Zoe Taylor's eyes flew wide.
She had never seen Ginevra Volkova look like this.
The girl who usually seemed to care about nothing—who sat through storms as if half-asleep—was suddenly standing over her, calm as ice and terrifying beyond words.
Zoe had no idea why she was even here, or how she had arrived so silently.
She only knew that nothing about her felt human in that moment.
"Still not talking?"
Ginevra's voice was quiet. Flat.
She glanced down at Zoe's twisted expression, at the sweat and tears smeared across her face, and pressed her knee into the back of Zoe's bent leg, pinning her more tightly against the desk.
Then she bent, plucked the small knife from the floor where it had fallen, and set the cold edge against the curve of Zoe's ear.
The metal made Zoe's skin prickle.
Every nerve in her body screamed.
Ginevra picked up the heavy literature textbook from the desk and held it up in front of Zoe's mouth, measuring the thickness with a narrow-eyed look.
"Open," she said.
Zoe clenched her jaw shut.
Ginevra's fingers dug into her chin, prying her teeth apart. She shoved the book between them, just enough that Zoe was forced to bite down hard to keep it in place.
Like that, no matter how much she wanted to scream, only muffled, broken sounds could escape.
Gasps rippled through the room—small, helpless noises—no one quite able to move.
Ginevra's hand closed around the fountain pen on the desk.
She grabbed Zoe's left wrist, lifting it into view.
Then—without the faintest hesitation—she drove the pen straight down through the soft centre of her palm.
It all happened in just a few seconds.
"Mm—mmh—!"
Zoe's cry strangled against the book, the sound cracking into something high and animal.
Pain exploded up her arm, flooding every nerve. Her fingers convulsed; her legs jerked beneath her, heels drumming helplessly against the floor.
Blood welled around the pen's barrel and ran down, soaking into the wood of the desk before dripping, slow and dark, to the floor.
Her head tried to thrash, but Ginevra's grip clamped down, forcing her cheek against the desk.
The only thing Zoe could move now were her eyes.
They stared at Ginevra, round with terror, veins red-shot, the book wedged between her teeth. Her jaw began to ache from the force of her bite; she could taste paper and ink and the faint, metallic tang of her own blood.
"Ginevra, are you insane?! Have you lost your mind?!"
Roy William's voice cracked hoarsely through the frozen air.
He could hardly process what he was seeing.
The quiet, composed top student of the year, standing in a puddle of blood with a knife in one hand, a pen buried in another student's palm, and not a flicker of panic on her face.
"She's crazy—she's a complete lunatic—" he stammered. "I—I'm telling a teacher, I'm going right now—"
He stumbled backward, almost tripping over a chair, scrambling toward the door more than walking. His hand shook so badly he nearly missed the handle.
The door creaked open a fraction—
Thud.
The knife slammed into the wood right beside his fingers, sinking in so deeply that the handle quivered.
Roy froze.
Ginevra's eyes slid toward him.
She raised one finger to her lips.
"Shh."
Her mouth curved into a smile that didn't reach her eyes.
"Knife's hers," she said mildly. "Want me to pass it along?"
Roy shook his head so hard it made him dizzy.
He collapsed into a crouch beside the doorway, arms wrapped around his head.
Ginevra let him vanish from her mind.
She turned back to Zoe, whose face had gone almost chalk-white.
Tears and sweat streaked down her cheeks; her breath came in ragged, shallow bursts through the gaps around the paper.
Ginevra reached down and tugged the book from her mouth.
Zoe coughed, sucking in air like she'd been underwater.
"Does it hurt?"
The question was soft.
The softness made it worse.
Zoe stared at her, trembling so violently she could barely stay upright.
Whatever she had once thought about this girl—bookish, harmless, easy to ignore—had shattered completely.
She wasn't looking at a classmate.
She was looking at something that had crawled up from a very cold, very dark place, wearing the face of a girl.
"Want to see it properly?"
Ginevra tilted her head, as if genuinely concerned Zoe might not have understood what had happened.
She lifted Zoe's bleeding hand by the wrist so that it hovered in front of her eyes.
The pen stuck straight through her palm, skin stretched and swelling around it. Blood dripped down in warm, steady lines, splashing onto her own cheek.
"Mm—m-mmh—"
The sound that tore out of Zoe's throat wasn't even a word.
"Then apologise," Ginevra said.
Her voice was as level as if she were asking for a pencil.
"I—I'm—s—sorry," Zoe choked, her voice shredded and raw.
"Not to me."
Ginevra's fingers tightened on her jaw and turned her head to the side, forcing her to look.
Forcing her to see exactly who she needed to face.
Jayna stood by the wall, one arm cradling the other, fingers pressed over the scraped skin.
She hadn't moved since the moment the pen went in.
Her face was pale, lips pressed together.
She couldn't bring herself to step forward.
Couldn't bring herself to look directly at Zoe's hand.
She kept seeing flashes of it.
The arc of blood.
The movement of Ginevra's wrist.
The way Zoe's whole body had jolted against the desk.
Her stomach twisted.
She swallowed hard.
"Go on," Ginevra prompted quietly.
Zoe's throat worked.
She forced her cracked lips apart and pushed the words out one by one.
"I'm… sor… ry."
They fell into the silence like stones.
Jayna's fingers dug into her own arm.
Her legs wanted to run.
Her heart didn't move at all.
"…Ginevra," she breathed, barely aware she'd spoken.
Ginevra didn't look at her.
She closed her eyes for a second, like someone trying to steady themselves on a rocking ship, then let go of Zoe's face.
Zoe collapsed, knees hitting the floor, retching dryly as if she might vomit.
Ginevra stepped over a fallen chair and walked slowly toward Lydia Westbrook, who had been standing frozen near the back wall.
She raised a hand.
Lydia flinched, stumbling backward, terror naked in her eyes.
But Ginevra merely patted her once, lightly, on the shoulder.
"Better get her to a hospital," she said calmly. "If you leave it too long, she might really lose that hand."
Lydia's mouth opened and closed.
No sound came out.
Ginevra turned to Roy, who was still crouched on the floor, arms over his head like he was waiting for lightning to strike.
She held out the mop leaning against the wall and placed it in his shaking hands.
"Clean-up's on you, president," she added, with a small, almost pleasant smile.
Roy stared at the mop as if it were a live snake.
Ginevra tore a page from a notebook, wiped the worst of the blood from her own fingers, crumpled the paper, and dropped it neatly into the trash can.
Then she crossed the room to the wall, where Jayna still stood as if rooted in place.
Without meeting her eyes, she slipped an arm around her, steadying her by the elbow.
"Come on," she said.
They walked out together.
No one tried to stop them.
The corridor felt empty and echoing, their footsteps the only sound.
Jayna kept her head down, almost afraid that if she turned, if she looked, it would all come crashing back in too clearly.
They didn't speak.
Not on the stairs, not in the hallway.
Only when they stepped into the infirmary did the spell break a little.
The door was half-open, the little room smelling faintly of antiseptic and herbs.
The school nurse wasn't there.
"Wait here," Ginevra said.
She guided Jayna to sit on the narrow bed, then turned away to rummage in the metal cabinet.
She found a tin of cotton balls, a pair of sterilised tweezers, and a bottle of alcohol.
Back at the bedside, she sat down facing Jayna, lifted her injured arm, and carefully pinned a cotton ball in the tweezers.
The first touch of alcohol-soaked cotton on raw skin made Jayna hiss.
"Ah—"
She sucked in a sharp breath.
"Sorry," Ginevra said softly, her movements immediately gentler.
She slowed down, dabbing more carefully, trying not to hurt her.
Jayna watched her face.
The concentration there.
The faint, almost imperceptible downturn at the corner of her mouth.
Guilt prickled under her ribs.
"Zoe's hand…" she blurted suddenly. "Will she be okay?"
Her stomach clenched.
Whatever Zoe had done, however much she might deserve karma, Jayna didn't want this to destroy Ginevra.
Ginevra lifted her gaze.
Her eyes were steady again.
"I avoided the major vessels," she said. "Her hand won't be ruined."
Jayna stared at her.
She didn't know what shocked her more—that Ginevra had thought to aim carefully in the middle of all that fury, or that she even knew where not to hit.
"How do you even know that?" she whispered.
"Are you sure?" she added, anxiety spiking again. "If they tell the school what happened, or go to the police… I don't want to think about what they could do to you."
Ginevra guided her arm a little higher, checking the scrape.
"They won't call the police," she said quietly. "It would be bad for them. Old things would come crawling back out."
"You mean that girl?" Jayna asked. "The one they pushed so far she… lost it?"
Ginevra didn't answer directly.
Her voice became distant, like she was reciting something about strangers.
"We were the ones being bullied. The knife was hers.
"And the pen," she lifted it slightly from the tray, "was self-defense."
Jayna's mouth closed.
Her heart was still thrashing, but she could feel something inside her settle around those words.
She trusted Ginevra.
If Ginevra said it would be okay, then—maybe—it would be.
Her mind kept replaying the scene anyway.
Zoe's body slamming into the desk.
The sharp, wet sound of the pen going in.
The blood, bright against skin and wood.
Her own useless legs refusing to move.
"Scared?"
The question came softly, tugging her back.
She blinked and realised she'd been staring at nothing.
When she focused, Ginevra's face was just inches away, those grey-brown eyes clouded with something like worry.
Worry and… shame?
Like if Jayna said "yes," she might break.
Jayna swallowed.
Then she smiled.
"Not of you," she said. "Just… still a bit shaken from the whole horror movie thing."
"Sorry," Ginevra murmured again, looking down.
Her shoulders slumped a fraction, like a child waiting to be scolded.
"How many times are you going to apologise today?" Jayna tried to joke. "If you hadn't shown up when you did, I think I'd be sitting here with half my curls on the floor."
Her back prickled at the thought.
She reached over and caught Ginevra's hand.
"Thank you for coming when you did," she said quietly. "But you were… really different back there."
That was the mildest way she could put it.
Ginevra's eyes flickered.
She set the last bandage in place, smoothing it carefully with her fingertips.
"When they hurt you," she said, "I got angry."
"So you got that angry just because they hurt me?"
"Yes."
No hesitation.
No excuse.
Jayna felt something warm surge up from the centre of her chest, pressing all the way into her throat.
She suddenly didn't know how to speak.
This girl—this apparently emotionless top student, who wore her calm like armour—had stepped into the ugliest part of herself for her.
Had risked everything, for her.
"Then you can't ever do that again," Jayna said finally, trying to sound stern and not the slightest bit choked. "Not for me. Not for anyone."
She didn't want Ginevra hurt.
Not by those girls.
Not by the school.
Not by herself.
Ginevra lowered her gaze, checking Jayna's arm one last time, making sure the bandage sat just right.
Only when she was satisfied did she slowly let go.
"I don't have any friends," she said quietly.
"Only you."
The words settled between them like something fragile and bright, trembling in the quiet, sterile room.
And for a long moment, Jayna could only sit there, hand still half-raised, wondering how anyone could say something so simple and make her heart feel like it was about to overflow.