The Cruel Prince by Holly Black

questions. The more correct answers I give, the angrier Cardan grows. He makes no secret of his displeasure, drawling to Locke about how boring these lessons are and sneering at the lecturer.
    For once, we’re done before dark has fully fallen. Taryn and I start for home, with her giving me concerned glances. The light of sunset filters through the trees, and I take a deep breath, drinking in the scent of pine needles. I feel a kind of weird calm, despite the stupidity of what I’ve done.
    â€œThis isn’t like you,” Taryn says finally. “You don’t pick fights with people.”
    â€œAppeasing them won’t help.” I toe a stone with a slipper-covered foot. “The more they get away with, the more they believe they’re entitled to have.”
    â€œSo you’re going to, what—teach them manners?” Taryn sighs. “Even if someone should do it, that someone doesn’t have to be you.”
    She’s right. I know she’s right. The giddy fury of this afternoon will fade, and I will regret what I’ve done. Probably after a good, long sleep, I’ll be as horrified as Taryn is. All I have bought myself is worse problems, no matter how good it felt to salve my pride.
    You’re no killer.
    What you lack is nothing to do with experience.
    And yet, I don’t regret it now. Having stepped off the edge, what I want to do is fall.
    I begin to speak when a hand claps down over my mouth. Fingers sink into the skin around my lips. I strike out, swinging my body around, and see Locke grabbing Taryn’s waist. Someone has my wrists. I wrench my mouth free and scream, but screams in Faerie are like birdsong, too common to attract much attention.
    They push us through the woods, laughing. I hear a whoop from one of the boys. I think I hear Locke say something about larks being over quickly, but it’s swallowed up in the merriment.
    Then a shove at my shoulders and the horrible shock of cold water closing over me. I sputter, trying to breathe. I taste mud and reeds. I shove myself up. Taryn and I are waist-high in the river, the current pushing us downstream toward a deeper, rougher part. I dig my feet into the muck at the bottom to keep from being swept away. Taryn is gripping a boulder, her hair wet. She must have slipped.
    â€œThere are nixies in this river,” Valerian says. “If you don’t get out before they find you, they’ll pull you under and hold you there. Their sharp teeth will sink into your skin.” He mimes taking a bite.
    They’re all along the riverbank, Cardan closest, Valerian beside him. Locke brushes his hand over the tops of cattails and bulrushes, looking abstracted. He does not seem kind now. He seems bored with his friends and with us, too.
    â€œNixies can’t help what they are,” Nicasia says, kicking the water so that it splashes my face. “Just like you won’t be able to help drowning.”
    I dig my feet deeper into the mud. The water filling my boots makes it hard to move my legs, but the mud locks them in place when I manage to stand still. I don’t know how I am going to get to Taryn without slipping.
    Valerian is emptying our schoolbags onto the riverbank. He and Nicasia and Locke take turns hurling the contents into the water. My leather-bound notebooks. Rolls of paper that disintegrate as they sink. The books of ballads and histories make an enormous splash, then lodge between two stones and will not budge. My fine pen and nibs shimmer along the bottom. My inkpot shatters on the rocks, turning the river vermilion.
    Cardan watches me. Although he doesn’t lift a finger, I know this is all his doing. In his eyes, I see all the vast alienness of Faerie.
    â€œIs this fun?” I call to the shore. I am so furious that there’s no room for being scared. “Are you enjoying yourselves?”
    â€œEnormously,” says Cardan. Then his gaze slides from me to where shadows