The academy corridors had always bent around Elena before.
Students used to part for her the way water parts for a ship's prow. Professors used to incline their heads a fraction of a degree past courtesy. Even the portraits on the walls seemed to watch her with a certain deference, and she had walked these halls for two years like a woman crossing her own estate.
Today she walked alone.
Her heels struck the marble too loudly. Her fingers raked through her dark hair, ruffling it out of its careful arrangement, snagging on pins she no longer cared about. She stopped at the landing, bit down on her thumbnail, and glared at nothing.
'What the hell is happening here.'
