“I assume most of you know why things get forged in Djinn fire,” Professor Gorgon said on Tuesday afternoon once we were all settled into our seats. Our beakers of geode crystals sat in front of us as did light grey metal mortars with a pestle made of an odd green stone that had brown and purple veins.

  “You are going to need at least forty grams of dust but no more than sixty. Begin.”

  That first day was at least accurate to the experience of being in this class. Gorgon might be a bit of a tyrant but he was an honest tyrant. I could respect that. I hated when people pretended to be something they weren’t.

  My left hand wasn’t bothering me but I didn’t want to risk Sealie’s ire. I didn’t have to wear the bandage anymore, but I held my arm away while I pulled my materials closer. The glove covered the scars and the mark.

  The stones seemed like a brighter red today. Or maybe it was the way the light was reflecting off of the metal, giving them the appearance of glowing.

  I struck the stones with the pestle once and saw small cracks started to form. I hadn’t even hit it that hard. Must have been a trait of Djinn forging. Cool. Wish I knew how that worked, but I guessed that’s what the library was for.

  It took me about ten minutes to grind down the crystals into a fine red power. It was less of a deep red and more a dull bright red in the powder form. The light didn’t glitter off of it like it previously.

  Ah well.

  I checked the instructions on the table and dumped the power back into the beaker, I had a little less than four tablespoons of powder.

  All good. I had enough.

  But now what?

  Looking around I was actually one of the last people to finish this part of the lab. Then again, arm strength was never my strong suit.

  “You all look done, all right. Follow my instructions very carefully when handling these materials. Basilisk sweat may not seem volatile, but can react very suddenly in the presence of certain minerals. This is not a race, and haste can ruin your entire project. Watch your solution carefully.”

  Was it going to explode? I didn’t need more than two disasters a week. Please don’t explode.

  The vial filled to a third with dark green, very thin fluid, and a yellower liquid floating on top of it.

  “Who here knows what jade serpent is?”

  Celica scoffed, “It’s just a green flower.”

  Gorgon sighed, “Yes. A species of Amaryllis its oil, when extracted and purified properly, helps inhibit the extremely volatile Basilisk sweat and silica reaction. That oil is the only reason first-year students are even allowed to try this.”

  Such inspiring words of confidence from our professor.

  If something has to happen, let it be to someone else.

  Along with the vial were long, thin glass stirring rods and a little measuring spoon labeled “one quarter teaspoon”.

  I put the first scoop of the red dust into the vial. It landed on the yellow liquid and floated. I grabbed the glass and rod and stirred it once. The dark green suddenly turned a muddy brown. And started bubbling.

  Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.

  Didn’t I ask for no explosions?

  The bubbly stopped after several seconds. I gave it another stir and it bubbled some more and then stopped.

  I did this four more times. On the last, the entire solution went from the muddy brown to a bright red like the crystals had been. Only now it was in viscous liquid form.

  It looked like blood.

  Spooky.

  Celica was stirring a bubbling green liquid next to me, “I wonder what we’re going to do with this?”

  “Is there anything we can do with this stuff?”

  “Right. I guess a non-Kraken doesn’t have to wake up and see the Alchemy syllabus hanging up on the wall of their Tower every day.”

  “One of the Pixies has a poster with a unicorn that says, ‘you can do it!’ on it. Can we trade?”

  “I wish. Pixie has cuter girls than Kraken.”

  I had no comment on that.

  “Or are you into something else?” Celica leaned towards me as she held up her quickly changing silver vial of…liquid gemstones I guess.

  “No comment,” I told her. I was a firm believer that what I was or wasn’t into was entirely my own business. While I didn’t mind Celica nor did I fear any judgement, I just simply didn’t want to tell her.

  “Boring,” Celica complained.

  “If I have a development in that area I will inform you,” I told her.

  “Glad we have an understanding Stewart.”

  (*********)

  After dinner I found myself aimless in the hallways. I had an hour before I needed to return to my personal hell. Maybe I was overreacting. Then again, the others in my year were all getting excited about the Chaser tryouts, and would absolutely ask me questions I had no answers for.

  It wasn’t my fault I knew literally nothing about Chaser as a sport.

  But everyone else in Pixie Tower seemed to know everything about it. And runes. And magic.

  I knew I would be behind a little. But I never imagined it would be this bad.

  I’d figure something out. I had to. I wasn’t giving up.

  “Serafina.”

  I snapped my head up quickly and looked around. Russel was walking towards me from a side hallway.

  “Russel, what’s up?”

  “Walk with me, I have something I want to talk with you about.”

  “Is something wrong?”

  “No. What? Of course not. Just something I’ve wanted to ask you for a while.”

  Umm….

  “You have mixed heritage, don’t you?” Russel asked.

  Oh. Oh. Okay. I stopped in the hallway. “Is...is that going to be an issue?”

  “No. I’m the same. My mother isn’t…she’s human.”

  I let out a sigh of relief. “My father. It is what it is.”

  He nodded. “I wanted to see if you were going to say anything about it, but I was starting to have doubts.”

  “Well…I mean…is it anyone’s business?” I asked. “Who my parents are shouldn’t matter.”

  “Don’t let the Kelpies hear you say that.” Russel had a grin on his face. “I figured it out after ‘Open Sesame’.”

  “You’ll notice that I’m not great at subtlety,” I told him.

  “I have no issues with that. I have no idea what the others will think. I don’t think they even suspect. They haven’t said anything about it that I could hear.”

  “I have no plans on telling anyone I don’t have to. That does include the others.”

  “Fair. I just wanted you to know that if anyone bothers you over it, let me know okay?”

  “Yeah. Sounds fair.”

  “Awesome. See you around.”

  (*********)

  Angelina was sitting in one of the pink armchairs curled into a ball her chin resting on her knees. She had ditched the outer pink coat, but was still in uniform.

  “You don’t like it here, do you?” she asked as I got closer. She wasn’t looking at me, mostly staring ahead of her and off into the distance.

  “It’s nothing to do with you,” I started to explain. “I don’t know, it’s just…not for me.”

  “People talk about you. Especially the Pegassuses.”

  To my credit, I didn’t roll my eyes. “It’s what they do.”

  “Your other friends, they’re from different Towers?”

  “I have classes with literally all the Towers. I was bound to meet a few of them that were all right.”

  “Do you wish you were in Towers with them?”

  I sighed. “Is hanging out with people in different Towers that strange?” I asked.

  “You do know that you guys are the only ones in our year doing it, right?”

  I didn’t know that. “No. Does it matter?”

  She looked up at me. “I worry. That’s all. What if they’re mean?”

  I shrugged, “People are going to be people. How about I introduce you to some of them this weekend? One is trying out for the Chaser team and I think the others are going to be there. Would that help you worry less?”

  She blinked a few times. “I thought you weren’t interested in Chaser?”

  I wasn’t. “I like at least making a show of moral support.”

  The response was like turning a light back on. She nearly jumped out of the chair and took my hands in hers. “That’s so great!”

  At least she was happy.

  “We have spare flags, you should borrow one!”

  Flags? No. I still had standards here. “No thanks.”

  Her eyes narrowed a little. “We’ll make a proper Pixie out of you yet.”

  Only in her dreams.