"Hypothetically, if someone wanted to break into school records, how would they go about it?"

  Cal's question was far from innocent, and he wasn't pretending it was.

  "No," Mia blandly replied, not sparing him a look.

  She was seated at the end of a long table, between two overburdened shelves. After tracking down the taciturn girl to her natural habitat, a deserted corner in the campus library, he offered no pleasantries before asking what was on his mind.

  "It's hypothetical," he stressed, laying his hands on the wooden surface. "Think of it like a fun thought experiment."

  That did nothing to change her standoffish demeanor, and she slowly flipped a page while answering him.

  "No."

  Their last talk had been amicable, so Cal gathered he had caught her at a bad time. He would have left her to it if not for the limited number of people he could ask about this. There were three others he'd thought of, and they each had their problems.

  Rolland, while likely being able to provide a step-by-step guide, would then know what he was up to.

  Lily had a decent chance of outright refusing after their last adventure, with the added potential of tattling on him.

  And the Spirit? Well, Cal didn't exactly trust it right now.

  "I thought we had expanded your vocabulary beyond one-word denials," he put forward, huffing exaggeratedly. "You didn't even ask why I would hypothetically want to."

  His logic was straightforward. School records would have known affinities of previous and current students while also containing various bits of information about the faculty. Both of which he would need. The former to rule out potential mind mages, and the latter to assist with digging into the faculty.

  Cal's focus would be Evergreen, but he'd be looking for anything that might cause a member of the faculty to hold resentment toward the school. Things like a history of complaints, being passed over for promotions, or documented disagreements with other staff.

  He was well aware of how fruitless his quest could be. The potential mind mage may never have gone to the school, and even if they did, why would that be listed anywhere? Similarly, as deputy headmistress, Evergreen could have cleansed the records or anything that painted her in a negative light.

  Why, then, would he go through the trouble of stealing them?

  The same reason he stuck Lennard on that skeevy professor—it was better to try and find nothing, than not try at all.

  "To cheat," she accused, pulling the book she was reading closer to her. "Scored too low? Too high?"

  It was a reasonable excuse, but not the one he'd decided on.

  "No, actually," he corrected, sending her an unimpressed look. "I'm getting involved with the Beast Husbandry club, but I got warned about them earlier in the year. I was hoping to see if it was just rumors or if there's anything credible there."

  Anne had warned him of them during their day in the city, and he did plan to meet up with Romero this coming week, so there was a certain amount of truth to his statement. That he actually wanted to compare anything he found with what the Spirit had shared didn't hurt.

  She paused in her reading, looking at him with a tilt of her head.

  "Who?"

  That was about the answer he would have expected from her. Mia's interests were pretty narrow.

  "They raise beasts. Your—" he stopped, catching himself mid?sentence and continuing at a quicker tempo. "The crown prince promised me one, but I'm taking my time in choosing."

  Mia's next blink seemed to take ages to complete.

  "Who—"

  If he'd been walking, he might have tripped at what he presumed was a question.

  "—are you working with?"

  A glimmer of amusement passed through her eyes, but it was a momentary thing, her irises returning to their usual uninterested brown. He couldn't determine whether it had been intentional.

  "Does the name Romero ring any bells?"

  A shake of her head answered that and gave him some relief. He would have been worried if she did know him.

  "It's not important. What matters are the records. Where they're kept, and how I could, hypothetically, access them."

  Maybe if he kept using the word 'hypothetically,' she would believe him.

  "I can provide you a beast," she said, her face shifting from indifference to contemplation. "Criteria?"

  Cal took a patient breath, slightly amazed at how unhelpful her help could be. He may have let too much of his annoyance be shown, as her eyes turned back to the book dismissively.

  "Office of club affairs," she said, sounding like she was fighting off a yawn. "Central tower, third floor."

  He honestly didn't think she would know the specifics of it. Unfortunately, that approach wouldn't work.

  "That would only let me access the history of our club, not others. I was hoping for something more comprehensive. There has to be a place where they store all the old files, right?"

  Considering how relatively recent the phones were to campus, he could imagine they had dedicated buildings for dumping those types of documents. If not the originals, then copies at least.

  Mia's eyes traced back to him, containing an element of judgment. Her thumb tapped along the page she was on, its contents forgotten.

  The clock tower chimed in the distance, and at that instant, she pushed her chair back. She hesitated before standing, pulling the book toward her. He found the action strange, and even stranger still was the way she held it against herself, blocking the title with her arms.

  There was little time to question her as she turned on her heel and marched away. He followed and got a sense of déjà vu as she led him down the same path they used to escape hordes of recruiting students during his third week on campus.

  Down winding paths and staircases, they were making their way through the basement when she came to a halt in front of the remains of a dusty bookcase.

  "You?" she asked with a dangerous tilt to her voice.

  When Mia had brought him here previously, she merely had to tap on the spine of a book before the entire shelf slid inward, revealing a passage. That book trick hadn't worked when Cal revisited the hidden entrance, and someone in his company hadn't felt like figuring it out.

  "Not me," he hurriedly confirmed, stepping away from the pile of debris. The torn-out bookcase had been left on its side, with books spilling out of it. Fragments of wood were visible among the crumpled pages. "Definitely not me."

  Mia stood there wordlessly, staring at the pile. Her fingers pressed on her book, depressing the leather and causing the binding to creak.

  Time slowed for him, and quickly, but carefully, he extracted the books, stacking them in a neat pile on the floor. He righted the bookcase next, observing the hole Lily had buried her fist in. The damage extended further, as the vandal had moved her hand up and down to better yank the piece of furniture out.

  In an effort to further mitigate things, Cal's magic seeped into the wood, but it was long since dead, and he would not have any luck mending it like—

  Cal's pocket thrummed, accompanied by a sharp pain. The sensation resembled that of a pair of fangs sinking into his flesh, only substantially worse. His knees almost buckled as a sudden emptiness swept through him, and he grabbed the old bookcase with both hands to steady himself.

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  His right hand dropped to his pocket, feeling for his attacker. Fingers curled around the inert seed he'd taken from Spirit B's sanctum. He'd fed it magic before, but it had never acted so aggressively. The reserves he kept on hand had been completely drained, ripped from his body. It was only his steady connection to the void that kept his rising panic at bay.

  Magic pooled inside him as he dug his fingernail into the seed. Thoughts of burning it to a crisp were gaining ground when what he was staring at registered.

  Directly in front of him was an intact shelf. With a dumbfounded expression on his face, he tentatively reached forward. His fingertips brushed against the solid back panel, and he caught a splinter for his troubles. Still confused, his magic ventured into the wood once more.

  It was dead, and as far as he could tell, it had been that way for a while.

  What in the hells?

  It looked no different from when he first laid eyes on it, the damage completely gone.

  The seed had done this. That much was clear. However, the how and the why eluded him.

  Before he could dig deeper into it, he remembered his companion.

  Funnily enough, he wasn't the only one to forget himself, and Mia stood with a look of consternation on her face, staring at the space the fallen shelf had first occupied. Sensing her lack of awareness, Cal gathered the books he'd set to the side, re-shelving them in a way that would have hidden the damage.

  Once satisfied with its restoration, he maneuvered the bookcase to the side and tried to gain her attention.

  "Mia," he said, failing to bring her into the present. "We're fine—

  Steely eyes met his, causing his throat to dry up. They were, apparently, not fine.

  "Who?" her question was crisp and demanding, seeming to force the floating dust itself to freeze.

  Cal considered defending the culprit for a solid second, maybe even two.

  "Lily did it," he said, the eagerness of the admission catching the traitor himself by surprise.

  Mia's lips moved, mouthing out the name while remaining deathly silent. The intensity of her hold on the book subsided as she regarded him with an air of authority.

  "She lives," the ordinary girl declared, putting her back towards him and delving into the unlit passage. "For now."

  Uh…

  "That's a funny joke," he said, running after her. He caught her swiftly, but his breathing was labored. "Right? Haha, funny and not 'off with her head' funny?"

  The girl offered nothing, hitting him with another instance of déjà vu.

  Faced with the two potentially coming to blows over a dingy bookshelf, Cal decided he'd done enough and to let the problem work itself out.

  His thumb turned the seed over in his pocket. With the context of what it had taken a bite out of him for, he felt a smidge more at ease keeping it. That magic had been familiar, reminiscent of what B had done by constantly repairing the tower.

  Cal had been specifically told it wasn't a nascent spirit, which left him questioning the Academy's Spirit even more. The way the seed had taken his magic was deeply disturbing, but destroying or leaving it unattended felt like the wrong choice.

  Could he maybe build it a container?

  To his genuine befuddlement, the answer his brain returned was yes. He noted the troublesome organ's suggestion while traveling down the musty tunnel. He kept a firm lock on Mia's back, wary of being separated. Her stride was devoid of hesitation, unbothered by the uneven flooring, narrowing of walls, or constant turns. Their way dipped in places, and rose in others, throwing his sense of direction into complete disarray.

  "Not for nothing, but aren't students barred from using these? The headmaster told me as much."

  For good reason. If the Spirit was to be believed, the tunnels changed as a result of Amir's lingering influence, and having students interact with the untamed power of a god was reckless to the extreme.

  The pair of wayward students nearly collided as she abruptly stopped, his chin hanging over her head. He attempted a step back instinctively, but failed. Turning to see the obstruction, his cheek was met with cold stone.

  Somehow, a wall had managed to sneak up behind him.

  "They don't understand it," she said, her voice sounding different from this angle. He couldn't see her face, but he envisioned a somber expression on it. "Don't take other people here."

  She didn't budge, and his back pressed into the wall, squeezing every millimeter of space he could. It took him a minute to realize she was waiting for a response.

  "Okay?" he said, questioning his own words.

  He could feel the beat in his chest, and as much as he'd like to say its rapid pace was from previous exertion, it wasn't.

  "Promise?"

  What the fuck, Mia.

  "I promise, I promise," he said hurriedly, wanting out of this situation.

  Blessedly, she started moving again. He didn't chase after her, resting against the wall that previously imprisoned him. When Mia was seven paces away, it disappeared, triggering his fall.

  Cal did not hit the ground. He hit the ground.

  Twisting before he could land on his back, his fist slammed into the jagged stone, fracturing it and prompting the walls to collapse in on him. He was gone before they could fall on his head, appearing beside Mia and pretending he wasn't the reason the ceiling was trembling.

  A clump of dirt fell on his head, and he had only just finished brushing it off when more dirt trickled onto him from the ceiling. He glared upwards, daring the tunnel to do any more. Whether it yielded to his threats or Cal was chasing ghosts, it left them alone the rest of the way.

  Their journey progressed in what he perceived to be an awkward silence as his attention split between the tunnel and Mia. After some time, the girl reached for something.

  Lights sprang to life, illuminating the room they entered. The ceiling was low, his hair brushing against it. Rows of brick arches supported it, stretching over forty meters. Some of the bricks were faded, their color completely washed out, while others might have been new.

  Placed between the arches were stacks of cabinets. Tall, squat, metal, wooden—they came in all sorts. In contrast to the hodgepodge assortment, there was a clear order to their placement. His eyes went to the lights, noting their age.

  "Last year's repository," Mia said, boredom infecting her tone again.

  This was all from last year? Was that too much or too little?

  He ambled forward, spying the labels displayed.

  Truancy.

  Tuition.

  Trolley maintenance.

  It was alphabetical. He grinned, regaining his nerve.

  "We're not supposed to be here, are we?" It was a dumb question, but he felt it needed to be asked. "And where exactly is here?"

  The passage they emerged from was already gone, and he needed to know where they were in case an escape was needed. He refused to comment on what he would need to run from.

  "No, under the central tower, and…" she trailed off, opening her book to resume the reading he'd interrupted, "have at it."

  He hadn't asked that last one, but appreciated it all the same.