One year after the Schism that Brittany mentioned. One year after the four disciplines formally separated.
Someone went through this library almost a hundred years ago and pulled every book that might explain what I am.
I sit back down at my table, staring at the cracked sphere, and try not to scream.
The next morning, I decide to be normal.
Not hiding-in-my-room normal. Real normal. Everly Grey normal—the version of me that makes friends everywhere she goes, that walks into rooms and warms them up, that has nevermet a stranger she couldn't charm into a smile or a laugh or, at the very least, a grunt of acknowledgement.
That version of me has to still exist. She's just been buried under weeks of storms and sabotage and fraternity presidents who look at her like she's a bomb about to go off. If I can just find her again, dig her out from under all this bullshit, maybe things will start to make sense.
I put on my nicest clothes—the charcoal blazer over a clean white shirt, black jeans, the most Nyxhaven-appropriate outfit I own. I brush my long dark hair until it shines. I practice smiling in the mirror until it doesn't look like a grimace.
Magical History. Professor Robertson's 8 AM drone-fest. I get there early, pick a seat in the middle of the room instead of the back, and wait.
A girl comes in—Mors, silver blazer, dark hair in a neat braid. She's in my Elemental Studies class too; I've seen her taking notes, frowning at Parker's sensory assignments like they personally offend her. She seems serious. Studious. The kind of person who might appreciate a study partner.
"Hey," I say as she passes my row. "I'm Everly. I think we have Parker together?"
She looks at me. At the empty seats surrounding me. At the sphere-shaped bulge in my bag where I've been carrying the cracked thing everywhere because I'm afraid to leave it alone.
"I know who you are," she says, and keeps walking.
She sits three rows back. A minute later, two more students come in and sit on either side of her, forming a little cluster that very pointedly does not include me.
Okay. Fine. Not everyone's going to be friendly. That's normal. That's college. I'll try again.
Dining hall. Lunch. I load up my tray with whatever's available—some kind of pasta, a bread roll, an apple that might be enchanted to stay fresh forever or might just be half wax—and scan the room for an opening.
There's a table near the windows with a few empty seats. A mix of students, no clear fraternity affiliation, just people eating and talking. Normal. Approachable.
I walk over. "Hey, mind if I sit here?"
The conversation stops. Four faces turn toward me with varying degrees of pity and discomfort.
"Actually," one of them says—a guy in a green sweater, not quite meeting my eyes—"we were just leaving."
They weren't. Their trays are still full of food, some of it completely untouched. But they pick them up anyway, gathering their things thoroughly and pointedly, and relocate to a table on the other side of the room.
I sit down alone at the table they abandoned, eat my pasta, and pretend I don't hear the whispers.
Library again. Afternoon. I'm at my usual table with the sphere and a stack of increasingly useless books when I notice a kid a few tables over struggling with what looks like an Elemental Studies worksheet. Tumult, based on the purple in his jacket—young, probably a first-year like me, brow furrowed in concentration.
This is the kind of thing I'm good at. I've tutored classmates since middle school. I'm patient, I explain things well, I make people feel less stupid about not understanding the first time around.
I gather my courage and walk over.
"Hey. That's Parker's sensory mapping assignment, right? I just finished mine—I could help you with the temperature gradient section if you want. It's tricky."
He looks up at me. For a second, I think it might work. His expression is open, almost grateful.
Then someone at the next table coughs loudly and says, not quite under their breath, "Careful, she might absorb you."
The kid's face closes off. "I'm good," he says. "Thanks."
I go back to my table. I don't try again.
The common room on the second floor of Bellamy Hall has a study group that meets on Wednesday nights. I know because I've seen the flyers—"All Disciplines Welcome, Collaborative Learning Environment, Snacks Provided." It sounds like exactly the kind of thing I would have joined in my old life. The kind of thing I would haveorganizedin my old life.
