“Yes?”
“Be on better behavior. Andrew wasn’t pleased with your attitude this summer. I suggest you start to behave appropriately if you want him to act kindly toward you once you’re mated. Rest assured; youwillmate him. It is up to you to ensure that you don’t invoke his anger.”
I murmur my acquiescence, and he ends the call.
Marcus sticks his head out of the small library. “Your father?”
I nod as dread knots in my gut. “Andrew Radcliffe is coming for the Feast of Marmora.”
CHAPTER6
Monday’s Intermediate Casting class nearly crushes me. For the first time since last year, when my magic was locked, I struggle to do as a professor asks.
We’ve moved into transitive sigil alteration, and Cassian was right when he said sigil alteration was challenging magic. Transitive sigil alteration is even more so. When I’m called to the front of the class, I struggle to transform the sigils the way we’ve been instructed, each string of sigils fizzling out before I reach the end of the spell we’re learning.
“Pitiful,” Cadigan finally mutters, sending me back to the worktable I share with Alyssa.
I slump in my seat, a blush of shame rising in my cheeks as he continues, his voice ringing with alpha authority.
“Miss Rose is the closest to casting sigil alterations and even she’s failed to do so.” He sighs before jotting our homework on the blackboard: ten pages of exercises and practical casting until we’re successfully casting transitive sigil alterations successfully.
Saints, I’m not even close, and others are struggling even more than I am.
He surveys the room with displeasure and finally dismisses us. Alyssa and I skip lunch, heading straight to the library.
We find a study room and start practicing again, despite being exhausted and frazzled from class.
A knock at the study room door startles us from our work, and Cassian raises a hand in greeting.
“Cadigan working you to the bone?”
“No one in class can do this fucking magic,” Alyssa bursts out as Cassian comes into the room, looking over my shoulder at the spell we’re supposed to be casting.
“Oh, this spell took meweeks.”
“I’m getting it by next class, saints help me,” I growl, and Cassian turns on me with a brilliant smile.
“Juniper, you’re a talented mage. You don’t have anything to prove—to Professor Cadigan or to anyone else.”
“Don’t care,” I mutter.
He chuckles and sits down beside me. “Well, if that’s the case, let me help? I swear, once you learn this, you’ll never forget it. And you’ll never forget learning it. It’s brutal. I cried. Really. Ask Simon.”
* * *
By the endof the day, I’m wrung out and fatigued, longing to see a friendly face. I’m desperate to see Ian, even if we end up spending most of our evening with our noses buried in old Baphomet lore, trying to uncover the secrets of the Ever Ember.
After dinner, Marcus and I make our way to the library, but I hold my hand up and stop him on the stairs down to the basement when voices rise from Ian’s office below.
“Shh!”
“I don’t hear anything, sweet-tart.”
Shit. “My affinity,” I whisper, slowly sitting down on the stone steps.
Professor Cadigan’s voice drifts through my mind, as clearly as if he were standing right in front of me. “It’s long past time for the resistance to take action, Ian. We need to make a move and we need more people.”
“Juniper needs to be brought in,” Ian insists, no hesitation in his voice. “The resistance needs her talents.”
