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Chapter Thirty-Two

I rushed to the treehouses the next morning, making an educated assumption that I would find Callan there. I used the slats to scale the tree to our favorite treehouse then ducked my head inside.

“Good morning,” I said brightly.

Callan looked up. He had been leaning over a bench, test tubes and bark neatly organized on the counter.

I’d caught him mid experiment. “Sorry. Is now not a good time?”

“Now’s fine, local. What’s up? You’re practically bouncing over there.”

I made a conscious effort to curb my physical excitement and sat on the stool Callan slid in my direction. “I have news.”

He waved a hand, signaling me to continue.

“I had my first field studies assignment last night.”

He perked up. “How’d that go?”

“It was great! I think I’m going to learn so much from my advisor. She has a defensive affinity.”

Callan whistled. “Defensives, huh? I’m surprised they found someone with that affinity power. ”

“Well, I think they had to look pretty hard because I don’t think my advisor has been in the country for long. Her accent sounds Italian, but we didn’t really get into that yet.”

“That’s not the only news you have, is it?”

I realized I was swiveling on my stool and forced myself to still. “My assignment is classified, but I was told I could share this piece with you.” I didn’t bother to say that, if pressed, I would tell Callan absolutely everything I learned in field studies. He already knew. And he wouldn’t press.

I took a breath and dove in. “During our session, we examined some of the soil samples from the poisoning last year.”

Callan raised an eyebrow. “Did you find anything?”

I nodded. “Ohhh yeah. We were able to determine that the person who manipulated the soil had, at minimum, a strong tree affinity.”

Callan stilled. “Are you sure?”

“My advisor seemed to think the science was pretty conclusive. We were using a new field of magical tracing.”

Callan nodded, as if that term was familiar to him. “Okay, this is good information to have. And really good work on the findings. Did you have to use all of your affinities to make the trace work?”

I filled him in on the scientific investigations I had performed with Petra, Callan nodding intently as he followed the science.

“Ahh, so it was the activating where your advisor was getting stuck. Interesting. Your different affinity lines must have allowed you to cleanly activate one signature at a time.”

“That’s what it felt like,” I agreed. As usual, I marveled at how quickly he picked up what was going on at both the magical and scientific levels.

“Well, I have no idea what else your field study is going to entail, but you’ll be kicking roots and taking names in no time, I’m sure,” Callan said, and his smile was so playful that I couldn’t even form a sarcastic return.

This moment felt like those nights we had spent studying in the treehouse last year, only instead of him tutoring me on Calculus, we were discussing the future of magical botanical research.

I didn’t know what the year had in store for me, but the ease of these moments with Callan was one thing I hoped would never change.