Page 22

“Sheep,” I said. I’d been sure to research my “hometown” the second I’d found the school’s expansive library. “And cattle. For the wool and leather and meat.”

Professor Dumley nodded politely, feigning interest, as though I were an infant pointing to something entirely base. I wondered vaguely what he’d have to say of the terranium mines of Scurry.

Theodore and I sat on the settee, drinking tea, listening to Professor Dumley chatter about the exploration of learning we would embark upontogether. He told us stories of his own years as an apprentice and his assent to headmaster. His hands danced to the stories with ever-intensifying flourish, and the room grew hotter and hotter until I was desiccating, desperate for escape.

“And now, we should really turn our attention to today’s lesson,” he said with gentle reproach, as though Theodore and I had been a grievous distraction. “Tell me, Mr. Shop, have you yet experimented with your medium?”

Theo blushed. It was somewhat endearing. “We aren’t permitted to use our mediums unsupervised in our first year, professor.”

“Oh ho!” Dumley laughed. “Yet no one’s the wiser when those dormitory doors close, are they? I was once an apprentice, too, you forget.”

Theo grinned, then said, “I can levitate small amounts, but I’ve yet to make it take shape.”

“But levitation is quite advanced!” Dumley said. “Would you show me?” And he opened the lid of the teapot, gestured for Theo to do as he may.

Theo hesitated for a single moment, then, with a glance in my direction, he slid to the edge of his seat, wiping his hands on his trousers. “Should I just…?”

“Don’t be bothered by any mess,” Dumley assured him.

Theo cleared his throat, then, with a certain measure of awkwardness, he brought his palms up.

The teapot trembled delicately, threatened to tip sideways, but then a speck of liquid floated from the spout, another from the opening. Theo’s hands trembled.

A shifting orb of tea slowly appeared, its shape morphing in the air. It held for a moment, suspended above the tea set, to the resounding cheer of Professor Dumley, and then it shuddered and fell, the tea splashing off the spoons and saucers.

And Dumley laughed and clapped.

After a moment, I clapped, too. It seemed bad manners not to.

Theo panted slightly and sat back in his chair, a smile spreading from ear to ear.

“Quite amazing, isn’t it?” Dumley said, watching Theo closely. “That sensation?”

Theo nodded, his hands trembling. “There’s nothing like it.”

Dumley winked. “Worth dying for, some would say.” He clapped once more, shaking his head in a show of amazement. “What a talent you’ll be.”

Then he turned to me.

“But I haven’t forgotten you, my dear.” He wagged a finger at me, then stood and consulted a dusty credenza, lifting from its top a large clay urn.

He dropped it on the tea table with a clatter, and Theodore and I jumped.

He said, “Here we are!” as though he’d just proffered a gift. “Just dug it from the rose garden myself.”

The urn had been half filled with dark, damp earth. I could smell it from here. Feel its texture already, as though my mind had fingers, soil building up beneath the nails.

“How about you, Miss Clarke? Have you yet dabbled?”

I twisted my fingers together. “A little.”

“Well, do not be intimidated by young Theodore here. We must all start from the beginning.” He looked upon me kindly, already sitting back in his chair, already sympathetic. “Why, it takes many students some time to learn to levitate their medium at all. WhenIwas a lad—”

But his sentence was cut short.

The earth rose from the urn, and Dumley’s mouth went slack.

What I had learned so far in my “dabbling” was that my mind was an extension of my hands. I now felt that familiar expansion, my mind unfolding until it tripled. I felt the dirt in my palms as though I cradled it. I felt it sift and crumble. It was wet, heavy. Malleable. My hands twitched at my sides.