POV: Malia Moon
The library is nearly empty by the time I slip inside, the late afternoon light slanting gold through the tall windows, dust drifting lazily in the beams. Rows of towering shelves stretch back into shadow, the air thick with the smell of old parchment and leather bindings, and somewhere near the entrance I can hear the quiet scratch of a quill against paper, one of the few other students who ever bothers coming here this late in the day. I've been coming here more often lately, drawn less by the books themselves than by the quiet, a rare pocket of the academy where no one seems to be watching me for once.
I should have known better than to trust that quiet would last.
"Malia."
I freeze at the sound of his voice, spine straightening before I'd fully decided to react at a
