She was no taller or sturdier than Clarissa or Emily, and they were neither of them inclined to attend. Yet after a moment’s confusion they found their struggle suddenly at an end, and themselves on opposite sides of the desk.
“What can you be thinking, to be brawling on the very day of the Sorcerer Royal’s visit?” demanded Prunella.
Clarissa looked away haughtily. She was one of the few girls who would not condescend to address Prunella as an equal, and she clearly believed it beneath her dignity to respond. Prunella was used to such snubs, however, and she looked at Emily.
“Clarissa was being an utter brute, and I told her she ought not to talk so about Lord Duchemin, for heismy cousin, and even if George is not very clever, he has the kindest of hearts, and it is a beastly lie to say that Millicent is only marrying him for his money!” said Emily all in one breath.
“I did not say that at all,” interjected Clarissa. “I am sure the prospect of being a countess is as much an attraction as his fortune, to the daughter of a grocer! But I do not like a mésalliance. I suppose”—she glanced at Prunella—“some peoplewould see nothing wrong in it. Some people would make themselves ridiculous if they thought they had half a chance at rank and fortune.”
“I know I should certainly take any opportunity of uniting myselfto a viscount,” said Prunella cheerfully. “But I think you will find that society frowns on trying to break the heads of one’s schoolfellows even more than it does on marrying outside one’s station. What would the Sorcerer Royal think of finding a parcel of fishwives where he was told to expect a charm of gentlewitches? He does so much for the nation, I am sure we ought to spare him the disappointment.”
Clarissa gave a hateful titter, by way of showing she, for one, would not be squashed by an upstart. “Indeed, he does a great deal!”
To Prunella’s surprise, Henrietta leapt into the fray.
“Has any Sorcerer Royal done as much?” she said. “Mr. Wythe is known for his generosity. Think of all he did for that ingrate Mr. Cullip, who writes such shocking things of him in theThaumaturgical Gazette!”
“I do not blame Mr. Cullip for doubting whether Mr. Wythe merits his office,” said Clarissa. “Zacharias Wythe is not even a proper sorcerer.”
“No one can say he is not a sorcerer,” said Henrietta hotly. “The Committee confirmed his claim to the staff. But perhaps you think the staff of the Sorcerer Royal may be used by anyone who is so disposed?”
It was not a serious question. The girls were given a serviceable education in thaumaturgical history, which contained so many instructive examples of the unfortunate consequences of women’s practising magic: Queen Mary’s horrific blood magics among them, and the outbreak of untrammelled witchery that had caused such chaos in the Middle Ages.
So, too, they had all been taught about the staff of the Sorcerer Royal, which only the true Sorcerer Royal could wield. The fraud Edmund de Bourgh had been blinded when he tried it. Richard of Kinnersley was slain by the very spell he cast to murder his rival. Jeremiah Larke had been sliced neatly in half, both ends of his divided person cauterised by the spell. These were preserved in one of the schools of magic, where he could still be seen, a pitiful look of surprise frozen on his face.
There was no denying that nothing so unpleasant had occurred to Mr. Zacharias Wythe, but Clarissa tossed her head. “All I can say is, I have never known a sorcerer that did not have a familiar!”
She looked around in triumph, as one who had produced a trump. All the girls had grown up in the thaumaturgical world, and understood its hierarchies. Any man could be a magician; any gentleman a thaumaturge; any scholar an unnatural philosopher. But only a magician that commanded the loyalty of a familiar could claim the title of sorcerer.
Without the assistance of a familiar, a spirit from the Other Realm bound in service to a magician for the duration of his mortal life, a magician had no access to the expanded world of wonder that was a sorcerer’s rightful demesne. He must rely upon his own imperfect perception and mortal frame in his spellcasting. But a sorcerer had the senses of his familiar to draw upon: his mind was intimately connected to that of a being of pure magic, and he had in his familiar a living channel to the power of Fairy.
“Does not Mr. Wythe have a familiar?” said Prunella, intrigued. Passing her days within the school grounds, she had little opportunity to hear the news of the outside world, which the girls imbibed upon their visits home. “Of course there have not been any new familiars for a great while, but I should have thought Mr. Wythe would have inherited the old Sorcerer Royal’s familiar. Did not Sir Stephen Wythe have a familiar?”
“Leofric,” said Clarissa, forgetting any intention to remain aloof in the pleasure of showing off. “My father knew him well. They used to lend each other books on insects—Leofric was a great entomologist. He had been familiar to the Sorcerer Royal for so many hundreds of years that he was nearly civilised, but Papa always said he was too ready to trust those he ought not. Poor creature! Now look what has happened to him!”
“WhenIspoke to Mr. Wythe at Papa’s party,” said Henrietta,blushing, “he assured me that Leofric is in good health, and much as he ever was, though he has retired from public life. I expect he has returned to Fairyland, and I do not see that there is anything to pity in that.”
“Oh, if you pretend to credit that, there is nothing to say!” said Clarissa contemptuously. “But everyone knows what truly happened, and if you were not so in love with him you would too. Everyone knows your precious Mr. Wythe is a murderer!”
The roses in Henrietta’s cheeks deepened to a flush.
“Henny!” cried Prunella in a tone of warning, but she had left it too late to avert disaster. Henrietta could never govern her abilities at times of strong emotion. She did not mean to cast spells when she was happy or sad or angry, she said, but the spells seemed to cast themselves.
The air in the classroom grew thick with magic. A strange light shone upon the girls, so that Henrietta’s curls appeared to writhe like serpents, and glowing sparks clung to Clarissa’s dress.
Henrietta stamped her foot, her grey eyes drowned in green light.
“I will teach you a lesson for that!” she cried. “Howdareyou call him my precious Mr. Wythe! How dare you say I am in l-love!”
5
ICANNOTBEGINto describe our gratification at your condescension, Mr. Wythe,” declared Mrs. Daubeney. “No Sorcerer Royal has ever showed any interest in the magical education of females. The girls feel the honour of your visit extremely, I assure you.”
Mrs. Daubeney was not at all what Zacharias had expected. Knowing what he did of feminine magic, he had envisioned a grey-haired, discreet sort of woman, wise in the ways of girls—horsey, perhaps—but certainly not magical.
Instead Mrs. Daubeney possessed all the glamour that the ignorant layman might have ascribed to her. She was tall and handsome, with silver-streaked black hair and a nose tending towards the beaky. She dressed in a picturesque style, with a great deal of purple and velvet. If spells could be cast by pure drama of gesture, she would have been a veritable sorceress. She was perfectly fitted for running a school for gentlewitches, however, for she did not in fact appear to have any magical ability whatsoever. What she did possess was a brain as keenly alert to the main chance as any politician’s.
“Of course, dear Sir Stephen—what a loss to the nation!” Mrs. Daubeney’s voice dropped, and she looked solemn. “And yet, you know, he visited the thaumaturgical schools at Seaton and Yarrow, but never seemed to think of our magical girls. I am gladyourecognise their importance, Mr. Wythe, for if we continue to neglect our girls, the nation will suffer for it!”
