A young wizard from the gutter
Living in secret and stealing to eat is a hard life, but it's all Kuro has ever known. Fear and necessity forged him into the finest young thief in the wizard kingdoms. Nobody can hide forever, though, and a run of poor luck lands Kuro in a place where his quick hands and quiet feet count for nothing: Avalon Academy, school of magic.
Out of his depth and unable to escape, can Kuro find a place among the other misfits at the school, or will his past return to ruin the one chance he has to leave his life in the shadows?
Wizards, Thieves, and Misfits
Returning for his second year at the Avalon Academy school of magic, all Kuro wants is to leave his past behind and be like any other young wizard. But life as a thief was poor preparation for the trials of friendship and schoolwork and his hopes are frustrated by a deluge of inconvenient mysteries, unprovoked attacks, and unexplained burglaries.
Aided only by his fellow Autumn Lodge misfits, who are as much hindrance as help, can Kuro avoid expulsion and arrest long enough to prove his innocence, and maybe even pass some classes?
High adventure and petty crime
The heir to the throne of Tirnanog, missing for fifteen years, is rumoured to be alive and attending Avalon Academy. Despite his hopes to finally have an ordinary school year, Kuro is relentlessly dragged into the centre of the hunt for the identity of the lost heir. He is hounded for answers he doesn’t have, pulled away from the safety of the school, all while his unfinished schoolwork taunts him with seemingly unavoidable failure.
Haunted by his criminal past and besieged on all sides by threats of expulsion, imprisonment, and romance, does Kuro have any hope of graduating from junior high, or of survival?