The knock at the window drags Thanatos out of his thoughts, and with a click of his pen, it unlocks. “Come in,” he calls, but it’s more irritated than he intends. That is, until he sees it’s Rebecca that flies inside on her decorated broomstick and lands delicately on the hardwood flooring.

She frowns at the state of his desk, scribbles on sticky notes tacked to all corners of his wall, and his cork-board is already getting full of photos. Rebecca squints at them. “You honestly suspect my student council?”

“It’d be foolish not to. You all have access to more records than the average students, and considering what I heard this morning, it’s quite a competitive scene, the council.” He doesn’t stop typing as he speaks. “I don’t think it’s you, if it makes you feel any better.”

Rebecca doesn’t know whether to feel relieved, offended, or both. “Of course I’m not a murderer!” she exclaims. “And neither are any of them!”

Thanatos sighs. “Ms. Hawthorne, if you came only to yell at me, kindly leave.”

She huffs and, with a wave of her hand, brings Jonny’s own desk chair to her. She sits, crosses her legs, and sets her bag in her lap. Retrieved from it is her phone, and she shows Thanatos the screen.

“Your sister’s roommate matches the other girls.” With a confident smile, she points to the contact information. “She’s officially on the Party Planning Committee as of about 15 minutes ago, when I submitted the paperwork.” He squints, was it really the afternoon already?

Thanatos scribbles the name down and tacks it to his board. “I really should’ve checked in with her sooner,” he mumbles. “Thank you for checking on her for me.” Before she can say anything, Thanatos quickly shakes his head and rubs at his temples. “Any luck with the headmaster?”

“Not yet. It’ll have to wait until Monday; the headmaster’s office is closed on weekends, and the email I sent hasn’t gotten a response.” Rebecca jumps at her phone buzzing. She huffs and rises, brushing her skirt as she approaches the door. Thanatos leans to watch.

Rebecca opens it and standing there, with his hands full of snacks and soda cans, is Jonny. He grins around the candy bar held between his teeth. He rushes to drop them on the coffee table. “So, good news and bad news!”

“What’s with the snacks?” Thanatos asks.

“Good news is Sibylla is a-okay, happy you’re here, and gave us some info.” Jonny tosses a soda can to Thanatos, who catches it with some ease. He grimaces at being ignored. Ah, well.

“And the bad news?”

Jonny tosses the second soda to Rebecca, who immediately checks the nutrition label. She ponders, then pops the tab open. “Is it the part where Briar’s sister almost killed you or the part where Briar kills you now for gawking at her.”

“I didn’t gawk — who even says that anymore? Anyway, no, she said something specific and had a message for you.” He points at Thanatos as the other cracks open his can. “She said, uh… ‘To know the answer, watch your back.’”

Thanatos and Rebecca share a confused look. “Is that all?” he presses. Jonny shakes his head. He sits on the arm of the couch.

“Definitely necromancy, and she said we should try to find things they’re attached to.”

Rebecca hums, “If the headmaster has this thing on lock-down, then could she also have their belongings? According to records, the girls moved out via the proper forms, so the rooms are definitely empty. In fact, I bet they’ve already been refilled by waitlistees by now.”

“Then add that to your to-do list for Monday,” Thanatos orders, and Rebecca grumbles behind her drink.

The trio waits in silence as thoughts run through their heads, but it’s Jonny who speaks up again first, startling himself with the memory. “Oh, yeah! She also said something about the death being familiar. Maybe it’s from a past case?”

Thanatos slowly sets his drink down on his desk, face progressively getting darker. He swallows and runs a hand through his hair. “Sometimes, really, I wish she’d just be blunt.”

Rebecca rolls her eyes. “That’s diviners for you.”

“Do you know what that means, Toasty?” Jonny’s head tilts like a confused puppy, brows furrowed with worry, hands fidgeting with a crinkly chip bag.

“I might, but that information Monday is absolutely crucial.” Scooting in his chair, Thanatos grabs a red marker from his desk’s pencil holder, and he starts crossing out several photos on the board. “Confirmed necromancy means we can eliminate suspects fast. The Laws of Auras come into obvious play.”

“Laws?” Jonny prods. Rebecca smirks and sits up in Jonny’s seat.

“The Laws of Auras encompass how we use magic, of course. You didn’t know that?” She scoffs. “How did you even get into this school at all.”

Jonny blushes bright red and stammers. “What? No, I know them! But a, uh, recap would be nice.”

“Honestly, you’re hopeless, Greenwell.” Rebecca sighs.

“Then pray tell, Ms. Hawthorne, do you know the Laws regarding necromancy?” Thanatos asks, exasperated.

At that, Rebecca’s confident smile falters, and she takes a sip. “Perhaps a recap is in order.”

Thanatos clears his throat. “As you both know, the Laws of Auras are about magic auras, the things in humans that let us perform magic and controls how that magic operates.” He thinks for a moment. “Jonny, the small whiteboard on the refrigerator, if you would.”

Jonny runs and retrieves it as asked, and Thanatos pops the marker open with his teeth. Resuming his lecture, he draws a circle in the middle of the tablet-sized whiteboard.

“The power of one’s aura can be affected by genetics— it’s why families like Hawthorne’s are so particular about who their heirs marry —but the biggest factor is, ultimately, luck. You get what you get.” Around the circle, he writes the letters A, C, D, En, Ev, I, N, and T. “The schools of magic known currently are abjuration, conjuration, divination, enchantment, evocation, illusion, necromancy, and transmutation.”

“The stronger the aura, the stronger the magic, and those strengths can be innate or developed,” Rebecca continues for him. Jonny nods. “Children will show aptitudes for certain schools at young ages.”

“Correct,” says Thanatos. Rebecca smirks and brushes her hair behind her shoulder. “Dedicating to specific schools will make it harder to learn other schools as you get older and your aura evolves to suit those schools, so that’s why they wait until secondary school to start offering school-specific courses.”

“Makes sense, but what does this have to do with necromancy?”

Rebecca frowns. “Now that I think on it, they don’t say much about it in any auralogy classes besides ‘don’t.’”

Thanatos makes sure they can see the board as he circles the N and scribbles in the aura circle, making it black. “Necromancy’s first use automatically corrupts one’s aura. As it’s very nature defies the laws of the divine and the natural, it seals off any ability to use magics under those properties.” He crosses out the D, E, C, and A. “The others remain usable because, like necromancy, they have to do with the material or the person.”

“So, anyone who can use divination, evocation, conjuration, and abjuration can’t be our killer?” Jonny hums in thought. “So Rebecca and I couldn’t do it because of what we do normally.”

“The same could be said for most of the student council,” Rebecca chimes in. “You crossed out those two, but all save for Winifred use one or more of those schools regularly.”

“What does Ms. Matthews use?”

“Illusion and transmutation, to my knowledge.”

Thanatos sticks an orange tack in Winnie’s picture on the corkboard. “This explains a lot,” he mutters.

“Pardon?”

“Nothing, Ms. Hawthorne.” Thanatos sets aside the whiteboard. “Speaking of the student council, the meeting this morning was enlightening. There were a few among the staff there that should be watched. The newer, like Mr. Thompson, the more suspicious. If at all possible, we should take this next week to just observe unless otherwise required and do our work in the background.”

“That’ll be hard considering—” Jonny gestures to all of Thanatos. “—you’re like a celebrity. Not sure how lowkey you can be.”

“Why do you think I said we? No one knows I’m here on a case; as far as they’re concerned, the official story is I’m here, given the Academy’s reputation for quality education, studying for future casework.”

Rebecca points at him. “And study, you will . I don’t know what school you’re actually from, but we have standards here.”

Thanatos rolls his eyes. “I didn’t graduate university with a bachelor’s degree two years ago for you to lecture me on high school studying ethics.” Both Rebecca and Jonny stare at him in awe. He pulls out from his drawer, framed perfectly, his diploma. “Criminal Justice major.”

The other two come closer to observe it. “It’s the real thing,” Rebecca confirms with contempt. “And from an esteemed place like Garden Grove.”

Jonny squints. “With a minor in—”

Thanatos quickly covers the diploma and tucks it away. “None of that. Anyway, you have your orders. Lay low, data collection discreetly, etcetera.” He shuts the drawer loudly. “Dismissed.”

Rebecca rolls her eyes. “Fine, whatever. Tomorrow, I’ll get those photos and whatever else I can get my hands on.”

“We can meet up again Friday!” Jonny adds, excited. “Maybe after dinner?”

Rebecca shakes her head. “That’s too late in the evening for something like this. If we’re going to have proper meetings, then lunchtime could work. We’re all seniors.”

“Friday lunches could work,” Thanatos agrees. “Jonny?”

“Sounds good! Just gotta grab our food and come back here.” He laughs. “We gotta be sneaky, but with the student president on our side, I’m sure we’ll be let off the hook.”

Grabbing her broom, Rebecca thwacks Jonny lightly on the head with the stick end. “Don’t get comfortable. Here, Friday afternoon, no tardiness.” And much like she entered, she leaves through the window. Thanatos magics it and the curtains shut with his pen.

“I said this to her earlier,” Thanatos starts after a beat of silence. “But thank you for checking on my sister.”

Jonny beams, and he pats Thanatos on the shoulder. “It’s no biggie, dude! She’s pretty cool, even told my fortune with her funky crystals. This one wouldn’t leave me alone though, so we’re pals now.” He pulls the citrine from his pocket.

“I may have been right then.” Thanatos pokes at it. “It was good you went. I’m sure you learnt a lot from her, hm?”

“If you mean the diviner thing, then yeah, I think so. I always stuck with evocation because, bro, bending fire like in cartoons is the coolest, but this is pretty neat too.” Jonny tosses it once, twice.

Thanatos smiles, something soft, but it’s brief as he turns his back to Jonny. “I’m going to take a shower.”

“In the middle of the afternoon?”

“I need to think.”

Jonny nods. “I’ll order us some lunch.”

Thanatos gives a thumbs up before shutting and locking the bathroom door behind him. Jonny sighs, deep and heavy, and he falls backwards from his seat on the couch arm to the cushions behind him. There’s soft crinkling as snacks are shifted further down and some even knocked off, but Jonny doesn’t think about it.

He holds the crystal up towards the ceiling, letting the sunlight peeking through the curtains reflect off its smooth sides. There’s no smile on his face, no excitement in his gaze. Jonny rubs at his eyes, always inwards to keep his contacts from moving, as he brings it back to his chest.

With a heavy heart, he makes a wish upon this little yellow star of his.