Edward is waiting outside the dormitory when I leave. I’ve decided I’m not hiding my plans with Robin from him, but I'm also not going to volunteer the information. And he doesn’t ask, so I say nothing.

  “What do you think Electra wants?” he asks instead.

  “Well, I need to talk to her about the case. And I guess you need to report back about whatever magical theory stuff she had you working.”

  “A five-thousand-word essay on the dangers of magical experimentation. I’m almost offended. But I did learn some interesting new things researching for it, to be fair.”

  “Not Electra’s most subtle moment,” I laugh.

  “I’m not going to do anything stupid with magic,” Edward says firmly. “Besides, even if I wanted to, I’m still at least two years away from having sufficient background to develop high-quality experiments.”

  I wonder whether she assigned that essay for a slightly different reason. If it relates to the anomaly. I could see it being very helpful in experimentation. And I could see the confidence and certainty it gives blinding someone to the danger of what they’re doing. Because sometimes the voice of self-doubt is the only thing between you and disaster.

  That’s not the sort of thing I should say outside a good set of privacy wards, though.

  We reach the office and glance awkwardly at each other before Edward knocks on the door. It swings open before the enchantment can get out a full sentence.

  “After you,” says Edward.

  “What, hoping the death trap kills me and not you?” I tease.

  “You know that’s not what I’d do if I thought there was a death trap.”

  I roll my eyes and step inside.

  “You’re almost too easy to have fun with,” Electra’s disembodied voice says from somewhere around her usual chair. I jump, and then quickly compose myself.

  Edward follows me inside, and the door closes itself behind us with an ominous click.

  Electra pops into existence, leant way back in her armchair. She’s toying with a quill, weaving it in and out of her fingers, and smiling. “Welcome back,” she says. “It’s… good to see you again.”

  Only Electra could make a sentence like that sound like a threat. Neither of us dignify it with a response.

  “I suppose before we get into what you’ve been working on, I should ask if there has been any new… anomalous activity.”

  “Not here,” says Edward. “Or not that I’ve observed, anyway.”

  I should probably tell her, shouldn’t I? Part of me doesn’t want to. Because talking about Malaina episodes isn’t easy. It’s letting someone see your weak points, your vulnerabilities. And when that someone is Electra…

  But this is important. “Actually, yes. I’ve found that it helps me to resist Malaina episodes.”

  I have the satisfaction, if you can call it that, of seeing Electra look genuinely surprised for once. She masters it quickly, though, and says simply “Elaborate.”

  So I sketch the stories of the incident in the haunted forest and then the second one in the temple. I watch her closely to see if she gives anything away with her reaction to my theory about the stars, but there’s no change in her expression that I can see. I should have known better than to think she’d give anything away that easily.

  “Interesting,” she says when I’m done. “I hope I don’t need to point out that neither of you should rely on this method of preventing Malaina episodes if there are any alternatives.”

  “You don’t,” I say. Even though I deliberately called on it in the temple. Just getting up and leaving might have been a better option, however impossible it felt at the time. Next time I’m in a similar position – well, hopefully there won’t be a next time, but if there is, I’ll try to take the less drastic measure.

  “Another thing I was wondering is if either of you noticed anything unusual on Esteral.”

  “No,” I say quickly. Too quickly? Some paranoid part of my mind wonders if she could possibly know about Lauren. But she must be referring to the anomaly, whether it did anything more noticeable.

  “Me neither. Why did you ask that?”

  “Esteral is a time where many magics are… different. Stronger. I wondered if there’s any evidence that it holds for this particular magic.”

  It’s a reasonable theory, but that evidence doesn’t appear to exist.

  “What about you?” Edward asks. “Have you found any theories?”

  Electra shrugs. “A few. Nothing certain. Nothing I want to share with you until it is certain.”

  Edward sighs. I can’t blame him. I’m not even sure Electra is wrong to be keeping her ideas secret, but we do really need to understand what this anomaly is.

  The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “In other news, your essay?”

  Edward produces a roll of parchment from his bag. “Has been written.”

  Electra unfurls the parchment and skims it briefly. “So it has, it would appear. Exactly five thousand words?”

  “…of course the counting-spell can be applied to words. That would have saved me a lot of trouble if I’d thought of it earlier.”

  Of course there’s a spell for counting things.

  “You would have taught yourself a spell without proper supervision in order to count the words of an essay on the dangers of magical experimentation?”

  “It’s a known spell. Clearly documented. It wouldn’t be dangerous.”

  “Oh? What do you think would happen if you tried to count, say, the number of grains of sand on a beach?”

  I can imagine, especially given the context. It would drain far too much power.

  “That’s different.”

  “Or the number of words in every book in your library, then.”

  “I don’t regularly work in the library – “

  “Have you learnt nothing from this exercise?”

  “I learnt plenty of things, actually, even if they were not what you intended me to learn. And I am well aware of the dangers of magic.”

  “Very well. I hope for your sake the essay is well-written. As for you, Tallulah… tell me why the boy John should not have been killed.”

  I haven’t touched the case or the project since before Holy Days. I should have. I should have known she would ask something like this, and I’m not prepared –

  I recognise where those particular thoughts lead in time to stop them. I focus on slowing my breathing, clearing my mind, collecting my thoughts. I’ve spent enough time reading the case that the knowledge should be there.

  As I begin answering, I realise that she’s not asking because she wants me to persuade her. She already said she believes he shouldn’t have been killed. No, this is a test of how well I can argue my case. Or, possibly, of how I’ll react to pressure. Whether I’ll have a Malaina episode, or draw on the anomaly.

  I hate that she does things like that. That everything has to be a test. Even if I think I’m passing this one: I answer as myself, and my arguments sounds reasonable and persuasive to my admittedly biased ears.

  “You have a good argument,” Electra admits begrudgingly once I’m done. “But what does that mean, when the other side has power and influence?”

  A former Prime Minister. The connections she mentioned the killer has. It’s not justice, those things mattering, but it’s reality.

  “Tallulah has me on her side,” Edward says. “That means she has power and influence, too.”

  He’s not quite right, though, even I can see that. And Electra shows him no mercy. “Would your father consider this a battle worth fighting?”

  All three of us know the answer to that question, but Electra is going to make Edward say it.

  “No,” he admits finally. “But he wouldn’t stop me.”

  “What can you meaningfully do for Tallulah’s cause without his help?”

  His silence and his grim expression is answer enough.

  But Electra’s line of question has got me thinking. The obvious answer to the problem she poses is that I should try to gather my own power and influence. And Lord Blackthorn isn’t going to help me, not in the way I want or need.

  He’s not the only one with the power to help, though.

  My idea might be an awful one. Or it might be exactly what I need.

  Edward sighs. I try to think of other ideas which aren’t so tentative and unformed. “This only makes a difference if the judge is more influenced by power than by justice, though.”

  “The person who isn’t is very rare indeed,” is all Electra says.

  She probably has a point, much as I hate to admit it. “…do you even think this is possible?”

  “Oh, it’s certainly possible. Anything is possible.”

  “That’s not what I meant.” I’m already losing patience with her mind games. Sometimes I just want a straight answer.

  “Very well. I don’t know. You’re doing something that hasn’t been done before. So no-one knows if it can be done, even.”

  Except I’m not even the one doing it, am I? Not really.

  “I think you could use some more time to think. And, perhaps, some more information. I’ve written some notes on who John’s killer is and why he’s a dangerous man to make an enemy of.” She pulls a roll of parchment from the arrangement of them on her desk and slides it across the table. “Read them, and send a copy to your Tara. If you still want to proceed after that, then I’ll do whatever is required of me.”

  She picks up Edward’s essay and begins to read.

  I take the parchment. “Am I… dismissed?”

  Electra shrugs. “I have nothing more to say to you at the moment. But you may stay while I look over this essay if you wish.”

  I glance at Edward. He shrugs. I decide that I don’t mind staying; he probably wouldn’t want to be alone with Electra. And besides, I am a little curious to see what she makes of this essay.

  She’s not impressed. Or maybe she is, with parts of it. It’s hard to tell with Electra. But she criticises his awkward wording, the way he cites his sources, how he quotes textbooks without showing original analysis or criticism. It’s brutal. I would be crying if anyone was so harsh on an essay I’d written.

  Edward, though, doesn’t seem all that bothered. It takes me a little while to realise that he doesn’t care. Because if it’s not directly relevant to making him a better magician, why would it matter to him?

  I don’t understand him sometimes. How he can care so little about so many things that do matter. Then again, maybe other people would say the same about me.

  Once Electra is done with her criticism, she gives us permission to leave. Which is to say that she tells us to get out and stop taking up her time because she has lesson plans to write. I’m reasonably sure she doesn’t resent the time she devotes to us, though. We’re interesting to her.

  It’s lunchtime when we leave. Well, it’s gone lunchtime, really, but if we’re quick we should still be able to grab something from the dining hall before it shuts. We are quick enough to get some fish and vegetables and claim our usual spot.

  “That could have been worse,” Edward says.

  “I suppose so,” I say, thinking of the time Electra tried to kill him. “Not that that’s saying much.”

  He laughs. “Good point.”

  “You’re not bothered about the essay?”

  “She was always going to pick it to pieces.”

  He’s probably not wrong. One problem with Electra’s particular style of feedback is that it’s hard to tell when you’re being criticised because your work is genuinely flawed and when you’re being criticised just because she wants to criticise you.

  I don’t know which is the case here without having read the essay. Some of the things Electra said did seem like problems in Edward’s writing, while others were more the sort of things teachers say when they feel as if they should be pointing out problems but can’t find any problems to point out.

  But I don’t feel like trying to convince Edward that his essay might have been flawed. Sometimes arguing with him feels like arguing with a brick wall, and I have too many other things to worry about right now to want to try that.

  The next step is to try and track down Elsie. I haven’t seen her around, though, or indeed any students I know other than Robin and Edward. Maybe she isn’t even back at the Academy yet. Some part of me hopes that’s the case, just because it means I can delay that particular problem a day longer.

  “What are you going to do next?” Edward asks once we’ve finished eating.

  “Read the file Electra gave me.” Or at least that’s what I should do, in the absence of Elsie. “You?”

  He shrugs. “One of my magic projects. Not sure which, yet. Study room?”

  “Study room,” I agree.