CHAPTER THIRTY

My mind twisted back to Mallow. That innocent sounding laughter in the center of all of this chaos, which now included no less than a dozen rainbow colored doves, was the one who kidnapped her. He might have her locked up somewhere unpleasant and dangerous this very moment.

Having fun with him was like betraying Mallow.

Grudgingly, I crawled my way over to the end of the rolling stage. I stepped off onto the ground. The entire building was filled with whooping and cheering. I hadn't realized how very much a sorcerer could change reality itself. The properties of everything were shifting at Winsor's utterances. Sometimes he had to start over, getting halfway through a rhyme and being overtaken by giggles. But still, the dancing girls were flying, the stage was like a sea, the torches twinkled like multicolored stars, and as the music of the lackluster band was enhanced, I saw the notes swirling through the air like snowflakes. Throughout all of this, he hadn't miscast once. Was it just nerves that made his spells fail? Was he actually a good sorcerer?

I made my way back over to Sir Osoro, whose brow was furrowing in concentration. I pulled up a seat next to him and spectated. If he could influence Winsor, maybe he could get the brat to tell me where Mallow was.

I swatted some notes out of my way, and as they exploded against the back of my hand, a loud burst of noise sung out.

Sir Osoro glanced down at me.

"Keeping the spell up difficult?" I asked.

Sir Osoro shook his head.

"No. Avalon's don't lose heat. It's more that I'm worried about him."

I held my hand up in the room. It was pretty warm to me. The breeze created by the show girl's wings was refreshing. When he caught my perplexed expression, Sir Osoro cleared his throat in disdain.

"A sorcerer's power comes from their own bodies. The energy is tied to their core temperature. If a sorcerer casts too much, he becomes unwarm. If he gets too..." Osoro hesitated, before continuing in a quieter tone, "... cold, his body cannot recover from the shock and he dies."

"Winsor's doing good," I said. "In fact, he looks flushed."

"Yes... he does, actually." Osoro took a step forward. Unlike usual, where his armor would have shifted and clinked, the step was silent in the fine clothes he wore. "If he's not tired yet, I suppose that all the time he spent studying hasn't been ill used."

"What shall I do now? Which fancies and dreams do you desire to see manifested?" Winsor called out to the crowd. I saw the adoration on the faces that peered up to him.

"Fireballs! I've always wanted to see a good ol' fireball like they use on Provings!"

"Ya, a fireball!"

"An inferno please! Uh, but don't burn us!"

"Unimaginative, but I supposed it cannot be helped in those of so little schooling. A fireball it is then."

Winsor laughed, mockingly but not maliciously, as he twisted his pale hands together for show.

"Betwixt my fingers a barrage,

shard of cosmos do I sow.

Form a flame engulfed mirage,

travel close with molten glow.

Fiery ball of harmless light,

drop some small transient gifts.

Enhance this fine crowds delight,

upwards everyone's joy lifts."

He threw his arms up and chanted. Manifesting from nothing, a large pockmarked rock engulfed in flames appeared above Winsor. The comet flew around the ceiling of the room, a tail waving in its wake. From it, small bubbles fell. Most exploded with a gentle pop, but others held within them coins or small gems. A game on the floor broke out of trying to catch the bubbles and hoping that inside of theirs was a prize.

I resisted the urge to join in.

"All sorcerers can do this, right? No big deal?"

Osoro shook his head.

"Changing one property of one thing. Funneling out a disease or healing an injury quickly that would have fixed itself if only given time is fairly simple. Adjusting the weather, a little bit harder, especially if one is to isolate the effects, since that is affecting multiple things, like the appearance and the warmth of the moisture... I should know, I've been handling it all week, but..."

I discreetly grabbed a bubble floating from the sky. It popped in my hand. A small glistening pearl sat in my palm. Tiny droplets of moisture from the exploded bubble rolled along the lines of my hand. Was this an illusion or had he somehow coaxed soap and water from the air to create these?

"Winsor is effecting all of these elements at once. The music notes in appearance and smell... the ... have you noticed the room even smells different?"

I breathed deeply through my nose. I held back a gag as the scent of the flowers from the manor hit me fully. He had masked the smell of stinking workers and townspeople. He had obliterated the fumes of the booze, and dulled it all with an ever present mask of those soft pink flowers from around his home.

"Yeah..." I said, fighting back the bad memories.

"He is even affecting the smell. That's three senses at once, and then touch... the stage is now soft, judging from the men's expressions as they fall. It rolls like the sea. He has given it animation," Osoro swallowed as the comet passed close to us once again. "In addition, he is creating where there is nothing, manifesting. The only thing harder than manifesting is sustaining life—"

A splash of drink hit Osoro in the back of the neck. Irritated, he resisted the urge to glower behind him, but I saw the muscles in his thick neck twitch. A group was singing while on a table behind us, their cups in the air sloshing drink everywhere. Their dangerous dancing slowed as my gaze leveled on them, the table's frantic rocking stopped.

"You're splashing us. Master Reglar wishes you to have fun, but please, Sir Osoro here isn't in need for a bath at this moment," I said with a smile.

They apologized, laughed and climbed off the table. They settled for standing on their chairs instead of causing the table to tilt precariously with their dancing. One man toppled anyway, the chair legs snapping, reminding me of Mallow tossing that old customer. Recalling my missing Mallow sobered my mood. The men made fun of their fallen friend as they helped him up.

"Bernard is rubbish at manifesting," Osoro was half talking to himself now, his gaze focused.

"Where is your friend, Bernard?" I asked.

"The most interesting thing about the dancers is their costumes as far as Bernard is concerned, at least these days. He went back to his shop to finish all of the rush orders he's gotten during the Festival."

Somehow the cabaret girls having no appeal to Bernard didn't surprise me at all.

"So... you're here alone?"

"I'm always here when they are performing later in the day," he clipped. I rose an eyebrow. "Not... not like that! I'm here to ensure their safety and the behavior of the men."

"Uh-huh," I said. The golden strand from his hand, leading to the stage where Winsor was, snapped. Osoro's attention shifted to where Winsor stood. The sparkling golden trail faded, and with it, Winsor's raucous laughter went quiet. The chaos continued around him like a maelstrom, but he stood in the eye of it, staring around.

The expression on his face drifted from confusion to realization to embarrassment. And then, he wrapped his arms around himself, holding himself tightly and shaking. His large black rimmed eyes sparkled with withheld tears.

"So he was unwarm. My spell must have been interfering with the thoughts that he should stop, ignoring his body's limits. No inhibitions," Osoro said. "That... that's why my magic ceased. I was hurting him." His voice was tight with regret.

And here I thought it was because he was lying about not being a leering pervert like the rest of us.

"Go on, cast another one. Find out if he knows anything about—"

"All of this nonsense I have caused, come to an immediate pause," Winsor shouted in his wispy voice, causing it to crack slightly. Everything stopped. Winsor beheld the cabaret from his new vantage point, his face past the stage of pink embarrassment and into the pallid whiteness of utter humiliation. "Everyone, if you are interacting with a magical component, disengage from it and move a safe distance away."

With some grumbling, people climbed off of the stage, with remorse they put down the gems and gold they had collected. The dancers were left in an unusual position, trying to stare behind them at the large fluffy white wings, not quite sure how to retreat from them.

"Every spell I've cast in the cabaret immediately and safely go away."

The meteorite fizzled out, the wings burst into a thousand feathers before fading away, the coins and gems all disappeared. The stage snapped into a solid board once more, cracking like a tree struck by lightning. Winsor's expression darkened. He walked quietly over to the steps on the side of the stage and descended. People around him showered him with appreciative thanks and compliments, but it was clear from his devastated expression none of it was being heard. My injuries stayed healed. We'd been here longer than I realized.

"I was supposed to let him down easy. Let him gradually realize what was happening..." Osoro fretted.

"Run?" I suggested.

"Avalons cannot run from their own mistakes." He slumped, losing his impeccable posture. "I would run if I were you, however."

"What, I wasn't mind controlling him," I protested.

"You two." Winsor's voice sounded strained as he came to a stop in front of us. He dragged a sleeve across his eyes, soaking up the tears of embarrassment, before he put on his best scowl. He was shorter than both of us, but somehow Osoro and I both shrank away from the broiled antagonism in his gaze. "Sir Osoro, I see that your pock marks have returned. Needless to say what you've done has been wildly inappropriate and the forces that be have deigned to alert you to that fact."

Osoro raised a hand and touched his face. I studied him closer in the dim light. His usually smooth skin had fallen prey to the same imperfections many of us ungifted suffered. Extra weight puffed out on his cheeks and under his chin, which made him less handsome but more relatable.

"I was only trying to ensure that you enjoyed your day, Winsor—"

"Let's not even start on how you lied to me about not telling anyone when we talked earlier." Winsor's voice was venomous. Osoro shot me a betrayed scowl. What? I wasn't the one he told, I just eavesdropped! It's his fault for being so arrogant as to not even notice me standing in the room. "I will be going. I do not want to see you again until the party tomorrow, and even then, I expect you to show up with your gift and avoid me the rest of the evening."

"Yes, Enchanted One," Osoro said. He cleared his throat. "I apologize for breaching your trust in me."

"I should have remembered that you are my brother's friend first, no matter what oaths you have taken." Winsor waved his hand. Osoro stepped away into the crowd of confused patrons. A few waved at Winsor, but he ignored them to glower at me.

I thought I heard Winsor's teeth chattering together before I realized that the sound was rain on the roof. Still, his arms were wrapped around himself, his mittens on his fingertips.

"And you..." he hissed. "You are in so much t-trouble..."

It hit me that this kid was in trouble, if what Osoro had said about magic was true. He'd acted tough in front of Osoro because he hadn't wanted word to get back to his brother that he had made another mistake, but he was cold. This was the sorcerer equivalent of the state I had been in earlier, bleeding and broken in that alley.

"Enchanted One!" I glanced around the room. Although all of the magic had faded, people were laughing and talking, recalling the surreal experience they'd all shared. Winsor's aura of wanting to be left alone kept the happy celebrants at an arm's length, but only just. I noticed one of the dancing girls peeping over her shoulder at where the wings were with melancholy, already missing the gift of flight. Two Assistants, Rorona and Papin, recognize me.

"Oh, Azark, get him over here. He's cold," Rorona shouted to me. She rose, gesturing for me to take her seat. Papin did likewise, dusting off the seat and moving into the darker area of the bar to make room.

"You will have to forgive even more than you already have."

"What?" Before he could protest further, I wrapped my arms around him and guided him over to the fireplace. He resisted as his scrawny form fidgeted in my arms. We sat down in front of the fire, me first and then tugging him unwillingly toward it.

"Thank you," I chirped at Rorona, who waved a hand with a smile and then went after her friend.

"Who do you think you are to handle me in such a way?" he protested. The flames licking the inside of the fireplace to our side already felt hot and dry on my skin, the waves of warmth washing over my body. I sweated. Winsor leaned toward it, drawn instinctively.

"May I have your hand Enchanted One?" I asked. Winsor's eyes went wide.

"What. No, I'm not going to marry you?" he said, questioning his own protest in shock. I laughed, and then reached for his arm. He pulled it away at first, but I was taller and stronger. I leaned across his body and grabbed him at the wrist. Yanking him forward, I flipped off the mitten and clamped his hand between my own two.

"No, I mean, for this." I rubbed his hand between mine. It was frigid. My own hands grew cool. I pulled them away and held them near the fire. Then I would move back and continue to rub. This second time he didn't jerk away, but surrendered to it, eyes watching me like a scared, but hungry, feral dog. They reminded me of the dog with the potato... wait, had that been his dog?

"See, movement warms you up faster than sitting near the flames," I said. Over his shoulder, I saw lurking by the bar, a woman in a BROS uniform. She was pretending to tend to her drink, but watching us quietly in the mirror set up behind the many bottles of the bar. Shuffling, she approached us.

"Enchanted One?" she asked. She was masculine, her dark hair cropped short to her head. That explained why I had thought all the BROS were men at the restaurant. Only closer I saw the soft curve of her small chest in the top of the tunic distorting the BROS stitching. She was younger than the bearded or the pepper-haired BROS. The folds about her eyes were upturned slightly, giving her a happy expression even as her broad mouth was a neutral line. How many of these BROS were there?

"What is it, Nitai?"

Nitai held out a small fashionable glass bottle. A potion. It was a deep, rusty color. Spirals danced in it, tiny stars, as they had in my undiluted tracking potion.

"Word reached your father, Divinis Wenrick, that you exerted yourself today, he believes that you should take an additional dose."

Word reached Divinis Wenrick already? But it'd barely been a few moments. Winsor curled his nose.

"I don't want to."

Nitai stood uncertainly, the fortune in unknown magic at the ends of her fingertips dangling in front of my nose.

"....Enchanted One, your father ordered. I cannot report to him without having first witnessed you drinking it—"

"I took it this morning, and I'll take it before I lie down for sleep tonight. I do not need a third dosage." Winsor bit the tip of his tongue. "Foul enough that the pungent taste aggrieves me at both ends of my day, like some pair of repugnantly ugly bookends."

"It doesn't taste good?" I asked. The rare genuine potion that I had drank in my lifetime tasted like sunshine, joy, and kissing. I wasn't aware it was possible for potions of healing to taste foul.

"No, not good is an understatement. Try abominable. Disastrous. Disgusting. It's enough to put one off of potion craft all together, to be perfectly frank. I do not see why Father cannot tweak the recipe to include more sugar or saffron or... something."

"It's the strength of the potion, Enchanted One. You and your father have discussed such. You may work with him to refine the recipe soon enough, but for now, you must drink it as he has prepared it."

"I hardly see how that is an option, as he won't share the recipe with me."

"The Divinis has a right to his secrets, as all sorcerers do. But I assure you, even for a sorcerer, it came at a precious cost," Nitai said, her tone even but her expression growing impatient. Her fingers stretched out impatiently. She jostled the vial. I watched as a spot of light imploded and then faded dark. "Now please, Enchanted One, the potion nearly scalds me with its warmth, but you're shivering, so it is a perfect match."

Winsor sighed, freeing one hand from mine. He took the bottle from Nitai, who dropped her hands back at her sides. She stayed, watching. Winsor uncapped the dainty vial. The smell hit me in a sudden wave. I struggled not to recoil. It wasn't plain and nasty, like horse dropping. It wasn't conditionally appealing, like sweat which repulsed in some and attracted for other situations. It was the void smell of the missing city, the crater from which the stench of magic rose up like thick smoke, mingling with a feverish heat that only heightened its unnatural tension.

Winsor drank the potion, grimacing. The apple of his throat bobbed with a single gulp. Despite his protests, he sipped at the bottle to make sure he got every drop before he capped it and handed it back to Nitai.

"There, your evidence that the crime was committed, just as Father orchestrated."

Nitai smirked and pocketed the bottle.

"Is it taking effect?" Nitai asked.

"My tongue is burning, but my skin is still frigid," he said coarsely. "Now go. Leave me be and pester someone else on Father's behalf." Winsor offered his hands to me. I took them again. Nitai inspected me with unmasked surprise.

"I'm his Assistant," I said.

Winsor waved a sleeve at me in unenthusiastic acknowledgement.

"I will see you both at the dinner tomorrow evening." Nitai bowed in deference, and left us.

I continued to rub. The tinge of blue in his white skin faded into pink, though it was hard to discern in the orange cast of the firelight.

We sat there quietly as the movement of the cabaret picked up. Winsor spied them over his shoulder, rubbing one of his ears with his good hand. The crowd that had been dancing on the table was at it again, singing.

"Do you think they're even more afraid of me than before?" he asked, quietly. "I... for only a moment, I felt like it was possible that they were not, but I was so disconcerted when I came out of the enchantment Osoro cast on me... I panicked and I think I have only worsened their discomfort with me."

"I think they're confused, Enchanted One."

"Oh, good," he said. "I felt... I mean, it was unbecoming to be acting like that on the stage."

"They didn't find anything wrong with it, Enchanted One. They liked you. I believe I even heard a few chanting your name."

"Really?" He hesitantly studied the crowd. "They liked me?" Disbelief etched across his narrow features.

"Certainly. Although the end was abrupt, I do not believe that is what they will speak of when they recall this night to others. I think mostly they will speak of how extraordinary it felt."

"I... It did feel nice." He sat up straighter. "Perhaps in the future I will not act so foolishly, but I may perhaps make their days better? In my own way. Sir Osoro was to a certain extent helpful after all; I shall apologize to him for my terseness next time we speak."

"Of course, Enchanted One."

"I may query him for further strategies. If I am to inherit the city, I need to become acquainted with the residents."

"Certainly, Enchanted One."

Winsor bit his lip to stop his smile.

"And maybe I'll make some friends... I mean, Bernard was friends with many of them—" A flicker of doubt.

"Few can afford his wares. He is selfish with his magic these days and people's memories fade quickly. It would not take much for you to be the sorcerer their hearts warm to."

Dawning joy crossed his featured as he realized the passing of his Age Day meant that he had a power that he'd never possessed before: the ability to steer his life in whatever direction he desired. If he wanted to be popular with the citizens of Blythe, he need only act on that desire. Bernard might insist that Winsor's room was still a cage, as he did after the play, but he had no authority to enforce it. The bullies of his past were predators with all fangs and claws removed, only menacing because of memory.

"Yes. I could be a highly regarded leader. A superior leader than Bernard at any rate." His dark hair fell over his eyes as he smiled in a way that made me instantly uncomfortable. "Really, you're the only one that should be frightened of me right now."

Oh, so this tender moment by the fireside didn't mean I was out of trouble yet. Still, I think I was closer to my goal of getting him to reveal Mallow's location, though I couldn't put my finger on how.

"Apologies Enchanted One, I overstepped my place."

"Certainly did. I am not some buffoon; I'm a destined Divinis," he scoffed. "You should think of a new cover story, phony sorcerer's Assistant. You've no idea how to behave around us."

"You mean, because I am overly friendly?"

He squinted at our joined hands.

"That is... one way to put it, yes."

(( A/N: All the minor female characters seem to be staking out the cabaret tonight, haha.  Thanks for you continued support and encouragement!))