Call flashed hot and cold all over. It was exactly what he’d been thinking, but now that Tamara had said it out loud, he didn’t want to believe it. “Why would my father have the wristband of the Enemy of Death? How would he have it?”

“How old is your father?”

“He’s thirty-five,” Call said, wondering what that had to do with anything.

“Basically the same age as Constantine Madden. They would have been at school together. And the Enemy could have left his wristband behind when he escaped from the Magisterium.” Tamara pushed herself to her feet and started to pace. “He rejected everything about school. He wouldn’t have wanted it. Maybe your father picked it up, or found it somehow. Maybe they even — knew each other.”

“There’s no way. He would have told me,” Call replied, knowing even as he said it that it wasn’t true. Alastair never talked about the Magisterium except vaguely and to describe how sinister it was.

“Rufus said he knew the Enemy. And that bracelet was supposed to be a message to Rufus,” said Aaron. “It had to mean something to your father and to Rufus. It would make more sense if they both knew him.”

“But what was the message?” Call demanded.

“Well, it was about you,” Tamara said. “Bind his magic. Right?”

“So they’d send me home! So I’d be safe!”

“Maybe,” said Tamara. “Or maybe it was about keeping other people safe from you.”

Call’s heart gave a sick thump inside his chest.

“Tamara,” said Aaron. “You’d better explain what you mean.”

“I’m sorry, Call,” she said, and she really did look sorry. “But the Enemy invented the Chaos-ridden here, at the Magisterium. And I’ve never heard of a Chaos-ridden animal being friendly to anyone or anything but another Chaos-ridden.” Aaron started to protest, but Tamara held up her hand. “Remember what Celia said that first night on the bus? About how there’s a rumor that some of the Chaos-ridden have normal eyes? And if someone was born Chaos-ridden, then maybe that person wouldn’t be blank inside. Maybe they’d seem normal. Like Havoc.”

“Call isn’t one of the Chaos-ridden!” Aaron said loudly. “That stuff Celia was saying, about Chaos-ridden creatures that look normal — there’s no proof that’s even real. And besides, if Call was Chaos-ridden, he’d know. Or I’d know. I’m one of the Makaris, so I should know, right? He’s not. He’s just not.”

Havoc bounded over to Call, seeming to sense that something was wrong. He whined a little, eyes pinwheeling.

Alastair’s words echoed in Call’s mind.

Call, you must listen to me. You don’t know what you are.

“Okay, then what am I?” he asked, leaning against the wolf, pressing his face into the soft fur.

But he could see in his friends’ faces that they didn’t know.

As the weeks wore on, they had no new answers, but it was easy for Call to let the questions slip from his mind so he could concentrate on his studies. With Aaron not just training to be a mage but also training to be a Makar, Master Rufus had to split his time. While they mostly trained together, Call and Tamara were often on their own, researching magic in the libraries, looking up histories of the Second Mage War and looking at drawings of the battles or photographs of the people in them, chasing around the various small elementals that populated the Magisterium, for practice, and finally learning how to pilot a boat through the caverns. Sometimes, when Master Rufus needed to take Aaron somewhere or do something that would last the whole day, Call and Tamara would join up with another Master.

The excitement of Aaron being a Makar had been slightly overshadowed by the news that Master Lemuel was being forced to leave the Magisterium. Drew’s accusations had been heard by the Assembly, and they determined that Master Lemuel could no longer be trusted with students, despite his steadfast denials and Rafe’s speaking up on his behalf. His apprentices were split up among the other Masters, landing Drew with Master Milagros, Rafe with Master Rockmaple, and Laurel with Master Tanaka.

Drew got out of the Infirmary a week after the news about Master Lemuel broke. At dinner, he’d gone around the other tables, apologizing to all the apprentices. He apologized several times to Aaron, Tamara, and Call. Call thought of asking what Drew had been trying to tell him in the hallway that night, but Drew was seldom alone and Call didn’t know quite how to phrase the question.

Is there something wrong with me?

Is there something dangerous about me?

How could you possibly know what I don’t?

Sometimes, Call felt desperate enough to want to write to his father and ask him about the wristband. But then he’d have to confess that he’d hidden Alastair’s letter from Rufus, and besides, he hadn’t heard anything from his dad except another care package of gummi candies and a new wool coat, arriving at Christmas. It had a card with it, signed Love, Dad. Nothing else. Feeling hollow, Call stuck the card away in his drawer with the other letters.

Fortunately, Call had something else that occupied a lot of his time: Havoc. Feeding a growing Chaos-ridden wolf and keeping him hidden took single-minded dedication and a lot of assistance from Tamara and Aaron. It also required overlooking Jasper’s telling Call that he smelled like hot dogs day after day as he snuck food out of the Refectory in his pockets. Plus, there was the matter of sneaking out through the Mission Gate for regular walks. But as winter turned to spring, it was clear to Call that Aaron and even Tamara had come to think of Havoc as their dog, too, and he would often come back from the Gallery to find Tamara curled up on the couch, reading, with the wolf resting on top of her feet like a blanket.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

FINALLY, THE WEATHER became warm enough for them to start having their classes outside almost daily. One bright afternoon, Call and Tamara were sent to the edge of the woods to study with Master Milagros’s class while Rufus took Aaron for special training.

They didn’t go far from the Magisterium gates, but enough greenery had sprung up to block most of the cave entrance from view. The warm air smelled of the rosemary, valerian, and deadly nightshade that grew on the grounds, and there was a rapidly growing pile of light jackets and coats on the ground as the apprentices dashed around in the sunlight, playing catch with balls of fire, using air to control the way they moved.

Call and Tamara joined in with enthusiasm. It was fun, focusing on lifting a flaming orb, then rocketing it between hands. Call strained to get it close enough to his palms so that it almost touched but didn’t quite. Gwenda had burned herself once and was now being extra careful; her ball of fire hovered more than moved. Although Call and Tamara had come late, the exercise was enough like ones Master Rufus had made them practice — particularly the sand exercises, which were forever burned into their minds — that they were able to get the hang of it quickly.

“Very good,” Master Milagros said, walking between them. She’d taken off her shoes and sloughed off her black uniform shirt, revealing a T-shirt with a rainbow on the front. “Now I want you to create two balls. Split your focus.”

Call and Tamara nodded. Splitting their focus was second nature, but some of the others were struggling. Celia managed it, as did Gwenda, but one of Jasper’s orbs popped, singeing his hair.