"They're useful," Calibri answered distractedly, although as to why a sixteen-year-old going into university would think a box of lethal substances was useful was a question in it of itself.

He had spread the box open again, undoing the metal latches with a swift flick, and was now running a measuring eye over its contents with a thoughtful frown. At length, he picked one or two small vials up, murmuring something quietly to himself about how they could be easily extracted from a living organism even after ingestion, which, all things considered, was not really the best line of thought for a sane person to go down.

"May I borrow a mammalian creature of any kind?"