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I had just finished putting the shield up for the night, and Nenya, my new familiar mouse, was already out and about my cell, sniffing every corner in search of any residual mal I hadn’t been able to spot.
It had been a good day, I had only been jumped once, while going to the library with Liu, and together we took care of the minor mals quickly. So of course, considering my luck, I heard a knock on my door minutes before the last bell rang.
Already laying on bed, I was definitely not answering. It was probably something - or someone - that wanted to kill me, because my allies wouldn’t be stupid enough to come to my room this late for nothing, and if it was an emergency, they wouldn’t be knocking so calmly.
Nenya went running to sniff the newcomer through the shielded door, and when she squeaked happily instead of running away scared, the realization dawned on me.
Most of my allies wouldn’t be stupid enough to be out this late, but one of them would.
“Lake, you brain dead wanker,” I said through gritted teeth, already on my way to let the moron in.
I didn’t bother to check for mals when I opened the door, I trusted Nenya with my life - literally - and I knew that any mal in a three mile radius would have been killed by the very person who stood at my door.
Before I could lay the string of curses that were coming out my throat, Nenya jumped through my feet and climbed Orion like he was a tree and nested herself on his shoulder. That traitorous mouse liked him just as much as she liked me, except he didn’t feed her with mana infused treats twice a day. He didn’t need to buy her allegiance like I did.
“The last bell is about to ring, Lake, what on earth are you doing here!” I was glad my voice only showed my anger, because as big as it was, my concern overshadowed it.
He had his stupid mouth open ready to say something, but stopped when his pea brain processed what I had said.
“I didn’t realize it was this late,” he replied. Orion Lake was the only person in this goddamn school that could forget curfew. “I was at the shop with Aadhya. I didn’t notice we spent so much time there.”
“Is she back in her room?” I half shouted, already shoving him out of my way. Aadhya’s room was not far from mine, if she was still in the corridor I would be able to see her. The hall was empty.
“She’s fine.” His tone dismissed my concern, which made me want to throttle him. “I walked her back to her room before I went to the showers.”
This type of recklessness was already so common to me that my brain barely registered he went alone to the boy’s bathroom on the senior floor at night . He would do it more frequently if people weren’t always following him around.
The new room placement got him as far away from me as possible. Orion had the first slot - where Todd’s original room used to be - and I had the last. I didn’t know what the school meant with it. The note from Mum burned through my mind every time I thought about it, but it was probably nothing like that. The school most likely just wanted Orion to die already.
Which could happen today if we were not careful. After making sure Aadhya was safe, I pulled him into my room, there was no way I was going to leave him alone in the hall at night, even if he would most likely be fine. There was a part of me that kept thinking that he would soon make a mistake, that his talent for mal slaying wouldn’t be enough to out weight his own stupidity disguised as bravery.
I knew I was setting myself for one hell of a night by keeping him, but together we had better chances. My ability to not be a complete fucking idiot complemented his ability to blast mals well, we had survived a night in the same room while I had a gut wound, we could survive one now.
Keeping him in my room at night was the exact opposite of what Mum had told me to do, and I felt guilty as hell about it. I kept wondering what she had traded for the allotted weight on Aaron’s luggage. I had asked him, but the freshman said she had traded with his parents, he had no idea what the deal was.
What bothered me the most - aside from the message itself - was that I probably knew what my mother had traded to get that simple spell and message to me. Her principles. She had most likely sold her healing artifices or crystals, because she loved me more than her own clean conscience.
Just so I could completely ignore what she had told me.
It was not like I hadn’t even considered cutting Orion off. The first week after induction I spent most of the time in my own room, under the subterfuge of one of the freshmen’s flus. The amount of sleep I was getting - which was none - was enough to convince everyone I was sick and contagious, so I basically survived from what Liu, Aadhya and Orion himself had brought me.
It was like one of those movie scenes where there’s an angel and a devil on each of your shoulders trying to steer you their way on a decision, but it was worse, because it was two angels , Mum repeatedly telling me to ditch Orion, and Orion himself saying I had promised not to cut him out of my life.
It would have been much easier if there was a clear good versus bad distinction, I was good at those, I had practice. I had spent most of my life swimming upstream, actively choosing to be good after all.
I was still guilty about which angel had won in the end. The one that was sitting on my bed like it was his own, completely ignoring that the bell had just rung, and we would be fighting mals all night. It was probably his ideal version of a sleepover.
Not nearly as relaxed as he was, I crossed my arms and looked at him with my best murder glare. Combined with my it’s-going-to-rain vibe, it would have sent about anyone on this school running.
Orion completely ignored it.
“We made you something,” he said, like it would change the fact that he was putting us both in unnecessary danger, but before I could point it out, he took a small thing out of his front pocket.
Okay, so that hadn’t been his secret pet mal. My brain provided the very uncalled for information.
However, as soon as I realized what he was showing me, I forgot everything about Aadhya’s mum’s stupid warning.
It was one of my crystals - one of Mum’s crystals - it hung from a platinum thread so thin it was barely visible, it looked fragile, but knowing Aadhya’s work, it would be stronger than a heavy steel chain. I took it from his hand before I could really think about it, that’s how much I trusted him, despite the warning.
I could see a tiny crack in it, so thin I wouldn’t have noticed if I wasn’t inspecting it so closely. It was one of the broken crystals Aadhya had asked for last month. I had given them to her because I was sure she could come up with something to put them to use, which was better than keeping them uselessly in my chest. I had never considered she was going to actually fix them.
And it was not only fixed, it was all the way full with mana.
“Thank you,” I said, and realized it was the first time I was saying those words to him. Orion looked at me like a sirenspider song had just come out of my lips. It was too close to the look he had given me last graduation day. If running away didn’t mean certain death, I would probably have been out of the room in a heartbeat.
“It’s not all,” he added, after clearing his throat, so I inspected the rest of the necklace closely. There was a thin disk of silver also hanging from the thread, too focused on the repaired crystal, I hadn’t seen it before.
“A shield holder?” If he had waited to give it to me in the morning, this would have been the perfect gift.
“More than that, a shared shield holder, Aadhya made them to hold Clarita’s shield spell.”
It was the best thing someone had ever given me - and it wasn’t even a trade! - in my three and a half years at the Scholomance, and if it hadn’t been given to me by an official ally and Orion, I would have thought it was some kind of trick.
And when I thought I couldn’t be more surprised, Orion pulled a twin necklace out of the collar of his shirt.
I instinctively looked at his wrist, searching for the New York power sharer - which didn’t share anything with him, and I was still mad about it - it was still there.
After the mission , Orion had almost completely ditched the New York kids, except from Chloe, who sat with us sometimes. It was clear he would rather be with me and my misfit allies than his own enclave. I kept getting offers from several of them, but after I made it clear I wasn’t interested, they left me alone.
I had also made it a sport of shooing Orion’s admirers when they got too close. That boy couldn’t establish boundaries if his life depended on it, so I established them for him, while also having fun by being my lovely bitch-y self.
With all of that, I was sure everyone was just waiting for him to officially ditch New York and join my alliance - which most presumed would turn into an enclave of its own, since I was slowly mastering the spells from the sutras - I tried not to think about it, but I was waiting too, against my better judgement. I was sure the idea had also crossed Liu’s and Aadhya’s minds several times as well.
That was why I was so disappointed to see that power sharer still on his wrist.
A little bit of that disappointment must have shown on my previously happy-ish face, so he followed my gaze to the power sharer, and in what must have been the only time he was not completely obtuse in his life, he realized what I was thinking.
“It’s not a power sharer anymore, Aadhya made sure of that. She made the block two-way. I still can’t get anything, but they can’t get mine either.”
So it was happening. Orion Lake was forsaking the most powerful enclave in the world for me .
For us , I told myself, Liu and Aadhya are his friends too .
“Why are you still wearing it?” I asked, still not quite believing it.
“The buzzer still works, so I’ll know if they’re ever in trouble. I promised my mother I would take care of them here.”
I had a lot of thoughts about that, but I swallowed them. It was no good to fight him about his hero complex, and since I would be fending mals all night with that idiot, it would be better if we were in good - well, as good as possible - moods.
“People will spend the rest of your life, and maybe a little after, wondering why you left New York for some indie losers,” I said instead, feigning nonchalance.
“People don’t know you are the best person in this building now, maybe ever.”
I burst out laughing. He looked at me like I was the crazy one.
“I’m serious! If everyone had to put half the effort you do into not being a maleficer, using mana would be the exception.” Maybe he had a point, people usually went malia with way less incentive than I had. Not that all malia users were automatically bad people, Liu was proof of that.
“You also saved half a class of freshmen by fighting a maw-mouth … Aadhya told me,” he added, when I began to disagree, “and you claimed no credit at all .”
“You don’t do things for the glory either.” I snapped, hearing him talking about me, complimenting me that way made me too uncomfortable, so it was easy to turn to anger. I had a lot of practice at being angry too.
“No, I do it because I can’t help it, it’s my affinity and it became who I am. You do the opposite, who you are is so… powerful, that it goes against your own affinity. You go all the way to be good, you are the best person here.”
That was when I started to feel the pokes on my shield. The mals had come for the feast. I decided fighting hungry monsters was better than talking about my feelings.
“Stop talking nonsense, Lake. Now that you’re with us, make yourself useful and build us some mana.”
So we started the slaying.