"Enclaves. Technically the Golden Sutras could do that, and if you did, in fact, hand out the Golden Sutras like candy that would admittedly eighty-twenty it pretty well, but the modern enclaves have better enclave-building spells and enclaves are a hell of a lot safer than not enclaves."

"A deep and flexible spell arsenal is important for doing classwork, which is not optional, and for fighting mals, which is also usually not optional. We aren't going to go build enclaves till we're out of here so I don't think we need the sutras literally right now, though I'd give a few toes for them."

"I'd give all my toes and several fingers for them and I don't even speak Sanskrit, but you're right, they're not urgent," she admits. "Food is more urgent, not dying of mals is more urgent although I admit I'm not sure how you solve that one single-handed, unless being several places at once is also a demon power."

"It is not. Is there an unlimited supply?"

"Not in the sense that there are an infinite number, but they breed. Plus most of them are in the Graduation Hall and if you wiped out all the ones up here then the bigger ones would get hungry and start forcing their way up."

"Okay, how do I get to the graduation hall?"

"Give everyone Christmas dinner and a stack of clothes first."

"And the Golden Sutras, they're not urgent but they are important and even if El can't kill your wing I wouldn't bet the Sutras that that means you're safe from Patience and Fortitude."

"Very well. How do you plan to try to kill my wing?" he asks El.

"Pick your poison, I can do fire, lightning, acid, small hailstorm..."

"Let's go with fire." He sticks a wing out. "Ready."

El collects her crystal and chants in Spanish.

Cam's wing is slightly discolored and then fine again. "Cool," he says, folding it up again a little clumsily.

"You probably want to distribute stuff in the cafeteria, everyone goes there and if you just leave stuff in a big pile people won't respect a sign that says 'take only one' or 'distribute equitably' or whatever."

"I can just leave more than enough. How many students are there?"

"Uh...there are sixteen hundred students a class, we've lost a surprisingly low number of the freshmen and sophomores so far but the juniors and seniors have normal levels of attrition, so sixty-four hundred is well over the number of living students but not, like, by twice as much."

"Cool, at least sixty-four hundred student-loads of things till folks get the idea and there'll be lots to go around."

"I suspect, human nature being what it is, that even once people believe you about who and what you are, not everyone is going to stop playing stupid zero-sum games. Although if you do manage to clean out the graduation hall that will make everyone take you seriously, nobody wants to deal with that shit."

"Liquid nitrogen seemed to largely do the trick last night!"

"Oh, is that why it was chillier than usual."

"Yes, sorry. Maybe in the future I will alternate supercooled and superheated stuff."

"It wasn't that big a deal or I'd've mentioned it sooner. That's an excellent strategy against lots of mals, but I don't recommend it against maw-mouths. Even mortal flame takes a while to eat through them."

"I can also just fully interpolate stuff." He makes a little block of wood and it disintegrates into sawdust in his hand.

"That's bloody brilliant."

Lucy whistles softly. "That's a bloody hell of a finishing move."