Chapter 6
I handed Chalice a cup of tea. “Here.”
“Thanks.”
We were up in my living room. Chalice was sitting on the sofa, knees together. I sat in the chair opposite her and put my own cup of tea on the table with a click. The sounds of the Camden night came filtering faintly through the window—shouts and laughter, running footsteps, the thumping of music from over the rooftops—but inside, the room was quiet.
I studied Chalice. Her coat was slung over the sofa along with her scarf, and she was leaning back, apparently relaxed. She wasn’t obviously pretty but she dressed well and held herself with a sort of pleasant confidence. She didn’t look like a Dark mage, or any sort of mage for that matter. She looked like a professional London woman in her late twenties or early thirties.
But she was a Dark mage, and the fact that she didn’t look dangerous just meant that I hadn’t yet figured out how she was dangerous. Being Luna’s master has given me a good basic understanding of chance magic. Chalice would be able to lay curses, protect herself with good luck, arrange for coincidences to happen when they most benefited her . . . and unlike Luna, she’d be in full control of it. “Thanks for coming on such short notice.”
“Oh, don’t worry.” Chalice spoke with a faint Indian accent, but her English was perfect. According to what I’d been able to learn, she’d grown up and trained in India before coming here in her midtwenties. “I had a free weekend, so I thought I’d drop by.”
“Hope you didn’t have to wait long.”
“I didn’t wait at all.”
“Actually, I was out of the shop all day. You rang just as I was getting home.”
Chalice smiled at me. “Just good luck, then.”
“Very.”
Silence fell. From outside, men’s voices echoed down the street, laughing and drunken. Inside, Chalice and I watched each other across the coffee table. If we’d been cats, our tails would have been twitching.
“I like your house,” Chalice said.
“It’s pretty small by mage standards.”
“I know, but the places most mages live are so cut off.” Chalice glanced back at the window; the sound of the boys had faded away to be replaced by the rumbling of a car engine as someone tried to park. “This feels more like the middle of the city. More alive.”
“That’s why I do it. I grew up here in London; I don’t like to be too apart from it.”
Chalice nodded, and I felt the tone shift. Pleasantries were complete. “So I understand you’re looking for a teacher.”
“That’s the idea.” I leant forward, picking up the teacup. “Do you mind if I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
“Usually, when a mage is thinking of taking on a new student, the first thing they want to do is talk to the student,” I said. “You wanted to talk to me.”
“Oh, I’d like to talk to your apprentice, too,” Chalice said. “But I thought it would clear the air if I spoke to you first.”
I raised my eyebrows.
“You’re deciding whether you trust me enough to teach her. Yes?”
“That’s pretty accurate,” I said. “If you don’t mind, I’m a little curious as to why you approached Luna in the first place.”
“Actually, I’ve been aware of Luna for a while,” Chalice said. “Word got around when you started looking for a teacher. She’s an unusual girl.”
“And how much do you know about her?”
“Her name’s Luna Mancuso and she’s twenty-four years old. She has an Italian father and an English mother, no brothers or sisters, and she was born and went to school in southwest London. She left school at age sixteen and started living away from home shortly afterwards. She became your apprentice at age twenty-two, two and a half years ago, and joined the apprentice program at the same time. She’s at the bottom of her class in magical history and metaphysics, and at the top of her class in duelling. She won the Novice Open in early spring last year, placed third at Greengrove, practices at the Islington gym in her spare time, likes Japanese food, and she’s a Leo.”
I looked at Chalice. “Also,” Chalice continued, “she’s the carrier of a family curse that protects her and harms everyone else. Which makes her an adept, rather than a mage. Which technically means it’s illegal for her to be in the apprentice program.”
“Technically, adepts are defined by being only able to use one spell,” I said. “You just said that her curse protects her and harms others. That’s two effects, not one. Which makes her a mage.”
Chalice smiled. “You sound like a lawyer.”
“I’ve become very familiar with the adept laws in my spare time.”
“Don’t worry,” Chalice said. “That wasn’t a threat. I’m sure that if you had to, you could prove to the Council that Luna’s a mage. Or at least muddle things enough.” Chalice paused. “But you’re still wrong. She isn’t using different spells; she’s using one spell. She’s simply channelling it in different ways.”
“Why are you interested in her, then? If you don’t think she’s a mage—”
“I didn’t say that.”
“So what do you think she is?”
“I think where you get your power from is less important than what you do with it. Have you tried teaching her any other spells? Luck control, blessings, slay machine . . . ?”
“We’ve done some practice.”
“Did you get anywhere?”
I hesitated an instant, deciding how much to give away. “No. Directing the curse, focusing it, yes. But we haven’t managed to change that into anything affecting probability more generally.”
“That’s because you’re doing it the wrong way.”
“How do you know?”
“Because of what you just said,” Chalice said. “Probability. Diviners always see it like that.”
“Isn’t that’s exactly what chance magic does?”
“Probability is mathematicians’ language, something separate from you. For a chance mage, it’s not separate. Chance is the air you breathe and the ground under your feet. You can’t set yourself apart.”
I thought about it for a second. I didn’t really follow what she was saying . . . but then, I didn’t need to. “Can you teach Luna?”
Chalice nodded. “I think so.”
I looked at her. “So.”
“So?”
“What’s in it for you?”
“There are a few minor things. I’m curious to see how that apprentice of yours develops. Then there’s the chance to study—”
“How about you just skip to the big one?”
“I want an alliance,” Chalice said. She wasn’t smiling anymore. “Which means your help. If I need information, or a favour of some kind, you give it.”
I looked back at her for a second. “That sounds dangerous.”
“Magic is dangerous. Your apprentice is dangerous. You’re dangerous. From what I understand, you’ve dealt with much worse.”
“That doesn’t mean I do it by choice. Isn’t there anything else you want? Money?”
“You couldn’t offer me enough.”
“Items?”
“More tempting, but I’m afraid I’m not bargaining. I told you my price and I meant it.”
I checked to see what Chalice would do if I said no. Sure enough, every future in which I turned her down led to her walking out. She wasn’t bluffing. “Your price isn’t cheap.”
“Don’t act as though you were expecting to get this for free. Did you think the Light chance mages were going to give lessons away?”
“No, but I wouldn’t jump on that kind of offer from a Light mage either.” I thought for a second. “What kind of help?”
“Right now, there’s nothing I need,” Chalice said. “I expect that’ll change, sooner or later. Most likely, I’ll need your help against other Dark mages.”
“Because that doesn’t sound like a bad idea.”
“You’re qualified to deal with it, aren’t you?”
I was silent. “Besides,” Chalice said. “I did say an alliance. You can call on me for help too.”
“Except that you’d expect that to happen less often, since you’re also teaching Luna.”