CHAPTER FIFTEEN

LESSONS IN MAGIC

By the time Eveline finally found the east courtyard, she had already developed a very personal hatred for the Academy's architecture, three moving staircases, one enchanted portrait and, although she was reluctant to admit it, Kaelen Vaelor, who had somehow managed to make getting lost feel like a personal failure on her part. The courtyard itself was nothing like what she had expected, opening into a vast circular chamber beneath the eastern tower where soft golden light poured from the walls despite the fact that there was no visible source for it. Long stone tables curved around the centre of the room, enchanted books opened and closed by themselves across them, quills floated lazily above waiting pages, and dozens of students were already settling into their seats while magical symbols drifted through the air like dust caught in sunlight.

Eveline immediately became aware of the glances.

Some students looked at her openly, others whispered behind their hands, and a few deliberately looked away when she caught them staring. She had known this would happen after the Presentation, but knowing something and actually experiencing it were two entirely different things. Yesterday she had been an unknown girl from another world, and today she was the lost heir whose face had appeared in every magical newspaper in Aurelis. She considered turning around and leaving, but then a bell sounded somewhere above the classroom, the enormous doors closed behind her, and a woman walked toward the centre of the room.

She was short and broad, with a soft, round face, deep brown skin and thick black curls gathered into a loose knot at the back of her head. Her robes were practical rather than elaborate, covered in tiny silver symbols that moved whenever she walked, and she carried an enormous wooden staff that looked as though it had been carved directly from the trunk of an ancient tree. There was nothing intimidating about her appearance, but there was something remarkably confident about the way she stood in front of a room full of young mages, and when her warm brown eyes travelled across the class, every conversation gradually died.

"Good morning."

The students responded with varying levels of enthusiasm, and the professor smiled as though she had expected nothing better.

"My name is Professor Amara Bell, and for the next year, I will be teaching Foundations of Magic, which means that by the end of this course, I intend to convince every single one of you that magic is considerably less mysterious than you currently believe."

A boy near the front raised his hand.

Professor Bell nodded toward him.

"Does that mean magic is easy?"

Her smile widened.

"No. It means that understanding why you are failing makes failure considerably less embarrassing."

The room filled with laughter, and Eveline found herself smiling before she could stop herself. Professor Bell noticed, although she made no comment, and instead turned toward the blackboard, where a single word appeared in glowing silver letters.

INTENTION.

"All of you have been taught different things about magic before coming here, and some of you have probably been told that magic is simply power, energy or the ability to manipulate the world around you, but all of those explanations are incomplete. Magic responds to intention, but intention without understanding can be dangerous, because every spell changes something, even when the change is so small that you never notice it."

She lifted one hand, and a tiny flame appeared above her palm. It was no larger than a candle flame, but the heat reached the nearest students, and Eveline watched as the professor transformed it into water, then ice, then a miniature storm cloud that released a few drops of rain directly into her palm before disappearing completely.

"This is elemental manipulation, and some mages are born with strong elemental affinities while others develop them through study. Some never develop elemental magic at all, and that does not make their magic weaker. You will each discover different strengths during your time here, but your task is not to become someone else. Your task is to discover what your magic already wants to become."

Eveline's fingers tightened around the edge of her desk.

She had been thinking about her magic ever since the Presentation, ever since the Crown had awakened beneath her and filled the Hall with enough power to make the entire city ring with bells. Everyone seemed to expect her to know what she was capable of simply because she carried royal blood, but the truth was that she had no idea what lived inside her. She had never been taught to control magic because, until a few days ago, she had not even known she possessed any, and now she was sitting in a classroom surrounded by students who had probably been practicing spells since childhood.

Professor Bell raised one hand.

Every candle in the room went dark.

For a moment, the classroom disappeared into complete darkness, and then hundreds of tiny points of light appeared again, floating above the desks like stars scattered across a private night sky.

"Listen to your magic before you command it."

One of those lights drifted slowly across the room.

Eveline watched it approach without understanding why it seemed to be moving directly toward her. It passed between two students, floated over the empty space between the desks and finally stopped above her hand. At first it glowed with the same soft golden colour as the others, but then the light began to change, becoming colder and brighter until the gold disappeared completely and the sphere turned silver.

Eveline stared at it.

The entire room fell silent.

The silver light pulsed once, and every magical object in the classroom responded at the same time. The candles along the walls flared violently, enchanted books slammed shut, quills dropped onto desks and the ancient runes carved into the stone floor ignited in rapid succession. Somewhere beyond the classroom, a deep bell began to ring, unlike the ordinary bells that announced the beginning or end of lessons. This sound was older, lower and powerful enough that Eveline felt it vibrating through her bones.

Professor Bell's expression changed.

"Don't move."

Eveline froze.

The silver sphere expanded without exploding, unfolding like a flower made entirely from light as thin strands of magic spread outward through the classroom. One reached the wall behind Professor Bell, and ancient symbols appeared across the stone where nothing had been visible a moment earlier. Another climbed toward the ceiling and formed a vast circular rune above the students, its centre displaying a crown surrounded by seven stars.

Eveline recognized it immediately.

It was the same symbol that had appeared beneath her feet during the Presentation.

The students began whispering.

Professor Bell raised her staff.

"Silence."

The room obeyed.

She stared at the enormous symbol above them, and for the first time since entering the classroom, Eveline saw genuine uncertainty in the professor's expression.

"It hasn't appeared in this Academy for eighteen years."

Eveline's stomach tightened.

"What hasn't?"

Professor Bell did not answer immediately. Instead, she approached Eveline and looked carefully at the silver light hovering above her hand.

"Give me your hand."

Eveline hesitated before extending it.

Professor Bell turned her palm upward, and a thin silver line appeared beneath Eveline's skin. It moved slowly from the centre of her palm toward her wrist, branching into delicate patterns that looked almost like veins made of light.

Eveline stared at them.

"What is happening to me?"

Professor Bell's expression remained focused.

"I don't know yet."

The answer frightened Eveline more than she wanted to admit.

The silver mark suddenly flashed.

Every window in the classroom shattered.

The glass did not fall.

Instead, hundreds of fragments froze in midair, suspended outside the broken windows as though time itself had stopped around them. Every fragment reflected something different, but none showed the classroom anymore. Eveline saw the Academy covered in vines, the royal palace beneath a storm, the Hall of Ancestors, the Northern Mountains and finally a room she had never seen before.

Then she saw her mother.

Eveline stopped breathing.

Lunara stood in the centre of the unfamiliar room, dressed in a long silver gown, her dark hair falling loosely around her shoulders, and although Eveline had seen her before in the Crown's memories, this was different. The woman in front of her was not peaceful or smiling or surrounded by the warmth of a family memory. Lunara looked frightened, and the fear in her eyes was so real that Eveline felt it in her own chest.

The room around her was covered in protective runes, dozens of them layered over one another in circles around a small cradle. The wards were not decorative; Eveline could see the magic straining against something beyond them, silver lines flickering and cracking as though an unseen force were repeatedly trying to break through.

Then the doors shook.

Lunara turned toward them.

Something struck the other side.

The entire room trembled.

Lunara rushed toward the cradle and lifted the infant inside it, holding the tiny bundle against her chest as another impact sent cracks racing across the doors. Eveline understood immediately.

Someone was trying to get inside.

Someone was coming for her.

Lunara looked toward the opposite side of the room.

Elara appeared through a portal.

She looked younger than Eveline remembered her, but there was no mistaking the silver hair, the dark cloak or the expression of absolute determination on her face. She stepped into the room and immediately began strengthening the protective wards, blood magic spreading from her hands into the ancient symbols around them.

Lunara handed the infant to her.

Eveline's heart seemed to stop.

Her mother said something, but the memory was damaged and her voice came through as a distant distortion. Elara shook her head, tears already gathering in her eyes, but Lunara gripped her arm and forced her to look at her.

Then the doors broke.

The vision became chaotic.

Black figures poured through the shattered entrance, their bodies wrapped in moving shadows, and the protective wards exploded outward as Elara threw herself between them and Lunara. Eveline could not see their faces, but she could see the magic they carried, dark tendrils that moved like living creatures and wrapped around the walls, extinguishing every silver rune they touched.

One of the figures raised a hand.

A spear of black magic struck the floor.

The entire room shook.

Lunara turned toward Elara.

This time, Eveline heard her.

"Take her through the Veil."

Elara shook her head.

"No."

Lunara stepped closer.

"Elara, you promised."

The words came through clearly enough that Eveline felt them like a blow.

Another attack struck the wards.

They were failing.

Elara looked down at the infant in her arms, then back toward Lunara, and Eveline saw the exact moment she understood that there was no other choice.

Lunara placed one trembling hand against the child's cheek.

Her expression broke.

"Tell her I loved her."

Eveline's eyes filled with tears.

The portal behind Elara widened.

The shadows rushed forward.

Elara stepped through.

The memory shattered.

The floating glass fell.

Professor Bell threw both hands upward, creating a protective barrier over the students as the fragments dissolved into silver dust before reaching the floor. The classroom erupted into frightened voices, chairs scraped against stone as students stumbled backward, and the silver light that had surrounded Eveline collapsed into her palm so suddenly that she nearly fell.

Professor Bell caught her.

Eveline could barely breathe.

"My mother."

The professor looked at her carefully.

"What did you see?"

Eveline stared at the place where the vision had been.

"She knew they were coming."

Her voice shook as the pieces began connecting.

"She knew someone was going to find me."

Professor Bell's expression hardened.

"What else?"

"Eighteen years ago, my mother gave me to Elara because someone was attacking the palace."

She looked down at the fading silver mark on her palm.

"It wasn't a memory of my parents simply dying. It was evidence."

Professor Bell's eyes remained fixed on her.

"Evidence of what?"

Eveline looked toward the shattered windows.

"That someone was hunting me before I was even old enough to know who I was."

The professor did not correct her.

That frightened Eveline more than anything.

The silver mark beneath her skin pulsed once.

Professor Bell immediately covered Eveline's hand with her own.

"Not another word about this outside this room."

Eveline pulled her hand back.

"Why?"

"Because the memory you just witnessed was sealed inside the Academy for a reason, and if someone deliberately buried evidence of the night your parents died, then they will not be pleased to discover that you have just uncovered it."

Eveline stared at her.

"You said the Academy recognized me."

Professor Bell glanced toward the ancient symbol still faintly glowing above them.

"No."

Her voice became quieter.

"The Academy didn't recognize you."

Eveline's stomach dropped.

Professor Bell looked at the silver light disappearing beneath her skin.

"It remembered you."

The words settled over the classroom.

Eveline looked toward the enormous symbol above them, toward the crown surrounded by seven stars, and suddenly understood that the silver light had not simply shown her a piece of the past.

It had opened something that had been waiting for her.

And somewhere deep beneath the Academy, far below the classrooms and towers where no student was supposed to go, an ancient ward awakened for the first time in eighteen years.

A second pulse of silver magic travelled through the foundations of the Academy.

And this time, something answered it.