The Copper Gauntlet

But maybe Aaron wasn’t thinking that. Maybe he was exhausted and not thinking about anything at all.

AFTER THAT, THINGS happened quickly. Alastair was squired off by Master Rufus to sleep in a spare Master’s room. The kids were sent to their common rooms to bathe and rest, meaning that Call was a) separated from Jasper and b) reunited with Havoc, both of which he regarded as good things.

No sooner had Call, Tamara, and Aaron spilled back into their common room to collapse in exhaustion on sofas and chairs than Alex Strike arrived, bearing food from the Refectory — wooden plates and bowls piled high with different sorts of mushrooms and lichen and tuberous puddings, from stuff that tasted like nachos to purple goop that Tamara thought resembled salted caramel to a mushroom that tasted exactly like a breaded chicken finger.

After eating his fill, Call stumbled to his bed and collapsed, exhausted. He didn’t dream — or if he did, he didn’t remember.

When he woke up the next day, he realized that his sheets were gritty with smoke and dirt. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a real bath and decided he’d better take one before Master Rufus got a good look at him and dunked him in one of the Magisterium’s silty pools.

Looking down at Havoc, he realized his wolf was in even worse shape. Havoc’s fur had turned an entirely different color from filth.

The washroom was a grotto off the main hallway and shared by two different rooms of apprentices. It had three chambers — one with toilets, one with sinks and mirrors, and one with warm pools that bubbled gently and streams of water that poured down over you like warm rain if you stood in the right place. Walls of rock cleverly separated all of the individual bathing areas, so that multiple people could bathe at the same time without having to see one another with their clothes off.

Call went over to one of the pools, hung his towel on a hook, stripped off the filthy civilian clothes he’d fallen asleep in and climbed in. The water was so hot it was almost uncomfortable at first, until his muscles relaxed. Then it felt amazing. Even his leg felt good.

“Come on in,” he told Havoc.

The wolf hesitated, sniffing the air. Then he took a suspicious lick of the water. Once, this would have annoyed Call, but now he found the idea that Havoc didn’t automatically do what he wanted to be a huge relief.

“Call?” he heard someone say. It was a voice coming from the other side of the rock wall of his bath. A very familiar girl’s voice.

“Tamara?” His voice went a little squeaky. “I’m taking a bath!”

“I know,” she said. “But there’s no one else in here and we need to talk.”

“I don’t know if you know this,” he said. “But mostly people take baths with their clothes off.”

“I’m on the other side of a wall!” she said, sounding exasperated. “And it’s really humid in here and making my hair frizz, so could we just talk?”

Call pushed his own wet black hair out of his face. “Okay, fine. Talk.”

“You called me a liar,” she said, and the hurt in her voice was unmistakable.

Call squirmed. Havoc looked at him sternly. “I know,” he said.

“And then it turned out that you were an even bigger liar,” she said. “You lied about everything.”

“I lied to protect my dad!”

“You lied to protect yourself,” she snapped. “You could have told us you were the Enemy —”

“Tamara, shut up.”

“Call, I hate to tell you this, but the bathroom is not exactly full of people listening in. It’s just us.”

“I’m not the Enemy of Death.” Call glowered at his reflection in the water. Black hair, gray eyes. Still Callum Hunt. And yet not.