Iron & Ice #ONC2024

Chapter IX

 By breakfast the next morning, the ten students who've been cut are gone, sent back home in disgrace. Since none of them were in Wolf House, for us, it seems like nothing's changed. But during our morning classes, the other Houses are subdued. A few students look like they've been crying. They've just said goodbye to friends, after all. Or maybe they're scared they'll be next.

Combat is the same as ever, which feels strange after last night. The only difference is that, while Jovianus explains the morning's training regimen, Gareth stands behind him, standing like a soldier at ease, his chest puffed out so we can all see his shiny Prefect's badge. It's like he's asserting his leadership onto the rest of us, like he's saying, Look at me, I'm in charge!

We ignore him, which is what we always do. And when he's out of earshot, several of our classmates have a few choice words to say about him, and none of them are complimentary.

Things settle down somewhat over the rest of the day. Our classes continue as normal, except that we keep glancing at the empty seats where there are now ten of our number missing.

But it's at dinner that night that everything changes.

When we straggle into the Great Hall after our last class of the day, we find that our teachers are no longer alone at the high table. In fact, a second table has been pushed together with the first to make room for the new arrivals. Twenty men and women (actually, only one woman that I can see) sit at the table with our teachers, already eating and drinking.

When I walk in, my blood freezes when I see their uniforms, the exact color of dried blood. Witchhunters.

I don't realize I've stopped dead until Victra gives me a little shove in the back. Okay, it's not really that little. I stumble forward, and it's enough to jerk me back to reality.

If they knew who I am, they wouldn't be sitting down to dinner, they'd have arrested me already. I make myself breathe evenly, make my heartbeat slow, make myself sit down at our table.

I barely eat anything; I can't. Even though logic says they aren't here for me-Professor Seneca would be so proud of my reasoning-I can barely breathe. I feel like my heart is going to beat out of my chest.

I keep one eye on them the whole meal, but I can't relax, even as they laugh with our teachers and quaff flasks of ale and local whisky with their meals. Their leader-the one with gold stripes on his jacket-sits between Agrippina Lycaeus and Princess Jessamine in a place of honor, and I find myself transfixed by how the two women interact with him.

The princess is cool and courteous, inclining her head towards him when he speaks, nodding along with him, always half-turned to face him, as if giving him her whole focus. The whole while, though, I can see the shrewdness in her eyes, the calculation in the tilt of her head.

Agrippina Lycaeus is less the gracious hostess, and more the reluctant listener. She gives her attention grudgingly, spending most of her time in conversation with Jovianus, who sits on her other side. But, every so often, I see her watching the Witchhunters' commander when his attention is elsewhere, and I realize her cool detachment is deliberate. She's pushing him towards Princess Jessamine, who might otherwise be too highly-ranked for him to be comfortable speaking with.

Further down the table, Miss Grace sits among several of the Witchhunters, seated far from the lone woman in their number, who regards her with suspicion. Another deliberate move on Agrippina Lycaeus's part, no doubt. Miss Grace's stunning beauty already has several of the men hanging on to her every word in the way men often fawn over particularly beautiful women, in a way that makes them forget to be cautious in favor of bragging, boasting or otherwise trying to impress. It's a move Miss Grace has been teaching us girls over the last few weeks, a trick for extracting information without anyone thinking twice about you.