The closing reception opened at dusk, and Soren spent the first hour of it standing on a grave he'd fought to keep.
That was Dani's read and it hadn't left him since she gave it. He'd planted the whole pack on the one spot where the buried thing could touch all of them through him, and tonight the academy had dressed the spot in lights and invited everyone it wanted to impress.
The floor was the fullest it had been all festival.
Delegation gray in the good seats. Council pins on half the jackets.
Faculty in the clothes they only wore when someone above them was watching, and above them, tonight, everyone was.
Selah's ice display stood at the center of the hall, taller than the festival version, columns of clean frost coming up off her own bare hands while she rebuilt a melting arch one touch at a time.
Maren ran the demonstration corner with the flame held at hearth-orange and not one shade past it.
Dani had the booth.
Joan had the door.
