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RE: K-Bike Training Initiative Fundraiser—Your Support Needed!

Dear Director Berman,

My name is Katinka Voss and I am the newly appointed Junior Coordinator for the Society’s Kinetic Bike Training Initiative. I am writing to ask for your personal support in helping us reach our fundraising target for the coming program year.

K-Bikes represent the future of magical mobility, and our Training Initiative exists to ensure that no practitioner is left behind, across all generations and traditions. We are seeking donations and auction items for our inaugural K-Bike Gala Fundraiser, to be held on [DATE REDACTED], and wondered if you might assist us in securing any of the following:

One (1) bottle of the Coventry Coven’s Reserve Elderflower Mead, vintage 1887, of which three bottles are understood to remain in existence. I am told you know someone who knows someone.

A decommissioned broomstick of historical significance for display at the Gala, as a respectful nod to traditional conveyance. We feel this would reassure those members of our community with cultural concerns about the initiative. Surely many such relics are languishing in the Society Archives? We would be most grateful.

A letter of endorsement from a magical figure of international standing. I have taken the liberty of drafting a shortlist, which is attached, but we are most eager to engage Minerva Lathrop of Primrose Court as K-Bike Influencer. Your aid with an introduction would be most appreciated.

With great excitement and sincere gratitude,

Katinka Voss Junior Coordinator, Kinetic Bike Training Initiative, Society for the Protection of Natural Magic

SOCIETY FOR THE PROTECTION OF NATURAL MAGIC

Office of the Director

This reply has been generated automatically by a standing correspondence charm. Director Berman is currently away from her office and has not read your correspondence. She will respond personally upon her return.

Amrita Berman Director, Society for the Protection of Natural Magic

SEVENTEEN

A MANDATORY FURLOUGH

The Tufan smelled distinctive. There were the obvious scents of sea salt, weathered wood, beeswax and dried fish on board, but there was something stronger underneath, something plant-based and faintly dusty in the hold that Amrita kept smelling. Not spice or grains, or the contents of the clay pots that carried oil and other liquid cargo. She didn’t smell swords or other metal items stockpiled there. The familiar scent that wafted from the belly of the boat was paper. The whole ship smelled of books.

She filed this information away, saying nothing.

By the end of the first week Amrita had claimed the galley for herself and established a rough daily schedule. During the mornings she tried to make herself useful up on the deck, helping Asha, Zara and Nell with whatever needed doing. Sometimes this meant mending sails with a curved bone needle and heavy jute-like thread or scrubbing the floorboards. She wasn’t known for being strong, but she was methodical, patient and willing. She preferred to stay busy. But Raya’s skeleton crew did not appreciate her volunteer efforts. They often paused their tasks to bring her figs and olives, fetch her a cooling cloth soaked in rosewater, or set up a hammock for her, in the shade. They didn’t need words to communicate what they were constantly trying to tell her.

You are our guest on this ship, and we do not allow guests to work.

She could also feel Raya’s eyes on her whenever he was close. Weighing her up. When Raya wasn’t watching her, the skeleton crew were. They did not rest or pause to eat. They just kept going.

Despite their obvious displeasure at her willingness to work, Amrita refused to leave the kitchen. This was a matter of survival. The gray slop the skeletons served up was the one thing that was terrible. It reflected their own lack of digestive organs and inability to smell or taste. By her third morning at sea Amrita had looked at the gelatinous sludge in her bowl, then back up at the skeleton who’d made it.

“How about I cook?” she’d suggested. “I promise you, it’s no trouble. In fact, I really enjoy it!” She smiled encouragingly at her bony servant.

Zara had stared at her with empty eye sockets, from across the galley. Amrita had begun to think of her as the shell one because of the fluted arrangement of seashells cemented across her collarbones. It helped to have a way to tell them apart. The one with the shells was much gentler than the other two. She was always smoothing things into neat piles and bundling the thick rope on the deck into aesthetically pleasing coils. Zara had cocked her head at Amrita, considering the offer to make breakfast.

There was a pause that could have meant anything. Then Zara handed her the ladle and stepped aside.

Amrita worked with what was available in the galley; at present that meant salted fish, dried lentils and a small burlap sack of coriander seeds. Further investigation turned up some rice, olive oil and cumin as well. She had no magic available with which to doctor the stew, but she still managed to make something that was well seasoned. When Raya came down to eat that afternoon, she set the bowl down in front of the pirate without ceremony.

He looked away from the book in his hand, surprised. He looked down at the bowl. He looked up at Amrita. Then he sniffed it. After making a brief sound of appreciation he returned to his reading. He wolfed the entire bowl down without looking up from his text.

Fortune, the owl, winked at her.

Amrita considered this a favorable review from them both.

After that first morning the galley was mostly hers. The skeletons watched her closely though. They hovered behind her as she hunted down ingredients and stood beside her at the stove, paying attention when she reduced the heat to a simmer. She found their constant presence unnerving until she figured out what they were doing. They were curious creatures. They seemed to enjoy learning, studying her every step, cataloguing it and storing it away somewhere. They could not eat, yet they seemed ravenous for both food and knowledge.

Or perhaps it was the human experience they hoped to enjoy.