A Practical Guide to Sorcery (Book 3)

Chapter 93 - In the Still of the Morning (Part 1)

Sebastien

Month 1, Day 21, Thursday 1:15 p.m.

When Sebastien arrived at Dryden Manor, Sharon took one look at her and bustled out of the kitchen to grab her arm as if afraid she was about to fall over. "Mr. Siverling! Oh, you look absolutely wretched! Thomas!" Sharon called to the servant who had opened the door for Sebastien, her voice loud despite them all standing within a few feet of each other. "Take Mr. Siverling's things up to his room," she commanded. "And you come into the kitchen, dear," she said to Sebastien more quietly. "I'll get you fed with something warm."

"No need. I was just going to have a nap. I've been granted leave from the University for a few days."

"Nonsense! How long has it been since you ate? And something good, not that University cafeteria slop." Before Sebastien could answer, Sharon was divesting her of her jacket and bags and dragging her into the kitchen by her arm.

Sebastien sat at the kitchen table, nursing the steaming cup of tea that had been thrust into her hands while Sharon bustled about, chattering. She set a loaded plate of food in front of Sebastien and sat across from her, suddenly silent. She sipped her own cup of tea and shot Sebastien subtle, inviting looks.

Sebastien ignored the encouragement toward conversation. She didn't want to talk. However, despite being sure she wasn't hungry, she ended up clearing the whole plate, and felt better afterward. The weight in her belly acted as a stabilizing anchor. Her fingers felt warm for the first time since...before.

With the feeling of weight and substance causing her to move even slower, Sebastien trudged up the stairs to her room, which was pleasantly toasty from the roaring fireplace. Her magical plants were in the window, a light crystal shining on the sempervivum apricus to give it more brightness, but neither looked healthy.

With a sigh drawn up from deep inside her like the last gasp of a dying man, Sebastien watered the wilting mandrake root, humming a half-remembered lullaby from her childhood to it while she tickled the leaves. Mandrakes appreciated music and being petted, according to the Comprehensive Compendium of Components. The sempervivum apricus, she took out of the window and set on a chair, settling light crystals pilfered from the various light fixtures in her room and the hallway atop the dirt. 'That is a ridiculous amount of secondhand sunlight. Hopefully enough to rejuvenate it.' The pot was too bright to look at without squinting, so she covered the whole chair with a thick winter blanket, draping it over and around the pot to contain the light.

Having done what she could to keep her magical components alive, Sebastien finally took off her shoes and outer clothing. She touched a finger to the skin of her chest, wincing. There was a distinctly medallion-shaped freeze burn there, from when her grandfather's artifact had sucked up warmth to deflect the fireball the Morrow man had shot at her.

One of the infirmary healers had put a salve on it while she was unconscious, which made her frown with a renewed feeling of violation. It was their job, of course, and better they be too thorough than miss a dangerous wound for privacy's sake, but she didn't like the idea of someone manhandling and casting magic on her while she slept.

Sebastien dug through her school satchel for the basic supplies she always kept on hand, using some burn paste and a dab of thick juice squeezed from one of the sempervivum apricus's leaves on the skin. She would like to avoid a medallion-shaped scar.

With the strongest dreamless sleep spell she could manage and an alarm on her pocket watch to wake her up in a few hours, she crawled into bed.

Huddling underneath the blankets, she clasped her Conduit between her hands, fingers laced together. "I'm in control," she murmured to herself. "I'm in control." She repeated it until her eyelids grew heavy and her tongue clumsy.