“I’m here,” she said. “I’ll be helping you. But you can do it on your own. You’re almost there already. Just imagine what you want to happen. And then concentrate on that, and only on that. The magic is everywhere. It’s waiting for you to take it and make it your own.”

I closed my eyes, and my brain went right back to yesterday, when Melindra had me pinned to the ground.

“No, no, no,” Gert said, clucking her tongue. “Not that. Pick a moment not so filled with emotion this time. Try not to let the anger fuel you anymore. It’s too unreliable. Too uncontrollable. Pick an innocent moment where you aren’t setting the world on fire.”

I remembered my first training session with Nox, him leaning into me, his hand on my shoulder.

“Yes, there you go.”

I imagined reaching out for him with my mind, searching for him.

Something was happening. I could feel the tingle of energy rippling through me, seeping out through my pores. I pushed at it, shaping it, trying to make it into what I wanted.

In my mind’s eye, Nox turned from me and began to walk away. He grew smaller and smaller, and then he looked over his shoulder and beckoned for me.

I opened my eyes.

An orange ball of fiery energy, no bigger than a fist, was spinning in the air in front of me. I had done it.

Nox, I thought. Where are you?

At that, the flare jittered and shot ahead, into the corn. I followed it as it twisted and turned through rows and rows of stalks, not dropping my singular focus on finding him. It only took a few minutes before I found him sitting on the ground, looking bored.

His eyes lit up in pleased surprise when he saw me.

“You didn’t think I could do it, did you?” I asked. He just shrugged like, Hey, can you blame me?

“Now I have to find you,” he said, standing. “Go ahead. Just try and hide from me. But I’m warning you—I could find you anywhere.”

Over the course of the next week, I learned how to use misdirection to hide from Nox in the cornfield. I learned how to direct my fiery darts at a target instead of setting structures (not to mention myself) on fire. I learned how to concentrate on what I wanted—which meant figuring out what I wanted. It wasn’t easy, but Gert and Nox were patient.

Every afternoon, I would spar in the training room with Melindra or Annabel or Nox. I was still so much slower than the rest of them but I could tell I was getting better.

After a few weeks, I was stretching in the training room, about to go up against Melindra, when Mombi materialized in the corner of the room. I hadn’t seen her or Glamora in days.

“What is she doing here?” I whispered to Nox.

“Ignore her,” he said under his breath. But it was hard to ignore someone like Mombi. It felt like some kind of test. Was she here to check up on my progress? To see if I was ready yet? I still hadn’t beaten Melindra, which didn’t bode well.

Now that I’d fought her a million times, along with Annabel and Nox, I’d realized that Melindra was by far the best of us all. Most of my sparring sessions with her just boiled down to staying out of her way, which I’d gotten good at doing.

But she’d also seemed to develop a grudging respect for me. Now, when we fought, she was all business, not bothering to insult me or snipe at me. She always beat me. Then again, she almost always beat Nox and Annabel, too. When she had me where she wanted me, she’d just shrug, toss her hair, and raise her arm and its built-in blade up in victory.

Today, as Melindra and I began, I could feel Mombi’s critical eyes tracking me as I moved and dodged Melindra’s weapon. I managed to hold my own, ducking every time she swiped at me with her arm. I was proud that I hadn’t let her get within striking distance. This fight was lasting longer than most of our previous ones had, and I could tell we were both getting tired. Maybe today would be the day I’d finally beat her. Maybe all I’d needed was an audience.

Melindra forced me back toward the corner, near where Mombi and Nox stood. “She’s still reacting,” I heard the old witch mutter. “Not acting.”

Her words hit me in the gut almost as hard as Melindra did.

“Oof,” I cried as Melindra surprised me—feinting with her blade and then kicking me right in the stomach. Now she reared back, ready to strike again, this time with the sharp metal blade of her tin arm.

I did the only thing I could think to do. I disappeared.

I found myself outside of the cave where Nox had taken me the night I made it snow ashes. I took a second to catch my breath again. Mombi’s words had affected me more than I’d expected them to. I’d thought I’d made so much progress, learned so much in the past few weeks. But in an instant, she made me feel like all those lessons hadn’t even happened.

It made me angry that Mombi had shown up for just one fighting session and was passing judgment on me—she didn’t care how I was doing, how much I’d changed. All she cared about was whether or not I was ready to fight.

You are stronger than you think. Stronger than Mombi thinks, I told myself. You can take Melindra. Gert believes in you. So does Nox.

I repeated these lines a few times like a mantra until I began to believe them. I thought about Gert’s training, focusing on something other than anger to feel the magic begin to thrum in my fingers.

I concentrated on the room again and materialized just as Melindra was righting herself after having fallen through the air where I should have been standing. Without hesitating, I flipped through the air, and pinned Melindra to the ground.