Bonus snippet -- children

Kylie

“What did you do?!”

“Ow! Auntie, I was just reading, I – ”

“Look at him! Look at Nick! He’s broken his arm!”

“I wasn’t even outside!”

“You hurt him with that thing in your face, didn’t you? You spoke this into the world.”

“I didn’t prophesy anything!”

“So you decided not to even warn anyone?”

“First I spoke it into existence, now I didn’t warn anyone? Do you want me to have prophesied or not?”

“I want you to stop hurting your cousin, you ungrateful little – ”

“Nata! Kylie! What is going on? Why is Nick crying?”

“Your niece broke his arm!”

“I didn’t do anything!”

“Nata, calm down. Let’s deal with Nick’s arm. Kylie, I’ll deal with you later.”

Max

“And what’s the fourth circle do, Max?”

“It… illuminates this corner. But, um… this rune here, it…”

“Yes?”

“I… don’t know.”

“You don’t know? How can you not know? We’ve been studying these patterns for weeks!”

“It’s new, it – ”

“You’re supposed to be intelligent! Have you been slacking in your studies again?”

“No!”

“Then you should know this. You do want to be chosen by Octavia, yes? You do want to be the Nonus Acanthos?”

“…”

“Maximillian. You do want to bring honour to your family after they’ve given you so much, yes?”

“… Yes.”

Kayden

“Ah, fuck!”

“Kayden, are you alright?”

“Yeah, Mum, I… think I sprained my ankle.”

“Okay, let’s get inside and get some ice. You sound stressed.”

“Well, yeah! It hurts!”

“That’s no reason to be stressed.”

“I think it’s plenty of reason to be – ”

“And now you’re angry! Calm down!”

“I am calm!”

“No, you’re not! We’ll get your ankle wrapped up and iced and it’ll heal, but if that thing in your heart wakes up and kills us both…”

“Okay, okay. I’m calming down. I’m calming down right now.”

“Good boy. Sit here, I’ll find the bandages.”

Magistae

“You really shouldn’t let them play together so often, Renard.”

“They’re siblings. They’re supposed to play together.”

“They’re Brandts. One of them is ours by succession, but nobody’s going to accept the non-mage. It’s cruel to let them get so attached to each other when you know they can’t possibly be friends when they’re adults. If we just knew which one our heir was, we could – ”

“No.”

“You’re only going to make them more miserable later by letting them both grow up expecting – ”

“No.”

Di Fiore

“Come down, Simon! My dad’s going to be here to pick me up any second.”

“You’re just jealous that you can’t climb as high as me. Why do you have to go home so soon?”

“My dad wants me to study magic for when I become the Fiore. I keep telling him it’s years away but he says that magic is really hard and I have to start learning now.”

“You’ll show him, though. You’re going to be a better Fiore than him. The best Fiore ever!”

“Yeah! And you’ll be Simon Madja, my right hand man! You’ll marry some really powerful mage lady and she’ll be really in love with you and do lots of favours for our family, and I’ll get a really cool spell and be the coolest Fiore, and together we’ll make the Madjas more powerful than they’ve ever been.”

“Yeah. Together.”

Clara

“Clara, dear, you look so much like your great-aunt. She was the youngest person in this family to ever get a spell, you know.”

“You said. And then it tore her apart.”

“Well, yes, it – ”

“How? What did she do wrong?”

“It’s not as simple as – magic is dangerous, my dear. That’s why, when you go through your Initiation, you will need to be very strong, and very brave, and clever.”

“I will. I’ll do it right. So. What did my great-aunt do wrong?”