It was early the next morning when Sky barged into my room, scaring the shit out of me (I had been asleep), made himself a spot at the end of my bed, and started telling me about all the amazing information he'd found about our little secret room hidden in the Library. Before you ask, yes, it is very normal for Sky to do this when he's excited about something. Usually he wakes up Isaiah, not me, but since we found a prophecy about me in the hidden room, he came to me. At five in the morning. When he should have been sleeping. As I'm sure you can guess, I was absolutely delighted at being woken up.

Not.

"It really is an incredible find," Sky was saying with way too much enthusiasm for so early in the morning. "The Lost Workshop has been thought to be a myth since Celestus died in the Time of the Ancients! He kept it secret from everyone except the Royal Family and Courtiers. Apparently they were the ones to cover up its existence after his death." Sky's voice took on a conspiratorial tone. "If I had to guess, I'd say it was because that prophecy book needed to remain hidden."

"That's great, Sky," I said with a yawn. "Why are you telling me this so early in the morning?"

"Because we need to go back and get that book!"

I stared at him flatly. "Why should we go back for something like that? It's asking for the prophecy to come true. I, personally, would like to avoid that."

"Hathy—"

"'The Vessel of Time will stand on the crossroad of life and death as a darkness of old threatens the Worlds.' Doesn't that sound like something bad to you?"

"But—"

"No, Sky." I eyed him firmly. "We are not going back for that book. End of discussion."

*

End of discussion, eh? I wish it was that easy.

After kicking Sky out of my room and managing to get another few hours of sleep, I awoke to find Sky, Maddie and Troy all staring at something at the table. Three guesses what it was. I dare you.

"You have got to be kidding." I stormed to the table and tore the prophecy book from under Sky's nose. "I told you not to go after this!" I turned to Maddie and Troy. "Please tell me you two of all people didn't help him get this from the Library."

"Of course not!" Troy exclaimed. He pointed at Isaiah's closed bedroom door. "He did."

"Mister sensible helped Sky get this?" I laughed sharply. "Oh please." My friends gave me worried looks. Well, they were more grimaces. I scowled. "Seriously?"

They didn't stop me as I kicked open Isaiah's door, scaring the life out of the Glacis who had still been asleep, no doubt because of his late-night activities with Sky. I waved the book in front of him. "Really?"

Isaiah had enough sense to look scared. "Have you met Sky? He would have claimed that book one way or another. I merely stopped him getting caught and getting into more trouble than he already is with you."

Once again, I let out a humourless laugh. "I cannot believe you people!"

Clutching the book firmly and ignoring my friends chasing me through the apartment, I slammed the door to my room shut in all their faces, threw the book onto my desk, and fell onto my bed, trying very hard to not scream into my pillow. That would only make one of them—Troy—break down the door to check I wasn't under attack.

Honesty, did these people not understand that nothing good came out of a prophecy? My family has been caught up in a few and none of them have been good. This latest one most certainly did not sound good. Why were my friends so obsessed with this book?

The thought made me glance at said book. Something about it made me want to read it. The only reason I didn't was because of my history and self-control. It was like the book was calling to me, begging me to open and read its pages. A move plenty had come to regret, I was sure. There was a reason the book had been 'lost'. No good comes from knowing what will happen in the future. You either ignore it and can't avoid it, misinterpret it, or you try to avoid it and make it happen anyway.

The book still calling to me, I picked it up and tossed it into my wardrobe where I covered it with a bunch of random shit living in there. Good riddance.

*

While I was able to solve my problem with this prophecy and my nosey friend for the moment, that didn't mean I wasn't having more problems. And by 'problems' I mean 'Kori'.

As Troy and I made our way to the training rings assigned to our class like we did every week, we found ourselves as the subjects of gossip. Which sucks. People were whispering, making faces, and very quickly stopping their conversations the moment we—I—came close enough.

"I can't believe she's allowed to stay here!"

"Her mother's the Queen. What were you expecting?"

"Did you see the statement this morning? How can they not put her on ice?"

"Must be nice to get away with anything you fucking want."

I wish I could say it went away in the classroom. The moment we walked through the doors, everyone who wasn't currently training and who wasn't Viviane gave me the most intense death glares I'd ever seen. And that was saying something.

"What's going on?" I asked Troy as we walked to put our bags on the bench. "That blog post can't have made everyone hate me."

"I have no idea," he said, eying everyone firmly. Very few held his gaze. It really does help having a Wolf Alpha with a tendency to overreact as one of your best friends.

"Troy! Hathor!"

We spun at the sound of our names. Two of our friends, Luke Fontana and Ezra Sierra, were jogging toward us from the other side of the room.

Luke I met through Sky. He's part of Sky's support group. Luke is a Dryad. He's got pale skin, platinum blonde hair, bright green eyes that glow when he uses his magic, and a tendency to put flowers on everything he comes across. It's actually quite annoying, though was a welcome distraction last year for a lot of the younger students.

Ezra I met with Maddie during one of our history classes in second year. They're Desi. They have pale skin, pale blue eyes, and long, curly, pale green hair. Like most Desi, Ezra's specialty is air magic. I swear their hair is permanently windswept. Though you can't see it, they have quite a few scars hidden under their clothes from last year. I'm surprised they recovered if I'm honest, but don't tell them that!

Ezra took my arms. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah?" I answered, pretty sure my confusion could be heard from the other side of the Continent.

"We saw the news this morning," Luke said, concern clear in his voice.

I groaned, rolling my eyes and my head back. "What did she do this time?"

Said 'she' I was referring to was my mother. The topic of me rarely comes up in the news but when it does, my mum has a tendency to run her mouth off and make things worse. It's not intentional, she just doesn't always think before she speaks.

Luke rushed to his bag, digging around until he found his phone. After a minute of typing and swiping, he held up the screen. It was a new video on one of Lyriumia's news sites (we don't actually have that many because nothing of interest ever happens here).

The name on the video was Dunixi Derrah. Okay, quick side note: I have no idea what it is with the alliterative names and news reporters but it's a thing here. Anyway, the video was just outside the Palace front doors. My mum and Nikki were walking back from the city when the camera rushed toward them.

"Your Majesty!" came the male voice from behind the camera, presumably Dunixi. "There are many rumours about the Princess and her Time Magic. Is it true she has developed this power?"

"Yes," my mum muttered, already looking annoyed. Clearly this guy was not the first person to bring it up this way. "And as I have told everyone else who's asked me, no, it is not going to be a problem. It's a power like any other. You all need to get over it."

"Are you saying the concerns of your people are not important?"

Behind my mum, Nikki facepalmed and vanished off the camera, heading back to the Palace and leaving Dunixi to his fate.

Mum rolled her eyes and went to follow Nikki. The camera followed, picking up every word she said.

Mum rolled her eyes and went to follow Nikki. The camera followed, picking up every word she said. "What do you want me to do? Put my daughter on ice? Oh, yeah, that's a great idea. We have never had any problems with that. It completely solves the problem and means she will absolutely have the chance to develop and control her power, so obviously that is what I will be doing!" Every word was laced with sarcasm.

The camera chased mum all the way up to the Palace doors where it was stopped by the Guards. "Time Magic is a threat to the peoples' very existence. Are you doing nothing to solve this problem?"

"There is no problem you fucking moron." Mum glared at the man over her shoulder. "If anyone wishes to return to the days of putting people on ice for having Time Magic, they can stop cowering behind their little chat threads and take it up with me personally. If anyone has a problem with how I parent my child, they can take it up with me personally. If anyone with concerns is too much of a coward to do anything other than harass and shun, they can fuck right off." She smiled tightly. "Have a nice day."

I pinched the bridge of my nose and took a deep breath. "Well, that explains why everyone suddenly hates me more than usual today."

"I can't believe people want to ice you!" Ezra's eyes were wide with worry. "It won't actually happen, will it?"

"Of course not," Troy said. "Have you met the Queen? She'd rather die than lock her kid up."

"Kori's been spreading this video like wildfire," Luke said. "She's been going on about how if it were anyone else, they'd be iced and the only reason you're free is because you're a, and I quote, 'spoilt little mama's girl with no fucking balls who gets away with whatever fucking shit she wants'."

The way he spoke was such a bad imitation of Kori's Wolfland accent that I couldn't help but laugh.

Troy, on the other hand, wasn't laughing. He was furious. It took me a full minute to realise he was no longer with us and, honestly, the only reason I noticed was because of the sudden and abruptly ended scream that came from the other side of the room.

"Oh, fuck." I ran toward it, Luke and Ezra right behind me.

Troy had, and I'm being nice about this, finally lost his shit with Kori. He stood over her unconscious form, blood on his mouth from the deep wound on her neck, restrained by several of our classmates. Somehow, she was still alive.

Viviane worked her magic quickly on Kori, keeping the bleeding under control as best she could. Another teacher ran out the door as a third tried—and failed—to move students away from the scene.

A Healer pushed through the small crowd and knelt next to Kori. She and Viviane had a quick conversation before the Healer wrapped up Kori's wound, picked her up, and ran from the room.

Viviane spun toward me, Troy, Ezra and Luke. She grabbed Troy roughly by the wrist and, with a surprising amount of strength, dragged him out of the room.

"You think Kori's okay?" someone nearby asked quietly.

"The Healers here are incredible," another voice answered. "She'll probably be fine."

"The fuck did Troy do that for?" a third asked.

"Probably because he hates having idiotic rumours spread about his friend," Ezra said pointedly. They placed their hand on my shoulder. "Hath is one of the kindest people I have ever met. So what if she has Time Magic? That's not her fault."

My face was burning but I managed to ignore it. "Lyriumians can't help the power they're born with. Do you seriously think I wanted Time Magic knowing something like this would happen?"

That seemed to shut a few people up. Some others gave understanding nods. Others, however, were clearly pissed with my presence and weren't shy about it.

"You shouldn't be here," a Shapeshifter said, pushing her way to the front of the crowd.

"Yeah." The Lyriumian beside her nodded. "You being here is putting all of us in danger."

I crossed my arms. "What, you think the power I've only managed to activate once will somehow make you all vanish from existence? That's bold."

"That's exactly what you will do," a Fae said. "Time Magic is dangerous—"

"So, your plan to prevent me from doing any time damage is to . . . prevent me from learning how to use my Time Magic thus causing that exact thing to come true because I won't know how to stop that from happening." I stared at them all dumbly. "Are you people idiots?"

"Clearly they are," Luke said, coming to stand at my side. "She's here. She's staying. Deal with it or take it up with the Headmaster."

Ezra snorted. "Yeah, good luck with that."

Before all out war could break loose, Viviane returned. She was alone. Our teacher clapped her hands. "That's enough everyone. Back to your warmups."

I didn't have time to ask her where Troy was.