing us Elizabeth allows herself to be tagged. Edward protests that’s against the spirit of the game and is rewarded for it by being charged at high speed.
He doesn’t even flinch, and just as Elizabeth stretches out her hand to tag him she runs straight into what I assume is a wall of magical force and is stopped in her tracks.
“Magic isn’t allowed,” she protests.
“There’s no rule against it,” Edward replies, smirking.
“All those in favour of instituting a rule against using magic in tag?” I ask, raising my hand. The motion passes by a four-to-one majority.
After that we spend a while negotiating a proper ruleset before the next game begins. Edward and Robin keep trying to out-loophole each other to the point that we eventually agree to Elsie’s proposal that the next person to debate the intricacies of whether enchanted items are allowed to be used will have to play the next round one-legged.
“It’s a conspiracy against us,” Robin complains.
“Everyone is always conspiring against me,” Edward agrees. “Come on, Tallulah. Back me up here.”
“You deserve it,” I reply, grinning.
“Traitor.”
“All right. New proposal. We begin the game with the current ruleset, and anyone trying to exploit loopholes is automatically tagged,” Elizabeth says.
“How exactly are we defining exploitation of loopholes for these purposes?”
“Having to ask that question, for one thing,” I point out.
They do stop abusing loopholes after that, and we’re able to play the rest of the games without any rule disputes. Elizabeth turns out to be slightly faster than Edward, much to the latter’s disappointment. He claims it’s because he hasn’t been keeping up proper training since coming to the Academy.
We’re all pleasantly tired by the time that finishes, and we spend a few minutes just lying on the grass and staring up at the sky before setting off on the next part of our adventure. This one is a joint arrangement between Elsie and I: properly exploring the City Market.
It’s a little quieter than the last time I came, when Elsie and I bought a gift for Mildred after the incident at the Abbey. There’s still chatter everywhere, though, and a dozen different sales calls ring out through the air, mingling so I can barely distinguish what each crier is selling.
Our first stop is a snack stall, since we’re all hungry after our morning’s exercise. The little cakes we buy are too small to really help with that, but they make up for it by being utterly delicious.
“Almost as good as cinnamon bites,” Edward says. “Then again, that’s an unfair comparison – enchantments affecting taste are illegal for food sold to the public.”
“…wait. You gave me enchanted food? Without telling me?” In old fairytales eating enchanted food is always how the heroine ends up trapped by some wicked magician or forest-spirit.
Edward shrugs. “It’s perfectly fine. The enchantment is practically part of the recipe. Family secret.”
Only Edward could say enchanted food that’s a Blackthorn family secret is perfectly fine.
“Probably actually safer than non-enchanted food, in most instances,” he adds. “If it’s enchanted to taste better, it can’t also have harmful enchantments.”
I can’t help laughing.
We wander after that, without any particular aim, stopping to look at whatever interesting things we can find. Beautifully patterned fabrics, exotic fruits, miniature plants. One stall claims to sell holy relics: amulets that channel a little of the stars’ power to ward off evil and bracelets that bring the wearer good fortune.
“Trying to sneak around the laws against unregulated sale of enchanted items,” is Edward’s verdict. “Religious artifacts aren’t covered by the same laws, and as long as they don’t make verifiable claims about their powers, they can’t be proven wrong.”
A couple of stalls down is a fortune-teller. She has skin darker even than mine and wears a loose, flowing blue robe; she’s standing in the entrance to a dark tent made of silvery-grey fabric. “Greetings!” she calls out. “Come, let me tell you your story.”
Elsie stops and looks at her curiously.
“Don’t be shy! Only a silver piece for each of you. Learn your fate – oh! It isn’t every day I see another shadow-child. Do you have the gift of prophecy?”
She’s talking to me. Shadow-child is an old name for my people, born of the superstition that developed when the first of them set foot on the continent’s shores. We come from a place untouched by starlight, we are set apart from others. You don’t hear those superstitions so much these days.
I never liked them, and I tense a little. “No,” I say. “I’m not an oracle.”
“Oracles?” The woman laughs. “No. They are short-sighted fools, blinding themselves to the truth. The true gift is so, so much more than that.”
“Well,” I say, a little awkwardly, “I don’t have that, either.”
She tilts her head to one side, examining me. “Perhaps not. But there is something about you… I would like very much to see your fate.”
I pause, considering. On the one hand she invoked the name of shadow-child, tying me to her when no such bonds exist. And I doubt there is a true gift of prophecy beyond what oracles can do. But… I’m curious, a little.
“What would that involve?” I ask. Edward shoots me a warning glance, which I ignore.
“You give me coin – for you, I would gladly do it for nothing, but the gift always demands payment – and then…” she gestures to the inside of the tent. “We discover the truth of you together.”
“Don’t,” says Edward. I can see why: venturing into that tent with a woman I have no reason to trust could very well be unsafe. And he doesn’t want me taking stupid risks.
“Ah,” the fortune teller says, smoothly switching her gaze to him. “You are a sceptic. You doubt my power.”
He shrugs.
“Why is that, I wonder?” She looks him up and down. He’s left his robes behind at the Academy in favour of a more casual outfit, so he passes for an ordinary person. “You lack faith.”
Edward shrugs again.
“It is a pity. You could be so much more than what you are, if you did not have such a narrow mind.”
He shrugs a third time, but I can see the tension in his body now.
“I would like my fortune told,” says Elsie suddenly.
“Yes,” the woman says, smiling a little. “You are interesting, aren’t you?” She holds out her hand to Elsie, who reaches into her purse and hands her a silver coin before I have a chance to warn her not to. I don’t even know if I want to warn her; I can’t read this woman at all.
“Thank you. Do come in.”
“Be careful,” I tell Elsie as she follows the woman into the tent, sealing its flap behind her.