On the morning of the fourth day after her first class, Enid sat in her office as usual, brewed herself a cup of herbal tea, and got back to work.

  Her course met once a week, which left her plenty of time to prepare the next lesson and keep up with her own research.

  Her four students also stopped by to ask questions. Eleanor came every day, Esme was next most frequent, then Nino.

  As for Wolfgang, he still had not shown up even once.

  Like always, Enid calculated the time classes ended for the day, set out tea and snacks ahead of time, and waited for her students to drop in.

  Before any of them arrived, a magical letter slipped in through the crack of the window.

  The signature said it was from Antonio. There was no envelope and no wax seal, like he had written it in a rush.

  The message itself was painfully short, “Professor Enid, come to the headmaster’s office immediately. It’s urgent.”

  Since it was the headmaster calling, Enid could only set aside her still-warm tea, throw on her mage’s robe, and head out.

  Her office was on the thirteenth floor of the central keep. The first ten floors were essentially the grand hall space, and only from the eleventh floor up did the building hold its other facilities.

  The headmaster’s office sat on the highest floor, the fiftieth, and that entire level was Antonio’s private domain, living quarters, office, reception rooms, plus a large conference hall.

  Thank the stars the city had a magic-powered lift, because Enid did not even want to imagine Antonio’s old bones trudging up and down dozens of floors every day.

  He had just complained recently that he was getting up there in years, that his back and knees were starting to protest.

  For a half-elf, Antonio really was long-lived. At five hundred and sixty-four, he had already outlived the half-elf average by sixty-four years.

  And aside from white hair and a white beard, he still looked and moved better than most ordinary young adults.

  For context, the average human lifespan in the Stahir Empire now ran a bit over a hundred years, more than double what it had been at the empire’s founding.

  That was simply what wealth and stability did. Even the poorest citizens could receive the empire’s minimum welfare package.

  That included one bottle of vitality tonic per month, medical subsidies, and food that was at least reasonably healthy.

  Even if someone got sick, they could go to a nearby charity church for divine healing, so life expectancy rose on its own.

  Most elf bloodlines matured at about the same pace as humans during adolescence, but their prime lasted for centuries, and then they entered a rapid decline once old age finally caught up.

  Half-elves, as a mix of high elf and human, were the same as humans in most life stages, except their prime stretched hundreds of years longer.

  When Enid reached the conference hall doors on the fiftieth floor, she was just about to give the passphrase to the gargoyle statue at the entrance and open the heavy wooden doors.

  Then she heard voices inside.

  It sounded like people were arguing, and there were quite a few of them.

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  Enid’s sharp hearing kicked in again. She pressed her ear to the door and listened.

  Through the thick wood, she caught a young woman’s voice raised loud, it sounded like Caroline Fleurien.

  “No matter how you spin it, impeaching a new professor this quickly breaks tradition. The proper procedure is to observe for half a term, then decide.”

  An older man cut in, his tone openly hostile.

  “Interesting, coming from you. When the headmaster hired Professor Inis, you were the loudest opponent, were you not? Your reason was that it violated academy tradition.”

  Caroline snapped back immediately.

  “That was then. This is different. Since Professor Inis is already officially appointed, due process is her right and her obligation. You do not fire someone because of one class and a single complaint. That’s nonsense.”

  Enid could piece together the situation now, and she could guess who was in the room.

  They were arguing about dismissing her, and Caroline was objecting because it was not the proper procedure.

  Which was ironic, since Caroline had been the most against Enid joining in the first place.

  Enid had underestimated just how much Caroline valued order and formal process. Even if she disliked Enid, she would still speak up for what she considered fair.

  Enid kept listening.

  The older man fired back again, but his words grew sharper and meaner, sliding into personal attacks.

  “Hah. So the youngest dean is also the most rigid and the least flexible. You opposed the group decision before, and now you oppose the group decision again. Were you born just to disagree with people?”

  “Youngsters should listen to their elders, instead of charging around like a calf that just learned to walk. Careful, or a tiger will swipe your head clean off.”

  That jab at her age finally hit home.

  Caroline’s voice rose higher, sharp enough to cut.

  “You rotten old ***, a filthy Stahir slur. You voted against it too.”

  “And besides being older than me, what exactly do you do better. Your papers are worse, your course ratings are worse, and the students you turn out are worse.”

  “Keep running your mouth, and don’t blame me when I stop being polite about seniority.”

  The old man, clearly stung, started shouting back from across the room.

  “You mouthy little brat, so full of yourself. Someone ought to drag Duke Fleurien in here and let him see you right now, arrogant, reckless, hotheaded. Compared to you, even the monsters up north look calm and civilized. You’re an embarrassment to Stahir’s nobility and to this academy. You should pack up and get lost with that showpiece professor.”

  After that came the sounds of chairs scraping and things being shoved around, mixed with more foul language and a few voices trying to break it up.

  “Let go of me! I’m going to smash that old bastard’s head in, then use his skull as spellcraft material!”

  “You reckless little witch. I’ll teach you how to respect your elders!”

  “If you’ve got any spine, fight me one on one, you walking corpse!”

  “Enough. Shut your filthy mouth!”

  So this was how deans competed at the magic academy. It was a lot more intense than Enid had imagined.

  And, honestly, for a young genius, Caroline’s insults were way more creative than the old man’s.

  Seeing things spiral, Antonio finally broke his silence. He rapped something against the table to force everyone to cool it, and the shouting stopped long enough for everyone’s ears to recover.

  Enid figured that was her cue.

  She gave the password to the gargoyle statue, and the heavy doors swung open. At last, she saw the people inside.

  There were six of them.

  A woman stood on the central dais. Seated were Antonio, Caroline, the older man still breathing hard, and three other deans.

  The human woman on the dais wore half-rimmed glasses with a thin gold frame. Nothing about her stood out, not her face, not her build. She looked about thirty, the kind of person you could glance at and immediately forget.

  Caroline sat in the seat reserved for the Dean of Hexcraft.

  The man she had been arguing with was Howard Vinnova, a marquess, and the current Dean of the Arcane College.

  The remaining three were, first, a blonde, sharp-looking middle-aged woman with an unmistakable soldier’s bearing, Felicité Bouchard, a countess, and Dean of the Cadet College.

  Second, a man with messy dark-green hair and a gloomy, brooding presence, his age impossible to tell, Comas Kallis, Dean of the Liberal Arts College.

  And last, a well-built man in classic Stahir gentleman’s attire, handsome, stern, with short dark red hair and that quiet authority that did not need to shout, Jules Drasco, a duke, and Dean of the Arts College.

  Every last one of them turned to Enid.

  Their eyes held appraisal, suspicion, and in a few cases, open disdain.

  Enid did not flinch under the pressure. If anything, she almost laughed.

  It felt like a pack of kids staring her down with the most serious faces they could manage, and Enid’s sense of humor had always been, well, a little strange.

  So she fought to keep the corners of her mouth from lifting. She overdid it, and her lips trembled slightly.

  Only Antonio knew she was holding in a laugh.

  The other deans, however, took it the wrong way. They assumed the new professor had been rattled by their stern presence and was simply trying, with all her dignity, to keep a calm face.