“I’ve been told you’re skilled with knives and will be able to keep up,” Messer says, and takes a good look at me. She speaks with a German accent. “I have no intention of spending part of my class reviewing things already learned by the elemental students.”

Everyone looks at me and it’s obvious from the disdain on their faces that not being able to keep up here is humiliating.

“I’ll keep up,” I say, and my voice sounds weak. Layla shoots me a disapproving look.

I drop a small knife toward my foot and try to kick it back up in the air with my toe, but it arcs out and away from me before I can grab it.

Dad watches me from the porch and laughs. “What in the world are you doing?”

I hold the knife in the air above my foot. “I learned this thing in soccer today and I thought maybe I could do it with my knife.”

He shakes his head and smiles. “Well, no one can accuse you of not having an imagination.”

I manage to kick the knife up, but it’s a little too far away for me to catch it. “Imagination, shmagination,” I say. “This is going to be so cool.”

I hang my cloak next to Layla’s on the vine-covered wall. She leans in. “Unless you want to explain why you didn’t report a dead body last night and go to the dungeon, you need to stop wearing your emotions all over your face.” Her voice is fierce even in a whisper.

I take a deep breath and we join the nine other students. Of course the first day I’m expected to perform in class would be the morning after I stumbled upon a dead body. And to make things more interesting, Nyx, Brendan, and Charles are here, and so are Aarya and Ines. I find it strange that none of them have made a snide remark or thrown me any pointed looks, which they all have made a habit of these past few days. The change in behavior makes me wonder if they already know about Stefano. I glance at the arched doorway; I keep expecting one of the guards to come pluck me from class and shackle me.

Messer holds a rolled-up piece of leather and taps it against her other hand. “In Persia in 522 BCE, a pretender stole the throne. The rightful ruler, King Cambyses the Second, gathered an army to march against him. But he never succeeded. And why was that?” She pauses. “Because he accidentally stabbed himself with his own knife and died from the wound.”

There are a couple of amused scoffs.