My plan for May had been to show Maguire some of my favorite vacation spots, just outside of the common tourist places where the more magically inclined folks meet. It’d be the perfect place to pick up some side jobs and collect some gossip. Also, I was dying to at least have a weekend off.

  Of course, the week before we were set to relocate, Maguire got an unexpected invitation.

  “I heard back from my first alchemist guild,” Maguire exclaimed.

  “Oh really? What did they say?” I asked, walking over to get a look at the letter.

  He'd been reaching out, with some guidance from me, for over a month after establishing some credibility with some of the locals. To say that the process of joining a guild was a long one was an understatement, especially with practices as precise and profound as alchemy.

  “I have been invited to a salon with the entry committee for the Mayfair Alchemical Society. They say I am welcome to stay at their estate for the full week while they further assess my request for affiliation. I've got permission to bring an additional associate to vouch for my character.”

  I suppressed a groan. “When do they want us to be there?”

  “Next week.”

  “Okay, that gives us some time to upgrade your wardrobe and get you up to speed on their customs. The organization is steeped in history and while the members are excellent alchemists, they hold very tightly to tradition,” I explained, choosing my words carefully.

  “Is that your nice way of saying they’re pretentious?”

  “Yes. They are good friends to have, though, especially if you make a good impression on them. I think with a little work on the linguistic side of things, you’ll blow their socks off.”

  “I dealt with my fair share of academics. I worked personnel in the North Pole, remember? The letter writers were particularly picky about how things were labeled and catalogued, and don’t even get me started on the wishlist.”

  “Yeah, you couldn’t pay me enough to deal with those departments long-term. I’ll put a call in with a friend who can get me the downlow on the current makeup of Mayfair. They’ve all got some amount of elven ancestry and they take great pride in that.”

  “Gotta get the good gossip in case we need to do any arm twisting?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Sounds like we are in for a fun time.”

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  “That’s one word for it.”

  Maguire stood and walked up to the wall calendar, marking off the dates and circling the tentative plans we’d have to reschedule. Thankfully, most of those plans hadn’t been set in stone, so moving them around wouldn’t be too much of a pain. After another round of coffee, he disappeared off to the library while I went to my office space to figure out how to not drop anything important in the chaos of getting ready for this trip.

  My interactions with the Mayfair Alchemists were limited and almost entirely indirect. They were a rather reclusive bunch and I hadn’t found any reason to make contact, though it was incredibly likely that I had a friend of a friend who could lend me a hand. Plus, with old organizations comes old money and old power, and that could come in handy in the long-run. Especially if the rumors about their archives were true.

  With the help of the favors I earned and working with Maguire, I managed to narrow down the possible explanations for why the rest of the Society vanished off the face of the earth to a handful of extremely powerful, extremely difficult rituals. That said, my knowledge of such rituals was limited, much less what it would take to pull it off.

  The only thing I knew for sure was that it had to have been done with great intention and no small amount of planning. Which meant there would be traces from where the plan was made. Perhaps the Mayfair alchemists would know something useful.

  Whenever we weren’t working on his wardrobe and taking care of other business, we were exchanging letters with the Mayfairs, discussing all the fine details of the visit. I found a few notes snuck in with these letters, addressed to me from some of the staff who happened to be familiar with the Jacks.

  Some held helpful tips that I shared with Maguire about how to navigate the social situation of the current Mayfair members, which was the amount if not the kind of messy I expected it to be. The others held requests that I kept to myself. He had enough on his plate with his studies. Those notes, I would address on my own.

  When it came to his wardrobe for this trip, we ended up going with a more dapper business casual look than the formality that came with those born into generational wealth. He looked good in that style, but I could tell he wasn’t comfortable.

  “This doesn’t feel very me,” he admitted, smoothing out the tails of the waistcoat.

  “I agree. I think in time you could adapt some of this into your style, but for this, we can try something a little different. There are many other ways to present yourself well without conforming to the kind of clothing they will be wearing.”

  “Do you have any ideas?”

  “Actually, I do, but I want to see what you come up with first. This is your wardrobe. You make the choices, I just make the suggestions.”

  “Alright.”

  He changed out of the stuffy clothing and put on a suit similar to one of the ones we saw when we first met the Giant Slayer. Turns out, Maguire can pull off the slacks and a nicely pressed vest better than I expected, though he opted out of a tie for this. With the right accessories and his long hair pulled back into a neat ponytail, he had half the girls in the store staring at him in awe.

  The other half either weren’t interested or were more focused on being jealous of me.

  “Alright,” I said as we took the bags from the counter. “Now you look the part of aspiring Mayfair alchemist. Next step, proving that you deserve that recognition without making them want to shanghai you into becoming an official member of their society.”

  “One Society is enough for me, thank you. At least for now. Maybe once we get the others back, I will think about it. Pretty sure I won’t be joining for the camaraderie, even if I do decide to on down the road.”

  “Can’t say I’d blame you. They’ve got some good people, but they can be a lot.”