A pillar of black flame erupts, skating the ceiling, casting the room in eerie, flickering light.
My smile splits my face.
I fucking did it!
The professor’s braid unravels a fraction, just enough to see the pulse in her throat jump.
I turn my head, just slightly. Thirty pairs of eyes stare back, wide and white-rimmed. One girl snatches the grin off my face. Seated in the front row with blond hair and wearing the same prissy face that most Argents carry. Her hand’s covering her mouth, a pearl—fucking pearl—choker around her neck.
The professor’s voice cuts through the white noise ringing in my head. “Well. That’s…oneway to do it.”
I smirk at the girl, slow and feral, before blowing out the flame. “I might like this class after all.”
Professor Astra clears her throat. “It appears you may have found your niche, Ms. Haide.”
Twenty minutes later, I jump up to hurry out with the rest of the class, but a barrier pops up before me, trapping me.
My brows furrow. I search for the source of the spell and find the professor staring right at me.
She puts her palm up, curling her fingers as if to call me to her in the creepiest, unnecessary witchy way I’ve ever seen. The barrier falls and I head right for her.
She smiles at someone behind me then seals us off once again. “That was good work today.”
“I know.”
Professor Astra chuckles, dipping her chin, but then her expression turns serious. “As soon as you depart today’s lesson, crossing the threshold from class to hall, your codex will grow in knowledge.” She points to the book in my hand. “Inside, you’ll find many spells you may practice outside of class. The grounds surrounding the university are protected, so stay within the wards. You may use the Casting Fields or Flying Grounds should you wish to practice. And something tells me that you will.”
“Something tells you right.” This is the first thing I’ve been successful at here, and I need to know if there is anything more to it.
I need to know if Creed was right.
Professor Astra nods lightly, holding my gaze, and my spine prickles in alert.
I cock my head. “Now that you got that out, what is it that you truly wanted to say?”
“Be careful when calling on fire,” she says without pause.
“Why?”
“Because you are no Fae, which means you do not possess elemental magic, and yet the element was eager to answer your demand. Dare I say, it was compelled to.”
Her words loop in my mind, and even by the third pass, still make little sense. “You know, for being a school, all you people in charge could really benefit from a speaking class or something.”
Professor Astra’s brows raise in surprise, but I just pop a shoulder and head out. For the first time, I’m not rushing to avoid the failure, a feeling I didn’t even know before this fucking place, but the opposite.
Today, I did something a real gifted can do.
Legend is going to—
My feet freeze mid-step.
No. We don’t run to royals to…ew. Share accomplishments?
“I swear to the gods, Haide,” I murmur to myself. “Keep your head fucking straight. You don’t want to impress him. The opposite, in fact.”He would smirk and say he couldn’t wait to see more, and he’d mean it.
More of that warmth stretches across my chest and I scrape my nails across it, annoyed.
Ugh! Stop.
