Emily looked down at her hands. She didn’t know what to do. Nothing she could think of seemed appropriate, not after Frieda had stormed out. She could do anything from summoning Frieda back to giving her a few days to get over it, yet none of her ideas seemed useful. Frieda had changed over the last year. Emily had no idea how to make it better.
You can’t do the work for her, she told herself. Perhaps she should seek out Sergeant Miles and ask for advice. Or write to Lady Barb. They were listed as Frieda’s other guardians, weren’t they? Perhaps they should step in ... although it was rare for parents to be directly involved in Whitehall. Students were expected to sort out their problems for themselves. But what can you do?
She groaned, tiredly. She’d hoped to either prove that Celadon was wrong or convince Frieda to listen to him. But she hadn’t had the chance. Celadon might not even be able to turn his theory into reality ... if he couldn’t, Frieda and Celadon were running out of time. They’d have to go back to their original plan and make it work before they faced their supervisors. And even if he could, Frieda would need to understand the spellwork to pass the exam. No one would condemn her for not coming up with the idea herself, but they’d certainly object if she couldn’t explain or build upon Celadon’s work.
Fuck, she thought. She rubbed her eyes, trying to think. But no magical solution came to mind. What the hell do I do?
There was a knock on the door, sharp and authoritative. Gordian, then. Or maybe one of the male tutors ... she waved a hand in the air, opening the door. Gordian had probably come to check on progress or ... or something. He didn’t know she’d been down to the catacombs, as far as she knew, but he might suspect something. Or maybe he just wanted to nag her about starting the second round of the dueling contest.
“Emily,” Caleb said.
Emily looked up, surprised. Caleb—not Gordian—stepped into the room. She smiled, feeling a wave of relief. Caleb had sisters. He could advise her ... if she asked him. And she could ask him. They might no longer be lovers—and their friendship was more than a little strained—but she didn’t think he’d deliberately sabotage her. He’d never been that kind of person.
Caleb raised his eyebrows. “Are you alright?”
“No,” Emily said. She wondered, vaguely, what she looked like. There was a mirror in the washroom ... she pushed the thought aside, sharply. She didn’t have time to worry about her appearance. “Frieda and I just had a fight.”
“Ouch.” Caleb sat down on the chair Celadon had vacated and gazed at her. “What happened?”
Emily gathered herself, then ran through the entire story. She wasn’t sure she believed her own words. Frieda had always been ... emotional ... but she’d never expected the younger girl to lose her composure so badly. Or to shout at her. Frieda had had her differences with other students—and Caleb—but she’d always been friendly with Emily. Emily had valued her uncomplicated friendship more than she cared to admit.
Caleb winced when she’d finished. “Did you check for any outside influence?”
“Yeah,” Emily said. Casting those spells without Frieda noticing hadn’t been easy. “No spells or potions to make her more ... aggressive.”
“Nothing that showed up, at least.” Caleb stroked his chin. Emily couldn’t help thinking that he looked like a younger, clean-shaven version of his father. “Did you check her room?”
Emily sucked in her breath. Nanette—Lin—had used subtle magic to keep people from noticing her, way back in Emily’s Second Year at Whitehall. It had worked, too. And yet ... she’d heard that Grandmaster Hasdrubal had modified the wards to sound the alert if someone else tried to use subtle magic outside the classroom. Gordian wouldn’t have cancelled that, would he?
Except subtle magic helps keep the school together, she thought, darkly. The detection spells might be completely useless.
She closed her eyes for a long moment. It went against the grain to walk into Frieda’s room without permission. She would have felt like a trespasser. And yet, she was Head Girl. She had authority to enter the dorms at will, even the male dorms. No one would question her looking for Frieda in her bedroom. The rune on her chest would respond to subtle magic, even if it wasn’t aimed at her. And then ...
It might have escaped detection, she thought. Or the spells might have been jiggered to let it work without sounding the alert.
She thought, fast. The only person who could have ordered the wards not to sound the alert was Gordian. He was the only person—save for her, perhaps—who could have ensured the housemothers didn’t catch a whiff of subtle magic. And yet, she found it hard to imagine him taking such a risk. He’d be in deep trouble if the truth got out. Frieda might be a nobody, as far as the magical community was concerned, but she was hardly the only student at risk.
Better check, she thought. And then decide what to do.
Caleb was speaking. She dragged her attention back to him.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I missed that.”
He gave her a long-suffering look. “What about her time of the month?”
Emily snorted. “It hasn’t been her time of the month for two months straight!”
She shook her head. Frieda would have been given potions to help her cope, like all of the other girls in Whitehall. She’d have a little discomfort every month, but nothing that would interfere with her schooling. Whoever had invented those potions, Emily had decided long ago, couldn’t possibly be honored enough. The magical community should have come up with a whole new series of awards, just so they could be presented to her.
“Then she might simply be cracking under the workload,” Caleb offered. “She’d hardly be the first student to have problems in Fourth Year.”
“I know.” Emily shook her head. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Mother would give her some time to calm down, then force her to go over everything piece by piece,” Caleb said. “But Frieda has to come to grips with this herself.”
Emily felt a sudden stab of envy, mingled with bitter resentment. How nice it would have been to have a mother who cared! Sienna was strict, but at least she cared about her children. And she’d worked hard to help her youngest daughter recover after the ... incident ... in Beneficence.
“I know,” she said. “But at this rate, she’s going to fail.”
She’s going to be expelled, her thoughts added. How much trouble could a student get into before the tutors decided to expel her? Master Tor had clearly thought Emily should be expelled, way back in Second Year. Gordian won’t let her retake the year—he won’t let her retake the Fourth Year—when she’s caused so much trouble.
“Then you have to make her get over herself,” Caleb said. “Or let her fail.”