Though Brakebills South had a heating system, the cold still managed to seep into Lilly's bones. They'd each been provided with a thick wool uniform that they would be wearing for the duration of their two-week stay. The spell that turned them into geese wore off almost as soon as their webbed feet hit the fluffy white snow. They were left naked and shivering out in the cold until one of the TA's was merciful enough to let them inside. The building was almost identical to the original Brakebills, with the same dark wood and layout of the classrooms. However, with one glance out the frost-covered windows, it was clear that they were not in upstate New York. Brakebills South was positioned in the middle of an icy tundra with no other civilization in sight. Whoever decided this would be a good place for a school was clearly not in their right mind.

They each realized the moment they met Professor Mayakovsky that the rumors were true. He was absolutely insane. The professor was middle-aged and always wore a thick wool cap over his head. He had a thick Russian accent, a bottle of vodka clutched in his hand and a disposition that was anything but pleasant. They'd been herded into one of the many empty classrooms where Mayakovsky had informed them all on how these two weeks would play out. Bottom line was, he could tell them to do whatever he wanted, no matter how horrific. His first task for them would be to use the Hammer Charm of Legrand to force a nail into a board. They each expected the spell to be a piece of cake. They'd learned it in the first few weeks of school. What they didn't expect was for Mayakovsky to revoke their voices.

Lilly found out almost immediately that she'd underestimated the difficulty of the spell. If she had her voice, it would've taken her all of ten seconds, but now she'd spent the better part of the day on it. None of her fellow students had any luck either. They'd been deposited into their dorm rooms and given the supplies they needed. She had a perfect view of Penny's struggles from her bedroom across the hall. This at least added a bit of comic relief to her day.

Lilly focused on the nail and tried as hard as she could to keep a hold on it with her magic. It wobbled lazily as if not yet decided whether to obey her. Just as it had every other time, it swung to the left, and as a result, Lilly overcompensated and lost control altogether. Mayakovsky occasionally peeked into each room with a delighted smirk. So when a figure stopped between her and Penny's rooms, she initially assumed it was him.

Kady stood uncertainly at the edge of Penny's doorway to gauge his reaction. The two had been colder than ice since arriving at Brakebills South, and Lilly couldn't help but imagine what had been confessed during the last trial to make it that way. Penny didn't look up from his work though it was obvious he'd noticed the presence. Lilly watched the exchange with genuine curiosity as Kady took a few tentative steps forward and placed what looked to be a chocolate bar on the table between them. Kady's muscles coiled tighter the longer Penny ignored her. After a very uncomfortable few moments, Kady turned to leave and shot Lilly a glare when she caught her eavesdropping.

Penny waited until she was gone to grab the chocolate bar and examine it longingly. Lilly half expected him to toss it in the trash, but instead, he gently placed it aside. He locked eyes with Lilly, who shot him an inquisitive look. Though she couldn't voice her questions, she had perfect control over her hands. She sent him a message through sign language and hoped he would understand. Unfortunately, the only response she got was furrowed eyebrows and a mask of bewilderment. With a shake of the head, she resolved to wait.

Another torturous hour passed before she was able to complete the spell. Penny followed only a few minutes later and both let out a relieved groan as they felt the invisible fist around their vocal cords slacken and release. Mayakovsky hurried to demolish their sense of accomplishment.

"Yes, yes," Mayakovsky clapped his hands tauntingly, "good doggies. Would you like a treat?" Neither Penny nor Lilly responded, though they could speak again, they let him finish whatever emotionally scarring speech he was gearing up to. "That is what you are, pets. You do what you are told and expect to be rewarded every time you learn a new trick, pathetic," he spat the last word and reached into his pocket to throw a handful of small, hard objects at her. Lilly shielded herself from the barrage. "There you go, eat up, maybe if I'm lucky you'll choke and I'll have one less child to teach." In a flurry of obscene hand gestures, he swept off down the hall. She and Penny shared a look of utter confusion. It wasn't until then that they looked to see what he'd thrown at her.

"Why the fuck does he have dog biscuits in his pocket?"

➺➺➺➺

"I can't believe he threw dog treats at you," Dani cackled. Lilly barely formed the words through her giggles. They sat in the common room, chatting while they awaited the rest of the students. "All I got was a bunch of insults thrown at me. For some reason, he called me a 'snotty little feminist troll doll.' What does that even mean?" They turned a few heads in the common room with their incessant laughter.

"I mean, I guess I can see it. You've got the pink hair, and the feminist thing down, and you can be a bit snotty," Lilly teased, earning a firm wack with one of the throw pillows from Dani. "I'm joking, I swear!"

"Mmhm," Dani glared, though it was all in good fun. Quentin and Alice finished a few minutes before Lilly had, but they'd both shut themselves in their respective rooms. Penny took one look at Kady sitting by the fire and fled, leaving Lilly to wait for the rest of her friends, "Alex, come sit!" Dani suddenly shrieked and Lilly jumped in her seat. He stood behind her, looking just as beat up as the rest of them. Unceremoniously he flopped down between the girls.

"What are our chances at survival if we make a run for it?" He groaned, resting his head against the back of the couch. Dani took the opportunity to stretch her legs across his lap and settle in.

"As appealing as that sounds, knowing Brakebills there are probably wards around the entire place, and knowing Mayakovsky they're to keep us in," the others nodded in agreement.

"Besides, we'd freeze to death, and I don't know how to turn into a goose again," Dani added and Alex groaned.

"So who were you paired up with for the secrets magic? I kind of lost track of you for a while," Lilly asked him, grabbing a blanket from a nearby chair and draping it over the three of them. Alex paused, staring into the roaring fire. "Ava," he whispered tentatively, Lilly almost thought she misheard him- almost.

"As in, Ava Westmore? You're joking, right?" Their eyes went wide simultaneously. The lack of response threw them into a frenzy.

"How the hell did you even pass? She's an ice queen! And we thought we had it bad! What's her secret?" Dani gasped, her words flowing out excitedly as she readjusted her position to get closer to Alex. "Did she kill someone? I wouldn't be surprised if she was some sort of assassin. It's a wonder you're still alive, Lilly, you slept in the same room for weeks! She could've slit your throat at any moment! Did she a--"

"She didn't kill anyone, and I'm not telling you her secret. That's personal and not for me to share," Alex interrupted, his voice serious and decidedly final.

"Touchy," Dani whined, "why do you care? She's rude to you too. I swear someone shoved a stick up her ass," his reaction surprised them both. He'd been just as put off by Ava's behavior as they were, yet here he was defending her.

"She's not that bad," he mumbled, shoulders tense. Dani looked at him like he was crazy.

"Well, you're entitled to your own opinion," Lilly told him, just as perplexed, "but, until I see some proof, I'm gonna have to go with Dani." A long silence ensued and Lilly used the time to mull over his defense of Ava. It was a small gesture of faith in her character, but from what they'd seen, Ava was in no way worthy of it. She wondered what had been shared during the final trial. She supposed she'd never know. The conversation was soon forgotten, and they returned to a pleasant banter between friends.

"What do you think Mayakovsky's hiding underneath that hat of his?" Alex wondered aloud.

"I bet he's bald," Lilly mused, "or he's got snakes for hair like Medusa."

"What if he's hiding Voldemort under there? Quirell did it," Dani theorized with a completely serious expression. Their roaring laughter earned more than a few eye rolls from their peers. They stayed cozied up together beneath their shared blanket long after everyone else turned in for the night. They would come to regret that decision the following morning, but at that moment they relished the company of friends and decompressed in the wake of the trials.

Six hours later, they sat half-asleep at the giant wood dining table and listened to Mayakovsky's lessons. He had a way with words that made everyone instantly loathe him with a passion.

"Alright children," he addressed them with his thick Russian accent, "today will determine if you are to be a great Magician or a mediocre one-trick pony." The professor waved a hand, and a jar appeared before each student. Everyone shared looks of confusion as they inspected them. A tiny firefly flitted about in Lilly's jar, it's light flickering rapidly as it tried to escape. Everyone at the table had their own insect. "What you will now learn, few know and even fewer understand- mind control. These," he pointed to their jars, "are your first subjects." A wave of murmurs swept along the table. Lilly's stomach twisted. This was wrong. How was she to steal the free will of another living creature?

"Uh, isn't that sort of unethical? I mean, even if they're bugs, they're alive," Quentin spoke, resulting in unanimous nods of agreement from the first, and second-year classes.

"They have free will. We've been taught not to try to control living things," Alice added.

"It's barbaric," Lilly gaped.

"How was your lunch today? Excellent beef bourguignon, no? How much free will was exerted by the cow?" They looked down as they realized, however harsh, he had a point.

"Mind control is in everything, everywhere. We make only one choice: are you the controller or the controlled?" He approached Quentin, unscrewed his jar, and released a moth. Quentin jerked away from the creature and Lilly also felt a trickle of fear leftover from the incident at the beginning of the year. After making fun of Quentin, the professor tormented Penny for a moment with a very unnerving centipede. To everyone's confusion, he pulled Penny from the room after asking if he was a Psychic. He instructed everyone else to go ahead with the lesson. Unsurprisingly, no one seemed too thrilled about starting. The teacher's assistant stepped in, explaining how they were supposed to do it. Lilly wasn't even sure she'd be able to. She felt sick at the thought of taking another living being's free will.

Mayakovsky had said that he didn't expect any of them to actually complete the task as it was rare for anyone to master mind control. She was grateful it wasn't a common skill. The other students were wary, as they tried and failed to control their insects. A few panicked any time it would get too close to them. A Healer named Sharon squealed, not unlike a pig when her spider decided to crawl up her arm. Lilly took a steadying breath as she zoned in on her victim. She had yet to open her jar, but it seemed easier to get a hold of its mind before she set it free.

Lilly tried to think of it as just another one of her occlumency classes. She took her feelings and apprehension and locked it in her own jar until she was a blank canvas. Then, just as she had all those times under Eliza's guidance, she reached out a tendril of her mind. The firefly's conscience held a different quality than that of a human, but it was still the same. She sensed its fear, it's panic, as it tried to escape its glass prison. Lilly felt nothing, keeping her emotions neutral, she brushed against its mind, a gentle caress. By the time it sensed something was amiss, Lilly had already closed her mind around its consciousness in a vice-like grip. The tiny creature was now her slave.

Slowly she unscrewed the top of the jar. The firefly remained where it was, no longer frantically bumping the glass in hopes to escape. It was unnaturally still until Lilly gave it the nudge it needed. Using her fingers to guide its direction, the Firefly shot up into the air, forming a figure eight above the table. The other student's attention was pulled from their work to the glowing insect and its puppet master. Lilly instructed it to make intricate shapes in the air, putting on a show for her peers. Her friends stared at her in awe. She'd done in less than ten minutes what few Magicians in history had been able to.

A sudden shriek from the other end of the table broke her concentration, and the firefly slipped from her control, veering off course and flying off. Lilly whipped her head to see what the commotion was about. Poor Sharon hopped straight up from her seat, a giant scorpion clinging to her sweater. Her eyes widened as the creature jumped from Sharon to the boy beside her. This wasn't natural behavior, someone else had control of it. A quick scan of the table and the culprit was revealed. Ava stared at the scorpion in concentration, her hands directing its movements as Lilly had. She shouldn't be surprised that Ava had done it, but she had to admit she was impressed.

After the rogue scorpion and Lilly's firefly display, the rest of the day was pretty uneventful. No one else was able to accomplish what they had, and Lilly spent the remaining time trying to reign in the firefly she lost to no avail. When Lilly and Dani finally collapsed onto Lilly's bed, it was late at night. They'd been given a break from Mayakovsky as he'd never returned from taking Penny away. Staring up at the ceiling, she wondered what happened.

"I can't believe you controlled that thing's mind! That's fucking sick!" Dani exclaimed, standing up on the mattress and jumping up and down. Her bright pink hair flew around wildly, and Lilly's body was jostled around by her movements. "My best friend can control minds! We could take over the world together!" She dropped back down beside Lilly with a grin.

"Not if Ava takes it over first."

"Ugh! Of all the people it could've been, it had to be her? Why not me? Do we really need another crazy person walking around with the power to control minds?"

"Hey!" Lilly protested, "I'm not crazy!" Dani chuckled and patted Lilly lightly on the head as one would a child.

"If you say so," Lilly reached over to grip her pillow and slammed it into Dani's face with a mischievous grin, "hey!" Dani gave her friend a mock hurt expression before retaliating, only this time with a particularly thick and heavy book that sat on Lilly's desk. Lilly raised her hands in an attempt to defend herself.

"I surrender! I surrender!" Lilly managed through her giggles. Dani pulled back, still holding the book threateningly. Before Dani could speak, a loud growl erupted from Lilly's stomach. They looked at each other for a second before collapsing in another fit of giggles.

"I think we need a trip to the kitchen," Dani smiled, and Lilly nodded enthusiastically, hopping up from the bed and pulling her friend with her. "Should we grab Alex?" Lilly made a show of thinking it over.

"If we must," her words were thick with sarcasm as she lead the way to Alex's dorm. Dani skipped energetically down the hall, Lilly a step behind, shaking her head. As they got closer, she slowed to a walk. Alex's door stood ajar, a soft light crept out into the hall. Dani didn't knock, she never did, she simply barged in as she pleased. Lilly slammed into Dani's back, stopping short. Her nose scrunched in confusion, and she craned her neck to see what had stopped Dani in her tracks.

"What is-- What the fuck!"