When the school year start date was a week away, their St. Rosetta’s welcome packet had come in the mail. In it were log-in details to a private online group for students at the Academy. Jaya had logged in, wanting to see who else she might recognize—the world of elites was smaller than you’d expect, really—when she’d seen it, in the E section. Her eyes went right to his name, like a soldier spying the glint of an enemy rifle.

Name: Grey Emerson

Formal Title: Lord Northcliffe of Westborough

Added: 5 years ago

Status: Inactive, never logged in

Unlike everyone else’s profile, his didn’t have a picture. It was annoying; Jaya had been unable to find a single recent picture of Grey Emerson online, even with extensive googling. She couldn’t remember hearing much about him at any of the many events she’d attended over the years, except perhaps that his father, the duke, was an awful man. And that his mother had died in childbirth when Grey was born.

But that was information about his parents, not really about him. It was like he wanted to stay hidden. Still, this much was true: an Emerson went to the very school Appa had picked, that their astrologer had picked. And not just any Emerson… the male heir of a family that found the Raos particularly deplorable. Just like the journalist had told her. The very person who’d brought so much pain to her family. The coincidence was remarkable. So much so that she began to wonder… was it a coincidence at all? Perhaps this was fate, finally smiling on the Raos. Perhaps it was an opportunity, perfectly laid out in Jaya’s path.

Right then, staring at the screen, Jaya had known his presence at St. Rosetta’s meant something. Something big. There was no question; she would take the opportunity, as anyone would. A dark little sapling of a plan began to form in her mind.

But if this was an opportunity, what was it an opportunity for, exactly? In the week following her discovery, Jaya had racked her brain. What could she do to Grey Emerson to exact her revenge? She’d thought of and discarded: poisoned tea, a carefully placed arrow to the heart, and laxative cake. All too obvious.

And then, one day while she was in her room getting dressed, it had come to her.