Jade
I know something’s wrong the moment I step into the dining hall.
The massive fire pit that usually blazes at the center has dimmed to barely more than embers. The floating chandeliers flicker erratically, casting unsettling shadows that make everyone look haunted. Even the usual morning chaos—overlapping conversations and bursts of laughter—has been muted.
“What’s going on?” Evie asks, her fingers tightening around her bag strap.
I scan the room, searching for one face in particular. The one who’s refused to meet my eyes since our whiplash of an encounter in his office three days ago.
But Logan’s usual spot at the fourth-year table, where he always holds court with that perfect posture and controlled expression, is vacant.
Worry tightens in my chest, as if the tension in the room has crawled its way into my body.
“Come on.” Evie tugs my arm, leading me to our all but officially assigned spots in social Siberia at the first-year table.
As we walk, I keep glancing at the fourth-year table, waiting for Logan to show up and take his seat.
He doesn’t. And I can’t get rid of the feeling that something is horribly wrong, and that somehow, it’s connected to him.
Soon after we sit down, a sharp ring of metal on crystal cuts through the murmuring.
At the head table, the Headmistress rises, and the temperature in the room seems to plummet.
Thad stares at his plate, Lydia Rousseau’s usual smirk is replaced by something hollow, and Kieran’s jaw works like he’s grinding glass between his teeth. Delia’s nowhere to be seen.
“Students.” Constance’s eyes sweep the room, and I swear they linger for a second or two longer on our table. “The academy has experienced a tragic loss.”
A loss?
The world stops turning. Fear numbs my bones. Because Logan’s not here, and the way she said it, it sounds like—
“A member of our community, Miles Deveraux, was found deceased in the Ember Archives early this morning.”
All the air exits my body at once.
Miles. Not Logan.
The relief is quickly followed by a wave of guilt at the fact that the announcement put me at ease. Because even though Logan’s okay—supposedly—another student is gone. Dead.
The word doesn’t feel real.
Meanwhile, gasps are rippling through the hall. Someone at the second-year table starts crying, quickly muffled.
“The Ember Archives are a restricted section of our library,” Constance continues, her tone sharpening. “It’s authorized for professors and fourth-year students only. Effective immediately, fourth-year access is revoked indefinitely.”
Murmurs explode across the room. The fourth-years look stunned, some angry, others calculating. But underneath their reactions, I catch something else.
Fear.
“This is being investigated as an isolated incident.” Constance’s words ring hollow.
“Additional security measures are now in effect throughout the academy. Grief counselors will be available in the Trinity Chamber for those in need of support.” She pauses, and the silence stretches thin. “Classes will proceed as normal.”
She sits without another word, and the hall erupts in hushed chaos.
“Delia found him,” someone whispers behind me. “Do you think maybe she did it?”
“First student death in decades,” another voice adds.
“Shut up.” The third voice is sharp and scared. “Unless you want to be next?”
I turn to see who’s speaking, but they’ve already gone silent, faces carefully blank.
Nina sits in her usual place in the middle of the table, a few seats closer to the Emberhearth, and I realize she’s been watching. Not the announcement, not the other students’ reactions, but watching me.
Her gaze snaps away, but not before I catch a glimpse of that black notebook open in front of her. At the top of the page, underlined twice: “Star touched as G warned?”
Then, quickly, she closes the notebook and tucks it into her bag.
“Speculation and rumors will not be tolerated.” Constance’s voice cuts through the whispers. “We will respect Miles’s memory with dignity, not gossip.”
The dining hall falls silent again, although I can practically feel the unspoken questions vibrating in the air.
“While Logan recovers,” Constance continues, “Margot Ridgeway will serve as temporary student proctor.”
Until he recovers.
My heart clenches, the words echoing through my mind.
Because what happens to someone when their emberlinked partner dies? Miles and Logan have been bound together for over a year, their magic intertwined. Now half that bond is just... gone.
Did he lose a part of himself, too?
I’m yanked out of my thoughts when a girl rises from the fourth-year table, and I have to blink twice to make sure she was the one Constance called up.
Because where Logan commands attention through sheer presence, Margot bounces with energy.
Her strawberry blonde curls catch the firelight as she bounds to the front of the room, and her smile is so bright it’s almost aggressive.
She’s the girl who was talking to Logan on the first day at dinner, who seemed to be agitating him.
“Thank you, Headmistress.” Margot’s voice rings with the kind of enthusiasm that belongs at a pep rally, not a death announcement.
She turns to look at the tables of students, and continues, “I know this is a difficult time for all of us. But we’re going to get through it together.
” Her smile widens. “The Blaze Academy family is strongest when we support each other, and I want you all to know that as student proctor, I’m here for you.
Day or night, rain or shine, whatever you need. ”
Evie shifts beside me, grimacing slightly.
Margot pauses to look at each table again, her voice dropping to what I assume she thinks is a respectable tone. “Now, let’s honor Miles with a prayer to Hecate. Everyone please bow your heads.”
I lower my chin, but keep my eyes open, watching Margot raise her hands toward the ceiling. The chandeliers respond, their flames brightening and dancing in patterns that feel choreographed.
“Great Hecate, goddess of crossroads and magic, keeper of the keys between worlds,” she begins, her voice taking on a sing-song quality. “We ask for your guidance in this time of loss. Help us remember that each day is a gift, and that each moment is precious.”
Someone behind me shifts uncomfortably, their chair scraping against stone.
“Let us use this tragedy as a reminder,” Margot continues, “to tell those around us how much we appreciate them. Reach out to your friends, your emberlinked partners, and your professors. Tell them they matter. Because we never know which day might be our last.”
My stomach churns. Because I know, deep in my gut, that Logan would be horrified that Constance chose this girl to replace him until he recovers from whatever he’s going through.
“In closing,” Margot’s voice rises again, “let’s honor Miles by pushing ourselves to be better witches, better friends, and better members of both the student community and the magical community as a whole. That’s what he would have wanted.”
Would he? I didn’t know Miles beyond our few tense interactions, but something tells me he wouldn’t want his death turned into Margot’s motivational speech.
She struts back to her seat, and the silence that follows feels heavier than before. At the head table, even the professors look uncomfortable.
“And now,” Constance says, her tone suggesting this display wasn’t what she had in mind, “breakfast will be served.”
The servers emerge from hidden doors, the smell of eggs and toast turning my stomach as plates materialize in front of us.
I turn to Evie, my fingers drumming against my thigh, electricity humming beneath my skin. “Is Logan going to be okay?”
“When an emberlinked partner dies, the survivor experiences magical backlash.” She pushes runny scrambled eggs around her plate, and whether she looks sickened by the clumpy bits of the food or Miles’s death, I can’t tell.
“It’s excruciating. Like having half your magic ripped out through your veins. ”
My lungs tighten, as does my grip on my fork. “But he’ll recover?”
“His magic will become unstable for weeks.” She lowers her voice, leaning closer. “Some witches never fully recover their power level from before the linking.”
I force myself to take a bite of toast, although it tastes like cardboard. Or maybe I can’t taste it because of how much my mind is spinning.
Because where’s Logan right now? What’s he going through? Is there anything I can do to help him? Would he even want my help? Or would I just annoy him, like a fly he wants to swat away?
“The whole thing is strange though.” Evie glances around, a secretive look in her eyes when she refocuses on me. “I was at the library late last night working on my Pyropsychology paper, and I noticed…” She pauses, biting her lip.
“You noticed what?” I lean in, the cardboard toast forgotten.
“There was only one heat trail leading down to the Ember Archives.” Her voice drops to barely a whisper. “Which means Miles was alone down there for a while before whoever killed him arrived.”
“So, the killer didn’t go with him,” I realize. “They followed him after you left.”
Evie’s hands tremble as she reaches for her water glass. “They must have been watching. Waiting. Then went down much later, when the library was empty.”
Vera’s voice suddenly cuts through our conversation. “Speculation and rumors won’t be tolerated,” she says from where she’s sitting three seats down, her sharp gaze fixed on us. “Didn’t you hear the Headmistress? Or are the two of you exempt from basic respect?”
Heat floods my cheeks, and Evie touches my arm in warning. She’s right—I need to control myself. Not because I might say something I’ll regret, which is what she’s likely thinking, but because I can’t risk releasing any electricity.
So, I contain my urge to snap back at Vera, turning back to my roommate instead.
“How long can you sense heat signatures for?” I ask her, keeping my voice casual. “Like, how long after someone’s been somewhere?”
“Not long. Maybe an hour at most. And that’s only when the signature is laced with strong emotions. Fear, anger, desperation… those burn hotter and last longer.”
An hour. If Miles was terrified enough, his heat signature would have lingered for at least an hour. Which means Evie saw it not long before…
I push the thought away, my mind racing as I focus on spreading jam on my toast. Because who would want Miles dead?
He seemed paranoid at the Forge Night, watching me with that calculating stare and coming down to find me and Logan.
Then there was that notebook he was always writing in, and the paper he was researching about Hecate.
My electricity responds to my anxiety, and I clench my fists to keep it from sparking.
Because Blaze Academy isn’t just about passing classes anymore.
It seems like someone murdered a student for putting his nose in places it didn’t belong.
And if that’s true, what would they do to someone who actually doesn’t belong?
Someone like me, with my electricity magic, or like Logan, with his ability to compel other witches?
I don’t know. What I do know, however, is that my goal just expanded from “survive and hide” to “survive, hide, and hope that whoever killed Miles doesn’t come for me next.”