All of Us Villains

ALISTAIR LOWE

The Lowes shaped cruelty into a crown, and oh, they wear it well.

A Tradition of Tragedy: The True Story of the Town that Sends its Children to Die

The Lowe family had always been the undisputed villains of their town’s ancient, bloodstained story, and no one understood that better than the Lowe brothers.

The family lived on an isolated estate of centuries-worn stone, swathed in moss and shadowed in weeping trees. On mischief nights, children from Ilvernath sometimes crept up to its towering wrought iron fence, daring their friends to touch the famous padlock chained around the gate—the one engraved with a scythe.

Grins like goblins, the children murmured, because the children in Ilvernath loved fairy tales—especially real ones. Pale as plague and silent as spirits. They’ll tear your throat and drink your soul.

All these tales were deserved.

These days, the Lowe brothers knew better than to tempt the town’s wrath, but that didn’t stop them from sneaking over the fence in the throes of night, relishing the taste of some reckless thrill.

Do you hear that? The older one, Hendry Lowe, stood up, brushed the forest floor off his gray T-shirt, and cracked each of his knuckles, one by one. That’s the sound of rules breaking.

Hendry Lowe was too pretty to worry about rules. His nose was freckled from afternoons napping in sunshine. His dark curls kissed his ears and cheekbones, overgrown from months between haircuts. His clothes smelled sweet from morning pastries often stuffed in his pockets.

Hendry Lowe was also too charming to play a villain.

The younger brother, Alistair, leaped from the fence and crashed gracelessly to the ground. He didn’t like forgoing the use of magick, because without it he was never very good at anything—even an action as simple as landing. But tonight he had no magick to waste.

Do you hear that? Alistair echoed, smirking as he rose to his feet. That’s the sound of bones breaking.

Although the two brothers looked alike, Alistair wore the Lowe features far differently than Hendry. Pale skin from a lifetime spent indoors, eyes the color of cigarette ashes, a widow’s peak as sharp as a blade. He wore a wool sweater in September because he was perpetually cold. He carried the Sunday crossword in his pocket because he was perpetually bored. He was one year younger than Hendry, a good deal more powerful, and a great deal more wicked.

Alistair Lowe played a perfect villain. Not because he was instinctively cruel or openly proud, but because, sometimes, he liked to. Many of the stories whispered by the children of Ilvernath came from him.

This is a shitty idea, Alistair told his brother. You know that, right?

You say that every time.

Alistair shivered and shoved his hands in his pockets. This time it’s different.

Two weeks ago, the moon in Ilvernath had turned crimson, piercing and bright like a fresh wound in the sky. It was called the Blood Moon, the sign that, after twenty years of peace, the tournament was approaching once more. Only a fortnight remained until the fall of the Blood Veil, and neither brother wanted to spend it in the hushed, sinister halls of their home.

The walk downtown was long—it was a waste of magick to drain a Here to There spellring this close to the tournament, and they couldn’t drive. Both were lost in their thoughts. Hendry looked like he was fantasizing about meeting a cute girl, judging from how he kept fiddling with his curls and smoothing the wrinkles in his sleeves.

Alistair was thinking about death. More specifically, about causing it.

The gloomy stone architecture of Ilvernath had stood for over sixteen hundred years, but in the last few decades, it had been renovated with sleek glass storefronts and trendy outdoor restaurants. Despite its disorienting maze of cobbled, one-way streets, questionable amenities, and minimal parking, the small city was considered an up-and-coming spot for the art and magick scene.

Not that the seven cursed families of Ilvernath paid much attention to the modern world, even if the world had recently begun paying attention to them.

The Magpie was the boys’ favorite pub, although no one would guess that from how infrequently they visited. Determined to keep their identities concealed and their photographs out of the papers, Alistair insisted they vary the location for their nighttime excursions. They couldn’t afford to become familiar faces—they’d been homeschooled for that very reason. The way their grandmother talked, one whisper of their names and the city would be raising their pitchforks.

Alistair looked grimly upon the Magpie, its sign a dark shadow in the red moonlight, and wondered if the trouble was worth it.

You don’t have to come inside, Hendry told him.

Someone needs to watch out for you.

Hendry reached underneath his T-shirt and pulled out a piece of quartz dangling on a chain. The inside pulsed with scarlet light—the color of a spellstone fully charged with high magick.

Alistair grabbed Hendry by the wrist and shoved the stone back beneath his shirt before someone noticed. You’re asking for trouble.

Hendry only winked at him. I’m asking for a drink.

Magick was a valuable resource throughout the world—something to be found, collected, and then crafted into specific spells or curses. Once upon a time, there had been two types of magick: frighteningly powerful high magick and plentiful, weaker common magick. Throughout history, empires had greedily fought for control of the high magick supply, and by the time humanity invented the telescope and learned to bottle beer, they had depleted it entirely.

Or so they’d believed.

Hundreds of years ago, seven families had clashed over who would control Ilvernath’s high magick. And so a terrible compromise was reached—a curse the families cast upon themselves. A curse that had remained a secret … until one year ago.

Every generation, each of the seven families was required to put forth a champion to compete in a tournament to the death. The victor would award their family exclusive claim over Ilvernath’s high magick, a claim that expired upon the beginning of the next cycle, when the tournament began anew.

Historically, the Lowes dominated. For every three tournaments, they won two. The last cycle, twenty years ago, Alistair’s aunt had murdered all the other competitors within four days.

Before they’d learned about the tournament, the rest of Ilvernath could only point to the Lowes’ wealth and cruelty as the reasons an otherwise mysterious, reclusive family commanded such respect from lawmakers and spellmakers. Now they knew exactly how dangerous that family truly was.

So with the foreboding Blood Moon gleaming overhead, tonight was a risky time for the only two Lowes of tournament age to crave live music and a pint of ale.

It’s one drink, Hendry said, giving Alistair a weak smile.

Although the Lowe family hadn’t formally chosen their champion yet, the boys had always known it would be Alistair. Tonight meant far more to either of them than a simple drink.

Fine. Alistair threw open the door.

The pub was a cramped, slovenly place. The air was thick from tobacco smoke; rock music blared from a jukebox in the corner. Red-and-white checkered cloths draped over every booth. For the sociable, there were billiards. For those keeping a lower profile, there was a pinball machine, its buttons sticky from whisky fingers.

The Magpie was flooded with cursechasers. They traveled the world to gawk at magickal anomalies like Ilvernath’s, such as the curse in Oxacota that left a whole town asleep for nearly a century, or the curse on the ruins in Môlier-sur-Olenne that doomed trespassers with a violent death in exactly nine days’ time. Now, the tourists clustered in groups, whispering over well-worn copies of A Tradition of Tragedy. The recent bestseller had exposed the death tournament and Ilvernath’s surviving vein of high magick … and had catapulted their remote city into the international spotlight.

"I didn’t believe that the Blood Moon was actually scarlet, Alistair overheard one of them whispering. I thought it was just a name."

The tournament is a high magick curse. High magick is always red, another answered.

Or maybe, drawled a third voice, it’s called the Blood Moon because a bunch of kids spend three months murdering each other under it. Ever think of that?

Alistair and Hendry avoided the tourists as they shuffled through the pub. Do you think Grandma will start getting fan mail? asked Hendry, snickering. I heard there’s a photograph of our whole family in the first chapter. I hope I look good.

Sorry to break it to you, but that picture is from ten years ago, Alistair said flatly.

Hendry looked momentarily disappointed, then delighted. So the entire world knows you had a bowl cut?

Alistair rolled his eyes and headed toward the bar. Even though he was a year younger than Hendry, his hollow stare always made him look older—old enough to avoid being carded.

After he ordered, Alistair found himself waiting beside a pair of girls bickering with each other.

Did you honestly come here alone? the first girl asked. She smelled strongly of cheap beer, and like all the patrons here, she wore crystal spellrings on each finger that glowed white with common magick. Alistair guessed they were filled with simple spells: Hangover Cure, Zit Zapper, Matchstick … whatever suited a Friday night pub crawl.

Of course not, the second girl said, smoothing down her violently red curls. My friends are over there. She gestured vaguely at the entire bar.

I thought so, sneered the tipsy girl. You’re famous now, you know. There’s a picture of you on the cover of one of my mum’s magazines. You’re wearing sweatpants.

It’s been known to happen on occasion, the redheaded girl grumbled.

"I heard the Darrows have chosen now, too. That makes three champions so far—Carbry Darrow, Elionor Payne, and you. The first girl smiled viciously, in the kind of way that made Alistair guess the girls had once been friends. But no one wants the Macaslans to win."

Alistair realized it now—he recognized the redheaded girl. She was the Macaslan who’d been announced as champion months and months before the Blood Moon had appeared, and the paparazzi had branded her the face of the tournament ever since. Alistair wasn’t surprised that the Macaslans would stoop to such desperate grabs for attention. His grandmother had always described them as the bottom-feeders of the seven families, willing to use unsavory methods for even a taste of power. But the Macaslan girl’s designer handbag and pretty face didn’t give the impression of someone who would have to fight for attention.

At their words, several of the cursechasers stared, and the Macaslan girl cleared her throat and turned her back to them.

Well, I don’t care what people think of me, she said. But Alistair disagreed. No one wore heels to a dive bar if they didn’t care about their reputation. The evening news already called me and the Lowe champion rivals. Because I’m the one who’s going to win.

The tipsy girl rolled her eyes. The Lowes haven’t even announced their champion yet. Whoever they are, they mustn’t be that impressive.

As the bartender slid Alistair his drinks, Alistair fantasized about how quickly the Macaslan champion’s confident expression would fall when he held out his hand, a ring glowing on his knuckles and charged with a curse, and showed her exactly how impressive he was.

But there would be time for that once the tournament began.

Still, as he turned around, pints in both hands, he met the Macaslan girl’s eyes. They held gazes for a moment, assessing each other. But not wanting to be recognized, he walked away.

At the pinball machine, Hendry took the offered glass and shook his head. I thought you’d start something. A spell shimmered around his ears—a Listen In, probably. I’m glad you didn’t.

Maybe I should’ve. Alistair took a sip and smiled despite himself. He shouldn’t be excited for the tournament, but he’d been groomed for it since his childhood. And he was ready to win.

No, definitely not. What is it you say about our family? ‘Grins like goblins. They’ll tear your throat and drink your soul’? You can’t help yourself. You have no restraint. Although it sounded like Hendry was scolding him, his smirk said otherwise.

Says the one who brought a high magick spellstone to a dive bar.

Someone has to watch out for you, Hendry murmured, repeating Alistair’s exact words from earlier.

Alistair scoffed and turned his attention to the pinball machine. Its artwork resembled the fairy tales he’d grown up with: A prince rescuing a princess from a castle, a knight riding into battle, a witch laughing over a cauldron. And Alistair’s favorite, the dragon, its mouth open in a snarl—worth one hundred points if the pinball struck its fangs.

While Alistair inserted a coin into the slot, Hendry sighed and changed the subject. I had a dream today—

Typically, one has them at night—

—while napping in the graveyard. Despite his charm and freckled nose, Hendry was still a Lowe. He had a little villain in him. The Lowe family graveyard was his favorite place, full of vague, unnerving epitaphs for those who’d died young—even excluding the tournament, their family had a surprisingly large amount of tragedy in its history. In the dream, you really were a monster.

Alistair snorted and mashed the game’s buttons. What did I look like?

Oh, you looked the same.

Then what made me a monster?

You were collecting the spellrings of dead children and hiding them in your wardrobe, cackling about souls trapped inside them.

Don’t be ridiculous, Alistair said. I’d do something like that now.

"You know, you should take a page out of that Macaslan girl’s book and try to seem more likable. This tournament is different—the curse isn’t a secret anymore. I mean, look at all these tourists! In Ilvernath! If you plan to survive, you’ll need alliances with other champions. Partnerships with spellmakers. You’ll need the world’s favor."

Alistair looked at his brother intensely. Hendry was breaking their unspoken rule not to discuss the tournament, and it wasn’t like him to be so serious. Besides, it didn’t matter that A Tradition of Tragedy had turned Ilvernath’s peculiar red moon and its bloody history into a global scandal. The Lowes had their pick of spellmakers lining up to offer Alistair their wares. Misfortune had a way of finding those who defied the Lowe family—their grandmother’s notorious curses made certain of that.

Are you worried about me? Alistair asked.

Of course.

The family isn’t.

I’m your big brother. I have to worry about you.

Alistair’s first instinct, as always, was to crack a joke. But confident or not, it was difficult to find humor in the tournament.

Kill or be killed. It was a somber affair.

Alistair’s fear wasn’t for his life, but for his mind. Even the most villainous Lowe victors left the tournament changed, broken. But Alistair refused to accept such a fate. No matter how brutal, how terrible he’d need to be, he couldn’t let himself care. Not about the other champions. Not about his soul.

He needed to become the most villainous of them all.

He was still debating how to respond to Hendry when he was tapped on the shoulder.

We’ve never met before, said the Macaslan girl as Alistair abandoned his game and turned around. Her words weren’t a statement—they were an accusation. The other townies and cursechasers behind her whispered, their wide eyes fixed on the two boys who’d drawn the local Macaslan celebrity’s attention.

Hendry flashed his sunlight smile and held out his hand. We’re not from here. We came to see if the book was true. That Blood Moon really is something.

His smile proved ineffective against the girl, who didn’t return it. Her gaze dropped to his outstretched hand, to the rings with crystal spellstones dotting his fingers. Sharma, Aleshire, Walsh, Wen, she said. How impressive that, as a tourist, you’ve managed to purchase from half the spellmakers in town.

Hendry withdrew his hand and laughed awkwardly. Impressive you can identify a spellring’s maker simply by looking at it.

He elbowed Alistair in the side for him to say something. Unfortunately, despite their grandmother’s warnings about exposing themselves, Alistair had little desire to keep up the charade. The cursechasers were going to stare anyway—he might as well give them something to look at.

Grins like goblins. Alistair smiled.

What would it take for you to leave us alone? he asked, even though he hoped she’d do the opposite.

The girl crossed her arms. Your names.

Pale as plague and silent as spirits.

Alistair took a threatening step closer, though she stood taller than him in her heels. He liked that. I’d like to know yours.

He held out his hand.

I’m Isobel Macaslan, she told him firmly.

They’ll tear your throat and drink your soul.

She grabbed his hand and shook. Her touch was cold, but his was colder.

I believe you called me your rival.

A curse shot from one of his rings to her wrist, twisting and slithering its way up her arm like a snake. Its teeth sank into her neck, leaving two puncture marks above her collarbone. Her ivory skin instantly swelled violet.

She gasped and jolted back, her hand covering her wound. But rather than shout at him, Isobel regained her composure in moments, turning discomfort into a wicked smile. It made her look unfairly attractive. Then it’s my pleasure, Alistair Lowe.

Alistair felt a pinch on his wrist. He frowned down at the mark over his pulse point: white lips. The mark of the Divining Kiss.

It wasn’t a curse, like what he’d placed on her. It was worse. She’d looked into his mind and plucked out his name. A cunning, clever spell. What else had she learned? A twinge of embarrassment gripped his chest, but he quickly swallowed that feeling down.

She can’t have learned much, he thought. Otherwise, she’d be afraid.

Isobel smiled smugly. "Maybe it’s you who should be afraid of me."

Alistair swore silently. Of course the spell hadn’t ended yet.

And with that, she left, heels clicking on the tiled floor. Alistair stared as she disappeared out the door, strangely disappointed to see her go. Their nighttime excursions were rarely so entertaining.

Once she left, Alistair felt the gazes of the room hot against his skin, and he suddenly wished he hadn’t worn such a heavy sweater. He heard a few of their whispers: terrible, heartless, cruel. Beneath the smoke-hazy neon lights, those words felt more real than their family’s usual bedtime stories. Harsher. He tried not to flinch.

Hendry pursed his lips. The Asp’s Fang? She’ll be unwell for days, and she’s another champion. His brother shot him a wary look. Some might call that cheating.

Alistair shrugged and finished his beer. Unlike Isobel, he genuinely didn’t care what the world thought of him. She saw it coming, otherwise she wouldn’t have shaken my hand. He tugged his sleeve to conceal the spellmark she’d left on him. Though he’d never have dreamed it, there might be another champion as cunning as he was. Almost.

"You are a monster. Hendry swallowed the dregs of his glass and hiccuped. Rotten to the core."

Even though Alistair knew his brother was joking, he suddenly was no longer in the mood to laugh. I’m blushing.

You’re absurd.

You’re drunk. And from one pint of ale, no less.

When Alistair turned, he came face-to-face with the bright flash of a disposable camera clutched in the greasy fingers of a cursechaser.

Rage surged through him. The world hadn’t paid Ilvernath a passing thought for hundreds of years. Not its bizarre natural phenomena. Not its whispered fairy tales. Not the blood splattered across the secret pages of its history.

Until now.

I hate that fucking book, Alistair growled. Then he seized Hendry by the shoulders and steered him out of the bar. If that photo was in the papers tomorrow, his grandmother would kill him.

It must’ve been the fury in Alistair’s tone that made Hendry stop once they were outside.

Al, he said in a low voice. If you ever want to talk about the tournament—really talk about it—I’m here. I’ll listen.

Alistair swallowed. The Lowes had prepared Alistair for this tournament his entire life, cultivated fear and fostered ruthlessness, teaching a child to twist the stories that scared him into ones he told about himself. They didn’t accept weakness from a champion. Hendry was—and had always been—Alistair’s only confidante.

Alistair wanted to win the tournament for many reasons. He wanted to survive, of course. He wanted to make his family proud. He wanted to return to his brother for nights like this one, drunken pinball and shared secrets at a local pub, pretending to live the life of normalcy they’d never had.

But most of all, he hated to imagine his brother grieving him. They had never been without each other.

I will talk to you, Alistair murmured. But not tonight. There was no need to spoil a rare night of freedom. Especially when it could be their last.

If that’s what you want, Hendry answered.

Alistair grinned mischievously. What I want is another round. Let’s find another pub, with fewer tourists.

And so, two hours later, their heads buzzing, the white kiss still stained on Alistair’s wrist, the Lowe brothers returned home to their bleak estate.

Each one, in very different ways, dreamed of death.

ISOBEL MACASLAN

Though it was seven great families who originally founded the tournament, it’s important to remember—that was a long time ago. Not all of them have remained great.

A Tradition of Tragedy

The funeral party flocked around the grave as the pallbearers lowered the casket into the earth. The weather was dreary and damp, heeled shoes sinking into mud, the grass field trodden and flooded, black umbrellas raised skyward. Funerals in Ilvernath were solemn, traditional affairs of veils and pearls and handkerchiefs. Families had lived here so long that many had designated burial grounds, where descendants could be entombed beside their ancestors.

Atop the hill overlooking the graveyard, the Macaslan family watched, licking their lips.

The Macaslans were a vile lot—stringy red hair, bulging purple veins, reeking of the most expensive yet repulsive cologne money could buy. There was no funeral in Ilvernath they didn’t attend, but it wasn’t to pay their respects.

They came to collect.

Before common or high magick was sealed in a spellring or a cursering, it was considered raw. And raw magick was a tricky thing to find. It could appear at random: in the accidental shattering of a mirror, tucked into the pages of dusty books, dancing in a clover patch the hour after dawn. Nowadays, much of it was mass produced, farmed and bottled like high-fructose corn syrup, sprinkled as a primary ingredient in everything from lipstick to household cleaners. But not so much in Ilvernath, where the old ways stubbornly continued on.

Isobel Macaslan examined the raw common magick shimmering white across the graveyard, like glitter caught in rain. People had magick inside them, too. And when someone was laid to rest, that life magick dispersed. If left uncollected, the wind picked it up and carried it away, where it would later nestle itself into forgotten places.

It was a beautiful scene.

Isobel was trying her hardest not to vomit.

She rubbed the two puncture marks at the base of her neck, where the Asp’s Fang had bitten her. Her stomach had quaked all morning. A healing spell would cure her, but she refused to waste magick on Alistair Lowe.

She smiled, remembering the frowning, irritated photo of Alistair in this morning’s edition of the Ilvernath Eclipse. Or even better: the fury on his face when she’d peeked into his mind. He had no idea how much she’d uncovered.

She knew about the crossword kept in his pocket, about the single word he couldn’t guess that had irritated him all day (the word was elixir, Isobel had realized almost instantly). He compared himself to a monster because of the stories his mother had told him as a child, the ones that still made him shiver. He’d found her attractive, and she wondered what he must’ve thought of the white kiss her spell had left on his skin, in the shape of her own lips.

Not that she’d uncovered his every mystery, only his thoughts floating at the surface.

But even if Isobel wanted to call last night a victory, there was only one victory that mattered. A victory the whole world expected the Lowe champion to claim.

And she had made herself his target.

You look nervous, her father commented from beside her. He had a coarse, raspy voice from decades of smoking, and his brittle fingernails dug into her skin as he placed his hand on her shoulder. You have nothing to be nervous about.

I know, Isobel said, forcing false confidence into her tone. She was good at that.

You’re the most powerful champion our family has seen in generations, he reminded her for what felt like the thousandth time. And this afternoon, you’ll secure an alliance with the town’s most respected cursemaker.

Isobel wished she shared her father’s optimism. But ever since A Tradition of Tragedy was published last year, her life had crumbled. Isobel had never wanted to be champion. Yet the newspapers had named her one eleven months ago without her family’s knowledge, and long before any of the other competitors. Seemingly overnight, Isobel was crowned Ilvernath’s murderous sweetheart. Reporters started camping outside both of her parents’ houses for the chance of a scandalous photograph. Her prep school classmates had dumped her like she was last season’s trend. And the one friend she’d thought would understand more than anyone had betrayed her, then transferred schools just to get away from her Macaslan stench.

At the funeral, the white shimmering of raw common magick grew brighter in the air surrounding the grave, dissipating like a sigh across the field.

The Macaslans waited until the mourners had scattered before scuttling down the hill. A few stragglers watched them angrily as they worked—most of them the deceased’s loved ones. One woman in a sleek black pantsuit hovered away from the crowd, assessing Isobel in particular. Maybe it was because of the contrast between her family’s gaudy clothes and Isobel’s patent leather miniskirt. Or maybe the woman was a reporter.

Isobel ignored them all as she coaxed a twinkling of magick into a flask. She sealed it inside, warm and humming.

You shouldn’t be here, another woman growled behind her.

Isobel turned to face one of the mourners. The woman hugged her arms to herself and glared at Isobel. Mascara ran down her cheeks.

Isobel pursed her lips. Of all the unpleasant methods her family employed to collect magick, funerals were by far the worst. Most considered the collection of raw magick from a burial unthinkable, but to the Macaslans, it was simply pragmatic. It wasn’t as though the dead were using it anymore.

Isobel glanced at her relatives, hoping they might intercede for her. Truthfully, Isobel had rarely attended these family gatherings until recently. But they were all too busy to notice the confrontation.

I’m sorry, Isobel told her, but—

You’re a bloody scavenger is what you are. All of you.

At that, the woman stormed away, and Isobel squeezed her silver locket in her fist, the one she always wore tucked beneath her blouse. Beneath her primer and long-wear foundation, Isobel’s skin remained painfully thin.

The town’s scorn had been easier to swallow before that book. Before strangers spray-painted obscenities on Isobel’s front doors. Before photographs of her taking out the rubbish became tabloid fodder.

But Isobel was the strongest champion the Macaslans had raised in hundreds of years.

And she wouldn’t be ashamed of doing what it took to survive.

To win.

The MacTavish cursemaker shop was in the roughest part of town, full of repurposed factories and condemned tenement complexes. Isobel’s heels slipped awkwardly between the cobblestones as she walked beside her father to the door. The store had nothing to mark its name, only an orange neon sign of a dragonfly in the window, dull in the afternoon light.

Are you sure this is it? she asked. The other spellmakers in town had cleaner, more fashionable storefronts, with spellstones glittering in elegant displays in their windows.

Everyone in the world used magick, but the average person typically bought brand-name spells at department stores or patronized local spellmakers rather than craft enchantments themselves. Spellmaking families had their own dynasties and secrets, passed down from parent to child for centuries, bits of knowledge collected from all over the world. The spellmakers in Ilvernath might not directly participate, but they, too, played a vital role in the tournament.

The Glamour Inquirer called them the arms dealers.

Since Isobel’s mother was a respected spellmaker herself, she’d already volunteered to supply Isobel with all her spells for the tournament. But to secure victory, Isobel would also need curses—enchantments designed to do harm. And her mother had no specialty in those.

The MacTavishes, however, were the best cursemakers in Ilvernath.

This shop has been here for over six hundred years, her father answered.

Yes. Isobel eyed the splintered doorframe. It looks it.

Before they could enter, a van pulled up behind them. The window rolled down, revealing a man with a video camera. Isobel swore under her breath. She was never free.

Isobel! he called. "I’m with SpellBC News. Securing Reid MacTavish as a sponsor would be a big win for any champion. Is that why you’re here today?"

This isn’t a good time, she said.

Oh, come on, her father told her, smoothing down the lapels of his imported pin-striped suit. Smile for the camera. Give the man his story.

When Isobel had accidentally found herself in the spotlight last year, her family had seized on it, hoping that her fame would garner her more spellmaker support. And so Isobel grinned through gritted teeth.

I’m visiting the MacTavishes today to discuss a sponsorship, yes, she told the reporter. And I hope I’ll earn it. That’s all—

Don’t be modest, her father cut in. You’ll earn it.

Do you have any comment on Alistair Lowe’s picture in the papers this morning? For months, he’s been called your rival, but with only thirteen days remaining until your face-off, what do you—

My daughter doesn’t have anything to fear from him, or anyone else, her dad said. Put that in your story.

Ready to be done with the interview, Isobel swiveled on her heel and entered the store. Inside, too, it was unlike most other spellshops, where counters gleamed, petty class one and two stones were heaped high in porcelain bowls and last season’s spells were discarded to the clearance section. This place was so dimly lit she needed to squint, and everywhere was cluttered with scrolls, quills, trinkets, and dust. She hugged her purse to herself to keep it from scraping any surfaces and spritzed some peony perfume in the air to help conceal the smell of moldy paper.

A fair-skinned young man sat at the desk, poring over a leather-bound grimoire of divination spells. He wore more than a dozen necklaces, each covered with oval-cut spellrings whose stones had cracked, leaving them unglowing and empty. His clothes were black and looked thrifted, matching his dark and unwashed, unstyled hair. He would’ve been attractive if he wore less eyeliner.

Isobel cleared her throat. Do you work here? We’re looking for Reid MacTavish.

He lifted his head and smiled insincerely. That would be me.

She hadn’t expected him to be so young, only a couple years older than herself. He didn’t look like any of her mother’s spellmaker colleagues, and she wasn’t embarrassed by her mistake. If he wanted people to take him seriously, he should’ve removed his tongue piercing.

You must be Cormac Macaslan. He reached out an ink-stained hand to her father, who shook it a bit too eagerly. And you must be the famous Isobel.

The media adores Isobel. They can’t get enough of her. Her father patted her back. When we spoke on the phone, you said to come with raw magick. So we have. More than enough for the recipe we discussed.

The Roach’s Armor. It was an old spell passed down in the Macaslan family, and it protected the caster temporarily from death. It wasn’t infallible, but it was powerful. And very traditional. Every Macaslan champion obtained the