As it turns out, though, at least two of the trio I’m looking for aren’t too hard to find. Elizabeth and Robin are in our usual study room; Robin is reading while Elizabeth paces up and down. They both glance up as I enter, and I see their relief as they recognise me.

“Tallulah! You’re okay!” Elizabeth says. “Is Edward – “

“He’s fine,” I reply. “Back here. Just feeling more anti-social than normal.”

“If that’s even possible,” Robin adds, smiling. “Look, I’m sorry if what I said earlier made things worse. I just wasn’t thinking – “

“It’s okay,” I say, though what she said probably did push Edward closer to an active episode. “Don’t worry about it. It’s fine now.”

“That was… Malaina, wasn’t it?” Elizabeth says.

I nod.

Neither of them asks why, thankfully.

“Where’s Elsie?” I ask after a moment’s silence.

They both flinch a little at that. “She… she hasn’t been herself, since coming out of that tent,” says Elizabeth.

“I don’t know if it’s what the fortune-teller said or what she saw when she came out, but… she was quiet all the way back, even quieter than she usually is, and then she disappeared once we reached the Academy.”

Great. All I need. Because dealing with one traumatised friend isn’t hard enough. I supress the uncharitable thought by reminding myself that Edward and Elsie both helped me when I was the one in need. “Should… should I go and find her?” I ask.

Robin shrugs. “She didn’t want our company, but you get on better with her than we do. I’m not sure where she’d be, anyway. None of us share a dorm with her, and I don’t really want to go poking around there.”

Elizabeth has a private room, due to the age gap between her and the rest of the first-year students. Much as I love my dorm-mates, I’m a little jealous of her for that, but even the Academy isn’t big enough for every single student to have a room to themselves. It’s only for those with special circumstances. Naturally, that includes Edward, not that he spends much time in his room.

“Thanks,” I say. I’m not sure whether I should go looking for Elsie. She might not want my company, and after the day’s revelations I don’t know if I’m up to another emotionally draining conversation. Stars, this was supposed to be a relaxing day before the tests tomorrow, and now I’m never going to be able to focus on them properly and all my revision will have been for nothing –

I’m breathing too fast, my heart beating too quickly. I’m not surprised when I channel what’s meant to be a little magic into my enchanted bead and nothing happens. Charles First-King. Edwin the Just. Simon the Drunkard.

Maybe I shouldn’t look for Elsie. I feel a stab of guilt at the thought of that, though, and my concentration on the list of kings slips a little. Thomas the Defender. Eleanor the Bold. It’s okay. I’m going to be okay. “Sorry about ditching you earlier,” I say, calm enough to speak. I try the bead again, but it still doesn’t light up. Timothy the Peacemaker.

“I don’t think you really have any responsibility for that,” Robin says, lips twitching in amusement.

Edward isn’t my responsibility, despite my so-far-unsuccessful attempts to turn him into a somewhat more normal person. “Mm.” I agree. Maria the Seafarer.

“Well,” says Elizabeth. “I’m going to get some rest. See you at dinner, I suppose?”

“See you,” I agree noncommittally. She and Robin leave the study room, and I realise belatedly that they were only there because they wanted me or Edward to come and find them, to make sure we were okay.

That thought helps me banish the last traces of the episode, and when I try the bead for the third time it glows a faint starlight-silver. Now I can think clearly, I can decide what to do.

I should be revising.

I should be looking for Elsie.

I should be processing the day’s revelations about Edward.

I should be learning a few basic wards so I can tell the others the cover story we’ve agreed on.

I don’t want to do any of those things. I just want to curl up in a ball and hope that if I ignore all those things long enough, they’ll go away. I know from bitter experience that problems do not have a habit of doing that, though.

The wards, at least, are out for today. I need Edward’s tuition for that if I want it to not take several hours longer than it needs to. And I think he wants to be alone at the moment.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

I did promise Edward I wouldn’t revise today. And I doubt I could do much in the mood I’m in now. But I need to do something; I also doubt I could properly rest in this state.

I’ll think. About Edward, about the day’s events, about how I can help him.

I close the door of the study room behind Elizabeth and Robin, and slump into the nearest chair.

It’s not that I’m afraid of Edward now, even knowing what he did. I’ve known him long enough to know that he would never hurt me even in the depths of an active episode. And I know that the circumstances of his Fall were extreme enough that with any luck there’ll never be a second episode that strong.

But it would also be a lie to say it changes nothing. You can’t quite look at someone in the same way once you know they’ve killed someone. And he’d do it again, so he says, if he thought it necessary. I guess I always knew Edward had that ruthless streak – the coldly analytical way he talks sometimes makes it clear – but there’s a difference between objectively knowing something and really understanding it emotionally.

Why are people all so contradictory? It feels like half the people I know are actually two completely different people at once, and I don’t know how to deal with it.

I try to put myself in Edward’s position. Alone, helpless, knowing that my father and I are in danger because of me. Knowing that it’s a choice between letting that unfold and – well, Falling. Unleashing Malaina, knowing the consequences.

I remember suddenly that exchange between Edward and Electra on my first day at the Academy.

If it’s a choice between that and death – Edward suggested. I thought nothing of it at the time, more struck by Electra’s response, but now I know that he was faced with exactly that choice, and he did not choose death as Electra instructed.

Stars, when I met him it must have been only a handful of days since that, and he seemed fine. I never would have guessed what he’d just been through back then.

I don’t know what to do now. He wouldn’t want my pity, and I can’t truly understand what he must have felt in that moment. I guess I just have to keep being his friend, keep being there. That’s all I can do, really. I hope it’s enough.

It might take me a while to fully process what I’ve learnt, but I feel a little better already. Now I just need to track down Elsie. Or I could wait until dinner; there’s plenty of time left in the day, and maybe then she’ll be more findable.

And in the meantime, I can – oh. I haven’t even started reading the True History of the Thalian Crisis Electra let me borrow. I buried it at the bottom of my trunk and told myself I couldn’t read it until tests were over, but by then there’ll only be a week before the Holy Days break, and we’re not allowed to keep Academy library books over the holidays.

“Tallulah? Are you there?”

…but the Prince of Thalia did not yet comprehend the full implications of… “Yes?” I say, pulling back the curtains that surround my bed.

“It’s six and ten,” says Robin. “Are you coming to dinner?”

Oh. Dinner. Yes, that is what normally happens at this sort of time. Wait: six and ten? Has it really been three hours? I know I often lose track of time when I’m reading, but… the stiffness of my neck from the way I’ve been sitting bent over the book hits me suddenly. Yeah. It probably has been three hours. “Yes,” I say. “Sorry. I was reading, and I lost track of time.”

Robin laughs. “That does not surprise me. Anything good?”

“Some history thing,” I say, trying to sound casual. “Probably wouldn’t interest you.”

Much to my despair, Elsie remains the only one of my friends with the slightest interest in history. I’m technically not lying, I guess, but it feels like a lie nonetheless.

“You’re probably right,” Robin agrees, much to my relief. “Anyway. I guess I should wait for you to come down with me. Just in case you get more distracted.”

I give her a teasing glare, but swing myself out of bed and shut the True History in my trunk. “Let’s go, then.”

Elizabeth is the only one waiting for us in the dining hall. Edward was here just long enough to notice I was missing and send Robin to look for me, apparently, but then disappeared before he could be drawn into a conversation. And Elizabeth found Elsie, who says she’s fine but not hungry.

I’ve learnt my lesson about skipping meals by now, more or less, so I’m a little concerned by that. Especially since Elsie normally has a keen appetite.

I’m still too deeply buried in the True History to be properly worried about her, or to really engage in conversation, so I mostly just half-listen to Robin and Elizabeth making small talk. Elizabeth notices my withdrawal after a while and asks if I’m okay.

“I’m fine,” I say. “Just buried in a book.”

“Of course you are,” Elizabeth replies, smiling. “Don’t you ever give yourself a break?”

I don’t think she realises that for me, losing myself in a history book is a break.

I make myself stay until everyone has finished eating rather than gobbling down my food and immediately dashing off to get back to the True History. I can’t teach Edward to socialise if I’m failing to do it myself, can I?

So it’s just gone seven after noon by the time I return to the dormitory and the True History. I can’t stay up too late reading, though: I need to sleep well before the tests start tomorrow. It’s already dark, so I cast a light-spell to read by and make myself comfortable.

Inevitably, when I come to the end of a chapter and think to check the time, it’s almost midnight.

See, says a little voice in my mind that sounds awfully like my mother’s, this is why you’re not doing better. Just think what you’d be capable of if you could just focus on your studies the way you do on those history books of yours.

She told me things like that more than once while I was at Genford.

And maybe she’s right, because despite all my good resolutions it looks as if I’ll be going into the tests sleep-deprived and head full of history and worry for my friends, which is not how you succeed.

I’m not surprised to feel my breathing quickening, my heart beating a little faster. My light-spell is brighter than it should be, bright enough it might wake the others despite my curtains if I don’t stop it. I dismiss the spell quickly. The loss of light makes me feel a little more on edge.

Charles First-King. Edwin the Just. I reach into my pocket for the enchanted bead, but I know it won’t light up for me right now.

Simon the Drunkard. The silence of the night lets me hear my breathing as I force it to slow. Thomas the Defender.

It takes me until Maria the Seafarer to gain a new silver light this time. Now I just need to sleep. I should probably change first, but that would disturb the others. And the enforced calm of a just-passed Malaina episode is a sleep-like state, which would be disturbed by making my way to the bathroom.

I settle for kicking off my shoes, returning the True History to the trunk with a little reluctance, and curling up beneath the covers. I’m asleep quickly.