The Bronze Key

He wondered if they’d spot Warren, potential assassin, and if he’d have something creepy to say to them, but the little lizard was nowhere to be seen.

Call used his wristband, with all its new stones, to wave his way into their rooms. Aaron set down Call’s luggage on their couch with a groan that made Call feel a little better about his own abilities and a little more guilty about Aaron’s generosity. The room looked smaller than it had the year before and it took him a moment to realize it was because he’d grown, not because the room had shrunk.

The door opened and Tamara marched in, dragging her suitcases behind her. “I didn’t know where you two had gone! You just wandered off!” she announced. Which was completely unfair, because she was the one who had wandered off, Call thought. She turned to Aaron. “And you know we’re not supposed to leave Call alone!”

“I didn’t,” Aaron pointed out.

“Hmph,” Tamara said before she stomped into her room. Call went off to his bedroom, which felt cold and dusty and unused, the way it always did at the beginning of a school year. He flung his suitcase open and put on his uniform — blue for third year. He snapped his cuff shut and looked at himself in the mirror on the wardrobe. There was a time when he’d been short enough that he could see himself completely in the glass; now his head passed the top of the frame and he had to crouch.

He went out into the common room and found Aaron and Tamara waiting in their uniforms. After promising Havoc some leftovers, they trooped off to the Refectory for dinner. Everyone but the Iron Year students — who were coming from their Trials and usually got to eat in their rooms — were settling in to their old tables and choosing from among the culinary options. Tonight’s menu was a purplish mash, large mushrooms cut up so they seemed almost like slices of bread and slathered with some yellow paste, and three kinds of lichen — bright green, brown, and dark red. Call piled everything on his plate, along with a cup of liquid with a thin film of algae on it.

It was creepy how delicious the lichen was to Call. He forked it into his mouth like a starving man and wondered if it was possible for the lichen to have some sinister purpose. Like brainwash him into eating so much of it that he would become an entirely lichen-based life-form. Was that a thing that could happen? He gave his next forkful a long, suspicious look before shoving it into his face.

Jasper sat down next to Call, as though they were friends or something. “So, what’s the plan?”

“What are you talking about?” Call asked.

“Oh, never mind,” Jasper said with a roll of his eyes, then turned to Tamara. “I don’t know why I even bothered asking him. What’s the plan?”

“We can’t talk here,” she said, leaning in and dropping her voice. Call couldn’t help noticing that the cut under her eye was still visible, a thin scabbed line. Every time he saw it, he thought of her fingers on his jacket, pulling him to safety. He thought of what he owed her.

He owed all his friends so much. He didn’t know how he’d ever pay them back.

Aaron, who’d been talking to Rafe, another Bronze Year student, about the robots he and Call had built over the summer, seemed to notice something important was going on and broke off his conversation to join theirs.

“Tomorrow,” Tamara said. “After dinner, let’s meet in the library. We can discuss then.”

“What are we talking about?” Celia asked, sitting down across from Call, her plate full of purple mush. “Is something going on?”

“No!” Aaron and Jasper said at the same time.

“Sure, that’s not suspicious or anything.” She stood back up. “If you didn’t want me to sit here, you just had to say so. I’ll go somewhere else —”

Call sprang to his feet. “Don’t,” he said before he could think of how to persuade her to stay. “We were just talking about the Gallery. But we hadn’t decided to go. But I mean, we could. Go, that is.”

“Are you asking me to go to the Gallery with you?” Celia inquired, her expression unreadable. The Gallery was where two people went when they were on …

A date. She is talking about a date. She thinks I am asking her on a date.

“I … don’t know?” Call stammered.

“Well, maybe you should figure it out,” Celia said, tossing her blond hair and stalking off to sit with Rafe, Kai, and Gwenda.

“The gauntlet is in your court, buddy,” Jasper announced the moment she was out of earshot.

“You’re mixing your metaphors,” said Call. “It gives me a headache.”

“Can we talk about saving Call’s actual life instead of saving his love life?” said Tamara, looking fed up. “Until tomorrow night, one of us stays with Call at all times. It’ll probably have to be either me or Aaron because if it’s you, Jasper, everyone will think it’s weird, since you don’t like Call.”

“Sure he does,” said Aaron, looking surprised. “We’re all friends.”

“Whatever,” said Tamara. “Tomorrow, after dinner, library. Bring some good ideas.” She glanced over. “Alex Strike is gesturing at me. I’ll be right back.” She stood up and caught hold of Aaron’s sleeve. “Come on. He probably wants to say hi to you, too.”

“What —?” Aaron began as he was yanked off his feet and tugged toward the table where Alex, Kimiya, and their other Gold Year friends were sitting. They seemed like a somber group. Call couldn’t blame them. Losing a friend like that —

“So do you like Celia or not?” Jasper asked, gnawing a piece of lichen. He had gotten a new slick-looking haircut before the awards ceremony, and a piece of dark hair fell into his eyes.

“How is that your business?” Call asked.

“Maybe I’ll ask her out,” said Jasper. “Did you ever think of that?”

Call hadn’t. He goggled. “Do what you want,” he said finally.

“I guess you don’t care.” Jasper’s eyes gleamed with amusement. “Maybe because you like Tamara?”

“Jasper —”

“Do you? Like Tamara?”

“She’s my best friend,” Call said between his teeth.

“That doesn’t mean anything.” Jasper twirled his fork between his fingers. “People like each other all the time in apprentice groups. Look at Kimiya and Alex Strike. Or, you know, me and Celia. You could totally like Tamara —”