Chapter 54: Apparently He Still Needed Homework

Chapter 54: Chapter 54: Apparently He Still Needed Homework

The warning followed Dante into Thursday’s class, where Professor Bell placed an enchanted desk fan in front of him and announced that they would begin with something simple. Dante had expected a forbidden instrument, but apparently his rise required office equipment.

"Find the supply before you touch the switch," the professor said, setting a small compass beside it. "The needle follows an active flow. It doesn’t tell you whether that flow is safe."

Three identical cords ran beneath a wooden cover. Only one powered the fan, and Dante had to work out which without casting or pulling the cover off. Jett sat at the neighboring desk with a worksheet and the expression of a man attending free entertainment.

Dante selected the middle cord because its position suggested importance. The compass turned toward the left, and the fan continued spinning while Professor Bell waited for him to explain.

"A preliminary challenge to its authority," Dante said, moving his pencil.

"The fan has rejected your challenge," Jett replied. "Try asking it out. That usually stops things moving."

Dante followed the needle more carefully. It pointed toward the left cord beside the fan, then swung toward the middle when he moved it closer to the supply. The cords crossed beneath the cover, which made his original guess accidentally useful and therefore impossible to admit as a guess.

He drew the route before Professor Bell lifted the wood. Two bends matched, but his last line ended at the wrong socket. The professor let him correct it instead of giving him a new object.

After three attempts, Dante traced the whole route correctly. The result looked small on paper, yet he could explain it without imagining anything. That felt different from copying a spell, and he wanted another problem immediately.

Professor Bell gave him a lamp with a reserve cell hidden in its base. When its supply was removed, the compass still reacted near the lamp. Dante remembered Honey’s dish and checked the base before declaring that electricity had learned defiance.

"Stored charge," he said, marking the base. "The supply stopped, but it had something left to use."

Professor Bell nodded and signed the worksheet. Dante tried not to look as pleased as he felt, though Jett ruined that by asking whether they should frame it beside his future wanted poster.

Across the classroom, Posey finished her own exercise and came over with the spare parts tray. She examined his drawing before touching his wrist lightly, below the dressing.

"You explained that really clearly," she said. "Would you show me the crossed cords afterward? I kept following the nearest one."

He had prepared for admiration in many forms, most involving fear, silence or an unusually flattering coat. Being asked to explain homework nearly finished him. He moved his chair so she could see, keeping his arm still when her sleeve brushed it.

Jett watched them for a moment before opening his worksheet with exaggerated care. "I’ll study alone while you two discover the educational benefits of elbows."

Posey laughed without moving away. Dante drew the crossing again and explained where the needle changed, pleased that she actually followed his answer. Nothing exploded, which left him wondering whether competent teaching could be added to his list of threatening qualities.

After class, Professor Bell kept Dante for one brief comparison. He shut off the fan and removed its cell, then asked Dante to watch the compass as it settled. The needle stopped, and the blades coasted to a halt.

Dante felt a pull behind his upper teeth, so faint that he almost mistook it for pressure from clenching his jaw. It came while he looked at the empty socket, then disappeared when someone closed a door in the hallway.

He reported it before trying to create it again. Professor Bell checked the compass and asked where Dante had been looking, but the feeling did not return. They recorded the time and stopped there.

"I may have developed another sense," Dante told Jett outside.

"If it finds dental appointments, that’s going to disappoint your enemies."

Jett had a better use for the afternoon. Alpha Rho needed help assembling the dry practice lane for Saturday’s tailgate, and the task involved folding signs rather than carrying equipment. He had checked that part before inviting Dante, which made the offer easier to accept.

The fraternity house stood beyond the student center, with blue flags in the windows and a grill large enough to threaten livestock. Two wolf-men argued over a banner while a third carefully painted glitter on his claws for the cheer section.

One of them handed Dante a stack of route cards and thanked him for coming. Nobody demanded a demonstration, asked about the assessment or treated him like an unexploded package. He sat with Jett at a picnic table and began sorting them.

"Blackwell Breakers against the Westhaven Riptide," Jett explained, separating offense from defense. "Four downs to gain ten fathoms. Six points for a dunk, three through the thermal ring."

Dante studied the arrows. "So we break their line, control the current and humiliate them in front of everyone they love."

"That’s roughly what the alumni newsletter says."

A cheerleader came over to collect the finished cards. Her short blue jacket left a strip of stomach visible when she reached, and Dante lost track of the defensive formation he had been explaining. She thanked him by name because Jett had just used it, which did not stop his mind from treating it as the beginning of fame.

Jett waited until she left before sliding the card back. "You put the gate behind our own line. Powerful choice, but the coach might object."

They stayed until the signs were ready, eating food that an enchanted spatula kept stealing from the grill. Dante caught it with an empty plate rather than his injured hand and received a round of cheers for saving the sausages.

He accepted the praise with suitable gravity. Nations had formed around smaller victories, and these people had mustard.

Before they left, the student organizing the lane asked whether Dante would try it first on Saturday. No swimming, no tackling and no personal casting, just timing his run with an imitation fish and a belt-powered current.

Dante agreed before Jett could invent an objection. The organizer handed him the rules, and he read them on the walk back instead of relying on destiny to understand a stopwatch.

At the dorm door, his phone buzzed with a message from Rhea asking whether he still wanted dinner at the Copper Turtle tomorrow. A second message followed before he answered, telling him she had reserved the table for two.