Violence echoed through the school’s hallways and near its alleyways.

The rumors surrounding Magic’s absence for the remainder of his allotted two weeks was rife with taunts and targeted attacks that tested Mira’s patience. Some yanked on the back of her shirt collar in the hallway between classes. She retaliated by slamming her heel into their knees. Others pushed her into the railing of the stairs. She fought back against that, too, tripping her assailants and watching them tumble.

At one point, Bentley had taken to pouring dirt—ash, she recognized from the porches of the southern houses—into her locker through the grates. Thalia had told her the morning it happened in class and when Mira found him standing outside the doors of the gymnasium, she’d slugged him in the face without giving him the time to make a half-assed remark about her brother’s absence as he’d taken to doing so many days before.

How’d the seance go? No spirits today? Or are the ones in your cabinets at home emptied already?

What’s the matter, Witch? Tired of digging up ghosts?

Mira didn’t know which insult she was hitting him for. Maybe it was all of them at once. But what she did know was that after her father came back from delivering the basket to Magic and Amelia’s house, the promise she’d made to him shattered the second she stepped into school the next day.

How’d he look? she’d asked, dreading the answer.

Benji walked up the steps behind her in agonizing silence before dropping himself onto the couch. The expression on his face that made her think he would have opened up the black box in their living room if he hadn’t been trying to keep a sober streak.

Ill, he’d said. Better than the wake … but very thin in the face.

The next morning, Mira woke with a vengeance so hot, she didn’t even need a calling card for her usual suspects to turn the other way.

She’d spent several periods that week sitting in the Headmistress’s office, waiting for her father to arrive where they’d talk about the usual. She was too reckless. Too disruptive. Too violent. She was a girl with a predilection for finding fights and ending them. A girl with a notorious reputation for testing her boundaries, even when those boundaries demanded to be pushed and fought against.

It almost made her laugh.

Especially since the key thing Mira knew that was missing in all of these conversations—conversations that she’d had so many countless times before—was that she was none of those things; not to the fullest extent. Sure, she was reckless. Sure, she was violent. Those were what she was at the surface. The colorful showcase of her bottled emotions.

Most of all, Mira was angry.

Angry that no one took this seriously enough.

Angry that no one saw her side.

No one aside from her father who, when he arrived to walk her home one afternoon, simply patted her on the back and hugged her tight.

When she was allowed back in the building two days later, the underclassmen avoided her like the plague. Word had gotten around during her own temporary leave. Freshmen and sophomores looked away as they passed Mira in the halls. Even some of the juniors and seniors left her alone for a while. It was an uneasy truce in this war of violent tongues and raging egos, but Mira was glad for the quiet, however false it was.

Janie and Thalia had little news for her, which irritated her so much she’d nearly kicked a wall. To deescalate the situation and their friend’s rising temper, the three of them relocated to the alleyway beside the school, sitting in a line as they ate snacks they’d kept in their bags from lunch, sharing crackers and cookies in the dark, musty passageway.

Mira hadn’t been by the alleyway since she’d spirited away Mabel to her short-term home with Magic. Being here now under different circumstances with different people from her norm was playing with her emotions in a way it shouldn’t have.

Or maybe that was her previous ones that hadn’t ebbed away yet.

The group sat listening to the chatter and gnawing on snacks. Mira, sandwiched between Janie on her left and Thalia on her right, wiggled a biscuit between her fingers. She pressed it against her lips a few times, but didn’t have the appetite to eat.

For the sake of consistency, Mira broke off small bits of her food and tossed it as if she were feeding her beloved cat. Crows and ravens swooped by instead, pecking at the scraps, asserting dominance over sparrows and quails with long, splayed wings.

Thalia prodded her shoulder. “Are you actually going to eat those?” she asked. “Or do you plan on giving them all to the birds?”

Without a word, Mira shoved the packet in her friend’s direction. She kept her attention on the remaining food in her hands to avoid the shock in the girl’s amber and brown eyes.

“Something’s up with you, Mirabel,” said Janie, her mouth packed to the brim with a cinnamon sugar cookie that left its crumbled trail along the girl’s jacket. “You haven’t said a word all day today aside from at the lockers. That’s not like you.”

“Not in the mood,” Mira replied, continuing to chuck biscuit crumbs further down the alley.

“Is your brother okay at least?” asked Thalia. When Mira didn’t respond, Thalia continued. “He’s been out for a bit. I don’t see you walking with him anymore.”

“Since when did you get to school early?”

“Since I started falling behind in Science. Miss Goodwin wants me there early in the morning every other day for extra help along with three other people. So sometimes, if I leave early enough, I’ll see you two sitting here.”

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Why didn’t you say hi?” asked Mira.

Thalia shrugged, her tightly coiled hair bobbing with the brief shake of her head. “You were the one who said he wasn’t really a people person. So I didn’t try.”

“I mean, I’m sure if you’d said something from a distance it would’ve been fine … I think.”

Janie lightly tossed her book bag in front of her lap, startling the small murder of crows to their right. “Does he usually get like this when the bells happen?”

“That’s what Amelia said when she called. He’s usually pretty jumpy—and it was a lot worse when he didn’t have the headphones, too.”

The conversation went suddenly still. Janie leaned forward, a worried furrow between her brows as she searched Thalia’s anxious expression with pursed lips. Mira felt her heart pound, thudding incessantly between her ribs. She was strangely warm despite the budding December chill. “What?”

“You aren’t going to like what Callie overheard, then,” whispered Janie.

“I thought you said you had no news?” Mira said, nearly shouting. The nearby birds cawed and honked at the volume.

“We said we didn’t have good news,” Thalia clarified. “Callie pulled me aside in class—I don’t know what changed for her to start talking to me more, but that’s besides the point. The anniversary is in two weeks.”

“I know that, Lia. Way too well.”

“But Mirabel,” Janie cut in, “there’s names being thrown around. And it’s not just Magic.”

“It’s him,” Thalia continued, “Kyrie, Lowell, Chase, Luminia … It’s everyone who attended the phoenix wake that year.”

Food crumbled in Mira’s hands—she’d completely forgotten she was holding it still and she chucked the remains at the birds further down. They scattered at first from the incoming crumbs, but when the shock settled, they returned to pecking at it, eying the three of them closely with a glint in their beady black eyes.

Briefly, Mira saw herself reflected in it. Wild. Feral. Eager to dole out punishment. “What’s the plan?”

“Theirs?” asked Thalia. “Not sure. Not even Callie knew. She just told us to keep an eye out in December—sit the fuck down, Mirabel.” She snagged Mira by the bottom of her jacket and yanked her back to the ground. Mira grudgingly complied. “Heavens. If you start throwing punches now, I’m going to have to land one across your jaw to stop you from walking straight. It’s a rumor. Nothing more, nothing less.”

“And I’m supposed to let them talk shit when Magic gets back next week? They’re not getting the jump on him. Not on anyone. I’ve seen what these wakes do to people and the damage they cause. I won’t let them.”

Janie rubbed her hands together, clearly fearful of the whole thing. She looked small, curled into herself like a little hedgehog. “Mirabel, they could also be saying something like this just to get you riled up and distracted. It wouldn’t shock me if Bentley and his little posse of idiots found your outbursts amusing, not threatening. Listen to Thalia. Stop.”

Everything in Mira’s body disagreed. She didn’t want to hold back. And she sure as hell didn’t want to stop, either. Bentley had given her far too many issues for her to consider putting all of this on hold. She was so sick and tired of people getting away with stuff like this, but Mira didn’t want to worry her friends either. She drew long, deep breaths into her lungs. “Fine,” she whispered.

“And promise,” Thalia said, amber and brown eyes glinting, “that you won’t do anything stupid until we figure out more.”

“I promise,” Mira replied, with the knowledge that she may as well have been speaking with her fingers crossed behind her back.

That weekend, Mira ran through contingency plans while Benji delivered baskets. He kept more than one with him so that he could justify being out longer, though the idea that her father even needed to do that didn’t sit right with her.

She kept her eyes on the clock, her ears to the brick oven, and her attention on the easily fabricated lies that came out of her mouth to placate nosy customers confused about her father’s absence. It was a tedious thing, but Mira was grateful for even the slightest bit of a distraction.

In the middle of sliding out a large loaf of seeded bread out of the oven, though, a familiar voice with a southern drawl echoed throughout the first floor of the bakery.

“Benji’s out running today?”

Mira whirled, nearly smacking the peel against the bricks. She dropped the loaf into a basket as a woman entered, gravitating towards the pastries on display. “I didn’t think we were in the season for deliveries,” said the customer. “I thought that happened when it snowed.”

“It does,” Mira replied, shaking off her nerves through a flick of her wrists. “But my father likes to make it widely known that he’s always willing to run baskets no matter the weather.”

The older woman smiled. She had dark skin—a few shades darker than Mira herself—and bright, brown eyes, one of which was darker than the other. Her high cheekbones and friendly mouth reminded her a lot of her friend Thalia. And, considering she was Thalia’s mother, that wasn’t shocking to her.

Tammala Regali—Tammi, as Benji referred to her—browsed the remainder of the pastries for sale, a wry smile on her face. “Then I suppose I’ll have to remind Callum to put his orders in. Thalia always complains that he forgets.”

Mira’s lips twitched. She dramatically opened her arms as if to showcase the remaining pastries in the display before crossing her arms atop the counter, rising on her toes to rest her head on her arms. “Anything to suit your fancy?”

Tammi shook her head. “No,” said the woman with a laugh, “not today. I’ll take a tea, though, if you’re up for it.”

“Sure thing.” Mira propelled herself towards the kettle, adjusting its heat as Tammi sat at one of the small tables. “Can I ask what brings you back to Chrome? Grimmshollow is a bit of a walk from here.”

“Oh, I came by horse. Stopped by to visit Thalia to double check on her.” The woman tapped her nails along the tiny table while the kettle sang and Mira poured the boiling water into a tea cup with as much care as possible before rounding the corner to deliver it. “While I’m here, though, I was hoping to catch your father.”

Mira set the tea down, then paused. “My father?”

Tammi sipped from the cup, making a tiny, pleased noise in her throat. She placed it back down and folded her hands in her lap. “Yes. He called me the other day and asked if I could swing by for a favor, though he wouldn’t specify what it was over the phone. Do you have any idea?”

She shook her head. Mira didn’t have the slightest clue what her father could want from her friend’s mom. And she didn’t have to wait all that long because as Tammi was about to speak, the chime sounded and Benji came in with a lag to his stride that told Mira there was bad news today.

“Hey, Bella,” he said. “How did front door duty—?”

Mira blinked, watching her father’s eyes flit from her to Tammi, as though he were taking in the scene before him. Then, he straightened, put one hand on the door, looked back over at Tammi and said, “You’re early.”

“And you’re late,” replied the other woman, who rose with the tea cup in her hands. She gave Mira the kind of placating look that said she was allowed to leave or go upstairs, but confusion kept her rooted to the spot. Tammi sighed and shook her head before motioning outside the bakery with her head.

Benji got the message and opened the door. Once Tammi had walked onto the porch, he pulled Mira aside and gave her a small peck on the temple with no more than that for an explanation before joining Tammi on the other side of the door.

Mira debated lingering. Curiosity begged her to eavesdrop, snag even the slightest bit of information away from the adult discussion. She saw her father’s tired look on his face, the weariness in his entire being. In that moment, she decided that it was a conversation she could ask about another day.

Another day, if Mira could ever breach the topic without risking a break-in.

Because when her father retired to the couch that evening, she didn’t miss his lingering stare on the black box.