With Grandma Gallus’s hand still clamped around his elbow, Dwayne followed the rest of Tarpan’s dinner guests into the dining hall.

“Just when it was getting interesting.” She looked around. “I see Iona’s pulled out all the stops.”

Tarpan’s staff had done good work. The dining hall’s long table was now covered in a blood-red cloth with fifty white padded chairs placed along its sides. Each place had aluminum cutlery, a set of glistening glass flutes, red napkins embroidered with the Gallus family seal, and white porcelain plates ringed with golden heads of wheat. At each end of the room, two fireplaces, each large enough to hold a family of four, bracketed the dozens of portraits of Magdala’s ancestors, who glared down from the walls. As they walked, Dwayne and Grandma Gallus’s shoes sank into the thick white carpet, and the smells of freshly baked dark breads, deep roasted meats, and exotic spices filled their noses and promised a hearty meal.

None of this impressed Dwayne however. He’d had dinner with Soura’s Water Sage and her Lord Commander before.

Grandma Gallus chuckled at his expression. “Not the decor, boy, the lights.” She pointed at the lamps hanging between the portraits.

Dwayne blinked. “I don’t…” The lamps were bright and hardly flickered, a sign that they weren’t candles but the new gas lamps, the latest and greatest in lighting and, according to Magdala, a triumph in alchemy. “Of course.”

“Watching you think on your feet is a treat.“ Grandma Gallus patted his arm. “I do hope Iona hasn’t separated us.”

Right, the seating plan. Lady Gallus had mentioned one, but Dwayne hadn’t had a chance to review it. He’d been far too busy. Feeling hollow, he looked around. A servant was seating Magdala at the far end of the room. Surely, he wasn’t going to be seated at this end.

“Young lord.” A servant intercepted them with a bow. “Lady Gallus. Shall we escort you to your seats?” A second servant materialized as they spoke.

Sighing, Grandma Gallus released Dwayne. “Let’s see where Iona thinks I’ll do the least damage.” She took a proffered arm. “Take care, young Kalan, and keep keeping those savage tendencies of yours in check.”

Good riddance. Dwayne turned to the remaining servant. “Where do I sit?”

They gestured to the near end of the dining table. “Here, milord.”

Of course. Dwayne sat down and snuck a glance at the far end of the table, where Magdala was talking to her mother.

“She cannot help you tonight.” Lord Gallus took the seat to the right of Dwayne at the foot of the table. “She has her own future to think about.”

“Lord Gallus.” Dwayne shoved a clenched fist under the table and inclined his head. “Good evening.”

Magdala’s father harrumphed. “Unfortunately, I’ll have to put up with you myself.”

Dwayne just nodded as he watched the rest of the guests take their seats. Because of Grandma Gallus’s insistence on dragging him all around the parlor, he knew that the people seated on the other end of the table were mostly mages and the ones seated on this end were mostly family. Everyone else - Mei, Huan, the merchants - had seats near the center. “Apparently, I’m more noble than mage tonight.”

“Tonight, yes.” Lord Gallus rested his hands on the tablecloth in a pose of calm. “Iona has been most impressed with your academic performance.”

Sure she was. “Magdala has helped me a lot.”

Her father’s pose crumbled. “To the detriment of her future.”

He kept mentioning that, but, as far as Dwayne knew, Magdala was doing just fine in class. Unfortunately, asking Lord Gallus for clarification would only result in stiff-jawed silence.

“Baron Thadden!” Lord Gallus smiled. “I’m glad you could join us tonight.”

“Well met, Lord Gallus.” A tall man with pale skin, graying hair, and a paunch barely hidden by gold and brown robes took the seat across from Dwayne. “This party is exactly what I expected from you and yours.”

“It had better be. So,” Lord Gallus leaned in, “you here for duty or pleasure?”

“Neither.” The baron’s gold seal ring flashed as he waved away the idea. “I volunteered.”

Baron Thadden’s family seal, a stone in a river, was unfamiliar. While a river was common for a noble family in this region - the Kalan family seal depicted a river delta for example - stones usually meant mining, a rare pursuit here in Eastern Soura.

Lord Gallus leaned back in his chair. “Her Highness the Royal Secretary typically sends a junior clerk, not her most senior one.”

It must be nice to have more than one clerk and one guard. With an actual staff, Dwayne could have gotten so much more done at the Tower.

“As the only mage in the office, I also happen to be the liaison to the Magisterium,” Thadden’s brown eyes alighted on Dwayne, “and this is our first opportunity to meet the most famous mage apprentice in the city.”

It was nice to be recognized for once. Dwayne inclined his head. “As the Office of the Royal Sorcerer’s Head Clerk, I look forward to working with you. Whom am I addressing?”

The baron’s smile stiffened. “You are addressing Baron Otto Thadden, premier mage of the Royal Secretary’s Office and master of fluidic Qe magic.” He sniffed. “You’ve been trained well. Your accent is indistinguishable from that of a native.”

Despite the heat rushing into his face, Dwayne kept his voice even. “Thank you, Baron.”

Back at the reception, Grandma Gallus had forced Dwayne to talk to a lot of people, but this man had evaded her efforts. That was suspicious.

“What do you do as your office’s liaison to the Magisterium?” Dwayne asked. “As I understand it, it’s the Royal Sorcerer’s Office that functions as Her Majesty’s official interface between the Magisterium and herself, not the Royal Secretary’s Office.”

Baron Thadden leaned back. “What do you know of our office, young Kalan?”

“That it manages the Royal household and the queendom’s foreign affairs.”

“Which means?”

Dwayne counted on his fingers. “Hiring palace staff, setting the agenda at Privy Council meetings, handling communication with foreign queendoms, arranging events like the Autumn Session and the upcoming Harvest Ball.” He inclined his head. “We at the Royal Sorcerer’s office are grateful to only oversee the monies handed to the Magisterium from Her Majesty’s Purse. Oh, and the licensing of mages and their work, of course.”

“This,” Baron Thadden turned to Lord Gallus, “is Lord Kalan’s apprentice?”

Lord Gallus nodded. “I understand your confusion. He’s bright, focused, and detail oriented.”

“He’s remarkable. With his disadvantages, I thought he’d be merely a cat’s paw for your lady wife.”

Dwayne’s jaw set. There was only one disadvantage that the baron could be speaking of.

“My wife has herself and her abilities, both of which are more than sufficient for her to achieve her own aims.” Lord Gallus waved over a servant. “Besides, we have more important things to discuss.”

“Ah, yes.” Thadden nodded. “Your heir is of age.”

“She is.” Lord Gallus turned to the servant at his side. “Break open the Edmonds barrel.”

The servant’s eyes flickered to the other end of the table. “Milord, the Edmonds is a fine ale, but possibly a bit strong.”

Lord Gallus glanced at his wife and nodded. “Then run it by her first. She’ll understand.”

“Very well, milord.”

As the servant walked to the other end of the table, Lord Gallus turned back to Dwayne and Thadden. “First, Magdala needs an apprenticeship.”

Dwayne’s mouth went dry. “First?”

Lord Gallus’s eyes locked on Dwayne’s. “Second, a betrothal, one that will ensure her future and the future of our family.” He turned to the baron. “As for Dwayne here, Iona intends for him to demonstrate some new theory. What was it called?”

“Resonance Theory,” Dwayne’s mouth answered as his mind processed Magdala’s imminent betrothal. If she did, would they be able to work together? It was doubtful her future spouse would be comfortable with a savage and lascivious Wesen around.

“Yes, that.” Lord Gallus shook his head. “Cups, it’s a complicated thing.”

“No, it’s not.” Thoughts of betrothal fell away as the desire to explain took over. “All Lord Kalan and I did was change the question from ‘Where does magic come from?’ to ‘When we do magic, what happens?’”

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“It sounds like you’re splitting hairs.”

“Maybe,” Dwayne leaned in, “but consider a battlefield full of arrows stuck in the ground, and there’s a castle nearby. When you search it, you find bows and empty quivers. Where then did the arrows come from?”

“The castle,” answered Baron Thadden. “Obviously.”

Lord Gallus narrowed his eyes. “You haven’t told me anything about the arrows.”

Dwayne grinned. “They’re stuck in the ground with their fletches pointed away from the castle.”

“Then… someone else fired the arrows,” said Thadden.

Lord Gallus shook his head. “A significant headwind could have blown the arrows back.” He raised an eyebrow. “What does this have to do with magic?”

“Context is important.” Dwayne gestured to Thadden. “He and I know this simple fact: arrows are stored in quivers. Therefore if the quivers are in the castle, then the arrows had to have come from there, but as a veteran of the battlefield, you know that wind and trajectory can affect how arrows fly after they’ve been shot.

“It’s the same with magic. It’s obvious that we mages initiate magic, we feel it, you see it, but until now, we’ve been looking at the magical result and saying, ‘This has to come from the mage.’ If magic spells are arrows, then we’ve never considered the role of the wind.”

Baron Thadden rubbed his chin. “An elegant analogy.”

“Thank you.” Dwayne gave Lord Gallus a look. “Magdala helped me with it.”

Lord Gallus muttered, “Under supervision of course. Oh?” The servant had returned. “What did she say?”

Thadden leaned in to talk to Dwayne. “Young Gallus only traveled with you and your master for the past couple of months, correct?”

Dwayne nodded, not sure where this was going.

“Ah,” Thadden sat back, “then I am impressed anew by how clear your papers are.”

Dwayne blinked. “What are you talking about? Lord Kalan wrote those papers.”

“I’m sure he wrote the initial drafts, but your master has never been known for either clear argumentation or attention to detail. Your dedication to clarity is all over his abstracts and methodology.”

“The papers are his.” Dwayne raised his chin. “I work on experimentation and practice.”

Thadden smiled. “Then I look forward to a demonstration of your practice.”

As the servant stepped away, Lord Gallus’s attention returned to the table. “What were we talking about?”

“Asking the right questions,” answered the baron.

“Right, mage philosophical discussion. A topic sure to enthrall and excite.”

“Here, here!” called out Grandma Gallus to general laughter.

“It should.” As bowls of salad were placed in front of diners, Dwayne kept his eyes on Lord Gallus and away from the other end of the table. Some things were not meant to be. “After all, knowing how something works means that we can make it work better.”

***

Seated between her brother and a Souran man in a dark coat, Mei grabbed a fork, speared a bunch of lettuce, and stuffed it into her mouth.

Huan muttered, “You’re using the wrong fork.”

Mei chewed. The leaves were bitter, but the orange-colored sauce they were covered in was sweet and tart. Maybe it was tange, like the pastries.

Huan nudged her. “Mei!”

She speared another bite. “It’s a fork. It works.”

“I doubt you’ll get her to stop enjoying herself.” The Souran watched her eat. “Though, cups, she can put that away.” He’d been seated before Huan and Mei, and his black coat stood out among the merchants in their section of the table, who by far preferred the seasons colors.

With a sigh, Huan picked up the fork furthest left of his plate then peered at it. “Is this aluminum?”

“Of course it is.” The Souran laughed. “Nothing but the best for the family that holds both a Privy Council position and a Sage seat. I must say.” He leaned in. “Neither of you look like the typical Gallus dinner guest. Oh, thank you.” A servant filled his stein with a pale beer.

As her stein was filled, Mei looked over the Souran. His coat was graced with a silver cup under a set of scales pinned to his left breast, and his face was rosy, which was a sign that he caught a bit more sun than Maggie, who could pass for a snow hare. He probably worked outside a lot. “Neither do you.”

He laughed again. “Certainly not.” He took a swig of beer, reveled in it. “I’m here as a representative from the Chamber, by which I mean the High Judiciary. Ah,” he scowled at his salad, “I guess I should try a bit of that.”

“You don’t want it?” Mei asked.

The Souran winced. “No, not really. Too tart for me.”

“I’ll take it. You can have this.” Mei pushed her stein of beer over to him.

Huan nudged her again. “Mei!”

“Salad for beer?” The Souran grinned. “You drive a hard bargain, miss, but I accept.” He dumped his salad on her plate and then claimed her stein. “Since we’re sharing food and drink, I should probably introduce myself. Charles Vogt, Senior Scrytive for the High Judiciary. You?”

Huan squeezed Mei’s arm. “We’re the Ma siblings. I’m Huan and this is my little sister Mei.”

Mei was getting sick of the name Ma. They were Li.

“Ma.” The Souran nodded. “Good solid Tuquese name. So I hear.”

“It is.” Huan released Mei. “It has the double benefit of being easy for Sourans like you to say.”

Chewing, Mei tried out the Souran’s name in her head. Since meeting Maggie, Mei’s Souran had improved immensely, but she still had trouble with some sounds. “Chararez.” Maybe just the last name. “Voeut.” Close. “Vogt.”

“That’s a bit formal for someone I’ve traded beer with.” Vogt waggled his eyebrows. “Call me Charlie.”

“Charlee. Charlie. Got it.” Mei held up a bite of salad. “Thank you for the salad, Charlie.”

“You’re welcome, Mei. So,” Charlie sat back, “what brings you two to our fair city?”

“Work,” answered Huan. “I’m employed by Lord Kalan as a bodyguard.”

“I’m Head Guard at the Scaled Tower,” answered Mei.

Charlie’s eyes widened. “Oh, wow. Between you and, well, him.” He gestured to Dwayne’s end of the table. “That’s two foreigners up at the Royal Sorcerer’s Office.” He grinned. “Which makes you the famous Axesnapper.”

As Huan bristled, Mei asked, “Are you a soldier too?”

Charlie shook his head. “Served my time a while back, but I prefer chasing cutpurses here in Bradford to chasing bandits out on the frontier. Still, it’s a rousing tale, what you did down in the jungle. Is there anything left out of the tall tales?”

“Yes, there is.” Huan pushed his salad away. “I-”

“I’m sure your contribution was essential, Mr. Ma, but I asked your sister.” Leaving Huan to fume, Charlie focused on Mei. “I have a few friends still serving, and they say that the Water Sage and her daughter finished off the monsters themselves. How?”

Mei swallowed her last bite and put down her fork. There was little she could tell. “Maggie is good at explosives, and her mother is good at water. Beyond that…” She shrugged.` She honestly didn’t know how Dwayne had set off the explosion or how he’d shielded everyone from it, and so leaving out his part only meant pretending that she was ignorant of just that little bit more.

“It was absolute chaos,” said Huan. “So much was going on that seeing what the mages were doing was impossible.”

Charlie raised an eyebrow. “I heard that you weren’t anywhere near the fight, Mr. Ma. Something about raiding the enemy camp?” He tilted his head. “Weren’t you the last person to see Sir Marcus of Pollum alive?”

Huan swallowed a wince. “Yes, he… saved my life.”

Mei’s stomach tensed at the haunted look on her brother’s face.

Charlie nodded. “It’s hard to live on when a good man dies for you.”

Huan growled, and Mei snatched up the sharpest knife on the table.

“Oh, you shouldn’t need that quite yet.” Charlie sipped his beer. “Save that for the main course.”

“Ah ha, she’s, uh, still learning local manners.” Huan drowned his growl in polite tones. “That’s for cutting meat, Mei.”

Mei met his eyes, which glinted in the white light. “I know.”

They stayed frozen for a long moment.

Then Huan laughed. “Ha ha, she’s a treat, right?” He was human again.

Mei placed the knife on the table and returned to her salad.

Charlie picked up his second stein of beer. “Certainly, she knows how to handle you.” He took a swig. “Ah, so good. Oh,” he wiped his mouth, “maybe you two could help me with an investigation I’m running. Recently, the homes of several mages around the city have been burgled, and, in each instance, only a single window pane has been broken.”

“Magic,” answered Mei around her salad.

Charlie frowned. “Surely, no spell is capable of that.”

“How big are the panes?”

Beside Mei, Huan tensed. Strange.

Charlie pointed to the palm of his hand. “No bigger than that. These were old homes, so none of them had those new single-pane windows the Magisterium is producing nowadays.”

Mei swallowed her bite. “Magic.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Human skulls are too big.”

Huan coughed. “Maybe the thief broke the pane to unlatch the window?”

“No.” Charlie reached up to the ceiling. “In two of the cases, the broken panes were so high up, no human arm would have been long enough to reach through them and open the latch, and in all of the cases, an nQe mage - there’s a whole college at the Magisterium for this sort of thing - was able to confirm that the paint on the windowsill lacked any recent wear patterns or signs that it had been rained on. The windows hadn’t been opened.” He sighed. “So, magic, huh?”

“Yes.” Mei drained a glass of water. “What was stolen?”

“Books, we think, probably ones containing family magic secrets although some merely rare texts were taken too.”

“Family magic secrets?”

Charlie shrugged. “All the old and notable mage families have a few tricks up their sleeves, which they pass down from mother to child. You should know. The Kalans probably have dozens.”

Mei’s eyes flicked to Dwayne, who was talking with Maggie’s father and the man in the brown and gold robes. “Yes, he does.”

Charlie finished off his beer. “Still, magic that lets one pass through a palm-sized window pane? That’s something.”

“How big were the books?” Mei’s stomach grumbled, and she eyed Huan’s still full salad bowl.

“No idea,” said Charlie. “The families are too embarrassed to talk about it. However, I doubt that any of the stolen books could have fit through the broken window panes.”

“Couldn’t it have been an inside job? Like a disgruntled servant?” Huan caught Mei looking at his salad and pushed it over. “The broken window could have been a distraction.”

“A credible idea if three of the robbed families weren’t too poor to have servants. You have to remember that magework is not how you get all this.” Charlie gestured to the room.

“Couldn’t the family-”

“Anything else unusual?” asked Mei through another bite of salad. She could eat this all day. Maybe she could convince Maggie to bring some to lunch tomorrow.

“At the first theft that we know of, there was a knife mark in the wood floor. The room didn’t have any rugs or carpeting so it stood out.”

Mei’s fork hovered over her salad. Knives. Like the ones the wraith had used to attack Lord Kalan in Walcrest. She glanced at Huan. He’d said that the wraith had had some kind of magic knives, which the Vanurians had taken back to their country. It could be a coincidence. “Magic.”

“Hmm…” Charlie sat back in his chair. “Well, thank you for your insight, Mei. I wish the answer weren’t magic, but it’s a start.”

Something creaked to Mei’s left. She glanced at her brother, who was gripping the arms of his chair tight, which was strange because this had nothing to do with him. He wasn’t a thief anymore. He’d said so.

She put down her fork. “Where do you live, Charlie?”

The scrytive blinked. “Oh, Boscage, a little ways from the river.” He brightened. “It’s a charming place. I got it for cheap when I made Senior Scrytive.”

“Cheap housing in Boscage?” Huan chuffed. “I don’t believe it.”

Charlie shrugged. “I got lucky. I have a brother who does favors for the landlady. It’s no cabin in the woods, but at least it’s my own, and it’s good for entertaining.”

Huan smirked. “Is that what they call it around here?”

Mei frowned. “It?”

Her brother’s face flushed. “Having someone over for, uh, activities.” He looked away.

“Oh, activities.” Mei nodded sagely. “Maggie’s roommate Fran does those in their dormitory all the time.”

Charlie’s voice was quiet. “Aren’t those single sex?”

“Yes?”

“So… young men are sneaking in?”

“No, they’re all girls.”

Charlie turned away and coughed. “Th-that’s fine. Who doesn’t enjoy an activity with people of the same sex?”

“Maggie doesn’t always like it.” Mei speared her last bite of salad. “She has to study in the library because there’s a glove on the door.”

As Charlie sputtered, Mei finished her third salad. Hopefully these dinners were rare. This one had had good food, but between the awkward conversation with Bruce and her brother’s strange behavior, Mei had to admit she wasn’t enjoying herself much. At least Charlie was nice.

Huan stood up and rubbed his hands on his breeches. “I need to use the restroom. If you’ll excuse me.”

With a bow, he abandoned Mei, leaving her alone at a party she’d only attended because of Maggie.

“Does he know where the restroom is?” asked Charlie.

“Yes. We’ve been here before.”

Charlie’s mouth fell open. “So Maggie is…oh, wow.”

Hopefully, the soup course was worth it.