It hovered there in the center of the stage, catching the lights.
Madame Giroux stood in the threshold, eyes thinned to slits beneath her half-moon glasses. She leaned heavily against her wolf’s head cane. Her mouth moved with music, soundless.
Madame had a cat’s countenance and a gift for silence, even in song. Magic did not need volume or vibrato; it needed practice and an open mind. Anyone could do magic if they had the pitch and the focus and knew the melody. But not everyone could be a magician. While there were magicians in taverns and carnivals and every rich man’s hall, it was a dangerous undertaking. As with all art, talent was not spread evenly. One might be good enough to sing shifting shades of light on a street corner and still be unable to weave an illusion deftly enough to hold the attention of a tavern. There was little unity between mages. The failure of one meant the success of another, which bred contempt as they became more adept. The higher the court, the more the mage had to work and sweat and bleed to get there.
And the King’s Mage was the highest one could go. Once every seven years, a mage had the chance to be known as the greatest in the world. It was more than prestige. There was power in it. Doors opened to the whole world, if the mage wanted. There was no more competing for the limited spaces in which a mage could earn a living. It was everything, a guarantee of a good life, a great life.
But it was not without risk. Magic required perfect technique and absolute precision. Few were brave enough to perform without schooling. Fewer still underwent the preparations for L’Opéra du Magician. It took years of training, and more magicians seemed to lose themselves each season.
Selene couldn’t be good. She had to be the best. The audience expected grandeur, each competition bigger than the last.
And Selene would give them that, if she made it through the auditions.
All the fire left Selene, replaced by fear. Like Priya, Selene had broken the rules. Priya may have brought in a mirror, but Selene had harmed a fellow magician. Art was not a weapon. It was a soul laid bare, an expression of beauty and pain and all the loveliest things. It was never supposed to be used in violence.
Madame’s melody changed, barely audible over Selene’s furious heart.
The mirror shattered. Not shards or pieces, but a shimmering powder that drifted down and settled into the cracks of the stage like glittering ash.
“Can you still sing?” Madame looked directly at Priya, her eyes as severe as her voice.
Priya pressed her fingers to the back of her head. They came back slick with blood. Her hand trembled. She clenched it into a fist. “Yes, Madame.”
“My office,” Madame said. “When the auditions are finished.”
“And what about her?” Priya’s look of vindication slipped from her face like a mask. “She could have killed me.”
Selene braced herself. There was no way she’d be allowed to compete now. Her stomach dropped like a stone. Priya had gotten exactly what she wanted.
Madame’s gaze settled on Selene. “You were warming up your voice.”
Selene swallowed hard, not letting any emotion show. “Yes, Madame.”
“Magic has its risks.” Madame Giroux stood very still.
Priya looked like she’d bitten into a lemon. “That’s not—”
“Enough.” Madame struck her cane against the stage.
Selene kept her breath even, her features empty of guilt or surprise. She’d accept this mercy from Madame Giroux. Gigi struggled up from the floor and Selene rushed over to give her a hand. She tried not to think of what she’d seen in the mirror and how Priya would make her pay for this later.
The door opened behind her. The rest of the students filled in the spaces between Priya, Selene, and Gigi. Benson took his place beside Gigi, catching her fingers in his. He looked to Selene.
“You look like you saw a ghost.”
As usual, Benson was impeccably dressed. His clothes were tailored and pressed, hitting all the right lines and angles. Except for the ankles. He’d gained inches over the last few months, and there wasn’t any hem left to be let out from his trousers. People in the opera house regarded him with fluttering lashes and bedroom eyes, as if the inches made him a new man. But he was still Benson. All Selene saw was the boy who flooded the practice rooms when he first learned how to sing for water. Who cried when he learned that meat came from things that had once been alive. Who still tore the crusts off his sandwiches because he swore they tasted better that way. She’d vowed never to let childhood friendship turn into something more. She’d never be that foolish again.
Gigi was not afraid of those feelings. She’d loved Benson since he was spindly and strange. She’d finally gathered the courage to tell him a few months ago. He loved her, too. Selene had volleyed their affections back and forth as a confidant for both, never knowing if it was the right thing to encourage them into each other’s arms or encourage them to let those feelings die. The rules for the King’s Mage were clear: your first loyalty belonged to the king. Marriage was banned. And though discreet romantic entanglements were ignored, the kind of love that both Gigi and Benson had would not be allowed. If either of them were to win, they’d have to put their feelings aside for the next seven years.
Still, Benson pressed his lips to her forehead. The pain in Gigi’s face dissipated.
Selene made her face as smooth as glass, flattening out every ripple of emotion.
Benson raised an eyebrow, his mouth quirking into half a smile. “You know that trick doesn’t work on me.”
Selene thought of those pale blue eyes from the mirror, like sapphires set in silver. Perhaps she could write that off as a trick of the light.
“She used magic against Priya.” Gigi spoke barely above a whisper.
