Fifteen minutes later, Max returned to the dorm, looking shaky. “She’s going to be fine,” he said, sinking into a chair in the shared part of our room while I put the kettle on.

“What happened?” Kylie asked.

“Not much. We got her to Malas and then he took over. She’ll need Malas’ help with her skin but the spell’s stable now, so… congratulations to her, I guess?”

“Not sure if we should congratulate her,” I said. “I think she was kind of hoping it’d stay dormant.”

“Tristan Symes has a good reputation. He’ll teach her well, I’m sure.”

“What was that you did for her?” I asked.

“Huh? Oh. Me spell. I’ve been figuring out how to use it.”

“You have a contract spell,” Kylie pointed out. “What the hell kind of contract spell stops someone from suffocating?”

“Mine, obviously,” he said with a weak smile. After a bit of silence, he reluctantly continued. “It’s concerned with… balance. Redressing debts, I think, or something related to it. It’s very vague.” He said this last word with a sneer.

“Vague and inherently political!” I clapped a hand on his shoulder. “The two things you love most in life.”

“I know! Couldn’t I have gotten something straightforward, that could be calculated with numbers? This really isn’t fair.”

“It sounds like you’re a legacy mage who got a spell that’s actually useful to… legacy mage-ing, though. The others are going to be so jealous.”

“I know. Why do you think I’m keeping quiet about it? Can you imagine Magista? Or di Fiore?”

I put on my best di Fiore voice. “‘You have the power to help your family and live up to their faith in you, Nonus. You should be grateful.’”

“You realise that you haven’t explained anything, right?” Kylie said. “How does a, a debt spell help Cheryl breathe?”

“I was breathing for her. Nearly passed out, but we both lived, so.”

“Is that dangerous?”I asked.

“I don’t think it could have killed me. But it wasn’t fun.”

“Oh, well, so long as you don’t think it could have killed you – ”

“How can your spell let you breathe for her?” Kylie asked.

Max shrugged. “I panicked, alright? I thought… I mean, I spoke to her, and the way you guys reacted I must have said something wrong, and the next minute she caught fire? I assumed it was my fault somehow. Like, you used to say, Kayden, that you were worried that your emotions might wake your curse up, so… anyway, it felt like something I’d caused, and I owed her. All my spell needs to work is somebody sincerely believing they have an unpaid debt and agreeing to pay it with… ah, life energy, I suppose?”

“Life energy??” I asked.

“I’m fine! I meant in a… sort of like how a familiar can take the strain of casting a spell. Nothing permanent.”

“Then don’t call it life energy! That’s the most terrifying way you could possibly have phrased it!”

“Next time I’ll be sure to use the proper terminology and have to spend ten minutes explaining all the words to you,” he said, accepting the cup of tea I was pressing into his hands. “I think the whole thing took more out of your air manipulator friend than it did me. I wish I had his spell.”

“His spell gave him brain damage, badly damaged several other internal organs and sent him blind.”

“Ah. Hmm. Perhaps not, then.”

“I’m starting to feel like the only witch in existence who wasn’t nearly killed by their own spell,” Kylie said.

“I haven’t been killed by mine,” I pointed out.

“Not yet.”

Kylie and Max were both watching me, and I realised that this wasn’t just about Cheryl. What had happened was something that could happen to me, at any time. And both of them knew it. Personally? I wasn’t that worried. I was just about convinced that I wouldn’t be able to wake up my spell even if I wanted to, that one of the many things we’d tried over the years to lock it away had worked. But… Cheryl’s had been dormant for as long as mine had. And then, she’d burst into flames. We could never know.

I tried a smile. “Look,” I said, “I promise if I get any weird fevers I’ll let you know and go straight to Malas Fucking Aksoy about it. Alright?”

“Would you really, though?”

“Yes. I don’t trust the guy and he’s proven to be a manipulative creep, but I’m pretty sure he doesn’t want me dying of a magic overdose in his school. Do you guys think I’m an idiot?”

“Well, good,” Max said, not answering the question. “Because if you burn to death right before we get to see what that thing actually does, I’m gonna be so mad.”

“I really don’t think it’s going to do anything.”

“Of course it will,” Kylie quipped. “Haven’t you read stories? It’ll wake up at a pivotal moment to save your life, awakened by the Power of Love or something. That’s what happens to the hero.”

“Oh, please,” Max said, “Kayden’s a sidekick, at best. So it might awaken and kill him to provide pathos for the hero, which is the last thing we want.”

“Sidekick? Excuse me? I’m right here.”

“Yeah, that is a good point,” Kylie said, not managing to hide her grin. “Hardly hero material, our Kayden.”

I crossed my arms. “Who’s the hero, then?”

“Max,” Kylie said, at the exact moment that Max said, “Kylie.” They looked at each other in surprise.

“No, it’s definitely you,” Max said. “A mysterious and extremely powerful prophecy having you whisked away to a new, magical world? Nobody knows where your gifts come from but they give you important information about the dangers around you? That’s Hero stuff, right there.”

“Sorry, but I’m not the extremely skilled scion of an ancient and powerful magical family finding himself embroiled in political schemes with blood enemies while trying to deny his destiny.”

“I don’t have any blood enemies,” Max protested.

“Are there people at this school whose families hate your family? Do they hate you just because of your family? Blood enemies.”

“It’s a bit dramatic to call – ”

“So,” I cut in, “Kylie’s the Painfully Generic Chosen One and Max is the Knockoff Political Intrigue Mary Sue. Which I guess leaves me as – ”

“Still the comic relief sidekick,” Kylie said. “Sorry.”

I opened my mouth to respond, realised that every possible response I had was a ‘comic relief sidekick’ sort of line, and closed it again.

“Hey, he knows the term Mary Sue!” Max grinned. “Kayden does read!”

Probably wouldn’t help my case to mention I’d picked the term up from Melissa. “I’m going to get a snack or something while you two get bullying me out of your system,” I said.

I ended up grabbing lunch with Saina and a couple of her friends whom I vaguely recognised as legacy kids who went to Magista’s parties, but didn’t actually know. Saina introduced us but I forgot their names immediately, because I was distracted thinking about my spell and what has happened to Cheryl and not at all by Magistus, who was sitting across the hall with Trevor. Just because they happened to be sitting in my field of view didn’t mean I was analysing every gesture or anything, trying to work out if Magistus’ hand on Trevor’s shoulder meant they were together or if it was just Magistus’ usual level of friendly tactility. I didn’t care if they were together. It was none of my business. I just wanted to know.

“What do you think, Kayden?” Saina’s voice cut into my musings of the pair sharing a piece of cake (a romantic gesture, or did they both just only want half a piece?).

“Hmm?” I brought myself back to the conversation at hand. “Sorry, I didn’t catch that. It’s been a bit of a day.”

“What happened?”

How was I supposed to answer that? Was somebody bursting into flames in front of me due to loss of magical control something I was allowed to talk about, or was it a sort of embarrassing gaffe that I was supposed to keep to myself? “It’s nothing,” I lied, and she seemed to take the hint.

“I’m thinking I might try to get in some pit competitions, anyway,” one of Saina’s friends said, apparently continuing their previous discussion, and immediately had my attention. “Don’t judge me! It looks fun, alright? But… y’know.”

“The family,” the other friend said, understandingly. “It’s not exactly dignified, is it?”

“What do you mean, not dignified?” I cut in. “Nothing undignified about sports.” Not that these legacy mages could trust the opinion of some backwater witch on the matter. I pulled out my reasoning. “Magista’s doing it.”

“Well that clinches it, then. Pit competitions are officially deemed dignified.”

“Wait, Magista Cottingly is going to be in a pit comp?”

Oh no…. Had mentioning that been bad? Was it some kind of secret? It’d have to be if they didn’t already know, right? No, no; it couldn’t be. Magista was very proud of getting on such an exclusive team so young, she hadn’t shown a hint of reservation talking about it, and it was going to be public knowledge the moment she walked out into the Pit. Gossipping positively about this was a good thing, politically. I hoped.

“She’s with the Amazons,” I said as casually as I could, and the expressions on everyone’s faces suggested that yes, this was something she deserved to be proud of.

“Straight out of Initiation? Are you sure?”

I was, but would further talking about this come off as boasting, either on her behalf, or mine for being close to her? No; it was an innocent topic, I was overthinking. But was I? I’d seen Max and di Fiore talk; overthinking didn’t seem possible. Ugh, why did I keep choosing to hang out with legacy mages?!

I spotted someone blessedly familiar entering the dining hall. If Talbot’s pretentious golden locks weren’t familiar enough, everyone was giving him space despite the crowded state of the hall; that might’ve been courtesy to someone who couldn’t see the people around him (he used one of those white cane things to navigate the tunnels, so it wasn’t like anyone was going to be embarrassingly misled about his sight like I had been at first), or it might’ve been the incredibly drained ‘I will take no shit’ expression on the parts of his face not covered by his stupid fancy designer sunglasses.

“This has been great, but I’ve gotta go talk to someone,” I said. “Nice to meet you both.” Let them do what they wanted with the information I’d given them; if I wasn’t around to question, I couldn’t slip up.

“Hey, Talbot,” I called, when I was close enough to initiate conversation but far enough away not to startle him.

He lifted a couple of fingers in greeting. “Your mage friend make it back to your room okay?”

“Technically, we’re as much mages as he is.”

One sardonic eyebrow appeared lifted above the glasses.

“Okay, yeah, I know what you mean. He’s fine. Freaked out and tired. How are you? I don’t know how long you usually keep up the air manipulating thing, but…”

“Tired. Hungry. I’ll recover.” He picked up an empty plate. “where are those tiny sandwiches they always serve? They keep changing the order of the food around here for no reason, it’s ridiculous.”

“They’re two platters to your left.” I had no idea if that was enough information, since a ‘platter’ wasn’t a particularly precise measure of distance, but it seemed to be; he unhesitatingly started filling his little plate with a frankly startling number of little triangle sandwiches, paying no apparent attention to what was inside them. “Um,” I said.

“I’m hungry,” he repeated, as if this was sufficient explanation for his steadily growing Sandwich Tower. “And Cheryl is alive, although I’m sure Max has already told you that.”

“Yeah. Nice, stable, awakened spell, apparently.”

“Hmm. For now. You know how magic can be.”

I didn’t, not being able to cast any, but that didn’t seem worth pointing out. “She’s got professionals keeping an eye on her, and the most dangerous part has passed, right? I’m sure she’ll be fine.” I hoped she’d be fine.

“Yes, I’m sure that was the entire point. They’ll keep a well enough eye on her.”

“What?”

Nobody was paying attention to us in the crowded dining hall, but Talbot still stepped closer and lowered his voice. “It really was the best place for this to happen, wasn’t it? Anywhere else, and she probably would have burned to death. But in the middle of the kuracar’s locus, with the best access to magical medicine in the world, surrounded by mages who could provide help and support? I guess that’s why you’re here, right? So that when yours flares up, have the best chance. But Cheryl doesn’t live here. She was exceptionally lucky that hers flared up during the two weeks her master happened to have brought her here, don’t you think?”

I swallowed. “You can’t possibly be suggesting – ?”

“Cheryl was clever,” Talbot said. “She made sure there was a clause in her vow so if the curse didn’t awaken before her twenty first birthday, her master would lose her. When my master was going to lose me to Skolala Refujeyo, he took steps to ensure I wouldn’t get in. I wonder what sorts of things someone in Cheryl’s master’s position might do to keep that vow active?”

He gave me a tight little smile with no joy in it, and strode off to eat his sandwiches. I stared after him, my mind a haze.

What sorts of things, indeed?