Poppy Reed, with brilliant ginger curls and eyes the warm shade of honey tea, greeted me the way no one else had, without suspicion, without caution, without wariness about my arrival halfway through the year. She had simply plopped her pile of enchanted quills beside me, smiled wide enough to reveal her dimple, and said she thought my handwritinglooked “like someone who fights harder than she speaks.” I still don’t know what that means, but it made me laugh, and Poppy decided from that moment we were friends. She is in Sylara, but her aura feels more nurturing than half the healers I’ve ever encountered.
History of Vireldan followed the next day, a class so dense with political entanglements and dynastic betrayals that even Liam seemed impressed. It was the first time he and I had walked into a room together since our screaming match in the hospital wing. That first reunion had been quiet, him approaching me with the look of a man preparing for battle, me avoiding every shadow that reminded me of Sebastian, but eventually, we found our footing again. Liam is all I have, truly. No matter how tangled our tempers become, no matter how many misunderstandings Trevor stirs, we circle back to each other because we’ve only ever had each other. His apology came in the form of a muttered, “You should’ve told me,” which in Liam’s language translates toI was scared to lose you. I forgave him because, truthfully, I was scared too.
Today is Advanced Enchantments. It’s the one class that feels like it might either change my life or expose me entirely. The magic is more temperamental, more alive, the kind that doesn’t allow mistakes to slip by unnoticed. My wand, still unsettlingly reactive since the day I chose it, vibrates at my side with a low hum that no one else appears able to hear. I’ve been praying every day that no professor asks why my enchantments flare a touch brighter, why runes flicker under my fingertips, why metal sings when I breathe near it. So far, I’ve managed to keep my head down. Trevor’s venom ensures I stay invisible anyway.
Sebastian, on the other hand, has become a phantom.
He gives me little more than the occasional passing glance, always guarded, always fleeting, never enough toread, always enough to feel. The moment I approach Theo, Sebastian vanishes like smoke pulled by a draft, as though proximity to me is something dangerous he can no longer afford. Whatever softness flickered in him during those moments in the infirmary has been shuttered behind steel. The boy who steadied my chin and told me I deserved something gentle may as well have been a hallucination.
The room hums with the low thrum of magic now as students settle into their tables, the air warm with candlelight reflecting from brass spell work bowls and rune-carved pillars. Poppy sits beside me, her elbows propped on the table as she scribbles notes about binding sigils, her penmanship looping across the parchment in joyful curves that somehow match her laugh.
“I’ve been waiting all morning to see if this class is as terrifying as the older students claim,” she whispers, nudging me with her shoulder. “I heard someone set their robe on fire last term trying to enchant a quill to write compliments about them.”
Despite myself, I smile. “Was it successful?”
“Spectacularly. The quill kept shouting, ‘He’s magnificent!’ across the dining hall for days.”
Poppy’s smile grows, wide and warm, and more comforting than anything I’ve felt since arriving. The Sylara warmth clings to her aura; you can feel it simply sitting beside her.
Across the room, Liam takes his seat among the Vespera students, offering me the briefest reassuring nod. Theo sits near him, head tilted with his usual thoughtful concentration. Sebastian is nowhere in sight, and a small, stab-like part of me is relieved. Another part, quieter, more inconvenient, questions why I care at all.
It has been five days.
Five days of pretending I didn’t remember the warmth of his hands on my skin.
Five days of ignoring the echo of the words he spoke with such sincerity I almost believed him.
Five days of him refusing to look at me for longer than a heartbeat.
I tell myself that’s for the best.
Still… my pulse quickens when the classroom door creaks open again, because some traitorous part of me fears it might be him.
“Harper,” Poppy whispers, leaning closer so only I can hear, “you look like you’re waiting for a ghost.”
I swallow hard, forcing my expression neutral. “Maybe I am.”
The last five days have been a blur of forced pleasantries and polite distance. I haven’t allowed myself to grow close to anyone outside of Poppy; after what Trevor did, after how quickly lies spread like rot, it feels safer to keep most people at arm’s length. Poppy is different, warm, without a single sharpened edge, but even she has asked why I flinch when certain boys walk by, why I stiffen when someone says Sebastian’s name.
I haven’t told her. I might never.
“I’ve been more guarded,” I murmur, answering her earlier observation as I shift my books aside. “About making acquaintances. About… everything, really. Since Trevor.” The name tastes sour on my tongue. Poppy’s face softens in sympathy, but she doesn’t press, which I appreciate more than I can say.
Locke has been absent since the morning Trevor nearly ruined me. He’s been occupied with Council business, though the details always seem to be cloaked in secrecy. A raven arrived from him yesterday, its script tight and deliberate, saying that when he returns to Vireldan, he and I willneed to speak privately. The phrasing sits heavy with implication. I imagine news of the tavern incident reached him through whatever channels he keeps. The idea of explaining the glow in my eyes, the part of me that slipped loose, makes my stomach twist unpleasantly.
I try to focus as Professor Anwen glides into the room. She’s a tall woman with sharp features softened only by the faint shimmer of silver threads embroidered through her cobalt robes. With a sweep of her wand, the rune-lamps brighten.
“Good morning, students,” she announces, her voice reverberating cleanly across the stone. “Today we are working with defensive enchantments. Nothing explosive, I promise, though I do advise proper wand discipline. Remember: the strength of your magic is only as reliable as the instrument you channel it through.”
My grip tightens around my wand.
The faint hum beneath my fingertips pulses again, barely there, just a whisper, but it’s enough to make my palms sweat. She speaks as though wands are everything, the heart of one’s craft, the source of control. For nearly every student in this room, that’s true.
For me… the wand feels more like a polite suggestion than a requirement.
I force the thought away.
Poppy leans closer. “You okay? You went pale.”
