Gorythorne Academy welcomed new magical minds beneath a sign that looked as if it had survived several attempts to set it on fire.
Its towers leaned in different directions.
Students practiced spells in the courtyards; a few were temporarily part of the courtyards.
The two girls arrived on balloon animals, which was the sort of entrance that earned attention and a lengthy meeting with the admissions office.
“One coin,” the redhead told the bursar, setting a single bright piece on his desk.
“Unlimited value.
You’re welcome.”
The bursar tried to object.
The coin multiplied in his hand.
He stopped objecting.
At Gorythorne, their gifts grew stranger and stronger.
The dark-haired student learned to read the hidden currents in a spell, then rewrite them before her teachers could finish casting.
The redhead preferred a more direct method: add power, add glitter, and see what survived.
Together they climbed to the top of nearly every class, mostly through cheating, chaos, and unregistered spells.
Their instructors called them promising.
Their classmates called them dangerous.
Both descriptions were accurate.
At graduation they stood above the school on their balloon mounts, gowns whipping in the wind.
They had degrees.
They had powers.
They had enough confidence to fill an airship and almost none of the sense needed to steer one.
“All we need now,” the redhead said, scanning the horizon, “is someone to annoy.”
Her friend smiled in a way that ought to have frightened the nearby villages.
Years later, the two had acquired a floating house, an unreasonable collection of enchanted equipment, and the habit of treating a city like their private laboratory.
One morning the redhead found a catalogue open to airship jousting boots.
“Ooh.
Look at these.”
“I’m bored,” said the dark-haired witch from a chair buried in books.
“Let’s ruin something dumb.”
“There’s a city festival tomorrow,” the redhead said.
“That sounds like an invitation.” The dark-haired witch traced a formula in the air.
“If I invert this incantation, I can turn a local levitation field into something permanent.”
“Let’s give them a parade they’ll never land from.”
They looked at each other.
It was the old look: the one that had carried them into the woods, through Gorythorne, and past every reasonable opportunity to stop.