“Well, that’s the idea. This one doesn’t work yet. The layers that go over it are even trickier, governing all the circumstances and commands the jess has to account for.” She cocked her head at the unfinished wirework. “It’s so orderly and logical. I have trouble keeping myself from throwing in improvisations, or trying shortcuts, but that always ruins it. The last one I made should have stopped a person from doing magic, but instead it stopped them from seeing out of their left eye.”

“Doesn’t it bother you,” Zaira asked abruptly, “making something like that?”

Istrella shrugged. “I grew up wearing one. It makes people feel safer around me, and Marcello leaves me released nearly always anyway. I can see why it would be more annoying for a warlock, though, having your powers sealed all the time. Especially since I hear you don’t want to be a Falcon.”

“Do you want to be a Falcon?” I asked.

Istrella’s eyes crinkled into a smile, the mage mark shining gold around her pupils. “Oh, yes! I get to putter around with artifice projects all day, I have all the books I want, and I have friends who understand me and aren’t afraid of me. It’s lovely.” She started picking through blood-red beads in a tray in her lap. The coach hit a bump, and she clucked her tongue disapprovingly.

Zaira’s brows clumped in frustration. “But you can’t leave the Mews without your brother, and he’s gone half the time—off bringing in new Falcons, or at meetings, or arresting some poor crazy bastard with a touch of artifice who’s carving explosive seals on all the village doors to keep the demons out. How can that not make you angry?”

“I do get angry at Marcello sometimes, when he’s being an ass. He’s my brother, after all.” The twinkle in Istrella’s eyes dissipated to a more contemplative shine. “But back when the colonel used to make us spend half the year with my family, he looked out for me. When Father found one of my devices and tried to ruin it, like he always did, Marcello would tell him that was property of the Empire, and destroying it was a crime. If our older brother raised his hand to me when Marcello wasn’t looking, I could hold up my jess to remind him I was a Falcon now, and he’d have to leave me alone.” She turned her wrist, making the red beads sparkle. “But Halmur tells me it’s unnerving sometimes when he leaves the Mews, and they have to seal his vivomancer powers, and he can’t sense the life around him. And I know you don’t want to be in the Mews at all, except when you’re with Terika. So I suppose it’s different for everybody.”