Kareen is trying so hard not to favor enclavers over non-enclavers but you see they have such nice things to bribe her with. 

If possible Kareen would also like to talk to Aadhya, schedule a time to do some cautious experiments with Kareen's-world materials, she has a lot of her time locked up in study group sessions but not all of it. 

Aadhya is down to do this!

Cool! Is Aadhya free at about this-ish time, Wednesday or Thursday? Those are the most promising times Kareen has open. 

"Yes if I cut math and yeah I can skip Bengali spell swap respectively."

"Maybe I should theme a study group around math. Unlike magic that's not something I'm coming in with a disadvantage at."

"Maybe! I can afford to cut, I did great on the midterm."

"Oh, good. Start with the Wednesday one and leave the Thursday one optional for if we get encouraging results on Wednesday?"

"Sounds good."

Let's see...what else...

...It's not time yet to put out an advert for Orion's mal hunger. She said she would do research for a few days first and she's going to stick to that. Although she hasn't done much since asking around New York about it...

...The next study group she has she asks people for rumors they've heard about Orion. 

He saved this person's life. He saved that person's friend. He chased a giant mal into a shop class and ruined five delicate projects exploding the mal over everything but no one died. He was named that prophetically. His mom's next in line to be the New York Domina. He saved this person's sister. He rendered half the language lab unusable for hours (fortunately not including the highest traffic hours) killing something that was spread across a lot of booths. He knows French and Greek. He saved that person's hallmate. He saved this person's cousin, though he died later of a flu somebody brought in with the next induction and a history exam. He's alchemy track even though as far as anyone in the room knows that's a weird choice for him. He saved that guy once, arguably, he probably would've gotten away. He saved this person's Mal Studies study buddy.

Well! This is informative research, in the sense that it increases the predictable value of giving people Orion Lake traits immensely. 

...How plausible is the one where he was named that prophetically, because Orion was a hunter...

Oh, super plausible, divination's a thing, isn't Kareen a diviner?

Right, yeah, for sure, but like, do people often do divinations to choose their children's names?

No, that's not standard, but maybe if you're the future Domina of New York you do? Or it just came to somebody without anyone doing an explicit spell about it, that's hardly unheard of.

Got it. 

This raises Kareen's estimation significantly that Orion's parents, or possibly just mum, have any idea what's going on with him, but she still has no way to ask so this is less than immediately helpful. 

Kareen finishes the study period, and naps, and--you know what, invites Orion to stay up all night murdering mals with her again. She doesn't say it's so she can cast a fuckton of divination spells on him but it's so she can cast a fuckton of divination spells on him. 

"Sure!!!"

Excellent. 

With a little experimenting, she's determined that she can cast a spell outside her pocket dimension while saying the incantation with the body inside the pocket dimension, or vice versa; she's not sure if this is normal or just a consequence of notebook powers maximizing convenience. Either way, she's not at risk of infecting Orion with Minoan, or anything else, as she discreetly casts spells at him while also participating in something that might inspire a new Slaughter ritual. 

Divinations! A lot of them just return the obvious answers--healthy cisgender male wizard who ideally ought to be asleep right now but do we not all make decisions and also choices--but there are some open questions!

-Has he done much lying lately? Has he lied to her, specifically? Is he lying to her, right now? (Presumably not, he's not really talking to her right now, just killing mals.)

-Has he ever done maleficing?

-Does he have Hidden Depths?

He has not done much lying lately besides telling one of the New York seniors that he was totally caught up on homework. He has not lied to her specifically and is indeed killing mals right now.

He has never maleficed unless this thing he is doing right now counts.

He's the kind of guy who would ask what the Spanish word for tortilla was, in the Scholomance, while not speaking Spanish. He is not very deep as a person.

Whether this thing he is doing right now counts is exactly what she was hoping that spell would answer!!!

...She supposes she's trying to answer a semantics question using non-semantic data, isn't she. Sigh. Not that she didn't have a good enough answer from the fact that El's crystals would take the mana, just. If you have a shitton of divination spells and an excuse to fire them off, why would you not. 

Does he have any unusual physical structures? 

Not especially, he is shaped like a guy is shaped. Mole on his left thigh?

"Mole on his left thigh" is starting to edge closer to the kind of creepy Beholding that Kareen actually endorses not doing, especially if it's on the inside of his thigh, especially especially if Orion is a minor, but it hasn't quite crossed the line. 

He's given his affinity as mal hunting, but what does this affinity-detecting spell have to say about it?

Well. It doesn't have to be mals.

That...tracks...and she is not going to mention it to anyone. Also she is never, ever letting him touch her home dimension with a stick, if she can help it. It's not just that it wouldn't end well, it would end a very specific kind of not well that's played out a thousand times before, and while technically the wizard element is novel she seriously doubts she would learn anything new from watching huntswizard fall to the Hunt Fear that she hasn't learned from a dozen Hunt-related case studies and also watching him spend the night murdeirng mals on multiple occasions. 

Not that that's more important than the number of people who would die or anything, just. Also a thing. 

Anyway. Orion can have Red Bull. 

Yay!!

And when the night is over Kareen goes up to breakfast and, when the opportunity arises, asks El if any of the ways mals have for getting up from the graduation hall could also be used by humans.