A pillar of shining mist rose from the center of the ballroom, thinner and prettier than the gray-brown fogs Olivia had become used to in London. Prettiness served no purpose, but because the mist was more transparent, she could easily see the two children who were standing within it. It was brighter around them too, as it siphoned off the energy that glowed like a second skin within them.
“Michael,” Olivia asked, focusing on the boy’s face now and letting her other awareness recede a little, “how do you usually begin to make it rain?”
“I go up to the clouds, in my head, of course, and—”
She held up a hand. “Let’s start there. How do you do that?”
Michael fell silent for a moment. Olivia let him think and switched her focus back to the flow of energy in the room. As she’d hoped, the patterns she’d chalked on the floor held the mist in place, and the mist was steadily but not too quickly conducting energy away from Michael and Elizabeth. Olivia could see its lower edges glowing as it transferred power away and grounded it harmlessly.
Theoretically harmlessly, that is. She hadn’t ever read that grounded power in floorboards would be a problem, any more than it was for electricity. Hopefully neither the floor in the ballroom nor that in Elizabeth’s room would suddenly take a dislike to everything above it, turn to rubber, or start sprouting trees.
She turned her attention back to Michael as he started talking again. “I think about what the clouds look like right then,” he was saying slowly, “and how they’re made, and then…it’s a little like talking to them, maybe? Not like a conversation. More like riding. You dig your heels in, and the horse knows it means ‘go.’”
“All right,” said Olivia. “Elizabeth, is there anything in what Michael said you think you could use?”
Elizabeth bit her lip and looked at the floor, tracing a pattern with the toe of one stockinged foot.
All three of them had removed their boots on entering, Elizabeth and Michael following the habit Mrs. Grenville’s practice sessions had instilled, and Olivia because the thought of wearing boots across the smooth expanse of floor made her wince. The ballroom, with its gold-papered walls and its large windows framed by amber-colored drapes, was one of the rooms that still looked like it belonged in a well-appointed country house, and she found she wanted to keep it that way.
“Maybe,” Elizabeth said, her forehead wrinkled, “if I think about how my power works? I know how gravity works, everyone does, so maybe if I think about that and then tell it to, um, stop working for me? A little?”
“A little,” Olivia agreed firmly. “Michael, do you tell the clouds how much rain you want?”
“Not so you could measure it,” Michael said, shrugging, “but a general sort of idea.” He looked over at Elizabeth. “Try and make a picture of what you want.”
“Now?”
Olivia nodded. “Now.”
The girl closed her eyes. Her face was squinched up into a mask of nervous concentration, and Olivia could see the power inside her start dancing like boiling water. Teeth firmly set in her lower lip, she took in a deep breath—
—and rose a foot in the air.
“Well done,” Olivia said, not allowing Elizabeth time to get distraught. “Much more controlled than last time.” That was true. She’d risen, not shot up, and didn’t show any signs of going higher.
“It’s more than I meant to move,” Elizabeth said, and she was doing a decent job of keeping her voice optimistic now too. “But it didn’t feel as…as downhill as usual.”
“Right. You won’t, in here.” Olivia gestured around the room. “And once you’ve practiced a little in here, you’ll have more control outside. Do you think you could move? Fold your legs, for instance?”
“I…maybe?” Slowly and uncertainly, Elizabeth crossed her legs in front of her tailor-fashion. She folded her arms too, for either symmetry or self-protection, and floated like one of the djinn from the Arabian Nights, if djinni had worn bloomers and blouses and had twin braids of red hair.
Mr. Hawkins and Lyddie would’ve given their eyeteeth for someone like Elizabeth, Olivia thought. She would have done so herself. Her hardest evenings had been when she was up against a Child Prophet or Girl Medium. Back then, she hadn’t thought those girls had any power. Back then, she hadn’t thought anyone did.
Now she wondered how many Elizabeths and Michaels had been among those children, and how many were still earning their living a step or two above sideshow exhibits. Had they looked down on women like Olivia, whose only abilities until three years ago had lain in swift talk and sleight of hand? Envied them for their control? Hated them, perhaps, as the reason people doubted them…or the reason people went to see them at all?
Past is past, Olivia reminded herself. It had been one of Mr. Hawkins’s favorite sayings. You can’t live there, and it’s best you don’t visit too often.
For a man without much education, he’d been remarkably wise.
“Good,” she said quickly. “Now hold that as long as you can, and let me know if you feel yourself slipping. Michael, I want you to make it rain, but not too much. We’ve had enough in the past few days, I think.” She made a face, and the children, as she’d intended, laughed. “Just a shower and just over this part of the house.”
“How’ll you be able to tell, ma’am?” Michael asked. “There’s only the one window. Unless—is there a spell so you can see two places at once?”
“Probably, but I haven’t cast it. I’ll depend on your honor.”
Also, it didn’t really matter whether Michael succeeded or not. The important thing right now was how the power drain affected his control.
He clasped his hands behind his back, recitation-style, closed his eyes, and took a breath. Concentrating, he looked even younger than usual. Power began to move inside him, but much more gradually than it had in Elizabeth. A few bubbles surfacing rather than a full boil. Olivia watched his face through the mist and restrained a sigh when she saw a fading bruise on his left cheekbone.
Olivia had glimpsed only a few of Mrs. Grenville’s practice sessions, but what she’d seen made her wince even in memory. Necessary, perhaps—probably, since neither of the Grenvilles seemed the sort who’d indulge in wanton cruelty—but certainly brutal. Part of her was even surprised Mrs. Grenville had forbidden boots during practice, given the resources at hand.
Then again, as far as the students and their parents were concerned, broken bones probably crossed a line even if they could be easily mended. Mrs. Grenville seemed smart enough to realize that. Perhaps, too, she hadn’t wished to put an undue strain on Dr. St. John’s strength…or his patience.
Olivia wanted to make a catty remark about his lack of either quality, in the privacy of her mind, but couldn’t quite make herself agree that he did lack them. She was no real judge of strength, either physical or magical. The only other natural talents she’d encountered were Michael, Elizabeth, and Dr. Gillespie, and they were all so different in form as to make comparison almost impossible.
As for patience, she’d rarely seen Dr. St. John display anything but control. Even a few days before in the library, one couldn’t say he’d been impatient. Quite the opposite. Remembering, Olivia blushed and felt heat spreading to places lower on her body. The strength of the feeling was as surprising now as it had been at the time.
She turned to face the closest window, looking out at the overcast sky and the half-built dormitories down the hill. No rain yet. Olivia watched for it, trying to compose herself as she did so.
Olivia was no sheltered girl. She’d enjoyed the physical aspect of her marriage a great deal. That had been long ago, though, and memory faded. In the time since, she’d not become precisely a fallen woman, but she’d touched men and taken a few hands. There’d been the occasional spark, since neither her heart nor other parts were in the grave, no matter what Society thought was proper. There’d been nothing like what she’d felt with St. John’s fingers on her, as outwardly close to innocent as the contact had been.
And what, exactly, had the man been playing at?
Olivia didn’t believe for an instant he’d taken her wrist purely out of either duty or altruism. If he’d been trying to seduce her, he wouldn’t have stopped, certainly not so abruptly. A magician might have been using the contact to better target her in the future, but St. John had admitted he was no magician. Besides, irritating as he might be, she’d never thought he was a danger.
The first fine drops of rain appeared on the window. As Olivia had requested, it was very light, almost a mist outside to match the one indoors. She turned back to face the children, fairly certain her face was its normal color again, and smiled approvingly. “Very nice, Michael. Is it more difficult than usual?”
“A bit, ma’am,” Michael said, sounding more cheerful and less petulant than Olivia had come to expect from him. Energy was flowing steadily inside him. Not particularly quickly, but more so than it had been when he’d worked under normal circumstances. “It’s not too much trouble, though. I’m keeping it over this part of the house too.”
“Well done, then,” Olivia said. She looked from him to Elizabeth, who was still sitting cross-legged in midair. The girl’s face was rigid with concentration, and her power didn’t flow as steadily as Michael’s. It seemed to stutter and skip on occasion. Even so she’d stayed about where she was, and that was a beginning.
Olivia smiled at them. “Now,” she said, “I want you both to stop what you’re doing, as gradually as you can. Michael, let the rain stop, but don’t send the clouds away. Elizabeth, float back down to the floor. Then we’ll start the next exercise.”