The planning session stretched on for another hour, though it felt longer. Emily had lists of potential equipment needs, estimates of depth based on old shipping records, and even a rough sketch of what the sunken vessel might look like after decades at the bottom.

  "The boat itself was a flat-bottomed cargo hauler," she explained, pointing to her drawing. "Not meant for deep water, and built just for moving things from one side of the lake to the other. When it went down, it probably settled more or less upright. The barrels would have been lashed to the deck."

  "Would have been," Brit repeated. "Meaning they might not be anymore."

  Emily’s tone was matter-of-fact. "Meaning they might have shifted. Or rolled. We won't know until someone goes down there and looks."

  "Which brings us to the practical matters." Cecelia leaned forward, her plate of noodles forgotten. "Where exactly do we set up this winch of yours? The shoreline isn't uniform. Some areas are rocky, some are soft. I’m guessing we’d need stable ground to set up on."

  Allen took a moment to study the map before replying. "There's a spot on the eastern shore, near an old mill that burned down. The foundation is still there. It’s solid stone sunk deep into the earth. We could anchor the winch to that, and it would hold."

  Xand set his plate aside. Pulling out a notebook, he began writing, his pen scratching across the paper in quick, efficient strokes. "And once you bring these barrels to the surface? What then? We can't exactly leave containers of dangerous chemicals sitting on the shore."

  Jane was ready with an answer. "We'll need containment. Something that can hold whatever is left inside the barrels without letting it leak into the soil or the water. My aunt and I can probably manage the magical side of that, but we'll need physical containers, too."

  "I can source those," Brit said. "The smithy keeps a stock of barrels for sale. They’re wooden, with good, firm, iron bindings. We'd need to reinforce them, maybe add some kind of seal, but it's doable."

  "How many?" Xand asked. "How many of these original barrels are we talking about?"

  Emily flipped back through her book. "Seventeen. According to the manifest, seventeen barrels were loaded onto that boat."

  The number hung in the air. Seventeen trips to the bottom of a contaminated lake. Seventeen chances for something to go wrong.

  "That's a lot of diving.” Bella was looking at Jane with worry in her eyes. "Even spread over multiple days."

  "It doesn't have to be seventeen dives,” Allen said quietly.

  Everyone turned to look at him.

  "I've been thinking about that,” he continued, his voice slowly gaining volume. “There might be a way to bring up multiple barrels at once, depending on how they're positioned down there. Some kind of system.”

  "Can you build something like that?" Jane asked.

  "I think so. I'm still working out the details about the best way to approach it. But the principle is sound. If we can secure multiple barrels to a single lifting mechanism, we can reduce the number of trips.”

  "How significantly?" Cecelia pressed.

  "Maybe three or four dives total, if everything goes well. Maybe less. Do we have funding?"

  Xand nodded. “As much as you need. We’ve dipped into crisis funds for this.”

  “Then maybe just one.” Allen held up a hand before anyone could get too excited. "That's a best-case scenario. It depends on how the barrels are situated, whether they've corroded together, and whether the seals are still intact enough to handle being moved. But it's possible."

  Jane felt some of the tension in her shoulders ease. Three or four dives was manageable. Seventeen had felt like an insurmountable mountain.

  "All right," Xand said, setting down his pen. "So we have a location for the winch. We have containment being arranged. We have a plan for reducing the number of dives. What else?"

  They spent another half-hour working through the details. Who would operate the winch. How to communicate between the surface and the diver below. What signals would indicate success or trouble. How they would transport the recovered barrels away from the shore and to a safe storage location. By the time they finished, Jane's head was spinning with logistics.

  "I think we've covered everything we can for tonight," Cecelia said finally. "We'll need some time to gather materials and build what needs building.”

  She turned to Xand. “I must direct the town council to close off the docks until this matter is resolved. Only those directly involved in the salvage effort are permitted.”

  Xand nodded. “I’ll see to that.”

  “Shall we plan to commence in two days?” Cecelia went on. “Two full days to prepare, and then all participants gather at the docks on the third morning. That should give everyone time to prepare their parts. Yes?”

  After receiving more nods from around the table, Cecelia concluded the meeting. People began to stand, stretching muscles that had stiffened from sitting too long. As Jane began to gather dishes, her aunt’s voice stopped her.

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  "Jane." Cecelia’s expression was serious. "I'm sorry to say this in front of everyone, but I need you at the shoreline tomorrow morning. First light."

  Jane blinked. "Tomorrow? I thought we said the third morning from now."

  "For the main operation, yes. But neither you nor I have done anything like this in some time, and it’s going to be a very arduous task. We can’t leave anything to chance that is in our power to prepare for. You understand why."

  Jane looked at the empty display tables and her poor, cold ovens. She had been away for days already. Though her customers had been patient and understanding, she couldn't ask them to wait forever.

  And yet, there was a dragon nearby, disturbed and dangerous. There were seventeen barrels of poison sitting at the bottom of the lake, leaking their contents into the water that the whole town depended on.

  Her bakery mattered, but so did this.

  "All right," she said. "Tomorrow morning. First light."

  Cecelia nodded, and something like approval flickered in her eyes.

  The cleanup went quickly with everyone helping. Even Xand pitched in, carrying the empty serving bowls to the counter. Within twenty minutes, the bakery was restored to order. People said their goodbyes and filtered out into the evening until only Jane and Cecelia remained.

  Jane finished wiping down the last table and put water on to boil. Her aunt had settled into one of the chairs by the window, looking out at the lake. The colors of sunset were painting the water. For a moment, the whole scene looked peaceful, like nothing was wrong at all.

  "Tea?" Jane asked.

  "Please."

  Jane prepared the pot with careful attention, measuring the leaves precisely and warming the cups before filling them. When everything was ready, she carried both cups to the window and sat down across from her aunt.

  "Here."

  Cecelia took the cup and thanked her. They sat in comfortable silence for a moment, watching the colors shift on the water as the sun completed its descent.

  "This is all so complex. When I came here, I thought everything was going to be so simple.” Jane let out a heavy sigh. "It seems silly now. Thinking I could escape the complexity."

  "It's not silly," Cecelia said gently. "It's what you needed. What you still need, probably. But life has a way of getting complicated."

  Cecelia’s tone was just different enough from her usual voice to give Jane pause.

  She’s not only talking about me.

  Jane gazed at the older woman for a moment. She knew there were many things she didn’t understand about her aunt, and this felt like one of them.

  “Did you ever want something different?” she ventured.

  Cecelia was quiet for a while. Her eyes were fixed on the lake, yet also focused far away, like she was seeing something nobody else could sense. Jane thought she might not even answer, until she finally did.

  "I wanted to be a dancer."

  Jane almost dropped her teacup. "What?"

  "A dancer." Cecelia smiled at her niece’s expression. "Don't look so shocked. I was quite good, actually. I started training when I was five.”

  "I had no idea."

  "Why would you? It was a long time ago. A different life, really." Cecelia took a sip of her tea. "Then I turned twelve, and they made me take the standard magical aptitude tests. The ones everyone takes. I had never thought much about magic before. It wasn't part of my world. Dancing was my world. I put the tests off as long as possible because I simply didn’t care about them.”

  "But you tested high."

  "I tested off the charts. The academy sent recruiters the same day the results came back. They were very persuasive." Cecelia's voice was dry. "It didn’t take much convincing for everyone around me to agree that I wouldn’t be a dancer."

  Jane tried to imagine her aunt as a dancer. It was difficult. Cecelia moved with precision and economy. But there was grace there, too, now that Jane thought about it.

  "Do you regret it?" she asked. "Giving up dancing?"

  "Sometimes. I would have been good. Not great, but fine enough. I probably would have been happier.” Cecelia set down her cup and looked out at the darkening lake. “Isn’t that funny? Imagine trying to explain to someone that being a powerful archmage should have taken a backseat to being a fine-enough dancer. They wouldn’t understand."

  Jane thought about that. She thought about her own gifts, and her own compromises. The academy had claimed her early, too, even earlier than Cecelia. She had never really considered alternatives until she came to her bakery.

  Her next words came out sounding smaller than she intended.

  "What does that mean for me? For me and my bakery, I mean. I've already passed the archmage test, haven't I? What happened with the dragon. That counted."

  Cecelia nodded slowly. "Yes. In all but paperwork, you're an archmage now. And the paperwork is likely being completed already. Word travels fast when someone single-handedly redirects a water spirit capable of leveling a mountain. The academy will have heard by now."

  "What does that mean for my life here?"

  Cecelia was quiet for another long moment. The colors had faded from the lake when she finally turned back to look at Jane.

  "I don't know," she said. "Things are different now than they were when I was your age. Between me, you, and the few other active archmages in the nation, we've never had more available power. It's a natural byproduct of the nation's population growth. More people means more potential mages, and more potential mages means more who reach the highest levels."

  "That's part of why you've been able to stay here to help me," Jane said, the realization dawning. "The other archmages have things covered."

  "Exactly. For the first time in decades, we're not stretched impossibly thin. There's actually room for people to have lives outside of crisis response." Cecelia reached across the table and took Jane's hand. "I don't know if that means you can stay here permanently. I don't know what the academy will want, or what the kingdom will need. But I can tell you this: I will throw every bit of my influence behind trying to make sure you do stay."

  "You would do that?"

  "Of course I would. You're my niece. You're family." Cecelia squeezed her hand. "And more than that, you've found something here. Something very nice, from all appearances. I’m not about to let them steal it from you.”

  "But what if the kingdom does need me? What if there's another crisis?"

  "Then we deal with it when it comes. That's how life works, Jane. You can't plan for every possibility.” Cecelia released her hand and picked up her teacup again. "For now, what's in front of you is seventeen barrels of poison at the bottom of a lake. Let's focus on that. Everything else can wait."

  They finished their tea in silence, watching the last traces of light fade from the sky. The lake was dark now. Somewhere down there, under all that water, seventeen sealed containers were slowly releasing their contents. Tomorrow, they would start the hard work of solving that problem.

  "I should go," Cecelia said eventually. "Frank and Deborah will be wondering where I've gotten to, and if I need another rescue. We can’t have those poor people panicked.”

  "Will you be all right walking back alone?"

  Cecelia laughed. For a moment, she sounded almost like a different person. Lighter. Younger.

  "Jane, I am the Grand Archmage. I think I can manage a walk across town."

  "I know. I just worry."

  "And that's why you're a good niece." Cecelia stood and gathered her things. "First light tomorrow. Don't be late."

  "I won't."

  When her aunt was gone, Jane didn’t linger by the window. Her body was still recovering from the stress and strain of the rescue mission. She took the two teacups to the sink, washed them, and headed for bed.

  Tomorrow, she told herself as she climbed the stairs. Tomorrow, we start fixing things.

  And after that, maybe, I can get back to baking.

  .

  !