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The café went completely quiet.

Everyone at the round table looked at Althea.

Althea looked at the ceiling.

Gerri calmly reached for another cookie, as if she had anticipated this result and brought snacks just in case. “Any questions?” she asked, holding up the cookie. “That’s a rhetorical question. You all just saw the demonstration. We’re all set.”

“I’ll pay for the machine.”

The barista wiped coffee grounds from her face. “It does this periodically,” she said, resigned and dignified — she’d made peace with her workplace a long time ago. “We have a repair relationship. You’re not the first.”

“She’s not wrong.” Bexley flipped to a new section—the red tab, which Althea suspected wasn’t encouraging in her color system. “I’ve written down six other times this machine has blown up on an awakened woman. Yours was the biggest yet.” She drew a line. “By a lot.”

“Great. I’m the most emphatic.”

Fiora was happy about it. “You absolutely are. Mine shivers at mirrors. Yours lights things on fire. That’s cinematic. That earns respect.”

“I don’t want cinematic magic. I want functional magic. I want non-arson magic. I want to stop having conversations where someone tells me that the fires I start are impressive.”

“You can have all of those things,” Gerri said. “That’s what the coven is for.”

“The machine tends to blow when someone argues against what’s true,” Garnet added, looking at her mug. “The machine agreed with Gerri.”

Fiora pointed at her. “She does that—the true-thing delivery—drops it in. Very calmly. And then you have to sit with it.”

“It’s efficient.”

“It’s terrifying,” Fiora said, and patted Garnet’s arm with great fondness.

Althea looked at the barista, who was wiping down the counter with a philosophical calm. Althea looked at the round table and the four women watching her, the way people get when they’ve all had a morning like this and consider it a reasonable membership fee.

She took a cookie. It was excellent — weapons-grade in comfort, which was completely on brand for Gerri.

“We’re having wine tonight. Seven o’clock. Fiora’s apartment, which has the advantage of being off the ward line intersection, so when things get emotionally heated, the furniture stays intact.”

“When things get emotionally heated,” Althea repeated.

“Girls’ nights always get emotional. That’s the structural purpose.” Valene pulled out her phone. “We’ll work through the basics — what your magic does, what triggers it, and what you can start doing differently — and drink wine and eat as much cheese as we want, which is frankly nobody’s business but ours.”

“Spiraling is so much better in groups,” Fiora confirmed. “I’ve done it both ways. The group version has better snacks, and someone always says the thing you needed to hear about forty-five minutes in, usually Garnet, and then you feel significantly better.”

“That is a fairly accurate description of how it works.”

“I’ll think about tonight.”

“You’ve already decided to come.”

“I said I’ll think about it.”

“You have the face.”

“What face? I don’t have a face.”

“It’s the face where you’ve already decided, and you’re giving yourself time to pretend otherwise. I’ve known it longer than I’ve known most things.”

Fiora nodded seriously. “I can also see the face. I’m very good at faces.”

Bexley looked up from the notebook. “I see it too.” It was slightly alarming, since Althea hadn’t thought Bexley was paying attention. “It’s in the eyes. The decision’s already there.”