"I'm, uh, fine? Are you...okay."

"Me? Yeah, I'm doing about as well as could be expected."

"I'm a little worried about how quickly I'll need to learn Russian for my class about Russian literature but all my other classes seem very manageable and I've met lots of nice people."

"I only ask because this kind of behavior isn't really usual in the Scholomance and my mother says anytime you see something weird in the Scholomance, you poke it with a stick to make sure it isn't a mal. Or, like, just back off and leave it alone, but."

"Well, the usual behavior in the Scholomance is gruesome death. I'm trying to improve on that."

"This isn't especially weird for Holden in particular," Larisa mutters, mostly sounding unimpressed and bored. 

Can he please GO AWAY this is awful. 

(Vanya would never, ever dream of saying that out loud.) 

"Well it sounds like everyone here has everything they need. Vanya you're not looking great, you might want to see the school nurse? We've got one of those again. Bye everyone!"

Shutupshutupshutupaaaaaaaaaaaaaah. 

Vanya sits in absolute silence and does not look at anyone. 

Larisa goes back to eating as though nothing at all out of the ordinary just happened. 

Ribo waits a moment and then because it seems desired deliberately changes the topic. "How were people's classes today? I generally liked mine, though Calculus for Engineers was just review and Russian Literature before Pushkin was a little intimidating."

"I had a class about dyes that I liked."

"Oh good, that sounds useful for making clothes. Are there magic dyes?"

"Yes. We haven't really gotten there yet on the first day, though."

"Of course, have to start at the beginning."

"Knock knock," Teresa says, out loud, "Lucy, do you have a moment? We'd like to take you up on the familiars deal."

Landon, until this point, has been sitting at the other end of the table, engaged in a quiet conversation with Justin about math homework. 

His head twitches up. "What are you– oh. Pisa, right?" 

"Yes, Teresa Calloconti. No malecifing involved, I promise. Though if you'd rather we step away to talk and Lucy's fine with that?"

Sigh. "If you're just here to finalize a deal of some kind with Lucy, go ahead." And then at least he'll know what's going on. 

Maleficers are really upsetting! Vanya curls up tighter on his seat and sets down his fork. (He's eaten two bites of a bread roll and about a quarter of his meatloaf and nothing else.) 

Something's up with Mr. Lump that she probably should have asked about with the cousins. Best not to ask Sacramento, though.

"We want seven males and a female. We're prepared to either trade poison detection - we have two that catch everything between them, neither of them in wide circulation, and the second also catches some oozes, those are Latin and English - or a well-tested incorporeal banisher in Ancient Greek."

Wilbur and Lucy put their heads together briefly for a quiet conference that probably wouldn't make sense to a third party even if they heard it; it has a lot of Twin Shorthand it it. 

"Okay. We don't have any spiders the appropriate age, we can arrange to make the swap when we do. We'll go with the poison detection."

"Lovely! You said a week or two? I'll come by then, today I just wanted to make sure we were at the front of the line."

"You are! And yeah, that should be about when."

It seems like nothing especially sketchy is going on - huh, do the maleficers want actual familiars, not malia sources? - but anyway, he's not going to intervene or anything, just pay very close attention to the proceedings.