Page 38 of Class Studies
I blinked in shock. Abe apologized to me.
“I’m also sorry I forced you to work with Ram.” Abe pulled two chocolates out of her pocket. “I’d not realized the extent of your physical abuse. However, I’m not sorry about the results.”
I sucked in a sharp breath. Abe made my life miserable since day one. But she’d just given me my scales back and apologized. My world tilted, and I leaned against her chunky table. My knuckles turned white as I gripped the smooth wood, trying to make sense of all of this.
The woman put one of her chocolate kisses near my elbow and backed up. Although she’d apologized for making me work with Ram, she’d also said she wasn’t sorry about the result. “Ah, what?”
“All of this.” Abe swept her arm around the room. “The culmination of your experiences here has helped you control magic I didn’t know existed.” Abe drew my gaze. “The ability to control free will. Do you even understand the magnitude of it?”
I shook my head.
Abe scoffed. “This place is a failure as an educational establishment.”
I couldn’t argue.
“Now, you can’t charge a potion.” She nudged the chocolate. “So, the potions charged with your magic were from your transfers into Damon. Is that correct?”
I took another deep breath and managed to stand without leaning on the desk. “Ah, yes.”
Abe raised an eyebrow. “And you never controlled his will?”
“No.” My shoulders slumped. “I didn’t even try….I would never have thought to.”
Another tear trickled down my cheek, and I brushed it away. I hated the MA for destroying my life, but I needed to let it go. Damon took everything from me. He was evil. No matter my internal conflict about right and wrong, that was a fact.
Abe wrapped an arm around my shoulders. I didn’t flinch this time.
“What happened to you is not your fault.” She squeezed me into her thin side. “I’m sure you can work with Doctor Roy. What’s important: you are free, and you are talented.” Releasing me, she glided to her desk and gathered the catalysts into a bag.
I watched her, still wrapping my head around my cold, sharp-edged alchemy instructor’s oddly caring side.
When she finished, she turned to me, her rigid posture back. “Now, make me a Bead of Will.”
I furrowed my eyebrows. “Like to put in you?”
“Don’t be dense.” Abe snapped her fingers. “I want to study the magic to see if I can manipulate it.”
My gut twisted. “But stopping people’s free will is bad.”
“I don’t care what you think good and bad is.” Abe walked to her desk and pulled beakers, jars, and bowls out of the drawers. “We all live by our own moral code first. Nothing we do truly matters in the grand scheme of things.” A metal bowl clanged against her bubbling cauldron. “Good people do bad things, and bad people do good things.”
“I’m ruining lives.” I balled my fist. “What I do matters.”
“You’re not ruining lives any more than the person next to you.” Abe glared at me. “We all take turns being nasty to each other, either on purpose or by accident. It’s called the human condition. Now,” she gestured to her collection of receptacles on her desk. “Which one of these containers will hold your magic?”
I blinked at her. “That’s not how life works.”
“Then tell me, oh wise child of life, how does life work?” Abe placed a fist on her hip.
I closed and opened my mouth several times.
“You don’t know.” Abe picked up one of her beakers and gestured around the room. “I’m seventy-three years old, and I still don’t know. We flounder about doing whatever we do until something changes and makes us do something else. I’m not here to prattle on about your insecurities.” She narrowed her eyes at me. “Focus, child. Which one of these containers will hold your magic?”
I tugged on my braid and looked at her collection. “None of them. The beads dissipate when they hit something other than a person.”
Abe pursed her lips. “What about an animal?”
I blinked. “I don’t know….unless Ram counted.”