Soul Gem Collector 5 Chapter 8

Chapter 8

The whirling vortex of mist in the middle of the room began to form into the shape of a gorgeous, naked woman. Stripes of steam curled around her legs and wound around the boundary of her outstretched arms. Her eyes glowed a brilliant blue, and tiny blue sparks began to crackle around the tips of her fingers.

“Battle Magic?” Susi squeaked. She shook her head and waved her paws in front of her. “It’s already mad at us!”

“It’s made of air, right?” I mentally reached into the emerald that contained my air elemental, held my hands apart, and felt tiny whirlwinds start to form in my palms. “Let’s blow it away.”

“I swear by Ratatoskr that if you start a magic fight in my lab, I will end you!” Susi yelled. She turned to the vila and held up her paws palms-out. “Excuse me, Miss Vila, but I’m very sorry that you were captured, and you are totally free to leave right now if you want. You can even go right out the door! Taslyn, open the door.”

“Got it,” Taslyn said from behind me, and a moment later the door creaked open. The next thing she said echoed in my head, and I knew that she was sending her thought to me through our psychic bond. “We’ll get it outside before you finish it, Zayre. Enough fire should weaken anything enough to kill.”

“Do you have your iron knife?” I thought back as I eyed the vila. I squinted a little as the wind blew harder against my face.

“Always,” Taslyn replied mentally. “Although I thought she’d take the chance to escape, and she’s not. You might have to fight the vila in here. Susi won’t like it, but we’ll help her clean up afterward.”

“Help me save the data!” Susi squeaked. The squirrel girl wrapped her pudgy arms around a stack of fluttering papers and shoved them into a sawdust-filled crate. “It’s the only thing we can’t replace!”

“Of course, the data.” Noura flicked her fingers out a few times, and twine began to grow around the bundles of papers. The djinn girl glanced over at me as the twine thickened around the bundles, and thicker ropes started to grow around the legs of the furniture. “I’ll do what I can to help.”

The vila’s form was getting clearer and clear by the second. Bolts of lightning ran down her long arms and crackled from finger to finger. Even though she was clearly as dangerous as a walking, thinking thunderstorm, she wasn’t trying to attack us just yet, and I didn’t want to be the one to start the fight.

I raised my hands and pushed the small whirlwinds I’d been holding toward the door in hopes that they’d start to tug the vila out. I knew I couldn’t do much to settle the wind or to shelter us from the rain, and the only way I knew to block lightning involved pushing huge pieces of stone up from the ground. If I had to attack the vila inside, I might end up destroying the whole facility despite Noura and Susi’s attempts to save the weather witches’ work.

The vila raised her arms. Thick blue bolts of lightning crackled around her biceps and sparked in her eyes as she spread her fingers. She squinted her crackling eyes, shook her head, and then began to rotate within her whirling funnel of mist.

“What is she doing?” Susi stopped her scurrying. Her paws splayed out over the bundle of scrolls she’d clutched to her chest. “Is she trying to leave?”

“I don’t know, but I hope so.” I started to back up toward the door until my ass bumped into the wooden edge of a workbench. I had wanted to capture a lightning creature, but I wasn’t looking forward to engaging in single combat with the vila in a cramped and cluttered laboratory. I wasn’t looking forward to the fight at all, in fact, and I told myself that if I managed to capture the vila, I could treat myself to a leisurely afternoon of ring prototyping with the girls.

The vila stopped with her back to us, but the mist that enrobed her body swept around her like the train of a noblewoman’s dress. She bent each lightning-wreathed hand downward like the head of a striking cobra, and her body glowed from within with a brilliant white light.

“Nooo!” Susi shrieked as the sizzle of lightning and the smell of a storm filled the air.

Two thick blue lightning bolts crackled downward from the points of the vila’s hands. One of the lightning bolts hit the glass jar with the cobra raiju in it, and the other hit the jar with the mongoose raiju in it. The bolts of lighting splayed across the glass for a few seconds, and the glass jars quickly turned red-hot.

“Duck!” I shouted as I dropped to my knees and pulled my leather jacket over my head. I knew that I was risking blindness if the glass exploded, but if I was going to capture the soul of a lightning creature without Susi seeing what I was doing, I was going to need maximum confusion. I slapped one hand over my eyes, but slitted my fingers just a little so I could see what was going on.

The jars didn’t look like they were about to explode. In fact, they were both starting to sag like paper bags left out in the rain. The corks blackened around the bottom, glowed red, and then burst into flame.  As the glass containers collapsed in on themselves, a thin stream of red-hot molten glass began to run from the bottom of each.

The mongoose and cobra didn’t look scared, though. In fact, the cobra was banging its head against the side of the glass, and the mongoose was scrabbling at the glass with its electric little claws. They didn’t seem to be affected by the heat, just eager to get out of their vessels.

Two thunderclaps rent the air as the glass jars collapsed. The mongoose sprang from his captivity onto the floor as the cobra slithered down from the cabinet. The long rodent’s body arched up like an angry cat as he hissed at the coiling snake, and tiny blue sparks flew from his teeth and claws. His tail lashed with angry yellow sparks.

The cobra’s head shot up from the ground as the mongoose hissed at it. The snake fanned out its hood, opened its mouth, and hissed blue bolts at the long lightning feliform. The serpent leapt forward as the bolts hit, and sank its wicked little fangs into the stunned mongoose’s neck.

Instantly the air in the room became drier and stiller. The vila’s body bulged back out into a fat vortex of mist, and the wind died down. The vortex of mist turned a lazy half circle, and the cloud that hung by the celing vaished up into the base of the cone like vapor being sucked up into a vacuum pump.

The sparks of lightning that brightened the room didn’t stop. The crackling snarls and hisses that accompanied the light show came from the mongoose and the cobra, who were still locked in deadly combat on the floor. The cobra had wrapped itself around the slender rodent’s body, but the mongoose’s sharp teeth were locked at the base of the cobra’s flared neck. The two of them rolled about on the floor as they lashed and writhed against each other, but their bodies passed through the wooden table legs and metal cabinets as though they barely even existed on the same plane. The sparks that flew from their bodies didn’t even set fire to anything that they landed on, but I worried that the flames could start any second.

“Is it safe yet?” Susi quavered. The squirrel girl had curled herself into a ball under a workbench, and her fluffy black tail with its white shock at the end stuck out into the air.

“Not yet,” I called as I watched the mongoose and cobra roll about on the floor. I cupped my hands together, summoned a single whirlwind, and pulled my harms apart quickly as I urged it to grow. I kept an eye on the mongoose and cobra as I pushed the whirlwind toward the squirrel girl. I still wasn’t sure how in the world I was going to be able to kill a lightning creature without killing myself in the process, especially since they seemed unaffected by mundane material, but I needed to salvage something from this mess that we’d created. “What do cobras eat?”

“Squirrels,” Susi groaned. “They like to eat squirrels.”

Taslyn dug in her pocket, wound her arm back, and threw something black and shiny toward the tussling lightning animals. Her stone skipped past them by less than two feet and ricocheted off a cabinet before it came to rest a foot from the mongoose’s nose.

The cobra’s head perked up and its nose swiveled toward the source of the skittering.

The mongoose, however, was not distracted by the promise of whatever Taslyn had thrown at it. It opened its mouth wide, lunged forward, and yanked out the cobra’s throat as quickly as a single bolt of lightning takes to strike. It shook its pointed little head as the scrap of lightning flesh in its maw dripped blue sparks, and then the creature ducked down to feast on the cobra’s body.

“Hold on, Susi, it’s gotta be almost over!” I sent another whirlwind Susi’s way, and put a little backspin on it so that it would take its time getting to her. I was pleased at how quickly I’d taken to manipulating the whirlwinds. I glanced over to check on the cobra’s body, realized that it had nearly dissolved into a snakey cloud, and clapped my hand to the ruby in my back pocket. I didn’t know if I’d be able to use my base soul-collecting power while I was wielding another one of my powers, so I let the wind go and started to creep closer to the decaying shape of the lightning cobra. “We’re handling it, Susi! I’ll let you know when it’s safe.”

The glittering sparks of the cobra’s corpse began to drift toward me, and this caused the lightning mongoose to lift his head and snarl at me. The little creature arched up like an angry cat and bared its fangs at me.

“Ohh, did you make it mad?” Susi groaned. “Don’t make it mad, you guys?”

“I’m trying not to!” I backed away from the lightning mongoose as the last of the cobra’s sparks sucked themselves towards my ass. I usually didn’t feel anything but a slight warmth when I’d collected a new creature, but this time I felt a gentle zap on my buttock, somewhere between the fiery burn of a candle and the shock of scratching your nails down a wool blanket on a dry day.

The mongoose dropped back to all fours, sniffed the ground, and then started to lumber toward the black shiny stone that Taslyn had thrown. It closed its mouth around the rock, lifted its head, and started to crunch the stone between its teeth. Then the little creature began to trot toward the open door, apparently satisfied with whatever magical nutrients the rock had given it.

“I believe it’s over,” Taslyn called to Susi. “But the mongoose is getting away quickly.”

“Let it go,” Susi sighed. She poked her head out from under the workbench, and her pointed little ears immediately perked up. “Maybe I can get it to settle nearby. Taslyn, what’d you toss it?”

“Just a lodestone,” Taslyn said. “It was a lucky guess based on one of Zayre’s experiments.”

“That is so useful,” Sushi chirped. She clambered out from under the workbench, grabbed a notebook, and started to fish for what I assumed was a pen. “Zayre, do you still feel like talking nitrogen? And lodestones, if that’s not too much of a secret.”

“Sure,” I agreed. I wanted to get back to the laboratory and start testing out my new lightning snake right away, but I figured I at least owed Susi a good long meeting of the minds for all the havoc we’d wrought on her workplace. Plus, I could always pick up some tips on manipulating lightning now that I had the power in my hands. “Fulgurites and fixers. Where to start?”

I talked shop with Susi and Taslyn until dark while Noura poked around in the books and asked the occasional question, but I had to call it quits after sunset. I wanted to be refreshed and on my best possible behavior for the morning appointment we had with the Leronds.

The next morning, I found myself awoken with the smell of strong beanbrew wafting under my nose and with a soft, sweet kiss from a pair of petal-soft lips.

“Hello, my love!” Janel sang as she nuzzled my face. Her hair was braided in the same up sweep that I’d seen her in yesterday, but she wore a simple red silk robe that buttoned up the front. “I’ve got Papi combing through everyone he knows for the closest contact to King Sweyn. I just know we’ve got to have some far-flung cousin or family friend in the Royal Service!”

“Hey, that’s great,” I mumbled.  I’d been sure that a family as venerable as the Leronds would know someone in the service of any of the royal households in the River Kingdoms, but something about the way Janel had worded her update made me a little less confident that the Leronds could provide anyone. I shoved that thought to the back of my mind and kissed my fiancee back instead. I had done all I could think of to find an agent of the King, and I just had to hope that my efforts would bear fruit. I had a wedding to deal with in the meantime.

“Drink your beanbrew and let’s get going,” Aylara chirped. She finagled her way in for a kiss and squeaked happily when I nibbled on her lips. The little mouse-girl handed me a steaming paper cup, kissed me on the nose, then jumped up and stuck her hands in the pockets of her pale pink pantsuit. Her curly blonde hair framed her face like a perfect halo, and a string of fat white faux pearls hung from her neck. “We don’t want to keep swells like the Leronds waiting.”

“Then we ought to make this quick.” Noura snapped her fingers, and I immediately felt clean all over.

“It’s Madame Erte you really don’t want to keep waiting, but we do have a few minutes.” Janel patted her hair, then turned to Taslyn. “Aylara and I picked out a nice little number for you that I think you’ll really love, dear. Just a sort of casual social outfit. Why don’t you change before we leave?”

“What’s wrong with this?” Taslyn looked down at her black dress and frowned. “We’re there to try on clothes, not show them off.”

“Then humor me?” Janel batted her jade-green eyes as she handed Taslyn a small stack of midnight blue boxes. “I’d just like to see how you look in them. You don’t need to wear them to the fitting if you really don’t want to.”

“All right, but if I don’t like them, you’re taking them back.” Taslyn grabbed the boxes, then glanced around the laboratory. “I’ll… just change, then.”

“Oh, use my boudoir!” Noura went over to the cupboard in the corner and opened the door to her silk-strewn bedroom. The djinn’s curly black hair started to braid itself up into a tall bun on top of her head, her white shift with the gold and purple triangles began to shimmer like silk, and a necklace of chunky golden triangles shimmered into existence around her neck. “I’ll even help you with your hair.”

“It’s in the cupboard?” Taslyn raised an eyebrow, then shrugged and stepped inside with the boxes in her arms. “You've got to tell me how you did that.”

“Ah, is this a nice clothes situation?” I grabbed my new linen shirt, my new black vest, and my woolen trousers, then held up the fancier gold-flecked vest for special occasions. I decided I didn’t want to spill beanbrew on the gold thread, set it aside, then started to dress. “If I was back in Sonnenblum Village, I’d wear the plain one to the wedding. I wouldn’t even know where to buy gilded clothing.”

“I got those from Argent and Matheson.” Janel stared at the cupboard, frowned, and sat down on the silk bed next to me. “We’ll have to have a boudoir that can fit everyone in our manor. I won’t have anyone left out.”

“Yeah, everyone in a bed together, just like when I was a kid.” My hands focused on buttoning up my shirt, but my mind drifted back to my family’s big bed right above the bread oven, and how safe I’d felt there. “Perfect.”

“Aww, that sounds nice.” Aylara sat down on the bed between Janel and me and slung an arm over each of our shoulders. She pressed a kiss to the side of my cheek. “Everyone all cozied up together in a big soft nest with lots of blankets and snacks. Heaven for a mouse mommy.”

“No snacks in the boudoir, or we’ll get crumbs.” Janel giggled. “And the nursery will undoubtedly be separate. As will our individual sleeping quarters, of course.”

“We’ll figure it all out.” I bent down and tugged my boots on.

“Here we are, loves!” Noura trilled as the door to the cupboard swung open. The djinn stepped out and swung her arms out to the side as if to frame the emerging Taslyn.

“I must say, it is my color.” Taslyn smirked as she stepped out of the cupboard.

The fox-girl was wearing a short-sleeved black dress that clung to her every curve as she walked. It stopped just below her knee to emphasize her luscious hips, dipped down to show just a hint of cleavage, and nipped in at her narrow waist with a wide black belt that featured a sleek brushed silver crescent moon buckle. Her shiny new black boots hit just below the knee, a shiny black purse hung from her wrist on a silver chain, and she slung what looked like a black jacket over her shoulder.

On top of her soft crimson curls sat a wide-brimmed velvet hat with a gently peaked crown, accentuated with a black satin ribbon, a small spray of iridescent black feathers, and a brushed silver star pin with a faceted jet gem in the center.

When she shrugged the jacket on, I could see that it was a tailored velvet thing that nipped in at the waist, flared out on the bottom, and sported wide satin lapels. The silver buttons were shaped like the crescent moon as well. The whole ensemble looked breathtakingly sophisticated.

“Uh…” My jaw dropped. I’d always thought Taslyn was beautiful, but now she looked powerful, too. “You could kill me with a look and I’d die happy.”

“You look like the perfect high society witch,” Aylara chirped. “Like you’ll hex anyone who breathes a single rumor.”

“Utterly perfect,” Janel breathed. She blinked, glanced at me, then clapped her hands together. “But we should get going. We did only have a few minutes, and the carriage is waiting.”

Lord and Lady Lerond’s apartment was usually hung with silks and colorful tapestries, but today the plush couches and low brass tables were especially cluttered. Silks and satins in all shades of white and green were strewn about the place, and I barely moved for fear that I’d step on something that cost thousands of dollars per square foot. The furniture in the very middle of the room had been cleared away to make way for an assemblage of wooden stools of varying height, surrounded by what looked like a small labyrinth of mirrors.

Lord Lerond was seated on top of a pile of cushions in the corner, with his legs crossed and a golden magic mirror in front of his face. He waved at us, pointed at the mirror, and then turned his attention back to whoever was on the other end of the call.

Lady Lerond bent over a couch that was heaped in white fabric. She held fistfuls of tulle and scowled at them as though they’d personally insulted her. Next to her, Malory Juno balanced on the arm of a couch and sipped at a porcelain cup of tea. Lady Lerond had hired the peacock woman as a wedding planner, and Malory’s feathers and cherry red bobbed hair looked ruffled enough to suggest that she’d had a busy morning with the mother of the bride.

“Ahh, the lucky groom!” came a lilting, fussy voice. A hedgehog woman bustled forward with her arms spread and a tape measure in one hand. Her front was draped in what looked like fluttery pastel napkins, but her spiny back was bare. Each one of her spines held a spool of different-colored thread, or a pair of scissors, or even a gleaming sewing needle. The spiny woman linked her arm through mine and started to drag me toward the center of the room. “Come come now. Your pretty bride told me you are strong of arm, wide of chest, and thick of groin, but she did not provide any exact measurements.”

“Uh, Janel?” I glanced back at my bride-to-be as the hedgehog seamstress pulled me along, then looked over at my parents-in-law-to-be. I definitely had never imagined that Janel would be willing to talk about my family jewels in front of her parents, but Lady Lerond merely glanced up, nodded, and went back to sorting out pieces of white fabric.

“Go with Madame Erte and get measured, Zayre.” The old lady waved her handful of white fabric at me, then straightened up and headed for Janel. “Men are harder to fit. Janel, my jewel, come here, I found some veil fabric that will not wash out your face.”

“It’s supposed to hide my face, mother!” Janel protested.

“Just listen to your mother,” Malory Juno sighed. “She wants you to look your best.”

“Come, come, this will only take a few minutes.” Madame Erte steered me onto one of the stools, grabbed my arms, and pushed them up until they were out to the sides. “Now stand with your feet as wide apart as the stool. I see you have worn tight pants, good, and no underwear?”

“Not usually,” I spluttered as the little hedgehog woman bent down and shoved my thighs apart. “Hey, I don’t do that on the first date!”

“Relax, this will be fast.” Madame Erte stood back and began to wiggle her fingers. Her tape measure floated up from her hand like a charmed snake, drifted toward me, and started to wind around my leg. The little hedgehog peered at me as a notebook and pen floated from among her back spines. “You really are barrel-chested, my dear. Do you skip leg day? You should never skip leg day.”

“I don’t skip any day.” I shivered as the ambulatory tape measure spiraled up my torso and started to inch over my arms and shoulders. I looked around to see if Taslyn or Noura could help me, but the only people in the room besides me and Madame Erte was Lord Lerond. “Where are the girls--I mean, the bridesmaids?”

“They are getting draped,” Madame Erte explained. She looked down at her notebook, scribbled something, and then snapped her fingers twice. At the sound of her snap, the tape measure leapt off of the back of my neck and wiggled its way through the air toward the hedgehog woman. “Measurements are done, and now you get to make a decision. Black, or white?”

Two nearly identical suits of clothing rose up into the air from one of the piles of clothes and began to spin around slowly in the air. Both of the suits included a high-necked, double-breasted jacket with gold and pearl buttons, a set of flare-bottomed trousers with gold and pearl buttons, a set of pointed-toe leather ankle boots with gold and pearl buttons, and a gold cloth turban studded with a huge pearl over the forehead. The trousers and coat were both embroidered with lotus flowers picked out in so much gold thread and pearl that the clothes seemed fairly encrusted. As the clothes spun, the outer jacket opened up to show the gold lining within, and a long-sleeved tunic hemmed with silver and gold ribbon drifted out from inside the outer layer. The only difference between the suits was that one was made of pearly white fabric that shimmered like the softness of morning dew, and the other was made out of satiny black fabric that gleamed like the coolness of night.

“Black.” I responded almost immediately. I could just see myself getting something all over the pearly white suit right before the ceremony and going around with a big beanbrew stain on my big day, but then I reflected that Noura would probably be around to help me clean it, and that I wanted to match Janel. “No, wait, white.”

“Mmm, you were right the first time.” Madame Erte tossed a paper packet toward me, then swiveled on her heel and headed toward the hall opposite the kitchen. From within her spines floated a pair of shining scissors and a long spool of black thread attached to a needle. The seamstress's tools flew toward the black suit as the white suit dropped down onto the floor. “Black flatters your complexion. Now, take off your clothes, and your suit will let you know when it’s ready.”

I sighed and started to unbutton my shirt as the scissors and needle flew around the black suit with blinding speed. I didn’t entirely love making myself so vulnerable in the presence of an ambulatory pair of gnashing blades, but I wanted to get the fitting over with, and Ferox was perfectly content to nap in the back of my head in the presence of the pointy tools.

By the time I was down to my trousers, there was a little pile of black material and black thread on the floor, and the scissors had slowed down to the occasional thread snip. Before I took my trousers off, I opened the paper package and pulled out three pairs of the shortest, tightest breeches I’d ever seen.

“Underwear,” I muttered as I shucked my trousers. I barely had a chance to pull on a pair of my new underpants before the black suit began to fly toward me. I spread out my arms, raised my feet at appropriate times, and let the suit slip itself onto my body.

The suit fit perfectly, and the lining was one of the softest things I’d ever put next to my body that wasn’t a woman. The buttons fastened themselves automatically, the turban tightened around my head, and a black cape embroidered with more gold and pearl lotuses attached itself to a pair of huge teardrop pearls that hung from my shoulders.

I turned around to feel the way my cape swirled and stopped to admire myself in the wall of mirrors. I thought I usually looked presentable, but there was something about the tailoring in the suit that made me look taller, svelter, and more perfectly proportioned than I ever had before. I wondered if the suit itself had been touched with a glamour, or whether it was just the effects of professional tailoring for the first time in my life.

“You look like a prince!” Lord Lerond declared. The short old gentleman had snuck up behind me while I watched the suit fit itself onto me, and his monocle gleamed in the soft light of the oil lamps as he scrutinized me. His purple robe fluttered and his mustache twitched as he strode toward me with his arms open. His hands hovered just above my shoulders for a moment, but then he patted me on the cheeks instead. “Yes, I will be proud to call you my son a week from Starday.”

“A week?” I frowned and calculated that in my head. “Today’s Windsday. That’s only eleven days! It took me months to get here from Sonnenblum. Lord Lerond, my family won’t have time to get the invitation let alone travel here.”

“Change the date?” Malory Juno squawked as she emerged from the corridor. “I’ve reserved the back room at Le Champignon D’Or, I’ve gotten us a whole hour at the Temple of Kalinda, and I’ve sent all of the invitations. The Bridgertons have already RSVPd! If you want to change the date now, you might as well cut your losses and go register with City Hall. Now, sit down and make sure that the trousers aren’t too tight.”

“I thought it was going to be close friends and family.” I hopped down from the stool and took on the seat on the arm of the nearest sofa. “The trousers are fine.”

“We have many friends and a large family.” Lord Lerond ran his hand over his bald head. “And I have a dear old friend whose son-in-law is the cousin of one of the ladies-in-waiting to one of Princess Amelia’s old school chums. Do you think that will be close enough to the Royal Household for you?”

“Wait, which one of those people--” I began, but I was interrupted by Madame Erte’s excited squeal.

“Behold, your bridesmaids and bride!” The hedgehog woman bustled back into the room and waved her little paws at the door, where Lady Lerond was emerging in a brilliant red saree embroidered with golden lotuses and sparkling rubies. “And the mother of the bride, of course.”

“At least someone will be dressed in the traditional colors,” Lady Lerond sniffed, but her tone couldn't hide the wide smile on her face.

“Mother, if you say one more single thing about your dress…” Janel’s voice floated from the corridor as Taslyn stepped out of the door.

The fox-girl’s copper hair shone in a delicate up-sweep decorated with a white silk rose that had a sparkling emerald gem at the center. Her eyes were lined with green shimmer and her lips with red shimmer, and emerald chandelier earrings hung from her pointed ears. Her dress was draped across one shoulder so that the material fell in elegant rills across her body, and made of emerald green satin that had a golden undertone when it rippled even slightly. Her freckled shoulders were adorned by a gauzy golden shawl and two jeweled silk roses even bigger than the one in her hair. Her arms were adorned with golden bangles and her feet with golden slippers, and in her hands she held a delicate bouquet of white and pink silk lotuses. Even her fluffy red tail was tied at the tip with a shiny green and gold ribbon.

“You look gorgeous,” I gasped as Noura and Aylara filed out behind Taslyn. “Like a rose… and a peony… and a dahlia.”

The other two bridesmaids were arrayed in the same dress and shawl as Taslyn, but with headdresses that showcased their own unique looks. Aylara’s platinum blonde curls sported a tiny green top hat decorated with a gold ribbon, an emerald brooch, and green feathers, while Noura’s orange braids had been woven with green ribbon, gold thread, and tiny seed pearls.

Finally, Janel appeared in her bridal wear. My gorgeous bride was wrapped in what looked like yards of delicate white lotus-patterned lace embroidered with gold thread along the edges of the petals and tiny white seed pearls in the center. Her hair was braided in an elaborate looping tower that was festooned with white and gold ribbon and tiny seed pearls, and a tiara of teardrop pearls and golden chain hung across her forehead.

At the very top of her hair, a golden lotus sprouted a frothy white lace veil that cascaded all the way down her back. Her pointed ears were hung with golden chain and pearl, a pearl stud gleamed in her nose, and a huge gold and pearl necklace that was so thick it looked like a collar. She held a huge bouquet of white silk lotuses edged in gold up to her chest as she walked, and I could see that her lacy train trailed behind her for yards.

“It’s a bit makeshift, but it is a nice shade.” Janel smiled, and when she did, it was as though the sun had come out from behind the clouds. “Do you think it’s as pretty as a Vottengardian wedding dress?”

“I think it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen,” I breathed. I walked toward Janel in a daze and held my hand out to her. “I think you’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

I hadn’t been looking forward to the pomp and circumstance of the wedding. I’d been sure that I’d be bored and uncomfortable in something ill-fitting and ugly, and that I’d be glad for everything to be over. But when I saw myself holding hands in the mirror with Janel, I actually started to look forward to the wedding. I wanted everyone to see me looking like a prince next to the woman I was going to get to make my wife.

I didn’t want to get out of the suit, but eventually we did have to get back into our street clothes and get back to the college. I had a batch of black powder to check on, after all, and I didn’t object when the girls all decided to come back with me and help out.

The clearing looked unchanged, but Ferox started to whimper in the back of my mind when we drew near the laboratory.

“Hold on.” I held up a hand and motioned for the girls to stand back as I approached the laboratory. My attention was drawn to a two-foot-wide box wrapped in satiny white paper with a huge red bow tied around it. I hadn’t seen the box before we left, so it had clearly been delivered while I was out.

“Do you think it’s anything dangerous?” Janel asked. “It looks like a wedding present.”

“Maybe.” I knelt down in front of the box and studied it. I didn’t smell or hear anything strange, but I could still feel Ferox whining in the back of my head. I did see a red splotch of wax sealed over the flap of the folded white paper, but I couldn’t understand the complex rune on the seal. I gave it a quick look with Tanow’s magical sight, but I couldn’t make out any spell work that had been placed on the box. “It doesn’t look enchanted, but there’s a weird sigil on it. Anyone want to take a look?”

“I absolutely do.” Taslyn squatted down and ran her fingers over the wax seal. “Hm. I can look it up--”

“Oh, that’s the Korlems’ insignia!” Janel exclaimed. “I would recognize it anywhere. Surely you’ve seen it before in your dealings with them, Zayre?”

“If I did, I didn’t know what it was.” I didn’t really remember seeing the insignia prominently displayed anywhere when I’d been dealing with the Korlems, but I hadn’t been looking for it. I’d also never gotten an official communique from the Korlems before, but I figured that Mr. Kay might have sent me some kind of gadget that would help me  prepare the black powder or a new suit of clothes to wear. I even dared to hope that it was a big pile of gold coins, although I increasingly had little need to earn my own money. I squatted down and slid my finger under the seal. “Hey, Janel, want to help me open this?”

“Of course!” Janel tore into the thick shiny paper and grinned when she saw the copperplate words printed on the white paper lid of the box. “Well, look at this! It’s from Argent and Matheson.”

“That’s where you got my clothes, right?” I slid my fingertips under the paper lid.

“Ooh, let me see!” Aylara craned her neck over the box and giggled. “New clothes?”

“It looks like--” I stopped as my eyes fell on the surprise inside.

Nestled inside a drift of pastel tissue paper was a small dead monkey. Its spine was kinked, its head lolled off its neck at an unnatural angle, and its tongue had been torn out and stuffed back into its mouth. Its eyes were empty red sockets, and its hands and feet had been cut off and arranged in the middle of its chest like a horrific flower. Finally, its tail had been sawn off and draped across its face like a mustache.

I stared in shock at the mangled mass of fur in the box.