“As my father abandoned my mother and me,” he said, clipped, probably through gritted teeth, “I would think it’s self-evident why I hold the views I do.”
She had to apologize. “Omnimancer?—”
“And while we’re on the subject of things that should be self-evident: Just because Wizard Garrett pats you on the head and says he sees things your way, it doesn’t necessarily mean he really does.”
They finished the prep in silence. It was five-ten when he cast the last of a dozen spells the brew required—too many for her to do on her own—and turned to the detested end-of-day routine.
As he checked through her hair, she squeezed her eyes shut and hoped he wouldn’t say anything except, “Now you may go.” But her luck was as good as usual.
“What would you do with a university degree?” he asked.
She swallowed, throat dry. “Research.”
“To lower the rate women die in childbirth?”
“Yes,” she stuttered, taken aback. He’d correctly guessed what she’d told nobody—not even Ella—and had never once dreamed of while sleeping, if many times while awake.
“You’d need a graduate degree at the very least.”
“Yes,” she admitted.
“If you start saving now, you might be done just in time to retire.”
Her “yes” was more sigh than word. It wasn’t as if this hadn’t occurred to her.
“So you’re giving up and trying for marriage instead,” he said, circling back.
She lifted her chin. “I’m not giving up.”
“You’d better find out what Wizard Garrett thinks of that, then.”
He meant it to rankle. And it did.
“Good-bye, Miss Harper,” he called after her as she stalked out of the brewing room. “Have fun railing against the magiocracy at your sister’s conference.”
Good heavens, the conference. He was so distracting that she’d momentarily forgotten, after helping plan it for months and months, that the event started tomorrow. It was hard to concentrate on anything but him after yet another day of repeated explosions. What horror was she helping him accomplish?
She had to redouble her efforts to pass some scrap of information to Theo, even if it meant she did nothing but choke on pomegranate the whole way home. Maybe some detail would fly off her tongue. Maybe this time she could force her hand to write a note. Maybe, by watching her fail and fail and fail again, he would realize the compulsion she was under.
But as she crossed into the woods, she discovered he wasn’t there at all.
She lingered for a moment. Finally she set off alone, realizing he must be detained at work but unable to prevent herself from feeling disappointed and uneasy. After nearly five weeks of finding Theo waiting for her, morning and late afternoon, she had come to rely on it.
She was halfway home when she heard the cracking of twigs breaking underneath running feet. Not from behind, though. From Cedarlawn. Lydia came crashing into view, the bottom inch of her dress caked with mud.
“Bee!” she cried. “Bee, the hotel claims we booked them fornextweekend, not this one!”
CHAPTER 20
Fury and panic made Lydia communicate more clearly rather than less. In a few moments Beatrix understood what had happened, if not how.
Rosemarie and Lydia, in Baltimore to check on the motley crew of caterers, stopped by the Key Hotel and were met with befuddled looks when they asked if everything was set for the weekend. The hotel’s copy of their contract had the dates as October 17th and 18th, rather than the 10th and 11th. The League’scopy of the contract, it transpired,alsoshowed October 17th and 18th, even though Lydia, Rosemarie, treasurer Meg Wallace and Beatrix had all been present when the contracts were signed and each was certain the dates had been correct at the time.
“And now the Key says it’s booked solid this weekend, hotel rooms and ballrooms, and can’t possibly accommodate us!” Lydia said, hand-in-hand with Beatrix not for comfortbut to drag her along at a breakneck pace back home. “Youknowthis wasn’t our mistake. Remember the owner made a joke about how Kirkpatrick Day weekend was an ironic time for an ‘anti-wizard party’?”
“Yes,” said Beatrix, dodging a sapling. She hadn’t liked the man, but she’d laughed, because he was right—Kirkpatrick being the country’s first wizard president.
“But how canthis have been done?” Lydia asked.
