Maggie nodded. “Tall is the only physical thing I’ve been able to remember about him. I didn’t even get his real name.”
“I mean, it’s not theonlyphysical thing you remember about him.” Dahlia said the words quickly, like she couldn’t quite believe she said them out loud.
Maggie held her palm to her face and shook her head, repeating, “Gods below, Dahlia.” She had no idea that her ears could burn so hot with embarrassment.
Jim sighed. “I can’t believe this was the year I had to staff the campus Beltane fair. I should have let Taliesin cover for me when he offered.” To his credit, Jim changed the subject after that with a small smile in Maggie’s direction, and she decided she liked him even more than she thought. “So, who is the lucky member of our department rooming with you?”
Maggie shrugged and grabbed a tissue to erase Dahlia’s absurd list. “I haven’t had a minute to check my email yet.”
“You’re better than I am. I was refreshing my inbox while I drank my coffee this morning.”
“Me, too. This is such a nightmare,” Dahlia groaned. “No offense, Jim.”
“None taken!” he said cheerfully, hopping up onto his new desk and swinging his feet. “None of us in Alchemy and Transmutation are exactly thrilled either. I just got my house keys back this morning after they were stuck behind the pall all weekend. And my lab supplies.” He grimaced and sighed. “I don’t know how we’re going to finish out the year.”
Dahlia’s eyes brightened, and Maggie knew that look. Jim had said a magical combination of words that sometimes pass between coworkers when you suddenly know the other is ready to dish. “So, what happened anyway?” Dahlia asked, her tone a little bit nonchalant and a little bit conspiratorial.
“Oh, well,” Jim said, as if he were stalling. “You know as much as I do, I suspect.”
“I doubt it. Maggie and I were there, and we’ve heard nothing about what exactly happened to bring down that pall.”
Jim glanced up and down the hallway from his vantage point on the desk and turned back to them. “They’re being very quiet about what actually happened. Dr. Taliesin’s class was the only lab in session at the time.”
“I can’t believe Taliesin allowed a student to do a spell strong enough to cast a pall without any additional staff support or spell guardrails, though,” Maggie said.
Jim raised his eyebrows, leaning in toward them. “What if it wasn’t a student?”
Maggie and Dahlia exchanged a glance. “You’re sayingtheArthur Taliesin messed up a spell so badly that a destructive, unmovable pall descended on his classroom and infected the entire building?”
“Maybe,” Jim said, shrugging. Maggie wasn’t sure which possibility was worse.
“I saw him that day,” Maggie admitted to Jim. “We both stopped the pall from coming down to the second floor. He seemed…” Maggie tried to find the right words to describe the frantic, angry way Taliesin had moved. “Flustered. I’ve never seen him like that.”
“ ‘Destructive, unmovable pall’! He must have known how bad it was before anyone else,” Dahlia said. The three professors were quiet for a moment, lost in their own thoughts about whatever must have happened that day.
“What’s he really like anyway?” Maggie asked.
“A hard-ass,” Jim said simply, and Dahlia snorted. Coming from a kind professor like Jim, it meant something. “Look, I don’t have any insider information that it was Dr. Taliesin, but I feel pretty confident that he would never cover for a student.”
“NowthatI believe. He’s never been anything but a jerk to me,” Maggie declared, wondering briefly if she should be a little bit more professional. But she just thought about the way he’d dismissed her after they stopped the pall, without so much as a thank-you. About the way he’d never once acknowledged his role in slashing her budget and dismantling one of her programs. About the way he had stood up onstage in front of his colleagues and didn’t offer a single explanation for what had happened.“Rude, inconsiderate,” she went on. “Pompous,” she added, for good measure. “A legacy…”
Maggie heard someone clear their throat behind her, and the color drained from Jim’s face as he jumped down from the desk, looking like one of her students caught cheating on an exam. Dahlia’s mouth was curved in a barely suppressed grin, and Maggie knew, without any doubt, who was behind her. She closed her eyes and muttered a curse under her breath.Of course.
Chapter Four
She turned and there was Arthur Taliesin, his eyebrows arched. He stood outside the office, since it was already too cramped for him to fit inside. He wore a turtleneck sweater, the sleeves bunched up to his elbows, and there was a slight sheen of sweat on his brow, as if he’d been moving furniture with his colleagues. The silence dragged on between the four of them, so awkward it physically hurt.
“Dr. Linden, can I speak with you, please?” he finally asked.
Maggie had been wrong earlier. Her face absolutely could turn a brighter, hotter shade of red.Dr. Linden. Not Maggie, was the only absurd thought in her head.
“Of course.” She pretended for her own sake that he hadn’t heard a word she’d said about him.He might not have known who I was talking about, she reasoned. How long had he been listening anyway?
Maggie joined him in the hall and stared at him expectantly, her arms crossed. He looked as uncomfortable as he had onstage on Saturday. “I would prefer to go to your office, where it’s a little more private,” he said, throwing a look at Jim and Dahlia, who were now shuffling file folders around as if they’d had no part in the conversation.Traitors.
When they arrived at her office, he looked around appraisingly and then said, turning to her, “We’ll have to remove the couch, but I think we can make this work.”
It took her a moment to understand what he was saying. “What—” she began.
