It was such a mundane, unexpected place to see evidence of the practice that it left Dahlia feeling torn between habitual revulsion and natural curiosity.
All fire burns something, Dahlia remembered her father saying gravely, when she asked about the possibility of investing in the new foxfire to create a warm room for the ducks. It would have allowed them to breed all winter long, but he had adamantly refused. Ask yourself, where does the fuel for foxfire come from? Not wood or coal or oil, or any other natural source. Sorcery draws its power not from this world, but the next. Is it worth disturbing the dead to save the effort of keeping the hearth coals warm?
Dahlia wasn’t stupid enough to express her interest or ask questions with Celadon around. Quin teachings said sorcery was unnatural, that sorcerers stole from the realms of the dead and the vitality of the living to create pretty tricks, but if it was so dangerous, why would someone risk using it for a task as silly as warming a stable?
Later, when Celadon wasn’t around, she would try to get that answer.
After all, she was in the city to learn new things.
Chapter 8
Naples
Seated in front of the low, round table he always used as an altar in the Cobalt Hall’s temple, Naples clasped a circlet of metal between his palms. The Terra might be right that he didn’t need an altar for his magic, but he was still used to these trappings, and wanted the support of familiarity for this project.
Mentally and magically, he tied off the strands of magic he had braided into the iron and tiger’s eye. He used his power to sculpt and smooth, until he opened his hands to observe his creation: a man’s ring, a bit too large for his own hand.
At first glance the design was simple. He had modeled it after the basic iron rings many Silmari wore, which weren’t intended to be ornamental. The last thing a sailor wanted was a clumsy bauble that was likely to snag or get in the way while he worked.
A closer look revealed that the metal had orange and black swirls, as if the tiger’s eye crystal Naples had used in its creation had been folded into the metal. Such a thing would have been impossible with any forge, but was exactly what he had done with his magic. By inverting the principles the Terra had used for her net to trap the Osei, he had also imbued the ring with a spell of aversion, designed to make any of the major wyrms instinctively want to avoid the individual who wore it.
At least, he thought he had. He hoped. There wasn’t any good way to test it.
He stretched, rolled his shoulders, and touched the fragment of shell he had used as a focus for the spell. The inside was creamy white, and the outside a hypnotic, iridescent gray-blue. The egg it had come from had been large enough that the curve of the shell was barely noticeable in the palm-sized piece the Terra had given him. Many years ago, an Osei queen had been born from it. The Terra had acquired it, and a few other fragments, at great effort and expense.
Naples sensed familiar power behind him before a voice asked, “What is that?”
A twinge in his neck chastised him for being still and focused for so long as he tried to twist to greet Henna. He winced and said, “It’s a gift for a . . . a friend.”
“A date for the festival?”
The words were asked politely, not from real interest. Henna didn’t want to know about his “dates” any more than he wanted details of what she had been doing with Terre Verte that made her power glow like a midsummer sun.
Fortunately, Naples’ mother used almost entirely cold magic, which meant she was essentially blind to the way a hot magic user’s power sparked and sang in reaction to sex. Unfortunately, Naples hadn’t known about that particular aspect of his power until he had returned from one of his first successful trysts and Henna had cornered him with a diatribe about being careful.
Their ensuing argument had covered everything from Kavet’s age of consent laws to the value a healthy, attractive, fourteen-year-old boy could fetch if sold as a slave in any of a half-dozen ports where the Tamari traded. Naples still wasn’t sure if Henna had been more horrified to learn her young student had had sex, or that he had done so on a Tamari ship, without any knowledge of the danger.
After that, Henna had left the rules to Naples’ mother, and done her best to keep her lectures focused on safety. From her, Naples had learned things like how to identify the drugs would-be slavers sometimes slipped potential victims, how to avoid disease, and the quickest way to use his power to sap the fury from an ornery sailor bent on beating the shit out of him when he misjudged a situation. He had scoffed through the lessons with a petulance he had later regretted; he’d had enough occasions to use the skills since that he had long ago apologized and thanked her.
Henna had used the word date ironically, but Naples answered, “Actually, yes. Well, somewhat. I won’t be available in the evening, but Sepia assures me I will have some free time during the day.”
He would still be working nominally as a servant during the ball, but only so he would be available to help support the spell to ensorcell the Osei. He wished he could discuss the spell and his role in it with Henna, but the Terra had forbidden him from doing so, even if Henna already knew of the spell’s existence.
Henna’s brows lifted in surprise. She had seen him turn down a half-dozen Napthol novices in the past year alone—not that that was much of an accomplishment, given the limited selection among sorcerers his age.
“Anyone I know?” she asked.
“Probably not.”
Henna didn’t pursue the question. Naples was used to most of the Order’s members dismissing sailors as somehow less than human, but Henna’s reaction to them always seemed more personal. Since the only thing he knew of her experiences before she came to Kavet was that she had been from a seafaring family, he never challenged her aversion to those who still sailed.
“I was going to do some work,” Henna said, changing the subject as one of them inevitably did whenever they discussed relationships. “Are you done with your project, or should I set up in another spot?”
There were half a dozen altars in the temple at the highest level of the Cobalt Hall, of different sizes, shapes, and materials. Novices worked at all of them during their education, eventually discovering which materials called to them most, which rituals would respond to them, and which would fade into nothing. Most sorcerers found two or three they liked, depending on the type of magic they were using, but Naples always used the same one, which was made of precious cast iron. The surface was covered with three layers, the first being soft leather, then a circle of black-and-white rabbit’s fur, and a disc of polished obsidian glass to make the surface smooth and slick.
“I’m done,” he assured her, gathering his materials to put them away. He tucked the Osei egg shell into the trunk where he kept his personal projects and made sure the Terra’s knife was sheathed securely at his waist, then returned the rest of his tools to their shelves. A glance at Henna showed that she had already given herself over to her magic, and was focused on the whispers of power that guided her to choose the tools she needed.
Naples returned to his room to clean up and wrap Cyan’s gift. He was just about to head out when he heard fussing from nearby, a distressed voice announcing, “Abibi! Gi gabba gimme! No! No!”
He recognized Clay’s two favorite words: abibi, which they all thought meant “banana biscuit,” referring to the toddler’s beloved snack, and no, which he had recently learned and liked to use at the least sensible times.
Naples sighed and went to check on the toddler, who was supposed to be napping. Their mother would hear him in a moment through a pair of crystals she had bespelled to carry his cries to her, but she was currently working downstairs and three flights of stairs were a lot for her to take if her younger son was just tossing restlessly before falling back asleep.
Clay was standing defiantly in his crib and jumped with an excited gurgle when he saw Naples, clearly expecting that the sight of his big half brother meant rescue from his imprisonment.
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“Nana! Nana!” Clay shouted, the closest he had been able to come to Naples’ name.
Henna breezed in behind Naples just as he caught the eye-watering stench from Clay’s diaper, and he was exceptionally grateful when she said, “I’ve got him. You were on your way out.”
Naples wasn’t going to argue. He had changed plenty of diapers since Clay was born and was willing and able to handle another if necessary, but he was supposed to meet Cyan soon, and would far rather do that than deal with the hygiene needs of a tiny person. As he walked out, he shook his head at Henna’s conversation with Clay, which sounded perfectly earnest as they “discussed” topics like whether or not the toddler’s clothing would need to be changed and how he felt about having porridge with roasted apples for a snack.
Focused on his own plans for the day, Naples opened the front door too abruptly and nearly hit the man standing there, one hand raised toward the brass knocker and the other holding a bouquet of flowers.
Terre Verte. Naples’ breath caught for a moment and he felt his shoulders straighten.
“Can I help you?” he asked, grateful his voice didn’t crack. Something about Kavet’s prince always made him feel like he was an awkward fourteen-year-old again.
“Is Henna available?” the Terre asked. “We don’t have plans until later, but I have some unexpected free time. I’m hoping she might, too,” he added.
“I can—”
“Honey, who is—oh!” His mother’s voice interrupted his response, followed almost immediately by her looping an arm around his waist to pull him out of the way—not unlike how she might have moved Clay. “Terre, do pardon my son. Are you looking for Henna?”
“Is she available?”
“Naples, go see if Henna wants to come down.” Only a slight rise at the end of his mother’s order made it seem like a request.
Naples nodded, suppressing an inappropriate sigh of irritation. What exactly did she think he was doing, that she needed to apologize for him?
“You’re . . . Madder, right?” the prince asked as Naples turned toward the stairs.
“Yes, that’s right, but you’re welcome to call me Maddy. Everyone else does.”
Including your father, probably, Naples thought, with an ironic smile. He wondered idly what Terre Verte thought of finally meeting his father’s mistress. Was his parents’ feuding and infidelity such a fact of his life that it didn’t bother him anymore, or was he concealing his awkwardness behind a well-practiced political veneer?
As Naples stepped out of the room, he heard his mother add, “That was my oldest son, Naples.”
“Is his father part of your order?”
Naples hesitated, and heard his mother do the same. They rarely spoke of his father these days.
“My husband worked in the paper mill before the fire,” Maddy replied, her voice soft as she referenced a tragedy that had taken over twenty lives a decade before. “Henna tried to warn him to stay home that day, but she was new to our order then, and we didn’t understand how powerful her gift was. When I ignored her, she convinced Naples to play sick. Otherwise he would have been with his father that day.”
Naples’ jaw tightened. Henna had kept him home by offering to teach him to juggle candlelight, which had interested him even more than his father’s promise to show him how the machinery at the mill worked. He wondered for a moment why his mother felt the need to share the whole story—a simple no would have sufficed—and then he realized she wasn’t talking about his father at all. She was warning Terre Verte that the woman he was courting was part of their family, and they expected him to treat her well.
“How accurate are Henna’s prophecies?” Verte asked. “She always downplays her second sight whenever we speak of it.”
“They tend to be accurate,” Maddy answered, “but she can’t always call them. The ones she tells in the square are often more fabricated than true. Most of the time, people are just looking for a moment of entertainment.”
“Maddy!” Henna’s voice carried well down the stairs, startling Naples into remembering he was supposed to be fetching her, not eavesdropping. She shot him a distracted smile as she brushed past. “Clay was fussing, so I—”
As much as Naples would have enjoyed seeing how the prince responded to meeting his own bastard little brother, he had places to be. Instead of risking more distractions in the front hall, he ducked out a side door.
He skipped the bustling marketplace and took familiar back alleys, tracing a path he had first discovered when trying to find a route to the docks that didn’t pass anyone likely to report his movements to his mother. These days secrecy wasn’t as necessary, but he still took it out of habit, especially on days when he was running late and didn’t want to run into anyone who might consider it rude if he refused to stop to talk.
Oh, perfect.
He sighed as he turned a corner and discovered a group of young men clustered together, speaking in low, entitled grumbles outside the door of a chandlery. Their austere clothes, deep frowns and choice of meeting place warned him they were Quin even before a familiar blond man turned around to regard Naples with singular distaste.
“What are you doing here, witch?” Celadon demanded, as if Naples were the one acting strangely. They had met soon after the preacher had moved to the city, and their relationship had become increasingly antagonistic since, as Celadon had evolved from trying to rescue the poor, innocent child raised in the Cobalt Hall—even going so far as to file an accusation of abuse with the king to try to get Naples removed from his mother’s custody—to deciding he was a lost cause. Naples had rather hoped Celadon’s recent long absence meant he had finally been eaten by one of the Osei who haunted his beloved Wyrm’s Shadow.
“Walking down a public path,” Naples replied. There were five of them, and though Celadon clearly avoided heavy labor, the others had the hard look of men employed in physical work. The hostility in their eyes could have been frightening if Naples hadn’t trusted his ability to teach them a scalding lesson if they attempted violence. “I’m not the one who spends my time whining in back alleys about how the Terre are ruining the country by using their wicked magic to do deplorable things like . . . what is it today? Fund schools and feed orphans?”
“Fund schools,” one of the Quin scoffed. “I had to pull my daughter out of the city school so she wouldn’t be indoctrinated with—”
“Don’t bother.” Celadon’s voice was soft and resigned as he cut off his follower’s rant. “This one would rather spend his time in back alleys in the valuable pursuit of another trick.”
Naples wasn’t sure if he was being called a common witch who performed silly magic stunts, or if he was being called a whore. Celadon had slung both slurs at him in the past. Naples had occasionally responded by trying to educate him about the difference between a sorcerer and a witch—the latter were usually Tamari or Ilbanese, and though their power was different than a Kavetan sorcerer’s, it wasn’t safe to insult them. Naples had also pointed out that he wasn’t pretty or skilled enough to compete with the Order of A’hknet prostitutes, who considered their vocation an art form.
But such verbal sparring had long since lost its entertainment value. These days, the only thing Naples really wondered was how the Quin could swing between claiming sorcery was useless chicanery to suggesting it was powerful enough to accidentally destroy this world and the next.
“Unfortunately, the tenets of your so-called faith mean I’m unlikely to find one here,” Naples drawled. Of course Celadon had resurfaced in time for his favorite holiday; he and his closest followers always protested Festival, and Naples and the other younger novices always gave him a hard time about it.
Like counting apple seeds to tell fortunes and kissing your sweetheart under the moon, it was a tradition.
Naples moved forward, trying to ignore the creeping sensation along his spine that warned that each of these men would like nothing more than to put a knife in him. He didn’t think the
y would dare try, not so close to the Cobalt Hall, but they also didn’t move out of the way. He had to push past them, roughly planting a shoulder in one man’s chest and using a burst of power to supplement his own strength as he shoved the Quin back a pace to clear a path.
They get bolder every day, Naples thought, unnerved despite himself as he hurried on his way. It’s getting ridiculous.
It was worse than ridiculous. It was, almost, starting to get a little scary.
Chapter 9
Dahlia
It was getting late. Celadon had warned Dahlia to avoid the central market square come evening, and she knew she should heed his words, but she didn’t have the heart to return to his house yet.
It wasn’t that she felt unwelcome there. Celadon’s aunt Willow was as quiet and reserved as his sister, Ginger, was exuberant and gregarious, but both had been friendly and glad to have her. But it didn’t feel like home.
She hadn’t imagined she would stay there long. She was well educated and a hard worker. She carried with her a letter of recommendation from the Eiderlee school dean, another from the parent of a particularly challenging young boy she had tutored one-on-one, and one from the town mayor. The mayor! Of a small town, yes, but he spoke of her accomplishments, her invaluable help in organizing civic events, and her talent for coordinating volunteer groups to manage community tasks. With credentials like that, how hard could it be to find a job in the busiest city in Kavet?
Very hard, apparently, which was what made it so difficult to face returning to the Cremnitz household.
For two days now, she had chased promising leads for jobs only to be told the vacancy had just been filled—usually right after she told her prospective employer where she was staying, or where she had grown up.
Dahlia couldn’t help but recall the scene at the stables in a new light. She wondered if Celadon’s associate Ash had quit entirely of his own volition, or if he had been encouraged to do so. No wonder Maimeri had thought Dahlia might get desperate enough to look for a job at the docks!