I turned back to Miss Hammersley. “So don’t allow yourself to worry about anything else. Right now, I want you to hold just one thing in your head: how desperately you want to be a magician...
“...Because you do, don’t you?”
“More than anything in the world.” Her voice was ragged with emotion. A sigh of empathy rippled through her classmates as she spoke, all of them leaning even closer.
“Then hold that in your head. Don’t even think about the words or what they might mean. Just think about whatthismeans to you, now: standing here, beginning your training amongst your peers.” I gestured to the eight young women around us. “By the end of your four years here, I can promise you that the nine of you will have formed a bond that will be nigh-on unbreakable. And when women work together...” I let my gaze drift to the watching Boudiccate inspectors. My smile turned rueful as I nodded discreetly to them. “Weallknow what national wonders they can work.”
Lady Cosgrave’s eyes narrowed. Annabel Renwick looked sour, while Miss Fennell looked pleased. Mr. Westgate looked stoically unmoved as usual...
And Miss Hammersley’s voice rolled through the room, firmly and clearly reading every word of the spell—with the full force of her impressive willpower behind it.
Thatwas exactly what she needed.
Glorious, celebratory bells suddenly rang through the air, sending students and inspectors jumping in their seats. The invisible bells chimed rich and resonant around us, so loud and overwhelming that they almost drowned out the cries of surprise and laughter and delight that sounded throughout the whole class in response...
And tears of pride sprang to my eyes, mirroring the sparkling drops that rolled down Miss Hammersley’s freckled cheeks as her own glorious and strong magic sang out in those bells, filling the room with music and power.
She read the entire spell from beginning to end without faltering even once.
“Andthat,” I said, as the final echoes faded into a wonderstruck hush, “is what I want every one of you to remember over your next four years here. We will work on the intricacies of control. You will struggle to master every complexity that our vocation has to offer. You will memorize more finicky details than you can yet imagine...but at its essence?Thisis what magic requires, more than anything else: pure willpower and determination.
“And Iknowthat every single one of you is capable of it.
“Now...” I plucked a well-worn book from a different table as Miss Hammersley strode back to her seat, her eyes shining and pride emanating from her like a visible sheen. “Let’s go back and start from the very beginning to see exactly how a competent spell is crafted.”
The basics could never be as exciting as a spell from a third-year textbook. But the glow of Miss Hammersley’s triumph illuminated every student in her class. At the end of the hour, when they flooded out of the room for their first outdoor lesson in weather wizardry, their enthusiastic voices rose in an honor guard around her, carrying her at their center through the door.
I wouldneverallow any scholarship students to be treated with less than full respect and collegiality at my school...and while Miss Hammersley might not yet have an alibi for the night before, my experiment had revealed one essential trust. No one who was only pretending to desire magic could have successfully cast that spell in that context, following those specific instructions.
If she was a spy for the Boudiccate, I would eat every one of my spellbooks—even the unforgivably ill-informed ones. But I didn’t believe it would ever come to that.
I was smiling as I looked back from the now-empty doorway. The Boudiccate’s inspectors, however, were not.
“Well!” said Annabel Renwick, shaking out the flowing skirts of her fey-silk gown as she rose to her feet. “You’re still willing to risk anything and anyone to prove a point, aren’t you? I should have thought you’d be a bit more careful when it comes to your students’ welfare rather than your own.”
“I beg your pardon?” A disbelieving crack of laughter fell out of my mouth before I could stop it. “How do you imagine I’ve put any of them in danger?”
Her upper lip curled as she studied me. “I seem to recall a certain arrogant woman magician losing all of her own magic—and nearly her life as well—whensheattempted a spell far beyond her own abilities. To set a third-year exercise as a first spell for one of your own students now...”
I didn’t even attempt to restrain my eye-roll at that nonsense. “You may ask Mr. Westgate, if you like, how muchdangerI put Miss Hammersley in with that spell.”
“None whatsoever,” Mr. Westgate said curtly. “If she hadn’t harnessed the willpower for that one, it simply wouldn’t have had any effect. It’s an entirely harmless exercise...as any graduate of the Great Library would know.” He pointedly refused to meet my gaze as he rapped out his next question: “Where exactly is this next class being held?”
“In the courtyard just by Mr. Luton’s cottage,” I told him.
“Fine.” He jerked a dismissive nod, still not meeting my gaze, and strode out of the room for the next inspection.
“Ah, young Luton. Poor, poor Delilah’s nephew.” Annabel sighed and shook her head as she swept past me. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised by now at your...unusual taste in staff members.”
“I suppose not,” I agreed with outward amiability.
Unease slithered beneath my skin, though, as I watched her leave. If she was only disparaging me with that barb, I could endure it well enough; but if she’d somehow ferreted out any dangerous hints of my housekeeper’s fey background and thought to make some mischief with it...
“Miss Harwood,” said Lady Cosgrave, “a word, if you please.”
“Of course.” I snapped my attention back to the space in front of me, where Lady Cosgrave waited with her young cousin and protégée, Miss Fennell, standing rigid and expressionless by her side.
I’d only met Miss Fennell a few months ago through her secret fiancée, but Lady Cosgrave had been one of the prominent figures of my youth. Fashionable, charming, and quick-thinking, she had been twenty years younger than my own mother, but the two of them had been on sociable terms even before she and Amy had formed a close friendship of their own. She and I had never had a personal relationship, but I’d always felt at ease in her company...until now.
