The Master Magician

Ceony resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

“Really, though”—Bennet clasped his hands in his lap—“it takes him a long time to get used to people, and he just likes to keep to himself. Sometimes it’s nice not to have to report every little thing, you know? As long as I keep up with my lessons and get my homework done on time, we get along. And he doesn’t care what I do with my free time. There’s lots of space to stretch out.”

A long sigh passed through Ceony’s lips. “I suppose he and I are just very different,” she said.

Bennet straightened, eyes wide and hopeful.

“And,” Ceony continued, “it’s only for a few weeks. I can follow these . . . rules . . . for a few weeks.”

Bennet grinned. “I’m happy to help, always. If you need anything. I know you’re more advanced and all—”

“You’ll be testing soon, won’t you?” she asked.

Bennet shrugged. “Maybe in a year. I don’t know. I don’t think I’m ready.”

Ceony frowned. “With a different teacher, you might be.”

He smiled. “I appreciate your confidence. And when you need a break . . . there’s a really lovely park not far from here. Magician Bailey has his own Mercedes, and sometimes he lets me take it out. There’s a duck pond, and it’s a nice place for a picnic.”

Ceony, who had taken to bending the corner of her test list back and forth, slowed her fingers. She kept her shoulders lax, but her chest began to warm. Surely Bennet wasn’t insinuating a date . . . Was he?

“Oh?” she asked. Prodded.

“Just say the word.”

Ceony glanced to one of the paper butterflies beside her window. I guess I just won’t give the word, she thought. No harm done.

“Thank you for the offer,” she said. “Hopefully I won’t need a break.” She sighed and lifted the list from the table. “I have so much to do. I’ll have to get to Folding tomorrow.”

“Well, I won’t keep you,” Bennet said, rising from the table. Fennel ran over to meet him, perhaps hoping the visitor would play. Bennet laughed and rubbed the top of the paper dog’s head. “So expertly made,” he said. “I’m really impressed. Would you consider letting me take him apart to see how he works? I don’t recognize some of these Folds.”

Ceony stiffened. Her extra enchantments on Fennel aside, she couldn’t bear the thought of someone taking him apart. Not when Emery’s hands had so expertly crafted him, twice.

“I’d . . . prefer to keep him intact,” she said.

Fortunately, Bennet didn’t push the matter. “All right, but I wouldn’t mind getting a lesson from you in advanced animation,” he said, apparently assuming Ceony the pup’s creator. “Have a good night.”

She smiled. “You, too. And thank you.”

Bennet left the room, shutting the door quietly behind him. Ignoring her work, Ceony penned Emery a note and Folded it into a crane.

She didn’t mention Bennet’s invitation.



Mg. Pritwin Bailey paced back and forth in the apprentices’ study, turning just before reaching either curtain covering the large window. Morning sunlight gleamed off his spectacles whenever he passed in front of a certain ray of light, and he clasped his hands behind his back.

“Recite the steps for a ‘Stiffen’ spell,” he commanded Bennet, who sat dutifully in a chair at the table.

Ceony, as before, had taken up residence in the corner of the room. She held her ledger on her lap, though the writing on the current page grew more lax and sloppy with each passing line. The words morphed from thoughts on her magician’s test to unsorted notes regarding Saraj Prendi.

He wouldn’t be in that community, Ceony thought, thinking of her personal investigation in Gosport. But could I send in spies? No, if there were anything to find there, Criminal Affairs would have found it. They’d catch me, and besides, paper spells aren’t complex enough to hold the orders I would need to give them. It’s a dead end.

Criminal Affairs had more information than she did. Mg. Hughes had been impressed with her before; perhaps he’d share something with her.

But Emery had already spoken with him. If he didn’t relay any information to Emery, he certainly wouldn’t let Ceony know his secrets. She frowned.

“—doesn’t work with complex Folds,” Bennet said from his seat. The “Stiffen” spell—a spell that would temporarily harden paper—was one Ceony had learned on her 211th day as an apprentice. It sounded like Bennet had learned it recently, written an essay about it, and was now being given a verbal quiz.

If I’ve heard nothing new about Saraj, he’s probably not a threat, she chided herself. A moment passed before a speculative thought arrived: But that also means he hasn’t been caught.