Or laundry spells. Mage buildings didn’t have washing machines, because everyone used laundry spells, so he was planning to hand-wash his clothes in the sink. A sad fate for a perfectly engineered bodyguard.
“I guess you can’t ask Cly for help with your boxers,” I said. I waved my hand and cast the spell for him.
“Thank you,” Aegis said. He struggled to meet my eyes. I tried to take advantage of that.
“If you feel like repaying me, can I go out and see the campus? I just want to see it. You know I’ve wanted to come here since I was a kid.”
I didn’t like saying that. I didn’t like begging a favor of Aegis, or twisting my now-painful dreams of this school into a tool of persuasion, into the means to an end. But I had to at least try.
Aegis frowned at me, though the guilt deepened in his eyes. “That’s too risky. You know that, Cassandra.” He trusted me, but not that much.
“If you want, you can go with me. I’ll cast an illusion over myself, so no one can tell that I’m a Redbriar.”
“But you can’t cast an illusion over me,” Aegis pointed out. “And the other students have already seen me as Cly’s bodyguard. It’ll draw too much suspicion.”
I opened my mouth to argue further, but Aegis had already turned away, staring pointedly out the window. He’d made up his mind, and I wasn’t going to reach him.
Sighing, I sat down at the desk. I could hear the headmaster’s speech beginning in the distance, and magically sharpened my senses to listen.
“At Wraithwood Academy, we nurture the best and brightest of each magical generation. In these four years of school, you’ll learn the latest in magecraft alongside your peers who will form the backbone of future mage society…
Nothing but platitudes, but I listened anyway, because at least it was a small part of the school experience that I wouldn’t miss out on. I hated the situation I found myself in—I was technically at Wraithwood, but not a part of it. I was a glorified wall charger trapped inside a dorm room, watching everything from afar.
After the speech ended, I even started flipping through Cly’s textbooks, the ones she hadn’t had to take to class today. There was one on higher magic, and another on artifact analysis. I knew a decent percentage of the information already, but I didn’t mind reading more.
I’d always been kind of a nerd. My mom had encouraged it; she’d told me she’d gone to school to become a doctor, and even the way she’d spoken of pre-med drama and all-nighters before the exams had sounded faintly wistful. But then Priam Redbriar had barged into her life, destroying any chance of ever finishing the necessary schooling. I think she hoped that I could do what she couldn’t and get through school in one piece. She took vicarious pleasure in how good I was at academics.
At that thought, I had to look away from the book, blinking a little. Then I continued, because there was a tiny chance that something I learned might be useful in the future, while crying wouldn’t help me at all.
I was working my way through an introductory chapter on ward design when Aegis suddenly jumped upright.
Aegis seemed to have some sort of instinct for when Cly got into trouble, whether through his Spellbreaker tattoos, or simply through dealing with her since childhood. In this case, it was clearly bad, because he ran out of the room without a word.
Chapter 5
For a moment, I just sat there, unable to believe my own luck. Then I got up and followed Aegis, from a safe distance behind, whispering spells to disguise myself and muffle my footsteps. It was a risk, but one I had to take.
I had to keep my eyes on the goal, I told myself, but one straying glance, and I was lost to gawking like a tourist around me. Everything was red brick and white stone, built in elegant archaic styles, even more beautiful and imposing than they’d been in pictures. Over there was First Hall, its windows aglow with the strange experimental magic performed inside it. And there was the library, with its domed roof. How often had I dreamed of studying in that library as a child, making my mother proud with my groundbreaking work on some advanced topic of magecraft? Will-’o-the-wisps floated in the soft autumn breeze, and perched like birds along the decorative brickwork.
But while I couldn’t