Hazel's POV
I almost withdrew from the auction when I saw her name on the list, my finger hovering over Professor Larsen's email for a long moment before I closed my laptop entirely and sat with my hands pressed flat against the cool kitchen counter, willing my pulse to slow. It was Professor Larsen who talked me out of it, over tea in her cramped office that smelled permanently of old paper and stronger coffee than she ever admitted to drinking, stacks of student theses forming their own small, precarious skyline along the edges of her desk. "You built this foundation from nothing," she said, setting her cup down with the particular firmness of a woman who had spent thirty years learning exactly when firmness was called for, "in six months, while defending your own name in the press. If
