I’d found Mayor Taira’s offices. The building looked like a palace, with five stories of smooth white stone and a gold cap that glimmered against the black cliffs.
I trailed behind a man carrying a pail of fish in each hand and followed him through the enormous gold doors. The main room was big enough to fit a whole sailing ship. Countless doors and hallways sprouted off the cavernous room, and four stairways branched up to different levels. The floor was paved in polished, dark gray stones hewn from the cliffs. The snow-white walls were unadorned except for wide windows rimmed with gold that looked out onto the sea. The view of boats floating in the waters looked more beautiful than any painting I had ever seen.
Streams of people hurried in and out of doorways. Clearly, they all knew where they needed to go. I inched back toward one of the windows.
A girl leaned on a stairwell, studying everyone walking by. She looked like she was around my age, and she had wavy hair, rich as sun-soaked barley, braided at the crown of her head and tied back with a blue ribbon. She wore a navy tunic cinched at the waist with a belt heavy with pouches, and tan pants with ample pockets. Her catlike gray eyes narrowed when she saw me. She sauntered over and looked down her snub nose.
“Are you the witch?” The girl turned her head to the side. “I thought you’d be… older.”
I stood as straight as I could. Still, I wasn’t very tall. “I’m twelve years old, just like any other witch going on their Novice quest.”
The girl shrugged. “Well, I promised Rin I’d show you in since she’s working. I’m Charlotte. Follow me.”
She led me up one of the stairways, down a few hallways, pulled open another set of huge, gold doors, and disappeared into the room. I had to hurry through the gap before the doors slammed shut.
In the room, a line of people waited to talk to a man sitting at a small desk. The man was dignified, with gray hair and a sky-blue uniform with gold buttons and trimming. He talked briefly to each person and sent them to the doors to the right, left, or behind him.
Charlotte waved. She was already in line. I hurried over. “Is he Mayor Taira?”
She raised an eyebrow. “Of course not. The mayor doesn’t have time to meet with just anyone. You’ll have to plead your case with Kyo, her guard and her secretary, first.”
The man holding the fish pails was arguing at the desk, but he frowned when Kyo motioned him to the right. “Next.” Kyo gestured at the woman waiting at the front of the line.
“The fish quality keeps degrading!” the man with the pails shouted, waving his arms. Seawater splashed over the rims and onto the stone. “We won’t be able to sell to the rest of the realm if this keeps happening! I need the money to restore my boat!”
I stared as two attendants firmly escorted the man out.
“That’s one of the owners of the fishing boats. He’s like that all the time.” Charlotte shook her head at the man’s retreating back. “Complaining about the fish quality even as he commissions a new fishing boat every year. He’s whining to get Mayor Taira to lower the taxes.”
I hoped Kyo wouldn’t march me out, too.
“Have your plea ready,” Charlotte warned. “Kyo doesn’t listen to babble, and Mayor Taira hates it even more. Get to the point quick.”
“Oh, thank you.” I hadn’t expected her to give me advice. She seemed like she had other things she wanted to do rather than chaperone me.
“Don’t thank me, thank Rin. I had to skip my last day of school for this,” she muttered, toying with a strand of hair that had escaped its braid. “It’s your turn.”
She placed her hand on the small of my back and shoved me. I stumbled forward; I was face-to-face with Mayor Taira’s secretary.
He smoothed his mustache. “And you are?”
My words spilled over one another. “Ah, yes, um, I’m Apprentice Evalithimus Evergreen, here to meet Mayor Taira.” I bobbed into a bow.
The man scrawled my name on his sheaf of parchment and tapped his fountain pen expectantly. “And your reason for meeting with the mayor?”
I stammered, a flush of heat burning my neck. “I’m—I’m trying to pass my Novice Witch quest.…”
The man kept tapping his pen. By my name, there was a huge, gaping blank for Business Reason.
Charlotte leaned over. “Kyo, Eva’s the witch that Rin found. She’s staying at the cliffside cottage, and she needs Mayor Taira to sign off on her paperwork.”
I stared at her, stunned. “Um, yeah, that.” Thank you, thank you, Charlotte!
“Eva will save Auteri from the Culling.” Wait, wait—what? How am I going to do that?
Kyo glanced at his paperwork, and the corner of his mustache twitched. “All right, all right, Miss Charlotte. No need for dramatics. Your witch friend can meet Mayor Taira.” Kyo scribbled To save the town for Business Reason.
Charlotte grinned, looking like a cat that got the cream. “Okay, Eva, you’re in. I’ve done my duty.” She turned and headed out.
“Didn’t Miss Rin ask you to stay with your witch friend?” Kyo called to Charlotte, his salt-and-pepper eyebrows rising knowingly.
She slumped her shoulders and sighed, looking completely different from when she had pled my case only seconds ago. “Rin only asked that Eva got an appointment. I figured Davy would be a better match.”
I winced. I was an errand she wanted to check off her list. “I’m fine on my own.”
“Did someone say my name?” cried a boy’s voice.
“Speak his name and he appears,” Charlotte grumbled, but the corner of her lips pushed up slightly. “Almost as if I was the witch.”
A lanky arm slung around Charlotte’s shoulder and a pair of light brown eyes peered at me underneath messy black hair. Davy was around my height and age, utterly disheveled in a pair of worn canvas overalls over a yellow shirt, and he smelled like the briny sea.
“Gross, get off me.” Charlotte peeled his freckled arms off her.
“Hi-yo, Uncle Kyo,” the boy said cheerily.
“How are you and your father doing, Davy?” Kyo asked, his steely face softening slightly.
“The usual.” Davy shrugged. “Pa talked this morning, though. A bit.”
Kyo looked as if he meant to say something consoling, but the look on Davy’s face made it clear that he didn’t want to talk anymore about his father. The secretary pointed to yet another line waiting at the door behind him. “You’ll get called in when Mayor Taira is ready for you.”
“Thank you, sir.” I bowed again.
Davy trailed me and Charlotte over to the next line. He glanced at me, his excitement picking up again. “Char, is this your new sidekick?”
“This is the girl that Rin asked me to take care of.” Charlotte stood straighter when she mentioned Rin.
“I guess she figured you needed a buddy other than me.” He clasped his chest. “Ah, and as Charlotte’s best and only chum, I would’ve sworn I’d never see the day that our ‘Princess’ of Auteri makes another friend!”
“Oh, stuff it.” The tips of Charlotte’s ears turned pink. “I’m not a princess.”
“I’m not a princess, either,” he confided to me. From behind him, Charlotte shook her head. “I’m Davy.” He stuck his hand out and shook my hand like his life depended on it. My arm flopped numbly at my side when he let go.