Page 97 of Embers of Midnight

My mouth is dry and my palms are steady. “Good.”

We stand a minute and listen to wind pull across old glass. No omens. No theatrics. Just stone.

Midterms

Seraphina

Hot water buys me thirty quiet seconds. I brace my forehead to tile and keep my breath where it belongs—two short in, one long out. Not spiritual; a tool.

I pull on a black tank, a soft hoodie, and jeans I can drop into a lunge in. The bracelet goes on my left, warm against skin. The thread sits light over the pulse on my right. Pyrelight stays sheathed on the dresser; arena exams run on school gear, and I’m not starting that argument before breakfast.

In the kitchen there’s heat, plates, and the sound of people who know where I live. Ronan slides a bowl to me—oats with cinnamon, peach slices lined up like he measured them. He doesn’t make a speech. He makes food.

“Eat,” he tells me, as if I’ve been known to forget.

I take the spoon. “What’s the curve for passing?”

“No curve,” Darian answers from the study stack, pen in hand. “Just cause and effect.”

“Cruel,” I mutter. He taps the inside of my wrist—two quick, one long. My lungs obey, the jitter at the base of my skull sits down.

Caelum appears with tea, steam soft against my face. “Lemon, not panic,” he murmurs.

Ash shoulder-checks me on his way past, opens my palm, and drops a sugar packet like he’s blessing me. “For bribing fate,” he says. Morrow and Silks lie quiet as ink along his skin. Vex lands on the back of my chair, steals a nut from my bowl, and pretends that was the price of admission.

I eat. The room calibrates.

“History,” Darian prompts, flipping a card. “Null-Weave Act?”

“Councilor Hadrin, three years after Silvergate.” I drink tea because my mouth still wants to panic. “Press panic. Hunters used it. Everyone caved.”

His mouth lifts one millimeter. “Acceptable.”

“High praise,” Ash says. “You’ll buy her flowers for ‘commendable.’”

Ronan sets a hand on my shoulder as he walks by: one second, warm, steady. It’s a whole conversation to the part of me that tries to run.

“Go,” he says. “Pass. Come back. We’ll keep the kitchen on your side.”

I go.

Ethics & History is a big room that eats noise. Rell writes three cases across the board and tells us to pick a side with our spine, not our crush. I pick fast because if I overthink I’ll decorate my answer instead of giving one.

Case Two: field agent vs. town council, veil risk, a panicking witness. I anchor my elbows, line up facts, and write like I’m testifying. No fancy. No heat flex. Just proof.

Rell makes a slow circuit. He stops behind me long enough that I feel it between my shoulder blades. “Clear,” he murmurs, then moves on. It’s one word. It lands like oxygen.

By the time the bell spits us out, my head wants to sprint around the courtyard screaming I knew at least three things. I don’t. I breathe and walk.

Lunch is loud. We sit by the high window because sunlight is free. Ronan tilts my water toward me without looking; Darian pins my knee with his, calm weight. Caelum pushes a plate of sliced tomatoes and salt to the middle and dangerous things feel smaller. Ash declares olives a food group.

Taya and Laz slide in with a bowl that qualifies as a forest. Laz steals my pickle on principle; I let him on principle.

“Report,” Ash demands, stealing an olive back from himself.

“I didn’t fail,” I say.

Ronan’s mouth tilts. That’s an entire party if you know the man. Caelum’s eyes are warmer than the light on the table. Darian’s knuckle drags along the thread at my wrist like a metronome I don’t hate.