Chapter 183. Divination

"Tell me, children," Beth said pleasantly. "What do you know about divination?"

Ada's hand shot up immediately, like she was in class.

Beth's smile widened. "Yes, dear?"

"Um." Ada's face scrunched up in concentration. "It's... when you know things? Before they happen? Like when mother knows I'm going to spill my juice before I do it, except... magic?"

Beth laughed—a warm, delighted sound that made her shoulders shake. She reached over and patted Ada's head gently. "A valiant attempt, child. Very close, in spirit if not in detail."

Ada beamed at the praise.

Bennu shifted his weight. "Adom told me once," he said, glancing at Adom briefly before looking back at Beth. "He said it was reading the past and the future from the mana around us."

Beth's expression brightened. She reached into her coat pocket, pulled out a copper coin, and held it out to Bennu.

Bennu stared at it. Took it carefully. "What... what is this?"

"A coin," Beth said simply.

"Well, yes, I know that, but..." Bennu turned the coin over in his palm. "Why?"

"Because I know you prefer salted things to sweet things," Beth said. "But I only have candy on me. So you can buy yourself something salty with that instead."

Ada's head snapped toward her. "You knew he preferred salty? How?"

Beth smiled at him. "Because he's about to tell me."

Bennu opened his mouth. Closed it. Looked down at the coin in his hand, then back up at Beth, then at Adom. His face was doing something complicated—confusion mixed with the realization that he'd been about to say exactly that.

"I—" Bennu started. Stopped. "I do prefer salty things. How did you—"

Beth laughed again, clearly delighted by their shocked faces.

Ada bounced on the bench. "That's magic! You did magic!"

Beth reached over and adjusted a curl that had fallen across Ada's forehead, tucking it back gently. "It is indeed, dear."

This old lady is quite an interesting one, Zuni observed from Adom's shoulder.

Adom nodded slightly in agreement.

Ada's eyes were wide now, and she sat up straighter. "Can I try again? I want to get it right! Do I get a coin if I get it right?"

"Getting competitive, are we?" Beth said, amused.

"I want a coin too!"

Bennu was still staring at the copper piece in his hand like it might bite him.

Beth settled back on the bench, her sewing resting in her lap. "Let me explain it properly, then. What your brother told you, Bennu, was correct in the broadest sense. Divination is the art of reading information from mana—past, present, and future. But it's more complicated than that."

She looked at each of them in turn.

"What I just did with you—knowing what Bennu would say before he said it—that's future sight. But only a few minutes ahead. Perhaps five, if I push it. And only here, where I am, seeing what will happen to me."

"Why only a few minutes?" Ada asked.

"Because time is..." Beth paused, considering her words. "Imagine you're standing in a river. You can see the water flowing toward you, yes?" Ada nodded vigorously. "You can see what's coming, just a little way upstream. But the farther you look, the more the river bends, the more rocks and debris change the current. Small things—a leaf falling, a fish jumping—they all change where the water goes."

She picked up her needle, threading it through the fabric.

"The future is like that river. In five minutes, many things can happen. And each thing that happens creates new possibilities, new paths. If I predict that Ada will ask me a question in three minutes, but then Bennu sneezes, and Ada looks at him instead, and forgets her question—well. The timeline splits. Multiplies. Too many variables."

"So you can only see a few minutes?" Adom asked.

"Reliably, yes. I can sometimes see further—flashes, impressions. But they're unreliable. More feeling than fact." She smiled. "And it's local. I can only see the future of where I am. I cannot, for instance, predict what will happen to your father at home right now. I would need to be there, seeing it myself, for divination to show me."

Ada frowned, thinking hard. Then her face brightened. "But earlier, you were talking to someone! When we were walking over. You said goodbye to a bird."

Beth smiled at that. She looked at Adom directly.

"Divination requires patience," she said. "You'll understand when the time is right."

Adom blinked. He didn't see the connection between Ada's question and that answer at all. It was the kind of cryptic non-response Mr. Biggins would give—vague, seemingly wise, but ultimately unhelpful.

Adom kept that thought to himself.

Ada was leaning forward now, clearly not satisfied with Beth's non-answer but too polite to push. Bennu was examining his copper coin with new interest.

Beth resumed her sewing, her needles moving with ease. "Divination is about reading the present so thoroughly that the future becomes visible. Every moment contains information—the angle of someone's shoulders, the way they breathe, the temperature of the air, the direction of the wind. A thousand tiny details. And mana carries all of it."

"Like reading a book," Adom said slowly.

"Like reading a book that's writing itself as you read it," Beth said. "And you have to read fast enough to see the next sentence before it changes."

Bennu looked up from his coin. "So when you gave me this... you saw that I would want something salty? Before I even knew it?"

"I saw you looking at the street vendor on our way here," Beth said. "The one selling roasted nuts. I saw the way your eyes lingered. And I felt the shape of what you would say when given the opportunity." She smiled. "So yes. I knew."

Ada was bouncing again. "Can you teach me? I want to see the future!"

"Perhaps when you're older, dear." Beth patted her hand. "Divination requires patience. And focus. And the ability to hold very still, both in body and mind."

Ada slumped. "I'm not good at sitting still."

"I noticed."

Adom was quiet, processing. Five minutes. That was the reliable range. And only local. Only what would happen to Beth herself, or immediately around her. It was more limited than he'd thought—but also more precise. More useful, in its own way.

He knew a few things about divination already. Had read about it, heard stories. But he thought Beth had some sort of secret, too. Something she wasn't telling them.

Because she'd seen the outcome of his battle with Nox. Merlin had told him she'd described exactly how Adom would end it—the specific moment, the exact technique. That was more than five minutes. Much more. She'd known before the fight even started.

His eyes drifted across the park, landing on the statue of Law. The bronze figure stood tall and dignified, draped in robes that no historian agreed were accurate. It wasn't at all how Law had actually looked, according to the records. But people liked their heroes grandiose.

The Farmer Mage had been able to look three thousand years into the future. Details so precise it was unbelievable—cities that would rise, names of people who hadn't been born yet, events mapped out like a schedule. It didn't make sense then. It made even less sense now that Beth had confirmed the mechanisms of divination to him.

Five minutes, she'd said. Reliably.

She was probably hiding how she did it. That was the only explanation he had.

"What about the past?" he asked. "You said divination could read that too."

Beth's smile turned knowing. "Ah. Now that's easier. The past doesn't change. It's already written. Already happened. The mana remembers. You just have to ask it the right way."

She held up her sewing—the flag she'd been working on.

"This fabric, for instance. I can read its history. Where it came from. Who touched it. What happened to it before it became mine." She ran her fingers over the material. "The past is like... footprints in snow. They stay until something erases them. And mana is very good at preserving footprints."

"How far back can you read?" Adom asked.

"Depends on the object. On how strong the impression is. Powerful moments leave deeper marks." She looked at him directly. "Your fight with Magus Nox, for instance. That left marks all over the arena. I could read those for weeks afterward."

Adom felt a small chill.

"But mundane things—a coin changing hands, a door opening—those fade quickly. Hours, maybe days."

Bennu was examining his copper coin now with new interest. "So this coin has a history?"

"Of course. It's been in many pockets. Passed through many hands. Each one left a tiny impression." Beth's eyes twinkled. "Though I doubt any of them were as interesting as a phoenix's."

Bennu's head jerked up. "How did you—"

Adom's eyes widened. "Wait. You know?"

Beth laughed—that warm, delighted sound again. She looked genuinely amused by their shocked expressions.

Adom stared at her. He wasn't even surprised, for some reason. Of course she knew. Of course she'd figured it out. But still—

"How?" he started to ask.

"You're about to tell me he is," Beth said, still smiling.

Adom's mouth hung open for a moment. "I mean... he is. But... how?"

Beth's smile widened. "You just answered the 'how,' child."

Adom blinked. Processed that. She'd seen him about to confirm it. Five minutes ahead. She'd read his intention to speak before he'd even fully formed the thought.

This old one seems scammy, Zuni observed.

It did feel scammy. Like Beth just made you say things she already thought were true. A self-fulfilling prophecy wrapped in mysticism.

But then again, she'd had no way of knowing Bennu was a phoenix of all things. That wasn't common knowledge. Wasn't something you could guess from observation alone. And she'd said it so casually, like it was obvious.

Adom thought back. Usually, when someone used magic, you could feel it as a mage. Mana moved, shifted, had weight and presence. You could sense it being shaped, even if you couldn't see the exact spell. It was like feeling someone breathe in a quiet room—subtle, but there.

Beth had said that about Bennu without using any mana. At least, none that Adom had felt.

She hadn't used mana either when she'd predicted Bennu would want something salty. And Adom hadn't felt any mana use in her direction when they'd first approached—and it had been more than five minutes since they'd sat down here.

So Beth had just... known. In advance. More than five minutes ago.

Which made Adom even more curious about how she did it.

Magic was very democratized these days. Anyone with a mana core could learn the basics, access the fundamentals. Knowledge spread through academies and guilds and published research. But a lot of mages also jealously guarded discoveries about mana they made. Personal techniques. Private innovations. Things that gave them an edge.

And Beth was the best diviner in the whole empire. It wouldn't be surprising that she'd hide things the rest of the world didn't know. Maybe the same things Law had known.

Or maybe she's just very good at reading faces, Zuni suggested. And you're overthinking it.

Adom didn't think he was overthinking it.

Ada bounced off the bench. "Can you read my history? What did I do today?"

"I already know what you did today, dear. You told me. You got ice cream."

"Before that!"

Beth laughed. "You played with your dolls. You practiced writing your letters—very poorly, I might add, but with enthusiasm. You asked your mother if you could have a kitten."

Ada's mouth fell open. "How did you know about the kitten?!"

"Your sleeve," Beth said, pointing. "There's a small tear there. Fresh. From climbing something you shouldn't have been climbing—the garden fence, I'd wager—to look at something small and furry in the neighbor's yard."

Ada looked down at her sleeve. The tiny tear was barely visible.

"That's not divination," Adom said. "That's just observation."

"Is it?" Beth asked. "Where do you think divination begins and observation ends? They're the same skill, Adom. Just pointed in different directions."

She set down her sewing and looked at him properly.

"That's your first real lesson. Divination isn't some mystical art that requires special power or unique talent. It's about paying attention. About reading what's already there. The mana just... makes it easier. Amplifies what you'd see anyway, if you looked hard enough."

Adom considered that. "But you said you have seventy percent accuracy three days out. That's not just observation."

"No," Beth agreed. "That's practice. Decades of practice. And yes, some talent. But it started with observation. With learning to see the small things." She smiled. "You're already good at that. Better than most. That's why I offered to teach you."

She's right, Zuni said. You do notice things others miss.

Adom didn't respond to that. He was still thinking.

Ada had moved closer to Beth now, peering at the flag in the old woman's lap. "What does your flag say? In the past?"

Beth looked down at it fondly. "It says many things. But mostly, it says hope. That's what flags are for, after all."

"Hope for what?"

"For what's coming," Beth said simply.