Page 14 of A Tower of Half-Truths
She pulled it tightly around herself and hoped he hadn’t noticed the bloodstain on her shirt.
“Er, I’m still a bit cold from the outside.” The sweat pooling on her forehead betrayed her lie. “I’ll keep it on.”
The wizard—Aventus, the man downstairs had called him—pushed aside a stack of books on the sofa and motioned for her to sit. He then navigated a path that snaked around the piles of books, leading to what Mavery assumed was the kitchen.
She wasted no time scoping out the room. The walls were decorated with a few maps and paintings—all cheap reproductions, at first glance. There was a rather alarming number of empty wine bottles scattered about. A dust-coated one lay on the tea table. Directly below it, a purple stain marred what had once been a vibrant Maroban rug.
Aside from the book collection, Mavery could identify nothing of value here. If Aventus owned any rare artifacts, they were hidden beneath the mess. It would take some digging—maybe literally—to uncover them.
Clinking porcelain announced Aventus’s return from the kitchen. Mavery vaulted over a stack of books and sat on the sofa, as though she hadn’t just been snooping around. He balanced a tray atop the books on the tea table, then lowered himself into a well-worn armchair—the only surface that was completely free of clutter. While his living space was chaotic, his approach to tea-making was the opposite. He spooned loose leaves into the pot and then filled it with steaming water, spilling not a single drop.
“As I said before… Sorry, what did you say your name was?”
“Mave Reynard.”
He blinked at her as though he’d misheard, but then nodded. “Mave, apologies for the misunderstanding. That newspaper ad was placed by mistake—one that I will rectify immediately after you leave.”
“Who placed it, then?”
Aventus stiffened. “Someone who, I’m certain, was looking out for my best interests. But that someone failed to realize that I prefer an…independentapproach to research these days.”
He strained the tea into a pair of teacups. The teapot had a hairline crack down its side, the cups were chipped in several places. This set wasn’t a valuable heirloom, handed down through the generations. Another sign that hisrealvaluables—Mavery was still optimistic they existed—wouldn’t be left out in the open.
“Cream or sugar?”
She shrugged. “However you take it is fine. I’m not picky.”
In Osperland, even the lowest of low-end taverns served tea, but it wasn’t the kind worth sitting down and savoring. More often than not, it looked and tasted like dishwater. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a cup of something evenhalf-decent. Whatever Aventus was preparing, it was bound to be luxurious,despite the state of his tea set.
He added a single sugar cube and a generous splash of cream. He stirred the liquid until it turned the color of old parchment, then passed her the cup upon its matching saucer. She took a sip with as much poise as she could muster, not wanting to look too obviously out of her element. The tea smelled strongly of bergamot and was warm, earthy, comforting.
“Does it need more sugar?”
“Oh, no,” she sighed. “This is perfect.”
She drank heartily as he prepared his own cup.
“Since you took the initiative in coming here,” he said, “I will at least do you the courtesy of passing along your information to my colleagues at the University.” He glanced at Mavery’s pack. “I assume you brought some application materials with you.”
“Such as?”
“Letters of recommendation, university transcripts, any spell tomes you contributed to…”
She should have known awizardwould prefer written evidence. She sipped her tea, buying herself a moment to craft a response.
“Oh, I left Burnslee in such a hurry, I’m afraid I didn’t have time to gather all my, er, papers. How about I deliver everything to you verbally now, then I’ll mail them to you the first chance I get? What do you want to know?”
“Your education, for starters.”
“I attended Atterdell College.”
Beneath his mess of hair, his eyebrows raised.
“What?”
“Nothing,” he said, shaking his head. “Only… Well, Atterdell’s reputation in the wizarding community is, shall we say, short of prestigious.” If he noticed her frown, he made no mention of it. “Anyway, which Schools did you study?”
“Gardemancy, of course.”
