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She raised an eyebrow. “Couldn’t you tell?”
I thought back to the ethereal creature I knew, tall, blond, and yes, elfin. It was sort of obvious, now that someone pointed it out.
“You’ve seen his gowns,” Jasmine added. “No Arcane magic made those.”
“It has better uses,” Caleb muttered.
The Valkyrie sighed. “Yes, tell us again how much superior your magic is. But I don’t see you solving the problem.”
“I don’t see you doing it, either.”
“At least we could identify it.”
“Identifying isn’t reversing.”
“We aren’t finished yet.”
“The covens have been finished for years,” he snapped.
And got whacked on the shin for his trouble.
“Slipped,” the tiny witch said, unrepentant.
Caleb cursed. “If you want to keep him alive—or as much as these things ever are—keep him away from them!” he told me.
Yeah. Only she was right; they’d known almost at once what they were dealing with. He hadn’t.
“Can you remove it?” I asked the witches again.
Which led to another round of eye contact, but no one said anything. Until the small one piped up again. “I’m willing to have a go,” she said cheerfully.
The other two looked less enthused. But finally, they nodded. “It would be in a city,” Jasmine sighed.
“Why does that matter?” I asked—stupidly. Because it wasn’t like I was going to understand the answer.
“It doesn’t,” Caleb said, sounding disgusted. “Magic is magic.”
“We use a reserve of power to augment our own,” Jasmine said, ignoring him. “As you do with the Pythian power. But ours is generated by the earth itself, the song of the sky, the land, the seas—”
“Bullshit!” Caleb said. “You’re messing about with wild magic, and it’s going to get you killed!”
Jasmine rolled her eyes. “You use talismans, do you not? They also gather the magic the earth gives off.”
“Slowly, carefully, safely. What we
do is like using electricity. You play around with lightning!”
“That’s an exaggeration, as you well—”
“How many of your people have been fried, trying to channel wild magic?” Caleb demanded.
“And how many of yours have poisoned themselves playing about with alchemy?” the Valkyrie interjected. “Magic is inherently dangerous—”
“Not if you know what you’re doing!”
“Ah, and there’s the rub, isn’t it?” she said, sneering. “Just because you can’t do it—”
“Can’t—” Caleb flushed. “We choose not to use something dangerously unstable and innately unreliable—”
