his hands together in enthusiasm, “let me give you a demonstration.” He knelt down and began to place the segments, chanting spells for angle calculation under his breath. His eyes were alight, intent on his work. It made me strangely happy to see him like this, in his element, proud and excited about what he’d made.
Darshan made sure to stand on the outside of the circle as he placed the final segment. “Sorry, you’ll have to do the honors,” he said, gesturing for me to step inside.
I doubted what awaited me would be pleasant, but I understood his reasoning. Out of the three of us, my magical strength was the closest to Arcturus’s, which made me the best test subject. Bracing myself, I stepped within the ring.
I immediately doubled over. It was nausea, and numbness, and vertigo, and something more than any of those. It felt like the blood in my body had reversed direction.
“It works,” I croaked, hanging onto a corner of the table to stop myself from toppling. Thank goodness Darshan had made the circle small enough to leave easily. With effort, I dragged myself back out of the circle, closing my eyes until the feeling could recede. Darshan handed me my water bottle, and I clutched it gratefully.
“Circle of Reversal, huh,” I said, once my systems returned mostly to normal.
“Yeah, it ended up being the only suitable magic circle with a broken-down form that could fit on stickers. You should’ve seen my attempt at the Heptagram of Devouring,” Darshan said, pulling a face. “I gave up somewhere around the ninth page. I’m relieved this one works just fine for incapacitating someone inside it.”
“It definitely works,” I said, grimacing.
“I never got more than bad motion sickness from it,” Darshan confessed. “The Circle of Reversal powers itself by sucking up magic from whoever’s inside. The more powerful you are, the worse the effect gets.”
“Arcturus is gonna be screwed, then.” The thought soothed my roiling stomach.
But Darshan looked away. “I hope so.”
“What’s wrong? Are there still kinks you haven’t worked out?”
Darshan looked almost offended at the suggestion. “Of course not! I’ve triple-checked everything. It’s just…”
“What? Come on, tell me.”
Darshan sighed. “It is incredibly awkward talking about this with you, but you do realize I’m a no-name going up against the Nightfelds in a duel, right? You might not feel it since you’re a Redbriar, but no-names don’t win against Great Houses. They just don’t. They either surrender or get broken. And no matter how clever I think I am, how carefully I’ve worked on this, I still feel that fear. How arrogant do I have to be to think I’ll be the exception? To think my magic can beat theirs?”
He raked a hand through his hair. “Sorry. I’m getting stage fright, I think.”
Hesitantly, I took his other hand. “No, don’t apologize. I didn’t realize that was how you felt. I mean, you’ve never seemed intimidated by me.”
Darshan gave a hollow laugh. “I’ve surprised myself, too. I’ve always thought myself a forward-thinking mage. Someone who judges others based on the person and not the surname. Someone who doesn’t believe the Great Houses deserve reverence just because they can beat me up. And yet I feel this superstitious fear…” He stared at his hands. “I think it just feels different when I have people I’m afraid of letting down.”
I’d opened my mouth to say something when an insistent pounding came from the door. “Cly Redbriar!” came Acubens’s voice from outside. “I know you’re in there!”
I groaned. “What does he want now?”
“Redbriar! Stop hiding!”
At this rate, he was going to break down the door if I didn’t respond. I sighed in aggravation. “I’m studying! I don’t know if you’ve heard of the concept!” I yelled back, while grabbing papers from my backpack to spread over the printed stickers. Darshan caught my drift and quietly chanted the glue removal spell we’d been forced to master in the last week, cleaning up the floor. We needed the ace up our sleeve to remain a secret until the duel.
“Redbriar! If you don’t open up, you won’t have a door—”
I’d tried to open the door all at once, but Acubens stepped back too quickly to let it slam into his face. A pity.
“What do you want?” I asked tersely.
I didn’t like the innocent, wide-eyed expression he aimed at me. “I just wanted to give you a gift before the competition. I’ve missed you, you know.”
“And what is this gift?”
Acubens handed me a gift box, matte black, embossed