L U K E

I don’t make it far after storming out of the dining hall. Two corridors, maybe three, before the heat in my chest burns out and leaves something heavier. I press a hand to the stone wall and breathe hard, wishing I’d stayed, wishing I hadn’t.

The whispers follow anyway. Luke stormed off. She won’t even tell him. They coil in my head until I want to put a fist through the nearest window.

But I didn’t leave because I was angry at her. I left because I couldn’t stand watching her shrink under all those eyes while I sat useless beside her.

I text her: You okay?
The dot spins. No reply.

Sleep doesn’t come. When it does, I jolt awake with the picture of her at that table, hands shaking around a spoon, trying to swallow down every word she wouldn’t give me.

By morning, my jaw aches from grinding my teeth. I’m outside the girls’ dorms before the first bell, a granola bar in my pocket, pretending I’m just early for class. Truth is, I need to see her. Need to make sure she made it through the night.

She doesn’t appear with the first wave of students. Or the second. My stomach knots tighter with each group that passes. When the bell rings again, I finally move. If she wants distance, fine. But I’ll be where she’s headed.

Alchemy with Professor Brielle.

I got there early. The lab smells of damp stone and mint. Frost fogs the north windows, faint but wrong. Brielle is already unpacking a crate, muttering about samples.

The door opens. Elle slips in at the tail end of the crowd, scarf tight, shoulders stiff. Relief hits me so sharp I almost forget to breathe. She doesn’t look my way. Doesn’t need to.

I’m already sliding onto the bench beside hers.

Professor Brielle claps her hands, sharp as snapped twigs. “Pairs. You’ll share a burner and a beaker. Handle the samples carefully. Frost herbs bruise easily and only thrive in balance.”

Chairs scrape. Benches shift. Maribel swoops in two seats down, already whispering loud enough for half the class to hear. “Careful she doesn’t hex it.” Snickers ripple.

I keep my jaw tight and focus on lining up our beaker and burner. I set a clean cloth and extra tongs near Elle’s side, pretending it’s nothing. She notices anyway. Her fingers hesitate, then close over the tongs like she’s grateful for the barrier.

Brielle moves down the rows with her crate, tweezers in hand. The herbs glisten pale-blue, veins glowing faintly like frost under moonlight. She sets a sprig in our dish, and the air chills instantly, little puffs of fog curling off the leaves.

“Observe carefully,” she says. “They should hold form for several minutes before reacting.”

But the moment Elle leans closer, the leaves quiver. A shiver runs down the stem. Then, before anyone touches them, the edges blacken, curling in like paper held to flame.

Gasps burst around us. Maribel’s satisfied little laugh cuts sharper than the frost. “Told you.”

Elle jerks back, eyes wide. Her scarf slips lower, exposing the line of her throat, pale against the sudden dark wilt of the herb.

My chest tightens. She didn’t even touch it. She just looked.

Brielle frowns, snapping her tweezers closed. “Interesting,” she mutters, but doesn’t remove the dish. Her gaze flicks to Elle with a glint that makes me uneasy, like curiosity outweighs concern.

The whispers start up again, low and sharp. She cursed it. Look how fast it died.

I lean closer, keeping my voice low, just for her. “Don’t listen. It’s not you.”

Her hands tremble as she grips the notebook tighter, but she doesn’t answer. Her eyes stay fixed on the wilted leaves, like she’s afraid they’ll start whispering too.

Professor Brielle doesn’t remove the ruined sprig. She simply moves on, distributing herbs to the next table, muttering about “unexpected variables.”

Elle stares at the blackened leaves, her grip on the tongs so tight her knuckles blanch. I want to take them from her, steady her hands, but I know better than to draw more attention.

“Focus on the mixture,” Brielle calls from the front. “Powder the stems. Add three drops of frostmelt. Keep your ratios exact, or you’ll have a mess.”

Students bend over their burners, grinding, measuring, heating. The air thickens with sharp mint and bitter smoke.

Elle lowers her eyes, forces herself to move, to copy the motions. She tips the vial too fast. The liquid hits the powdered stem with a hiss. The beaker sputters and fizzes, froth spilling over the lip.

She startles back, bumping the table. The whole setup wobbles. The burner tilts.

I react before thinking. My hand shoots out, steadying the stand just as liquid sloshes toward the flame. The cloth soaks instantly, pale smoke rising.

“Careful!” Brielle snaps, whirling around.

Elle’s face flames red, panic tightening her shoulders. I don’t care who’s watching. I grab the cloth and drag the beaker away, ignoring the sting of heat against my palm. The potion fizzles out across the counter, harmless now.

I press a second cloth into her hand. “Here. We’ll clean it before she makes it a spectacle.”

Her fingers brush mine, hesitant and cold, before she clutches the fabric. Together we blot the spill in silence, shoulders almost touching, the closeness sharp enough to make me forget the whispers buzzing around us.

Her hair brushes forward as she leans in, the faint lavender of her scarf wrapping around me. She bites her lip, focused on scrubbing, like she can erase the whole moment.

“It’s fine,” I murmured, keeping my voice low, steady. “You’re fine.”

For just a second, her eyes flick up, meeting mine. Something soft, fragile, and real passes between us. A heartbeat of quiet in the chaos.

Then a sound cuts through it, sharp and wrong.

A crackle. Ice spreading where it shouldn’t.

The cloth under our hands stiffens. At first, I thought it’s just dried potion, but then the damp fibers glazed pale-white, rimmed in ice.

Elle jerks her hands back. The frost creeps outward, veins spidering across the wood. A spiral etches itself into the surface, delicate and deliberate, like an invisible hand is carving it there.

The nearest students gasp. One girl shrieks and knocks her stool over.

Maribel’s voice cuts sharp and triumphant: “See? I told you, she’s cursed.”

Whispers whip across the benches faster than fire. Look at the table. It’s spreading. Don’t touch it. She made it happen.

Elle presses her scarf tighter to her throat, eyes wide, breath shallow. She looks like she wants to vanish.

I plant my hand flat over the spiral, ignoring the bite of cold that races up my skin. The chatter falters. “It’s just frost,” I say, steady and loud enough to cut through the noise. “Potion reaction. Nothing more.”

The truth is, I don’t believe my own words. But I’ll swallow frost itself before I let them tear her apart over it.

The spiral pulses once under my palm, then stills. When I lift my hand, it’s fading, already melting back into damp wood. My fingers burn from the cold, but I don’t flinch.

Professor Brielle steps closer, eyes narrowed with fascination, not alarm. “Most unusual,” she murmurs. “Reactive frost in a sealed room…” She trails off, tapping her quill against her lip like she’s discovered a new puzzle to pick apart. She doesn’t scold Elle. Doesn’t protect her either.

The students don’t care. They’ve already decided what they saw.

“Did you see how it spiraled?”
“No herb does that.”
“She didn’t even touch it.”

Their voices churn, louder, crueler.

Elle’s shoulders curl in, scarf hiding half her face. Her hands knot in her lap.

I shift closer, blocking her from their stares. “Ignore them,” I whisper. My throat is tight. “It’s not you.”

But the back of my neck prickles. The room feels wrong, heavier, like the frost isn’t done.

And when I glance toward the shadows at the rear of the lab, I realize someone else has been watching all along.

He’s there again.

The new boy.

Half-shadowed by the frost-fogged windows, arms folded, still as stone. Like he’s been standing there the whole time, waiting for something only he can see.

No one else notices. The room still hums with gossip and laughter. But his presence drags the air taut, sharp as a held breath.

His eyes, storm-gray, and unreadable aren’t scanning the class. They’re fixed on Elle.

She doesn’t notice. Her scarf hides most of her face, her shoulders curled in tight. She’s too busy trying to shrink smaller while the whispers sharpen around her.

A cold knot forms in my chest. I don’t like the way he looks at her. Not cruel. Not mocking. Just… intent. Like he’s waiting for something.

I want to call him out, demand what his problem is, but my throat locks. There’s something about him that makes every sound in the room fade.

Professor Brielle claps sharply. “Class dismissed. Leave your benches clean.”

Chairs scrape. Students file out in clusters, buzzing with rumors. Wrenwood cursed the herbs. Wrenwood froze the table.

I pack away our burner with more force than I mean to. Elle doesn’t move until nearly everyone is gone, her movements brittle, mechanical.

When she finally stands, I want to step in close, shield her from the corridor waiting outside. But I can feel him still there, across the room.

Watching.

The door shuts on the last of the noise. The lab feels colder, emptier.

He hasn’t moved. His stare pins her like frost to glass.

And for the first time, I don’t know if I should be more afraid of the whispers in the walls… or of the boy who won’t look away from her.