After two days spent doing little more than sleeping and eating, the damage that The Mother in Purple had done to me had healed enough that it only hurt a little when I moved.

In all of my short years and the memories that I had lived through, I had never seen a bruise so big and doubted that I ever would again.

From just below my chest to the bottom of my right hip, I had been transformed. I was usually as pale as a ghost. The swollen red places that Ali had left on me had quickly darkened to a violent purple. Almost all of my middle had turned black then, and I was left looking like my ribs and stomach were made of night itself.

When I had woken up the afternoon after the play, Anna had already taken up the mantel of my nurse so I could heal quickly enough to be ready for my first class with Precept Mon Zetta.

We had not quite accomplished that, but I was better enough that I could grit my teeth through the first day. Precept Seram's first class had been easy enough that I had very little worry for what was to come.

I was still a new moon. I would not be breaking myself anytime soon.

"Is there any reason why you have chosen to come here so early?" Alexei asked as we reached the hall that held Precept Zetta's classroom.

After I had drank the sleeper at Hinnigan's, I had not seen my guard again until I had stepped out of my quarters not long before he had asked his question.

I pressed my back against the wall and slowly slid down it as I exhale through my pain and soreness. "At the new moon ball, Precept Mon Zetta said that she would tell me why she wore all those colored bands on her arm if I was on time to her first class."

"Ah," Alexei said as he leaned against the wall opposite me. "I have noticed that you are quite persistent when there is something you wish to know."

The walk to where my new class would be held was thankfully much shorter than the one to Precept Seram's. It was on the first floor with the hall of conquest and the dining hall. After grimacing my way up the first flight of the singing stairs, I had known that I could not have made it up another.

"After the other night, can we be friends now?" I asked as I lowered myself onto my back and straightened out.

The stones of the floor were cold enough that I could feel them through my uniform, but it was a welcome comfort to my sore body. Anna had gone to get ice from the kitchen more times than I could count over the last two days.

I had seen the true Alexei when he had been talking to Hinnegan, but for how quickly his answer came, I might as well have been talking to the thing at the bottom of The Well.

"No. I am your guard. You are my ward. It will remain that way." Alexei insisted, his hands resting lazily on the ends of his down turned swords.

I closed my eyes and settled into a place that would allow me to annoy him into telling me something. "Will you tell me why Hinnegan was so surprised to see you?"

"No." Alexei said, evidently settling into a place that he could not become annoyed in.

I did not give in. "Will you tell me why you had to drink so many sleepers when you were young?"

"No." He answered again.

"Will you tell me why you don't love Mother Ali the way she loves you?" I asked, sure that the sudden change of subject would catch him off guard.

My confidence was misplaced.

Without a moments hesitation he answered just the same as he had before. "No."

"But you do love her?" I smiled. He had fallen right into my trap.

For such a small amount of time that I could have imagined it, Alexei looked impressed.

"In a way." He admitted as he crossed his arms.

"Victory!" I shouted as I threw my arms up in triumph.

"Ahhh!" I shouted as I wrapped my arms around myself in agony.

When I recovered enough to speak again, I opened one eye and peeked up at my guard. "So that is the game now? I have to trick you into answering my questions?"

"No." Alexei repeated.

I managed to open the other eye as my pain settled back down. "You will just answer them?"

"No." Alexei said as he walked over to me and offered me a hand up.

I heard footsteps coming down the hall and assumed that was why he was helping me up. The others had arrived, class would be starting soon.

"Will you tell me why you didn't like the play?" I asked as he pulled me up from the ground and sat me on my feet gently enough that it barely hurt.

I saw in his one white eye that he desperately wanted to tell me no one more time, but with a glance back at the small group coming towards us, he gave me an actual answer. "Some other time. If you do not discover it for yourself first."

He turned away from me then and walked straight by Plia, Mallory, and Vanda without so much as a glance.

"Hey handsome, where are you off to?" Mallory said as she left the others and took off after Alexei.

Vanda shook her head and sighed. "She needs to be locked away before she gets herself hurt. Goodmorning, Ire."

"Goodmorning." I said just a moment too late for it to sound natural. I had not become comfortable with the others speaking casually to me quite yet.

Plia greeted me next, but it might as well have come from The Mother in Grey for how hard she tried not to meet my eyes. "Hey, Ire."

"Goodmorning, Plia." I said as I tried to find the words to ask her what was wrong.

Before I could, the door to Precept Mon Zetta's classroom swung inward and the sorceress herself stepped into the hall. She peered down at each of for a long moment and there was enough weight to her sapphire gaze that I nearly tried to hide my face.

"Well? Come inside before I decide you aren't worth it." She command in her rough voice as she herded us through the door.

Every polite impression that Precept Seram gave, Mon Zetta's presence delivered the opposite.

Her blue black hair was a short, jagged, mess that made it look like she had either been up all night or just got out of bed. Not a single strand was nearly half as neat as my pink haired precept's tight bun.

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Seram's face was sweet and pleasant, Mon Zetta's was sharp, scared, and locked in a scowl that reminded me of Anna the morning after she had drank to much.

Where my Implementation teacher had worn pastel colored dresses that somehow was always straight and without creases, the sorceress who would teach me that day wore a simple grey shirt and pants underneath her strange half cloak. It was the same icy blue, Katarina's blue, as all the other precepts, but it hung evenly all around her before it ended at the crook of her arm.

Even her body stood against the symmetry that thoughts of my previous teacher brought to mind. Every step or movement that Seram made was even and measured.

Without her other arm, Mon Zetta looked unfortunately incomplete.

"Welcome back, Vanda and Mallory, I hope you do better than last semester," Mon Zetta rasped as she led us to the middle of her class room. "The others, I'll either learn your name with time or you'll do something that makes me remember you."

Her classroom was also unlike Seram's.

It was square instead round, and the floor was flat stone instead of being cut into terraces. There were no private places or white curtains. I could not hang my cloak on a silver hook, because there was nothing on the walls, not even windows. It was colder too. Not cold enough that I could see my breath, but I could not remember ever being as chilly in Seram's room.

"Alright, line up. Let me look at you." Precept Mon Zetta said.

We all did as we were told and formed a loose line in the middle of the room.

She started with Vanda and pointed to each of us as she went. "Gentle and Rake, we will start with you two together."

She raised an eyebrow when she got to Plia. "We are gonna call you Bones, you pair up with Lank. Wait, aren't we missing one?"

I raised my hand. "Why am I Lank?"

I understood why she had called Vanda gentle and Plia bones, but what she meant by naming Mallory rake or me Lank was lost on me.

"Because you look dull and lanky." Precept Mon Zetta answered immediately.

Plia followed my lead and raised her hand. "Why are we pairing up?"

"Tana is coming. We told her not to go out last night, Precept Zetta, but she is lost in the violent swings of infatuation," Mallory said without raising her hand. She wrapped her arms around herself and closed her eyes. Then, without warning, she stomped her foot in obvious anger. "Why wasn't it me?"

Precept Zetta shook her head and snapped her fingers once. The sharp sound of clinking crystal broke through the room and left us all silent.

"Listen. If I haven't explained something, it is because I do not want you to know. While you are with me, think before you speak. I've only got you in here for a month. If you don't learn enough, you'll fail, get hurt, or die. Understood?" She asked in a voice that made me straighten my spine and go completely still.

"Yes, Precept Zetta." Mallory and Vanda answered together.

"Yes, Precept Mon Zetta." Plia and I said at the same time as the others.

Our ragged looking teacher snapped again. "Just Zetta. Calling me Mon Zetta is like saying Teacher Lord Zetta. It wastes time."

"Yes, Precept Zetta." All of us said correctly.

Hurried footfalls echoed into the room from the hall. It was a tangled mixture of thumping steps and clicking claws that led to Tana appearing in the doorway.

"My apologies, Precept Mon Zetta," She started as she ran over to where we all stood. Even though it took her more time to do it, she walked all the way to the end of the line I was not on before she stopped. "I have had some trouble with my familiar this morning. It will not happen again."

"Is that what you're calling him now? What's the matter, you still couldn't work up the courage to ask him his name?" Mallory blurted out as she gave Tana a little push.

Tana pushed her back. "Shut up. If you want to know so bad then you should have come."

"So you did get his name! Tell us, you have to! Pretty please? He's a little tall for my taste, but with the right name, those feelings could change. What is it?" Mallory begged.

Tana shrugged her shoulders and looked away from the persistent new moon. "His name is Arthur. He is a page from the armory enclave, and he is in Hymneth to see his-"

Precept Zetta snapped her fingers for the third time, and it worked on everyone but me.

I was halfway to Tana when my new teacher grabbed me by my collar and pulled me out of line. "Good. We have a volunteer. Thank you, Lank."

She took Tana in the exact same way that she had me and told the others to step back. "And what are we going to call you? Tardy? No, I don't like that."

"Puddles." Plia said with an evil looking smirk.

"What? No!" Tana shouted.

Precept Zetta gave a vicious smirk of her one. "Yes. I like that. Puddles."

Tana grew so red in the face that I thought her pretty little head would explode like one of my fireworks.

"Listen," Precept Zetta said as she squared Tana and I to one another. "They make me call this class Conflict and Resolution. What I am actually going to teach you is how to kill and how to not die."

Hearing Tana say Arthur's name, even if it wasn't my Arthur, was enough for me to know that I did not need to be taught how to kill.

"All the workings and power each of you have mean nothing if you can not master the most important skill you will ever learn," Zetta continued, her raspy voice working up into something powerful in its own right. "How to take a hit. You, Lank. Make a werelight."

It took me too long to respond to her orders.

"Come on, it's not that hard. Make a werelight." She insisted.

I did as I was told, focusing my air and bringing it to my palm as quickly as I could.

"Good. You've got a pretty color," Precept Zetta said before she turned her attention to Tana. "Now, Puddles, hit her."

Tana gritted her teeth at the sound of her nickname, but she did not strike me. "What?"

"Hit her. Right in the stomach. If she keeps her werelight formed, she passes. If not, she has to try again. Go on. It's not that complicated." Precept Zetta explained.

Our teacher did not have to tell Tana a third time.

Her blue stoned necklace peeking out of her collar as she moved, the new moon that I liked the least stepped forward and drove her fist into my stomach.

Fortunately for me, Tana was rather weak.

Unfortunately for me, I had fought some one that was impossibly strong not very long before.

I doubled over and wrapped my arms around stomach as waves of pain washed through me. My breath grew short, and I was nearly certain that I would be sick. My werelight fell away to bright blue dust and streamed down onto the stone floor beneath me.

"I didn't even hit her that hard, Precept Zetta. I swear." Tana cried, the sound of her voice only making me feel sicker.

Precept Zetta raised her voice. "What would have happened if this had been a real fight?"

No one answered.

"Lank would have died. It's that simple. Your turn, Puddles. Make your werelight."

I forced myself to stand and bit my tongue so the scream I wanted to scream would not burst from my lips.

Tana's were light floated up from the floor and came to a stop right above her head.

"Whenever you are ready, Lank." Precept Zetta said with a nod.

It was too much. She had done too much for me to control myself any longer.

I met Tana's eyes, and they went wide.

I hated how much they looked like the warden's

Tana began to panic. "Wait, no, stop. She's crazy. She's going to-"

With all of the new moons and Precept Zetta watching, I shut Tana's mouth by driving my right fist into her face.

The sound of my knuckles cracking against the bone of her jaw echoed off the walls of the classroom.

Bright blue light leaked through the small creases of my clenched fist and illuminated the honey haired underwitch's face.

I had grown so angry, had hurt so bad, that I had not realized I had been performing a working.

Pressure built within my fingers and before I could pull it back, the firework burst against Tana's face.

Blinding light filled the room and faded just in time for me to see Tana hit the far wall of the room and become still.

Before I could blink the burning in my eyes away, Precept Zetta put her hand on my shoulder.

"What was your name? Maybe you aren't so dull."

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