“Good god.” The next coin headed straight for Cheyenne’s ear. She jerked her head away at the last second, and the penny pinged the far wall. “This isn’t gonna work.”
“Oh, it will.” Mattie picked up one coin at a time and began flinging them at her student. “Is this annoying?” Fling. “Stupid and pointless and juvenile, huh?” Toss. “Doesn’t it make you wanna come over and stop me?”
Cheyenne snatched the next coin from the air and clenched it in her fist. “Stop.”
“Uh-huh.” Mattie lifted her chin and stared at Cheyenne’s forearm, the coin still in the halfling’s fist.
When she looked down, Cheyenne saw dark-gray patches blooming on her pale skin. A few of them grew, but it was slow. She swallowed.
“Happy place,” Mattie reminded her. “Or whatever’s the opposite of how you bring out the drow.”
“The opposite.” Cheyenne took a deep breath and stared at her forearm. It felt as if she could will the dark splotches away if she focused hard enough, breathed slow enough.
Another penny struck her shoulder.
“Ugh! I almost had it!” The halfling chucked the penny across the office, and her drow transformation swept over her before the coin left her hand. It cracked into one of Professor Bergmann’s framed certifications and bounced on the carpet. Then, the office fell silent.
“‘Almost’ isn’t good enough. Not in this situation,” Mattie said. “And you know it.”
“I also know I’m never gonna be target practice for a carnival coin-toss booth. Outside of your office.” Purple sparks crackled along Cheyenne’s fingers. She clenched her fists and dampened them.
“That would be hilarious, wouldn’t it? But you may find yourself trying to get some sleep or study or focus, and some dog two doors down won’t stop barking. Or how about toddlers on an airplane? The ones that don’t make the flight more entertaining for everyone and end up doing the opposite. Maybe somebody rear-ends you at a stoplight, and you have to deal with that mess.” Professor Bergmann spread her arms and leveled a bold stare. “What are you going to do then? Pull over and scare the poor bastard off when a gray-skinned woman with pointy ears tries to exchange contact information and blows his car up instead?”
Cheyenne glared, then she let out one continuous, irritated sigh.
“I’m throwing coins at you because that’s what I’ve got today as a Virginia Commonwealth University professor. We’re not ready for a magic duel just yet. So if you want to learn, this is part of it. Target practice goes both ways.”
“You mean I get to chuck things at you after this?”
Mattie lifted a finger. “Not that way. You’re the target, Cheyenne, because accessing and using your magic can only happen when it counts. When there’s no other way to handle things in the guise the rest of the world sees you in, then and only then, do you let the illusion drop.”
“What about all the other people walking around without illusions, huh?”
“What?”
“I’ve seen, I don’t know, half a dozen orcs and a spare troll and goblin in the last few days. None of them tried to look human. Why should I have to?”
Mattie swallowed and shook her head. “The rules are different for you.”
“Why? Because I have drow blood? Or because of who my mom is?” Heat flared in Cheyenne’s veins, and she did not have the patience left to contain it. “Trust me, the rules have been different for me all my life. If I’m to play by some rule that doesn’t apply to everyone else, the least you can do is give me a straight answer, something that isn’t bullshit.”
“Cheyenne.” Professor Bergmann’s tone was sharp and authoritative, but she didn’t move a muscle. “We’ll talk about that after you handle getting hit with pennies longer than I can handle throwing them.”
“Nope. If you want me to hang out and follow your screwed-up training techniques, I need to know why. I’ve made it twenty-one years without any of this. I can go another twenty-one.” The halfling’s nostrils flared, and she spread her arms. “Go ahead.”
“I know you understand politics,” Mattie said. “Your mom taught you plenty, I’m sure. The world I came from—the world your father came from—has its own politics too. And they are…complicated.”
“Whatever.” Cheyenne whirled toward the professor’s desk and headed for her copper puzzle box. “You know, most people see my name and assume I’m Bianca Summerlin’s entitled brat, and I couldn’t care less about that. But this?” She lifted the box toward Mattie and shook it. “I am entitled to know these things. They’re mine.”
“It’s not my place to open that door for you until we both know you’re prepared to use the information the way it needs to be—”
Cheyenne scoffed. “You won’t open that door. Cool. I’ll just open this one.”
She went to the professor’s office door and jerked it open. The door squealed out of the frame, and the brass knob popped off in her hand. She glanced at it, tossed it behind her shoulder, and took one step toward the hallway.
The door slammed shut and would have knocked her sideways if she’d been any closer. Cheyenne whirled around to see Mattie flick her fingers toward the door again. The knob that had never hit the floor whizzed past the half-drow and clicked back into place before reattaching itself.
“You can’t do that,” Cheyenne snarled.
“I just did.” The professor lowered her hand, her jaw clenching and unclenching as she stared at the door.
“Tell me why the rules are different.” The words sounded more like a growl from the drow halfling’s throat. She held her professor’s gaze and wondered if she’d let herself use magic on the only woman who knew enough to tell Cheyenne anything she wanted to know. “Or I’ll find someone who isn’t a spineless—”
“Because you’re a halfling, Cheyenne.” Mattie huffed out a sigh like she’d been holding that sentence in for way too long. “Most magicals haven’t seen a halfling in their lifetime, which is why they treat those of you
