As they rounded the side of Mystwerk Hall, light flared under the gallery, catching Han’s eye. He squinted, making out a robed silhouette amid the shadows, an angular face illuminated from below.

Overhead, stone cracked with a boom that set Han’s ears to ringing. Without looking up, he launched himself into Dancer, sending both of them flying to a sprawling landing on the grassy quad.

Han rolled to his feet. A jumble of roof tiles and broken stone littered the ground where they’d stood moments before. Palming his knife, he charged toward the gallery, running a zigzag course so as to make a difficult target. But nobody was there.

“What is it?” Dancer said, just behind him. “What did you see?”

Han shook his head and put his finger to his lips. He looked back toward the walkway.

It appeared that a large second story gallery had broken off and shattered on the cobblestones. Some of the pieces were bigger than his head. Any one of them could have killed them had they struck true.

As they watched, a crowd of students and faculty rounded the corner and clustered around the fallen masonry. They didn’t notice Han and Dancer hidden in the gloom.

Neither of the Bayars were there.

Han touched Dancer’s shoulder and jerked his head toward their dormitory.

All the way back, Han kept his knife in one hand, his amulet in the other, his senses on alert for an ambush along the way.

Blevins looked up as they passed through the common room. “Dinner over already?” he said.

“Has anyone else come back from dinner?” Han asked.

Blevins shook his head. “You’re the first.”

They climbed the stairs to the fourth floor. Han closed the door at the top of the stairs and rechecked his magical barriers. Soft-footing it down the hallway to his room, he eased the door open. No one there. Crossing to the window, he looked out. Excited voices still floated from the crowd around the rubble near Mystwerk Hall.

Han turned around, to find Dancer in the doorway.

“Somebody was standing under the gallery on the far side of the quad,” Han said. “He cast a charm right before the gallery came down on us.”

“Are you sure?” Dancer asked. “The wind might have loosened one of the cornices. It’s been howling all day.”

“Whoever did it wanted it to look like it was the wind,” Han said.

“You didn’t see who it was?”

Han shook his head. “Somebody tall, in wizard robes.”

The light from the amulet had momentarily illuminated their attacker’s face, but it had extinguished so quickly he couldn’t be sure who it was.

He had a guess, though. Fiona would have had plenty of time to get into position. Or Micah could have hurried out the front door in time to be waiting for them when they came around the building.