Consideration
The summons arrived on the third day.
Lark had been expecting it, had known from the moment they reached Springhope’s gates that their presence would not go unremarked.
Strangers didn't simply appear in a remote mountain enclave without explanation.
Strangers accompanied by an injured fire witch, a black wolf, and a story about war and dark magic would certainly require an accounting.
But she hadn’t been thinking about it. She had been trying very hard not to think about anything at all.
The guesthouse had a small courtyard at the back, tucked between the building and the mountainside.
It was barely more than a pocket of flagstones and a wooden bench, sheltered from the wind by high walls and warmed by one of the steam vents that threaded through the city.
Lark had claimed it as her own the day before, needing somewhere to be that was not Rion’s sickroom, a place free from Pippa’s worried glances and the unending burden of everything she couldn't fix.
She practiced her magic instead. It was the only thing that made her feel normal and useful.
The cup came first. The one she had made hundreds of times before, though never for drinking.
She held out her hand and felt the familiar pull of aetheria.
Springhope’s magic had an earthiness to it, but it was still familiar and answered when she called.
Light gathered in her palm, dense and bright, and then solidified into reality.
A cup of pale silver, perfectly smooth, catching the morning sun.
She let it dissolve and tried a key. Harder.
The shape was more intricate, the teeth requiring precision.
She had picked enough locks in her life to know exactly how a key should feel, how the ridges should align, how the weight should sit in her fingers.
The aetheria resisted at first, wanting to smooth the edges, to simplify the form.
She pushed back, insisting on details, and felt the moment when the magic yielded to her will.
The key gleamed in her palm, perfect and useless. She had no lock to test it on, so she let it fade.
A shield next. Not a full battle shield like the ones she had made before, in desperate moments when survival demanded it, but a smaller buckler, the size of a dinner plate, curved to deflect rather than absorb.
This was easier. Defensive magic came naturally to her, perhaps because she had spent so long needing to defend herself.
The shield dissolved, and Lark stood in the empty courtyard, breathing hard, hands tingling, her mind finally quiet for the first time in days.
Then she thought about Pippa’s question at the washout. Couldn’t you have just made a bridge?
The honest answer was that she had never tried. Her magic had always been about things she could hold, things that existed in relation to her body. Cups and keys and daggers and shields. A bridge was a different matter. It was large, structural, and would need to bear weight.
Too big. She wasn’t ready for that. But smaller, maybe. A construction that could hold weight while she maintained contact.
A stool.
She knelt on the ground and held out both hands, palms down, reaching for the aetheria. It came sluggishly, as though confused by the request. This was not a weapon, not a tool. This was furniture, and furniture was not what her magic had been trained to make.
She pushed through the resistance, building the shape in her mind.
Four legs. A flat seat. Simple enough in theory.
But the geometry was more complex than a cup or a key, the relationships between the parts more demanding.
The legs had to be the same length, the seat had to be level, and the whole thing had to be stable enough to bear weight without collapsing.
The first attempt died before it was fully formed. The second lived briefly, a ghostly outline of silver light, before one leg buckled and the whole thing dissolved.
The third attempt held.
Lark stared at it. Beneath her palms, the stool glowed faintly, standing on the flagstones of the courtyard. It looked real. It looked solid. But she would not know for certain until she tested it.
The problem was contact. Her creations lasted only as long as she touched them, vanishing the moment they left her hands.
She could not simply step back and observe.
She had to stay connected, which meant she had to somehow get herself onto the stool while maintaining the flow of aetheria that kept it in existence.
She moved carefully, keeping one hand pressed to the seat as she shifted her weight. The stool flickered. She steadied her focus, pouring more power into the construct, and felt it solidify beneath her palm.
Slowly, carefully, she lowered herself onto it, her hands gripping the edge of the seat.
For one glorious moment, it held. She was sitting on a stool made of light and will, her weight supported by nothing but magic and persistence. It was the most impractical thing she had ever created, and she felt absurdly proud of it.
“Lark! The council sent … oh!”
Pippa’s voice shattered her concentration.
The stool vanished, and Lark hit the flagstones with a graceless thump, her tailbone taking the worst of it. She bit back a curse and looked up to find Pippa standing in the courtyard doorway, her expression cycling rapidly through surprise, concern, and barely suppressed delight.
“Was that a stool? Did you just make a stool? Out of magic?” Pippa was already crossing the courtyard, her earlier purpose apparently forgotten. “Lark, that’s incredible! How long have you been practicing? Can you make other furniture? Could you make a chair? A table? A very small bookshelf?”
“Pippa.” Lark pushed herself to her feet, rubbing her bruised tailbone. “You came out here for a reason.”
“What? Oh, yes.” Pippa’s excitement dimmed slightly as she remembered herself. She held out a folded piece of parchment, sealed with wax that bore an unfamiliar oak leaf imprint. “This arrived. From the council.”
Lark took the parchment, her brief moment of accomplishment fading as quickly as the stool had. The seal was formal, official, the sort of thing that preceded demands rather than invitations.
She broke it and read:
The Council of Springhope requests the presence of the visitors from Autumncrown at the council hall on the seventh terrace at midday. Attendance is mandatory.
The formal parchment with its pressed seal suddenly felt heavier than it should have.
Pippa read over her shoulder and let out a slow breath. “Well. That sounds ominous.”
“It sounds like bureaucracy,” Darian said. He was standing framed in the open back door of the guesthouse, arms folded across his chest. “Standard procedure for any enclave receiving guests.”
“Standard procedure rarely includes the word mandatory.”
“It does when the guests arrive half-dead and trailing trouble behind them.”
Lark folded the parchment and tucked it into her pocket. “Rion can’t attend. He’s barely speaking.”
“Then we go without him.” Darian said. “The three of us. We explain the situation, answer their questions and make our case.”
“Our case,” Pippa repeated. “You mean asking them to join a war.”
“That’s what the council wanted. That’s why they sent word ahead.” Darian’s expression was grim. “Springhope has witches, resources and a defensible position. If the enclaves are going to stand against the Ashen Enclave, they need to stand together.”
“And if they refuse?”
“Then we ask for time. Time for Rion to heal, at least. We can’t go anywhere with him in this condition.”
The council hall was an imposing structure carved directly into the mountainside, its entrance flanked by columns of natural stone that had been shaped but not cut, smoothed but not polished.
It spoke of a people who worked with their environment rather than against it, who valued permanence over ostentation.
Lark found it beautiful in a stern, uncompromising way. She also found it intimidating.
A functionary met them at the entrance, a young man with the pale complexion of someone who spent most of his time indoors and the practiced neutrality of someone trained in civil service.
He led them through corridors lit by glowing crystals set into the walls.
Aetheria made visible, Lark realized. Springhope’s earth witches must channel power into the stones themselves.
It was beautiful, practical, and another reminder of how much she didn’t know about the wider world of magic.
The council chamber was circular, with tiered seating arranged around a central floor where petitioners presumably stood to make their cases. Seven figures occupied the highest tier, their faces grave, their postures formal. The Council of Springhope, guardians of neutrality, keepers of isolation.
They did not look pleased to see their visitors.
But they were not the only observers. In the lower tiers, perhaps two dozen residents sat watching, permitted to witness the proceedings. Among them, near the front, sat a woman with silver hair. Morena.
Lark wondered why she was here.
“You are the party from Autumncrown.” The figure in the center spoke first, an older woman with gray hair and eyes to match. Her voice carried easily in the chamber's acoustics. “The ones Councilor Thornwood sent word about.”
“We are.” Lark stepped forward. “I'm Lark Silvertree. These are my companions: Darian Crowthorne and Pippa Starling. Our fourth companion, Rion Palinore, is currently in your healing halls.”
“We are aware.” The councilwoman’s gaze was sharp and assessing.
“We received Councilor Thornwood’s Copperwing six days ago.
She informed us of the attack on Autumncrown and the threat posed by the Ashen Enclave.
She asked us to consider joining an alliance against them.
” A pause. “She also mentioned that a rescue mission had been dispatched to retrieve some prisoners. She did not know if it would succeed.”