“Professor East says you belong, so you belong. I know we’ve never had someone at Evergreen with no affinity powers before, but?—”
“Wait? Never? But magical botanists with no affinity powers are a thing, right?”
Callan twisted away from me on his stool, casting his eyes down at his math textbook.
“Are you saying you’ve never met anyone else with no affinity powers? Isn’t your family connected to tons of magical botanists on the East Coast?” My pulse quickened as I hoped for an answer that I had a feeling I wasn’t going to get.
“Look on the bright side—you’re an enigma, local.”
My forehead scrunched as my stomach dropped. “Professor East said it was unusual, but he didn’t tell me it was unheard of.”
“Guess he wanted to spare your feelings.”
Something like irritation began to form, and I looked Callan straight in the eyes. “Okay, what is going on? Is having no affinity powers rare, or is it… impossible?”
The feeling that I didn’t belong, the one I’d tried to shove away over the past few months but that continued to nag at me every time I failed at using a Floracantus, forced itself back to the front of my brain. Had this all been a mistake? Was Professor East wrong about me?
“Whoa, slow down. I can see your brain going into overdrive. Just take a breath. It’s obviously not impossible, if you’re here. You responded to the initial test in Professor East’s office, and the charged ring allows you to see thecampus. That wouldn’t work if you weren’t a magical botanist.”
He rolled his chair closer to mine, and he took my hands in his. Warmth flowed through me, and I sucked in a breath. I tried to send concentration to my brain instead of solely where our hands touched. He ran his thumb across my emerald ring.
“Youdobelong here. Your power is just somehow… different than everyone else’s.”
“One of your powers isn’t mind reading, is it?”
Callan laughed and rolled his chair away from me again, leaning back to stretch his arms overhead. I felt a slight chill at the loss of contact and tucked my hands into the pocket of my sweatshirt.
“No, but it’s not necessary with you. Your thoughts were written all over your face just then.”
“Oh, really? And what am I thinking now?” I made a silly face and tried not to think about the feeling that I wanted him to take my hands again.
“You’re thinking that all these questions distracted me from your biostatistics studies. But you’re wrong. I believe we left off on problem three.”
I sighed dramatically, but my mind was still sorting through what he’d said when we got back to work. I had three takeaways from our conversation:
I didn’t have any affinity powers.
That wasn’t normal.
But I belonged at Evergreen Academy.
Could all three of those statements be true at once, or were Callan and Professor East telling me what they thought I needed to hear?
Chapter Thirty-Three
That week in Basic Plant Biology, we studied a rotting log in the forest. Professor Bowellia had us doing detailed drawings and documentation of plants that were making their home on the decomposing wood. Yasmin, Coral, and Aurielle were having a field day studying the ferns and mosses, and I was enjoying putting my drawing skills to use.
“How old do you think the tree was?” Yasmin asked, filling in a table in our notebooks.
“Fifty,” Aurielle guessed.
“Ninety-one,” I said, the number popping into my mind out of nowhere.
Coral’s eyes widened as she checked the answer key. “It is ninety-one. Nice guess, B.”
“So, Callan’s back,” Yasmin said. “Are you resuming your ‘tutoring arrangement’?” She put the last two words in quotes, and I gently shoved her shoulder with mine. I glanced at thearea where Callan was working with Eli and Nevah, making sure none of them were listening.
“Why the innuendo? He is tutoring me.Onlytutoring me.”
