Free The Magicians and Mrs. Quent by Galen Beckett Page A

chilly with so little sun to warm the world, and a mist rolled out of the west. By the fourth such night—an umbral of twenty-two hours—it grew so cold that the rain turned to snow, and when dawn finally came it found all of Invarel glazed with white.
    They kept to the parlor on the second floor as much as possible so they would not have to heat the upper stories, save for Mr. Lockwell’s room. Since it was too cold to be out of doors, they found what activities they could within. There were linens to mend, and Lily’s charity basket had languished in a corner for so long that Miss Mew had taken it for a bed. Ivy urged Lily to remove the cat and pull out the basket of half-finished shirts so she might complete some of her work.
    “Mighty Loerus!” Lily exclaimed as she pricked her finger for the third time that day. She had copied the bad habit of swearing by extinct Tharosian gods from a romance she had read in which the hero did the same. “It’s so dark in here I can’t see what I’m doing. Did you misread the almanac, Ivy? I thought you said nightfall was hours off.”
    “It’s the fog that makes it so dim,” Ivy said, peering at her own sewing in the wan light. “But tonight is to be a long umbral and tomorrow short again, so we’d best sew as much as we can while we have any sun at all.”
    “We could light candles,” Lily said.
    “Candles are for night, not day.”
    “Well, it’s nearly dark as night, so I think we should light some.”
    “Not when they cost as much as they do. Move closer to the window, and you’ll be able to see better.”
    “It’s too cold by the window.”
    “You can share my lap blanket. Now, come here and sit down.”
    With much dragging of feet, Lily did so, plopping her basket down beside her. “I don’t know who would want to wear these ugly shirts anyway.”
    “There are many who will be grateful to have new garments, however simple,” Ivy said. “Not everyone in the city is so fortunate as we are. Besides, Rose’s shirts aren’t ugly at all. They’re quite handsome.”
    Rose looked up from her work and smiled at Ivy. No matter how dark the room, her needle always set neat, even stitches in the cloth. “I always have light when you’re near, Ivy,” she said.
    Ivy smiled back at her, then bent her head over her sewing. Before long Lily let out a sigh, crumpled her shirt back into the charity basket, and went to the pianoforte, where she commenced practicing all her most dolorous chords.
    Mrs. Lockwell entered a short while later, huffing for breath after coming up the stairs. “Oh, it’s so dark in here!” she exclaimed. “I can hardly see my hand if I wave it before my face. Light a candle, Lily. Or two or three. And put more wood on the fire, Ivy. We shall freeze to death!”
    Lily gave Ivy a smug look, then flounced about the parlor, lighting candles. Ivy said nothing and did as her mother asked.
    After that, their work proceeded more easily, with more laughter and fewer needle pricks, and Ivy tried not to think of the extra cost of the wood and candles. She decided a little tea would be a welcome reward for their work—Lily had finally been coerced into finishing a shirt—and went down to the kitchen to prepare a pot.
    As she started up the stairs, she heard the bell at the front gate ring; the post had come. Ivy wrapped her shawl around her shoulders, braving the bitter air to retrieve the post from the box, then hurried up to the warmth of the parlor.
    “Here’s the tea,” she said, setting the tray on the table. “And the post as well.”
    Lily leaped up from the bench at the pianoforte. “Is there anything addressed to me?”
    She always seemed to think there would be a letter for her, though from whom it might come, Ivy couldn’t imagine. The cold had been so shocking, Ivy hadn’t taken time to look at the post. She picked it up from the tray. There were two letters, neither of them for Lily.
    “There’s one here for Father,” she