Amon rolled his pen between his fingers. “I’ll look into it,” he conceded. “I’ll see if anyone by that name is enrolled at Wien House or Isenwerk. If he came here for school, it seems most likely he’d be going as a soldier or engineer.” He bent his head over his work and began scratching notes. “Unless you think he’s going into orders. Speaker Jemson seemed impressed with him.”

Amon Byrne was actually making a joke.

Raisa watched him for a long moment, then slumped in her chair. “You’re right. I was probably mistaken.”

Amon kept working, so Raisa turned back to her own task, squeezing sentences out with great effort and little enthusiasm, like paint from an empty tube.

She tried to ignore the dull ache beneath her ribs that might have been disappointment.

C H A P T E R  T H I R T E E N

CHARMCASTING
FOR BEGINNERS

Han scrubbed at his eyes with both hands and set the book of simple charms aside. He was a decent reader—he’d been the best in his class at the school at Southbridge Temple—but this vocabulary was totally foreign to him. It didn’t help that he’d risen before the sun, after a sleepless night, driven by worry. It was only his first day of classes, and he was already drunk with fatigue.

Taking hold of his flashpiece, he walked the perimeter of his room, stumbling over words as he tried to reproduce the spoken charm. When he’d circled the room twice, he stopped in the center and looked around.

Nothing happened. No gush of flame charred the walls (a good thing). No shimmering net of protection settled over the doors and windows (maybe a bad thing). The book had described it as a charm of protection against those who meant him harm. How would he know it worked if there was no enemy to try it out on?

An enemy lived two floors below. And he still hadn’t decided what to do about it.

He’d already sat through a lecture from Dancer on the topic, the night before, when Micah left the tavern and Han wanted to follow.

“Leave him be,” Dancer had said, getting in his way. “You don’t know how well armed he is, or what he knows. Don’t start a fight unless you know you can win.”

“The fight’s already started,” Han said. “It started on Hanalea.” But the war began with Mam and Mari, he added silently.

“He has an amulet, and he probably knows how to use it,” Dancer said. “Unlike us.”

“You heard what he said,” Han argued. “He’s coming after me. Better if I hush him first.” It was what he knew, the law of the streets, kill or be killed. “He’ll be dead before he can squeak out a charm.”