An Unkindness of Magicians (The Unseen World #1)

by Kat Howard

But this rough magic I here abjure . . . —WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, The Tempest

Stalking down Wall Street, the spire of Trinity Church rising before her, she slid among the suits and tourists like a secret, drawing no eyes, no shouted “hey, babys,” not even the casual jar of a shoulder bumped in a crowd. She could have been a ghost. A shadow.

Fortune’s Wheel has begun its Turning. When it ceases rotation, all will be made new.

Any House may contract out their participation. Any such contracted champions will be deemed members of Houses with all attendant rights and responsibilities for the duration of their contract. Once contracted, a champion cannot be substituted. Any House that does not contract out its involvement accepts full consequences to its members, including death and disappearance, and forswears vengeance outside of the sanctioned challenges. The actions of a champion, contracted or otherwise, during the course of a duel are final. Any House that, by the activity of any member, Blood or Contract, exposes the Unseen World to mundane attention will be unmade. Any House that chooses not to participate will be unmade. Malicious interference in an active challenge may result in magic being stripped from the magician or the interfering House being unmade.

Any House whose champion, either Blood or Contracted, dies in the course of a duel will be exempt from the next required sacrifice to the House of Shadows. The House ranked highest at the end of the Turning will become the head of the Unseen World.

“Your mother,” Laurent said, “is going to lose her Chanel-wearing shit when she finds out you’re doing this.”

She planned to drag all those dirty little secrets out of the shadows and into the light, and if necessary, the light would be cast by the flames she had lit as she burned the Unseen World to the ground.

Miles Merlin, leonine and silver-haired, nose like a crag and bright blue eyes that missed nothing,

“Noticed,” she said, “is very different from seen.”

But there was a type of terror that didn’t care about reality, a fear that lived in secret places, and it clawed at her soft insides. It clawed harder at night, which was another thing she hated.

That magic was only truly yours if it came from your own pain, your own sacrifice.

She had relearned who she was when there was no one who had the power to force her to be someone else, and then she had decided who she wanted to be.

Eliot Vincent wore no coat, no scarf, no hat, his lack of armor against the weather a subtle reminder that he was strong enough not to need it. He stood, calm and easy in the cold.

“Is it that easy, to destroy your home?” Shara asked. “To turn your back on me? All I ever did was make you stronger. It’s because of me you are what you are.” “This was never a home. And I made myself what I am.”