Chapter Twenty-Five
After dinner, Arthur made good on his promise and brought out handfuls of chocolate, marshmallows, and graham crackers, picking up two sticks and burning the ends in the bonfire. He handed Maggie a stick and set the plate of s’mores supplies on one of his blankets.
Neither of them reached for the marshmallows right away.
Maggie’s skin glowed in the firelight, reminding him of Beltane, but gods below, everything reminded him of Beltane.
He couldn’t stop thinking about how much he wanted to slide her shirt up her torso slowly, revealing soft inch by soft inch of the skin beneath.
At least he had brought two tents, he thought, so maybe he could take care of himself later.
“It’s no wonder people used to think fireflies were magic,” Maggie said, breathless, looking out past the wards.
The insects danced in the spaces between trees, their lights flickering on and off in a language neither he nor Maggie would ever understand. Their quick blinking reminded him of the twinkling lights Maggie had strung up in their office. He was glad she found something about this place beautiful.
“We called them lightning bugs growing up,” he said, knowing how much she’d like this little word difference, and sure enough, her eyes lit up at the mention.
He had been foolish thinking he could keep her safe out here, but even as the banshee had hovered above him, somehow he’d never doubted that they’d be crossing back over the wards. The Wilds felt real, tangible, in a way nothing in the pall did. It made the woods predictable, even in their danger.
A pleasant warmth had spread through Arthur after two glasses of wine.
He and Maggie were sitting on separate quilted blankets, though Maggie’s hand was creeping closer and closer to his.
He didn’t want her to feel uncomfortable if their hands accidentally brushed, so he lifted his knee and slid to the side, trying to think of some kind of conversation to distract him from the way he wanted her so desperately.
He knew it must be plain on his face. “So you did your graduate work at Bryn Ridge, right?”
She tensed. Did she not want to talk about work? She’d briefly mentioned her time at Bryn Ridge and how burnt out she had been afterward; that was fairly standard for rigorous graduate programs that sucked you dry. “I did,” she said, very carefully.
“I’ve heard great things about that program. It’s very competitive,” he went on, thinking this must be a better conversation than the one he really wanted to have about her soft skin and softer lips. “What eventually brought you to Hawthorn? You could have gone anywhere.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” she asked with a snap, and he knew he’d said something wrong. “You ended up here and you went to Dartwood, for gods’ sake.”
He grimaced, tripping over his words slightly.
“That’s not what I meant. Hawthorn is wonderful.
It’s just an unexpected move for someone who went to such a research-heavy program.
You said the same thing about me, remember?
” Practical arts colleges like Hawthorn focused more on foundational magic, less on groundbreaking research.
A program like Bryn Ridge prepared you for a different kind of career, that was all he had meant, and he hoped Maggie understood that.
Maggie bit her lip, taking another big sip of the wine that was left in her cup. She fiddled with the corner of the blanket she was sitting on, and Arthur couldn’t imagine what she was thinking.
“Sorry,” she sighed, shaking her head. “I know you didn’t mean anything by it.
I didn’t expect to end up at Hawthorn either.
” She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye.
“I was an apprentice in Dr. Fleet’s lab, along with five other students.
Two linguists, an alchemist, a runologist, and a botanist. The other linguist and I…
” Maggie cringed, and Arthur couldn’t tell whether the creeping blush in her cheeks was from the wine, the bonfire, or something else.
She swallowed and then reached for the wine bottle, filling first her cup and then his. She took a fortifying gulp.
“This is just such an embarrassing story. The other linguist and I, Evan Clark, we fell in love. At least, that’s what I thought was going on.”
Arthur bristled at her words but didn’t interrupt her as she continued her story. “The five of us spent more time together than most families. And Dr. Fleet is notoriously difficult.”
“He certainly has a reputation. I’ve had students who come from his lab and they’re all a little bit traumatized, convinced I’m going to scream at them for every little thing.”
“Evan and I…I thought…” Maggie went on, like she was searching for the words to explain what happened.
When she finally spoke again, the words tumbled out of her.
“I thought we were going to get married. I thought I was going to have his kids. We had already lined up positions at Coughwain and Trident.” The two colleges were on opposite sides of a small city, and he could see her dream so clearly.
An adorable apartment in the city center, dream jobs at prestigious universities, a dog and then kids.
In the flickering light of the bonfire, he saw the tears welling in her eyes, and he wanted to reach across the quilt to brush them away. “Maggie, you don’t…”
She shook her head. “No, I want you to know.” She took another sip of the wine, wiping a drop of it from the corner of her mouth. “It wasn’t real. None of it was. Not how Evan felt about me, not our plans for the future.
“On the day we presented our final research, he went first. He had stolen half my data. He took it and said that it was his, that I must have gotten nervous and copied his work because I wasn’t capable of an original research idea.”
Arthur swore, rage curling at his fingertips.
He couldn’t imagine what kind of sniveling, awful man would do something like that, let alone to the woman he proclaimed to love.
He didn’t understand how anyone could look at Maggie, talk to her and see how her mind works, and think she would have stolen someone’s data.
It was ludicrous. “Surely the dean must have seen right through that ridiculous story of his,” he managed to say through the anger.
Pain flashed across her features, and he wanted to bring her close to him, tuck her under his arm and ease this hurt.
“I went to the dean and presented my side of it, but he wasn’t convinced.
He stopped short of accusing me of anything concrete.
No plagiarism charges would follow me, but he was good friends with the dean at Coughwain. They rescinded my offer.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” he growled.
She turned her head to the side and gave him the smallest smile, but it was better than the grief he’d seen there a moment ago.
“I didn’t want it anyway. I couldn’t imagine being in the same city as him, but it meant scrambling to find a last-minute position.
I had given up, when Dean Clearwater called me for an interview. ”
“I’m so sorry, Maggie.”
She just shrugged. “I am, too, but at least I didn’t marry him. At least I ended up here with Dahlia.”
At least she ended up here with me, Arthur thought selfishly.
“When I got here, and I needed to start thinking about what to publish, I realized I had no interest in what I’d researched before with Evan.”
“What were you studying?”
“A very safe, boring analysis of incantation length in de novo spells, collaborating with our alchemy colleagues to rework time-sensitive alchemical incantations to shave off seconds here and there. To be honest, I felt so out of my depth during my early years at Bryn Ridge that I thought I had to choose a focus that was more traditional. More…” She paused.
“Oh, I don’t know, more serious.” She curled her fingers in quotes as she said it.
“When I let myself research what I wanted all along, it was such a good feeling. I get to combine my love of literature and translation with linguistic spellmaking. I’m only doing what I love because everything went up in flames.
” She glanced over at him, and he hoped she could see how angry he was for her, how much he hated the way academia sometimes chewed people up and spit them out with no care.
“No question in your mind that I’m telling the truth?
” she asked hesitantly. “Maybe I did steal his work.”
That was such a ridiculous notion, it had never crossed his mind. “None,” Arthur said emphatically. “I’ve seen your work. There’s no way you had any reason to steal from some boy. Your research is brilliant, Maggie.”
She flushed a deeper shade of red, even the tips of her ears matching her hair. “I’d like to say I wasn’t fishing for compliments, but I absolutely was.”
“Would you like me to give you some more?” he asked. He had gotten closer to her as she’d told her story, leaning toward her almost imperceptibly until their bodies were mere inches apart.
“Yes,” she whispered.
Tell her, tell her, tell her, but instead he said, “I’ve never seen students love their teacher as much as yours love you. Not even Rory can make me laugh like you do.” He paused and then he said, “You’re mean to me, but I think I like it.”
“You should, maybe, talk to a therapist about that last one,” she said, grinning, and then they were both laughing, and he never realized how light he could feel.
—
Maggie was a grown woman. She was a grown woman who was capable of complex, varied spellwork.
She was a grown woman sleeping in a warded tent in a warded campsite.
But she was in the Wilds, and the sun had set, and she was alone in her tent.
Gods below, she could not sleep like this.
Every sound outside had her trembling, spinning more and more ridiculous possibilities, until she was certain there was a wraith breathing right outside her tent door.