I hoped I’d sleep later than normal after that, but my body has other ideas. I’m wide awake by six and fifteen after midnight. That is not enough sleep to function effectively. I lie on my bed, eyes closed, willing myself to go back to sleep for another hour, but half that time passes without any success and I give up shortly before seven.

Now I have two hours until the first test, and it’ll take me a lot less than that to dress and get breakfast. How am I going to fill the rest of that time? I could – I force myself not to reach into my trunk for the True History. Based on yesterday, doing that would quite likely lead to me missing the first test altogether. And we’re starting with Countering Magical Effects, as well: whatever Electra sets us will not be easy.

Edward will be at breakfast. He’ll think of something to distract me without being too distracting. I wash and change out of my slept-in clothes quietly and make my escape from the dormitory.

He’s in his usual place, reading the papers as usual. I get my porridge and join him.

“Morning,” he says.

“Morning. Anything interesting in the news?” Or anything too interesting, for that matter.

Edward shrugs. “Not really. The usual gossip about the High Princess. And – have you heard of Ariana Carling?”

I think for a second before shaking my head.

“Nor have I,” says Edward. “And yet she’s just been elected leader of the United Reformist Party.”

The URP are the largest Parliamentary faction of the “radicals” Edward was talking about yesterday. They hold about sixty of the two hundred and fifty elected seats but are apparently predicted to take many more in the upcoming elections, and it’s likely that their new leader will have much influence in the next Parliament.

“An unknown factor,” I say.

Edward nods. “The papers have all been scrambling to find out all about her. Here – “ He hands me a copy of the Herald, open to a page describing what’s known about Ariana Carling. There isn’t much to note: she’s only just thirty and worked as a secretary to the URP before entering politics in her own right.

That’s about it other than her speech to the URP after the leadership election, which makes it clear that she’s certainly ambitious and radical.

“If she’s hiding something, my dad will find it,” Edward says flatly. “I’m not sure she is, though – that speech seems like she’s a genuine believer in her cause at least.”

“As opposed to…”

“Someone in the pay of a more established faction, twisting the radical agenda to suit their own purposes.”

Of course. I don’t know what else I expected.

Politics proves to be an effective distraction, and over the next hour or so I expand my knowledge of the current state of affairs.

Elsie joins us at eight after midnight. Well, she tries to avoid us, but I wave conspicuously enough that she can’t pretend she hasn’t seen us.

“I’m sorry about yesterday,” she says, sitting down next to me. “If I’d known that – well – I wouldn’t have done it.”

“Thank you,” says Edward carefully. “And it’s okay. You had no way of knowing.”

“You’re both okay, then? When you disappeared straight after, I was worried – “

“We’re fine,” I assure her. “Just… Edward needed to be – “ alone with me, is the end of that sentence, but I realise before saying it that it carries quite the wrong implications. “And you? Elizabeth said you were out of sorts afterwards.”

Elsie shrugs. “I just felt bad about what happened with Edward. You’re right, I had no way of knowing, but I should have at least checked with you all that it was okay. I’d never forgive myself if – if something had happened because of that.”

That’s all true, I know, but I’ve told enough half-truths to recognise that overly casual tone. There’s more to it than that. It must be whatever the fortune-teller said or did in that tent. Still, this is hardly the time for an interrogation even if I want to push her to talk about it, so I let it go for now.

“Anyway,” she says. “Feeling ready for today?”

I wince. My goal is to get through the tests without an active episode, and preferably pass everything. And I’m still not convinced I can accomplish that. “…ish?” I try.

“Please, Tallulah. You’ll be fine. You’re so much more prepared than I am. I feel like I barely know half of what we’ve covered so far.”

I feel much the same way, actually, and the fact I’ve somehow persuaded Elsie I’m prepared doesn’t help.

Edward doesn’t dignify Elsie’s question with an answer. “Maybe we shouldn’t talk about the tests now,” he says. “Let’s at least forget about them for one last hour. Tallulah and I were just discussing the King’s Party’s prospects for the upcoming elections.”

I realise that I may not be much more normal than Edward, if I think talk of politics is a pleasant distraction from worry about the tests. Elsie’s expression suggests that she disagrees with me on that.

“I don’t follow politics,” she says. “I wouldn’t know.”

“Well, you must at least be planning to vote for one party or another – “

“I don’t turn sixteen until spring. Not eligible.”

That rather puts a halt to Edward’s attempt at conversation.

“So you’re the only one of us who can actually vote,” I say in an attempt to resume it. “Who are you voting for?”

Edward shrugs. “King’s Party.”

His dad is a member, if only because nearly all the hereditary seats are considered members of the King’s Party unless they or the King declare otherwise. That makes it a broad coalition which is nearly always in government but has a lot more difficulty agreeing on policy than any other party.

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“Edward Blackthorn, a loyal royalist,” Elsie says teasingly. “Who’d have thought?”

“I’m the heir of a Royal Magician. I can hardly be anything else. No sensible King would let someone not loyal to them be their advisor.”

After all, the King does have the power to strip even the Blackthorns of their titles and influence. It’s strange, though: he must have a decent working relationship with Lord Blackthorn, and yet I can’t imagine the latter taking orders from anyone.

Hannah and Aisha join us. They’re quizzing each other on counterspells. I know the answers to their questions, but it still makes me worried. The rest of our classmates trickle in over the next few minutes.

Today is the practical Countering Magical Effects test. Electra wants to test each of us individually, and each of my classmates has a five-minute timeslot. It’s in alphabetical order, so my test will be one of the last. I want to leave the dining hall – being there is not helping my stress levels at all – but it feels awkward to abandon everyone else.

Instead I reach into my pocket and focus on channelling magic into the enchanted bead. I’m surprised to see it light up; I feel on the edge of an episode, but maybe I’m okay. I force myself to breathe slowly and sink into the trance-like state of working magic. I don’t need to for simple channelling by now, but there’s comfort in losing yourself to the flow.

I understand why Electra warned against drawing too deep from your magic.

“Well,” says Hannah, standing up, a couple of minutes before nine. “If I don’t come back, I’m leaving my white dress to Aisha and would like to be remembered to my family.”

We all laugh, though it’s more out of nervousness than because what she said is funny. She sets off with the air of a condemned woman. I’m not surprised. If there’s one thing worse than being tested on your magical ability for the first time, it’s being tested on your magical ability for the first time by Electra.

Edward is next, a few minutes later. He’s been trying to fade into the background since more people arrived, and I think a lot of people had forgotten he was there. “If I don’t come back,” he says, “Tallulah knows the contingency plans.”

I don’t know any contingency plans for Edward not coming back from a test – oh. This is his idea of a joke, isn’t it? Very funny, Edward.

I’m even less amused when neither Hannah nor Edward return to the dining hall within ten minutes of leaving. Electra probably told them not to talk to us, to avoid spoiling whatever was on the test. Or maybe she told them not to talk to us so we’re suitably terrified. If that’s the case, I think it’s working.

“I hate my surname,” mutters Robin, when there’s only her, me and Daniel left.

She’ll have to wait the longest of anyone, so I’m not surprised. Though there’s a more bitter note than I expected there. Didn’t Edward once say she wasn’t on the best of terms with her family? I wonder what the story is there; does it have to do with whatever Mildred did to her?

I glance at the clock again. Three minutes until my timeslot. I stand reluctantly. If I don’t come back has become a running joke whenever one of us leaves, but I haven’t been thinking of a good line. I’ve been too busy channelling magic and trying not to have a Malaina episode.

I could leave my history books to Elsie, but she also hasn’t come back. And tell my parents I love them doesn’t feel quite right given recent events. “If I don’t come back… remember me,” I say. “And preferably not just as that one weird Malaina girl.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll remember you as that one weird history geek instead,” says Robin.

“Thanks,” I say sarcastically, and set off for the Countering Magical Effects classroom.

I arrive one minute early. There’s no sound from inside the room, even though Aisha should still be there. Of course Electra has warded the classroom specifically for this. I pace back and forth along the corridor, channelling more magic into the bead. It still lights up, somehow. Is this careful control a way to avoid a Malaina episode? I should do it more often.

Precisely on time, the door swings open. Aisha emerges. She doesn’t appear to be crying, which is a good sign, but there’s definitely tension in her and she barely reacts to my “How was it?”

Electra is waiting in the doorway, holding the door open behind me. “Hello, Tallulah,” she says, smiling. “Do come in.” Is it just me, or is her lipstick a shade redder than normal? How has Edward ever managed to be in the same room as her without having a Malaina episode?

I slip the bead back into my pocket, my fingers releasing it reluctantly, and step into the classroom. No monsters jump out from the shadows and no traps are sprung, but Electra does shut the door with a faintly ominous click.

“Sit down,” she says.

I cross the room to my usual desk and sit.

She follows me, and places a fist-sized cube of wood on the desk in front of me. “Identify and remove the enchantment on this object. You have two minutes. You may not use any detection devices you may have on your person.”

I supress a laugh at that last sentence. I have a feeling I know who made it necessary. That’s not important right now. I need to focus. Most enchantments can be removed by a purging-spell, but the requirement to identify it first makes that less of an option.

I should probably make sure it is enchanted before anything else, since Electra would absolutely give me a perfectly mundane cube of wood and watch me suffer through trying to find its enchantment. That divination spell is one I know well, at least. I cast it and discover that if there’s a trick to this assignment, it isn’t quite that obvious: the cube is enchanted.

There’s only a handful of other divination spells I know that would be useful in this situation. The one that springs to mind, though, isn’t one we’ve learnt in class: it’s one Edward taught me while I was learning to enchant my bead. It detects whether an object is drawing in magic from the ambience. Knowing that would narrow down a lot of possibilities.

But if it wasn’t taught in class, it can’t be the expected method. And besides we’re not supposed to teach ourselves spells outside of class. Then again, Electra tacitly allowed Edward to do it on our first day here. She probably already knows he’s dragged me into extra-curricular magic. And she didn’t say anything about which spells we should use.

I cast the divination spell. Electra watches me curiously and scribbles a note, but says nothing. The cube isn’t drawing magic from the ambience. That means either it’s a permanent enchantment that doesn’t require magic to sustain itself, or it’s activated by channelling magic into it.

I lift the cube and examine it from all angles, trying to work out whether it has any anomalous properties that would give a clue about the enchantment active on it. No such luck: it seems a perfectly ordinary cube of wood in every respect.

It’s been nearly a minute, and I’ve made very little progress.

It’s a test set by Electra. I shouldn’t expect it to be straightforward. I have to stay calm, stay focused, keep trying things. I try channelling a little magic into the cube, but even losing myself in the flow a little gives me nothing. It’s not too hard to tell when an object responds to your channelling; the flow is so much quicker, more natural. It could be that there’s only a particular point on the cube where channelling would work, though. I turn the cube over in my hands, pressing my fingers to different points and focusing on the flow of magic. There’s no reaction.

Most likely a permanent enchantment, then, but I haven’t ruled out the possibility it’s something like my bead that only activates if magic is channelled in the right way.

“Thirty seconds left,” Electra says, smiling a little.

Probably a permanent enchantment. Has no evident effect, but then a permanent enchantment wouldn’t most of the time. I run my hands over the cube again, trying to feel something, anything, that isn’t just what’s expected. Nothing.

Should I just cast a purging-spell? Would Electra give me more credit for removing the enchantment even if I can’t identify it, or would admitting defeat like that see me lose marks?

I don’t have time to freeze in indecision like that. My hands are shaking, stars help me, and I doubt that the bead would light up if I tried it now. I take a couple of breaths and reach for the familiar calm I need to cast. It takes me three attempts to cast the purging-spell. I know it well; I can normally get it first try. And now that I’m being graded on my performance –

I cut that thought off before it gets any further. Yeah, this is definitely the start of an episode. I can’t do anything more with this assignment in the twelve seconds I have left, though, so I take them to close my eyes and focus on breathing and kings. Charles First-King. Edwin the Just. Simon the Drunkard. Thomas –

“And that’s time up,” Electra says, scooping the cube off the table and slipping it into a pocket. “Your next task – “ she raises a hand, and five paper birds soar up from her desk at the front of the classroom – “is to bring down these birds. You have one minute.”