The Paper Magician (The Paper Magician Trilogy, #1)(17)

found in solihull stop

The words whipped away from her eyes as a new hand pinched the message’s corner and pulled it from the machine. Ceony didn’t need to turn to know Mg. Thane stood behind her. She spied the name Alfred at the end of the message as it flew past her.

She stepped back and watched Mg. Thane read the note, his bright-green eyes holding their secrets, for once. She found nothing in his expression save for concentration and a spot on his chin where he had missed shaving that morning. He read the telegram in the space of half a breath and crumpled the paper in his hands.

“What’s in Solihull?” Ceony asked. The city was over a hundred miles away, to the northwest.

Mg. Thane gave her a small smile—one of his odd smiles, for it was all lip and no eye—and said, “Just a friend.” He then turned on his heel and strode out of the library, nearly stepping on Fennel as he went.

Ceony peered after him, watching him cross the hall and disappear into his bedroom. What sort of friend had been “found” in Solihull?

She stood there a moment, wondering at the light fleeing from her mentor’s eyes. She had the feeling of reading a story with all its even pages torn out. What did that telegram say?

Chewing on her bottom lip, Ceony sank back into her chair and returned to her frog, only half her mind on its Folds. She had begun forming its back legs when Mg. Thane returned with a large stack of things in his hands, paper and books and ledgers and pencils. He dropped them beside Ceony and straightened up two paper stacks on the desk before speaking.

“A spontaneous lesson,” the paper magician announced, taking a sheet of off-white typewriter paper from the desk. He picked up his board and sat cross-legged on the floor. Hesitating a few seconds, Ceony took another sheet of the same and joined him.

“Watch carefully, this will be quick,” Mg. Thane said, setting the paper longways before him. He Folded up an inch of it, creased it with his thumb, then turned it over to Fold it up another inch.

“A paper fan,” he explained, flipping the paper over again. “I’m sure you’ve made these before.”

“As a child,” Ceony said, glancing to his face.

He turned the paper over and over, Folding it up and up, somehow managing to get each Fold perfect without a ruler. “The trick is to make it even,” he explained. “Every panel must be the same length and width, or the spell won’t hold. You can measure it if you like, but focusing on that first Fold and using it as a guide works just as well. If there’s anything left over, you can cut it off.”

He finished the fan, having nothing to spare, and pinched its bottom. “It doesn’t need to be secured,” he added. Turning the fan away from Ceony and toward the door, he flapped it lightly. One, two, three gusts of wind spat out from the paper, too strong to be ordinary, but too weak to do any harm.

He set the fan down. “Simple enough. I want you to practice it while I’m gone.”

The words tumbled over one another in Ceony’s mind. “G-Gone?” she repeated. “Gone where?”

“Magician’s business, as usual,” he said, standing. He left his board on the floor and returned to the stack of things he’d brought in. “The Art of Papier-Maché,” he said, reading the title of the lowest book in the stack. He pointed to the ledger above it. “I want you to record notes on it while you read. Take thorough enough notes and I won’t make you write a report.”

Ceony’s jaw fell. “But—”

“A Living Paper Garden,” he said, gesturing to the next book in the stack. “Do the same. I bookmarked chapters five, six, and twelve; they have exercises in them I’d like you to do. And A Tale of Two Cities. It’s just a good book. Have you read it?”

Ceony stared at the paper magician, words caught in her throat. He’d gone mad again. He’d tricked her into thinking he wasn’t mad, and yet now he’d proved—

“And I want that paper fan perfected,” he added, withdrawing his hand. “Made well, it can give gusts that would embarrass a thunderstorm. And the reading I previously assigned you.”

Shaking her head, Ceony stood and asked, “How long do you plan to be gone?”

Mg. Thane shrugged. “Hopefully not too long. It’s quite the bother to break one’s routine too many days in a row. Do you know Patrice’s contact information, just in case?”

“Patrice?” Ceony repeated, her voice a little higher. “Magician Aviosky? I . . . yes, but—”

“Excellent!” Mg. Thane clapped her on the shoulder and strode out of the library. “I’ll be on my way. Try not to burn anything down.”

Ceony followed after him. “You’re leaving now?”

“I am,” he replied as he vanished into his bedroom. Somehow in the few minutes between receiving the telegram and delivering the pile of homework to the library, he had managed to pack a bag. He returned to the hallway with it in tow. He swept a hand back through his dark hair, and in that moment Ceony saw a flicker in his eyes and a thinning of his lips. He was worried.

“Is everything . . . all right?” she asked, hesitating at the threshold of the library, unsure of her bounds.

“Hm?” he asked, his countenance smoothing between ticks of the library clock. “Quite fine. Do take care, Ceony.” He walked down the hallway as far as the lavatory, where he turned around and added, “And keep the doors locked.”