-Continued from #1 of Chapter 2-

After going through all of the rare majors, besides Grower, I and the elf could tell it probably wasn’t going to happen for me. The elf pulled out an unflowered rose bush in a terracotta pot from her trunk. “Wait, what’s your name?” Maybe I wanted to stall the pain of feeling useless for a moment, and maybe I wanted to stop knowing her as the nameless, blonde-haired she-elf. The forever giggling elf blinked at me for a moment.

“Oh, sorry. It’s Sasha.” She smiled a toothy smile. “Anyway, make these buds flower.” Sasha kept smiling, even through my horrible attempt to make a rose bush grow. “Try to focus a little more.” Her icy blue eyes looked at me through the rose bush, her chin resting on the knuckles of her fingers.

“It’s not going to happen.” I sat down the planter, exasperated. “So, what’s next?”

“The common majors; liquid, air, fire, and gravity.” I felt like this elf would never stop smiling, and it was starting to annoy me. “Liquid first. Try to do something with this tub of water.” She placed a glass container of water on the wooden ledge on my side of the booth. Nothing. Nothing at all. I couldn’t do water, air, or fire. “Well, at least we know what you are now; we don’t even need to test if you’re a Gravit—if you don’t want to.” Sasha smiled up at me, lips closed, eyes sullen.

“No. I am making sure the Assigners who said I was a mage weren’t lying to me.” I was determined; this was one of my family’s last chances to make a name for ourselves. My mother didn’t go to school; she lacked both money and noblesse. 

“Okay, here is a rock. Smush it.” Sasha handed me an ordinary-looking rock. I nodded, committed to smushing this rock. I grabbed it, and believe it or not (it would make sense why you would be doubtful), I easily crushed the thing. “Whoo!” Sasha jumped up, grabbing my hands and bringing me up with her. She gave me a tight hug, stopping herself mid-squeeze, and pushed me away from her, her hands on my shoulders. “Sorry. We’re not supposed to touch the examinees anyway. But, yay! You’re a Gravit! Fun—right?” She clenched her fist and lightly punched the air.

“Yeah, thanks, Sash. Bye.” I exited the booth to see the sun was a little lower, and everyone except Noma had left for their dorms to go prepare for their classes tomorrow. 

“Sash? Huh? Was she cute?” Noma nudged me while we walked to our dorms. 

“Shut up, Nome.” I nudged her back.

“Well, you’re lucky; I got a cranky Moon Sylph named Daniel for my Assigner.” I laughed out loud at this remark, making Noma start laughing too. “Now you shut up.” 

“Can you guys be quiet? Have you not realized that it is like 9:00 and some of us are crepuscular—” (weird Drewlian thing) “—and are trying to finish the summer homework that they forgot to do?” Avera came out of her dorm.  

“Oh, sorry, Vera.” Noma responded. “Oh, wait, is this B2F?”

“Yeah, why?” Avera crossed her arms and looked at us like we were the most annoying creatures on the planet.

“That’s my dorm.” Noma put on a slight smile, eyebrows raised. “I can change it if you want. I know how much you dislike me.” Noma half-joked—mostly not. 

“No.” Avera rolled her eyes dramatically and exhaled dramatically. “Come on.” Avera dragged Noma inside their room by the collar of Noma’s shirt.

“Bye Ash–” Avera slammed the door in my face, breaking off Noma. Bye Nome. I continued on by myself, looking for my own dorm, A6M. I had been wandering around for a bit until I found it. When I opened the door to my room, I was presented with the image of Aaron Goldlock relaxing on a bed and reading a book.

“Oh hey. I didn’t know there would be three of us here.” Aaron said, looking away from me, before finding and placing a bookmark into the book he was reading from. Looking back at me and smiling. 

“Who’s there, Aar?” Someone asked from the bathroom.

“Oh, our third roommate,” Aaron called out, moving his head towards the voice as he talked.

“Who is it–” Nathan walked out of the bathroom, drying his wet hair with a towel. But he stopped walking and talking when he saw me. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.”