After the raucous events of the early morning, the rest of the school day had reached an end without the slightest fuss. Students whispered and chattered as they always did, but something was different. The usual passive or outright aggression aimed at me and the overwhelming fanfare for Raven were absent. It’s not that those sentiments had gone away, but people were preoccupied with gossip about how the paparazzi had upset the princess, and they weren’t happy about it.

  Cynthia’s plan had worked. In fact, it worked so well, that when Eva, Mizuki, Raven and I stepped outside the school after the final bell, there wasn’t a single paparazzi or member of the media to be seen. And while I knew that the more skilled of their ilk liked to lurk just out of sight, sneaking pictures, footage, or outright stalking their targets, I could just feel in the air that even they weren’t present.

  The chilling effect Cynthia had created wouldn’t last forever. After all, those paparazzi had to eat. At some point, they would certainly return to reporting about Raven, which meant they would return to spying on her, and, by extension, me. But I doubted they would return to a full force assault for fear of upsetting Cynthia or messing with the gauntlet. For now, though, they were likely to remain spooked, and that was fine by me.

  It was time to train now, and even though the paparazzi had evaporated into thin air, riding in Raven’s limo to the abandoned warehouse would still attract lots of unnecessary attention. She had one of her people bring over a much more suitable, though still fancy, car. Her full-time driver, Jamie, hopped in the driver’s seat and let the other driver take the limo. The four of us loaded into the car, and he drove us to the warehouse.

  I expected more tension during the ride, but Jamie seemed to take to Eva quite easily. The two of them bantered about all kinds of things, most notably food, which rescued the atmosphere from awkward silence. Raven bantered with him as well, but she and Eva seemed to go out of their way to avoid directly conversing with one another. Meanwhile, Mizuki and I remained quiet.

  When we pulled up to the warehouse, Raven asked Jamie to wait around for us and keep watch, a request he was happy to oblige. The rest of us walked to the entrance, and instantly, I found myself wishing he’d come in with us. The absence of his lighthearted demeanor was evident when the smiles faded. Eva and Mizuki walked beside one another, away from Raven, and the actress’ body language made it clear she was okay with that.

  No one has said anything, and things are already tense. That certainly bodes well!

  Inside the warehouse, Raven scanned the derelict space while Mizuki took a seat. Eva grabbed her bag and slung it over her shoulder.

  “I’m gonna go change into my gear,” she said.

  “I’ll do the same,” I added.

  That meant Mizuki would be left alone with Raven.

  Not good.

  “Will you be okay waiting here with Raven?” I asked my best friend in a whisper.

  “I’ll be fine,” she replied. “She’ll be the one to worry about if she tries something stupid again.”

  Not concerning at all.

  “Got it. See you in a sec.”

  I grabbed my bag and headed to one of the empty offices to change into my workout clothes. My shirt was off, and I was midway through slipping out of my pants when I heard a “pssst!” come from the corner of the room.

  Uh…

  Cautiously, I crept closer to where I heard the noise. There was nothing there but the wall and some scattered papers from the nearby ajar filing cabinets.

  “Hey, can you hear me?” I heard someone say.

  Wait a minute, is that…?

  I inspected the wall in more detail and spotted a small crack in it.

  “Eva? You, uh, can’t see me through that crack, can you?”

  “Why, can you see me?”

  I knelt, placing a palm against the wall for leverage and hovering my eye over the hole. The crack was a microscopic zigzag that allowed me the sight of a blurry shape, but nothing more.

  Then I realized.

  Eva burst into laughter on the other side of the wall.

  “Mr. Watanabe, did you just try to sneak a peek at me?”

  “N-no! You asked if I could see! It was just reflex—”

  “I’m just messing with you!” she chortled. “I already checked, you can’t even see anything through the crack.”

  That was true. But if she knew that, then that would mean…

  “So, you knew I wouldn’t be able to see you because you already tried to peek at me?”

  “Yeah, I—no! That’s not what I meant!”

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  I snickered, relishing in the sound of her flailing in the thorns of her own trap.

  “Anyway!” she cleared her throat. “I wanted to talk to you before we go out there.”

  “What’s up?”

  The question hung in the air for a moment. Just when I thought she may not have heard me, she spoke.

  “I’m sorry for what happened back at the mall. I really lost my cool, and I’m ashamed of myself for that. I’ve never let myself get that way before.”

  “It surprised me, especially given how much you kept your calm when we took on those goons that threatened Mizuki,” I admitted. “But I get it. Raven went way too far, it’s only natural you’d match her aggression.”

  “Yeah, well, something isn’t right about that girl. I said it before, but she shouldn’t be nearly as proficient in magic as she is. Especially not with shadow magic.”

  According to what she had shared with me, Raven herself didn’t even know why she was so magically gifted.

  “Raven told me a lot about her past that isn’t my place to repeat,” I said. “But she told me that she doesn’t know where her shadow magic abilities come from, she’s just always been able to use it.”

  “That bothers me. A lot. It just doesn’t make any sense. But we’ll have to leave it for now. Let’s go train.”

  I finished changing into my exercise clothes and stepped out of the office. Simultaneously, Eva exited the neighboring room she’d also used to change.

  Raven watched us walk back to the main area and said, “you two finished changing at the exact same time.”

  I couldn’t tell if that was an observation or a suspicion.

  “What a coincidence,” Eva laughed.

  I approached Mizuki and asked, “how were things while I was gone?”

  “We ignored each other,” she said flatly.

  Better that than another fight.

  Eva ushered me over to her.

  “All right, Shinsuke. Let’s get started.”

  “Okay, what are we doing?”

  “Do you think you can perform the lightning bolt spell you used against Emil for me?”

  “I can try.”

  I took a deep breath and shaped the fingers on my right hand into a mock pistol. The name of the spell echoed in my head while I tried to visualize the magic circle that identified it. But the image was hazy, to put it mildly. I recalled the sigil to the best of my ability and channeled the magical energy through my arm and to the tip of my finger.

  Lightning bolt!

  I felt the indescribable sensation throughout my body—that charge one feels when all the processes handshake together, permitting your body to cast a spell.

  From the end of my pointer finger, a pitiful spark eked out and fizzled into the air.

  Why…?

  I sighed. “I don’t get it. I did it during the fight, so I don’t understand why it didn’t work this time.”

  “I think I might,” Eva claimed. “You were under a lot of pressure at the end of that battle and didn’t use any magic until the end. With the stress of the moment and pent-up magical energy, you likely overcharged the spell and that made it easier to cast. Having to think too much about it is probably psyching you out right now.”

  I relived the finale of my battle with Emil, retracing my steps to think about exactly what I did differently. The night before the fight, I studied the lightning bolt flashcard Eva had given to me. When I cast the spell during the fight, the sigil was clearer in my mind, though still not a complete image.

  “I think that’s part of it. But I think I remembered what the magic circle looked like a little better that night. I had trouble picturing it during the fight, too, but I can barely recall what it looks like right now. Just the general shape, really.”

  “I remember noticing how weak the spell looked when you initially cast it that night, but then its power tripled. An imperfect cast coupled with overcharging and energy leakage would explain it.” She shook her head. “And your inability to remember the magic circle definitely explains what just happened. Shinsuke, you have to learn how to properly memorize magic circles—fast.”

  I rubbed my face in frustration. “Easier said than done. Memorizing one of them is hard enough, I don’t understand how you’re supposed to remember a bunch of them. I have no idea how anyone does it.”

  “It’s not that hard once you get a good practice and study routine.”

  “For you, maybe,” I objected. “I think you’re forgetting I’ve been bad at this since I was a kid.”

  “But you have to do it. This is basic stuff, Shinsuke. You should know how to—”

  Raven loudly cleared her throat to interrupt the conversation. She approached me and began speaking in a tongue I didn’t recognize at all.

  “Huh?” I asked.

  “I said, I can teach you,” Raven clarified. “That’s Osmelan, my first language. You see, Evangeline, you’re not approaching this the right way.”

  Eva looked confused and, perhaps, a touch annoyed. “What do you mean?”

  “I used to struggle with memorizing magic circles at one point, too. I’d hyperfocus on learning a handful of spells, and the rest were all an interchangeable blur. That was, until I realized that magic is a language.”

  Eva and I traded glances as Raven continued.

  “Learning to write in Steylian was really hard for me since it’s such a structurally different language than Osmelan. So, I started creating shortcuts, little mental and muscle memory devices that helped me get better at writing and reading the characters. When I applied those same techniques to my magic studies, I improved tenfold.”

  It was an interesting point of view. Growing up, I had always fared much better in my Steylian language classes than my magic courses. Thinking about it, magic was often taught similarly to science, which is another subject I wasn’t particularly great at. Biology and the like were usually fine, but labs, formulas, and physics required a lot of agonizing studying and focus. Likewise, magic history and adjacent subjects were no issue for me, but spell casting classes were a lost cause. Boiling it down that way made me wonder if reframing the learning process closer to a subject I was more comfortable with could actually be beneficial.

  “Let Shinsuke study magic circles with me, and he’ll learn it in no time,” Raven advised.

  “No thanks,” Eva quickly declined. “I know what I’m doing, and he’s better off sticking with the person he’s been learning from instead of getting confused by different mentoring styles.”

  “Well, he needs to make quick progress, right? If doing it your way hasn’t produced the results you need up to this point, why not let me try with him once and see what happens?”

  Eva didn’t seem convinced in the slightest, but I could tell something was cooking in that brain of hers.

  “How about this,” she started. “You can try tutoring him about sigils once, but only if I’m there to make sure you aren’t teaching him any bad habits. And if the session isn’t a success, I won’t entertain any more of your training offers. I want him to learn, not confuse him even more.”

  “Okay, it’s a deal,” Raven agreed. “Tomorrow is Saturday, so you can come to my penthouse, and we can study there.”

  “All right. Now, no more interruptions. Shinsuke, let’s make the most of the rest of our time here today.”

  Well, I guess they decided for me, then.

  I was a bit surprised that Mizuki hadn’t chimed in. I glanced over at her to find her lost in her phone.

  “You all right, Mizuki?”

  She looked up at me. “Oh, yeah. My dad just asked me to run some errands for him. I have to go. I’m really sorry.”

  “That’s okay. Do you need help?”

  She shook her head. “Focus on your training, I’ll be okay. I wish we could go home together, but I’ll see you when you get back.”

  “Okay, be safe.”

  Eva and I waved her off, then resumed my training.

  A lesson with Raven, huh?