na

ing lecture hall thirty min

ed only by the floating globes of witch-ligh

still clung to t

sat, marched straight down to the front of the amphitheater

ing behind her scarf, she stopped dead in her tracks

doing down here? This is the line of fire! Foster spits when she

enly, arranging my inkwell, quill, and pr

tered, but she took the seat to my left anyway

n, filling the b

stone walls, but every time the heavy oak

ed in the crimso

t, my lungs refusi

final be

eaked open o

nto the room, her dark c

n her wake, his head held r

stopped

heartbreaki

et filled out with the muscle he woul

arbones sharp against the threa

ded to a dull, washed-out greenish gray, the silve

r cracked at the toes where no wat

his clothes, there was nothi

s a column o

shadowing a face of striking, severe beauty-high cheekbones, a sharp

there wer

vertical pupils that cau

gon

on the fringes of the realm, feared for their destructive fire-mag

at the cente

own," she

replaced by a suffocat

lski of Abyssal House will be joining our pra

eyes swept acros

th, scanning the students as if asse

idn'

offer a po

owalski,"

n I remembered, cool, re

was

one cleared their throat

r rippled through the Avi

but she simply gestured to

alski. We are covering w

at the students w

climb the stairs toward the very last row-the broken, drafty corner under the back rafters wher

e my brain could ca

too

t the stone rang through the dead

ill suspended over h

, her hand shooting out to grab my

you doing?" she

d her co

le, placing myself dir

opped three

ned slightly, the first crack in

tensing as if bracing for a public humiliation f

the lump i

le, but I forced it to ring clear, loud enough

est, most genuine smile I possessed. "I'm Giana