“Not exactly, no.” I took a sip of the hot, spiced wine. I shivered with appreciation as warmth spread through my body, at least partly from a potion additive in the drink. I hadn’t fully realized how cold I was, but now I huddled gratefully around Luc’s drink. “But you did an amazing job, you and Mir.” I motioned over the cemetery. “It’s absolutely perfect.”
Luc smiled, and I raised the mug he’d given me.
“This is lovely, too,” I added. “Thank you.” I shivered as I looked up at the dark sky. “It looks like it might actually snow.”
The cemetery lived on a steep, tree-dotted hill, not far from Devil’s Fall, in the same broader park northwest of town. When we’d first got there, not having visited a Magique cemetery before, I hadn’t been able to tell which parts had been altered by my friends. The tombstones all appeared hauntingly lifelike, and were often carved in the shape of the deceased, or sometimes their primals. Only a handful depicted other things, including an elaborate lineage tree I examined over a family grave.
More startling than the carvings, a lot of the headstones were spelled to interact magically with visitors. Some recited poems, some talked interactively for a few minutes, a few even played instruments or sang. One I stopped near emitted a lifelike apparition of the deceased who gave a long speech about the importance of the magical sciences and advocated for constant innovation in all disciplines.
Luc and Jolie explained that, given this was Bonescastle, a lot of famous researchers, writers, teachers, and artists had been buried here.
But, despite the city’s name, none carrying the Bones name were interred here. Nyx said they had a family cemetery on the grounds of their main estate, an enormous castle with an actual moat, which everyone called the Black Tower.
“Not at all ominous-sounding,” Draken had scoffed.
“I more think it’s weird they didn’t name their castle Bones-anything,” Miranda commented. “Isn’t that their thing? To name everything after themselves? Why isn’t it Bone Tower, or Tower of Bones, or something like that?”
I couldn’t help agreeing with both observations.
But thinking about Bones,anyBones, even dead, non-maddeningly alive and impossible to comprehend Magicals with that name, wasn’t something I really wanted to do right then.
“Are you okay?” Luc asked, quieter.
When I glanced over, I saw him studying my face.
The scrutiny there made me look away.
“How are the Offensive and Defensive Magic sessions going?” he asked, his voice neutral. “You had one today, didn’t you?”
I hesitated, considered lying, then, for some reason, didn’t.
“We fought pretty much the entire time,” I confessed. “It was a bit more exhausting and vicious than usual.”
Luc quirked an eyebrow. “You and Bones?”
I nodded.
Luc swallowed a mouthful of wine as he studied my face. “Aren’t you supposed to be doing that? That’s generally the idea of those sessions, isn’t it? I’d assumed they’d get more intense as you progressed.”
I exhaled, holding my own mug with both hands and inhaling the scent of cinnamon and cloves. “Well, in theory, yes,” I acknowledged. “But in this case, I meant arguing more than sparring. We spent a good chunk of the session arguing during the talking part of things.”
“Talking” was a generous way to describe any part of what we’d been doing.
Luc’s eyebrow rose higher, but I saw a faint quirk reach his lips.
“Any particular reason?” he asked.
“Other than him being a maddening, deliberately cryptic, and lying prat?” I asked, letting annoyance seep into my words. “Not really, no. Do I need a specific reason?”
Luc grunted.
“I suppose not,” he said, still watching me. “Do you want to talk about it?”
Remembering the conversation that had so incensed me, I immediately wondered why I was telling Luc any of this. It’s not like I could share the details of what we’d been arguing about. Not that I was entirely surewhatwe’d been arguing about, other than his stubborn refusal to admit what he’d done the night of my birthday, much less apologize for it.
Not only had henotbeen apologetic, he’d had the unbelievable gall to be angry at me.
He insisted I’d never shown up at his place, that he’d waited for me, that he’d stayed up late waiting for me, until he’d eventually given up and gone to bed. He couldn’t even tell me what the broadcast had been about, since, according to him, he’d never bothered to listen to it. When I asked him why not, he just repeated what he’d said the other day, that he never listened to the Priest’s broadcasts, and only intended to that night because he’d thoughtIwould want to hear it.
