She knew some did. Professor Hargreaves had talked about it the afternoon before, in her lecture “Conservation and Practicalities.”Magic is not a disposable tissue, there to be used frivolously and lazily and then discarded, she had said.In fact, I would invite you all to question if it is even natural for us to use it at all.
And the memory made her come close to asking him.
As did the way he currently looked. He seemed almost soft now. Almost ordinary—lazing with a book, sleeves of that baby-blue sweater too long and almost covering his hands, hair hanging over his forehead, battered sneakers on his feet.
But then she remembered that yesterday, he had told her a story so terrifying she was still sweating about it now. Yesterday, he hadalmost set her hair on fire and split the strap of her dress. In fact, he’d split the material of the blouse below it, too. She found a cut so fine in the shoulder of the material that it looked like it had been done with a razor.
So better to keep seeing him as the monster he was, she felt.
And she was glad she had, when his gaze suddenly flicked up to hers.
For some reason, it thumped her hard in the gut. “I didn’t think you’d return for a second round,” he said, while she was still recovering from whatever those eyes had just done.Tried to get me in a headlock, she thought and looked away before she answered, in as unbothered a manner as she could muster.
“Well, you hardly managed to rattle me yesterday, so it seemed a little less foolish to. Though don’t take that as me dropping my guard. I upped the iron dust, just in case you decided to really put your back into being evil,” she said, in a tone that came so close to withering. In fact, she tensed for a second, wondering if she’d gone too far. Goaded him, instead of just making clear that she wasn’t a pushover.
But when she let her gaze go back to him, he looked almost amused.
And just a little irritated. “I know. I feel like my lungs are on fire,” he said, breezily enough that some of the tension went out of her. She didn’t flinch, either, when he got off the stage in one sinuous roll and stepped a little closer.
She just sank into the first thought she had.
“So you do actually breathe, then. Like a human.”
“Is this you trying to ask if I stole someone’s skin to wear?”
“Well, there’s at least a fifty-fifty chance you did.”
“They overstate how common that is, to make anything that comes here in human form seem disgusting and like a thief. Instead of something that could have possibly gone there, and then returned.”
“You were taken as a child, then.”
He hesitated. Touched his pocket, where that silver case sat.
Then finally, he answered. Just one tight word: “Yes.”
It didn’t sound convincing, however.
“That seems like a lie, somehow.”
“Even though I have no reason to.”
“Maybe you want me to feel sorry for you.”
“I doubt there is a single unendurable agony I could suffer that would garner your sympathy,” he said, voice light and almost amused. Like it was a joke, like it was meaningless. Even though that choice of words stood out, a neon sign in the dark.So it has been beyond endurance and absolutely agonizing, then, she thought.
And didn’t like how hard it made her stomach drop.
“You’re right. Nothing ever could,” she said.
Much to his satisfaction.
“Then you understand I’m telling you the truth.”
“I don’t know. There could be other reasons to lie.”
“Name one.”
“You want to hide something worse.”
