“But I understand if you do.”
“I—”
A commotion swelled from inside the Beaker. Panicked shouting. For the second time in a week, one word carried above the others in a crowd.
Aurum.
Desmond squeezed my fingers, even as he turned toward the open kitchen door. “I’m sorry. I have to go.” Then he released my hand and disappeared into the chaos.
As I exited the alley, I saw several Alchemary staff members carrying a motionless, gold-tinged man out the front door of the Dusty Beaker on a litter made of coarse material stretched over two poles. A crowd had gathered. Professors and researchers were examining the man by the light of several lanterns, while a cluster of students watched.
I snuck through the dark on the edge of the crowd and headed for the bridge alone.
Yoslyn popped up off a weathered wooden bench when I stepped out of the ladies’ tower and into the Dormitory courtyard. “Amber!” she called as she crossed the expanse of cobblestone between us, scattering crunchy brown leaves with every step. “I’ve hardly seen you in days!”
Dayswas a bit of an exaggeration. I had snuck home alone thirty-six hours earlier during the chaos caused by the aurum—an employee of the Beaker—because I had no idea what to say to Wilder.
Unfortunately, slipping out of the alley without even a word to him after he’d kissed me—in public—had left me crawling with guilt and smoldering with embarrassment. I’d spent all of Tuesday in my room, studying, drinking cold tea, and nibbling on stale bread I’d snuck out of the Refectory during my trial prep.
Poorhouse food, Wilder would have called it. But any pauper would be grateful for the warmth and luxury of my private room and soft bed, so rather than feeling sorry for myself, I’d buried myself in studies. I had one month until the White Trial, which took some of the pressure off and gave me time to continue relearning the alchemy basics alongside my trial prep.
“Shall we break our fast?” Yoslyn fell into step beside me as I headed out of the paved courtyard into the quadrangle. “You like to eat in the morning, do you not?”
“I do,” I conceded. “But if that isn’t your custom…”
“Honestly,” she whispered, leaning closer, “I would love to. I always thought I’d appear a glutton, eating the moment I rolled out of bed, but you’ve inspired me to indulge my more fleshly appetites. And not just with food.” She waggled her eyebrows at me salaciously, and my face warmed when I realized what she was referring to.
Wilder’s kiss.
“Food is fuel,” I said, ignoring her implication. “You need food in the same manner that a fire needs kindling or oil. If you eat in the morning, you will find that your stamina is robust and your thoughts flow faster and more clearly, like the current in a strong river, rather than the stagnant waters of a pond.”
“Well!” Yoslyn huffed, eyes wide. “Food is fuel,” she repeated. “Both fire and water. What a beautiful, alchemy-themed metaphor as an excuse for our morning indulgence!”
“Life is alchemy,” I told her.
And alchemy was life.
Wilder did not appear in the Refectory, but that did not stop Yoslyn from talking about him as she sipped her tea and nibbled almost reluctantly at an edge of toast.
“Of course, it’s not unusual to see him pay special attention to someone at the Beaker. You certainly don’t remember this—and I hope I’m not speaking out of turn—but he has been known to drink to excess, and the forces of chaos know there is no limit to the man’s charm. He was quiet as a Fundamentals-year student, but by Proficiency year, he was the verylifeof the party. And there was that thing, briefly, between him and Petyr. Which Petyr was always trying to rekindle.”
She frowned with her teacup halfway to her mouth, and I doubted she would manage a single sip before it went cold.
“I wonder how poor Petyr’s death is affecting Wilder? Maybe that’s why he was a bit excessively merry last night. As a method of coping, I mean. My point, though, is that while it’s not unusual to see Wilder enjoying himself in the company of a particularly attractive classmate”—her gaze flashed briefly, pointedly at my entire visage—“itisunusual to see him leave the Beaker alone.”
I drank the last of my tea and gathered our dishes onto the wooden tray, doing my best to scrub all emotion from my face. She had no way of knowing how guilty I felt, or how unsure I was about how I would normally have reacted to a kiss from Wilder. And for one careless moment, I almost asked her. I almost asked a classmate whether or not Wilder and I had been an acknowledged couple before I’d lost my memory.
Just because Desmond didn’t know about it didn’t mean it hadn’t happened.
My mouth opened, and I could feel the traitorous question clawing its way up my throat, where it sat heavy on the back of my tongue, waiting to pounce.
“Yoslyn,” I said as I backed slowly away from the table, clutching the tray tightly enough to press splinters into my palms. “Are you aware of the secret code written into the bones of dead alchemists bolted into the walls of the Conservatory?”
I hadn’t meant to tell her. Even three hours later as we stood on the second floor of the Conservatory, eschewing a midday meal with our classmates in order to stare at a plaque at the back of the hallway, I could not entirely understand how the revelation had come forth.
The mind was a complicated thing, and sometimes it reacted in defense of the body—of the psyche—in ways we were not prepared to fully understand.
At least, that was the closest I could come to understanding the defensive impulse that had spewed a secret to a classmate I hardly knew. One who refused to leave my side, despite her repeated assertions that she did not want to bother me or keep me from my studies. Maybe it was because my burgeoning friendship with Yoslyn was less complicated than my relationships with Wilder and Desmond.
