Indigo glances down at his clothes. It occurs to him that he won’t get very far until he’s free from the putrid smells imprinted in the clothes hugging his body. He takes a few peeks left, then right, and once he is sure nobody is around to see him escape, Indigo leaves in search of a stream.

It feels like forever since he last entered this forest, and he wonders if he’ll ever be truly out of the woods someday, or if this is but a break inside the everlasting storm that has now enveloped his life.

Tiny forest animals jump and dash past him; they are too quick for Indigo to register what they are aside from small, fluffy balls of light and dark browns. He makes it his mission to follow them, and keeps the hope in his heart that wherever they are going will be a place with edible berries, if not more.

Soon enough, Indigo hears the sound of running water, of relief settling back inside his chest. A soft sigh escapes his lips as his shoulders deflate. He takes quick and ushered steps toward the modest stream and bends over to splash cool drops of aqua across his face. No matter how much the healing potion had done for him an hour ago, it’s clear to him that nothing beats the natural elements.

Indigo loses sight of his small forest guides and, in turn, forgets his woes inside the cool and refreshing flow of the water.

Soon, he vouches for the idea of finally taking at least some of his clothes off. He rubs some soap from a modestly sized vial—which had sunk to the bottom of his bag—into the stains, and hangs his coat up to dry.

As Indigo grabs the sides of his shirt and readies himself to pull it off and over his head, a presence causes his limbs to freeze.

In the air above him, cyan, fog-like colors drift around the river. Indigo’s eyes widen—for he recognizes this aura as one belonging to one of the finest healers of his village.

A million solutions, ideas and plans flash into his mind. However, before he can even put them into action, a clear and soft-spoken voice calls out his name. “Indigo?”

Drenched and knee deep in the river, Indigo can only stare at the young woman who scratches her short blond hair in confusion. “You are Indigo, right?” She raises a brow. Indigo wants to meet her gaze, yet he ends up fixing the freckles peppered across her nose instead.

“Alice,” he finally manages, his tone a lot weaker than he’d anticipated. “You followed me?”

She crosses her arms, takes a step forward. “Not exactly,” Alice says with a shake of her head. “You see,” she smirks, “I went out looking for you. I wanted to thank you.”

Indigo huffs. A fish brushes past his ankle, but he pays it no heed. “What is this?” he says. “A hallucination? A sick joke before you turn me in? How did you even survive?” He hates himself for asking the question, for it feels as if he’s admitting to some kind of plotted crime he purposely committed. But I must know, he thinks. It shouldn’t have been possible, not even for a healer of her caliber.

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“It isn’t possible for a healer.” Alice snorts. She points at Indigo. “No offense, but you should see your face right now. It’s priceless!” It occurs to Indigo that something’s off about this version of Alice, for she isn’t the graceful young woman who used to greet the Council every now and then when they visited the village.

“Seriously?” She cringes and makes a scrunched-up face Indigo finds no words to properly describe. “Even you out of all people believed someone as talented as myself would stay at home and wait for people’s legs to be broken in a village where nothing ever happens? Also, having a kid when I’ve barely started my life? Geez, no thanks. But thanks for the info, and for stealing those archives.” She chuckles. “I learned a lot from you, pal.”

Indigo gasps. “You can read my mind,” he whispers, like it is a secret, a lie.

Alice tucks a piece of her bangs behind her ear and snorts. “You got it!” she exclaims, as if Indigo has just won an incredible prize. “Oh.” Alice coughs into her fist. “Yeah, before we go on, I have to say—you have got to stop lusting after the pretty boys, Indigo.”

Indigo makes a gesture to claim it is otherwise. But Alice rolls her eyes, clicks her tongue. “Come on,” she groans. “You don’t remember when that representative for the third years came down to visit? All you could think about was bending him over and—"

“Okay, that’s enough!” Indigo waves his hands in a cross before his burning face. “I don’t…” he blurts, yet quickly stops himself. “Wait a minute.” He pauses. “You knew? I mean…you know, about me? About everything?”

She marches over to the riverside and plops herself right down before him. The dust that leaps out from beneath her causes Indigo to squint. Alice giggles. She rests her chin against an open palm and says, “I know a lot of things.” Her sentence is also made up of hushed mumbles; it leaves Indigo to wonder whether they truly are telling secrets in the traditional sense. “And I also know that it must suck to be you. Honestly, good for you if you’re not being paired up with some random man who doesn’t even know you’re also a man…let alone a fellow user of the Craft.”

Indigo figures he should be creeped out by the fact that she’s been inside his head one too many times; yet in a certain sense, a piece of him feels oddly at ease knowing his terrible experiences are now shared ones. “You didn’t tell anyone,” he states, his voice breathy and brought down by fatigue. Perhaps from the cool of the river, he thinks.

Alice shrugs. “I didn’t feel like I needed to.”

“So, you just spy on people with your gift, then, is that it?”

She laughs again. “Not really. It’s more like I happened to overhear, and then…” She looks to her feet with pursed lips and a raised brow. “Okay, fine.” Alice huffs. “Maybe I was stalking you. But only a little. I mean, it was such a boring life, and you’re such an interesting person, I couldn’t help myself!”

Indigo frowns. “I’m guessing this means you can control it?” he asks; it’s the only thing he can muster after being met with such a revelation.

“Oh, yeah! Totally. Of course, at first, it was kind of a nightmare because it was like my on switch”— Alice motions to her head—“was always on.”

Another fish swims between and past Indigo’s shins. He shivers and bites his lip; their talk had distracted him from the goose bumps that had risen on his legs. “Just get out of the water already,” Alice snaps before he can even have the thought. “I’ve got a better solution to your problems.”

Indigo raises a brow. “What do you mean?”

“I mean…” Alice retrieves a scroll from her own bag and unrolls it right before his face. “You want to get into the Academy, right?”

Indigo’s eyes go wide upon seeing the recipe scribbled across the yellowing, crisp paper. His attention is glued to the ingredients and what this might imply. He gasps. “No way.”