Sleeping, after the painkillers wore off, was awful. Getting up the next morning was worse. I dressed, slowly and painfully, and debated whether I should see kuracar Malas before or after breakfast. I had… what classes did I have? English. Maths. Science? No, that was tomorrow. I had nothing for a couple of hours, anyway.

I could hear Kylie snoring behind her closed bedcurtains. Max’s were open, revealing a perfectly laid-out, if very crammed, little office behind the bed containing no Max. He’d probably gone to get a book on advanced quantum theory or something from the library. In Latin.

Breakfast first, no matter how much my arm was complaining. If my body couldn’t handle a little pain, it should stop doing stupid shit like slamming its way through unlocked doors.

The cafeteria wasn’t super crowded. It never was. That was, I figured, probably an advantage to the whole no-set-schedule thing the school had going; everyone naturally scattered their mealtimes, so way more people could use the same room.

Did that make more work or less work for the staff? I hadn’t thought much about who actually made the food and cleaned up before, but now I couldn’t stop thinking about the army of brown-clothed servants who’d come to save us. I mean, there was a reason most places had scheduled meals, right? Because it was easier to serve and clean everything all at once instead of continuously throughout the day? Sure, scattering things meant you could get more people through a small area, but one thing the school had going for it was plenty of space, so wouldn’t it be less work to have a proper schedule and more cafeterias? Argh, I didn’t know how any of this worked.

Well, if I was staying, at least I’d have time to find out. If I was staying.

When I walked into the cafeteria, things seemed to get quieter. It might have been a coincidental lull in several conversations at once. Or people might have quieted because I’d come in.

People kept looking at me, too. I was used to that; over the first few days they’d all done it, the up-and-down sometimes followed by a definitely-polite-and-not-invasive curse question. But the curiosity of having two cursed students had passed, so why were they all looking at me now?

Probably because I’d just entered the hall. They were looking up to see who it was. They’d look up for anyone.

Conversation seemed to rise again as I went to grab some food. Right; I had imagined it. Good. I was puzzling over whether I wanted tuna sandwiches or curry for breakfast when someone tapped me on the shoulder.

“Hey,” the vaguely familiar girl behind me said.

I took a moment to place her. From Magista’s party… what was her name? Senna? Sina? “Hi.”

“Did you try to kill Instruktanto Miratova?”

I gaped at her for a few seconds while I wrapped my head around this. “Did I what?”

“Alania Miratova. Did you try to kill her? Everyone’s saying she’s laid up in the ward because you snuck into her lab and blew her up.” She raised her voice pointedly. “They’re all saying that because they’re a bunch of cowards who’d rather gossip behind someone’s back than just ask them and get the full story. Did you do it?”

“What? No! Why does anyone think I’d do that? I don’t have anything against her, and even if I did, I don’t try to kill people!” Technically a lie, I supposed, but nobody else new that.

The girl nodded. “I don’t know why anyone thinks you’d do that,” she said, still quite loudly. “I guess scared idiots like to chatter about crazy theories and demonise innocent people. Maybe they don’t have anything more important going on than stupid drama.” Then she turned on her heel and strode away.

A lot of people were very carefully not staring at me. I decided breakfast could wait.

In the ward, Intruktanto Miratova was looking much better. She was sitting up in bed, both hands cupped around a glass of ice water, and nodded at me as I came in. Her staff had been propped up by the bed; the explosion hadn’t been kind to it. The crystal on top was gone, and the gnarled wood cracked and charred. A couple of shards of metal were embedded in it. I tried not to think too hard about how Miratova’s back would have looked the same, before Malas got to her.

“Ah, you’re here,” Malas said. “Good. This will only take a moment.” He touched me, briefly, then nodded. “No sign of poisoning, but I want to keep seeing you the rest of the week to be sure.”

“Why does everyone think I tried to kill Instruktanto Miratova?” I asked.

Malas and Miratova exchanged a surprised look. Then Miratova’s eyes narrowed. “I’ll have words with them,” she promised.

“With who?”

“After they discovered their cleared-out laboratory this morning, some of Alania’s students came to see if she was alright,” Malas explained. “She explained what happened. At no point did anybody accuse you of doing anything wrong.”

“I owe you an apology,” Miratova said. “You shouldn’t have been in that room at all. I shouldn’t have put you in such danger.”

“I followed you in.”

“And I should have halted the experiment and escorted you to safety immediately.”

“Did you know it was going to be dangerous?”

“Of course not. But all magic is dangerous. I should have treated it as such.”

“Well by that logic, this whole school is dangerous,” I pointed out. “And everyone says you’re super cautious, so really, being with you is the least dangerous place to be, right?”

“Nevertheless.”

“How’s your arm mobility?” Kuracar Malas asked.

“I can raise it this high.” I demonstrated, went slightly too high, and winced. “Can you do anything about it?”

“I can give you painkillers if you like, but if you can’t feel the pain you’re likely to hurt it more. I’ve already treated the bone; if I treat the muscle, it’ll heal slower and weaker than if your body does it alone.”

“And the bruise?”

“I can’t do anything about bruises.”

“You can replace skin but you can’t heal a bruise?”

Kuracar Malas raised an eyebrow, amused. “I have scalpels,” he offered jokingly. “I could remove and replace the bruise, if you like.”

“Uh, no. I’m sure my body can handle it.”

“And you wonder why students don’t like you,” Miratova said.

“If they don’t like me, maybe they should take better care of themselves so they’d never have to see me.”

“Ah, I see. It’s strategy.”

“Are you going to be like this until I let you go, Lani?”

“Yes. And I’m perfectly fine now.”

“Really?” Malas plucked the glass of ice water out of her hands, inspected it, and gave it back. “You call that thermal control? I can’t let you go until your spell is in proper balance with your body again.”

“My spell is fine. I’m having trouble casting because you’ve got me on painkillers, that’s all.”

“That’s the oldest excuse in the book.”

Instruktanto Miratova sighed. “Who did they give my classes to while I’m twiddling my thumbs in here?”

“Your students are in perfectly qualified hands.”

“It’s the Fiore, isn’t it?”

“He was available, and agreed to help.”

“Jinlong?”

“In East Asia.”

“Harold Brewster?”

“Doing something secret for the Council.”

“So you’re telling me that the only person available was the Fiore?”

“Well, you tell me. You’re the one who invited him to the school, ensuring he’d be here and have a clear patch in his schedule, and then took yourself out of action. This one’s on you, Lani.”

“I hate it when you’re right.”

“You must hate it all the time then.” Malas handed me a small bottle. “Painkillers. One every four hours at most – I’ll know if you take too many. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Thanks.” I got out of there.

And realised I didn’t really have anywhere to go.

What I wanted was breakfast, but I didn’t want to go back into the cafeteria. I could pass the time with rock climbing – I wanted to get really, really good at climbing that cliff – but that would be a bad idea until my arm healed. Instead, I just went back to my room.

Three letters were waiting for me, in a neat pile just outside my bed’s force field. Careful not to wake Kylie, I tore open the one labelled in Mum’s blocky handwriting, laid back on my bed, and started to read,

Kayden,

We’re so happy to hear that things are going well! Sounds like an unusual school to be sure, but I trust you to be responsible and keep up academically until you come home. We all miss you here, but only five and a half months to go!

Don’t worry about the trial. Just trust your lawyer and let us handle everything else.

How did your party go? It’s good that you’re making friends, but be careful. These are mages. I’m sure Mr Cooper only wants what’s best for you, but you hear stories.

We can’t tell you how relieved we are that your curse isn’t still acting up. If it’s quiet, with or without mage help, that’s the best possible news. Maybe it’s settled down on its own! After the trial and after you come home, we’re thinking of taking a month or so to go on a big holiday as a family, before school starts again. Somewhere warm, I’m thinking; just the three of us. We’ll have so much to catch up on! Where do you think we should go? Your father wants to go to a beach in Hawaii somewhere but I told him you’d go stir crazy.

If anything happens, tell us right away and we’ll bring you straight back home.

Lots of love,

Mum and Dad.

I reread the letter a couple of times. I should reply right away. I really should. But I didn’t have the energy to deal with that right now.

I glanced at the other two letters in my hand. Chelsea and Melissa had written separately.

I’d been looking forward to hearing from home. Why did it make me feel worse?

Kylie’s alarm went off. I heard her groan, then smack at something until the noise stopped.

“You’ll be late for class if you sleep in,” I called.

“You’re not my mum,” came the muffled reply.

“Just so you know, there are rumours.”

“Mmm?”

“About the lab thing. People were asking me if I tried to kill Instruktanto Miratova, so they’ll probably ask you, too.”

“If you’re trying to get me to go to class, you’re bad at it.”

“Hey, like you said – I’m not your Mum. People are gossipping, though.”

“Fuck ‘em.”

Hard to argue with that. I had time for at least one more letter before English. Chelsea’s looked shorter.

Hey-hey, K!

So I guess we’re writing physical letters now, like it’s the eighteenth century or something. I hope this actually reaches you and the homing pigeon doesn’t get lost. Will you get in trouble for writing with a ballpoint pen and not a quill?

Trying to lure Liss over with buff guys might’ve happened a bit too late. She’s started getting very talky-talky with Martin. You know, from science class last year? I know, right? Total reed of a boy, not her type at all. But they both like the same books. Maybe that’s enough.

So what I’m saying here is you guys are abandoning me and it’s awful. You’re off in the Magical Mountain Kingdom and Liss is having her PG Library Romance and where does that leave me at lunchtimes and group projects? Huh?

Well okay, I’m still doing group projects with Liss. But lunch is boring as hell.

Anyway, Matt hasn’t come back to school. I think he’s transferred to somewhere else. So thanks! You really took one for the team there! Without Matt in the way, Kyle is ten times more insufferable, but you win some, you lose some.

I bet there’s no bullshit high school politics where you are, right? Just a bunch of solemn nerds all very seriously learning magic with no time for gossip or finding games.

Anyway, my hand is getting tired from all this physical writing with an actual physical pen like a barbarian, so I’m gonna stop now. Next time you get whisked away to a secret school, smuggle in a mobile phone.

Best of luck.

Chelsea.