All Chapters of Book One of the Rosewood Trilogy: The Broken Sanctum: Chapter 51 - Chapter 60

THe nexting I woke before the bells.For a moment I lay still in the quiet of my room, staring up at the ceiling while the first grey light of dawn slipped through the small window above my desk.Then I pushed the blankets back and sat up.If I got to breakfast early enough, the hall would still be mostly empty.No whispers.No staring.Just food and quiet.The dining hall was only a quarter full when I arrived, mostly older students who kept strange schedules or first years who hadn’t figured out the rhythm of the school yet.I ate quickly, enjoying the rare silence.By the time the crowds started to arrive, I was already slipping out the doors.Advanced Potions was my first class of the day.And the one I was looking forward to the most.The potion laboratory sat in the eastern academic building, a wide stone room lined with long work tables and shelves packed with glass bottles, herbs, powders, and ingredients whose names most students struggled to pronounce.The room smelled faint

The whispers had gotten worse.It had only been a few days since classes started, but that was more than enough time for rumors to spread across Rosewood.Now more students had seen my wings.Which meant the speculation had grown… creative.I heard pieces of it everywhere.In the halls.Outside classrooms.Even drifting across the dining hall tables when people thought I was too far away to hear.…she’s not really an angel.”“No angel has wings like that.”"Maybe she’s some kind of creature.”“I heard her mother was strange.”Someone had laughed.“Maybe her mother wasn’t mating with an angel.”The implication had been clear.Beastiality.The word hadn’t been said out loud.It didn’t need to be.I kept walking.Head up.Eyes forward.Just like I had practiced.Just like I had promised myself I would do.The cafeteria doors swung open as students began filtering out after lunch.I stepped outside with my tray balanced carefully in my hands.The courtyard between the academic buildings a

The Moon Garden had quickly become my favorite place on campus.By the time Herbology started that morning, the sun had climbed high enough to spill warm light across the stone paths that wound between the raised garden beds.Unlike most of my classes, this one was quiet.No crowds.No staring.Just rows of plants and the steady sound of students working.We had spent most of the week cleaning up the gardens after the summer growth.Harvesting what was ready.Trimming back what had grown too wild.Preparing the herbs properly so they could be dried and stored for the potion labs later in the year.I knelt beside one of the larger beds, carefully clipping the pale blue blossoms from a cluster of moonshade stems.The scent was faint but sweet.Once the blossoms were gathered, they had to be tied in small bundles and hung upside down in the drying shed so the oils inside the petals would settle properly.It was meticulous work.But I liked it.Plants didn’t whisper behind your back.They

Saturday morning meant one thing.My turn to bring breakfast.Which meant I had to actually leave the academy before noon, something I usually avoided if I could help it.The portal at the end of our floor hummed softly as I stepped through it, the familiar pull of magic wrapping around me before dropping me into Thornridge a heartbeat later.The town was already alive with weekend traffic.Students.Locals.A few traveling merchants.I shoved my hands into the pockets of my pants and headed down the familiar street toward the bakery.The smell hit me halfway down the block.Warm bread.Cinnamon.Honey.The same scent that had drifted across the courtyard earlier that week.And the same scent that had clung faintly to the girl I’d kissed.The memory tugged at the corner of my mind as I pushed open the bakery door.A bell chimed softly overhead.The shop was bright and warm, the glass cases already filled with pastries and loaves.Behind the counter stood a woman I recognized immediate

Metallurgy quickly became my favorite class.Partly because there were only six students in it.And partly because, for once, I didn’t feel completely out of place.The workshop sat at the far end of the academic buildings, closer to the training grounds than the lecture halls. The air inside smelled faintly of iron and coal, the scent lingering from years of forging and shaping metal.Today’s lesson began the way most of them did.Meditation.Professor Halvern stood near the front of the room while the rest of us sat around a long wooden table scattered with small metal objects—nails, rings, coins, and thin strips of steel.“Close your eyes,” he instructed.I did.“Metal comes from the earth,” he continued, his voice calm and steady. “Every piece you see before you began as something raw. Something unshaped.”The room fell quiet.“Some people find it easier to influence metal after it has been forged,” he went on. “Others can sense it more clearly when it is still in its raw form.”I