The Paper Magician

Rubbing her eyes to ensure what she saw was real, Ceony stepped forward and called out to the canvas-clad man.

“Excuse me!” she shouted, but the man didn’t turn, even when she repeated herself. The eldest boy ran an uneven circle around her, but his eyes never saw her, only peered through her. He didn’t notice her presence at all. None of them did.

And Lira . . . where was Lira? Ceony moved around the bee boxes searching for her, the insects ignoring her as readily as the people did. She scanned beyond the trees to shallow, rolling hills, but saw no sign of the Excisioner.

She pulled a white sheet of paper from her bag and held it between both hands. It made her feel safer.

“You’re it!” shouted a girl of about eight, two auburn pigtails peeking out from beneath her face net. She ran away from the eldest boy, laughing even as bees swarmed from half a dozen boxes.

“Don’t touch the hives!” the adult shouted as he pawed at his bee box. He had a low, brawny voice, deep and rugged. He pulled a tray from the box’s top, and Ceony marveled at the thick, amber honeycomb clinging to it. The man brought it to a wheelbarrow, bees crawling all over his protected arms, and scraped honey into a tall bucket. Ceony’s mouth watered, but still she wondered, How did I get here?

More importantly: Where is here?

Surely Lira’s spell hadn’t whisked her away. Why would a practitioner of the forbidden arts ship Ceony to a remote—and rather jolly—honey farm?

Fennel stood on his hind legs as he tried to get a better look at a particularly fat bee flying about his head. Another bee buzzed about Ceony but never landed, never tried to sting her. At least, if it did, she didn’t feel it.

“Emery, get me that spoon, will you?” the man shouted, pointing to a long metal spoon in the grass.

The name made Ceony’s eyes dart to the second-youngest child, perhaps six years old, running between hives to the spoon. Still clutching the paper, Ceony ran to him and peered through the pale netting over his face. The child didn’t notice her at all, even as she crouched in front of him. She saw uneven patches of black hair sticking out from under his hat and bright, green eyes.

“Magician Thane,” she whispered. The eyes gave him away. The child phased through her like a ghost and handed the spoon to the man whom Ceony could only assume was his father. The man patted Mg. Thane’s head—Emery’s head—and the boy grinned a wide grin before returning to play with his siblings, darting between boxes with a precision that told Ceony he could do so blindfolded.

Mg. Thane’s family . . . , Ceony thought. But why did she see this . . . memory? Dream?

Didn’t he say he was an only child?

“Magician Thane!” she called out to him, but as she did she spied a shadow beyond the hives, where the grassy ground dipped down into a hill and a tire swing hung from a tall tree. Dark locks of hair caught on the breeze.

Lira.

Ceony’s breath caught in her throat. Her fingers turned cold, but she managed to snap them and call Fennel. The dog followed her as she ran in the other direction, away from the Excisioner and the bees, and away from the young Emery Thane. All she could do now was run . . . and figure out how to defeat an Excisioner who couldn’t be killed.

The view warped, darkened, and Ceony found herself assaulted by thunderous applause that nearly made her jump from her skin.

Fennel yapped at her heels as rows and rows of men and women Ceony didn’t know clapped around her in the auditorium of what looked to be the Royal Albert Hall in West London. Scarlet carpet lined the tilted aisles, and chandeliers filled with candles—not electric bulbs—hung unlit overhead. Ceony spun, her eyes landing on a heavyset woman in a fur coat clapping in a nearby chair. Approaching the woman, Ceony asked “What’s happening?” over the applause, but the woman didn’t answer. Didn’t look at her. Ceony found herself once more a ghost, though the vision unfolding around her seemed far more ghostly than she herself did.

Ceony glanced behind her, but didn’t see Lira anywhere. She sucked in a deep breath of relief. The applause died down, and Ceony crouched in the aisle between seats to Fold a paper bird.

“And Magician Emery Thane, Folder, District Fourteen,” boomed a voice from behind her. Ceony blinked at the brightly lit stage lined with velvet curtains. A man who looked like a younger Tagis Praff with a mustache stood stage left behind a broad podium with the Magicians’ seal painted on its front. He clapped his hands loudly together, and the audience followed suit.