Past the door, the heat from the furnaces was nearly overpowering, even with the chill of winter blanketing the town. Three furnaces, ranked in size, dominated the room. Vast skylights lit the workshop with warm winter sun, which made the glass sparkle brilliantly. M. La Pierre bade them stand some distance from the largest furnace and watch his apprentice work. Even with a heavy leather apron and gloves protecting him, the boy must have felt the heat terribly. In some ways, it was like watching glamour drawn in the physical world, as he worked a blob of molten glass into a refined and elegant shape. The red glow of the glass absorbed Jane, and she found herself possessed of a sort of jealousy that the apprentice was making something physical and of service. As much as she loved glamour, the illusions had few practical applications. Only the charms for cooling had any daily use, and those were limited by the amount of energy required to work them.

Though it was possible to create heat with glamour, governing folds at that end of the spectrum often led to poor health. As with all folds outside the range of visible light, it took such an inordinate amount of energy to manage them that it was far easier to make a fire with sulphur matches than to try to create one from glamour.

After they watched for a few minutes, M. La Pierre led them to the table of glasses his apprentice had already finished. The matched set had a delicate stem crowned by an elegant thin bowl. ‘Identical, yes?’ He picked up two and held them out. ‘But look closely. See the bubbles? No two exactly the same. You need a simpler shape to put inside it.’

‘The red cone is extraordinarily simple.’ Vincent protested.

Snorting, M. La Pierre picked up the paper and pointed at it again. ‘You think introducing an inclusion to cause that bend is simple? I’d like to see you try.’

‘Your . . . good information is why we came to you, M. La Pierre.’ Jane tried to smooth over the man’s ruffled feathers. To be sure, he was not the only glassblower in the area, but he was widely accounted the best. ‘Can you speak to what shapes are easier? Perhaps we can find a glamour that suits the medium.’

He gestured with his chin at the boy blowing goblets. ‘Bubbles and tubes. That is what the glass wants to do.’ Setting the goblets down with deliberate care, he shook his head. ‘A fool’s errand, if you ask me. If it were possible, someone would have done it already.’

Jane’s stomach sank at that, for there was something to his argument. ‘But have the techniques for glassblowing not improved with time? Perhaps something is now possible that was not before.’

‘Mayhap.’ He shrugged. ‘But it doesn’t look so to me.’