The Paper Magician

Mg. Aviosky pursed her lips into a thin line, but Ceony wasn’t sure if it was in regard to her statement or not. Mg. Aviosky always looked pursed.

“Things have gone from very hectic to very calm very quickly,” the magician said. “It disconcerts me. But if you believe it is well, Dr. Newbold, I suppose I’ll be wont to agree with you.”

“It is well,” the doctor said, closing his bag and standing with a grunt. His right knee popped as he did so. “But telegram if anything does go amiss.”

“Me as well,” Mg. Aviosky said to Ceony, clasping her hands behind her back. She still wore the same clothes she had donned when first responding to Ceony’s call, and Ceony found herself grateful not only for the woman’s quick response, but also that she had stayed beside Emery when the others had left him for dead.

Ceony smiled. “Of course. I’ll let you know any and every change, Magician Aviosky. I promise it.”

Mg. Aviosky smiled as much as her stern countenance would allow. “I am glad to hear it. I apologize for this incident disrupting your learning.” She looked at Ceony with a critical eye. “I admit I’m not a fan of mixed genders in apprenticeships, and our only other Folders are likewise male, but I’m willing to consider reassignment.”

Ceony bit down on her tongue to keep from blurting an adamant “No!” at the very idea. Instead she calmly, politely, said, “Magician Thane has been a good teacher thus far, and very patient with me. I’d like to continue apprenticing under him as far as the situation allows.”

Mg. Aviosky nodded, a fraction of skepticism marring her otherwise poised visage, but she said nothing. “Dr. Newbold,” she said, turning to the man who stood at eye level with her. “Thank you for your time. I’ll send your bill through the Cabinet. If you would excuse us.”

Ceony chewed on her lip as the doctor nodded and left. She had assumed Mg. Aviosky would go with him. What more was there to say?

Once Dr. Newbold had departed, Mg. Aviosky sat straight-backed on the edge of Ceony’s narrow bed and said, “Tell me precisely what happened.”

Ceony curled in on herself. “I’m rather hungry, Magician—”

“Is it so long a story?” Mg. Aviosky interrupted. “You fled the premises against instruction to pursue an Excisioner!” She gasped at the very idea. “And yet you not only survived, but rescued the heart of perhaps the most talented Folder in England. I deserve the details, Miss Twill.”

“You didn’t ‘instruct’ me to stay,” Ceony countered. “Just to leave the dining room. Which I did.”

Mg. Aviosky rubbed the bridge of her nose under her glasses. “This feels very much like detention again, Ceony.”

“It’s just . . . private, I guess,” she replied.

“Private?” the magician repeated, obviously surprised at Ceony’s choice of adjective. “How so? What is so private that you can’t tell me?” She paled. “You didn’t bargain—”

“No, no,” Ceony said, glancing down to her hands. To the blood underneath her nails. In her mind’s eye she saw Lira’s frozen form, hands clutching her bleeding eye. Blood magic, Ceony thought. Does that make me an Excisioner, too?

It was the thought Ceony hadn’t dared consider until now. What would Mg. Aviosky—and the Magicians’ Cabinet—do if they knew how Ceony had defeated Lira?

Looking away from Mg. Aviosky’s eyes, Ceony said, “I took Magician Thane’s glider—it’s in the attic—and used a bird scout—a paper bird, that is—to follow Lira. She must have seen the glider and gotten scared and fled. I chased her to the coast, where she had taken camp. I tracked her to the water. I think she escaped. I . . . I saw a boat in the water. It might have been for her.”

Mg. Aviosky raised one brow. “And she left the heart behind?”

Ceony nodded.

“Foolish to come all this way and leave the very objective of her attack in a camp,” Mg. Aviosky said. “I’ll trace your coordinates and send some detectives in.”

Ceony’s breath caught at that. She hoped Mg. Aviosky didn’t notice.

“I think I’d like to rest now,” Ceony managed. She was unsure of what anyone would find on that beach—had the men taken Lira or left her? “And eat. I can look at a map and guess where the camp was . . . telegram you the location tonight, perhaps.” Buy some time.

Mg. Aviosky appeared suspicious, but she receded. Ceony was, after all, one of her best students, detention or no. Another purse of the lips and Mg. Aviosky stood and said, “I want them by tonight, unless you want the Cabinet hounding you. Magician Hughes is a very impatient man and keen on details.” She adjusted her glasses. “I’ll leave the buggy running, just in case,” she said, and took her leave.

Leaning against the warm glass of the window, Ceony waited until Mg. Aviosky passed through the paper charms disguising the cottage’s appearance before she rose from bed and padded lightly to Emery’s room.