“Omnimancer Blackwell is my employer,” she said. “I’m restocking the brewing room on his orders.”
This information came as a surprise, if his raised eyebrows were any indication. She opened her bag to show him the ingredients inside. “Nothing alarming—am I free to pass?”
“All right, Miss ...?”
“Harper,” she said—and watched those dark-brown eyes widen and his mouth fall open. “Good day,” she said, hurrying through the door before he could ask what her connection was totheMiss Harper.
She passed by the receiving room—door shut tight—and unloaded the shopping in the brewing room. Then, overcome with curiosity, she pressed an ear against the connecting wall in hopes of finding out why an important-looking member of the armed forces was paying a call on Blackwell.
She couldn’t hear a thing. Not stray words, not a hum of background noise, nothing. Magic, clearly. Ah well.
She glanced about for the brewing guide to take another look at the recipes Blackwell intended to follow. She found it on the preparation table, sitting next to a textbook entitledBrexton Casting Level 1: Starter Spells. What on earth would he need that for? She almost picked it up to see before recollecting herself. Classified.
Utterly maddening.
The risk of anyone catching her was low, but she resisted the impulse and re-read the brewing recipes instead. Then she gathered what she hoped were the proper tools. Whatproved hardest to find was the timer, an ornate double-clock specimen lying upside down in the highest cabinet, and she had just set it on the table when she heard the receiving-room door creak open.
“—expected of you.” A deep voice. The officer’s, obviously. Hard to tell whether he was angry or simply driving a point home.
“I’m doing what I must.” Blackwell, sounding weary. “Good-bye, General.”
Beatrix peeked into the hallway in time to see the front door close behind the man. She retreated, disquieted, before Blackwell could see her. That snippet of conversation made it sound as if he had been sent here on an assignment and the general stopped by to get a report. What if Lydia and Rosemarie were right?
No. Ageneralwouldn’t be running an anti-League campaign. The armed forces were the last bastion of federal power where wizards held relatively few positions of authority, and besides—surely they would judge a colonel or major sufficient against a monstrous regiment of women. Not to mention that they wouldn’t show up in broad daylight and blow Blackwell’s cover.
Speak of the devil: Blackwell swept into the room as if nothing unusual had just happened.
“Ready, Miss Harper? Ah—you certainly are,” he said, catching sight of the table. “Good. Hand me your old dress, will you?”
She watched with the familiar mix of anticipation and vexation as he plucked half-a-dozen leaves from one of hismany pockets and murmured several spellwords. The dress expanded and contracted in his grasp, as if an invisible, out-of-breath woman had just slipped it on.
Then it split down the front—from the high neckline all the way to the ankle-length skirt. The lace at the bodice pulled free and fell in a heap on the floor. The leg-of-mutton puffed sleeves, fashionable when it had been her mother’s dress but long since out of style, sucked in to form a sleek line from shoulder to wrist. The fabric hiccupped six times in quick succession, popping out pockets.
She leaned on the table for support. “You’ve made me a wizard’s coat.”
“Not yet—it needs to have a few spells worked into the fabric. Then it’ll be just the thing for protecting your clothing while you’re brewing.”
He extracted several more leaves, laid the dress-turned-duster flat on the floor and ran his hands over it, muttering more words of power as he went. Flipping the coat over, he repeated the procedure.
“Voilà,” he said, standing and holding it open for her.
She slipped her arms into it and ran a hand down one sleeve. It felt—there was no other word for it—alive. She had to suppress the urge to spin around in it like a six-year-old.
“Thank you,” she said, suspecting he could hear the emotion clogging her throat.
“Button up, wash your hands and let’s begin. Have you prepared a pomegranate before?”
“Never.”
“Your time has come.” He handed her a long knife. “Just score the skin—don’t cut all the way through.”
She managed that without incident, breaking the fruit apart the way the manual suggested. The diagram did not do the insides justice. The ruby-red pips—seeds surrounded by juice sacs—practically glowed.
“They’re beautiful,” she murmured.
“Yes, but more work to juice than an orange. It’s fortunate we have two mortars and pestles to speed up the process.”
She picked out a large handful of pips and handed him the fruit so he could do the same. For a minute they crushed in silence. Then she caught his expression. “Is something wrong?”
