Steven's magic tutor has been more and more disapproving of his lack of a tether. Steven can't give him an explanation as to why not, since at this point it's Marc holding out not Steven and his teachers don't know about Marc, but at least today he can kind of understand where she's coming from. He feels kind of terrible, and his ability to focus his magic today was dismal, so she'd sent him home with yet another admonishon to deal with his situation before he gets even sicker.

He's been having a heated argument with Marc about it in his head for the whole walk home, but stepping inside and seeing one, fluffy hair, then two, bare shoulders, then three, ice in a pack and a pained expression, all manage to derail his train of thought. He stares for a beat, then shakes himself, hurries over to take over the ice, and exclaims, "Layla! What happened?"