Page 132 of Into the Isle

Another girl: “Bottom feeder gameplan from a bottom feeder. Makes sense.”

“Yeah. But it worked.”

“I hear Astrid is pissed. That the swamp-rat girl clowned her during class.”

“Would have loved to be a fly on the wall during that test. She may be a swamp rat, but Astrid’s a bitch. She’s also a swamp rat, don’t forget.”

“True. Not a half-blood, though. Just a bastard silvermoor.”

“Wouldn’t you be a bastard if you got socked in the face and then owned during midterms months later?”

There were two types of bastards, and apparently Astrid was both. I ignored the conversations around me and grinned as I ate my egg sandwich.

Randi came up and clapped me on the shoulder. “I’ve never heard of such a useful condom before.”

I spluttered, cackling, and nearly choked on my sandwich.

Dagny showed up ten minutes later, setting her tray beside us. The three of us girls were the Three Amigas.

Dagny said, “Is it true? How it went down?”

“I mean, I guess,” I said with a nod. “Not sure about all the fanciful bits I’ve heard. Like, that it was a used condom I strapped to the arrow? Fucking ew.”

They both laughed.

Chomping into some cereal, Dagny tucked her hair behind her ears and readjusted her glasses. “Are you two ready for today’s midterm?”

I tensed, nodding slowly. Randi had a similar reaction.

“Ready as we’ll ever be,” I said.

I looked around the mess hall for any of my guys—Grim, Magnus, Arne—and couldn’t find them anywhere.

I wanted to have a talk with Grim, since we hadn’t cleared the air since frolicking in the woods during the full moon. In fact, we’d taken a short break on our nightly strolls, and that made me sad. I hoped he wasn’t ashamed about what we’d done, or how he’d been in an uncontrollable trance during it.

Hells, if I wasn’t ashamed, he shouldn’t be. I had wanted that just as much as he did, and had no regrets.

I just want to do it again.

With Arne, I wanted to ask the flighty man if he could introduce me to some more of the Lepers Who Leapt soon.

Most of all, I hoped to see Magnus. Our nightly foray in Mimir Tomes was coming to an end, and I felt like I was on the verge of losing him. That sucked.

On top of that, it would be nice to see the draug, because I would need him today.

The midterm for Combat & Strategy wasn’t a pass-fail like Runeshaping Basics had been. It was more for bragging rights, and to see how far our trios had come in the first few months of class.

The concept was simple: Capture the Flag. Three against three. Each bout took place in the woods south of Tyr Meadow, with Hersir Axel watching as referee.

In this particular version of the game, fighting was encouraged. Our weapons were wooden. There was strictly no killing—which was baffling to even have to point out. That’s what happened when you pitted bloodthirsty, power-hungry warriors against each other.

Naturally, we wanted blood. We wanted the glory of victory. We wanted pride for our group, our coach Grim, and bragging rights against whoever we defeated.

The flags were staked on either side of the southern woods. The space between flags was only a quarter-mile, which was short enough that the event would be over fast, but far enough apart to allow some sneakiness.

If you captured the enemy team’s flag, you had to bring it back to your side for the victory. One strategy was to play defense, outwait your opponents, and then beat them down once they showed up to take your flag.

The problem with that strategy, was even if you knocked them out and ventured off to find their flag to bring back, when they woke up they’d still be next to your flag . . . which would be defenseless.

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