“Juice?” Nate answers helpfully, not looking up as he adds creamer to his coffee.
“Itisjust juice,” I say. “It’s not even noon yet.” I roll my eyes at Ian while Amelia shakes her head. “Was that you who set the common room curtains on fire last week?” I ask him, changing the subject.
He lifts one scarred eyebrow in mock innocence. “You have no proof of such shenanigans.”
Nate finally looks up. “There were witnesses. And scorch marks.”
Ian only huffs. “I was actually trying to set Dash’s jacket on fire.”
Amelia looks aghast. “Why on earth would you do that?”
“He told me my accent was ‘cute,’” Ian says, appalled. “In front of Chelsea! It is not cute; it is aggressive and manly and delightfully charming.”
Nate takes a sip of his coffee. “I actually was impressed with your restraint that time.”
“Thank you. At least someone appreciates it.”
“You didn’t even aim for his hair,” Nate says, deadpan.
I can’t help the small laugh that escapes my lips. It feels good to be sitting here with my squadmates. To be talking of anything other than the hole in my chest where my heart used to be.
“Anyway,” Ian says, like he didn’t just confess to attempted arson, “do you guys wanna come with us? I want to find something for my mum for Parents’ Week in April. Something that saysI’m thriving, notI’m one incident away from expulsion.”
Amelia shrugs—which we’ve all learned by now means “yes.”
Fifteen minutes later we spill out into the cold. Ink & Ether is a peculiar little bookstore tucked between a florist and a bakery. Inside, the shelves bow under the weight of obscure arcane tomes, folklore compendiums, and out-of-print novels. Somewhere in the back, incense burns, the smoke curling lazily toward the ceiling.
The shopkeeper, known only as Madame Romari, is a raven-haired woman with eyes like storm glass. She seems to appear beside you just as you’re reaching for a book—as if she already knows what you were looking for, even when you don’t.
I head toward the elemental theory section, wondering if she carries anything our school library doesn’t. The soft clinking of her bangles gives her presence away before I even see her.
“You’re looking for something,” she says. Her accent is thick and foreign, and it’s not a question.
“Yeah… I mean, yes. Just browsing elemental theory. Maybe something specifically on water magick?”
She peers at me—no,throughme, a feeling that’s both eerie and unsettling. “I have something you might like,” she says, then turns, expecting me to follow.
We pass through a beaded curtain that rustles softly behindus as she leads me into what must be her office. The space is small but brimming with secrets. A towering bookcase dominates one wall, lined with ancient tomes—cracked leather spines, handwritten titles in dead languages, and symbols I don’t recognize. Her desk is a chaotic arrangement of half-melted candles, stacked parchment, and arcane instruments. Crystals glitter faintly beside chipped ceramic bowls filled with sand, salt, and herbs.
She paces to the bookcase and carefully selects a volume. The cover is a faded, blood-red leather, its binding cracked and delicate.
“It looks a hundred years old,” I murmur, almost to myself.
“Older,” she corrects gently, without looking at me.
The title is faint but still legible:Elemental Fusion: The Art and Origin of Convergence.
My heart lurches. Fear and possibility crash together inside me like opposing tides.
I thank her and quickly purchase the book. As I gather my things, she watches me with dark eyes.
“You are sad,” she says quietly. Again, not a question.
I pause.
“He will find his way back to you,” she adds, her voice almost too soft to hear.
I look up, startled—and a little uneasy. “Excuse me, but?—”
