Page 101 of Malcroix Bones Academy

“What?” I asked.

He reached tentatively for where he’d been staring, and before I’d figured it out, he was fingering the green crystal pendant that hung there.

“Well, this is quite a pretty trinket,” he said, his voice unconvincingly light. “It’s family jewelry. Isn’t it? La Fey?”

I looked down in surprise. Then, taking the green crystal from his fingers, I tucked it back inside my gauzy blouse. I hadn’t realized it had fallen out. Really, I shouldn’t have worn it out at all, especially when I knew I’d be drinking.

“It was my mother’s,” I admitted. “She was always a bit secretive about it.”

“Was she?” Alaric deadpanned. “How interesting.”

He continued to stare at the place where my necklace lay, despite it being hidden. He looked about to say something more, but before he could, the cocktail waitress reached us. Alaric’s mouth went from pursed to widening to his most dazzling smile.

“I think we need more drinks over here,” he told the thirty-something woman with bright red hair piled up on her head. He smiled wider, more disarmingly. “We’re renewing our long-lost bonds of friendship. Bring us both goblin-bangers. Best scotch you have.”

I laughed, partly at his words, partly at the absurd name of the drink, and partly from the realization I’d apparently be getting truly hammered that night.

What the hell, I figured.

I’d survived a whole month in this place, and only one person had tried to kill me so far.

I supposed that warranted celebrating.

23

Wings

Iwas drunk.

I was really, really drunk.

We walked through the second boundary onto the school campus, and I burst out in a laugh when the forest reappeared around us, twinkling with violet and gold fairy lights that floated among the branches of trees. Calling on my magic, I breathed out a handful of dragonflies as I walked, their wings glowing the same color as the lanterns, and grinned when they buzzed quietly among the leaves.

My monocerus trotted along next to me, tossing its head and occasionally kicking up its clawed heels. I watched it fondly, wondering if it might be drunk, too.

Draken and Miranda walked on either side of me.

Jolie had left with a friend of hers from secondary school, at some point while I’d been downing goblin-bangers with Alaric. Luc had gone off with Darragh, apparently to look at some famous stained glass window in the moonlight, in a building rumored to house a whole family of ghosts.

I’d been tempted to go with them after Alaric left, but in the end, decided it was too late.

Also, Miranda promised me that hangover cure.

I strongly suspected I would need it, if I didn’t want tomorrow to be a wash.

“You didn’t seem to know him before,” Draken repeated stubbornly, his deep voice slurring as he bumped into me drunkenly as he walked. “I just don’t understand… if you’re suchgreat pals,why didn’t you so much as wave to one another for four whole weeks? And why did he justsitthere, like a paralyzed gnome, while his pal, Bones, spewed vile garbage in your direction every time he laid eyes on you?”

I didn’t have a good answer for that.

I didn’t have a good answer for any of it.

My spinning mind swirled around Draken’s questions.

In the end, I only shook my head, and lifted up both hands.

“No idea,” I declared. “That’s why I went over there. To ask him that.”

“And what did he say?” Miranda asked. Unlike Draken, she sounded curious, not annoyed. I definitely got the sense the Alaric connection fascinated her.