Page 29

LEIF

Logan releases me from my patrol duties, and I calmly walk back to Darwin House, even though my urge is to run. The fleeing figure must be Holly. Is she still here? Is Dash around? Are the pair now leaving? After all, Holly’s plans always involved running away with Dash.

The girl’s jittery questions about Violet’s whereabouts should’ve alerted me that Holly was planning something that she didn’t want Violet around to witness, but surely, she isn’t dumb enough to follow Dash?

Some students remain awake, and the sound of a car chase drifts from the common room TV.

Holly isn’t with the small group fixated on a movie, or making a drink in the kitchen area, so I hesitantly head to the hallway that leads to the girls’ rooms. Plenty of us sneak between rooms, but if Holly mysteriously disappears, and somebody sees me approach hers tonight, pointing fingers will push me straight back into police custody.

Light filters beneath Holly and Violet’s door, and I rap.

Nothing.

I knock again.

No answer.

Is Holly ignoring me or wearing headphones? I quickly send a text.

open the door I saw you outside the sports hall we need to talk

No response.

or I will go straight to Violet

A threat does the trick, and Holly opens the door far enough to peep out, curled hair pulled back from her face. “What do you want, Leif? I’m trying to sleep. Why would I be at the sports hall? I don’t understand what you mean.”

“Yes, you do. Let me in.” Her eyes grow bigger as I lift up Dash’s jacket. “Please.”

The door widens, and I step inside quietly closing it behind me. Holly sits on her bed, wearing unusually dark clothes with no resemblance to pajamas.

“Obviously I didn’t wake you, since you’re dressed to go out. Or did you come back from somewhere?” I say.

Holly avoids looking at the jacket in my hand. “No. You met me walking to the room before you went on patrol, remember?”

“You mentioned staying with Marci tonight.”

“She’s out.”

I narrow my eyes. “I found this jacket, Holly. Logan and his buddies discovered evidence that somebody’s using the sports hall basement to hide activities. They think it’s witches since there’re runes painted, but I know who this belongs to.”

“Oh?” Holly asks innocently. “Black hoodies are common.”

“Can we stop playing games?” I sit on Violet’s desk chair. “How long has Dash hidden inside the academy? Did he ever leave?”

“That isn’t Dash’s jacket.” She takes a pink pig plushie and picks at the ear.

“Holly…” I huff.

“I saw a girl running from the direction of the sports hall, Holly. Were you with Dash and is he living in there?”

Holly lifts her eyes to mine. “Dash isn’t hiding in the academy. We meet in the sports hall at night.”

“Oh, bloody hell,” I mutter. “Are you both stupid?”

“I told Dash that if he left, I’d look for him.” Holly’s lips press together.

“And risk what might happen if witches find you both? What the hell is wrong with you? That scenario should worry you because it fucking terrifies me!”

“Dash can protect me,” she mumbles. “He killed Viktor.”

“Because Eloise had Viktor trapped!” I push fingers through my hair. “Isn’t Dash worried what might happen to him?”

“Don’t tell Violet.”

I soften my voice when Holly’s eyes glisten. “Holly. How can I keep this from her?”

“Um. By not saying the words? What if Violet takes Dash to Dorian? That’s what Eloise wants!”

My shoulders drop. She has a point. Violet may’ve changed, but she’s unpredictable. Every time I think I understand Violet, she does something that shows me I don’t.

“Why are you both risking your lives?”

I’m aware how bonds work. Look at Violet and Rowan’s: something inevitable brought the pair together. Even if Violet hadn’t enrolled at Thornwood, Rowan would’ve caught Dorian’s attention eventually due to his prowess and hunger for power. Violet and Rowan would’ve met through fate that way.

Is there something between Holly and Dash? Holly claims she might have supe blood, but there’s not the smallest amount of supernatural energy around her.

“I worry the spell on my mind still exists,” I tell her. “Do you think the one linking you to Dash does?”

Her lips purse. “No. We have a bond.”

“Or is that what you want to believe? Sometimes, it’s easier to pretend none of this shit happened to us, right?” Holly blinks at me. “And to hold onto the idea that somebody out there can protect you.”

“Exactly. You have Violet to protect you.”

“And she’ll protect you . Holly, you know how hard it hit Violet when someone hurt you. Look at everything that happened as a result. Violet is determined to find evidence that may’ve died with Viktor so Dorian can take down the real leaders.”

Holly examines her hands now clasped in her lap. “Where is Violet tonight? You never answered.”

How much has Violet told Holly? “At the funeral home.”

“ What ?”

Not much, obviously.

“Cornelius took Viktor’s body, and Violet’s attempting to discover where…” I rub my forehead. “It’s complicated.”

“Why don’t I know this?” she retorts. “I heard Viktor’s body went missing but presumed it was Violet or Dorian!”

“Like I said, Violet wants to protect you. She has her plans and her reasons.”

Footsteps echo in the hallway, one loud pair and the others softer.

Only one person wouldn’t sneak quietly back through Darwin House at this time of night.

The door flies open, and the handle bounces off the wall as Violet stomps into the room.

She halts, darts a look between me and Holly, then steps aside to allow Grayson and Rowan inside.

Rowan.

I’ve held back the guy’s magic enough times to sense when he’s misused spells. There’s never anything visible, but something always tangible to me, including the strong emotions that prompt Rowan’s outbursts. This time, that aura is weird. Darker. He rests against the wall and slumps to the floor.

“What’s happening?” Violet asks as Grayson wanders over to sit on her bed. “Why are you here, Leif? And Holly—Leif told me you planned to stay at Marci’s tonight.”

Holly shoots me a look. “Are you my watchdog now?”

“Don’t be rude, Holly,” says Violet.

Grayson can’t suppress his laugh.

Violet steps further into the light thrown out by the single lamp on Holly’s nightstand, and Holly shrinks back. “Your face! Like Kai’s party… What happened at the funeral home?” she asks.

This time Violet sends me a slicing look. “How do you know where we were, Holly?”

Grayson rests his palms on Violet’s bed, arms outstretched behind him. “You’ll be glad you didn’t join us, Leif.”

“Incorrect. If I’d known the outcome of tonight in advance, I would never have listened to you, Grayson. I would’ve asked Leif to join us.”

Why? I don’t know where to start with the questions, but whatever happened concerns Rowan and his silence.

“Should I leave?” asks Holly pointedly. “So, you can discuss things without me again?”

The odd energy in the corner of the room isn’t fading, and I glance over at the witch resting his head against the wall. “Rowan. What’s wrong with you?”

“Rowan killed someone.”

Matter-of-fact Violet strikes again but the three words punch all the air from my lungs. “Is that true?”

Rowan nods at me, his expression blank. No. I swallow. But Rowan’s capable; I’ve stepped in before and seen how magic changes him sometimes.

“Something I could’ve stopped?” I ask hoarsely. “I should’ve been with you.”

“Yes,” says Violet stiffly.

Holly darts a look at the door, then at Rowan. She’s unsure of him at the best of times. Rowan murdered someone.

“What spell?” I ask. “Self-defense or…”

“The bond,” says Grayson.

The witch sits on his hands; a tell-tale move Rowan uses when he’s worried that the manifested magic still clings to him. The first time he did this was when he’d used fire magic, and I panicked, unable to understand how Rowan didn’t scorch himself.

Other times I intervened rush into my mind.

The night he fought the shifters at the town park. The time he stopped Violet’s heart at the Brightgroves’ reno house.

That’s the aura around Rowan now. Shadows. Ever since the magic found him and he welcomed them, Rowan killing someone became a possibility. But inevitable? I crouch down and pull at Rowan’s hands, taking them in mine and squeezing until he yelps back to reality.

When I interrupted Rowan’s fight with the shifters in the park, I’d detected a darker tinge to his magical aura. Like then, this isn’t the usual elemental energy that erupts from Rowan when he’s pissed off.

Definitely shadows.

I yank my hands away, shocked at their coldness, but more so by how shrouded he still is. Is this what Violet means about the shadow magic taking hold of Rowan?

Holly senses his malevolent edge too, as humans can with supes but never understand why, and she babbles how Rowan always felt wrong, and she always knew he’d kill.

Violet ignores her—all of us—and takes a thick black pen from the desk beside me, then approaches the latest paper pages stuck to the bedroom wall. Viktor’s death, connections, and major players.

Rowan watches every move she makes through panicked eyes.

How can she detach herself and remain calm? Oh, yeah. Because she’s Violet.

The world I’m in is often surreal recently, but tonight I’ve left my own world completely. What the hell have you done, Rowan?

“Who are they?” asks Holly wearily as Violet writes three partial names on the board:

Woman: Penelope

Man 1: Edward

Man 2: Corey

She then draws a thick line through Corey at a force that almost tears the paper.

“You gonna add Rowan to the list with me and Dash on?” asks Grayson, tapping his sneaker toes together. “Under Leif’s”

“Why?” Rowan lifts his head.

Violet holds her pen in front of the paper.

“I shouldn’t be on any lists; I haven’t killed anybody,” I protest.

“Something that now adds you to a minority.” Violet scrawls Rowan’s name. “How ironic that I’m the dark, evil child of Dorian Blackwood, yet I’ve controlled myself enough not to kill anybody.”

“Yet.”

I suck air through my teeth at Rowan’s bold comment. Violet turns and takes slow steps to look down at him.

“Unless it’s for self-preservation, when I kill, the act will be calculated, and the death deserved.

I have other skills I use that leave the assailant in a non-life-threatening state.

For instance, tonight, against Penelope.

I required a mental pickaxe to chip through the spell, and I found answers.

I did not kill. I left her with the same memories as I planted in Edward’s mind. ”

“Where are the witches?” asks Holly. “Will they look for us?”

“No. The pair’s task tonight was to take Viktor’s body for Cornelius.”

“You let them go?” I ask in shock. “The woman saw Rowan kill.”

“Why? Do you hold the opinion we should’ve killed and placed her in the furnaces too? Both of the remaining witches?”

“In the what ?” shrieks Holly. “Omigod.”

“Albeit that would’ve been the easiest solution, we need them to deliver Viktor’s body to the location that Cornelius instructed.”

“Violet,” whispers Holly. “This all gets worse.”

“Killing and death aren’t shocking occurrences in my life, but at times inconvenient. This situation worries me for many reasons.”

Rowan doesn’t move. Doesn’t blink. Just sits and stares at nothing. I wait for Violet to say something harsher and snap him out of it, but she doesn’t.

A tight band wraps around my chest, squeezing. Rowan isn’t just in shock; he’s somewhere else, mind still trapped by whatever happened back there

“Where are the witches taking the body?” I ask.

“The Whitegrove mausoleum, as predicted. The problem is, we’re unsure exactly where that is,” says Grayson.

“Penelope’s mind revealed a graveyard location but not an address,” adds Violet. “But we’ll discover where, using Rowan’s less murderous abilities.”

“Time to tell Eloise?” I suggest.

Violet doesn’t answer. Instead, she frowns. “Leif. Why are you with Holly? Did she join your patrol and you have information to impart? What occurred?”

“I’d like to go to Marci’s now.” Holly stands, and Violet peruses her, then me. “I don’t want to listen to more about Viktor and death and spells. I’m trying to forget about all that.”

“How is spending time with Leif helpful if you suffered at the hands of the same man?”

“Mutual support?” suggests Grayson.

Holly looks at me pleadingly.

“I’m waiting to speak to you about my evening’s discoveries,” I say, and Holly’s face fills with panic. “Which sound less eventful than yours.”

“I’d really like to go to Marci’s now,” presses Holly. “Like you said, it’s better that I don’t know everything in case… something happens to me again.”

“But you expressed dissatisfaction with us excluding you.” Violet blows air into her cheeks. “However, if you prefer the company of Marci while we discuss the Viktor situation, Rowan can accompany you to Pendle House.”

“Me?” He looks up.

“Rowan just killed somebody. He might be unstable,” Holly protests.

“Rowan won’t kill you.” She nods at me. “I’d like to speak to Leif.”

“You want me to leave too?” Grayson asks and sits forward. “Shouldn’t we discuss this together?”

“I’ve already disclosed the information that I gathered to you and Rowan. Now I wish to impart that knowledge to Leif.” Her eyes hold mine. “And he can share his evening’s discoveries with me.”

Humans tracking supes, discoveries in the sports hall, and Holly meeting Dash are part of that old world, not this new one where my best friend commits murder.

Murder.

Well, I guess Rowan added himself to the Blackwood blacklist.