Benji arrived at the plantworking building with the sincere hope that his second university class would go significantly better than his first. In truth, it would be hard for it to go much worse. His general magic theory course, a fundamental class taken by all first-years, took place in a dusty lecture hall in the Hall of the Elements. He’d settled into his seat in the semi-circular lecture hall only to hear someone whispering the words “Tall Man” over his shoulder. Behind him were not one, but two small blonde teenagers. Simon’s sister Lucy looked exactly like him, her hair cut in an ill-advised bang/bob combination that made it look like she had done it herself. Any pity he might have had for her attempts at achieving an individual style evaporated as she and her brother proceeded to spend the entire lecture whispering about how they couldn’t see because of the Tall Man in front of them. The lecture hall’s terraced seating notwithstanding, their whispers were so consistent that Benji barely heard a word uttered by Yuki, the magical theory professor whose frail voice hardly reached the middle of the lecture hall anyway. Worse, Benji had misheard when he was called upon, and answered confidently that it was not possible to make inedible objects edible using magic. This was of course not true, and had elicited a laugh from the crowd of students who had no doubt spent their childhoods eating copper coins that they themselves had turned into candy.

  Next was plantworking. The plantworking building seemed impossible from the outside. High up on the hill just east of Benji’s dorm, it resembled an upside-down pyramid, its wide top providing plenty of space for the gardens and greenhouses where students practiced their plantworking. The lecture was in one of the top floor classrooms, with a staircase leading up to one of the rooftop greenhouses. Benji noticed Maynard sitting near the back, and joined him at the high two-seater table. The mood in this classroom was much calmer than the general theory class. This was a secondary discipline course, which meant the students were significantly older. They were mainly excited to see their friends as they slouched into their seats, most not bothering with the heavy bookbags worn by their younger peers, just carrying whatever notebooks and pens they needed in light shoulder bags or the inner pockets of their cloaks. The older students also took the concept of dressing like a mage far less seriously. The woman at the bench in front of him was wearing a floral dress, while her partner removed his school regulation waistcoat and set it on the back of his stool.

  The professor, a woman with a hooked nose and a swoop of thick brown hair, introduced herself as Matilde. She started the class with a rather intricate icebreaker involving identifying which plants was each student’s favorite, which embodied their personality, and which they would pick to win a game of lawn darts. Matilde interjecting herself on numerous occasions to debate the students’ choices, resulting in a playfully confrontational back-and-forth. This classroom seemed perfect for this type of learning. It had a wildness to it, the windows that made up the roof and stretched across the back playing host to all manner of vines and hanging plants, the air almost tropical with the smell of humus.

  Maynard picked a deathspool for all three of his choices, remarking that he liked it because it was the most poisonous plant in the known world and that he thought it matched his personality rather well. That was the one choice Matilde did not object to.

  After the fourth student had gone, it became clear that the exercise had been less about actually determining which plant represented which person, and more about getting the class involved and starting to think about plants. Plantworking had a reputation for being one of the duller subjects—after all, how excited could one be about pouring magic into a bin of manure for an hour in the hopes that it might help some plants grow faster?—but in Matilde’s hands, the boring subject matter was at least offset by an atmosphere of convivial chaos.

  As Matilde turned to the course syllabus, which she handwrote in pencil on a self-erasing tree stump hung on the back wall, a knock sounded on the greenhouse door above.

  “Ah, that’ll be my assistant,” Matilde said, her thick hair straying behind her as she opened the door. “Nella has the unadmirable task of helping me organize this class.”

  The door opened with a rusty squeal. Down the stairs came a woman maybe a couple years younger than Benji. If the other students had made minimal effort to dress as mages, her attire made minimal effort to suggest she hadn’t just been rolling about in compost. Dirt streamed from her bare arms as she set planters full of earth down on each table. Her sleeveless shirt, which had been brown to start with, was caked in mud and mulch.

  “Nella, why don’t you introduce yourself to our class?” The way Matilde said “our” class told Benji everything he needed to know about just how favored a student Nella was.

  “Sure, right, I can finish setting up later,” Nella began. “I’m Nella, I’m a tenth year. If you listen to most of my classmates, they’ll tell you I’m absolutely nutty for plants, like I might actually prefer them to human company. I often think they’re right.” Maynard nodded solemnly in agreement. “My specialty is in plant consciousness, so I do actually know a thing or two about making plants fun to hang out with, though I wouldn’t suggest trying it on anyone from the legume family. They’re conniving bastards.”

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  Nella paused for a space of time that could only have been intended as a well-earned laugh or applause break. Instead, the class shifted uncomfortably. Light streamed in through the greenhouse windows above, glinting off her hair. Benji had been so locked in on the dirt that he had completely missed that her hair was dyed a brilliant shade of orange, shot through with an aquamarine bolt.

  “We won’t be doing anything as complex as plant consciousness in this class,” Nella said, rushing to fill the silence. “I’ve been helping Matilde design experiments that are practical, not too difficult, and which will actually be useful once you leave class and forget ninety percent of what you’ve learned. I did suggest they call this class ‘Plantworking for Mages Who Will Never Use Plantworking Again,’ but the administration wasn’t having it.”

  She stared off wistfully for a moment, then abruptly climbed back up the stairs. So, her introduction was over?

  “Plant consciousness, that’s scary,” Maynard whispered.

  “You’re scary,” Benji retorted.

  It could’ve felt like crossing a line if not for how self-consciously Maynard leaned into his aesthetic. “Remarkably perceptive of you.”

  The rest of the lecture was punctuated by Nella coming and going, dropping off a pot at each of the work benches. Benji found himself paying attention to her rather than listening to Matilde. It wasn’t just her whippy movements—which reminded Benji more of bamboo than anything human—or the care with which she set down each pot. She also seemed to be whispering something to the soil.

  The only magic within Benji stirred as he watched. Inside the pots were tiny tubers that, according to Matilde, made great introductory plantworking subjects because they were abnormally responsive to human influence. Somehow, Benji could feel the presence of the tubers. Not just that, he thought he could feel the tubers . . . bending towards Nella. They did so calmly, as if her words were meant not as commands, but as invitations. Whatever magic she directed toward each little pot, the tubers were clearly receptive to it.

  “I wish I could talk to plants,” Benji whispered to Maynard.

  “It would certainly improve your odds of fitting in here.”

  Their first actual assignment was to take their pot of tubers back to their dorms and just keep them alive. Matilde didn’t specify where within the first three chapters of their textbook the care instructions could be found, thereby politely suggesting that they should read all three chapters.

  By the time the lecture had finished, the classroom had grown warm, and a drowsy post-lunch lull hung over the students. Benji felt the opposite. His magic clearly activated around plants, and his excitement overrode his usual caution. On the way to the door, he stopped near Nella, who was cleaning gardening supplies in a massive tub by the door.

  “Excuse me. Nella, right?” For some reason, talking to a tenth-year felt infinitely scarier than talking to a professor.

  “That’s the name the plants gave me,” she responded, staring out through the open window and far away. “I’m just messing with you. Yeah, that’s my name. What’s up?”

  Benji’s laugh came out somewhere between grateful and terrified. “I wouldn’t think the plants would pick such a human name.”

  “You’d be surprised.” Water sloshed as Nella rinsed off a rake.

  “I had a question about the lesson. Is it alright if I ask you, since you’re the classroom assistant and everything? Please let me know if it’s not.”

  Nella eyed him as if trying to determine if he was actually this obsequious.

  “Well, um,” Benji stumbled forward, “I noticed you were speaking to the tubers when you passed them out, like you were giving them instructions or something.”

  “Not far off,” Nella said.

  “I could tell you were speaking to them, and they were responding, but I couldn’t hear what you were saying.”

  Nella smiled widely. Benji found he had no control over whether or not he smiled back.

  “That’s a great ear for a first-year,” she said. Benji noted that she had intentionally dropped the “senior” from in front of first-year. “It wasn’t much of a plantworking. I was really just giving them a bit of encouragement to grow like they know how. Every plant is different, with its own personality, its own temperament, and its own relationship to humans. I didn’t want the tubers to get ideas and decide not to grow just because they’re in the hands of inexperienced plantworkers.”

  “That’s . . . really kind of you.”

  “I’m the classroom assistant, I’m supposed to help my class succeed,” Nella said, pulling the rest of the gardening tools out of the tub with a loud schlorping sound.

  Benji thanked her for the explanation before turning to go. Maynard was waiting for him at the door, his eyes so wide that he looked like a surprised owl, or perhaps an owl-fox.

  “You like plantworking, don’t you?” Maynard asked as they started down the stairs into the heart of the plantworking building’s inverted pyramid.

  “I think it’s about all I like here so far,” Benji said. He couldn’t help one last glance over his shoulder to see Nella carrying an inordinate amount of rakes toward the storage closet.

  “Except for your good friend Maynard, of course,” Maynard said.

  “Oh of course, can’t forget him.”

  By the time Benji had turned back toward Maynard, he had already disappeared, leaving Benji to walk back to his dorm alone, with his pot full of tubers.