Brittany sits in an empty chair on the stage and stares off into the distance with a bored expression. A weird few minutes of silence pass. I pull out my magic practice cube, a common tool for doing exercises that work on basic magic skills. After placing it on my lap, I activate my magic sight and mentally reach for the threads of magic in the small metal cube. Okay. Weight drill one. I push on the magic strands with my mind, willing them to expand. As the strands grow larger, the cube grows heavier in my lap.

Out of the corner of my eye, I notice Ana tapping her toes rhythmically on the carpet. Electricity sparks at the tips of her fingers as she does this, each spark lining up with a toe tap. Eight taps with the right foot. Eight taps with the left. Four with the right. Four with the left. Two right. Two left. One. One. One. One. Then she starts over with her heels.

It’s not an exercise I recognize. Maybe she has a tutor who is giving her practice drills you can’t find in the MAT prep books? The idea of her having a tutor makes me sick with envy. Getting a good score on the standardized test requires hard-core magical training, which is much easier to get through if you have someone helping you.

“We really are nerds, huh,” Ana says.

“What?” I say, pulling my gaze away from her feet.

She gestures at my practice cube. “We have five seconds to ourselves, and we’re both practicing,” she says. “What are you doing? Weight drills?”

“Yeah. Any downtime is good practice time.”

Electricity crackles at her fingertips, and a little smirk tugs at the corner of her mouth. “Spoken like a true nerd.”

“Whatever,” I say, rolling my eyes. “You’re a nerd too.”

“Oh yeah.” She nods solemnly. “A big one.” Then she goes back to her foot-tapping exercise, whatever it is.

Finally, Mr. B walks onstage to start the meeting. He’s a youngish white man with some light beard scruff in a checkered button-down. From a distance, you wouldn’t be able to pick him out of a crowd. Yet every eye in the auditorium is laser-focused on him once he steps out of the wings. Everyone knows he holds the key to their future. Brittany breaks into a radiant smile when he appears. She’s been one of his favorites since she was a freshman, so it wasn’t a big shock when she won the scholarship last year.

He goes by Mr. B, as if anybody is going to forget the B is short for Brockton. His family of real-estate tycoons runs the foundation that gives the money for the scholarship. He’s the head of the committee that picks the Brockton Scholars. He’s also the drama teacher.