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A faint smile touched her mouth, but there was nothing amused in it.

"So when you say you don't want anyone getting hurt because of you, I understand that. Probably more than you think."

"Tam," I whispered.

"This whole magical world can be wonderful sometimes." She looked down at her hands. "And sometimes it really fucking isn't. Sometimes people hurt you because of what you are, and then somehow you end up feeling like it's your responsibility to make everything easier for everyone else." She glanced at me. "And you've already done enough of that, babe."

I swallowed.

"I've written to my parents twice since I got here," she said. "Nothing back."

I thought of the long, cheerful letters she'd written at the Saltmere table with her tongue caught between her teeth. Of the way she watched the post every morning without ever saying what she was waiting for.

"I don't think there's going to be anything back," she said. "Ever."

I didn't know what to say, so I put my arms around her the way she'd put hers around me.

For a moment she leaned into me. "I don't really have a family anymore."

My throat tightened.

She pulled back and looked at me, her round, freckled face suddenly fierce. "So I picked one."

I blinked.

"You," she said. "The Saltmere students. All of you idiots."

"Tamsin—"

"My point is, you don't get to decide you're a burden and remove yourself from our lives for our own good. That's not how family works."

Something inside me seemed to buckle.

She reached down, picked the rucksack up off the floor, undid the straps, and upended it onto my bed.

The sweater.

The toothbrush.

The forty dollars.

The cookie-tin photograph, which I'd packed first, before anything else.

"And there's another problem with your brilliant plan."

"What?"

She picked up the letter from Marion.

"You keep saying you'll give yourself up and they'll let Marion go."

I didn't answer.

"Why?" Tamsin asked. "Why would they? Once they've got you, Marion doesn't stop being useful. She's still someone they can threaten if you don't cooperate."

I stared at the letter.

"She's leverage," Tamsin said.