“I can’t figure this out,” Lillian complained. She was staring at a parchment. “Why doesn’t this work?”
Nanette left the trolley and walked back to the table. “Because you’ve knotted the magic into a collapsing spiral,” she said. “You’ve basically twisted the spell into a ball of string and tied the ends together.”
The door opened behind her. Nanette glanced back. Penny was stamping into the room, looking furious. Nanette wondered, idly, what’d happened. The suggestions shouldn’t have been that effective. Perhaps she’d had a row with one of her friends. It couldn’t have escaped their notice that Penny was spending a lot of time with a newcomer. Solid friendships had been destroyed by less.
“It’s time to go,” Penny said. She sounded like she was on the verge of exploding. “We don’t have much time left.”
Nanette glanced at the clock. It was mid-afternoon. “We have enough,” she said, picking her words carefully. She had to push the right buttons, all the while maintaining plausible deniability. “Just let me finish here…”
“Come on,” Penny urged. “It’s not that important…”
Lillian looked up, defiantly. “I need help and…”
Penny glared. “Be quiet!”
“I need help,” Lillian repeated. “I…”
“I said, be quiet!” Penny cast a spell. Lillian’s mouth and nose melted into her skin. “I said…”
“Undo the spell!” Nanette didn’t have to pretend to be horrified. Lillian was starting to suffocate. “Now!”
Penny’s rage built. She drew back her hand to slap Lillian.
“Enough!” The librarian cancelled the spell. Lillian started to gasp for breath. “You” — she jabbed a finger at Nanette — “take this firstie to the healers.”
She rounded on Penny. “And you, report to Lady Damia at once. Now!”
Nanette helped Lillian to stand, carefully concealing her private glee. It had worked! She hadn’t known precisely what would happen, but she’d been certain something would.
And now to see where the pieces fall, she thought. If everything worked as planned, she’d have a window of opportunity. If not… she’d think of something else. And no one can ever blame it on me.
Chapter 9
It was nearly an hour before Nanette was able to return to the bedroom, an hour spent watching as the healers poked and prodded at Lillian and then escorting the younger girl back to her room. She was tempted to stay longer, but she couldn’t be seen in a younger girl’s dorm. Her dormmates would say all sorts of things, mostly complete nonsense. The rumours of favouritism wouldn’t do her any good after the older girl graduated.
And I won’t be here in a couple of weeks, if not less, Nanette thought, as she pushed the door open and stepped into the bedroom. Lillian will have to make do with what I can give her before then.
She frowned. Penny was lying on the bed, tears staining her eyes. It was brutally obvious she’d been caned. Nanette felt a stab of sympathy that surprised her. Penny might have done something that deserved something more than a slap on the wrist, but she hadn’t been quite in her right mind. The suggestions had pushed her into lashing out at her rival before she could realise just how bad an idea it was.
“I’m grounded,” Penny said. Her breath came in fits and starts. “I… I’m grounded.”
Good, Nanette thought. She pasted a concerned expression on her face. “You’re stuck in this room?”
“No more flying for the rest of the term,” Penny said. “I… I won’t get to impress the guests.”
Nanette pretended to think about it. “But you could still claim the credit for planning the display, couldn’t you?”
Penny shot her a look that suggested she’d said something stupid. “Do you think anyone will give me the credit?”
“If you’re the one who planned the display,” Nanette argued, “they can hardly tell everyone they did it.”
“Yeah,” Penny said. “They just won’t mention it. I have to blow my own trumpet and… and I can’t.”
“I see.” Nanette opened the drawer and searched for the soothing lotion. “Why don’t you ask someone to do it for you?”
“And precisely who do you think is going to risk giving up their share of the credit?” Penny took the jar and started to apply the lotion to her backside. “My team? They’ll be pretending they don’t know me. The other teams? Get real. They’ll be promoting themselves, not me.”
Nanette smiled. “Ask Lillian.”
Penny stared at her. “Are you out of your mind?”
“No,” Nanette said. “Think about it. Lillian has every reason to want you to suffer, right? So her telling everyone you planned the display will look good, right? And you can play it up, later, as you trying to apologise for losing your temper and hurting her. Nearly killing her. You do owe her more than just a written apology, so… you can claim you’re giving her some patronage. And so on.”
Penny didn’t look convinced. “You think she’d do it for me?”
“I’d urge her to do it,” Nanette said. Things might just work out better than she’d hoped. If nothing else, it would be embarrassing — afterwards — for Penny to withdraw her patronage or cheat the younger girl. The community might not give much of a damn about Lillian, but they’d take note of a patron who tried to weasel out of her commitments. “And you would find a way to reward her, wouldn’t you?”
She smiled. “So you can’t fly yourself. So what? You can still show off your spellwork.”
Penny frowned as she forced herself to stand. “I’m not even allowed to talk to the team.”
“So have Lillian carry messages,” Nanette said, patiently. “And if someone complains, you can say you’re trying to make it up to her.”
“Hah.” Penny took off her dress and headed for the washroom. “Do you think that’ll work?”
“It should,” Nanette said. She winced at the marks on Penny’s backside. The gym mistress had caned the back of her legs, as well as her buttocks. She knew from experience that was extra painful. “Yes, you did something stupid. Yes, you deserved to get thrashed. But… you have a chance to show you can learn from experience, that you can recover from your mistakes. And it will work out in your favour.”
Penny turned and gave her a shy smile. “Do you think so?”
“Yes,” Nanette said. “And I’ll help you.”
She smiled, coldly, as Penny stepped into the washroom and closed the door behind her. It had worked. Penny and Nanette would remain within the school during the flying display, while practically everyone else was in the Silent Woods. And they’d see more than they expected, when the different pieces of spellwork started to interact. Nanette allowed her smile to grow wider as she studied the parchments. Lillian would serve as the go-between, if Nanette asked, giving Nanette a chance to switch the parchments around. It didn’t matter if she told everyone Penny had done the work or not. It might be better, afterwards, if no one was quite sure who to blame.
A shame Penny isn’t someone worse, Nanette thought. It would be a lot easier to set her up to take the fall.
The thought bothered her. She’d have had no qualms about landing Ophelia in the cesspit. Framing the girl for something awful would’ve been fun. She’d have deserved it, even if the deception hadn’t lasted long enough to get the girl in real trouble. But Penny… wasn’t so bad. She was an aristo, and haughty enough to deserve some comeuppance, but she wasn’t an outright villain. She might even have been a good friend, if things had been different.