She flashed him a wide smile. “I think you mean irresistible.” She picked up the necklace, running a finger over the face, and asked the vendor, “How so?”
“It’s a tree trunk,” the woman said, “but all trees have multiple sides. You see the front there? With the bumps on the metal? What do they look like to you?”
She brought the pendant closer and wrinkled her nose. “Magic lichen.”
The jeweler nodded. “But turn it over.”
She did as instructed, flipping the pendant to display the back. Bright green crystal, smooth to the touch and near glowing, winked at her.
“See?” the jeweler said. “The magic’s on the inside.”
Nes sucked in a breath.
The trees.Of course. She should have seen it sooner.
If Damari could smell magic, as Nes could, she’d seek the strongest scent.
The magic’s on the inside.
True, people scraped the magic lichen from tree bark to mix with seawater, but the magic growing on the outside was just a small piece of the magic—the lichen only the excess magic the tree could no longer hold. The majority of the magic was still hidden inside.
Nes dropped the necklace back on the table. “We have to go,” she said to Toran.
Then she was running, heading away from the Siren’s Hair and the Valley. She heard Toran behind her, his footsteps crunching in the frozen dirt. They turned the corner just as the sun hit the horizon. A gentle game of cat and mouse, the dark carefully creeping up on the light.
Ahead, hordes of seagulls squawked, their droppings painting the blue roofs of the Wharf white. But there, at the edge of the Ditch, stood a warehouse. Phineas’s magic distillery. She had always been able to smell it blocks away—like a bakery erupted in frosting or a field of wildflowers in full bloom—and if she could, then surely so could Damari.
They were quiet as they slipped inside.
By now, the dark was winning its game, and the sun had all but vanished, the soft light left behind filtering unevenly through the windows overhead. It was just enough to see the destruction.
On a normal day, the warehouse was open and airy, with rows of young saplings filling the center of the space. Only when she listened closely, beyond the hammer of metal and theshickof mesh sliding together and thewhooshof water down a slope, could she make out the chatter of the seagulls.
It was not a normal day.
The floor was littered with torn cheesecloths and empty barrels. Long rafters cut across the dying light like thunderclouds. But it was the lack of saplings that made Nes pause.
She crept forward, stepping around copper stills and stopping in the center of the room. She turned in a slow circle, taking a small whiff each time she faced a new wall. It smelled of nothing but decay. No magic in a place that, only a week ago, had been filled with so much magic there were nights she could have sworn the building glowed green.
She shivered when Toran came up behind her and whispered in her ear, “Why are we here?”
She saw no point in lying to him. There was more than enough evidence scattered about to charge the building owner with distribution of magic. Not that the charges would stick. Not on Phineas.
“I had to make sure I was right.”
Toran hummed. “And were you?”
She nodded. There were too many thoughts in her head to speak.
Toran turned just enough so she could see his expression out of the corner of her eye. “Since you’re being so forthcoming, care to elaborate and tell mewherewe are?”
She sucked in some air to clear her head. “A magic distillery.”
Behind her, she felt Toran stiffen.
“A magic distillery,” he repeated.
She nodded again and turned to face him. The shock on his face was delicious. “A now defunct magic distillery,” she amended.
