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“All right, hear ye and all that shit,” Ruda proclaimed as soon as everyone was seated. “I’m callin’ this meeting of the Class of 1182 to order.”

“And Schkhurrankh,” Scorn added, raising a hand.

“Right, yes,” Ruda agreed. “Class of 1182 and their sidekick, Phlegm the Mighty.”

Suddenly scowling thunderously, Scorn started to rise from her chair.

“Vrash’khai nkh thrimpf,” Teal said softly. The Rhaazke paused, glancing at her guiltily, then sank back down. Teal turned to Ruda, scowling herself, now. “Will you please not mock her? She’s working to adjust.”

“Fuck yes I’m gonna mock her,” Ruda said bluntly. “I mock everybody. She’s supposed to be learning how to get along on this plane, right? Well, she can’t be flying off the handle at anybody who looks at her crosswise.”

“That actually is true, and important to learn,” Gabriel said more quietly, directing himself to Scorn. “Being demon-blooded on this plane means trying extra hard not to make waves. A lot of people barely need an excuse to attack you to begin with.”

“Let them,” Scorn huffed, folding her arms. “I collect they faces!”

“Who has been teaching her words?” Juniper asked, frowning at Ruda.

“I think we need to have a few conversations about this later,” Toby murmured.

“Anyfuckingway!” Ruda shouted. “Before this digressed into a discussion of demon social skills, we were gathered here for a reason!”

“A reason in addition to lunch?” Gabriel asked, picking up his sandwich.

“Arquin, by Naphthene’s pendulous teats, I swear—”

“Yes, yes, fucking stabbed, I know,” he said around a mouthful.

There were several spots around campus with picnic tables, all isolated from each other and most somewhat shaded by trees or buildings. No space had been provided for the entire student body to move an organized meal outside the cafeteria, unless they wanted to lay it out on the lawn, but the outdoor tables represented opportunities for smaller groups to gather for food or study sessions. The sophomores had, at Ruda’s insistent urging, collected lunch from the cafeteria as usual and made their way to a nook close to the alchemy building near the campus’s east wall. Actually, the table here had appeared only a few weeks ago; previously the spot had only held a few trees, one of which had been altered somehow during the first week of classes to look almost anthropomorphic.

When asked about this, Professor Tellwyrn had only said cryptically that anyone seeking to torture classmates should do it their damn selves and not involve innocent shrubbery.

“Here’s the issue,” Ruda said, laying her hands down flat on both sides of her plate and panning a stare around the table. “Trissiny keeps sensing demons.”

“It was just twice,” Trissiny said hastily. “It’s the circumstances that are strange.”

“Right,” said Ruda, nodding. “Both times, other people present who should have been perceptive to a demon felt nothing. The first time, though, Scorn did feel it, and could even identify it by species.”

“Vanislaas child, yes, I remember,” said Scorn, looking bored and still somewhat annoyed. “But that is one time. Last night, you interrupt my sleep for nothing.”

“Right, that’s what I was coming to,” said Ruda. “The difference is, the first time Scorn was right there, while the second, she was five floors down.”

“For stealthy species of demon, such as Vanislaads,” said Shaeine, “that distance would make all the difference in whether a sensitive individual would detect its presence.”

Gabriel raised his hand. “I am being invisibly harangued to insist that there is not and hasn’t been a Vanislaad demon on this campus, and Vestrel is beginning to be insulted at the lack of faith being expressed.”

“Hard to have faith in something you can’t see,” Juniper murmured, absently lowering her hand to pat her jackalope, who was back at Clarke Tower. He had been banned from the cafeteria after charging at Mrs. Oak and demolishing a rack of glasses.

“Isn’t that what faith…is?” Fross chimed.

“Right!” Ruda said loudly, slapping the table for emphasis. “Fuck’s sake, people, I’m starting to empathize with Tellwryn, and that pisses me off. Can’t you lot keep your focus for thirty seconds at a time?”

“Is food time,” Scorn mumbled around an unnecessarily visible mouthful. Everyone averted their eyes. “Better things to do than watch you speech.”

“I see two basic possibilities here,” Ruda went on, ignoring her. “One, to get it out of the way, is that Trissiny’s losing her mind.”

Trissiny sighed.

“Uh,” said Gabriel. “I don’t think…”

“Yeah, I’ve honestly ruled that out immediately,” Ruda continued. “And not just out of personal attachment. If the Hand of Avei were suffering mental disturbances…well, that would create notice. Anything from the Sisterhood discreetly sending people here to collect her to Avei coming down and putting a stop to it. You can’t have your soul hooked up to a deity and them not take note when shit’s seriously wrong with you.”

“That’s more correct than you may realize,” Toby added. “Paladins don’t go insane—there have been observations written on this for centuries. It’s another reason paladins are used as front-line defenders in the case of chaos incidents. That kind of direct mental connection to a deity protects the mind from severe damage.”

“Right,” said Ruda, nodding. “So, unless anybody can think of something I haven’t, we’d best assume that Trissiny and her ‘sense evil’ thingamajig are functioning as intended.”

“What’s your actual idea, then?” Teal asked after a moment, in which there was no sound except chewing.

“Assuming that her senses are working correctly isn’t the same as assuming what they’re sensing is true,” said Ruda. “Senses can be fooled. We’ve got two other paladins to contradict Trissiny’s impressions, and especially Gabe’s valkyries. I get the idea they’re kind of specialized anti-incubus agents. Right?”

“Anti-undead would be more accurate,” Gabriel replied, setting down his sandwich. “Remember that Vanislaads are demonic undead, not true demons. But yes, their extra-dimensional origin makes them especially visible to valkyries, who themselves exist multi-dimensionally. Vanislaad stealth and shape-shifting absolutely do not work against soul reapers.”

“You are suggesting that someone is deliberately sending false positive demon signals to Trissiny?” Shaeine asked, frowning faintly.

“Nothing else makes sense to me,” Ruda replied. “That just leaves the questions of who and why.”

“I should think the how is also a significant concern,” said Ariel.

Ruda sighed. “Arquin, do you have to bring that thing with you everywhere?”

“Funny. I was going to ask Trissiny the same thing, but it turns out this meeting was your idea.”

“She always has a helpful perspective on magical matters,” said Gabriel, “you just have to learn to tune out the other commentary. Speaking of which, Ariel, you have any insight on this? And kindly refrain from irrelevant personal observations.”

“If you would refrain from associating with irrelevant persons, I would have none to make. To answer the question, however, the key issue here is that two other paladins in proximity to Trissiny were not alerted during the first incident. Sending out signals to trigger senses of that kind is rather simple magic, and would not be noticeable to valkyries; Fross could probably do it.”

“Aw, thanks!” Fross chimed. “I don’t actually know a spell for that, but now that you mention it, it seems pretty easy to reverse-enchant from the description…”

“At issue,” Ariel continued, “is that sending such a signal in such a way that it triggered only one specific person’s senses while avoiding others is inordinately complex magic. I can extrapolate arcane, infernal and fae methods of doing such a thing, but all would require significant energy reserves and a highly sophisticated casting. I frankly do not know what to make of the fact that the demon perceived the same signal. Data on Rhaazke is generally lacking on this plane of existence.”

Everyone turned to look at Scorn, who was busily licking the napkins in which she had carried her sandwich, and eying Toby’s half-eaten one. He nudged it away from her.

“Well, the sword’s not wrong,” Ruda admitted. “How is indeed a concern. But to backtrack, I think who and why are still things we should discuss, since we seem to be at a dead end there.”

“The who would explain the why if we knew it, I think,” Teal mused. “Any number of people might want to take potshots at the Hand of Avei. Most of those have motivations built right into their affiliations.”

“Something about that troubles me,” said Shaeine. “In Tar’naris we have a saying: ‘Evil yields only to a greater evil.’”

“Well, that’s grim,” Gabriel commented.

“I believe I understand what she’s getting at, though,” said Trissiny, nodding. “The Avenist proverb is ‘if the wicked feared the righteous, they would be righteous themselves.’ Assuming this is the work of someone with an established enmity to me… I don’t have any personal nemeses, that I know of. And if it’s someone opposed to Avei, it is very strange that they would attack me here.”

“Uh, here’s where you are, though,” Juniper said.

“Perhaps I muddied the issue with my choice of words,” said Shaeine. “My apologies. ‘Evil’ is a somewhat naïve concept most often used to dismiss foreign perspectives. My point, and Trissiny’s if I am not mistaken, is that any of the parties who would be inclined to assault Avei’s interests would also tend to shy away from antagonizing Professor Tellwyrn. Between her and Avei, I would hesitate to guess whose wrath is more fierce, but Tellwyrn’s is indisputably more indiscriminate.”

“This who becomes an increasingly interesting question,” Ruda mused.

“Well, one prospect springs right to mind,” said Gabriel. “I assume you all remember that asshole in the white suit from Veilgrad. He played us all like fiddles—if Malivette hadn’t jumped into that, the whole thing would’ve been a clean Black Wreath victory. Here, we don’t have a vampire backing us up, and even then she pulled it off through sheer element of surprise.”

“That is a significant point,” Shaeine agreed, nodding. “Professor Tellwyrn is, at present, a somewhat static entity, and it has been observed before that she can be maneuvered around. These particular tactics suggest discretion of exactly that kind.”

“And the Black Wreath are excellent candidates for someone looking to start trouble for the Hand of Avei,” said Toby. “What’s curious is that they specifically avoided doing the same to me and Gabe. Seems like they should have just as much of a problem with us.”

“Maybe not,” said Trissiny. “I mean no offense, but Omnu and Vidius aren’t usually represented on the front lines against the Wreath. Avei’s forces are.”

“Hn,” Ruda grunted. “If anything, this makes the motive more obscure, not less. It’s fine and dandy to call this general Black Wreath fuckery, but remember their defining characteristic is they don’t do shit without a plan in place. What do they gain from ruffling Trissiny’s hair?”

“Provocation?” Shaeine suggested.

“I could see them maybe wanting to goad her into making a mistake,” Gabriel said, frowning, “but I can’t see how this leads to that. If I were the Wreath, aimlessly pissing off the Hand of Avei would not be on my agenda. Stop me if I’m wrong, Trissiny, but based on the crash courses Tarvadegh’s been feeding me, the Wreath’s strength is its cunning. In a straight-up fight, hardly any warlock is a match for a paladin, especially one of Avei’s. If it’s them, there’s gotta be something more going on.”

“We don’t have any actual info on that yet,” Ruda cautioned, “but you’re right, Gabe. We’d best be on the alert for something further to develop. Anyhow, while this is a productive theory, remember we haven’t established for a fact that this is the Wreath’s doing.”

“Who else?” asked Teal.

Ruda drummed her fingers once on the picnic table. “Well. There’s one other prospect…maybe. Ravana has a theory.”

Teal stiffened. “When were you talking with Ravana about this?”

“Ravana’s the little blonde one, right?” said Gabriel. “Of the new froshes I’ve only really talked to Iris.”

“Let me backtrack a bit,” said Ruda. “This started with the revival, and Bishop Snowe’s very un-Izarite shot across Tellwyrn’s bow. Then, after the cults packed up and left, there were two extra priests left over—an Avenist and a Vidian.”

“There’s a new Vidian priest?” Gabriel said, straightening up. “I haven’t been really involved at the temple since this weekend…”

“Sister Takli isn’t assigned to the Silver Mission in any official capacity,” Trissiny added. “But she’s staying in Last Rock for awhile, and wanted to volunteer while she’s around. That seemed perfectly admirable to me.”

“Has there ever been a priestess of Avei who randomly moved to town before?” Ruda said pointedly.

“The Mission wasn’t here before,” Trissiny replied. “Neither was I. I thought it was odd, but nothing about it seems sinister. I’m not sure where you’re going with this, Ruda.”

“Well,” Ruda continued, “yesterday there was the play, and the impromptu picnic, where Juniper’s bunny caused a scene, remember? Well, that new Vidian was there, right before, and immediately got involved.”

“What’s your point?” Gabriel asked, frowning.

“I’m repeating a theory, not proposing it,” Ruda replied. “Ravana found the sequence of events suspicious—she wanted to come to the paladins with this, but I asked her not to. That’s just something I prefer to do myself. Honestly, I’ve seen that girl’s type, and she’s trouble; it remains to be seen whether she’s trouble for us or someone else.”

“You have no idea how right you are,” Teal said grimly. Shaeine reached to hold her hand under the table.

“But her theory is that Archpope Justinian is using proxies to move against the University. Agitating the townsfolk, that kinda thing. Remember how Jack suddenly lunged at that guy from a standstill?” Ruda turned to Gabriel. “Arquin, hypothetically speaking, how possible would it be for a Vidian cleric to use a little spark of divine magic to flick a rabbit’s ear, and more cult-specific gifts to make sure no onlookers noticed it?”

“What?” Juniper sat bolt upright in her seat.

“Easy, there,” Toby murmured, patting her arm.

“Hypothetically speaking?” Gabriel pursed his lips, frowning at the table. “It’s the divine spark bit that would be tricky, there, but it could be done with a very small shielding spell. That’s possible, Ruda, but this whole thing seems really tenuous to me.”

“What?” Juniper snarled, rising from her seat. “Are you saying that woman hurt my bunny?!”

“Whoah!” Toby and Teal immediately lunged from both sides, taking her by the shoulders. Not that they were physically strong enough to hold the dryad down, but she at least stopped while Toby continued. “Nobody’s saying that, June. Gabe’s right, the idea is seriously a stretch. Why would a priest do such a thing?”

“Now who is fly off the handle?” Scorn commented, smirking.

“I thought something was wrong!” Juniper growled. “Jack doesn’t just freak out like that for no reason!”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Ruda exclaimed. “He does that all the damn time!”

“He really does, June,” said Toby. “Everyone’s noticed it. Haven’t you seen how people leave the area when you bring him around?”

“I hate to have to tell you this,” Gabriel added, “but that rabbit’s a menace.”

“He’s not a rabbit,” Juniper said sullenly, finally letting herself be nudged back into her seat. “He’s a jackalope. There’s a difference. They’re excitable. It’s not his fault!”

“That is correct,” Ariel observed. “Since wild animals cannot be expected to train themselves, it is clearly your fault.”

Gabriel silently stood up, unbuckled the sword from his belt, laid her on the bench and sat on her.

“Thank you,” Ruda said to him.

“I believe I follow Ravana’s line of thinking,” said Shaeine. “If her theory is correct, this priestess’s actions would be consistent—assuming she actually committed such an action instead of simply being present while Jack exhibited perfectly characteristic behavior. Agitating the bunny to create a scene between students and citizens would advance this hypothetical goal. However, that scenario is constructed almost entirely of unverified assumptions.”

“Ravana’s a sly little snake,” added Teal. “If there are political machinations afoot, then it’d be a very good idea to listen to her—she’s probably more of an expert on that than anyone our age has a right to be. But the other side of that is I think she’ll be pretty likely to see hidden motives where they don’t actually exist.”

“Why on earth would the Archpope want to attack the University?” Trissiny exclaimed. “How could he possibly gain from that?”

“I dunno,” Gabriel mused. “Snowe did make that speech—we all saw it. And what she did afterward, or tried to. Plus, Tarvadegh’s warned me to be careful about the Universal Church; Justinian has a reputation for being a smooth operator.”

“He seems pretty popular with the general public,” Teal said, frowning.

“You do understand what a smooth operator is, right?” Ruda said dryly.

“Mother Narny and Commander Rouvad have both said similar things to me, now that you mention it,” Trissiny mused, her expression growing thoughtful.

“No one’s said anything like that to me,” Toby objected.

“It stands to reason that the various cults would have different attitudes toward the Universal Church,” suggested Shaeine. “A defining trait of Omnists seems to be their inclination to get along with everyone. By contrast, Avenists are constitutionally more combative, and Vidians more…subtle.”

“You can say it,” Gabriel said with a grin. “’Two-faced’ isn’t even taken as an insult in the faith.”

“Guys, I think this is wandering off the point,” Fross chimed. “Remember where we started from? Are you seriously going to suggest that the Universal Church is trying to antagonize Trissiny with false fragments of demon aura?”

A short silence fell across the table.

“Yeah, I’m inclined to agree with Fross, here,” said Ruda, nodding slowly. “Figured I should mention Ravana’s ideas; if there’s underhanded fuckery afoot, they’re worth considering. But this kind of shit in particular seems a lot more characteristic of the Black Wreath than the Universal Church. Pretty much by definition.”

“I’m not entirely convinced this Church thing has anything to it,” Teal added. “Though…I may be biased. Ravana Madouri really makes me nervous.”

“At some point, Teal,” said Gabriel, “I think we’re gonna need to hear the story behind that.”

“Regardless of that, she has a point,” said Toby. “Even if Justinian’s as much of a politician as you’re suggesting, and even considering Bishop Snowe’s behavior—which was extremely creepy at minimum, I’ll agree—I can’t see any possible motivation for the Archpope to try to start trouble with the University.”

“You children should make more of an effort to keep up with the news,” Professor Ekoi said brightly. Everyone jumped, staring; she was standing at the head of the table, smiling benignly, and had definitely not been a moment before. The kitsune laid a short stack of newspapers on the end of the picnic table. “There are fascinating things in the headlines today, quite relevant to your discussion. I happened to pick up the fresh editions in Calderaas this morning.”

“What were you doing in Calderaas?” Gabriel demanded.

Ekoi fixed her eyes on him, her smile widening to show her long canines. “On the subject of invasive personal questions, Mr. Arquin, why are your undershorts flying from a flagpole on the main lawn?”

“What?” he exclaimed. “There’s not a flagpole on the lawn. I don’t even know what you’re talking oh gods please tell me you didn’t.”

Ruda collapsed in laughter, nearly sliding off the bench.

“Remember, Mr. Arquin,” Ekoi said solemnly, “manners are miniature morals. You kids may keep those—I think you will find them enlightening. I shall see you in class.”

She turned and sauntered away, tail waving languidly behind her.

“I disavow any knowledge of anything flying from any flagpoles,” Gabriel announced. “On an unrelated subject, you guys know if there’s a shop in Last Rock where you can get clothes on the cheap?”

“Don’t buy cheap clothes,” Teal said, lips twitching. “They just need to be replaced faster.”

“Uh, guys?” Juniper said, holding up the topmost newspaper so they could all see the headline.

“Snowe vs. Tellwyrn?” Teal read aloud. “How does anyone think that’s even a contest?”

“Are they all like that?” Trissiny asked, reaching for the remaining stack.

Ruda grabbed it first, spreading them across the table amidst the remains of their sandwiches. “Looks like…yup. Wow, I wouldn’t have expected one Bishop’s speech to generate this much interest in the newspapers. Was it really that newsworthy?”

“I…guess?” Teal said uncertainly.

“Or,” Shaeine murmured, “someone has exerted influence on the papers to make this happen.”

Another brief silence fell.

“So,” Ruda said, drumming her fingers on top of one of the newspapers, “the Church or the Wreath. Well, they both have a motive, though I still can’t tell what the Church’s is. They clearly are taking aim at the University, though.”

“Is this something we should be worried about?” Fross asked nervously. “I have to admit I’ve sorta skipped politics in my reading. I mean, apart from what we’ve been over in Professor Tellwyrn’s class, which isn’t exactly…current.”

“This is something for Professor Tellwyrn to worry about,” Toby said firmly. “Someone targeting Trissiny is our business.”

“And hers,” Gabriel pointed out. “Come on, you know that’s exactly what she’d say. Don’t you guys think we ought to take this to her?”

“I’m not sure I want to approach her, with the mood she’ll be in when she sees this,” Juniper muttered, still reading the paper.

“We’re not gonna have Tellwyrn’s skirts to hide behind forever,” Ruda snapped. “And we will have many of these same problems. We know the Wreath is after Vadrieny, and from what you guys said about what happened in Veilgrad, that guy seemed weirdly interested in the paladins. It stands to reason the Archpope would have similar interests, whatever it is he’s doin’ here. No, we deal with this.”

“How?” Teal asked.

“Well,” Ruda said thoughtfully, leaning backward and staring absently at the scattered newspapers, “we’re gonna need more information, first. Which of our prospects is actually behind the demon shit getting thrown at Triss?”

“Wreath,” Scorn snorted. “Is obvious. You are stupid?”

“Teal, I’m gonna stab your demon in a minute,” Ruda growled.

“Why is it obvious?” Teal asked Scorn.

The Rhaazke shrugged. “Sword say the hard part being the hiding, yes? Easy spell, but hard to make Trissiny only sense the aura? Well, I sense it too, so is Wreath hiding.”

“What?” Gabriel frowned. “What did she say?”

“Why does that mean it’s a Wreath spell?” Trissiny demanded.

Scorn looked incredulously around the table at them. “I am Rhaazke.”

“Yep,” Ruda said. “Gonna stab her.”

“Scorn,” Gabriel said irritably, “pretend for a moment that you’re from a completely different plane of existence with different rules, and nobody here knows what the hell you are talking about!”

“If I understand correctly,” Shaeine said before Scorn could react to that, “you are saying that the Wreath’s gift of stealth does not work against Rhaazke?”

“How’d you get that outta that word salad?” Ruda exclaimed. “And that’s another thing, Tanglish isn’t demonic. You can’t just mix words together at fucking random!”

“That’s what I thought she said,” Fross chimed.

Scorn sighed dramatically. “You know nothing. Fine, I explain. The goddess, she does not trust demons. They are made by Scyllith, and made to be hard for control. Also some still being loyal to Scyllith. Rhaazke are different; Scyllith throws us out, very long ago. So in Hell, when Elilial takes command, she does not trust demons to be in charge. Her highest…um… What is word?” She turned to Teal. “Servants in charge?”

“Lieutenants?” Teal suggested.

“Llllluuuutennn…” Scorn drawled out the word and gave up halfway through, shaking her head. “You all complain my language is silly.”

“Anyway,” Gabriel prompted.

“Yes, fine, going on. Highest… People being in charge under the goddess, they are the archdemons,” she nodded to Teal, “and some others she makes herself. Very unique beings, not like the demon races. Prince Vanislaas, the Shroudwraith, Kelvreth of the Eyes… Others like them. Not being of Hell’s races, they are loyal to her. Well, our queen, Srkhankhvrithz, she is one of these highest leewww…in charge. But the other Rhaazke, we serve a little lower, but still over the demons. Hell is not our home, we have always hated Scyllith, and the Lady Elilial gives us everything, so we are trusted servants,” she said proudly.

“So…Rhaazke are middleman administrators in Hell?” Ruda said, frowning. “What’s that got to do with you being able to sense through Wreath fuckery?”

Scorn shrugged irritably. “Obviously, we have powers given to do our tasks, yes? We served the Lady before the Wreath was made, and we stand closer to her. Humans are not permitted in Hell, but humans are also not trusted. Some try things, even some Wreath. Rhaazke must be able to hunt through their tricks, yes?” She grinned. “Not all Rhaazke have as many gifts, but I am noble bloodline, being trained for high service. This stealth the Black Wreath has, it is the Lady’s gift, and she decides where it does not work.”

“Fascinating,” said Ariel, slightly muffled under Gabriel.

“If that’s true,” Trissiny said slowly, “we have a perfect counter to the Black Wreath’s greatest weapon.”

“It also means Scorn’s right,” added Toby. “That would explain perfectly why the spell aimed at Trissiny caught her as well. If the concealment was a Wreath stealth that doesn’t work on her… It has to be them.”

“It also means we can beat them,” said Gabriel, grinning fiercely.

“Yes!” Scorn said, smiling back.

“Hang on,” Ruda interrupted. “Scorn, does the Wreath know Rhaazke can do this?”

“Not for them to know,” Scorn said haughtily. “If they know, they can sneak around it, yes? Then is pointless.”

“What’s that got to do with anything?” Juniper asked.

“She literally just explained it,” said Ruda in exasperation. “After Veilgrad the Wreath know we’ve got a Rhaazke. If they knew their concealment doesn’t work on her, they could compensate. But if Scorn is right, they don’t.”

“Which means,” said Trissiny, her eyes widening, “we have exactly what we need to outmaneuver them.”

“Yes!” Scorn cried, grinning broadly.

“Um,” Toby said, “you do realize that in order to capitalize on this advantage, you’re going to have to keep Scorn near you and…wait for them to strike again?”

“Oh,” Trissiny said, frowning.

“Yes!” Scorn repeated. “We will have fun! We go to classes and visit the town and when the Wreath moves again, we crush them!”

“…great,” Trissiny said weakly.

“Whoah, now, stop,” Ruda interjected. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, we need a plan. First, this advantage has to be protected; we can’t let the Wreath learn that Scorn can see through their defenses.”

“Yes, very true,” Scorn said, deflating. “This is secret—Wreath is not to learn.”

“Also,” Teal added, “it’s not clear to me exactly how we can capitalize on this. If the Wreath is just making Trissiny sense the presence of demons that aren’t there, having Scorn sense them too changes…what?”

“Right,” Ruda said, nodding. “We need to come up with a plan.”

“To begin with,” Fross chimed, “I may be able to work out a spell to augment Trissiny’s senses—there has to be a way to track those signals more precisely, rather than just perceiving them. It’ll be really tricky for me to work with divine magic, though…”

“I know a spell for that,” Ariel said from under Gabriel. “Trissiny will have to cast it herself, but I can walk her through the process. After a few weeks of basic schooling in divine spellwork, she hopefully possesses the basic competence.”

“That sounds like a skill I would be interested in learning anyway,” Trissiny agreed.

While they carried on talking, Gabriel surreptitiously shifted, pulling Ariel out from under himself and gripping her by the hilt. Her scabbard hid the patterns of faint blue light that flickered along her blade as he ignited a charm they had worked out previously.

“Vestrel,” his voice echoed from the sword, silently but resonating through the dimensional medium in which the valkyries dwelt.

Invisible to the others, a black-clad figure approached him from behind, spreading one ebon wing protectively over him as she leaned forward. “Something on your mind, little brother?”

He glanced fleetingly up at her with a small smile, quickly enough that his classmates did not notice, absorbed in their discussion. “What do you know about this new cleric in town?”

“Nothing, really. We don’t keep track of them all. Why?”

“There’s something going on. It’s too perfect, more priests arriving just as Bishop Snowe starts trouble with Tellwryn and the newspapers start carrying these tales. Are the girls too busy to do me a favor?”

“Never,” Vestrel said with a grin, affectionately brushing him with her pinions. They didn’t physically connect, of course. “We can spare the time to see what the new priestess gets up to when she thinks no one is looking. The Avenist, too?”

His eyes flickered at Trissiny, who was paying attention to what Toby was saying. “I don’t know… That seems wise, but also like it’d be stepping on Triss’s toes.”

“What she doesn’t know hurts nothing. And if a cleric of her faith is indeed trying to manipulate her…”

“Point taken. If you would, then.”

“Oh, this sounds like it’ll be fun!”

“Stop, back up,” Ruda said sharply in response to Juniper’s last objection. “Nothing just happens without context—just because we’re pretty sure the Wreath is behind these specific events does not mean we can just ignore whatever the hell the Church is up to.”

“Indeed,” Shaeine agreed. “Even if the Wreath are not responsible for the trouble presently being stirred up, trouble can be taken advantage of by anyone. We must not develop blind spots—everything going on here deserves our attention.”

“I’m still lost as to why the Church would attack the University, though,” Toby said, shaking his head. “I just don’t see any benefit in that. And in its own way, the Church is almost as inscrutable as the Wreath; Triss, Gabe and I can probably get some information from them, but you can be sure they’ll stonewall us about anything they’re doing with regard to the University we all attend.”

“Maybe not, though!” Fross chimed. “Can it hurt to ask?”

“Fuck yes it can,” Ruda said firmly. “If they’re playing games with us, letting them know we’re onto them will only make it worse. I can’t see the Universal fucking Church backing down from a challenge.”

“Well,” Gabriel said mildly, “keep in mind that just because we don’t know everything now doesn’t mean we won’t learn more.”

“How exactly are we going to learn more?” Ruda asked, exasperated.

He shrugged. “I’m pretty sure something will come up.”

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10 – 11

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She waited, perched on the roof of Clarke Tower, while the moon drifted higher, patches of scraggly clouds scuttling across it now and again. There were many ways to put the tower’s occupants to sleep, but considering the mix of people in there, none were reliable—or wise. Anything that worked on the demons would be nullified by the light-wielders; anything that worked on the fairies risked agitating the demons. It was only one person whose continued wakefulness posed a particular problem, anyway. Poor Trissiny; she’d had a rather stressful night. Or so it seemed, based on the constant, low-key gleam of divine energy burning from within the top room.

Kaisa sat there, calm as a statue but for her languidly waving tail, waiting. Almost an hour passed before the irritating hum of divine magic finally faded from beneath her. The girl was going to be groggy in class tomorrow.

Bursting from her stillness into furious but silent motion, she leaped from the peak of the conical roof to its lower edge in a single bound, grabbing the rain gutter with one hand and swinging downward. For a bare moment she hung outside the window, one pointed ear twitching, then swung herself upward and landed with her dainty feet on the sill, still without a sound.

She didn’t attempt to open the window, for all that the barrier mocked her. There were much more important games to play tonight, and she didn’t need to get inside in order to play them.

As she had suspected, the spell had been designed to respect physical boundaries rather than simply making a beeline for its target. Really good spells did; it took so much more energy to have them phase through any possible barrier, and such modifications made them more vulnerable to magical defenses. Anyone targeting a paladin would craft their spell to have minimal impact on magical shields. Indeed, now that Trissiny’s aura had finally ceased cluttering up the atmosphere with its abrasive jangle, Kaisa could clearly follow the path it had taken. Up the tower, through this window.

She tipped over backwards, spinning about as she fell to impact the stone wall of Clarke Tower face-first, her claws deftly finding purchase in its fancifully rustic stonework. What a silly affectation—the thing was less than fifty years old, there was no need for it not to have smoother walls than this. Then again, there was no need for it to be floating above empty space, either. Ah, well, she did appreciate Arachne’s little whimsies.

The kitsune scuttled lizard-like down and around the side of the tower, with the difference that Shaeine might have been able to hear a lizard’s progress, had she been listening. Kaisa made no sound as she followed the rapidly fading trail. Layer upon layer of stealth, invisibility and deflection hid it from any kind of detection—too many layers. She could not sense the demonic energy within, but all those layers of concealment, that obvious path of nothing… That was like a paved road through the swamp, it stood out so well.

Wreath. So confident in their cleverness. Far too clever for their own good.

The trail didn’t wind around the tower as if needing to climb it physically, but quested back and forth on the way up, apparently having searched for the right window. Following it in reverse, Kaisa swiftly came to the base of the tower, where it rested on that improbably island of floating stone, and peered down at the distant prairie. Clearly, it was not bound to the ground, and had not climbed the mountain directly. She detected the path it had taken up, though she could not sense very far along it. Far enough to get a direction, however. Her own keen eyes were more than adequate to project a path to the ground far below, where it must have launched from. Roughly. It was a rather steep angle.

She considered this for a moment, ears twitching, then abruptly launched herself into space.

Spread-eagled, Kaisa soared outward, grinning gleefully into the wind that rushed past her face. At the point where her arc began to descend, she suddenly exploded into a cloud of smoke and swirling red maple leaves, which danced away on the wind. Her empty kimono continued to fall, making a far slower and more uneven descent as it was caught and played with by currents of air.

The swath of embroidered silk fluttered down through the night air, drifting this way and that, swirling about in circles and generally making a distracted, disorderly trip toward the ground. It did continue downward, however; air resistance could only do so much against gravity. It was several long minutes before the garment neared the end of its lazy descent, its moon-cast shadow sharpening against the tallgrass below. Finally, with a final regretful ripple, it banked a last time on an invisible current and fell the last few feet toward the ground.

A second before it got there, a slim, bare arm darted out from behind a thin stand of tallgrass that couldn’t possibly have concealed anyone, snatching it out of the air. The kimono was yanked behind the stand, and a moment later, Kaisa stepped daintily out from its other side, smoothing it down her body and absently double-checking that her obi was properly straight.

Stepping lightly on bare feet, she paced this way and that across the prairie, eyes roving and nose uplifted, until suddenly zeroing in on an invisible point ahead. She bounded forward, landing nimbly on the balls of her feet, and knelt, studying one nondescript patch of ground.

A wide, feral smile stretched her lips, revealing pointed canines to the moonlight. There—perfect. Well, a dozen yards or so off, but considering that jump and the guesswork necessary to find the proper landing spot, that was as good as perfect. But then, of course it was. She didn’t know how to fail.

With a flick of her tail, she dived forward, and in place of a silk-clad woman, a reddish fox with a white-tipped tail dashed along the prairie, moving in bounds that covered dozens of yards each. She streaked through the night, tracking back and forth slightly as she followed the trail, but never slowing from her pace, which could have out run a jackalope or cheetah. Nothing on land could have matched her speed.

A shadow drifted toward her. There were things not confined to land that could outpace anything on legs.

From the tiniest smudge, it grew rapidly to a huge dark blot on the moonlit prairie, keeping behind her so as not to reveal itself. The creature had begun at a dizzying altitude, keen eyes attuned to movement finally spotting her frenetic dash through the tallgrass, and it plummeted into a nearly silent, blindingly fast dive.

A split second before its outstretched beak could have connected, the fox leaped, whirled around on itself, and seemed to vanish into its own tail.

The hunter let out a croak of frustration as it beat its huge, leathery wings once, pulling up and shooting skyward again.

It got all of two yards upward before she deftly seized it by the neck.

Standing over twenty feet tall, Kaisa held her squirming, croaking prize in one hand.

“How very rude,” she admonished. “I am a guest in these lands. You are not even supposed to be here.”

The creature might at a casual glance have been taken for a bird, but it was all wrong. A long, beaked head was surmounted by a bony crest; its beak was filled with jagged teeth. The stunted little legs trailing behind it were clearly not designed to be walked on, though they would serve to hang from a perch, or stabilize it sitting. There were feathers, but accenting it rather than covering its body fully. It was not a bird, but something whose descendents might become birds, millions of years hence.

These things did wander out of the Golden Sea from time to time; settlers either fell prey to them or the reverse. There were a number of time-lost specimens stuffed and mounted in various collections around the Empire. Whatever magic animated the Sea, one simply did not wrench space in that manner without occasionally disrupting time as well.

“Well, I haven’t time to play just now,” Kaisa said, “but I believe I’ll keep you for later.”

With this pronouncement, she was suddenly woman-sized again, the proto-bird correspondingly diminished in size. It let out another agitated cry at the adjustment, struggling in her grip—and in the next instant was a rigid, palm-sized figurine, apparently carved of ivory.

“Perfect,” she said smugly, tucking it into her kimono. With another self-satisfied flick of her tail, she whirled and continued along her path, again a fox.

The mountain at Last Rock was a lump on the horizon by the time she slowed, sniffing the ground around a peculiar circle of trampled grass, sitting in the middle of apparent nowhere, with no tracks leading to or from it.

Kaisa straightened up, folding her arms and studying the patch with a raised eyebrow. It was like looking at a hole in reality, so complete were the protections concealing it from any eyes. Good protections, perhaps the best to be had. They would have worked on nearly anything, even upon the Pantheon… But the Black Wreath were not accustomed to dealing with the fox-goddesses of the Eternal Kingdom. Indeed, the Wreath in Sifan had learned long ago to stay out of the Twilight Forest. There was nothing to be gained, after all, by agitating dangerous creatures who otherwise wouldn’t even consider chasing after them. Kaisa might well be the first kitsune to actually hunt the Wreath past the boundaries of her own home.

The thought brought a vindictive smile to her face.

She held out one hand and languidly made a beckoning gesture at the tallgrass bobbing nearby, past the edge of the area mashed flat by whatever activity had occurred here. It dipped once, as if in a breeze that was not currently blowing, then bent obligingly toward her, its stalks lengthening as they leaned, till a few pencil-thin reeds extended halfway over the flattened circle.

Kaisa leaped nimbly onto them, landing with the balls of her feet on one stalk each. The tallgrass barely flexed under her weight. From her perch, she slowly turned her head in an arc, examining the ground all around. Her left ear twitched repeatedly.

Finally she snorted.

“Aw, golly gee shucks,” she said aloud, in Tanglish, and in a scathing mockery of a prairie accent. “Ah’m a big ol’ invisible warlock, Ah don’ need ta bother hidin’ the tracks left by mah big ol’ clodhoppin’ feet, hurr durr burr gurr nurr.”

She bounded to another stand of tallgrass, this one not modified; it bent slightly under her weight, but only as if under the weight of a squirrel.

“Let’s see,” the kitsune continued in a more normal tone, pointing at the ground. “Woman with a limp, who has no idea what constitutes sensible footwear outdoors. Two men…or hefty ladies in men’s shoes.” She paused, sniffed the air twice, and wrinkled her nose. “No, men. Oh, but you, my darling…”

Kaisa hopped to the ground just past the edge of the circle, kneeling to press two clawed fingertips against the print of a bare foot.

“You, I think, are who I came all this way to meet.”

She took two mincing steps forward and folded herself to the ground, sitting in a lotus position at the edge of the circle, heedless of her expensive silk kimono. It was not so much as wrinkled by the motion, anyway. Kaisa rested her hands on her knees, closed her eyes and drew in a long, slow breath through her nose, then let it out slowly.

After that, she didn’t breathe at all.

Lifting the layers of concealment upon the site was careful work—at least, doing it properly was. She could have stripped the lot away with a snap of her fingers, but that would also have ripped up the traces left beneath the concealments, rendering the whole exercise pointless.

Gradually, as she sat motionless in meditation, patterns began to emerge on the ground. Faint shadows at first, they darkened like spreading ink, forming the broken shapes of what had been an extremely complex ritual circle. The circle itself was long gone—in fact, it seemed it was one of those designed so that its components were absorbed physically into the spell being cast, a standard Wreath trick for covering their tracks. It had left marks, though. Marks few could have found.

Ekoi Kaisa, even among her own kind, was one of the few.

The black traces that emerged on the ground resembled burns, fragments of the ritual circle re-inscribed in ash against the dirt and flattened grass. For nearly a full minute after they had ceased to appear, she sat in silence. Finally, however, her eyes snapped open and focused on the ground.

It was only a partial circle—she hadn’t been able to completely reconstruct it. That much was probably entirely impossible. The black remains looked rather as if someone had taken a giant eraser to swaths of it, blotting them out. It had been a hasty erasure, though, not following any deliberate pattern, but merely scrubbing out streaks here and there. Had they taken the time to re-trace the spell’s steps, scrubbing out the fading marks it had left in reality… Well, there were ways to circumvent that, too, but it would have been harder, and the final picture less complete. Now, she didn’t have the whole spell diagram, but enough pieces that she could fill in the gaps with guesswork.

Kaisa rose fluidly to her feet and began pacing in a slow circle around the edges of the black diagram, her dainty steps doing nothing to disturb the tracks left on the ground. Really, this reconstruction probably looked more ominous than the original had—elaborate spell circles were usually rather pretty, having to be made of a variety of materials, some of which were pleasingly sparkly.

“Hm hm hm,” she mused, coming to a stop and kneeling at one edge of the circle. The faint, charred remains of Avei’s eagle sigil were visible within a small containment ring. “Little boys should not play with fire.” She reached out to scrape a finger through one edge of the ring, then lightly tapped the eagle.

A small fountain of sparks flew up, and she yanked her hand back.

“No need for that,” the kitsune muttered. “If you would pay attention in the first place I wouldn’t need to be hunting your prey. Eagles are useless on the ground, no?”

Off in the far distance, toward the east, thunder rumbled faintly.

“No one is impressed,” Kaisa said disdainfully. “Shush, let me work.”

She rose and stepped around to the opposite side, a grin forming on her face. Here was another ring, marked with less aggressive, more precise containment runes. And in the middle of it… A particularly dark blot, where her efforts to create a shadow of the original spell had seized upon something more potent than lines on the ground.

“Ahh. Here you are.”

Kaisa stood over the circle, head tilted and left ear twitching, while she considered. Then, with a pleased flick of her tail, she reached up and plucked a hovering ball of green fire out of the air. Moving her fingers in deft motions, she pantomimed hanging it on a wall peg; when she took her hands away, the fireball remained in place, casting a sickly viridian glow over the area.

The kitsune cracked her knuckles, then held up her hands between the fireball and the ground, positioning her fingers to form a shadow-puppet on the ruins of the spell circle. A bunny.

She giggled sibilantly to herself. “Fufufu!” Next came a dog, and a duck. Then the profile of Emperor Sarsamon Tirasian, whose face was on the current Tiraan decabloon. He opened his mouth a few times, stiffly.

Kaisa continued manipulating her fingers, and the long-dead Emperor became a bird flapping its wings…and then two samurai silhouetted in perfect detail, swords clashing in a silent duel. They broke apart into clouds of exquisitely rendered snowflakes, cast in such detail that their crystalline edges were as precise as the real thing, no two alike.

The snowflake shadows swirled together, making the shape of a rattlesnake, which reared up, parting its jaws to reveal a flickering tongue and extended fangs, the tip of its coiled tail shaking in a silent warning. The shadow snake struck suddenly at the edge of the ring in which it was cast, then again, then a third time, seizing an amorphous dark blob in its mouth. It tilted its head back, throat working in rhythmic pulses, and swallowed down its prey.

Kaisa lowered her fingers, smiling smugly, and the shadow of the rattlesnake dissolved, lifting up from the ground in a slow puff of black smoke. She pointed at it with both forefingers, then twitched her hands apart, and it abruptly separated into two puffs. One of congealed shadow, the other a misty, effervescent purple.

She dismissed the shadow-smoke with a wave of her hand, beckoning the other toward herself. It drifted closer, remaining more coherent than mist was generally wont to do.

“There, there,” Kaisa crooned, “don’t be shy…”

The purple mist hesitated, then began to drift in the opposite direction.

Quick as a striking scorpion, she lunged forward, clapping her hands together over the little purple puff.

“Yatta!”

Kaisa turned her closed hands so that the right one was on the bottom, and lifted the left away, revealing a silver-bound perfume bottle with an attached spritzer resting on her palm. Within the faceted glass rested a glittering violet liquid.

“So nice to meet you at last, darling,” she cooed. “Oh, the fun we’re going to have together…” She spritzed a little squirt of the perfume onto the inside of the wrist, then lifted it to her nose, inhaling deeply. “Mmmm. A child of Vanislaas…female, aged two centuries, give or take. Recently summoned, I should think, to judge by the dusky notes of hellfire. Now then!” she said more briskly, tucking the bottle into the sleeve of her kimono and turning to peer around. As she studied the surroundings, she plucked a silken kerchief from midair and carefully wiped off her wrist, ignoring the way it burst into blue flames and burned away to ash as she did so. “The question is, where did you little rats scurry off to?”

She again paced in a slow circle around the spell diagram, this time holding her left and out as if trailing her fingertips along a wall. Halfway around the circle she abruptly stopped, her claws catching in an invisible crevice in midair. With another grin and a self-satisfied little hum, she turned to face the spot, sticking the fingers of her other hand against those of the first, and very slowly began to pull.

Where her hands parted, they stretched open a gap in reality, peering into a hazy, off-colored space behind physical existence. The traces left by a shadow-jump were not, under ordinary circumstances, trackable. Few knew the secret, and fewer still were willing to step between the planes to follow them. There were things between the planes that no sensible person wanted to risk going near.

Kaisa the kitsune was wise and clever, not sensible.

Grunting softly with effort, she wrestled open a hole no wider than a dinner plate, revealing a writhing tunnel through spacetime, the shadowed and blurred world of between visible through its translucent walls. Even as she watched, tiny cracks forming in those walls slowly spread. These traces would not last long; every second made the prospect of following this trail more dangerous. Not that she feared being stranded in the space between; she could easily open a way back to the material plane. Or several others, for that matter. The tricky thing was that one had to plan trips between very carefully, or coming back out could deposit one virtually anywhere.

Kaisa pulled herself forward, flattening her ears back to squeeze her head into the space, which was visibly too small for it. Her shoulders followed, somehow, and then the rest of her body, legs kicking agitatedly in midair as she squirmed through. A bit at a time, her tail slipped into the gap, and at last her bare feet, untouched by the dust of the prairie. The hole snapped shut behind her, reality huffily reasserting itself the moment no one was actively holding it at bay.

On the moonlit prairie, a green fireball hung in midair, casting its weird illumination on the partial summoning circle.

Coming out was a lot easier than going in, though not much more dignified. She was spat out all at once, at an entirely unnecessary velocity; a less nimble creature would have risked injury, or worse, embarrassment. Kaisa bounded off the brick wall at which she was flung, landing nimbly on the balls of her feet and peering around.

Her eyes saw nothing but a dingy, dirty alley. A suitable shadow-jumping point for those not interested in drawing attention; not for nothing were alleys just like this one used for all manner of unsavory purposes in every city in every world. The smells were even less pleasing, and that wasn’t the worst of it. This was clearly a modern city, to judge by the gleaming fairy lights visible in the street up ahead, the noise of traffic and pedestrians—even at this hour, for the moon was in nearly the same place overhead as on the edge of the Golden Sea. Worst of all was the constant, oppressive buzz of arcane magic, absolutely everywhere, in abominable quantity.

Humans and their enchantments.

Ears flat back, bristled tail twitching in dislike, she glared around, looking for someone to blame. The Wreath were long gone, though, and with this much loose magic in the vicinity, she had little chance of finding whatever trail they had taken from here. No matter, anyway; if they were smart (which they were, relatively speaking), they’d have moved physically before moving magically again. Such steps were entirely standard for those seeking to evade pursuit.

I would have been so satisfying if some thugs had risen from the very trash around her with evil designs upon her belongings or her person. Thugs congregated in alleys, did they not? In the stories, that was always the way: random thugs appearing just in time to be brought low by the crafty heroine. Visiting extravagant torment upon some deserving fool would have done much to soothe her affronted sensibilities.

Alas, the stories remained comforting lies, and the alley remained uninhabited.

Kaisa emitted a ladylike snort of disdain, then turned and scampered rapidly up a drain pipe. Three stories up, she reached the roof and paused only for a moment before leaping back across the alley to the face of the taller building on the other side. A few more bounds, from windowsill to tiny windowsill, brought her within reach of the roof, and she swung herself up with one hand. Atop this structure was a sloping roof up which she dashed in seconds to the chimney set at its peak. Kaisa made it to the top of this in one leap, then crouched on her toes on its metal lip, surveying the view. The chimney, blessedly, was dark, silent, and cool. If anyone lit whatever furnace or fireplace lay below it, they were going to suffer unimaginably.

This was far from the highest point of the city, but she could see enough to get a sense of the layout. It was a patchwork of new buildings and old ones—temples and palaces dating back to the styles of centuries ago interspersed with modern factories and warehouses. Flashing scrolltowers rose amid minarets and steeples. Everywhere was the glow of arcane magic, of fairy lights, scrolltower orbs, the lamps on enchanted carriages. And this was surely the quiet hours of the evening; this city must be absolute pandemonium by day.

Its shape was most interesting, though. It was common for cities to be built on hills, with their most important features on the highest point near the center. So it was with Tiraas, and Kiyosan. This one, though, seemed the opposite. The ancient palace rose high from its center, of course, but that was clearly built up by human hands. Overall, it appeared to be in some kind of valley, its ancient walls rising from ground that stood well above the palace, sloping downward toward the center of the city. No…not a valley. A crater. And with that realization, she recognized the palace, illustrations of which she had seen a few times.

Calderaas.

Not so far from Last Rock, a goodly stretch of miles south, past the Green Belt and the Mirror Lakes. Here ruled the Sultana who claimed dominion over this province, including Last Rock itself, though if that amounted to more than words on paper Kaisa would wear her tail as a hat. She knew enough of Tiraan history to know that the frontier folk considered themselves citizens of their own little towns first, the Empire second, and their local governments only if they had any attention left over for them.

What now?

This was clearly a cold trail. There would be no tracking the Wreath in this city; tracking in cities by mundane means was a steep challenge even for her, and this wasn’t like Sifan, where even warriors of the Queen would give kitsune a respectful amount of space and stay firmly out of their business. In her true shape, here, she would be a magnet for attention; in any disguise, she would be someone snooping about, which was a magnet for different kinds of attention. And tracking magically was absolutely out of the question, unless she could convince every inhabitant of the city to turn off their damnable enchantments for a few hours. Or force them to.

Kaisa considered that for a moment, then regretfully shook her head. The Sultana would be irate, then Arachne would be irate, and poor Prince Sekandar would be embarrassed in class. That would be a shame; he was so much more respectful than most of his oafish Tiraan classmates. Not to mention prettier.

She waved her tail slowly in thought, staring out over the city. Shame to come all this way for nothing… If the Wreath weren’t still here (they probably weren’t), they chose this city as a jumping-off point for a reason.

A slow, crafty smile spread across her face.

Kaisa reached into her kimono, pulling out the ivory proto-bird figurine, and held it up before her, staring deeply into its tiny carved eyes.

“Look for me,” she whispered. “Lend me the sharpness of that gaze, through the subtlety of my own.”

She flung the figurine skyward, and it expanded above her to full size. Not as flesh, though; she grabbed the trailing string of the oddly-shaped kite, expertly guiding it as it ascended on the updrafts of the caldera city. With a little aid from her own breath, it climbed far higher and faster than the simple night air would normally impel it. In minutes, she held the reins on a kite so distant above that only to her own keen eyes was it visible. Well, hers, and any elves who happened to be in town and looking upward, but she didn’t much care what elves thought. Unlike most humans, they knew to mind their own business.

Kaisa closed her eyes, re-focusing her vision through the charmed proto-bird’s. Yes… Up there, the haze of arcane magic was much, much thinner. Looking downward, it still formed a huge blur over the city itself, but with the kite’s eyes being above it, she had the space necessary to weave her own countermeasures without interference. The fog could be seen through, as long as one wasn’t looking from the middle of it.

That done, spotting the passage of demons through the city was as simple as spotting prey on the ground would have been for the proto-bird. To such as she, demons were prey.

Humans would have been surprised how many there were in their cities. Bruise-colored tracks made a thick spiderweb through the cold blue glow of the arcane. Most of those she ignored, focusing on the nexi where many of them came together. Not very many…but enough. In fact, just the right amount. There would be time to have a little fun tonight, and still make it back to her classes in the morning.

In seconds, Kaisa’s nimble mind formed and filed away a sketch of the city’s layout, with the locations of concentrated demon activity marked for reference. Humming eagerly to herself in anticipation, she reeled in the kite. That took longer than sending it up had, but the proto-bird was turning out to be a useful pet—not to mention a very rare catch—and she had decided to hang onto it. Once it was within arm’s reach above her, she gave it one last yank on the string, and the ivory figurine dropped into her waiting palm.

Three seconds later, she was back on the street, making a beeline for the first spot marked in her mind.

It would not do to agitate the Calderaan too much; she took the precaution of concealing her ears and tail. A Sifanese woman in a kimono was still an unusual sight in this city, particularly one striding along at a businesslike pace after midnight, but no one bothered her. City folk left each other alone as a rule, and Calderaas was as cosmopolitan as Tiraas—perhaps moreso. Sifanese faces would not be unknown here.

As for the element which tended to come out at night and intercept women walking alone, none showed themselves. By instinct or design, or both, they targeted the vulnerable, and she didn’t need to bother communicating to make it plain that she was not prey.

The first warlock haunt was, unsurprisingly, a magic shop. A perfectly legitimate one, to judge by its signage and window displays, for whatever little that was worth. Kaisa tittered to herself as she stopped outside its doors and withdrew the perfume spritzer from her sleeve.

It was the work of moments to lightly decorate the doorframe, overhanging sign, and windows with eau de succubus. There was, of course, no scent, but any number of magically sensitive people or creatures would pick up on the residue. Quite a few of those would sense exactly what it was, if not how it got there.

Alternately humming and giggling, she turned and glided off toward her next target. By dawn, the Black Wreath’s pet succubus would have left blatant tracks all over Calderaas.

Oh, was she going to be surprised.

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“It is inconvenient timing, of course,” said Andros, frowning into the distance ahead of them. “I have found you a dependable assistant in my dealings with the Church and the other cults. Restraint and careful social judgment are necessary traits in my work, and I’m afraid Shaath’s way does not encourage their development. Whatever aid I find is the result of either happenstance or the god’s blessing.”

“I am sorry to leave you alone like this, and so abruptly,” Ingvar replied. “I will try not to prolong the journey, of course, but this is not going to be an easy hunt. I can’t say even where it will lead me…”

Andros stopped, turning to face him. They stood near the front of the lodge’s main hall, for the most part alone; the few other Huntsmen passing through did not pause to pay untoward attention to a private conversation. The Bishop placed a hand on the younger Huntsman’s shoulder, smiling.

“Forgive me, that was poorly spoken. I didn’t mean to lay any guilt upon you, brother. Remember, we are an order dedicated to the wild and to its god; you have been given a clearly sacred task, and it must take precedence. Being stuck in this city, handling its intrigues, I sometimes worry that I begin to lose sight of the prey for focusing on the hunt. The sacred is always of greater import than the practical.”

Ingvar smiled back, hiking his travel rucksack up onto his shoulder. “Don’t worry, brother, your point was clear. Regardless, I don’t wish to prolong this any more than absolutely necessary.”

Andros frowned slightly. “Be very wary of the Crow, Ingvar. Yes, I know, you obviously would be. She lays plans built of smaller plans, and is no friend to mankind, except perhaps in certain individual cases.”

“That is just one of the things about this matter that trouble me,” Ingvar replied. “There is no way for me to proceed that doesn’t involve becoming a playing piece in her agenda. I shall do my best not to bring any harm upon Shaath’s interests, of course, but I don’t think myself a match for her cunning.”

“That is well,” Andros said firmly, nodding. “Nothing kills faster than arrogance out in the wild. Trust your skills and your instincts, and they’ll serve you well.”

Ingvar nodded in reply. “I’d best move out. Putting this off longer would be a show of weak-heartedness. And besides, I have a caravan to catch.”

“Hunt well, brother,” Andros said, bowing. Ingvar bowed as well, then turned with no more talk and strode out through the lodge’s front doors. So it should be, between men. Too many words were a waste of air.

Andros strode back through the lodge, following its corridors to the residence of the Grandmaster near the rear. He rapped once and waited.

It was only a brief span of moments before the door opened a crack, revealing the face of a pretty young woman peeking up at him curiously. Recognizing him, she immediately bowed and pulled the door wide, stepping aside to let him in. Andros entered, nodding politely at her.

“Sir, the Bishop is here,” Auri said deferentially to her husband, who sat at a desk near the hearth not far away. A very well-mannered young woman, and a fine acquisition for the Grandmaster; Veisroi had been notably less grim in the months since marrying her. Given his position, he could have been swimming in wives, but Veisroi had only the two. He had never had more than two, and for several years since the passing of his first wife, he’d had only his Jula.

Andros heartily approved of this restraint. A woman was a significant responsibility, not a plaything; he worried, sometimes, that the younger generation of Huntsmen did not properly appreciate their women—among their other failings. But then, every generation saw those who came after them as somewhat degenerate, or so he seemed to recall from conversations with his own father. Still, such attitudes caused problems. Had that strutting young cockerel Feldren paid more attention to his Ephanie, she probably wouldn’t be back in the Legions now, finding new ways to be an embarrassment to Shaath.

“Andros,” the Grandmaster said with a hint of annoyance, slapping a sheet of parchment down atop a whole stack of them on his desk. “If you’ve brought me more paperwork, I may have you excommunicated.”

Andros raised an eyebrow at this empty grousing. “Veisroi, when was the last time you took a day to yourself to go hunting?”

“Bah! When was the last time I had time to breathe? Church business, Imperial business, that’s all just the wind in my hair. It’s these wretched lodges, Andros. What a pack of sniveling pups. Can none of these alleged men handle their own affairs? This idiot!” He picked up the letter again, shaking it. “He’s still after me to, and I quote, ‘do something’ about Arachne Tellwyrn. Do something! About Tellwyrn! All because his fool son wanted a drow wife and fell for that Masterson boy’s cruel streak. How many times must I explain this man’s stupidity to him before I have to have him removed as Lodgemaster? I’ve half a mind to call a Wild Hunt on the fool.”

“Wasn’t that Hranfoldt, from the Wyrnrange?” Andros asked. “That one’s politically minded, Veisroi. He might be jockeying to make you look bad—he hasn’t the seniority to try for your position, but I could see him planning ahead.”

“Don’t lecture me, young pup,” Veisroi grunted. “I know what he’s about. I suffer his schemes because the way the world is shaping up, I can’t afford to waste a schemer. Even one with eyes bigger than his belly. Anyway, you haven’t come here an your before lunch to listen to an old man’s griping. What do you need?”

“Merely to bring you an update,” Andros replied, folding his hands. “Ingvar just departed on his quest.”

The Grandmaster turned in his chair to face, him, twisting his thin mouth. “Another promising schemer, now out of reach. And that one is both loyal and sensible. I very much hope the boy’s not getting in over his head. Hrathvin is concerned about him.”

“As do I,” Andros replied, “but I trust Ingvar’s judgment. If he has one flaw it’s that he is too cautious and contained. He won’t be easily goaded into misstepping.”

“Well, it’s out of our hands until he comes home,” Veisroi said. “I’ll burn an offering for him; nothing else to be done from here. Surely that wasn’t all you came to tell me.”

“No, I wouldn’t interrupt your paperwork for that,” Andros replied. “I know how you enjoy it so.”

“I am this close, Andros, by Shaath’s paws!”

The Bishop grinned. “In seriousness, I just received an update by courier from the Archpope. If there’s to be a major move against him in the city, it will likely come soon, and may come here. As of this morning, of his core of trustworthy Bishops, I am the only one left in the city.”

Veisroi narrowed his eyes. “What happened to the Eserite?”

“He has just departed for points unknown. The notice he left said it was on personal business.

The Grandmaster snorted. “That’s what you and the others all said when Justinian sent you to Hamlet.”

“Indeed, and I never assume that what Antonio says has any bearing on what he’s up to. Words are just another layer of his camouflage. I don’t believe this is on the Archpope’s orders, however.”

“Another weapon, out of pocket,” Veisroi murmured, staring into the low fire and absently rubbing his forefinger and thumb together. “At least Snowe is actively working on Justinian’s orders.”

Andros curled his lip disdainfully. “That little bundle of fluff is in his Holiness’s inner circle purely on the weight of her loyalty. I’m glad she’s found some use as a propaganda tool; if not for that, she’d be wasting her calling by not warming someone’s bed.”

“I’ve come to expect a bit more perceptiveness from you, Andros,” Veisroi retorted, staring piercingly at him. “You know what kind of dangerous people Justinian keeps nearest himself. You, that mad dog Syrinx. Even the Eserite—we’ve seen that his foppish act is a smokescreen for something truly vicious. If Branwen Snowe appears useless to you, I suggest you start paying closer attention to her.”

 

Tellwyrn opened the classroom door, stepped in, shut it behind her, and paused inside, studying the room with hands on her hips. The cherry trees and ornamental screens softened up the stark angularity of the room nicely, but she hadn’t come here to admire the décor.

She descended to the dais in the front, stepping up to one of the folding screens. It was beautifully preserved, but clearly old, or at least a masterful reproduction of an old original. This style of ink-painting was no longer popular in Sifan, and newer pieces of such exquisite quality were unlikely to be produced.

“Hmm,” she mused. “Not bad, but could use a splash of color.” A brush tipped in red paint appeared in her hand, and she raised it toward the delicately inked silk. “Maybe right around—”

“All right, all right!” Professor Ekoi snatched the brush away from her from behind. “You can make your point less destructively, you absolute savage!”

“Well, I’m never quite sure with you, Kaisa,” Tellwyrn turned just in time to see the arcane-conjured paintbrush disintegrate into sparks and ashes, swept away by fae magic. The kitsune pulled a silken kerchief out of thin air and carefully wiped off her fingers, grimacing in disdain. “Now that you are here, there’s something I’d like to discuss with you.”

“Bah. Schedules, command performances, discussions whenever it’s convenient. You used to be fun, Arachne.”

“I have no memory of that,” Tellwyrn said, folding her arms. “The students from the morning exercise group brought me an interesting story right before my class. Apparently as they were wrapping up, Trissiny and Scorn sensed the presence of a demon. Scorn insisted it was a child of Vanislaas. Gabriel, Toby, and November were all there and felt nothing; Gabriel’s valkyrie friend did not sense anything, either.”

“Hmm.” Kaisa tucked her hands behind her back, tilting her head and twitching her ears. Her tail began to wave, a sure sign that her interest was caught. “When is an incubus not an incubus?”

“I questioned them closely on that point,” said Tellwyrn. “Trissiny didn’t feel anything quite so distinct; it was only Scorn was thought it was a Vanislaad. And while Scorn may not be the most reliable of witnesses, since I’ve no idea what kind of training she’s had, she is clearly a highborn Rhaazke. They are powerful and perceptive creatures.”

“Perhaps it would be wise to find out what kind of training she’s had, yes?” Ekoi said with a mischievous smile. “And you trust the accounts of the others? Students do love their little pranks.”

“Not this group,” Tellwyrn said, shaking her head. “Half of them haven’t the imagination, and the others at least know better than to mess around with something like this. What gets me, Kaisa, is the differences in opinion. The paladins, at least, should have a fairly uniform perception of demonic activ—”

She abruptly whirled, a gold-hilted saber appearing in her hand, and stared around at the empty room.

“Oh, don’t worry,” Ekoi said airily, “there’s not actually a rawhead here. You see, Arachne, senses can be fooled, if you know the method. That holds true for magical senses as well as mundane ones. I wouldn’t expect you to know, given your disdain for subtler tactics, but there are ways of creating the impression that highly magical creatures are present when they are not. At least, to those attuned to them.”

“Who was it who was just talking about destructive means of getting attention?” Tellwyrn muttered, vanishing her sword and turning back to the kitsune.

Kaisa tittered gleefully. “You’re right, though. It’s very interesting that little Trissiny and big old Scorn would react, when the others didn’t. Almost as if something had been…aimed at them.”

“It remains an open question who would do that, and why.”

“Well, the why is at least partially obvious,” the kitsune said. “If you wanted to rile up those paladins…honestly, which of the three is the most easily riled?”

“That’s all well and good, as far as it goes,” Tellwyrn began. “But—”

“Yes, yes.” Kaisa languidly waved a folding fan which had just appeared in her hand. “There’s a finite list of those who can employ such subtle methods. One must have power—considerable power. Not to mention mastery of the given magical art. This is not a small matter, if it is what it seems.”

“You’re suggesting that a warlock or demon of seriously high rank is playing games with my students,” Tellwyrn said, a dangerous scowl falling across her features.

Kaisa grinned broadly, displaying her elongated canines. “Oh, indeed. And do me the courtesy of not pretending this isn’t exactly why you brought this to me, Arachne. You may consider me interested. If someone wishes to play that kind of game… Well, a lady does need hobbies, no?”

 

While he didn’t generally enjoy pushing through crowds, Ingvar had learned to appreciate the lack of attention people paid him in the busy streets of Tiraas. If anyone so much as glanced his way, it was generally due to his Huntsman gear; nobody stopped and stared, and rarely did anyone seem to note any disparity in his appearance unless he actually talked to them. City living was unnatural and stressful in many ways, but the jaded disinterest of urbanites was a blessing for those who didn’t enjoy attention.

Still, the Rail station was something else again. People were crammed in here like canned sardines, somehow managing to push through one another without acknowledging each other. He kept his bow tucked against his body and his other hand on his backpack, mindful of pickpockets. Allegedly the only such in the city would be operatives of the Guild, who didn’t prey on just anyone (again, allegedly), but Ingvar had been warned that Huntsmen, in their eyes, were not just anyone. He had never personally been targeted, but Andros had had to send requests to the Thieves’ Guild several times for the return of personal objects of spiritual significance, which were often the only things of value a Huntsman carried.

He made his way through the heaving throng to Platform 6A, where Mary had directed him to meet the companions she was sending along on his journey. She had said they would be individuals who would benefit personally from being along on his quest, and not simply hired muscle, which was fine as far as it went. Ingvar did not have a good feeling about this, however. He had excellent reason to be mindful of his privacy, and wasn’t enthused about the prospect of going on a long journey with complete strangers. If he had to have anyone along for this, he’d have much preferred known and trusted Huntsmen from the lodge.

Mary, clearly, had no interest in what he preferred. And he had no option but to cater to her plans. She hadn’t even told him where he would be going, only where to meet his new companions. It was a very neat way to get him out of the city without letting him catch his balance, which didn’t bode well for this whole enterprise.

The platforms were clearly labeled, at least, and 6A was in a quieter end of the station. According to the sign he passed, that was because these tracks were for specifically chartered caravans, not the regularly scheduled ones. Well, the Crow probably didn’t lack for funds after however many thousands of years she had been operating. Then again, Ingvar wouldn’t put it past her to have made one of the others pay for the trip.

Hopefully she wasn’t expecting him to. He had a little money, but not the kind of money that would charter a Rail caravan. He hadn’t even been given a ticket before coming her.

The platform was positioned behind wooden privacy screens—apparently the people who chartered private caravans could not be expected to mix with the common public any longer than they absolutely must. Ingvar paused to make sure he had the right one. Yes, 6A, this was it. He stepped into the space and froze.

There were two other men present—well, a man and a boy. The youth looked to be in his mid-teens, and was wearing a hat and duster of clearly expensive make over a dark suit, with a bolo tie inset with a large piece of tigerseye. Two wands were holstered at his waist on a leather belt bulging with pockets. He was lounging against the wall with his arms folded, and looked up upon Ingvar’s arrival. The Huntsman took in the boy at a glance before fixing his startled attention on the other man present.

Dressed in a slightly scruffy suit over a loud red shirt and scuffed snakeskin boots, occupying himself by doing tricks with a doubloon, there stood Antonio Darling. He looked up, grinned broadly and exclaimed as though delighted, “Ingvar!”

Ingvar stared at him, then very carefully backed up and looked again at the sign outside the platform. Yes, 6A.

Darling laughed. “Yes, yes, not what you were expecting, I take it?”

“That…is putting it mildly,” Ingvar said very carefully. Somehow, and he had no idea how, he was going to make the Crow pay for this.

“Well, c’mon in, don’t be shy,” Darling said cheerfully. “Let me introduce everyone around. Ingvar, this is Joseph Jenkins, who you may know as the Sarasio Kid.”

“Pleasure,” said Jenkins, tipping his hat. Ingvar nodded back, mind whirling. The Sarasio Kid? Legends of frontier wandfighters were popular among Shaath’s followers; frontier folk in general were well thought of in the cult. He was definitely familiar with the name.

“Joe,” Darling went on, “this is Brother Ingvar, Huntsman of Shaath and the reason for this little outing of ours.”

Ingvar managed not to grind his teeth. Little outing. “Why would you want to come along on this journey, your Grace?” he asked somewhat curtly. “I thought you were principally a creature of the city.”

“Oh, that much is definitely true,” Darling said lightly. “Everybody needs a change of scenery once in a while, though, don’t you think?”

“If you can manage to get a straight answer out of him about anything,” said Jenkins in a distinctly dry done, “I will be immensely impressed.”

So. There was already some mistrust here. Ingvar’s opinion of Jenkins rose further.

“Now, no need to be like that, Joe,” Darling said cheerfully. “In seriousness, Ingvar, I took some convincing when Mary asked me to come along, but honestly, even aside from the case she made, I do have an interest in this. It’s past time I got out and got my own hands dirty again—too much politics is turning me soft. Besides, Joe and I both have some recent business to follow up on in our first destination. Ah, speak of the Dark Lady!”

Ingvar’s hair tried to stand up as the Rail itself began to glow a fierce arcane blue. The caravan arrived, barreling into the station at terrifying speed and decelerating similarly swiftly. In mere seconds it had hissed to a stop alongside the platform, one compartment lining up neatly with the short ramp extending from beside them. A moment later, the door hissed open with a soft sound like escaping steam.

“It just…goes?” Ingvar said doubtfully. “It doesn’t need to stop for…fuel, or maintenance, or something?”

“Nah, they fix ’em up overnight,” Darling said brightly, bending to pick up the suitcase sitting by his feet. “We can chat more on the way—no sense in wasting time! All aboard for Veilgrad!”

 

They had to leave the carriage at a farm at the end of the road. The Old Road ran out of Viridill all the way to the dwarven kingdoms in the mountains at the northernmost end of the continent, but that road quite deliberately passed between patches of forest rather than through them; going into the Green Belt meant taking a smaller road which did not go all the way there. The elves would never have tolerated that.

“Are you sure it’ll be okay?” Schwartz huffed, not for the first time. “I mean…they were nice enough, but they’re just folks. It’s not as if we were parking it in an actual garage…”

“Where, in this country, would you expect to find a garage?” Basra asked. She led the group, plowing through the fields toward the forest up ahead. The road and the farm were lost to the distance behind them; they had already passed out of cultivated fields of barley and corn and were hiking through a patch of prairie. Rather than the clean tallgrass of the Great Plans, this was a scrubby kind of prairie, filled with rocks, thorns, and hefty bushes that sometimes neared the status of trees. It wasn’t easy going, but Basra did not slow her pace despite Schwartz’s discomfort. “You saw how taken they were with the vehicle. I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

“Well, that’s sort of it,” he panted. “I mean… Who knows what they’d…”

“They will not damage it,” she said curtly. “We made it clear it was Legion property. They wouldn’t dare.”

“Also, they’re not animals,” Covrin added. “Not a sophisticated class of people, to be sure, but even the peasants in this province are a respectful lot.”

“If you say so,” Schwartz said, then fell silent, having to concentrate on walking and breathing. Meesie had clambered up to perch atop his head, where she peered about, whiskers twitching. Now that it was clearly visible, Basra could tell the creature wasn’t quite a rat—in shape she was a bit more like a weasel, but with overlarge ears and dextrous little hands, not to mention a long, tufted tail. Actually, it was rather cute, in a garish way.

“All right there, Covrin?” she asked. “I know you weren’t planning a hike in that armor.”

“Perfectly, ma’am,” Covrin said crisply. Basra had guided her cadet experience toward more political than military training, but they didn’t graduate someone to the rank of Legionnaire unless she was in good shape. “We may want to stop, though. Mr. Schwartz is clearly not used to this kind of exercise.”

“Oh, no, don’t worry ’bout me,” Schwartz wheezed. “Onward and upward!”

Basra did come to a stop, turning to study him critically. The man was half-staggering now, clearly tired and out of breath. Useless boy… So far he’d contributed nothing to the mission. The last thing she wanted was delay, but if he collapsed out here it would slow them down a great deal further.

“It’s not quite noon, yet,” she said, carefully moderating her tone and expression. “We shouldn’t need to push ourselves to make good time. And I suppose it’s wise to give the elves time to prepare for our approach; they likely appreciate abrupt visits even less than visits in general.”

“Well, when you put it that way, I suppose,” Schwartz said gratefully, sinking down to sit on the ground right where he stood. Whether by accident or design, he ended up perched on a large rock rather than sprawled in the dirt. He slumped there, head hanging and struggling to catch his breath. Meesie hopped down to his shoulder and reared up, sniffing at his head in concern.

Basra sighed, shaking her head in disgust, and began pacing slowly in a wide circle around him. More by reflex than because she expected any kind of attack, she studied their surroundings. The scrubby plain stretched out in all directions, leading to the forest up ahead and Viridill farmland behind, with the mountains themselves rising not far to the west; insects and birds sang, but there was no sign of any large animals, much less other people. They might have been an island in the utter wilderness, rather than a few hours’ walk from civilization.

Completing a circuit, she paused next to Covrin, who was standing still and gazing at the distant forest.

“Do you think they’ve spotted us yet?” she asked quietly.

“Almost certainly,” Basra replied. “Elves are prickly about their borders. They know we’re here and that we’re headed right toward them. For all we know there are a dozen crouched in the grass all around us.”

Covrin’s eyes darted back and forth. “That’s…surely not.”

“It’s a possibility,” Basra said mildly, watching the increasing unease on the girl’s face with satisfaction. “The stories about elves are not exaggerated; they don’t need to be. If anything, popular fiction undersells them, because some of the facts simply aren’t believable.”

The Legionnaire unconsciously lowered a hand to the hilt of her sword, and Basra had to repress a grin. “Don’t worry,” she said, patting Covrin on the back of her breastplate. “Elves are persnickety, but the woodkin aren’t violent unless provoked. Whatever they’re doing or thinking, they are very unlikely to attack us.” She paused, stepping up close from behind, and leaned in, near enough that Covrin would feel her warm breath on her ear, to whisper. “You’re safe with me, Jenell.”

From that angle, she just barely caught the twitch at the corner of the girl’s eye, and she stepped back, marshaling her expression against the thrill of amusement it brought her. That had yet to get old.

Basra turned and stepped back to Schwartz, who was sitting there playing with his fire-rat and looking generally more at ease. “Feeling better?”

“Much, thanks!” he said immediately. “Just a quick spell to lighten the fatigue—uh, oh, not that I was doing particularly poorly, of course,” he added hastily. “It’s just…general principles, you know. When out on a hike. Um, if you like I could…?”

“No thanks,” she said wryly. “I believe I’m doing fine. Come on, we had better keep moving.”

“Of course, of course,” he said, groaning very faintly as he stood up. Meesie clambered back up to the top of his head, ears twitching.

They set off again, Schwartz quickly falling behind again to lag in the rear. Basra, after a quick mental debate, slowed her pace, despite her annoyance. There would be no end of trouble if she let actual harm come to him.

Glancing over her shoulder, she started to speak, but suddenly figures materialized out of the grass around them.

The five elves were arranged in a neat semi-circle between her group and the forest ahead. Those on the flank were even with Basra; they had been about to blunder right into their formation. Clearly this had been arranged ahead of time. Despite her reassurance to Covrin, all of them were armed with a mix of bows and tomahawks, and three had arrows nocked and aimed at them.

The one in the center carried a staff in one hand and two tomahawks hanging from his belt; he was the only one without a bow. He stared flatly at Basra.

“You can go no further.”

She inhaled softly, gathering her composure, and bowed. “Good day. My name is Basra Syrinx; I am Bishop of the Sisterhood of Avei.”

“Well met,” the elf said, nodding. “You can still go no further.” His companions made no move to lower their weapons.

“I’m here on a matter of importance,” she said, still speaking calmly. “Believe me, the Sisterhood respects the privacy of the elves, and we would not trouble you were it less than urgent. It was my understanding that the people of Viridill and those of the groves were on good terms. Have we offended you?”

“I know why you’ve come, Bishop Syrinx,” said the elf. “And you are welcome in our forest. What you bring with you is not.”

Slowly, Basra and Covrin turned to stare at Schwartz, whose eyes widened.

“Oh, I say,” he squeaked. “Surely you don’t mean—”

Abruptly Meesie let out a shrill squeal, puffing up her fur, and scampered down his face to dart into the collar of his shirt and hide.

Behind him, darkness itself rose up from the grass.

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Addiwyn pushed open the dormitory door and stalked through as usual, making a beeline for her own room without pausing to engage with anyone present. This time, however, she paused, half-turning to peer through narrowed eyes at Szith.

The drow stood alone against the front wall, between the room’s two doors. Her posture appeared relaxed, but she was just…standing, doing apparently nothing. None of the other freshman girls were present.

“What are you doing?” Addiwyn demanded suspiciously.

“Waiting,” Szith said in perfect calm.

“Waiting for what?”

Szith looked over at her, raising one eyebrow. After a moment, Addiwyn snorted disdainfully and entered her own room, slamming the door behind her.

Half a minute later, she came storming back out, stomping right up to Szith and glaring murderously.

“I suppose you think you’re clever,” the elf snarled.

“Compared to whom?”

Addiwyn bared her teeth. “What have you done with my things?”

“I haven’t touched anything of yours.”

“All right, fine. Very amusing. We can do this all night, bitch. Where are they?”

“By ‘they,’” Szith asked mildly, “are you referring to your belongings, or the rest of our roommates?”

“I’ve got a funny feeling those two questions have the same answer!”

“Why are you so hostile?” Szith inquired.

“Is that a joke?” Addiwyn snapped. “You’re holding my entire wardrobe hostage and you want to ask why I’m hostile?”

“You know very well what I mean,” the drow said with inexorable calm. “If all you wanted was to be left alone, you could have had that easily. Your words and actions create a stark disconnect, Addiwyn. If you are so disinterested in us, why go so far out of your way, risking the consequences you have, to cause us all hurt?”

“I will see you rotting in your grave before I deign to explain myself to you, darkling,” the elf said venomously.

Szith raised an eyebrow. “If it were just me, I doubt I would even wonder. Yet you’ve attacked every one of the others, and I know your people are not at war with humanity or the gnomes. There is no logic to your actions, and it is beginning to grow disturbing.”

“Good,” Addiwyn sneered. “Be disturbed. Now where. Are. My. Clothes?”

“I am trying to get through to you,” Szith persisted, “because if I do not, you’ll have to deal with Ravana. Not knowing what you want or intend, she is of the opinion that you represent an actual threat to our well-being, and will address you accordingly.”

“I really cannot stress enough how little I fear the wrath of that stuck-up porcelain doll.”

“Then you fail to comprehend what you are dealing with,” Szith said, a sharp edge entering her tone. “And for your information, I don’t believe she understands restraint in dealing with her opponents. The consequences for challenging House Madouri would be significant.”

“I’m getting tired of this, Szith.”

“As am I,” the drow shot back. “Whatever you may believe, I am trying to help you, and all of us. Just explain, Addiwyn. We only want to understand.”

Addiwyn curled her lip contemptuously. “Why don’t you just be a good little lackey and lead the way to your mistress?”

Szith held her stare for a long moment, then sighed very softly and shook her head. “As you wish.”

 

Among the campus’s numerous nooks and hideaways was a shadowed grove along the east wall, at the middle terrace. Ronald Hall rose above, but had not been built against the actual wall of the campus—nor, for whatever reason, had the terrace itself. The result of this was a small alcove, about nine yards square, buried beneath the terrace wall and the perimeter wall, which lurked in deep shadow, accessible only from one direction. There was no paving or furniture, nothing placed there to indicate it had been intended for use, but it did have a carpet of dense brown clover, several fluffy little bushes and even three small trees of a thick, twisted shape, all species from the Deep Wild which thrived beneath the shadows of the thick canopy. They did quite well in this dark little nook.

Needless to say, it was popular among students for a variety of purposes. Thanks to Stew’s industriousness, the area remained clean no matter what took place there. Relatively clean, at least.

Despite the brief time they had been on campus, Addiwyn apparently knew the spot well enough to recognize the goal of their trek and pull ahead of Szith once they rounded the corner under Ronald Hall, pausing only to sneer at the drow in passing. Szith continued without altering her speed, or her expression, and arrived a few moments after the girl she was escorting.

Addiwyn came to a stop just within the shade of the little nook, planting her fists on her hips and glaring.

The largest of the twisted trees stood along the back wall of the square nook, slightly off-center. It was a little taller than an average male elf, its thick, spiraling trunk sprouting stubby branches with patchy leaves the color of mold—never an impressive sight at the best of times. Now, it was festooned with skirts, blouses and undergarments like some kind of deranged solstice tree.

Iris stood next to the tree, arms folded, looking smug. Maureen sat upon the small lip of stone at the base of Ronald Hall, some ten feet above, kicking her legs idly. A folding stool had been set up in the center of the nook, and Ravana perched upon this, her spine straight, a faint smile playing about her lips.

“Good evening, Addiwyn,” she said politely.

“My interest in you trollops and your hogwash is at an all-time low,” Addiwyn snarled. “Haul your gangly ass out of my way and I will consider not bringing this to Tellwyrn’s attention.”

“From what I understand of Professor Tellwyrn’s educational ‘talks,’” Ravana said idly, “you are in no position to be carrying complaints to her and won’t be for a while. Indeed, she has a long history of using students of the Unseen University to educate, control and even discipline one another. Quite elegant, really, and more subtle than her reputation would suggest. Of course, there is really no other way she could keep control over this particular student body.”

“I do not have time for—”

“Much as I usually enjoy verbal fencing, let us skip past the obligatory time-wasting, shall we?” Ravana daintily crossed her legs and folded her hands in her lap. “After your persistent, unprovoked, and utterly demented campaign of harassment against your roommates, you will receive no sympathy from the University’s administration or our house mother at finding yourself facing a much gentler version of the same treatment. You have no notable magical skill, and physically? You’re probably not a match for Maureen, definitely not for Szith, and most assuredly not for both. Your father the merchant may be able to buy you out of the little intrigues you created back home, but his fortunes compared to those of my House are a candle against the sun. In short, Addiwyn, you have nothing with which to threaten us. Therefore, if you wish the return of your things, you will discuss whatever we wish. And you will do so politely.”

“I am going to walk past you and collect my clothes,” Addiwyn said flatly. “And if any of you lays one finger on my person to stop me, you’ll be in front of Tellwyrn for assault, and find out how much less sense of humor she has about that than practical jokes.”

She strode forward, coming nearly abreast of Ravana before Iris spoke.

“I wouldn’t, if I were you.”

Iris shifted slightly, moving a step closer to the tree, and abruptly a half-ring of light sprang up around its roots, terminating against the back wall. The entire tree shuddered as if in a breeze, then moved further, its trunk actually twisting faintly. Wood groaned softly, a faint floral scent arose from midair, and there came a tiny, sourceless puff of wind.

Addiwyn froze, her eyebrows drawing together in consternation. Behind her, Szith moved silently into the nook and took up a position against one wall.

“Were you aware that our Miss Domingue is a witch of some skill?” Ravana asked pleasantly. “I was not. Really, it is quite impressive, what she is able to do with trees and plants. If you are concerned at all for the condition of your belongings, I really do suggest that you don’t attempt to touch them until you are told that you may.”

“You’re a contemptible little shit,” Addiwyn said flatly, turning to her.

“That is true,” Ravana said, still wearing a polite smile. “But I am also a clever, powerful little shit, and you have entirely consumed your allotment of my patience. Now, Addiwyn, shall we have that conversation?”

“You know,” Addiwyn said, a tiny little smile quirking her lips, “none of this is going to make Daddy love you.”

Ravana gazed at her in silence for a long moment, her expression altering not a hair. Then she drummed her fingers once against her leg.

“What are you doing, Addiwyn?”

Addiwyn folded her arms. “Waiting for you to finish your pitiful little drama.”

“It is your pitiful little drama that concerns us here,” Ravana said calmly. “None of us have done anything to provoke you until now, and yet you seem willing to defy all reason and the boundaries of civilized society in order to cause us grief. You risk increasingly serious punishment and seemingly disdain the preservation of your own well-being to attack us. And if you were a lunatic out for blood, that would at least be consistent. Yet for all your totally disproportionate aggression, it seems you can manage nothing but contemptibly juvenile pranks. It is puzzling.”

“Or,” Addiwyn suggested, “maybe it all makes perfect sense, and you’re just stupid.”

“I don’t think you get it,” said Iris. “You’re not getting your stuff back or leaving here until we have this out, bitch.”

“Iris,” Ravana said with gentle reproof, “let us not be needlessly offensive.”

Iris curled her lip contemptuously. “Why not? She is.”

“That is precisely why, my dear. Ideally we can all come to an understanding and put these hostilities behind us, but if Miss Addiwyn will not oblige us even to that extent, we ought at least to retain the moral high ground.”

Addiwyn looked pointedly at her clothes festooning the twisted tree. “Good job.”

“Really, though,” said Maureen from atop the ledge, “what has gotten up yer bum that makes ye light into us the way you have?”

“It really is a simple enough question,” added Ravana. “All we seek is a little understanding. With that done we can all be finished with this absurdity.”

“All right, enough already!” Addiwyn snapped. “You’ve had your fun, got a little of your own back. Let’s just call it even, agree to a truce and go our separate ways. Fair?”

Ravana shook her head slowly. “At issue, Addiwyn, is the cause of your irrational, aggressive behavior. To be perfectly frank, I am concerned about our well-being. So long as I have to sleep in a complex with a belligerent unknown quantity, the prospect of waking up with a slit throat is not unthinkable.”

Addiwyn stared at her. “You…actually think I’m going to kill you? Woman, are you utterly daft?”

Ravana tilted her head to one side. “I understand your adoptive family are human, Addiwyn. How familiar are you with elvish culture? With the language?”

“My personal history is in no way any concern of yours, you little goblin.”

“Do you understand what the term anth’auwa means?”

Addiwyn jerked back from her, eyes widening. In the next moment, they narrowed to slits. “You are very close to crossing a line.”

Ravana shrugged. “Then convince me otherwise. Explain yourself. You must have reasons.”

The elf stepped closer, leaning forward till her face was less than a foot from Ravana’s, and spoke in an icily quiet tone. “You don’t know me. You will not know me, and you don’t need to know me. I am done with this idiocy. Take yourself out of my way, and give me back my clothes, Madouri. Now.”

They locked eyes in silence. The other three girls looked on, Iris and Maureen frowning, Szith apparently without expression.

“One last time, Addiwyn,” Ravana said quietly. “Answer the question. Why?”

“I have made my final offer,” Addiwyn replied. “Drop this, leave me alone, and we can have peace.”

“Peace is a lie,” said Szith. “There is no peace in you. Show us the root of your belligerence, convince us it’s over. Then we can drop this.”

Addiwyn looked up at her, curled her lip in a sneer, then stepped back from Ravana. She planted herself firmly in the middle of the space, folded her arms, and just stared.

Ravana sighed softly. “Well. Let the record show we attempted to do this the civil way.”

“While the record has been brought up,” Szith said evenly, “let me reiterate that I believe the matter ought to end here.”

“So noted,” Ravana said, turning to nod to her. “Iris, if you would?”

“You asked for it,” Iris said with a note of satisfaction, then knelt, grasped something hidden amid the clover, and abruptly straightened, flinging her arm out to the side. The glowing semicircle surrounding the twisted tree went flying with it, the braided cord that had formed it flicking through the air and sending up a cloud of faintly luminous dust.

A deep, low groan filled the air, and the tree began to move.

It slowly pivoted around itself, its twisting trunk seemingly trying to straighten out. Branches jerked, then flexed, setting the clothes draped on them to swaying. With a soft rumble, it tilted to one side, roots popping loose from the ground.

“You seem fond of practical jokes, Addiwyn,” Ravana said calmly. “We thought we might show you how to properly perform one.”

Staring in fascinated horror at the rising tree, Addiwyn took two reflexive steps backward from it, toward the path out of the nook.

The tree leaned back the other way, wrenching the remainder of its root system free from the earth, its trunk flexing back and forth with a crunching of bark. Branches cracked, bending sharply at specific points.

Ravana slipped quietly from her perch, pacing across the enclosed space to stand alongside Szith.

Iris was busy wrapping the still-glowing cord around a small doll she had taken from within the loose sleeve of her dress. Finally knotting it off, she held it up to her face and whispered, “Awake.”

The tree twitched once, shuddered, and suddenly cracks opened in its bark. Two limbs rearranged themselves.

A yawning knot opened in the middle of the trunk, below two horizontal (but uneven) cracks which flexed wide, knocking loose fragments of bark. The matched pair of limbs flexed their furthest extremities—like fingers. Suddenly, its shape held meaning. It had a face, arms, and grasping hands. A low groan emerged from deep within the tree, this time very clearly coming from the single, now-gaping knothole. From its mouth.

“What have you done?” Addiwyn whispered.

“It’s called an entling!” Iris said, beaming in pride. “Isn’t it adorable?”

The entling shook its arms, causing Addiwyn’s skirts and blouses to flutter, and groaned again.

“Oh, and by the way,” Iris added sweetly, “it has your scent. Ah, ah!” she added as Addiwyn took a rapid step backward. “I would not do that. It’s curious, see—your smell is part of the magic animating it, so it’ll be irresistibly drawn to you. Best not to make it chase you, though. If it burns too much energy and needs to replace some, well… There’s a thin line between ‘drawn’ and ‘hungry.’”

“You’re all insane,” Addiwyn breathed, staring at the entling in horror. It began shambling toward her on its groping roots.

Behind her, Maureen suddenly stood and jumped off the ledge. She plunged ten feet straight down, landing right in the thick bush positioned below her, which exploded under the impact, spraying a thick blast of greenish liquid into the middle of the nook, misting Ravana’s sleeve but practically dousing Addiwyn. A sharp, citrusy smell suddenly hung in the air.

The elf shrieked in startlement, leaping straight up and whirling around to glare at the gnome, who was already struggling backward out of the bush, dragging a hefty apparatus that had been hidden therein.

“What the hell?!” Addiwyn squawked. “What is wrong with you people?”

“You’ve used a perfume spritzer, aye?” Maureen said cheerfully, brushing leaves off the device and turning to face the soaked elf with a grin. It appeared to consist of a mess of hoses and brass tanks connected to a huge rubber bladder and a thick nozzle set on a tripod. “Or at least seen one? This is basically that, on a somewhat larger scale. Remarkably simple t’put together! Oh, an’ the stuff in there, we got that from Professor Rafe. Jus’ like the purple ink!”

“Except we had to be a little sneakier about this stuff,” Iris said smugly. “It’s not the kind of thing a professor would let students play around with. It’s basically…bait. For fairy creatures. Makes things smell irresistible to them.”

Addiwyn broke off trying vainly to wring the thick, lime-scented fluid out of her blouse, straightening up, her eyes widening.

Even with all her elven agility, she wasn’t fast enough.

The entling, despite its previously ponderous movements, lashed out with both arms faster than a striking cobra. They extended to twice their length in an eyeblink and grasped Addiwyn by the shoulders, hiking her bodily off the ground. She yelped and kicked, struggling vainly against the summoned creature’s grip.

“I really would be quiet,” Iris advised. “You’re already appetizing twice over to him, you know. Best not make too much noise, or squirm around, or do anything that’ll agitate him. He’s a newborn, y’see, and will be wanting a meal.”

“Have you all lost your minds?” Addiwn squalled, flailing furiously with her legs.

The entling groaned again, more loudly than before, then lifted her up over its center of mass and abruptly lowered her, stuffing her flailing feet into its suddenly gaping mouth.

“Told you,” Iris said with a shrug.

“Help!” Addiwyn shrieked.

The entling shoved her farther down, her legs disappearing up to the knees in its trunk.

“I can make him be still for a bit,” Iris said idly, “but you’ll need to be still for it to work.”

Addiwyn froze, wide-eyed with panic and quivering.

“Attagirl,” Iris said with a fiendish grin, and held up the little doll before her face again. “Calm,” she whispered to it, stroking its head.

The entling emitted a deep, contented rumble from around Addiwyn’s feet, but stopped shoving her downward.

“Now, then!” Ravana said brightly. “Shall we resume our discussion?”

“You are completely insane,” Addiwyn whispered, staring at her in horror.

Ravana shrugged. “I was raised in a disgusting degree of privilege with a regrettable dearth of affection. It tends to warp a person. What’s your excuse?”

“All right, I have to register an objection,” Szith said rather sharply. “I understood that the plan here was to intimidate her, which in frankness I only consented to so as to present myself as a moderating influence. This verges on torture. I think you should release her, Iris.”

“Oh, come now,” Ravana chided, “we are so close to reaching an accord. As you can see, my dear Addiwyn, we can play jokes, too. The difference is, we have considerable resources and the will to exert them beyond childish sabotage. Are you at least convinced to cease your own campaign?”

“Help,” Addiwyn whispered.

“I would still prefer a diplomatic solution,” Ravana said in perfect calm. “But if you decline to oblige, we can begin by establishing that your continued aggression will lead only to—”

“HELP!” Addiwyn howled.

Iris flicked the doll’s head with her finger. The entling grunted in displeasure and shoved the elf a few inches deeper into its maw. She squeaked and froze again.

“If this does not cease immediately,” Szith said sharply, “I will be forced to insist.”

“Aye, I’m startin’ ta be in agreement,” Maureen said nervously. “Iris, ye described this as a prank. She looks scared half t’death, there.”

“I think she can only benefit from knowing what it feels like,” Iris said grimly.

“We are undoubtedly in violation of numerous campus rules as it is,” Szith stated, “simply by virtue of this being an extravagantly cruel action. I am all for displaying strength, but it should be done with restraint.”

“She looks plenty restrained to me,” Iris said.

“It seems we’ve a difference of opinion, then,” Ravana mused. “Well, Addiwyn, rather than encourage further discord within the ranks, I’m inclined to oblige my friends and call a halt to this.”

“Aw,” Iris complained, frowning.

“On the other hand,” Ravana continued, “we can hardly afford to back down without gaining some concessions. That’s simple politics. Have you anything to add?”

“Tellwyrn is going to skin you imbeciles alive!” Addiwyn grated.

Ravana shrugged. “Do you imagine that is news to me? Now you understand that you are not the only one willing to face consequences in order to strike at an enemy. It would seem the difference between us is that our enmity has been earned.”

A soft giggle sounded. They all froze, then turned toward the front of the shaded nook.

Full dark had fallen over the campus, but thanks to its omnipresent fairy lamps, a dim light prevailed even in the middle of the night. Now, a black silhouette stood between the freshmen and the exit from their secluded nest—a silhouette surmounted by slowly twitching triangular ears. Eyes gleamed an eerie green in the dimness.

“Well,” a silken voice purred. “What have we here?”

“P-professor Ekoi!” Addiwyn spluttered. “I’m being murdered! Get them off me!”

“Mmmurdered?” Ekoi’s ears twitched once more and she angled her head to one side. “You’re being manhandled, you silly thing. Entlings do not eat. Your feet have reached the bottom of that trunk. It can’t do more than push you in, and can’t push much farther than you already are. Someone has been pulling your little leg.”

Addiwyn blinked, then blinked again, then her expression of fear slowly melted into a deep scowl. She twisted as far as she could in the entling’s grasp to glare at Iris. “Oh, you vicious, snub-eared little whore!”

“Ah, well,” Ravana said resignedly. “It was a good trick while it lasted.”

“It’s…it’s just a bit of fun, Professor,” Iris said nervously. “We were just scaring her a bit. Nobody’s in any real danger… I mean, you know that, surely.”

“I would have appreciated knowing that beforehand,” Szith said sharply.

“Nobody’s in danger?” Ekoi mused, gliding forward a couple of steps. Her luminous eyes suddenly seemed excessively wide in her shadowed face. “You think not?”

A tense silence fell, in which the girls glanced uncertainly at each other and even Addiwyn stopped struggling against the entling.

“Professor?” Szith said carefully. “Are you quite all right?”

Professor Ekoi moved closer, languidly holding up one hand. A palm-sized orb of blue fire burst alight in her grip, then slowly drifted away to float aimlessly through the air around the stilled entling. In its eerie illumination, they could finally see her expression. Her eyes were insanely wide, her mouth stretched in a grin that displayed a great many very shiny teeth. As they stared, she slowly licked her lips.

“Tell me,” the kitsune all but whispered, “what is that absolutely delicious scent?”

“Oh, bugger,” Maureen mumbled.

“Iris?” Ravana said, a note of tension in her voice for the first time.

“It’s—it’s just a floral p-perfume,” Iris stuttered. “C’mon, it’s not really fairy pheromones, that’s…that’s ridiculous. There’s no such…”

“It’s been just so long,” Ekoi crooned, “so long since I’ve had a proper hunt. The taste of fresh prey, so delicately seasoned…”

“Ah, Professor,” Ravana said carefully, “I think perhaps—”

Ekoi moved faster than even an elven eye could follow, flickering around behind Ravana and wrapping both arms around the girl. One hand gripped Ravana’s slender neck, tiny claws pressing against the pulse in her throat.

“Why,” the Professor cooed, “you reek of it, delicious little morsel.”

“Professor, I believe you should release her,” Szith said, drawing her sword.

Ekoi’s gleaming eyes flicked to the drow. “Why, Miss An’sadarr, why ever are you holding that sssssssnake?”

Szith gasped; the serpent whose tail was in her hand twisted around to hiss menacingly at her. She flung it away, hopping backward.

Her sword landed in a bush on the opposite side of the space, eliciting a yelp from Maureen, who stood uncomfortably close.

“Professor,” Ravana whispered, wide-eyed and trembling, “please unhand me.”

“Arachne won’t miss one,” Ekoi murmured, her tongue darting out to flick across Ravana’s cheek. She glanced slyly around the group. “Or four. Or five.”

“You unspeakable bloody idiots,” Addiwyn rasped. “I wish I had wanted to kill you!”

“How was I supposed to know!” Iris babbled. “It was supposed to be a fake perfume, how could it possibly—”

A sharp pop sounded, and suddenly the space was flooded with brilliant white light.

Professor Tellwyrn stood at the mouth of the nook, a blazing globe of light hovering over her head.

“Kaisa,” she said flatly, “what did I tell you about eating the students?”

Ekoi pouted, loosening her grip on Ravana. “I know, I know. Not until they graduate.”

“There is no circumstance in which you should be fondling one of your pupils quite that intimately, Kaisa. Step back.”

“Oh, pooh,” the kitsune said sullenly, abruptly shoving Ravana away. “You’re no fun.”

Ravana immediately skittered to the opposite side of the nook, pressing herself against the wall.

Tellwyrn turned her gaze on Addiwyn. “Miss Domingue, do I even need to say it?”

Iris gulped heavily, then lifted the doll to her face with a trembling hand. “R-release,” she whispered.

The entling grumbled softly, but lifted Addiwyn carefully from its mouth and set her feet down on the ground, then finally let go.

The freed elf instantly bolted away, zipping around to hide behind Professor Tellwyrn.

“Kaisa,” Tellwyrn said calmly, “I need to borrow these…delightful little scamps for a bit. Can you put that damned thing back the way it was? And perhaps return Addiwyn’s clothing to her room?”

“Can I?” Professor Ekoi asked, tilting her head inquisitively and peering upward as if in thought. “Why…yes, I do believe I can. Is that really the requisite question here, Arachne?”

Tellwyrn heaved a sigh. “Why do you insist on being difficult?”

“Why must the sun rise in the east? It’s just so arbitrary, don’t you think?”

“Ugh. Fine, go tell Stew to straighten all this up.”

“We weren’t going to hurt her,” Iris said tremulously. “It was just a—”

“Domingue,” Tellwyrn said flatly, “shut up.”

Another, louder pop echoed through the space, and suddenly Tellwyrn and all five students were gone.

The entling twisted in place, the clothes festooning its branches swaying, and let out a guttural mumble that sounded almost inquisitive.

Ekoi Kaisa examined it thoughtfully for a moment, then smiled. Humming to herself, she turned and strolled casually away, her bushy tail waving behind her.

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The entire sophomore class appeared in Tellwyrn’s dimly-lit office with a series of small pops, over the course of about five seconds.

“Dammit!” Ruda shouted after getting her bearings. “Can you not at least ask first, woman? What if somebody had been changing?”

“Someone was,” Toby exclaimed, feeling nervously at his clothes. “I don’t know whether I’m less or more disturbed to find myself fully dressed, now.”

“Wow, that’s really impressive,” Fross chimed. “That’s a whole order of magnitude more complex than a standard teleportation.”

“At least twice that,” Professor Tellwyrn said calmly. She was seated behind her desk as usual, framed by the unshuttered windows granting a view of the clear night sky. Only the small fairy lamp above the desk was active, leaving the room mostly in semi-darkness. “Based on my observations of you precious little buggers, I am playing a hunch. Mr. Arquin has just brought something rather unsettling to my attention which, at first glance, seems it should concern only himself and Juniper, but I have the most peculiar feeling I’m about to find that the lot of you will either become involved, or already are.”

“Peculiar feeling?” Juniper said nervously, hugging her jackalope to her chest. Jack hung with his back legs dangling, and to judge by the way he kicked and squirmed, wasn’t enjoying it. Being continually prodded about the head and neck with his antlers didn’t seem to discomfort the dryad. “About something unsettling involving Gabe and me? What’d I do?”

“It appears,” said Tellwyrn, staring at her, “there is a new dryad sniffing around Last Rock.”

“What?” Juniper squawked. “Which?”

“She said her name was Aspen,” said Gabriel.

“Oh!” Juniper brightened considerably. “That’s probably okay, then, she’s really nice.”

“June, I don’t know how to break this to you gently,” he said with a wince, “but she tried to kill me.”

“I’m guessing you talked to her first,” Trissiny said dryly.

Gabe shot her a long look, then sighed. “Look, I know when I’ve provoked someone, and I didn’t. I was very diplomatic. She came here looking for a fight.”

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Juniper whispered. Jack finally kicked free of her, and she had to lunge after him as he bounded for the door. It was closed, fortunately.

“I actually met Aspen once,” said Fross. “She seemed nice to me, but it was a brief sort of conversation. Why’d she try to kill you?”

“More important,” said Teal, “how did you get out of that situation? You’re obviously not killed, and I think we’d have noticed if somebody nearby had harmed a dryad.”

“I can’t take credit,” he said ruefully, rubbing at his neck with one hand. “This was on the Vidian temple grounds. Soon as she got her hand on my throat, the valkyries chased her off.”

There was a moment’s silence.

“There are valkyries around here?” Trissiny exclaimed.

Wordlessly, Gabriel and Tellwyrn both pointed at an empty space in front of the Vernis Vault with the music player on top. Everyone immediately shuffled back from it.

“There are usually several around the last few months,” Gabriel said. “They sorta rotate in and out; they’ve all got other things to do but it seems like they hang around me in their free time. This is Vestrel; she’s the only actually assigned to help me. She says hello.”

“Hi, Vestrel!” Fross chirped enthusiastially.

“Gods, please tell me I’m not the only one who doesn’t see anybody,” said Ruda.

“Valkyries don’t actually occupy the mortal plane,” Tellwyrn explained. “They can’t even be seen here except on Vidian holy ground and in places where the dimensional barriers have thinned. They also cannot interact physically with anything that’s not…out of place. Undead, ghosts, Vanislaad demons, things like that.”

“So, could they be present, say, around a fresh hellgate?” Ruda asked in an interested tone. “Cos I’ve gotta say, couple of those woulda been really useful this spring. What with tall, dark and creepy clearly hanging around anyway.”

“And incidentally,” Tellwyrn added with asperity, “this fact should not be mentioned in front of Aspen, should any of you find yourselves having a conversation with her. We’ve found one way of scaring her into behaving; she doesn’t need to know its limitations.”

“Why would a dryad be afraid of valkyries, though?” Juniper asked, frowning and stroking Jack’s fur. She had him settled in a more comfortable position in her arms. “Dryads are, like, the ultimate apex predator. Nothing is dangerous to us.”

“You’ve never met a dragon,” Tellwyrn remarked. “We can explore that another time.”

“Also, what’s a valkyrie?”

“If I may, Juniper?” the Professor said acidly.

“Sorry,” she mumbled, flushing.

“Aspen’s stated reason for being here, according to Mr. Arquin, is to look for you. She seems to be under the impression that you’re dead.”

Gabriel sighed, looking over at the others. In nearly perfect unison, most of them stiffened, eyes widening. Shaeine merely tilted her head, raising an eyebrow.

“And there it is,” Tellwyrn said with grim satisfaction. “The oh-so-familiar expression of a bunch of kids realizing exactly how they’ve screwed up. It would almost be satisfying if it weren’t going to result in a whole bunch of unnecessary hassle for me. See, I knew the lot of you were involved with this. All right, spit it out. Why is there a dryad poking around my University believing in Juniper’s alleged demise?”

“Well…” Juniper trailed off, gulped, and bent to set Jack on the floor. He immediately hopped off into a corner away from the group. “I think it’s because of what happened in the Crawl.”

She paused, watching Tellwyrn warily; the Professor simply raised an eyebrow.

“There was this…sort of…room. A complex of halls, more like. It was full of illusions that made us face…um, fears.”

Tellwyrn nodded. “Yes, I read Professor Ezzaniel’s report. That is why I wasn’t more irate at you getting rid of my incubus; I obviously can’t have him sending my students on detours that dramatic. Go on.”

“Well, I…” Juniper swallowed again, glancing at the others. Teal stepped over to squeeze her shoulder encouragingly. “I sort of had to…come to grips with…some stuff. I mean… Well…”

“I don’t need to interrogate you about your emerging conscience unless it’s immediately relevant to the issue,” Tellwyrn said. “You’ve been making positive progress in that regard, Juniper. Kindly skip to the non-stuttering part that explains this fresh brouhaha.”

Juniper sighed and nodded. “I was having trouble dealing with it, so… Shaeine helped me by invoking Themynra’s judgment, which was… Well, Themynra seemed not to condemn me. So I asked Trissiny to do the same thing. With Avei’s.”

Tellwyrn’s eyebrows slowly narrowed; her eyes thinned to slits behind her spectacles. “You didn’t.”

“She insisted,” said Trissiny, standing stiffly at attention.

“You do realize,” Tellwyrn said in a dangerously quiet tone, “that given the average dryad’s habits, that could very easily have resulted in your classmate’s death?”

“I knew the risks,” Juniper said hastily. “I asked her to, Professor. She didn’t want to.”

“Why is it,” Tellwyrn said, ignoring her, “that every time you fail to think something through, Avelea, you nearly end up getting somebody murdered?”

Trissiny flushed and lowered her eyes, offering no comment.

“All right, well,” Tellwyrn said after a moment. “Clearly Juniper’s not dead. Thanks for small blessings. But somehow your fellow dryads now think you are?”

“She…” Juniper paused, sighed, and squared her shoulders. “Avei cut me off from Naiya.”

“Bullshit. That would simply have killed you.”

“That’s what Elder Shiraki said,” she replied. “It wasn’t a complete severing, more of a block. It means…I don’t have Naiya’s protection anymore. Avei thought it would be an appropriate punishment to have me, you know, on my own in the world. I…don’t disagree.” She trailed off, looking at the floor. Toby stepped over to her other side, placing an arm around her shoulders.

Tellwyrn stared at them all in silence for a long moment, then removed her spectacles and carefully folded the earpieces, then set them on the desk. She leaned back, her chair squeaking as it partially reclined, and stared at the ceiling. “No matter how many times I tell you little bastards to think before you act, you continually plunge headfirst into the dumbest damn course of action you can come up with. Now, why is that? And more to the point, how long can this go on before you bring this whole bloody place down around our ears?”

“Asking what you’re talking about is just gonna get me called stupid again, isn’t it,” Ruda said sardonically.

Tellwyrn rubbed at her face with one hand. “During our impromptu class at the inn in Lor’naris, I spoke to you about the nature of the gods. The conditional nature of their agency, and how it is sometimes possible to subvert or manipulate them. Please tell me you remember that?”

“We do,” Shaeine said after a moment when nobody else spoke.

The Professor sighed. “Well, Miss Avelea, that’s what you just did to your goddess.”

“What?!” Trissiny exclaimed.

“The goddess of justice, invoked physically by her chosen Hand, and asked to render judgment on a complex moral case with far-reaching implications?” Tellwyrn shook her head. “She pretty much wasn’t able to refuse. Such judgments are a large part of what she is. And so, you basically coerced Avei the deity into doing something that Avei the mortal strategist of eight thousand years ago would’ve had the sense to not damn well do!”

“Hang on,” Gabriel protested. “I get how this leads to Aspen thinking Juniper’s dead, but isn’t it a little harsh to get on Avei’s case about it? Justice as an absolute concept has to be above the overreactions of random dryads.” Trissiny shot him a look that started out surprised and became grateful.

“I do not give a bowl of chilled rat’s ass consomme about Aspen, and neither does nor should Avei,” Tellwyrn snapped. “Juniper wasn’t cut off from Aspen, except perhaps incidentally. The issue here is Naiya. Naiya, who now thinks Juniper is dead, and either told Aspen about it or quite possibly sent her here to investigate. Please, please tell me I don’t have to spell this out any further? Can you kids not see the potential catastrophe unfolding here?”

“Um?” Juniper raised a hand. “Pardon me for interrupting your tirade, but people keep pointing out to me how Naiya is, uh…not terribly attentive. It’s not something I enjoy hearing but I don’t really have an argument against it, y’know?”

“Juniper,” Tellwyrn said in exasperation, “you know you’re an exceptional circumstance. And the rest of you frankly have no excuse for not having figured this out! Honestly, how many dryads have been sent to attend a school in all of history? How many have been permitted by the Empire to attend said school and move around Tiraan territory? You cannot possibly have failed to put together that Juniper has a higher degree of Naiya’s attention than most of her kind—or so I would have assumed, and yet, here we damn well are!”

“I hardly think that’s fair,” Shaeine said coolly. “Several of us are in unprecedented circumstances, in one way or another, and our interactions have been geared—quite deliberately by you, I might add—toward teaching us to work together more than to intellectually ponder one another’s origins.”

“Also,” Ruda added, “some of us are from places like the sea and deep underground and can reasonably be forgiven for knowing fuck all about fucking dryads.”

“Well, this is an argument we can have at length another time,” Tellwyrn began.

“Why is it the argument gets moved to another time when you’re losing it?” Trissiny demanded.

“Because I’m in charge, Avelea, and on a related note, shut up. Right now we have to deal with this dryad situation which you’ve created. Regardless of how dim it was or wasn’t for you to have helped get Juniper into this state, there is no good reason why I’m only hearing about it now. What you have done is potentially set Naiya and Avei on a course for direct conflict. There are a million possible ways this can play out, and you’d better believe I will be bending my energies toward making sure one of the relatively harmless options is what occurs, but the worst-case scenario is nothing less than the bloody Elder Wars revisited in miniature! Kids… If you have to fuck around with deities, will you at least tell me about it before I find myself with demigoddesses assaulting my students?!”

“I think she’s got us there, guys,” Fross said.

“Whose side are you on?” Ruda muttered.

“…there are sides?”

“All right, enough,” Tellwyrn said, putting her spectacles back on. “I’ve set up wards around Last Rock so I’ll know if and when Aspen returns. It’s not clear to me why she would be especially bothered by valkyries, so I can’t guess how frightened she was or how quickly she’ll come back, but it can be assumed she didn’t hike all the way here from the Deep Wild to be turned back at the first opposition.”

“Wait, when did you set up wards?” Gabriel demanded. “You’ve been sitting right here ever since I came and told you about this.”

Tellwyrn gave him a sardonic look.

“Yeah,” he said with a sigh, “I realized why it was dumb as soon as I said it.”

“Story of your life. Anyway, I’m not leaving it at that; too much potential for bystanders to be harmed. There are people moving about the periphery of the town much of the time, and while the wannabe adventurers can be annoying, I doubt most of them deserve to have a run-in with a pissy dryad. If all goes well, I should have Aspen in hand by morning.”

“She went off into the Golden Sea,” Gabriel said. “Gonna be hard to track her there. And by ‘hard’ I mean ‘technically impossible.’”

“You let me worry about that, Arquin.”

“Please don’t hurt Aspen,” Juniper said worriedly. “She’s really super nice. She’s just upset about me dying, I’m sure she doesn’t mean any harm.”

“She did try to kill me,” Gabriel pointed out.

“Oh, everyone tries to kill you,” Ruda said, grinning. “You’ve gotta stop taking these little things so personally, boy.”

He sneered at her; Trissiny patted him on the shoulder.

“It isn’t even a question of who deserves what degree of manhandling,” Tellwyrn said impatiently. “Harming a dryad is off the table, for reasons you all know very well. Odds are good I’m already on Naiya’s shit list, thanks to you brats. That’s just one of the things I will need to learn from Aspen as soon as I have her secured. But no, she will not be harmed in any way. This won’t be the first time I’ve had to take a dryad out of commission without ticking off her mother. It’s not terribly hard if you’re careful.”

“That seems even more ominous, somehow,” Juniper mumbled.

“Anyway, I will come get you as soon as I’ve got her,” Tellwyrn continued. “Obviously, hearing from you will be the first step in settling her down. I’m hoping a lot of this can be made to just go away once she understands you are alive.”

“And once she understand that, I’ll be wanting an apology,” Gabriel added.

“It is unlikely to be so simple,” Shaine pointed out. “We will then have to explain why Juniper appears dead to Naiya’s senses, which, as Professor Tellwyrn has said, could become complicated.”

“I assure you I’ll be getting information from Aspen before I give her any,” Tellwyrn said grimly. “But you’re right, Miss Awarrion. I can’t detain a dryad indefinitely—not safely, anyway, especially when her mother may already be tetchy about this. We’ll have to do something with her. And figuring out exactly what will have to wait until I know more about the situation.”

“So…what else do you need from us, then?” Trissiny asked.

“For now? That should be it. You can all go back to bed, or studying, or more likely wasting time. Whatever you were doing. Juniper, this is important enough that you may be excused from class to speak with Aspen when she’s available. Otherwise, you just keep the rest of your classmates informed, and I will notify you all if I need you for anything. Oh, and Mr. Arquin, you have handled all this rather well. Not that your role was particularly complex or challenging, but it’s pleasing to see you not buggering up a simple task.”

“Stop, I’m gonna blush,” he said flatly.

“All right, everybody be off,” said Tellwyrn, then paused, scowling at the far corner. “…except Juniper, who will be reporting to Stew for cleaning supplies and then back here to remove the essence of rabbit shit from my carpet.”

Self-doubt was a new sensation for Aspen, and she was not enjoying it.

It had been a long day of walking, followed by a stressed, sleepless night. Now, the sun had not yet arrived, but the sky was lightening and taking on the first reddish tinges in the east that signaled the rise of a new day. Aspen didn’t stop in her pacing to appreciate it, much as she hadn’t stopped to rest all night. She didn’t actually feel at all tired; her nerves were still too twinged by the encounter at the human temple.

Really, that was her own fault. She should’ve known better than to confront a human on holy ground. The magic of their gods wasn’t healthy for fairy kind. Still… A priest she could have handled. Those things, though. Nothing could have prepared her for those.

Well, she was gaining some insights into what had happened to Juniper. Not that she intended to stop until she’d found the Arachne and squeezed some answers out of her, but this was progress. If there were things like that around the human town where poor Juniper had been living, no wonder she’d come to grief.

Poor, silly little Juniper. It made Aspen furious even to think of. What must her brief time here have been like, if that was the kind of company she was forced to keep?

She turned and resumed her pacing. After several hours spent wandering aimlessly through the Sea, she’d settled down to a fairly limited spot and had been pacing like a restless lion. By this point she’d worn a track of mashed tallgrass and was simply stalking back and forth on that line.

How was she supposed to get past those things? The sheer horror of them made her shudder even in recollection. Nothing like that had ever existed in the Deep Wild. Surely they weren’t of human origin, for all that she’d found them in that human temple. The truly terrible thing had been the way she could feel them through attuning. Almost exactly like she could feel her sisters, except… Wrong. Backwards. Inverted.

Anti-dryads, that’s what they were, which made no sense. How could something like that even exist? And what were they doing with humans? If this was what humans were up to, the Arachne had been right. Somebody needed to start domesticating them. It seemed Aspen’s warnings had been both wrong and horribly right: Juniper’s mission had been very important, and she had surely come to grief from it.

Poor Juniper…

But what to do?

She reached the other end of her track and was about to turn around again when a face appeared suddenly in the tallgrass right in front of her.

Aspen yelped and hopped backward in surprise. It was a humanoid face—a woman, pretty, with lustrous black hair and almond-shaped eyes. She also had triangular fox ears, which Aspen was fairly sure humans were not supposed to. More to the point, now that she saw the fox-woman, she could feel the torrent of Naiya’s power rushing through her, which she had not sensed a second before. She’d either been hiding or had simply not been there before—which wasn’t too farfetched, considering how the Golden Sea behaved.

“Um,” Aspen said. “Hello?”

The woman smiled broadly, revealing excessively long canines. Aspen smiled tentatively back.

Then a hand flashed out of the tallgrass and slapped her hard across the face.

The dryad could only stare in shock, lifting her own fingers to probe at the four stinging scratches laid across her cheek by the woman’s wicked claws. They were already closing up, of course, but that had hurt.

“Tag!” the fox-woman chirped. “You’re it!”

Then, laughing brightly, she whirled and dashed off into the tallgrass, a bushy, white-tipped tail bobbing behind her.

Aspen let out a roar of fury and charged after her.

She kept a short distance behind her quarry, the laughing woman always just out of reach, so close Aspen could almost grab her tail. She would sprint ahead, then pause, turning to grin and wave until the dryad was nearly on her again, then dart off in another direction.

Despite the frustration of it, and the obvious fact that she was being toyed with, the chase very quickly started to clear her head. Weltering in uncertainty wasn’t good for her; a good chase, though, this she understood. A hunt was exactly what she needed.

At least, for the first few minutes. Quickly, the frustration started building, and the gap between her and the fox-woman grew wider and stayed wider. Was she getting slower? Surely not. She could go forever.

Aspen lunged through a dense stand of tallgrass stalks into a relatively cleared space and paused, looking around. She had been sure the woman was just ahead, but now she couldn’t see anybody. The sky was red with dawn; there was ample light to make out her environs even without borrowing night vision from one of the animals. There was just nobody here.

Then someone off to her left cleared their throat.

Aspen whirled, beholding the woman, who was wearing an ornate silk robe, sitting calmly in an ornately-carved wooden chair which had no business being out here on the prairie, sipping tea from a dainty porcelain cup. A second ago that spot had been empty.

“Good morning,” she said pleasantly. “Allow myself to introduce me: I am Ekoi Kaisa, and you are exceedingly disappointing. Really, is this the best you can do? This almost isn’t even fun.”

Aspen snarled and lunged forward.

Kaisa laughed and dived underneath her own chair in a whirl of silk and bushy tail. Aspen skidded to a stop right next to her and savagely kicked the chair aside.

It burst apart into a spray of blood red maple leaves, which swirled on the air, drifting into the tallgrass all around. Once again, there was no one and nothing else there.

“Stop doing that, you jackass!” Aspen raged, whirling and glaring around.

“Really, there is no need to be rude,” Kaisa said reprovingly from the other end of the clearing. “Just because you’re slow and clumsy doesn’t mean you need to be boorish.”

“I’m gonna chew your ears off!” Aspen yelled, charging at her. The giggling kitsune darted away into the tallgrass.

This time, she led the dryad on a straight dash, eschewing her zig-zagging pattern of before. Aspen growled as her legs pumped at their maximum speed, and even so, the fox-woman was pulling ahead slightly. The dryad, tasting bitter outrage in the back of her throat, tried to pour more energy into her run, but she simply hadn’t been designed for speed. She staggered to a halt, half-doubled over, feeling the ache in her joints.

“And by the way,” said her quarry from just ahead. Aspen lifted her eyes, glaring at the kitsune, who had folded her arms and was staring severely down at her. “What were you thinking, setting foot in a town as naked as a piglet? The disgrace.”

This was ridiculous. The woman was obviously a fairy. Fairies were supposed to respect dryads!

“Do you have any idea who I am?” Aspen demanded, straightening up.

“Why, yes!” Kaisa said with another fang-baring grin. “Your name is Aspen. You are belligerent, pushy, ill-mannered, slatternly and slow.”

Aspen roared in wordless fury and lunged at her again. Kaisa dashed away, cackling in delight.

The kitsune ducked to the side, hopping over a stand of tallgrass that made an impenetrable clump near the ground, passing through its less dense upper fronds with ease. Aspen tried to follow, and the grass stalks springing back from Kaisa’s passing smacked her in the face with the force of a punch. She landed hard on her rump, blinking stars out of her vision.

The vulpine face appeared in the tallgrass, grinning down at her. “I think we can add ‘dense’ to your resume. In both senses of the word.”

Scrambling to her feet, Aspen grabbed a handful of the thickest part of the tallgrass stand and ripped it bodily out of the ground, hurling the whole thing aside.

Kaisa blew her a kiss and darted off again, the dryad right on her heels.

Abruptly they burst out of the tallgrass entirely into a vast cleared space. She skidded to a halt, realizing belatedly that she was back in the environs of Last Rock. The buildings of the town were sprawled dead ahead; there was the huge shape of the mountain, blotting out the sky, and off to one side stood that odd flat temple where she’d run into the things.

In front of her, the fox woman had halted as well, turned to face her, and bowed politely. Straightening up, she waved. “Well, thank you for playing with me! Good-bye.”

“You’re not going anywhere!” Aspen snarled.

“That is correct,” Kaisa said equably.

Then, with a sharp little pop, the world disappeared.

Aspen was suddenly in a room. Square, not large, made of reddish bricks with heavy granite blocks reinforcing the corners and its sole doorframe. There were no windows; the illumination came from those artificial magic lights humans had started using recently. More slabs of granite made up the floor and ceiling. Additional panels of the smooth gray stone were set into the walls at intervals, engraved with glowing blue sigils.

She didn’t need that, or the prickly sensation on her skin of arcane magic at work, to know this was some kind of wizardry. Aspen had materialized three feet off the floor, and wasn’t falling. She kicked, reached for the floor and ceiling, and only succeeded in making herself spin impotently about in midair. Once she stopped flailing, the spell holding her up gradually returned her to an upright position. That was a small courtesy, at least.

When she got her hands on that stupid fox, she was gonna kill her in an unnecessarily messy fashion. For the first time, Aspen was starting to empathize with Larch.

Another little pop sounded, and she found herself face-to-face with the Arachne, who studied her grimly over the rims of her spectacles.

“Hello, Aspen.”

“…aw, crud,” she sighed.

“Well put,” the elf said dryly. “And thank you, Kaisa. That was very neatly done.”

The kitsune leaned out from behind the Arachne, grinning up at Aspen. “I hope you find something more interesting for me next time, Arachne. She’s not clever enough or powerful enough to have been any proper fun. Really, how disappointing. Dryads are such a let-down.”

“Perhaps I should introduce you to Jacaranda sometime,” Arachne said, raising an eyebrow, then turned her attention back to Aspen. “For now, though, you and I are going to have a chat, Aspen. Let’s begin with the matter of you laying your hands on one of my students.”

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8 – 3

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“I think he’s mellowing with age.”

“I don’t think that man is capable of mellowing, Ruda,” Toby disagreed. “I think we’re just getting used to him. Which…could be a good or a bad thing, depending on how you look at it.”

“What’s bad about getting used to things?” asked Teal.

He shrugged, pushing his teacup back and forth on the table. “I don’t know…just something about this place. In hindsight I can see the point of a lot of what Tellwyrn’s subjected us to, but on the other hand, I sometimes get the feeling the University is training us to cope with a certain kind of ridiculousness that just doesn’t occur anywhere else.”

Ruda laughed and added another splash of brandy to her “tea.” She’d been doing that after every sip and not refilling it from the pot; by this point she basically had a teacup full of brandy.

The cafeteria was open to students at all hours except during the night. There weren’t meals to be had except at mealtimes, but they could almost always find hot tea and cold pastries. It had long been a popular place for groups to study, between the plentiful table space and free food, though the library was enjoying a resurgence in popularity since Weaver had been replaced by the somewhat awkward but vastly more pleasant Crystal.

The newly-minted sophomores had stopped in to relax and swap stories of their various summers after their first class. Rafe, as per his pattern, hadn’t kept them long, using a tenth of the allotted class time to do little but say hello, strike a few poses and give an extremely brief description of the focus of this year’s alchemical studies.

“The unexpected and extreme can occur anywhere,” Sheaine said. “Perhaps we are better served by—”

She was interrupted by an enormous antlered hare, which bounded onto the table and snatched the half-eaten muffin from Gabriel’s plate. Gabe yelped in surprised, jerking backward so hard he nearly tipped his chair over.

“Jack, no!” Juniper exclaimed, lunging across the table to seize the animal, which kicked in her grasp. Teal grabbed the teapot, barely averting a disaster. “I’m so sorry, he’s not really used to indoors, yet. We’re working on his manners.” The dryad settled her pet back in her lap, soothingly stroking his fur. Only the antlers were visible over the edge of the table.

“Well, this is as good a time as any to ask,” Gabriel said, grimacing and pushing away the smashed remains of his muffin. “June, what is with the rabbit?”

“Actually he’s a jackalope!” Fross chimed. “Closely related to rabbits, as you can see, but a distinct species. They’re fey, rather magical; an actual rabbit’s neck wouldn’t support the weight of those horns very well.”

“They’re antlers, not horns, and it’s a druid thing,” Juniper explained. “Animal companions are a tradition of druidic practice.”

“They’re called ‘pets,’ and they’re a tradition everywhere,” Ruda observed.

“Well, yes, but I mean it’s a specific druidic practice. Several traditions of shamanism and witchcraft make use of animal familiars. It’s a way of…well, it’s kind of technical…”

“It involves imbuing an animal with a part of one’s essence!” Fross said brightly. “Thus creating a second point of observation which is capable of instigating the wave-function collapse which is at the heart of all magical action.”

“Wave…what?” Teal asked, mystified.

“That’s arcane theory, though,” said Gabriel. “Does it really apply to druidic or any fae arts?”

“Arcane physics is so called because it’s most easily investigated by use of arcane magic,” Fross explained. “The principles themselves apply to basically all magic equally. That’s why magical creatures are popular familiars. Actually, some witches use pixies, if they can! Pixies are hard to get, though, you usually have to go to the Pixie Queen’s grove to find any, and she’s not big on visitors.”

“That’s an interesting choice, Juno,” Trissiny said. “Aren’t jackalopes sort of…infamously ornery?”

“Well, he’s not a true familiar,” Juniper said somewhat defensively. “I’m not at that point, not nearly. Really, I’m just starting out. The Elders had me take care of an animal for somewhat more mundane reasons. It’s all about forming a bond with—”

She broke off, having to grab and subdue Jack again as he launched himself at Teal’s plate.

“Taking on a more challenging prospect can be a way to learn more swiftly,” Shaeine observed. Juniper was too busy wrangling the jackalope to respond; he didn’t seem as interested in settling down in her lap again this time.

“Hey, check this out,” Ruda said, craning her neck to peer past Toby at the glass front wall of the cafeteria. “It’s the freshmen!”

“There are an awful lot of them,” Teal remarked, turning to look.

“Twenty-two!” said Fross. “The student roster is posted in the library.”

“Twenty-two isn’t a large class at most schools,” Toby pointed out. “Though…compared to nine, I guess it is.”

“Why are they all boys?” Trissiny asked, her brows lowering.

“Oh, here we go,” Ruda muttered, rolling her eyes.

“The Class of 1183 has seventeen men and five women,” said Fross, “which is a seventy-seven percent gender imbalance, which is the same as the seventy-seven percent gender imbalance in our class skewing the opposite way. Actually those are rounded percentages and ours is just slightly greater, but you get the idea.”

“I didn’t know you could do that kind of math in your head,” said Teal. “Bravo!”

“It’s an important skill if you’re going to study arcane magic,” said Gabriel. “Which is why I really ought to work on that…”

“And I do it in my mind, not my head,” Fross clarified.

“Hey, wanna go say hi to the newbies?” suggested Ruda. “Look, they’re trooping toward the greenhouse. Already had Tellwyrn’s claws in them and are about to meet Rafe. Makes you feel sorry for the little darlings.”

“You mean, like how Natchua said hi to us between our first two classes?” Toby said, smiling faintly.

“Well, no,” Ruda replied. “Because we aren’t creepy and pathetic.”

Gabriel cleared his throat pointedly.

“I stand corrected,” she said, grinning. “Most of us aren’t creepy and pathetic.”

“Thank you,” he said with deep dignity. “I hate to fuss, but a fella likes to be acknowledged.”

“It’s a good idea, though,” said Trissiny, standing up. “Shall we?”

“Yeah, sure,” Gabriel replied, glancing down at his desecrated muffin. “I guess we’re pretty much done here.”

“It’s almost time to head to Yornhaldt’s class anyway,” Toby added, also rising. “C’mon, we can meet the freshmen on the way.”

“Well, a few of them,” said Ruda. “They mostly went past while you lot were jabbering.”

Indeed, most of the students had gone past by the time they emerged onto the lawn. The freshmen walked alone or in small groups, forming a staggered line; some turned to look at the emerging sophomores, a few slowing down to stare as they recognized Trissiny’s armor and put the rest together. Only the last cluster actually stopped, though. For whatever reason, the girls were walking along at the end, with only a couple of their male classmates.

“Mornin’, little lambs!” Ruda said cheerily. “How’re you settling in?”

“Well, thank you,” said the drow woman politely, then turned fully to Shaeine and bowed. Shaeine nodded deeply in reply.

“Teal, how lovely to see you again,” said a diminutive girl with waist-length blond hair, smiling brightly.

“Likewise, your Grace,” Teal said in a carefully neutral tone.

“Pshaw, let’s not fuss about that,” the girl replied, waving a hand airily. “We are all equals here, as Professor Tellwyrn has just emphasized at some length. Call me Ravana.”

“If you say so,” Teal replied evenly. Shaeine eased closer to her, moving her hand so that the backs of her knuckles brushed Teal’s.

“Can I ask a question?” said the gnomish woman timidly, raising a hand and peering up at Ruda. “Are you really a princess?”

“Only on my parents’ side,” Ruda said lightly. “C’mon, girl, project from the diaphragm! Are you actually raising your hand? Trust me, outside of Tellwyrn’s class, that’s not gonna do you any good.”

“Ruda, be nice,” Trissiny said reprovingly.

“I am being nice! It’s all about confidence, Boots. C’mon, let me hear you roar!”

The gnome’s eyes widened, and she began sidling behind a tall, dark-skinned girl in a white dress, who was gawking at Gabriel.

“Hmph.” The speaker, whose derisive snort seized everyone’s attention, was a plains elf incongruously dressed in a conservative, old-fashioned human style. “We are going to be late. Come along,” she ordered, grabbing one of the boys—also an elf—by the arm and dragging him off toward the greenhouse. He glanced back at them, smiling timidly and offering a small wave.

“Well, damn,” Ruda said, raising her eyebrows. “Who pissed in her oatmeal?”

“Oh, she’s just like that,” said the girl in white. “Are… You’re Gabriel Arquin, aren’t you? The new paladin!”

“Um…for whatever that’s worth, yes, that’s me,” he said, smiling somewhat awkwardly and settling a hand on the hilt of his sword.

“That’s amazing!” she gushed, eyes shining. “I mean… You’re amazing! To be a demonblood and get to… Augh, I’ve wanted to meet you ever since I heard and when I got accepted here I just, oh I can’t even think!”

“Oh, gods, don’t do that,” Ruda groaned. “He gets a big head over the slightest little thing.”

“And this is my fan club,” said Gabe, turning to Ruda and raising an eyebrow. “Not to worry, if my head starts needing the air let out, I can always count on you to fucking stab me!”

“And he carries a grudge like you wouldn’t believe,” Ruda added, winking. “Anyway, you don’t need me to stab you anymore, Arquin, since you seem determined to carry that thing around.”

“I’m getting better with it,” he said defensively, running a hand over the black sword’s hilt, almost as if he were petting it. “Anyhow, it seems like an appropriate thing to carry, me being a paladin now, and all.”

“You were given a divine weapon,” Trissiny pointed out.

“Yes, but it fits in my pocket,” he said, grinning. “The ancient elven sword is so much more impressive.”

“It’ll be real impressive when you hack your foot off,” said Ruda. “I dunno, Arquin, something about you with a sword will just never look right.”

“Hey,” he protested, “do I give you crap about the special lady in your life?”

“…I can’t even start to deal with all the shit that’s wrong in that sentence.”

The remaining male member of the freshman party stepped forward and bowed directly to Trissiny. “General Avelea, may I say it is an honor to be in your presence, and one I have eagerly anticipated since long before my arrival.”

“Oh,” she said, nonplussed, “that’s kind of you.”

“Forgive me,” the young man replied with a smile. “I should have introduced myself to begin with. I am Sekandar Aldarasi, prince of Calderaas.”

He was dressed casually, in a simple open-collared shirt with pressed slacks. The lack of regalia did not detract from his claim, however; the boy was every bit as good-looking as a prince from a fairy tale would be, and carried himself with the confidence of a man who knew it.

“Wait, prince?” said Fross. “I’m confused. Calderaas is an Imperial province, right? How do they have royalty?”

“Calderaas is one of the original provinces,” said Ravana. “The then-Sultanate of Calderaas formed the alliance with the city-states of the Tira Valley that became the Tiraan Empire. Several of those first provinces still have royal titles, though the rank of king, sultana or whatever is applicable is functionally the same as that of an appointed provincial governor.”

“As the Lady Madouri knows quite well,” said Sekandar, nodding to her with a smile which she returned. He turned back to Trissiny, bowing again. “If it is permissible, General, I would greatly appreciate the opportunity to speak with you further.”

“Of…course,” she said uncertainly.

“For now,” said Ravana, “I think we should all be moving along. It’ll make a poor impression on our professors if we are late on the first day.”

“I shall count the hours till we are together again, my lady!” Gabriel proclaimed grandly, bowing deeply to her and ignoring Ruda’s snort.

“Aren’t you a charming one,” Ravana said with a coquettish flutter of her lashes. “Come along, girls.” The girl in white looked to be on the verge of some kind of outburst, but swallowed heavily and followed meekly along after the much shorter blonde.

The sophomores watched their younger counterparts retreat into the greenhouse in bemused silence.

“Gabe,” Teal said tersely, “not to meddle in your love life, but… Not that one.”

“That’s right,” he said, turning to her. “She implied you know her?”

“I…” She stared after Ravana, expression unreadable. “…am aware of her.”

“So, this is a departure,” Toby commented, peering around at Professor Yornhaldt’s classroom as they wandered into their seats.

“I like it,” said Teal. “Doesn’t seem like his style, though…”

“I’m not sure he did it,” said Juniper, frowning and stroking Jack, who rested in her arms. “There’s a lot of magic at work here. Fae magic. Professor Yornhaldt is an arcanist.”

Most of the room’s accoutrements were the same, but it had gained a great deal of greenery over the summer. The back corners of the room contained artfully arranged clusters of potted ferns, which spilled out in a riot of leafy fronds. Other plants were placed strategically under the windows and along the walls, and in a huge, squat container on the dais itself was a small cherry tree, bursting with lovely pink blossoms, for all that it was completely the wrong season.

“So,” Ruda said, turning in her seat to leer at Trissiny. “That boy was crushing on you hard, General Shiny Boots.”

“What?” Trissiny demanded, her cheeks coloring slightly. “What boy? You mean Prince Sekandar? Nonsense.”

“Oh, come on,” she snorted. “’Such an honor to be in your presence, general.’ He was way into you.”

“You’re being ridiculous,” Trissiny snapped. “He was just showing respect to a Hand of Avei. I simply happened to be that Hand.”

“There were three paladins standing right there,” Teal pointed out with a smile. “One of whom is a lot more interesting, for being new and unprecedented in several ways. Not to mention foreign royalty, a demigoddess…”

“Hm, Gabriel the Unprecedented,” Gabe mused. “I like the way that rings. I should have business cards printed up.”

“Calderaas has been heavily Avenist for over a thousand years,” Trissiny said testily. “The old Sultanate was a matriarchy and a lot of its traditions are still alive. Naturally an Aldarasi prince would be more interested in a paladin of Avei.”

“One presumes,” Shaeine observed, “that a prince of any extraction would be sufficiently poised not to snub the other members of a party to whom he was introduced. Unless, of course, he were emotionally overwhelmed by, for example, meeting the object of his distant affections…”

“Not you, too!” Trissiny exclaimed. The drow smiled at her, with only the faintest hint of mischief.

“Yeah, that boy wants you bad,” said Ruda, grinning insanely. “Juno, back me up here!”

“Oh, I don’t like to spread other people’s business around,” the dryad demurred, scratching behind Jack’s antlers. “I can’t help picking up on people’s desires and inclinations, but there’s no reason anyone else should be privy to that information. Everyone’s privacy is important.”

“Thank you, Juniper,” Trissiny said stiffly.

“No dryad business, then,” said Ruda. “Just girl talk, based on what you saw.”

“Oh, just that? Then yeah, he was totally into you.”

“Good morning, class.”

Several of them jumped, all whirling to stare at the dais. No one had seen her enter, but a woman now stood there, beneath the cherry blossoms, smiling mysteriously up at them. She was slender, with luxuriant black hair, almond-shaped eyes and vulpine features, and dressed in a sleek silk robe in dark green with a subtle pattern of white ferns around the hem and cuffs.

Most eye-catchingly, triangular ears, covered in reddish fur, poked up through her hair. A bushy tail extended from behind her, through some apparent opening in her robe, also dusky red and tipped in white. It twitched twice as they stared at her in shocked silence.

The doors of the classroom were infamously squeaky, and were easily within their frame of view. She had not come in that way.

“Let us begin by attending to the obvious, shall we?” said the fox-woman, still with that enigmatic smile. “Professor Yornhaldt is taking an unexpected sabbatical for this semester. I am assuming his duties in the classroom. I am Professor Ekoi, interim teacher of magical arts.” She bowed gracefully, her ears twitching. “And of course, I know each of you by description, and by reputation. You created quite the stir on this campus at the end of the spring term, did you not?

“It is my understanding that last year, you explored the basics of magic—what it is, and how it is used. In my class, you will be learning more specific, more practical things pertaining to that same basic school of thought. We will be examining each of the four common systems of magic, as well as the few which lie outside such classifications, with regard to their actual use. It should be your goal to learn to identify magical objects, creatures, spells and attacks, and understand how each should be dealt with. In short, you have absorbed sufficient theory that you can now begin learning facts. And, more importantly, strategies. You have a question, Mr. Arquin?”

“Yeah,” Gabriel said, lowering his hand. “Um, what exactly are you?”

Professor Ekoi gazed up at him placidly, in silence, until he shifted uncomfortably in his seat and opened his mouth to speak again.

Suddenly she flicked her wrist, and a folded hand fan slipped out of the wide sleeve of her robe, landing neatly in her grip. She swirled it open, covering her face below the eyes and revealing its pattern of calligraphy in a language that wasn’t familiar to them. Then, in a very disorienting spectacle, she twirled the fan in a full circle. It did not visibly grow, and yet it somehow concealed all of her body in passing—and she did not reappear when it moved on. The fan whirled in a complete arc and then vanished into its own center, like water swirling down a drain, leaving nothing behind.

The students gaped down at the empty dais.

“Um,” said Gabriel, “I didn’t mean to yipe!”

“There is endless variety in this world, Mr. Arquin,” Professor Ekoi murmured from right behind him, close enough that he could feel her breath. He could also feel the tips of her sharp nails, resting against his throat. Trissiny half-rose, gripping the hilt of her sword, but made no further movements as the professor continued. “People of every conceivable belief, origin and description. If you are privileged to lead a long life, and to explore the world in all its beauty, you shall come to know the grand diversity of its inhabitants—provided you possess the sense to absorb what you are shown. And you will find, Mr. Arquin, that none of these people enjoy being referred to as a what.”

He hissed softly as the tips of her claws—and those were clearly not just nails—pricked his skin. Five tiny points of blood welled up.

Before he could react physically, she was gone.

And then the professor stepped out from behind the cherry tree, down on the dais. “Except,” she said pleasantly, “for individuals in certain…specialty social clubs one tends to find in the major cities, which you are unlikely to enter or even discover without a specific invitation. For now, we should focus our attention upon the study of magic, children. Now, let us begin.”

Walter tromped through the tallgrass back toward the homestead, four hares strung on the rope thrown over his shoulder. It was early, not even noon yet, but he’d had the luckiest morning of hunting in a good long while, solid enough that he could justify taking the afternoon off. Ma would be happy enough with the meat he brought in to let him go without a fuss…probably. He had his bow in one hand, quiver hanging at his hip—he had a wand, of course, but that was for emergency use against any predators he happened to encounter. Lightning had a bad effect on game. All in all, he was in a great mood, whistling as he walked.

As such, he wasn’t paying terribly close attention, lost in his thoughts, and didn’t spot the other person coming toward him until Smitty barked. The hound was staring, on point but not growling, meaning he didn’t sense a threat. That was generally good enough for Walter; he found dogs were the best judges of character.

Then the individual coming toward him through the tallgrass pushed aside a particularly dense clump, coming fully into view, and he froze, almost dropping his bow and hares.

She was a girl, looking to be about his age, maybe a few years older, and stunningly beautiful in a way he only saw in magazine illustrations and never before on an actual woman. Also, she had pale green hair and was stark naked. He’d have been hard pressed to say which of those traits commanded more of his attention.

“Hello!” the nude girl said brightly.

“Uh… H-hi,” Walter choked out, then swallowed, struggling valiantly to keep his eyes on her face, a battle he knew he was doomed to lose. Not that it wasn’t a gorgeous face, but she also had gorgeous breasts, and he’d never actually seen… He gulped again, trying desperately to maintain an even keel. “Um, can I…help you with something, miss?”

She tilted her head to one side as if thinking, and suddenly frowned. “Maybe. Did you kill my sister?”

That made even less sense to Walter than her appearance and manner, but luckily he had a ready and truthful answer to it. “No, ma’am, I didn’t.”

“Oh, okay, then,” she said, that dazzling smile returning. “Maybe you can give me directions! Am I still headed toward Last Rock? Is it close?”

Last Rock. It figured. Ma always said the only downside of living out here was the proximity to that place.

“You’re headin’ the right way,” he said, looking at her chest again in spite of himself. “It’s about thirty miles on. Careful not to stray too far north or you’ll be in the Golden Sea.”

“Oh, I know all about that,” she said dismissively, taking a step closer.

Smitty whined, and instantly Walter was on full alert. The hound pressed hard against his leg, clearly frightened. His teenage hormones were telling him one thing, but the dog told him something very different—and he knew quite well which was more trustworthy.

“Since you offered to help, though,” she said, licking her lips and smiling broadly, “I’m kinda hungry. Can I have a couple of your rabbits?”

“Oh,” he said, easing backward from her. “I, uh…” It had been a lucky morning, true, and he had ample time to go back out and hunt more… But this was a significant amount of good meat, not to mention what the pelts would sell for.

“Don’t worry, I’d make it worth your while,” the girl promised, stepping forward again, her smile widening. “Would you like to have sex?”

He very nearly exploded on the spot. Ma was forever going on about how boys his age had exactly one thing on their minds, and to be truthful, that thing was very much on his mind right now. Meeting a nude beauty in the tallgrass and receiving such an offer…this was a situation straight out of some of his more absurd fantasies.

But Smitty wasn’t the only one whose instincts were jangling, now. Walter had looked into the eyes of predators before.

“Tell ya what,” he said carefully. With the slow, even movements he knew wouldn’t startle or provoke a wild animal, he pulled the string of hares from his shoulder and held it out toward her. “You just help yourself, my treat. I’ve gotta get home.”

“Aw, you sure?” she said, pouting slightly even as she took the hares. Her warm brown eyes flicked up and down his body, making his pulse accelerate. “I wasn’t just offering a trade. I think it’d be swell to stop and make love. Don’t you?”

Walter had to gulp twice before he could speak again. That would be swell. But Ma, it seemed, wasn’t wrong about everything; the very, very bad feeling he had about this was more powerful than lust. Her knowing smirk widened, almost as if she could tell what he was thinking. Maisie Taathir down at the trading post sometimes gave him that impression, especially when she caught him sneaking a peek at her bum, but…not like this.

“I really have to go,” he repeated. Smitty whined again.

“Okay, then,” she said with a shrug that did extremely interesting things to her chest.

Walter tipped his hat to her, backed up a few steps, then half-turned to set off in a wide arc around her, keeping her in his peripheral view.

As he watched, she licked her lips again, then calmly ripped a leg off one of the hares and bit into it, fur and all. Bone crunched audibly and she made a soft sound of approval.

He didn’t walk backward, but kept going in the slightly wrong direction at an angle until a more comfortable distance had stretched out between them. Even then, Walter very carefully kept his pace measured as he and Smitty left the girl behind.

It was, as he knew very well, a bad idea to run from a predator.

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