“Ooh, it might. —There was a plan to auction that, right?” she looks between El and Aadhya. “To seniors, presumably, so it probably wouldn’t be safe to invite them to watch, but what a demonstration.”

"My planned demo was liquefying the lignin in a piece of wood to make a book case, and then silver to inlay it, but if there's demand for more demos..."

“Oh, perfect!” 
To the sutras: “El is making you such a cool chest.”

Pet pet pet the sutras. (Pet pet pet the mouse, which she has convinced to stay in her pocket with a pizza crust.)

"Anyway, priority one is getting the walls fixed before mals swarm the school, but if it's possible, priority two is to bleed off some of the mals in the graduation hall single-file so's they're easier to kill than all in a giant mob."

"I guess this is rather what we signed up for when we agreed to be allies with you of all people."

"Don't pretend you didn't know what you were getting into," Lucia says cheerfully. "Anyway, the more mals I kill, the more mana we'll have for graduation." 

"Till you fill up all my crystals, which you will probably accomplish by November if not sooner."

"Well, we have bones now, I'll do the beads thing."

"Make lots and lots of beads. --Anyway--being in an alliance with me means dealing with my harebrained priorities. But me being in an alliance means that you guys get to veto any plans you aren't satisfied aren't stupid. Even if I don't actually go 'okay yeah' when you voice your objections."

"Just don't try to sleep in the hallway."

"I won't." She considers following this up with 'cross my heart,' but the implicit second line would be, uh, stupid, in the Scholomance, so she doesn't. Instead she says, "You're thinking of doing the demo in shop, right? When?"

Aadhya can answer this one; she selected a time wherein most of the Sanskrit-doing seniors could make it.

"Perfect! I will be there, mostly in case of mals but, also, partly, I can't wait to see."

And indeed on the day of, for an audience of interested parties, El liquefies the lignin in her piece of wood, curves it, clamps it in place, and then resolidifies it. When released from the clamp, the curve holds.

Eeeeeee.

Lucia does not clap her hands like a mundane child presented with a magic trick, but she’s thinking about it.

(Following the spirit of El’s injunction and not just the letter, she’s cut down on after-curfew sojourns over the past few days, and has even more energy than usual.)

El responds to followup demo requests with a liquefying silver inlay.

EeeeEeeeee. 
THIS IS SO COOL.

Someone is trying to fetch a canister of nitrogen for a third demo when the school gears start moving.

Everybody hates it when that happens!

Oh, crap—

The weak spot in the walls—

Lucia is the first one who bolts from the room, but not the first up the stairs.

The problem with Lucia running for it is that either something is very very bad and everyone else should be hot on her heels, or the very bad thing is wherever she's running toward and no one should follow her.

El snarls and follows her.

IT’S DEFINITELY THAT SECOND ONE.

Specifically there is a grogler! El gets there just as Lucia is figuring that out, her first sword-stroke having been worse than useless.

”I fucking hate things that are only weak to ice.”

"Do you not have an ice spell??"

“I have, like, one—“ she starts hissing it under her breath.

"Oh for fuck's sake," growls El, and she solidifies a shell of nitrogen around the grogler, which doesn't look like much in itself but has dramatic effect on the grogler.