Death's Handmaiden Series by Niall Teasdale

The Clan Worlds Alliance is the larget political body in the known galaxy. At its centre lies Shinden, home to the Clan Assembly and the Shinden Alliance School of Sorcery, probably the best educational facility of its type anywhere. Students from all over the Clan Worlds go there to study a form of magic based squarely on scientific principles. Many of them will end up in military services when they leave, but sorcery is useful for more than just war... moreThe Clan Worlds Alliance is the larget political body in the known galaxy. At its centre lies Shinden, home to the Clan Assembly and the Shinden Alliance School of Sorcery, probably the best educational facility of its type anywhere. Students from all over the Clan Worlds go there to study a form of magic based squarely on scientific principles. Many of them will end up in military services when they leave, but sorcery is useful for more than just war. With a history shrouded in secrecy, Nava Ward plans to learn to use magic for more than just killing. Her goal is to live a normal life, find normal friendship, and spend six years making her considerable magical potential useful to society. But Nava is far from being a normal girl and she does not fit perfectly into Clan Worlds society. A normal life may be what she wants, but getting it is an entirely different matter. less

Nava Ward, the mysterious first year student at the Shinden Alliance School of Sorcery, is about to receive an offer she would be stupid to refuse. Then she gets an offer she would really prefer to refuse but can’t. And soon she must deal with the ghost of a dead actress and the bitter schemes of a mad metaphysicist. It’s all pretty normal for the top student at Shinden’s best magic school…

Nava’s second year at the Sonkei Alliance School of Sorcery begins with a strange new student who seems to have a real invisible friend and just gets stranger. By the time she’s going off-world to rescue a friend during her summer break, events have conspired to make her question a lot of things, including her very nature. Just how alien is Death’s Handmaiden.

How do you defeat an enemy who knows the future?

Nava Greyling has only ever wanted a normal life in a normal school. Well, relatively normal. Normal schoolgirls don’t have to worry about terrorist organisations (old and new) and the threat of impending interstellar war. When magic, bullets, and missiles start flying, where does Nava’s loyalty lie?