The class watches with wide eyes. I can tell by Nyx’s expression that she’s furious not only with me, but also with herself for having jumped like that in front of everyone.

I laugh. “Nah, I guess we’re even. Now that you’re looking at the door like you want to run and cry.”

She locks her jaw and glares at me like she wants to tear my head off, and even though I can’t see him, I can feel Brendan’s eyes boring into my back. So much for having a normal day.

Chapter Four

I SIT ON one of the cold moss-covered benches in the garden courtyard. Overhead the oak branches are strung with strands of royal-purple profusion berries, and in the fading light of day they glow like they’re lit from within. The last of the blue, purple, and white flowers peek through the grass in intricate patterns around my feet. I look up at the canopy of tall trees, where the flurries from this morning have already melted. When I first got here, Layla explained that a hot spring runs under the school, allowing us to enjoy the flowers nearly all year round, and while it is a bit warmer on the ground than in the trees, I’m still convinced that the head horticulturist here must be something of a genius. I twirl a piece of fresh grass between my fingers, the fast motion mirroring the wound-up tension in my body.

A small group of elemental-level students are clustered at the other side of the courtyard, speaking in hushed voices. It’s impossible to know what Families they belong to, since the students come from all over the world and speak multiple languages. But they clearly know who I am, because every once in a while they glance in my direction and lean toward one another, as though to further conceal their words.

There is movement near the arched vine doorway leading into the adjacent courtyard, and I hear cloaks being taken off hooks on the other side of the vine wall, signaling that strategic sparring has just ended. Strategic sparring, knife throwing, mind games—a month ago I would have laughed at the idea that such a curriculum even existed.

Aarya and Felix are the first to come through the vine doorway, and I get up from the bench. Aarya’s eyes light up and she brushes back a piece of wavy hair that has fallen out of her loose ponytail.