“Memorize that from the Everwitch 101 pitch they gave you?”
Sang shakes his head and looks at me with such earnestness that I have to look away. “Not everyone is out to get you, you know.”
I sigh. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be a jerk.”
“I know you’ve had a rough few months. But as long as we’re doing this together, we may as well make the best of it. I’ll give it my all if you do.”
“Okay,” I say. “Deal.”
“Let’s get your baseline set and call it a day.”
I go through the same routine as before, Sang’s calm blanketing me, and this time, when I send the wind into the woods, Sang tosses a large red ribbon into the current. We watch as it blows through the trees, past the rows where my previous attempts stopped, until it finally slows and the ribbon catches on a branch.
“I should be able to obliterate this entire forest,” I say as we walk to find the ribbon. “I’m so used to pushing my magic down, I’m not even sure I know how to let it go. I don’t think I could lose control even if I wanted to.”
“You’ll get there.” He says it as if it’s obvious, the surest thing in the whole world.
When we get to the tree where the ribbon is caught, Sang takes out a large roll of bright-red tape and wraps it around the trunk several times.
“Congratulations,” he says. “You’ve set your baseline.”
“It’s not much,” I say, embarrassed by how far I have to go. “But I guess it’s something.”
“It’s something,” Sang agrees.
We walk back to the control field and gather our things.
“Hey,” he says, pausing. “I can’t imagine how hard it must have been, coming to train with me today instead of Mr. Hart.”
I look at him. His dark-brown eyes have rings of gold in the centers, as if the Sun herself wanted to live in his gaze. I didn’t notice it before, but now that the bruise around his eye is gone, it’s all I can see.
“It was hard,” I say. “But I didn’t really have a choice.” I remember what he said about his research and soften my tone. “I guess neither of us did.”
Sang shrugs. “I came out here to study botany, and instead I’m running from tornadoes and getting black eyes. What can you do?” He slips on his sweatshirt and slings his bag over his shoulder.
“The black eye wasn’t so bad. It made you look pretty badass.”
“I don’t think the word badass has ever been used to describe me before.”
I drop my mouth open and give him my best shocked face. “But you’re a botanist who loves to study!”
“I know,” Sang agrees. “It’s baffling.” He zips his sweatshirt and follows me off the field.
“I’ll see you Tuesday,” I say, walking off toward my small cabin. I’m anxious to get back to Alice’s book, but something makes me stop and turn. “Hey, Sang?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m sorry you got stuck with this. With me. I hope you get to make up your trip soon.”
“I’m sure I will. And I’m sorry you got stuck with me too.” The way he says it makes me sad, like the sorrow that flows from autumn magic.
“There are worse people to be stuck with,” I say.
“I’m flattered, truly.” I can’t help but laugh, and he flashes me a smile. “See you Tuesday,” he says.
Instead of leaving as well, I stay where I am, watching Sang as he walks off the field. It’s only when I can no longer see him that I finally walk away.
Chapter Ten
“If spring is a whispered promise that everything can be made new, autumn is a brilliant sacrifice born of love. Because if the autumn did not love the spring, it would not fall to winter just so the spring could rise.”
—A Season for Everything
Finals week at Eastern is unlike finals week anywhere else. There’s a heaviness that settles on the shoulders of those whose season is nearing its end and a lightness in those whose season is about to begin. The autumns move around campus like zombies, slow and unkempt and easily agitated. They’re mourning the loss of their season, their perfect position to the sun, the most important part of themselves, and it won’t be back in its entirety for nine months.
Even I feel it. Right now, I believe autumn is the best season. I don’t want it to end.
But on the first day of winter, I’ll forget all about autumn, the way warmth makes you forget what it’s like to be cold.
Our last final was this afternoon, and now it’s time for our season-end celebration before the new quarter starts. Gravel crunches underneath my heels as I walk down the path to the library. The remaining leaves dance in the breeze before finally falling to the earth, and the wind blows my burnt-orange dress against my legs, the long silk skirt billowing out behind me.
The dress code for the Harvest Ball is formal, and seeing everyone dressed up after a quarter of jeans and sweaters is always satisfying.
I didn’t want to come tonight. So much noise, so many people, and the breathtaking loneliness of being alone in a crowded room.
But it’s important to honor the season.
The Harvest Ball doesn’t start until late in the evening, when the sky is perfectly black. It always happens on the full moon. The moonlight casts a blue glow on the path, interrupted every few minutes by a passing cloud. Mounds of fallen leaves have been swept to the sides, covering the dark earth with beds of color. The library is lit up in the distance, music and voices carrying out into the cold night air.
I walk up the cement steps, through the front doors of the old building. The stone that covers the outside of the library makes up the inside walls as well. Large windows stretch all the
