A/N: Thanks to Be Rose for the beta read! And thanks to coolcat12345, Be Rose, and savethemadscientist for the reviews. You guys rock. :)


I'd never skipped school in my life. My dad could rant all he wanted about how I was such a "shortsighted, rebellious teenager," but I'd never rebelled against anything a Humdrum would recognize.

Until today.

The bell rang when I pushed open the door to Pumpkin Spice. But that was the only noise. Pumpkin Spice was quiet. The only person here was a college-aged wizard who only worked weekdays when Elle was at school. He sat behind the counter with a textbook propped on his lap.

He jumped up as soon as I reached the counter. "What can I get for you?" he said.

I glanced at the menu behind him, written in glittering gold on a background the dark green of a pumpkin stem. "Chili cocoa," I said.

"You got it."

I took my drink to a small table and waited. A drizzly rain started outside.

I couldn't get the Oracle out of my head. She knew something, that was for sure, and I didn't know if she'd learned it from Queen Amani or on her own.

But she wouldn't need to learn it from Queen Amani. If she was watching our lives down to the details of Imogen's Proctor Exam and my opinions on Humdrums, nothing could be hidden from her.

And if that was the case, then she already knew who was attacking the Humdrums, and she wasn't telling.

Not that I cared about the Humdrums and their attacker right this moment. Imogen burned through my thoughts, taking anything more important away. Tendrils of rage snaked down the veins in my arms and made my hands hot enough that my cocoa gave off a curl of steam every time I touched it. If the Oracle was right, and she had cheated, I knew all I needed to know.

Anyone who could cheat on an exam and their best friend all in the same month wasn't worth my time.

Stop thinking about her, Feye, I mentally ordered. Move on with your life.

How could she be so stupid? It wasn't like cheating on a Proctor Exam wouldn't have consequences. If word got out, she'd never make it into any school, let alone Institut Glanz. She'd probably lose her job. And Imogen would care about something like that. But maybe she didn't care. Maybe she just got off on the thrill of lying to people.

My cocoa steamed.

The bell rang and I looked up to see Elle. She shook her head, tossing damp blond hair out of her eyes, and called across the room, "Hey, toss a tray of scones in the oven to warm, would you?"

Then she saw me. She slid into the chair opposite me without waiting for an invitation. "What's wrong with you?"

I couldn't get the words to form. Too many of them clamored around my mind and in my mouth, and stringing them into sentences was impossible.

"What?" Elle said. The spot between her eyes creased. "Hey, are you okay?"

No, I was not okay. Nothing about anything was okay.

"Hello?"

"Imogen and Lucas are dating," I blurted. And then the back of my throat started closing up and a hot prickling started behind my eyes. I stared at my cup. I was not going to burst into tears in the middle of this cafe like a child.

"Shit," Elle said.

It was the right answer. I laughed. The prickling faded.

"Are you serious?" she said. Her eyes were like two cups of steaming coffee, round and brown and vaguely caffeinated. "When? What happened?"

I opened my mouth to tell her, but she glanced up at the pumpkin-shaped clock on the wall behind the counter and interrupted. "Listen, it's almost time for the after-school rush," she said. "Come talk to me while I work. Logan's getting off in five minutes and Cortney's going to be late today."

"You want some help?" I said. "Unless I'd be in the way."

"I would freaking love some help," she said. "Cortney's at the eye doctor and who knows how long that's going to take."

I stood and followed Elle to the counter. "She getting glasses?"

"Who knows," Elle said. "She says her vision gets blurry when she reads, but I'm not totally sure she can read."

Despite her tone, I felt the begrudging affection underneath. Cortney and Elle were stepsisters, and Elle had come to that union kicking and screaming. But they'd gotten used to each other.

Elle led me behind the counter and handed me an orange apron to tie around my waist. She pointed around at the bottles and dark green canisters that littered the counter.

"Italian syrups, seltzer, carbonated Fountain of Youth water, cream, fairy dust," she said, her finger jabbing with each new item. "The mini fridge under the counter has apple spritzers from a Tree of Life. Nonalcoholic, obviously, but I have a policy that we only sell one of those per customer per day. Two in a row would probably land you in the hospital."

The number of bottles overwhelmed me, and I was glad. Being overwhelmed by anything that wasn't Imogen or the Humdrum attacker felt like a vacation.

Elle pulled a crystal bottle with a flame-colored stopper out from behind a stack of paper cups. "Dragon tears," she said. "I use them for keeping drinks hot, but careful or you'll get burned."

She directed me to a laminated card that listed recipes and instructions for Italian sodas, fairy dust sodas, and mocktails.

"You put dragon tears in fairy dust sodas?" I said.

"Gross, right?" she said. "That's what I thought until I tried it."

The bell on the door jingled as two girls came in with backpacks. I got their muffins out of the glass-fronted case while Elle whipped up their drinks. Once they were sitting on one of the comfortable brown couches, Elle leaned against the counter. "So," she said. "Imogen and Lucas."

I explained the whole story as quickly as I could. I liked him, he seemed to like me, he got dumped, Imogen said to wait, and then—"They were right there in the lobby, and he freaking kissed her."

Elle winced. "Ouch," she said.

"Yeah, and then I asked her—"

I was interrupted by customers, who wanted mochas and blueberry sodas. I made the soda while Elle kept one eye on me.

"So I asked her—"

And then we were interrupted again, and it was another hour before I could finish the sentence. I couldn't believe how crazy it felt behind the counter, or how cool Elle was in the middle of it. She whipped out drinks and joked with customers and calculated change in her head like there was nothing to it. Meanwhile, I kept reading the wrong lines on the recipe card and had to re-make someone's fairy dust soda twice because I couldn't keep the dust from clumping as soon as it hit the seltzer.

Finally, the place was full of contented people sipping beverages and nibbling on pastries.

Elle turned to me. "Okay, so you asked her about it."

"And she said he'd been telling her all about Aubrey and that talking to her 'helped him.'" The words alone made me want to gag. How cloying could she get? "I'm sure her glamours didn't hurt," I said.

"She'd been glamouring him?"

I thought about pointing out that Elle wasn't one to talk, seeing as she'd spent the entire first few months of our acquaintanceship manipulating everyone she knew with charms. Unlike Imogen, though, she'd learned her lesson.

"Probably for a while," I said. "And then they hooked up and she didn't even bother to tell me."

Elle's eyes flashed. "Like, how hooked up?" Elle said.

"Just kissing," I said quickly.

"But still," Elle said.

"Yeah."

We fell silent. At least I didn't have to explain to her what was wrong about all this. She'd grasped in seconds what Imogen still probably hadn't figured out.

The bell on the door rang and I looked up, poised to jump back into action. But it was just Cortney. She came behind the counter and put on an apron.

"Olivia!" she said, as soon as she saw me. "Oh my god, hi! How are you?" Everything that came out of her mouth was about twice as enthusiastic as it needed to be.

"I'm good," I lied. "Just helping out for a couple of hours."

"Super fab!" She leaned in to give me a quick hug and then went back into the larger room, where she started clearing drinks and napkins from tables. She stopped to flirt with a couple of guys sitting near the window.

"She is such a child," Elle said. "Okay, so what are you going to do about all this?"

I wiped a dribble of syrup off the counter. "I already went to the Oracle," I said.

"Wow," she said. "Ballsy move, kid."

"Yeah, I'm an idiot," I said. "I know. It was ridiculous."

"Not ridiculous, just gutsy. What'd she say?"

I let out a long sigh. The air seemed more than ready to escape from me, and I didn't blame it. I wished I could run away from the thoughts fizzing in my head, too. "She seems kind of… revenge-y," I said. "She told me some stuff about Imogen and said I could do whatever I wanted with it."

Elle's eyebrows furrowed. "That's weird."

For some reason, I didn't like Elle saying exactly what I'd been thinking. "She must have a reason," I said.

"I guess," Elle said. "That's terrible advice, though."

"She can't give terrible advice," I said. "She's the Oracle."

Elle hadn't even been in our world a year yet. No one who'd been around longer would say something like that and be serious.

And yet.

"Are you sure you didn't, like, misunderstand her or something?"

"Maybe?" I said. I tapped the counter. "No. She was pretty clear. But it makes sense, when you think about it. Her job is to keep balance in our world."

"Like, an eye for an eye kind of stuff?" Elle said. "That's messed up."

"That's what holds our world together," I said.

My tone was too sharp, and she held her hands up. "Hey, I'm not arguing," she said. "It's your world. I still don't get how half of this works. It's just weird."

Cortney came back behind the counter, a stack of cups balanced in each hand. She disappeared behind the curtain that led to the small kitchen.

My phone buzzed. I reached for it. "Yeah, it is," I said. I let out another long sigh.

Amani: Our friend Eris just released a swarm of fairies into a brand-new Humdrum apartment complex. Just fyi.

Technically, the horrible little creatures were called hex moths, but everyone called them fairies since they looked so much like my race. They had our human figures and the wings our species had evolved out of thousands of years ago, but they were nothing but pests, half as bright as most household pets and a thousand times as mean. As far as I was concerned, the dust that constantly fell from their wings was the only good thing about them.

And their bites were nasty. A whole swarm of them in a building full of Humdrums was a full-on disaster.

"What's wrong?" Elle said.

"Nothing," I said. I clicked the screen off.

"You look like you just ate a lemon."

"I just got a Glimmering news alert," I said, which was not exactly a lie. "A fairy swarm just invaded some apartments downtown." The thought alone made me tired. My mind flickered to the nice, quiet college dorm room I knew was waiting for me somewhere in Humdrum Land. "The little moth fairies, I mean."

She shrugged. "That's not surprising. They tend to live in old Glimmering houses, right?"

"Yeah," I said. "People can usually control the infestations and harvest the dust. But these are Hum apartments."

"It's not surprising," she said. "Keep tearing down old buildings and they have to find a new home same as anyone. Just another reason for people to be upset about all the historic homes people are destroying out of capitalistic greed." And then she was off, talking about gentrification and social stratification and evil corporations.

I pulled out the phone as she talked and sent Amani a quick message back.

Olivia: Thanks for the update. I'll keep an ear out for any gossip. Any news on who we're dealing with?

Calling the two of us "we" felt weird, but I kept it in and hit Send. Amani wanted me, after all. She wouldn't get offended or think I was getting above myself. Probably.

After all, we might not exactly be friends, but our meeting in the garden had been nice. The garden itself was amazing, and I'd liked talking with Amani.

And then, like an idiot, I'd gone and suggested that Imogen should be her heir. Freaking Imogen. I shouldn't have even mentioned Imogen, let alone suggested she—of all the dishonest, unreliable people—should be selected as the leader of the Glimmering world.

Trying to imagine Imogen as our queen made my ears feel hot. I felt my magic frizz around my fingertips. A world where she was in charge would be a disaster, and if that happened, it was going to be all my fault.

Elle snapped her finger. "Yo," she said. "You're not listening."

"Sorry," I said. "I started thinking about Imogen."

She pursed her lips. "Guys aren't everything," she said. "You changed my life. I'd like to see Imogen do that."

I only hoped Queen Amani agreed. I glanced up to see a new customer coming through the door, and silently promised myself I would do my best on this Lily case, if only to prove to Amani and myself that I could be queen if I wanted to, and that Imogen wasn't that great in comparison. After all, she wasn't the youngest godmother in a hundred years.

I didn't want to be queen. I just didn't want her to have a shot.