Mages of a department sat together, with presenters to one side—which meant that Sciona ended up elbow-to-elbow with Cleon Renthorn. The proximity—the smell of the grease in his hair—made her stomach turn and her heartbeat pound straight to her head. But she couldn’t let the rat man see any of that, so she gave him a cordial smile.
“You’re looking sharp today, Highmage Renthorn.” She flicked her gaze pointedly to the bruise Thomil’s fist had left around his left eye. If the blow had upset him, wait until she got her shot in.
“You know that assaulting a highmage is a capital offense,” he hissed, “you little slut.”
“Ha,” Sciona said as she realized that Thomil must have knocked a few moments of memory out of the spellweb specialist when he hit him. If Renthorn thought Sciona was the one who had assaulted him—and if he didn’t compare accounts with his colleagues too closely—maybe no one would think to look for Thomil. Yes, Thomil and Carra were in the widow’s house, where the authorities weren’t likely to search, but in an ideal scenario, no one would be looking.
“I don’t know what kind of silly impact conduit you used against me,” Renthorn continued under his breath, “but if this was all an attempt to throw me off before the presentation, you’re out of luck.”
I attempted to throw you off? Sciona scoffed internally. Ultimately, she opted for maximum damage and smiled instead of scoffing. “That implies that I care how your presentation goes—which I might if your material was competition for mine, but we both know it’s not.”
Renthorn looked like he wanted to put his hands around her neck and strangle her right in front of the Council. “You—”
“Shh.” Sciona pressed a finger to her lips. “The archmages are starting.”
With the hundred members of the High Magistry seated, there were opening words from Archmage Orynhel, followed by a brief presentation of the planned action spells for the barrier expansion—brief because these spells had been all but finalized years ago. Sciona already knew from her foray into Orynhel’s office that the distinctions between proposed spells were incredibly minor, not taking long to cover before the Council moved on to the meat of the matter: mapping and siphoning.
Renthorn the Younger was called to present his sourcing plan first, with Tanrel assisting. The work the two of them had put together was masterful—although not revolutionary. Everyone already knew Tanrel could compose a decent base mapping spell, and he had. Everyone already knew that Renthorn could write an excellent spellweb, and he had. Overall, they had completed the best possible work any pair of mages could within the parameters they were given. It made Sciona glad that she had spent her time pushing the parameters themselves instead of diddling around within them.
She waited with her hands clutched tight on her folio after Renthorn and Tanrel had finished presenting, but the archmages didn’t call her to the floor. They asked Renthorn a dozen follow-up questions, then a dozen more on irrelevant details—well, not irrelevant, Sciona supposed, but nothing that would ensure that the spellweb produced sufficient energy to power the barrier expansion. No matter how Renthorn, Tanrel, Mordra the Tenth, and their many assistants fiddled with individual lines of spellwork, the archmages were not going to tease out what they wanted—and what Sciona could actually deliver: a guarantee of success.
As the Archmages argued over the particulars of Renthorn’s proposal, Sciona itched, her stomach in knots. Eventually, just as she worried that she might run out of time before noon, Archmage Gamwen murmured something to Bringham, who leaned over and whispered to Archmage Orynhel.
“Oh, yes, of course. Miss Freynan.” Archmage Orynhel peered over his spectacles at her. “Did you have anything to add to Highmage Cleon Renthorn’s demonstration? I hear that you were recently taken ill, so it’s quite alright if you have nothing to present.”
“No, Archmage.” Sciona stood. “That is—I don’t have anything to add to my colleagues’ presentation, but I do have my own.”
“Do you have copies of your spellweb for us?” Archmage Gamwen asked. “I don’t think I received any.”
“Apologies, Archmage. I, unfortunately, had to dismiss my assistant this week and haven’t had time to make copies myself. Suffice it to say the web is serviceable, but nothing you haven’t seen before—not as good as Highmage Renthorn’s. But I expect that once you’ve seen the mapping spells I’ve composed for the expansion, you’ll find that the differences between my spellweb and Highmage Renthorn’s do not matter.”
Renthorn the Third looked like he had just swallowed a rotting lemon. Meanwhile, a few other archmages muttered to each other in bewilderment and disapproval at her unwomanly confidence.
“That is a decision for the Council to make, Miss Freynan,” Duris said coolly. “Make your demonstration, and we will judge whether your proposal warrants consideration.”
A week ago, the admonishment would have made Sciona shrink and possibly vomit from nerves. It was oddly freeing that Archmage Duris’ scorn was the least of her worries now. Drawing her shoulders, she faced the archmages with a smile.
“Gladly, Archmage Duris. Apologies.” She had to stop herself from jogging down from the seating to the presentation desk in her eagerness. “If I may, what I have to present for you today are two new mapping spell compositions, one we might call the Stravos-Kaedor”—because Thomil was right; Stravdor really didn’t roll off the tongue—“and the other I’m calling the Freynan Mirror. Both have the potential to increase our siphoning accuracy by a significant margin.”
On all sides, Sciona’s fellow mages looked bored, and someone made a show of covering a yawn. She didn’t blame them. This was a claim mages had made before—including Highmage Tanrel in the presentation just before hers.
“With your permission, I will now demonstrate a mapping spell I composed using the Stravos-Kaedor Method.”
At Archmage Orynhel’s nod, Sciona placed her folio on the demonstration desk and opened it. Unlike the exam, where spells were written on the spot, presenters brought their spells to this demonstration pre-written to save time and technical difficulties. Under the eyes of the Council and her peers, Sciona fed her first sheaf into the spellograph and hit the activation key.
“The visual you see here represents the space between mapping coordinates 334.44 H, 334.63 H, 242.9 V, and 243.13 V,” she said as white shapes glowed to life before the assembly.
This spellograph was built for presentations, with a comically large mapping coil three times as tall as Sciona herself. As the Stravos-Kaedor visual lit up, despite everything, she allowed herself a moment of pride. Even expanded to the size of a house, every grayscale energy source was bright, every edge crisp as type set. It might not be the Freynan Mirror, but it was as clear as any mapping visual these mages had ever seen.
Gratifyingly, several of the Council gasped as wondering chatter rippled through the chamber. Archmage Scywin leaned forward with intense interest. Archmage Thelanra’s jaw hung open, and the elder mapping specialist kept blinking through his spectacles as though unable to believe what he beheld.