Page 87 of Zenith Court

Sabine stared at the pale holes it had left in the blue wool. “Put that back.”

His gaze settled on her face. He did not obey.

She had never seen him refuse her. Not when she sent him into winter rain for a book she had forgotten. Not when he took a disciplinary strike meant for her after she left the south gate without permission.

“Are you leaving?” she asked.

Marek looked toward the closed doors. “I don’t know.”

Her mother came down from the gallery. Families moved behind her now, gathering into tight, furious groups. Questions crossed the hall: estates, appointments, contracts, petitions. Rector Vey answered none of them. She stood at the lectern with the notice beneath her hand and the meridian star waiting on its cushion.

“Close the academy,” Lady Dacre told her. “No student leaves until the families have reviewed this.”

A dozen faces turned toward the main doors.

“Our authority to confine students came from the same charter,” Rector Vey said. “Until Meridian writes another, I will not bar the doors.”

Rector Vey nodded to the porter instead. “Open them.”

He lifted the bar. Sunlight reached across the gilt lines. The students nearest the entrance did not move at first. A girl from the unranked row stepped out of place and walked into the courtyard. Two boys followed her. Someone in the gallery called for a steward who had already removed his academy sash.

Rector Vey approached her last. “The circlet, Miss Dacre.”

Sabine’s fingers slipped on the clasp before she found it. Lucan did not help her. Neither did Marek.

She lowered the circlet. A smear of blood marked one inner point.

Rector Vey placed it on the velvet cushion beside the unattached star and returned to the lectern.

By the time the hall emptied, Ivo had obtained a copy of the notice. Lucan had gone with his father. Marek remained near the doors, the Dacre crest still loose in his hand, but he no longer stood at Sabine’s shoulder.

Her mother was already dictating letters in the arcade.

Sabine went back to the cushion.

Her family’s standard still hung above the gallery. Gold still crossed the floor beneath her shoes. The circlet waited where Rector Vey had left it.

Sabine lifted the circlet and set it on her head herself.

The points bit behind her ears. She left them there.