Orientation — Vanessa Cardui

"Let me be perfectly clear on this subject. I shall teach you, and you will learn; you will learn a good deal more than you would have with any other instructor. However, I am not teaching because I enjoy it, or for any other altruistic purpose. My primary interest is the suffering I shall inflict in the course of your instruction."

Grandmaster Eris Andromeda Carmichael isn't one of the pure white-magic practitioners. But she is one of the world's greatest living wizards--certainly the best who will take Academy students for their seventh and final year of instruction--and Lynn Kennedy has never settled for anything less than the best.

Lynn thinks she's prepared to accept the dangers of studying with Eris. But nothing in the academy has prepared her for the reality of it. Between Eris' sadistic mindgames, the brutal attentions of her assistant Master Rostem, and the cut-throat competition of her fellow students, Lynn will be lucky just to survive the year.