Then she flipped over to the front of the paper and changed the overall grade from D to C/D. Of course no actual A-level examiner would give Mathias a C-slash-D with the benefit of the doubt. But she wanted him to see how close he was. She went back through the paper again, hunting for marks, looking now at all his diagrams—and yes, there was enough there; she couldn’t get him seven extra marks, but she could justify two, and several more comments focused specifically on his arcane notation. If he tightened it up just a little more—which he clearly could—he could hope for a low C on this theory paper in the mocks, and a mid C by the real examination in summer. A mid-C theory plus a high-B practical would get him a B grade overall.

You are pleased, said the Phoenix, the first thing it had said in twenty minutes. Walden realised that the slight ache in her jaw was a fierce little smile. She’d been certain all along that Mathias could get a B in the end, but this was the first time she’d really seen how—seen it, and known she could make him see it too. Once he believed he could succeed, he would actually try. Once he tried, it would become true. The trick of teaching wasn’t to know more than your students—it was remarkably easy, after all, to know more than most teenagers. Teaching wasn’t about being right, or being clever, or being in charge. It was about making them believe.

You manipulate his perceptions, the Phoenix said, to make him stronger. And this satisfies your nature.

“The word is inspire, usually,” Walden said. “And I suppose it does.” It wouldn’t be enough just to hand Mathias the marked paper. Aneeta would have got the point from red-pen comments alone, but you could never count on Mathias to actually read your comments, or to process them once he’d read. So she would set up a one-on-one—did she have a spare breaktime this week? Yes, Tuesday break would work, she’d skip her mid-morning coffee. They would go through the whole exam, and she’d show him: here’s what you did, here’s what you will do, here’s the grade you deserve, and here’s how you’re going to get it.