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“To defy Leon’s edicts is dark magic.” Sciona had to remind herself not to be impatient with her assistant’s ignorance.

It wasn’t his fault he hadn’t been educated properly.

“That’s how it’s defined—as in the darkness outside the light of Leon’s teachings—and for good reason.

God makes the zone within the Forbidden Coordinates look especially enticing and rich with energy, but the consequences of using that energy are…

let’s just say that the magic Sabernyn practiced was singularly gruesome in Tiranish history.

I won’t sicken you with the details, but—Is something funny?

” she asked when Thomil smothered a laugh.

“No, ma’am.” Thomil blinked, seeming to remember himself, and schooled his features. “Apologies.”

“What is it?” Sciona demanded, wishing she wasn’t quite so good at squashing Thomil’s smiles whenever they came up, wishing she could hit the keys to seize on them before they faded like light into the Otherrealm.

“Nothing, ma’am. Just that you must think me a bit delicate if you assume I can’t handle a little gruesome history.”

“I don’t—it’s not that.” Sciona sighed. “If you must know, I don’t like to talk about it.

Not because my sensibilities are delicate,” she rushed to add, realizing how girlish the confession had sounded.

“It’s just… I’ve devoted my entire life to magical research.

I wouldn’t have done that if I didn’t believe that magic was a uniquely powerful force for good and progress.

The idea that a great mage used this knowledge for something as petty as murdering his colleagues… It disgusts me.”

And damn it, now Sciona had gone and displayed more emotion than was comfortable or indeed appropriate. “Anyway.” She shook her head. “It’s all resolved now and has been for decades.”

“Resolved?”

“When the other mages uncovered Sabernyn’s activities, he was tried before God and sentenced to death.” The High Magistry had executed him by poison in the Hall of Leon, on the same spot where Sciona had tested for the rank of highmage.

“I thought death sentences didn’t exist for native Tiranish citizens.”

“They don’t, usually. Most offenders can be safely held in prison for a life sentence, but a mage who abandons God and gives himself over to dark magic is too dangerous to keep alive.

Sabernyn was the first and only highmage ever sentenced to death,” she added.

“There has to be a consensus vote among the High Magistry—not just the Council but all hundred practicing highmages—to deliver a death sentence, so it’s not something that happens every day. ”

Thomil nodded. “Well, I wouldn’t want to give them a reason, ma’am, so how about three hundred fifty by two thousand?”

“Perfect.” Sciona punched the coordinates into the keys, but before she could activate the spell, there was a knock at the door.

Thomil pushed from the desk as though it had burned him and stood back.

Sciona glanced at him in confusion before recognizing that it probably would be a strange picture to walk in on: mage and Kwen, bent over the same spellograph, deep in conversation like equals.

Certainly, it wouldn’t do Sciona’s reputation any favors.

“Come in,” she said in her strongest voice and braced for the derision of whoever entered. Relief flooded her when the door opened, and it was not one of her peers but her mentor.

“Archmage Bringham!”

“Highmage Freynan,” he said, and something in Sciona glowed at the title on his lips. She wondered if the sound would ever cease to light her up. “I see that you’ve settled in well.” He smiled fondly at the cot, the empty teacups, and the notes across every surface. “How was your first day?”

“It was fine,” Sciona lied, but she had never been particularly good at hiding things from Bringham.

The sympathy was already on his face. “I’m so sorry.”

“About what?”

“Don’t play dumb with me, Freynan. It doesn’t suit you. Mages talk. I know your welcome here hasn’t been warm.” If he tilted his head a little toward Thomil, Sciona was too busy scrambling to the sink to clean a teacup to be sure.

“Can I get you some tea, sir?”

“No, Highmage Freynan,” he sighed, “you may not.”

She paused to look at him in confusion.

“Highmages don’t fetch tea. That’s what your assistant is for.”

“Oh…” Wordlessly— soundlessly —Thomil materialized at her side and slipped the teacup from her hands.

“Redleaf,” she murmured Bringham’s favorite tea under her breath, hoping Thomil would be able to read the fancy lettering on the tin.

He nodded and moved to the cupboard with the silent fluidity of a shadow.

“Listen, Freynan,” Bringham said when he and Sciona had sat at one of the lab tables, “your fellow mages are going to spend the rest of your career trying to get in your way. You’re far too good to let them. They’ll come around.”

“Will they?” Sciona said. “They seem pretty upset to be sharing their floor with a woman.”

“I want you to know that what’s going on here happens in every department of the High Magistry—this elbowing for dominance. It isn’t about your sex.”

“It feels like it’s about my sex, Archmage,” Sciona confessed. She’d certainly never heard a male mage accused of sleeping his way to his success. “They seem fine with Jerrin Mordra.”

“Jerrin Mordra doesn’t threaten them,” Bringham said.

“He doesn’t have the talent or, if I may be crude, the stones to get in their way.

You, Sciona Freynan, are a threat to their comfortable mediocrity.

Yes, all these archmages and highmages got their start as innovators, but the more entrenched in the institution a mage becomes, the more terrified he becomes of real change, and you, my dear, are change incarnate—young, fresh, and unwilling to slow down for anyone.

Renthorn the Third especially needs to mitigate your power to defend his turf as the up-and-coming mapping specialist in the High Magistry.

To make matters worse, he’s actually one of the smart ones.

He’ll get away with all of it if you let him. Don’t.”

“I won’t,” Sciona said vehemently. “I’m not.”

“I see you took the, um… assistant he gave you,” Bringham sighed with the briefest glance at Thomil as the Kwen set a cup of tea before him. “I apologize for that, by the way. I can insist that they give you a real—”

“No!” The last thing Sciona wanted was for her co-mages to think that she had gone crying to her mentor for help. Even more pathetically, she didn’t want to lose the only friend she’d made at this new job. “I mean—it’s fine, Archmage.”

Bringham took a sip of his tea, looking skeptical.

“If I had a problem with it, I’d have come to you, but I don’t. I know they meant to throw me off, but we’re actually ahead of schedule, aren’t we, Thomil?”

To the Kwen’s credit, he didn’t betray any confusion at the lie, seeming to understand Sciona’s need to present total confidence to her superior. “Yes, Highmage Freynan,” he said without inflection.

Bringham studied Thomil for a moment in thought before his gaze shifted back to Sciona. “I see what’s happening,” he said.

“What is happening, sir?”

“Other mages tend to get in your way, slow you down. Perhaps you’re smart to work with someone better suited to taking instruction than offering input.

And the young man does make a good cup of tea.

” He flashed his Bringham-warm smile for the first time at Thomil, where the Kwen had withdrawn off to the side. “Perhaps he’s perfect for you.”

And Sciona wasn’t sure when Thomil had moved again without her noticing, but suddenly, he was setting a schoolbook on the table between them: A Beginner’s Guide to Leonic Sourcing.

“Oh—right,” Sciona said, impressed that Thomil had remembered her offhand comment about the book when he asked about shelving it.

“A girl in my neighborhood asked if I could sign this.” She placed a hand on the elementary spellbook and slid it across the table toward Bringham.

“I told her I’d do her one better and get an archmage’s signature. ”

“Oh.” Bringham looked genuinely flattered. “Do you know the little lady’s name?”

“Um…” God, it was hard to remember names when they weren’t attached to noteworthy research.

“Not to worry,” Bringham laughed as he picked up the pen Thomil set beside him.

“I’ll make it out to a great future mage .

” He opened to the title page and signed in his uniquely smooth and tidy hand.

“And just to make sure she can resell it at a great value to pay her way through university…” He pushed the spellbook back across to Sciona. “You sign too.”

“I don’t know if—”

“I mean it. By the time that little girl is ready to apply for higher study, your signature will be the most valuable of any living mage. I have no doubt.”

Bringham only stayed as long as it took him to finish his tea, updating Sciona on the comings and goings in his research facilities, discussing his search for a new head of sourcing, and lamenting the decline in productivity since her departure.

“But listen to me, yammering on when you have work to do,” he said finally.

“I just wanted to check that you weren’t letting the other mages get to you. ”

“I’m not, sir,” Sciona said as he rose from the table. “Thank you.”

“And you…” The archmage turned to Thomil, who straightened nervously. “You’re going to do everything this one says, yes?”

“Of course, sir.”

“Then I don’t think we have anything to worry about.” Bringham beamed as Thomil crossed to open the laboratory door for him. “I’ll see you at the next Council meeting, Highmage Freynan, if not before then. You know you can come to me for help of any kind whenever you need it.”

Sciona nodded, and Bringham gave her a last warm smile before taking his leave, Thomil closing the door behind him.