Disclaimer: I own nothing but Dami and the plot and her power, which is the same as my other characterses power. The rest belongs to Tamora Peirce.

A/N: Alright people, I did this for school. My English teacher doesn't know what a fanfic is, so I wrote this as a bonus thing so I could get good in the class (please Ms. Grant?) Since this will be for class it will not be as long as my *ahem* other works. This will not be altered from the version I have handed in.

Unseen Magic

Sandry rode hard to Yazmìn Hebet's school of dance on the busy Festival Street. She had overslept, a habit she had not fallen into for years, and was late to meet her student, Pasco. It was hard to believe that she had been training him-and occasionally helping with Lark's new student, Comas- for about three months now. Pasco had improved much over the months and between the two of them and the famous Yazmìn, they had come up with many useful ways for him to use his dance magic.

Dismounting from her horse, she began to approach the crowd blocking the way to the school. Oama and Kwaben, her two guards, managed to catch up to her while she stood there, perplexed. Oama tapped one man on the shoulder, inquiring as to the reason for the crowd.

"Was terrible," the flustered man began, not noticing that a noble stood before him. Sandry was glad for that. "All a sudden, all the school disappeared and them in it's been hangin' in midair since!"

Her thoughts went immediately to Pasco. Finding the cord of magic she kept tied to him, she looked up to the people hanging in the air and looked carefully for her pupil. She found him floating at would have been the top floor where his class was "Pasco," she said sternly, not raising her voice but allowing it to travel up the magical cord to her student. "I want to know exactly what you did."

"Lady Sandry, I was just stretching!" he called back, not having the advantage of letting his voice travel back down a cord to her. "I swear it!"

Sandry made a confused face and made her way through the crowd to inspect the building better. The crowd easily complied, now seeing that she was the Duke Vendris' great-niece and her guards who were dressed in the normal regalia of the Duke's own.

Approaching the would-be building, she tried to see the magic causing this with the special sight that she and her friends Tris, Daja and Briar had acquired. Oddly, she did not see anything, though it was very clearly a work of it.

She held out a tentative hand to where the wall should have been and touched something. Curious, she felt her way along the wall, feeling much like a mime, until she felt what seemed to be a door handle. She turned back to Oama and Kwaben to find that the Provost guards had begun to blockade off the area, leaving her to work in piece.

She opened the door, or what would have been the door had she been able to see it. Using a bolt of cloth, she marked where it was and continued into the school where many panicked students resided.

Sandry looked to her guards pleadingly. "Would you-?"

"Of course," Oama agreed. "That piece of cloth marks the door, right?"

Sandry smiled and began her search for the stairs, groping along the walls until she found them. Half way up, dropping a bolt of cloth to mark each step, she realized that she could better find her way around the school with her eyes closed, so that she did not have to look down to see that she was walking on nothing. Finishing the first set of stairs in this way, still dropping a bit of cloth onto each step, she found herself almost thankful for the event three months ago when she had cause to begin to carry extra bolts of cloth with her.

She reached the second floor where the sense of panic was even greater. Opening her eyes to the scene of students hovering in midair with the air beneath them as solid as the floor that was once there, she directed everyone on the floor to step on the bolts of cloth to go down the stairs and to listen to the palace guards on directions out of the building. Looking down, they saw Oama and Kwaben finishing the evacuation of the first floor and followed her instructions.

Sandry continued to do this until she finally reached the top floor where Pasco and Yazmìn were. Opening her eyes, she saw Pasco nervously testing the stability of the floor he could not see while Yazmìn did stretches. Sandry had learned that not looking down was advisable, but her eyes traveled down to the floor, revealing stories of empty space between her feet and the ground.

She brought her eyes back up sharply and took a few deep, calming breaths. "I had the ward up and we were just stretching," Yazmìn assured her. "Whatever it was, didn't come from here."

Sandry broke the connection of the ward so that she could pass and closed it once more behind her. "I know," she assured both of them. "I can't figure out what happened, though. I can't see the magic that's responsible for this."

"Uh, Lady Sandry?" Pasco asked warily. "Is she supposed to be able to get in here?" He indicated a small girl with large brown eyes mirroring innocence and brown hair tinged with red tied neatly back. She stood inside the boarder, watching them intently and waved a greeting to Pasco. "Dami, why didn't you leave with the others?"

"Why is everyone leaving?" the girl, Dami, asked. "Is there a fire? I didn't smell any smoke." Realizing that she was in the presence of nobility, she bowed gracefully, her eyes never meeting Sandry's.

"How can you not know what's goin' on?!" Pasco exclaimed incredulously. "Look down and tell me you don't know what's wrong!"

She looked curiously downwards. "The floors are slippery because they've just been waxed? Honestly, Pasco, can't you tell me what's really going on? You said I could ask you anything when you were helping me with than dance."

"You mean you can't see it?" Sandry asked with growing interest. Something told her this girl had something to do with this.

"No, Lady Sandraline fa Toren," she said, eyes not meeting hers. "What am I supposed to be seeing?"

Yazmìn scowled slightly. "Literally nothing," she replied. "We see nothing but our feet and the dirt beneath the school. The walls and floors of the school seem to be invisible."

"But, it can't be-" Dami protested, shaking her head in disbelief.

"What can't?" Sandry prompted.

"I pretend I can do magic sometimes, Lady Sandrali-"

"Just Sandry will be fine."

Blushing, Dami fixed her eyes on her toes as she continued. "Lady Sandry, they're just games. I just pretend I can do magic, I don't actually do it. Before everyone started screamin' and stuff, I tried really hard to make the walls and stuff invisible, 'cause it was really dark in the room. Then everyone started to get ascared and I didn't see anything change, so I didn't know what was happening."

Sandry considered the story carefully, then shot a meaningful glance at Yazmìn. Understanding, she began Dami on some warm up exercises and Sandry brought Pasco to the side.

"What do you know about her?" she asked.

"Dami? She's been here longer 'n I have. I got partnered with her to help her out with a dance she was havin' trouble with. Brought up real proper, though her parents weren't the most successful merchants. They died in a shipwreck about three months ago. She ain't never lied, though, that I know of."

Sandry nodded, kneeling closer to the floor to inspect it more closely. Now she noticed a silver transparent coating on it, hard to see if you did not know what to look for as it reflected everything around it to avoid notice.

"Dami?" Sandry asked. The girl looked up from her splits, the lowered her eyes once more. Perhaps she was brought up a bit too well, Sandry thought as she tried to carefully word her request. "Could you do what you did before to make the walls invisible, only this time focus on making them visible again and try really hard?"

Her face lit up as she looked directly at her. "Really?"

"Lady Sandry," Pasco quietly interrupted, "what about the wards?"

Nearly smacking herself, Sandry released the wards on the room. Just because she could somehow make her way through the wards did not mean that her magic could penetrate them. She found the window and let another long piece of string encircle the school to make another ward so nothing else would become invisible. Not quite knowing where anything was when you were on the top floor of an invisible building was beginning to become unnerving.

Dami's breathing became meditative as she gathered her concentration. She lifted an open palm to the would-be wall, arm outstretched, and unleashed a stream of reflective silver magic. From the point on the wall it collided with, the wall reappeared, the floor beneath them. Gradually, the whole building came back to their vision.

Dami opened her eyes and lowered her hand "Did it work?"

Sandry sat down, admiring the fine wood floor in relief. "It worked, Dami. Now we need to find you a teacher. I'm going to make a trip to the Winding Circle." At a pleading look from Pasco, she added, "Yes Pasco. You're coming too."