Page 66 of A University of Betrayal

He avoided eye contact with my fellow students and simply handed out some of the protocols.

I started my laptop, hoping to somehow distract myself from this strange incident. Something like this could only happen to me...

“Um...” Kelly spoke up. “You gave meJulie’sprotocol.”

I looked up, shocked that my name had been mentioned and that the whole seminar room was now looking at me.

But I was only able to stare at the professor, who was looking grimly at the document in Kelly’s hands.

“Pass it to her, please.”

With these words, he placed the full stack of protocols on Penny Bexley’s desk, who went through it with irritation, pulled out a protocol and passed the rest to the back.

“There’s something strange about him.” David laughed quietly beside me, while I reached far too hastily for the document that Kelly handed me, not without looking at me as if she was just as afraid of me as she was of a Senseque.

I looked absent-mindedly over the protocol.

Ninety-nine percent.

What?

I looked for my mistake, but all I found was a scribbled-over number in the chemical formula that I couldn’t decipher myself.

Was he serious? This wasn’t a mistake; it was an ink stain. Not even my own…

And then I noticed the spidery writing he used to write his numbers in the margin. It looked familiar to me... Maybe because I already knew it from his documents, which I always spread out on the floor for him? Or maybe I just wasn’t quite present yet.

“Before we begin, I’d like to remind you that the application period for the internship at the DLSC starts today.” I looked up at Mr. Suspicious, who seemed less distracted than a few seconds ago. “I’ll give you extra credits on a decent application to boost your semester grades.”

You’re Loved & I’m Hated

Christopher Tyng

This lesson had passed agonizingly slowly. I had managed to stare at the screen of my laptop and not look up once, even when the professor had touched on risky topics. And when the bell had finally rung, I had hurriedly packed up my things and vowed to sign out of this seminar just as quickly.

However, I couldn’t stop my gaze from gliding to the front of the room once more, where I spotted Amber hanging over the professor’s desk and pushing a folder toward him.

For a moment, I couldn’t help but stare, until I realized that it must be her application for the position at the DLSC.

Feeling caught, I turned away, my cheeks warming again, and hurried out of the seminar room, down one of the side corridors toward the main corridor of the west wing. But just before one of the large passageways, I stopped in the middle of the crowd.

My gaze slid to the staircase that led up to the second floor of the main building. I knew that if one took these stairs and turned left into the first corridor at the top, one would end up at the private offices of the professors of theFaculty of Natural Sciences.

The tingling in my fingers this time was not of supernatural origin. It was curiosity.

No, Julie. You’re going to sign yourself out of this seminar and keep your distance from this guy.

This man was one of many fanatics who had made it their mission to uncover magic, but sooner or later he would blow his cover and a Quatura would take away his memories.

Deep down, I knew that wasn’t true. This man was a potential threat to the Circle. Even if he couldn’t work magic, he obviously had enough knowledge of alchemy. Maybe Salma wasn’t the only thing he knew about?

“Dammit,” I pressed out quietly, looking around the throng for champagne blond hair, but spotting no one taller than most of the footballers here, so I finally stole my way up the sandstone-colored steps, my shaky hands on the stone snakes of the railing.

The hallways here were less crowded, as most students headed to either the lawn, the parking lot, the library, or the sports parks, as well as downtown for their big lunch break.

With a queasy feeling in my stomach, I took the first corridor to my left and walked right past my statistics professor, but she ignored me, which must be because she must never have noticed me in her seminars. A consequence of being advantageously overlooked among other people, as I was.

I went through the golden nameplates next to the wooden doors decorated with floral patterns, hoping to quickly find the name of my molecular biology professor, as the nervousness in my stomach rose, and my hands filled with a strange tingling sensation.