“What’s so funny?” Nat asks, narrowing her eyes. Then, looking at Isla, “Are you seeing this?”
“Now she’s blushing,” Isla says. “Hmm. Something tells me you weren’ttotallyalone this weekend.”
“No, I was! I swear! I was totally alone…” I laugh, covering my face to hide the blush. “On the weekend, anyway.”
“And the other days? Hmm.” Nat taps her lips. “Your lover-mage?”
“Which one?” Isla asks.
“Um. All of them? And they’re not my lovers! Well, not all of them. It’s complicated, okay?”
“I knew those slutty little eyes were going to get you in trouble.” Nat links her arm in mine. “Clearly we have a lot to catch up on.”
“And we will,” I promise them. “But first… the assembly awaits.”
And judging from the dark vibe I’m getting as we file into the crowd, it’s not going to be a happy one.
Five
STEVIE
The assembly hall is jam-packed with students and faculty, but Isla, Nat, and I manage to find seats together near the front of the room. A minute later, the lights flicker and a hush falls over the crowd as Anna Trello walks onto the stage and takes her place behind the podium.
I turn around and scan the crowd for the guys, but the only one I see is Baz. He’s leaning up against the back wall, sleeves pushed up, sunglasses covering his eyes, the very definition of too cool for school.
“Security protocols, huh?” Nat whispers. “So this is the part where Trello tells us to salt our doorways and always use the buddy system at night?”
“Sounds about right,” I say, but I have no idea what Trello’s got planned. After the guys told her what happened with Phaines the other night, I thought—naively, of course—she might pay me a visit in person, or at least call to see how I was feeling and give me an update on the search. Instead, I received a brief email expressing generic condolences about the “unfortunate incident,” instructing me to keep a lid on all the details.No need to cause mass panic, Miss Milan.Her favorite mantra.
“Good morning,” Trello begins, and the last remaining fidgeters go still in their seats. “Once again, we are called together not by celebration, but by tragedy—this time, one that struck very close to home. In the late hours of All Hallow’s Eve, Professor Phaines—a trusted elder mage and member of the Arcana Academy family—stole precious magickal artifacts from the very library he swore an oath to protect. Even more egregious, he violently assaulted a student in an attempted ritual sacrifice, leaving her for dead in the Forest of Iron and Bone.”
A curious murmur ripples across the room as those who hadn’t heard the news speculate and turn their heads, searching for the poor victim. For a brief moment, I'm searching too, wondering who could've endured this terrible fate on our own campus.
It takes me a few beats to remember that it was me.
It was one thing talking about it with Isla and Nat. But now, as the pitying eyes of strangers find their way to mine, I’m hit with a rush of dark memories all over again.
Phaines’s black boot coming down on my face. The evil gleam in his eyes as he carved my flesh and drained my blood, demanding answers I just couldn't give him. The emptiness I felt, alone in the Forest of Iron and Bone, tied up and bleeding…
“Stevie? Are you okay?”
Isla’s kind touch on my knee brings me back to the moment, and I look into her eyes, blinking away the terrible memories.
Concern tightens her brow. “Goddess, you're trembling. Do you want to leave?”
I shake my head, doing my best not to draw more attention to myself. What am I going to do? Run home and cry every time I remember that night? No. Phaines took enough from me already. I need to be here. Present in my own life. With my friends.
Nat puts her arm around my shoulder and gives me an encouraging hug as Trello continues with the news.
“I want to assure each and every one of you that we’re doing everything we can to locate Professor Phaines and bring him to justice. We don't believe anyone here is in immediate danger—all indications are that the professor got what he was looking for and is unlikely to return to the scene of the crime. However, your safety is as always our top priority, and there are other forces at work beyond our walls that put all of us in a perilous position.”
The murmurs intensify, and Trello lifts her hands to quiet them.
“We’re receiving numerous reports of larger cities militarizing in the wake of additional clashes between magickal and non-magickal residents,” she says. “Protests are growing, along with counter-protests, and many of them are not peaceful. While witches and mages continue to be charged for crimes they likely didn’t commit, others are, in fact, using their magick illegally. Sometimes it’s in self-defense. Other times, it isn’t. In both cases, the authorities have a right to arrest them.”
“Damn,” Nat whispers. “I can’t believe how quickly things are going downhill. I kept hoping the military thing would stop with Portland.”
“Have you heard anything else about your mom’s friend?” I ask, remembering the woman charged last month with torturing her husband and mother-in-law.
