Great, now everyone is looking at me. Why do teachers always pick on me when no one else raises their hand? If only I could pretend not to know, but I do know so of course I have to answer because my brain apparently loves how the others glare at me.

“Namibia.” The answer tumbles from my mouth. “The Virunga Mountains in the Congo, and a few oases in the Sahara. And actually, the reserve in Kamchatka was just declared depleted.” I saw it on the news last week. It made my parents brood in unhappy silence all evening.

“You’re absolutely correct.” Emmi looks pleased.

Natalie gives me a crooked smile from across the glade and you know what, that makes all the other daggers thrown my way entirely worth it.

“Right, grade nines, your task today is to find a source of natural energy in this forest and imbue your amulet. Taika, please.”

Grudgingly, I dish out the amulets: some wooden, some metal or stone, all of simple design.

“I didn’t know mages got personal assistants.” Ekaterina sneers, her teeth held hostage by silver wire and red elastic, as she plucks a metal amulet from the bag.

“Hey, maybe one day someone might actually hire you to hold their grimoire while they do magic,” Sini says.

“A know-it-all, can’t-do-anything.” Aysha chooses a wooden amulet. I’m about to attempt a snarky comeback when Natalie beats me to it.

“Could you not?” She steps between Aysha and Sini, jabbing them with her sharp elbows.

“I didn’t know about Kamchatka,” she says to me, dipping her hand into the bag. “It’s a little scary we’re losing so much magic.” She holds my gaze and I want to respond, I do, but for some unknown reason all the blood has rushed out of my brain and all I can do is stare at her. How have I never noticed the flecks of gold in her deep, brown eyes?

“As if they could care?” Ekaterina butts in. “They’re just Taika the Talentless.”

“Katya, don’t call them that,” Natalie says.

Ekaterina shrugs skinny shoulders in her studded leather jacket and trails after Sini.

“Ignore them.” Natalie hovers a hand above my arm that never lands. “You know it’s not true.”

“Isn’t it?” I can’t look at her. If I do, I might cry, and the class doesn’t need any more reasons to think I’m pathetic.

With a sigh, Natalie follows her new and magical friends into the woods, leaving me alone with tears burning at the back of my nose and a churning in my belly that has nothing to do with the cold porridge I ate for breakfast.

The earth group steps up to get their amulets. If they make any comments, I don’t hear them. I can’t, not over the voice at the back of my mind now sing-songing Taika the Talentless on repeat.