Quenti’s heart beat a hard rhythm in her chest as she silently followed Alara back to their room. So loud was it, she was amazed the other girl couldn’t hear the unsteady thumping. But then again, the other girl seemed preoccupied herself. When they returned to the room, Alara didn’t even look her way as she picked up a stack of books from the corner of the room, shoved them in a bag, and rushed out.

Quenti left the room a few minutes later, unsure of when first meal began or ended, and knowing she eventually needed to find Senya Emaru’s office. She had a feeling this was one of those things that Alara was supposed to have helped her with. She rolled her eyes, alone with her annoyance. Perhaps she’d remember to make an extra biting comment or two the next time she saw the fledgling magite.

If there was a next time.

She let herself dwell only briefly on what she had been told. There was a way out. There were stories of magites and mages—or, gasp, bruyas—who had escaped the Haven without permission, never to be seen again. Of course, some of these stories had alternate, less happy endings to them.

Some believed those that betrayed the Haven were found and killed, while others talked of them joining the bruyas beyond the borders or crossing the sea to escape Sombria altogether. Happy or sad tales aside, the important fact was that escape was no longer impossible. Not everyone stayed trapped here.

Quenti shook herself from these thoughts. There would be time to think and plan later, but for now she had to act normal—or whatever passed for normal here.

It only took ten minutes to find Emaru’s office. Or more accurately, it took ten minutes to run into a magite that was willing to walk Quenti there. It was just down the hall from where they had just met Cruz, and she made note of this, already starting to build a map of the Haven in her mind. She needed to know these things if she was going to make use of her new information.

But she didn’t have time to think about such things once Emaru swept her into the office and started talking.

The woman loved to talk.

There were going to be classes and extra lessons and tests to make sure Quenti was up to speed with her reading and writing skills (which she most definitely was not). She would be spending her mornings with the little ones and her afternoons in private lessons. And following the look she must have given Emaru when she mentioned writing, she was told her evenings would be spent practicing with a quill and parchment until she met some standard Quenti was quite unsure of.

The Haven sent out ambassadors to the villages to teach reading and writing to the little ones, but the skill was unnecessary for most adults living on the coast and most just let the lessons of their youth drift away. Quenti could read better than most, her mother having been an avid reader of history who had passed down her passion to her daughter. However, writing was a skill she had had little use for.

Emaru did not seem to agree with this assessment.

As they exited her office, the councilwoman walked through the measures in place for keeping the students safe—guards and locked doors and curfews and regulations on powers. Quenti couldn’t help but hear the threat in all of this.

Do not break the rules.

Do not step out of line.

Do not try and escape.

But there was a way out.