“I have invited three representatives from each of the grand traditions,” Mirabilis said, not really answering.
“Credomancers and their trines,” Miss Pendennis, walking behind them, muttered. Mirabilis did not look back, but bent his head close to Emily’s to whisper. “Remember what I told you earlier.”
“Eyes open and mouth shut,” Emily whispered back, now understanding the reason Mirabilis had emphasized it. “Don’t worry, I got it.”
When they reached the group, Mirabilis stepped back and presented Emily with a flourishing bow, as if she were a life-size doll of his own design.
“Gentlemen, this is Miss Emily Edwards, of whom you have heard so much.” Mirabilis looked at each of the sangrimancers in turn. “Mr. Heusler. Mr. Rocheblave.”
Emily stared into the middle distance, trying to ignore the fact that the men were looking at her like a cupcake on a plate. Her carefully cultivated composure was rattled when Heusler grabbed her arm. He lifted the truncated appendage to his face so he could examine it with his small paste-diamond eyes. As he turned her arm this way and that, Emily caught a glimpse of dark patterns showing under his grimy cuffs. Black inked tattoos, the kind sailors wore, but heavier of line and strangely unsettling.
“Where’s the stone?” Heusler finally asked, after having apparently committed the exact lineaments of her arm to memory. “I didn’t come all this way to look at a stump.”
Mirabilis disengaged Emily’s arm from Heusler’s grasp, put his body between hers and the High Priest’s.
“Your questions will be answered when the Grand Symposium commences,” Mirabilis said.
“He’s got it locked up somehow,” Rocheblave said to Heusler. He had a high, querulous voice. “And here I thought credomancers put more store by trust.”
Mirabilis smiled noncommittally and gestured toward the end of the room where a table had been laid.
“The remaining colleagues will join us soon,” Mirabilis said cheerfully. “Shall we eat?”
At the table, which shone with silver and prismatic cut crystal, Emily was seated between Mirabilis and Miss Pendennis. She picked at a plate of something exotic that probably contained lobster. Miss Pendennis leaned across her, speaking to Mirabilis under her breath.
“So I’m dying to know—who have you invited from the animantic tradition? I know Mr. Saladin Buck is off in Europe somewhere, but surely you got ahold of Mrs. Amanda Haynes Reader … or maybe Townley Newgate? This symposium sure could use a little Townley Newgate right about now.”
Mirabilis buttered a small piece of bread with extravagant casualness, but said nothing.
“Well?” Miss Pendennis demanded.
“Miss Edwards and the Indian Holy Woman will serve as the other two animantic representatives,” Mirabilis said smoothly.
“Are you insane?” Miss Pendennis’ voice carried across the table, as did the sound of her fist pounding the damask. Mirabilis smiled apologetically as the gentlemen around the table looked up. Heusler seemed glad for the opportunity to let his piggy little eyes linger on Emily. “You’re telling me that spirit workers will be represented by—excuse me, Miss Edwards—a backcountry Witch with no experience of magical society and an Indian in a nut?”
“And a very pushy women’s reform crusader,” Mirabilis said mildly, sipping his wine. “You’ve summarized it perfectly, Miss Pendennis.”
Emily looked down at her plate, trying to ignore that horrible High Priest. He just kept looking at her, his tiny eyes appraising and disgustingly suggestive. To make matters worse, he was seated next to Tarnham; when the fat man leaned his head over and said something under his breath, Tarnham laughed in not a nice way and reached up to stroke his ferret. Emily thought of black knives and blood. The images made her flush suddenly.
“I’m going for some air,” Emily murmured.
But Miss Pendennis didn’t seem to hear. She was leaning toward Mirabilis again, her cheeks pink with indignation.
“Come to mention it, you’ve hardly outdone yourself in your selection of credomantic talent either. Tarnham, for mercy’s sake? Your secretary? Why not Rex Fortissimus, or one of your own magisters? And where’s Dreadnought, anyway? You promised Miss Edwards that you’d allow him to participate!”
Emily pushed herself away from the table without waiting to hear Mirabilis’ response.
Along one side of the great hall was a line of tall French glass doors that opened onto a broad veranda overlooking the Institute’s gardens. One of the doors had been left ajar to admit fresh air. She snuck out through it, her skirts rustling. She came to stand by the mossy stone railing, looking down over it at the smooth green grass below.