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we have to do other things as well, and I have ideas about what. I just think we should talk about them when we’re all together. We’ve got Rusty on our side now too. You go to your mother, and to—Jared. Tell them we all need to talk. Tell them I’ve got a plan.”
    Kami tried to say Jared’s name as if she could not have cared less. She couldn’t do it, could not stop the catch in her voice before she got out his name. She felt a wash of humiliation go through her when Ash rose and left without a word.
    There was no comfort for her in her mind. She had to swallow pain down and pretend. “What’s wrong with him?” She was certain that her casual tone did not sound very convincing. But Holly only looked distressed.
    “Well,” Holly said. “Well—it’s probably Jared.”
    Before, she had always known if Jared was all right. Now anything could happen to him and she wouldn’t know.
    Kami looked up at Holly and said, painfully, “What’s happened to Jared?”
    Holly looked so sorry for her.
    “What’s happened ?” Kami demanded, and her voice shook. “Tell me.”
    “Nothing,” said Holly. “I mean, he’s all right, Kami. I promise you. It’s just that I imagine Ash is upset that Jared left home.”
    “Left home?” Kami asked. “Left Aurimere?”
    Holly looked alarmed, possibly because Kami sounded slightly hysterical. “Yes. It’s all over school,” she added, which did nothing to help Kami away from the path of hysteria.
    Kami grasped the edge of her desk, and used it to stand up. “Where did he go?”
    * * *
    She was running too fast and completely against school rules when she almost sent Amber Green, a girl she sometimes sat beside in English class, flying down the school steps. Kami grabbed Amber by the scarf and prevented her own arrest for haste-motivated manslaughter.
    “Sorry, so sorry, but I can’t stop,” Kami said. “I promise to bring some of Mum’s cookies to school and share them with you. Don’t think of it as a present. Think of it as a bribe for your silence.”
    “Don’t bother,” said Amber.
    Kami blinked. “Ah, I see. Making a hard bargain for some caramel squares. I have to admire your tactics.”
    “Were you working on your little newspaper?” Amber sneered.
    “Uh,” Kami said, stunned for a moment because Amber had never spoken to her like this before in their lives. “Uh, ‘little,’ really? Like, you’re literally belittling the newspaper? Not going with anything more imaginative than that? Sure, I was working on my little newspaper. Good luck trying to make me feel small.”
    She made a move to go past Amber, but Amber’s hand shot out and grabbed her wrist. Her grip was tight enough to let Kami know she really meant it.
    “Rob says he doesn’t want any more of your pathetic li”—Amber swallowed the word, and Kami felt an obscure sense of satisfaction—“your pathetic stories about him in the paper.”
    “I’ve been considering this new headline,” said Kami, “but I’m worried it’s a little juvenile. Tell me what you think. ‘Rob Lynburn Is Not the Boss of Me.’ Yes? No? I guess he’s the boss of you.”
    Amber’s eyes narrowed: green sparking in the hazel, like something stirring in the woods.
    “Cease loitering on the steps, girls,” Ms. Dollard, their headmistress, said sharply as she walked up to them. She gave Amber a push between the shoulder blades.
    Amber jumped almost as if she had received a tiny electric shock. Actually, exactly as if she had received a tiny electric shock.
    “Don’t bother the other students, Amber,” Ms. Dollard added.
    Amber glanced at Ms. Dollard, at Kami, then all around. Her shoulders were hunched: she looked afraid. “But what am I supposed to tell him?” she hissed.
    “Tell him thanks,” said Kami. “Now I know another one of the sorcerers on his side.”
    Amber recoiled at the word, as if Kami had waved a cross in front of a vampire, as if all the sorcerers of Sorry-in-the-Vale thought