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"Permitted and proper are not the same thing. I objected, but before the assembled envoys, I did not have the authority to stop him."

"So did I pass?"

"There was nothing normal enough about that proceeding for the word pass to have much meaning."

Her gaze moved briefly to the dressing across my collarbone.

"Your classification is now disputed, your Hollow review remains unresolved, and the Council has become considerably more interested in you than it was yesterday."

"Silas brought you the staff," I said.

It was not a question.

"He did. Instructor Varga assures me it was perfectly sound when he inspected it. He is very sorry to hear that it broke and suggests that you may have struck it at an unfortunate angle."

She tilted her head slightly.

"I can prove that the staff was tampered with. I cannot prove who tampered with it or when. Instructor Varga understands that distinction very well. I suggest you remember it too."

"What am I?"

The question came out louder than I meant it to in the quiet room, and once I had said it, I couldn't take it back.

Oda watched me for so long that I started to think she wasn't going to answer.

"That," she said at last, "is the question every creature on this island woke up asking this morning. Some of them are very interested in being the first to answer it."

"Did you know?" I asked. "When you gave me the tower, and when you watched my hand at the Beastglass, did you already know what I might be?"

Oda held my gaze, but she didn't answer.

After a few seconds, I understood that she wasn't going to.

She turned toward the window instead, looking east toward the harbor, where the envoys' black launch still sat at anchor.

"Be careful who you show your hands to, Wren Hale," she said. "The tower is yours for as long as you want it. Good morning."

That was all she gave me.

By lunchtime, however, the rest of the island seemed to have decided that I was suddenly worth noticing.

The envoys' black launch left the following morning with Aldric Vance standing at the rail, and after it disappeared beyond the harbor, some of the tension that had been hanging over Ironmoor finally eased. The staring didn't.

That was the strangest part. For three months, people had gone out of their way not to sit beside me, speak to me, or even look at me for too long. Now they found reasons to be near me.

A girl from Skyreach whom I'd never spoken to asked if she could borrow my notes. Two Saltmere boys spent half of lunch loudly debating whether my wolf had been bigger than Kaelen Vance's, making absolutely no effort to keep me from hearing them. Even Portia Vale stopped at the end of the Saltmere table on her way out of the Great Hall.

"That was actually quite impressive," she said stiffly.

Then she walked away before I had time to answer.

"Don't," Tamsin said.

I looked over at her. She was glaring after Portia while stabbing her pie with unnecessary force.

"Don't what?"

"Don't start thinking any of these people are suddenly your friends, babe." She pointed her fork at me. "Last week they were happy to laugh at the Stray. This week they all want to sit next to the Stray because she might turn out to be important. Next week they'll find something else to care about."