RYAN. BETWIXT FIRST AND SECOND.

Ryan was interested to see Angie emerge from the stairwell with Ardath Osterly and Circe Pendergast, actually appearing to be engaged in conversation with them, shortly after the other boys left. However, Angie immediately gestured toward Ryan and walked away from them. They both watched with puzzled expressions.

“Hello Matchstick,” Ryan said, winking at his girl. Though more accurately he was her boy. Whatevs.

She smiled. “Hey Snowball.”

“Come on,” he said, wrinkling his nose. “At least not in public.”

“Aww, you embarrassed?” Angie said slyly.

“And no teasing,” Ryan said, pouting.

“You wimp,” she said, grinning at him, and he grinned back. Even before she’d finished turning to start walking though, the grin slid off her face and she developed a small crease between her eyebrows.

They made their way toward the west door of the tower. Something was up with her, and not just because of the events of the morning, or because she was cranky about being in Pre-Enchanting. “What’s up?” Ryan asked as they opened the door. “Something new?”

Angie shrugged, and her voice was a little distant. She was working on whatever it was, still digesting it. “Yeah. I’ll tell you later, though, when Evan’s around.” She frowned more deeply. “It’ll be easier to tell you both once.”

“Mm, okay...” Ryan replied. “Did it happen to involve Chris Gramyre?”

“What, you saw us talking and didn’t come introduce yourself?” Angie asked.

Ryan grinned. “Nah. I saw him go the same way you did, and then his parade stopped and turned into a crowd. Was pretty sure, what with you looking all puzzled like that.”

Angie shook her head. “You just deduced it. Of course. Incredible.”

“Thank you. What was it? What happened?”

Angie’s smile turned upside down. “I told you I’d tell you when Evan was around. So here’s your punishment. We both had magpie auguries, and that’s all I’m telling you alone. You have to start learning to respect what people say. Gramyre was just as bad.”

Ryan felt bad, and was also horrified. He wanted to know so badly, now. “I’m sorry. I’ll drop it. I might die, but I’ll wait.”

“You baby,” she said. “You need to learn patience too. You accomplish things too quickly and easily.”

They headed straight across the quad to the Language building for Freshman Common-tongue, their Fredonic language course for the year. There was barely even a bubble of space around them on the way over, so many of the upperclassmen didn’t know or care about their deal.

They’d nearly reached the door when someone said, “Oh my moon, Angie? Ryan?”

They turned to find a taller girl with sandy hair and a long, mildly horsey face, wearing a white button up blouse and some nice jeans. Angie lit up. “Tammy?!” she cried out. “Oh my spirits! I didn’t know you would be here!”

“Angie! I’ve barely been back a week,” Tammy Whiteshrine said, grinning as she stepped up to them. “Oh, it’s so good to see a friendly face! Haven’t recognized any people so far this morning! Sorry I haven’t reached out. We have to get together and catch up!”

“Absolutely! And you can tell us about how San Francisco was!” Angie said, grinning back. “I’m happy to see a friendly face, too, believe me. You missed a real shitshow while you were gone.” Some of the joy faded, and she said ruefully, “Though you wouldn’t have stood for any of it, if you’d been there.”

“What now?” Tammy frowned. “What happened?”

Angie said, “I don’t want to talk about it here.”

“It’ll take a while to get into and won’t be super fun,” Ryan said. “What lunch you have?”

“First,” Tammy replied, looking worried.

“Damn,” Ryan said. “We have second. I could send you a primer online?”

“Um. Sure? Did it have anything to do with why you and Evan have had your profiles locked the whole time we’ve had them?” Tammy said, frowning. Then she looked apologetically at Angie, her eyes sinking downward as she talked. “I’m, um, really sorry for not ever writing.”

Angie looked away as Tammy continued. “I just kinda didn’t know what was going on, with them having closed profiles and you never doing anything with yours, and Megan’s full of other people. I, um… I guess I didn’t want to know.” She fidgeted with one of her (un-charmed, purely decorative) bracelets. “I’m really sorry.”

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

“It’s okay,” Angie said, still looking away. “I certainly could have written you, too. I just…”

“I sent Evan my condolences,” Tammy said, barely audible. “I never heard back. I was afraid I’d said the wrong thing.”

“Evan still has a small pile of unopened mail from people we were in grade school but not middle school with,” Angie said quietly. “He could never bear to open them.”

Tammy took that in and slowly nodded. “I get that. I wish I’d been better. I just… I didn’t know if we’d ever come back.”

“And I get that,” Angie said. “It’s hard. We didn’t get Social profiles until we were thirteen. That was two years we didn’t write, since it had to be by hand and we were kids.”

Tammy chuckled and nodded. “Exactly. I had new friends, who I miss now, but I missed you guys too.”

They stood in silence for a moment.

“Here, let me get your comm, and then we should get to class,” Tammy said as she got out her phone, smiling with at least a little levity. “We can make plans to catch up later. You going to Freshman Common?”

“Yup,” Ryan said, and spouted his commcode to her.

“Nice! Me too,” Tammy said, then Angie and Tammy gave theirs. “I’m excited to have a class with you guys. This’ll be fun!”

“Hopefully!” Ryan said brightly.

“Hopefully?” Tammy said, looking at him with puzzlement.

“We’ll see how things go,” Ryan said. “Shit’s a little up in the air, and you never know with a class. Teach could stink.”

“Yeah, I suppose,” Tammy said, still puzzled, as they entered the room. They caught three seats next to each other.

“Okay, tell us about San Francisco,” Angie said, smiling now. “I’ve never left Seattle. I’m jealous!”

“Frisco was cool, but kinda weird,” Tammy said, and then got into it, at least for a couple minutes before class started.

As she did, Ryan took stock of the classroom. Katier Ryuyama was in there, carefully not looking at Ryan and Angie. And there were others of note, of course, and Ryan noted them all.[1] This class had potential to be interesting, if other people turned out to be interesting too.

[1] There are a lot of people in this high school, and Ryan knows about them all. You don’t want to hear about them all.

MEGAN. BETWEEN FIRST AND SECOND.

Once Beth finished getting a handle on her sobbing and they got back to Choir, it was fine. The instructor was just getting a feel for everyone’s voice individually and grouping them appropriately. It was a nice chill class where Megan could stand aside quietly and think for a while. Katier and Beth both gave her space. They didn’t even try to talk to her after class, which suited Megan fine. She was thinking about what to say to Lauren.

After the bell, Megan crossed the quad, on the lookout for Katie Kay or Lauren, but no luck before reaching the Social Studies building. No one tried to talk to her, including a lot of Asphodel students she was on friendly terms with. Lots of people watched her, more even than was normal, and not just Asphodel students. Her discovery of the Exiles must be getting around, and her expression must be warding off any attempt to talk to her.

But whispering followed in her wake.

Once she arrived in her Civics class, no one from Asphodel would meet her eye. She did, however, share the class with a few people from other schools that she’d met only at Lauren’s parties and various sports-meets, and two of them approached her as she settled down in a seat.

One was Oberon Stormheart, whose older brother, a senior, was a Light Bearer. Handsome, with a cool red-brown complexion, thickly curled hair, and dark brown eyes, Oberon had always seemed to be the sort of boy who expects that everything will go right for him and had seldom been disabused of the idea. Megan had crushed on him hard for a while.

The other was Yvette Karga, as pretty as Oberon was handsome, and sister to the junior class’s Light Bearer. Her rich, cool, dark brown hair was just longer than chin length, half of it pulled up into two tiny buns and the rest framing her head and face. It contrasted well with her warm, almost golden, light brown skin.

“Hey girl,” Oberon said, sitting down backwards on the chair of the desk in front of her as Yvette sat across the aisle. “How are you? You hanging in there?”

“Bad, Oberon,” Megan replied. “And by a hair. And I don’t want to talk to you two about it.”

They didn’t seem to know how to take that. “Megan, we’re just worried—” Yvette started.

“You knew,” Megan said, not quite through her teeth. “There is no way you didn’t.”

Oberon said, “Well, I mean, yes, but—”

“No BUTS,” Megan said, this time absolutely through her teeth. “Go away.”

They both stood, but didn’t walk away. Seeming like he didn’t want to do it because he feared the consequences, Oberon said, “Okay, but I really think you should know something before you talk to Lauren and Katie Kay. You haven’t, right?” He said it quickly, the words avalanching out of his mouth.

Megan took a deep, slow breath through her nose. “No. What?”

“I know this sounds like an excuse, I know, but we didn’t know it didn’t come from you,” he said, still quickly. “The Exile, or the request not to talk about them. Lauren and Katie Kay and Brandon implied it was your wish, if they didn’t say it outright—I don’t recall. We, the bulk of us, were lied to, too. Please remember that when you talk to them. And the rest of us.” Yvette nodded.

Megan chewed on that for bit. They stood several meters away and waited with patience.

Then Megan said, “You’re right. But I don’t think that excuses anyone. Literally no one checked with me, not once. They all just, I guess, assumed.” She paused. “So everyone also thinks I’m a monster, too. Perfect.”

“No one thinks that,” Oberon said quickly, but not entirely convincingly.

“They think something less than great about me if they think I wanted three kids ostracized for three years. Don’t even try to say they don’t. Impossible,” Megan said, staring at her hands on the desk.

They didn’t reply.

“I didn’t want this. I think it’s abhorrent, and I’m shattered that this happened to my friends,” Megan said. “If anyone thinks differently, you can tell them that. I never wanted this. I didn’t know at all. You all somehow puking kept it from me. And I was a fool and a coward and let you. Get away from me.”

They got.

Megan brooded until class started. She didn’t pay very much attention once it did. Only five syllabi more before the end of the day.