The Marvellers: List 3

They ran all the way to the Touch Tower, nearly earning a demerit from Dr. Weinberg for scaring her golem and causing it to molt some of its clay, and narrowly missed receiving another from Dr. Stone for aggravating her emo-stones and disrupting their absorption of daily feelings.

Ella had seen advertisements in Marvellian newspapers about the best place to buy channellors—Curtis & Claude’s Channellor Consortium—with catalogs full of all kinds of things Ella never thought you could use.

Then she parroted something Gran always said about the noble service provided by Conjurors as stewards of the Underworld: “Ensuring that your ancestors make it home to their resting places is important work.”

Clare traipsed off with Abina and Lian.

They weaved through a row of twinkling starpost stationery, which waxed and waned like the stars themselves.

The kids around them were too fixated on the store window to even see Brigit, so Ella's embarrassment subsided.

“Excuse me, Miss Durand, that's one demerit for running.” He pursed his wrinkled lips and scowled.
“But—” Ella started to protest.
“That's another for insubordination. You must do better to fold into our ways or you won't make it very far.”

She craned her neck to see all the topiary mazes of moonflower hedges and starfruit trees.

“Just know that history is like a palimpsest manuscript. Know what that is?”
She shook her head no.
“It's a document or a book in which words have been written on top of the original text. Our society is a bit like that. But under a mag-scope...you'll find all the things others have tried to cover.”

Art and dance studios lined the left side and lapidary labs the right.

Ella ducked behind a cabinet display boasting the best knives for vanquishing.

Striped balloons and plump golden dirigibles clustered in the center with baskets ready to receive parcels and packages.

He dug out a small satchel labeled The Nostrum Nook's Sleepy Time Powder and stepped closer to them.

She’s a lovely trainee and deserves our benefit of the doubt and open-mindedness. For she profoundly respects each of you, and thus we should offer her the same.

They always flew along the wires of this place like a kettle of jeweled hawks, cresting over the rooftops of turreted houses and quaint shops all stuck together like assorted taffies.

Its ramshackle storefronts leaned at odd angles, like bones knocked a little out of their sockets.

Fat fall pumpkins sat in windows as late-night shoppers slipped in and out of Ignoble Incant Imporium or the Wicked Warehouse of Wonders or into the open-air Mischief Mart full of trinkets offering dark promises.

Once inside her dressing rooms, she ran her fingers over everything: her various faces still on hooks, smiling brown ones, gorgeous black ones, angry white ones, eager tan ones, all premade and ready at her disposal; tins of chalk-white face powder and bloody lip paint on her vanity; her father's mimicry potions on tiered shelves, shimmering the darkness; and her stage name poster—the Ace of Anarchy—staring back at her.

Aunt Sera reached her hand toward a trellis of conjure-roses, stroking the beautiful black petals.

They hissed and writhed with volatile energy.

Gran called these dangerous and irritable plants “hot plants'' and kept them in a separate area of the garden and greenhouse, each one inhabiting its own personal cage like petulant birds in a quarantined aviary.

Ella dodged its viscous flowers.

The room devolved into chaos despite Aunt Sera's commands.

The map unfurled its contents: the souls, tiny as match flames, on their way to doors to each afterlife location, the twilight sky and its stars, all the roads of the dead filled with High and Low Walkers on their routes, the two deathbulls at the main gate, fields of plants, and more.

A very, very long time ago, the non-Fewel folk, as everyone used to be called, outsourced the divine responsibility of deathwork to Conjurors, and their gifts built this place.

Marvellers who have committed crimes exist inside this powerful set of conjure cards. They're made from the threads of death and act as vessels, or containers. Once sentenced, you cross into the card and are held there in perpetuity or until you're released.

“It's not an issue, Ella. We didn't want to worry you or your parents. There will always be people who try to thwart change,” Headmarveller Rivera said.

As Gia trailed her down a long hall, the woman transformed step-by-step into one of the most beautiful women she’d ever seen. Iridescent skin, bright eyes, and ears elegantly pinched at the tops.

Gia's eyes snapped open. The memories fresh, so tangible she could almost taste the blood.

“They were united in their purpose, but of course, there was tension. Whose customs got to be followed? Whose protocols were the best? They had to figure out a way to blend. To take the best everyone had to offer and turn it into something new...marvelling.”

It has been brought to our attention that your knitting has revelatory information, and thus we must investigate.

The warnings her gran always issued drummed through her: Whatever is conjured with an ill heart will backfire.

Ella hadn't even made it across the threshold before she got caught in a big hug.

Gumbo stretched under the table waiting for any wayward piece of chicken or lost sausage to come his way.

The ceiling held a canopy of Underworld plants, flowers peeking through the foliage, appearing and disappearing in a game of hide-and-seek.

Mama combed through her Red Book: A Compendium of Conjure Maps.

Mama kissed her mother's cheek and spread a map of Louisiana across the table. An outline of the boot-shaped state pulsed on the thick paper, its sprawling cities and sleepy towns and rural outposts gleaming and glittering.

More tears poured down, and Brownie stared at Ella with big, pensive eyes.

The Cards of Deadly Fate are reporting a breach. The entire prison is on lockdown. The disgraced yet legendary circus performer Gia Trivelino has escaped.

I need a soul reaped from the Underworld. She died on June 18 at 9:22 p.m. I'll pay the top price—name it.
Let me know the cost.
It is imperative.