Page 43

I ’d barely slept for a few minutes before I jerked awake, hearing Lucy’s scream, feeling it echo through my chest. Gasping, I sat up and looked around the dorm. No one else was moving.

I ran a hand over my face, the tremble of my fingers, the shaking of my breath ... I needed to get a hold of myself.

I gathered some clean clothes and went to the oversized washroom that was for the girls. Multiple showers, tubs, and toilets all set behind screens. Still trembling, I could feel the build-up of an oncoming attack, could feel the sweat sliding down my spine and the sudden struggle to breathe.

“Fruck me sideways,” I muttered as I hurried to the closest shower, my vision darkening at the edges. I couldn’t go running, couldn’t dive into the moat around the castle, so a cold shower it was going to have to be.

I stepped behind the screen and flicked the lever all the way to the right, leaning against the tiles as a shudder wracked me. I wasn’t cold, I was burning up. The spray of the cold water hit my toes as I stripped out of my pajamas.

My chest twisted and knotted, and the shakes in my hands had worked their way through to my whole body as Lucy’s terrified face refused to leave me.

And her face kept morphing into Opie’s. Lucy had said something about being used up.

About being empty. I thought of my recent dream, so real .

.. so terrifying. Did Lucy mean she had no magic, like Opie?

I couldn’t stop seeing the connections, real or imagined. That’s what panic did. It magnified all my fears tenfold.

What if what happened to Lucy could happen to Opie? And how could I stop it when I had no idea what it was? Where had Lucy come from? And why had Typhon and the others been so intent on putting her back there?

The spiral pulled on the muscles around my chest until I couldn’t breathe.

A sharp snap of air escaped my lips as I stepped into the streaming cold, the icy droplets cutting through the heat of my skin, cutting the lines of the anxiety as it tried to take control of me.

I bowed my head and stepped fully under the stream, hands out to the side to steady myself on the walls. Cold, so cold that it made my head ache with the temperature, but it knocked out the building heat of the attack until I was shivering for a completely logical reason.

“You are zero help to anyone if you fall apart, woman,” I muttered under my breath.

Five minutes turned to ten, and then ten to twenty before I finally felt in control enough to turn the water off. Shakily I dried myself off and slid into some dry clothes, my limbs icy like I’d just stepped out of a meat locker, skin still pebbled hard from the cold water.

Marina and Ellie stepped into the washroom as I opened the door to leave. Marina’s keen eyes slid over me. “You okay?”

“Better now.”

I knew she wasn’t convinced, hell, I wasn’t convinced. But I made my way out to the main room where my housemates were slowly waking.

They hadn’t seen Lucy; they’d only heard the aftermath of her escape. The broken glass, the long scream, Tarquinius saying there was a wraith. My barely coherent, shock-laden explanation.

“Harlow . . .”

“I really appreciate your concern, but I just need to put a pin in this for now. I’m –” I broke off to meet Marina’s sympathetic gaze and went with the truth. “I’m not okay, but I also can’t face this head on right now. Can we just pretend things are normal for today? Please?”

Ellie laid a gentle hand on my arm and nodded. “Of course.”

“This just came, from Elmwood,” Zeed said, holding a piece of stationery as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes. “Apparently, the rule of two has been revoked.”

What the fruck?

I held my hand out for the paper, glad to see the shakes were nearly gone. “That can’t be right. Not after last night.”

Why now?

Zeed’s eyes flicked from me to the others. “Do ... do you think she might have survived the fall?”

I shook my head. “No.” My throat was too tight to elaborate. As small and weak as she’d been ... a fall like that. I blinked back hot tears.

“Mother Hecate bless her,” Ellie whispered, crossing herself. I wasn’t sure the mixing of theologies would work, but maybe it would help Lucy, wherever she was.

“This doesn’t make sense.” Ross took the paper from Zeed. “From what you said, Lucy was just scared. Not a threat. But they were afraid enough of her to lock us all down? How long do you think she was wandering Neverthorn for?”

“She doesn’t want to talk about it, Ross,” Fable said, tugging on a fuzzy robe as she stepped between us and scowled at him.

I gave her shoulder a pat. “It’s okay. I know we’re all upset.

It’s just, I don’t have any answers right now.

All I have are questions myself. But the Senate and Tarquinius need us to defeat Nocta.

We know that much is true. So, despite all the lies, I have to assume that our safety is their number one priority.

If they say we can walk the school freely, I’m going to assume that’s the truth.

And until I see Opie and make sure she’s safe, I can’t concentrate on anything, never mind solving this mystery. ”

“I can go with you?” Fable murmured, worry etched onto her pretty face.

“No, I need to talk to her alone. But thanks.”

I made my way down the stairs, toward the third floor. It was too early for breakfast, but hopefully she was awake. The Unicorna crest was etched into each of the doorways, a rearing unicorn, surrounded with white and purple runes. Opie’s room was halfway down the hall, and I knocked once.

No answer.

I knocked a second time.

Third.

The fourth time I banged my fist against the door, panic finding its way back to me in double time. “Ophelia! Open this door!”

The door flew open, and Opie stood there, her eyes wide and only half a braid in her hair. “What!? What’s the matter?!”

I reached out and grabbed her by the shoulders and dragged her into a hug, crushing her to my chest as I tried not to sob. “I was just ... you didn’t answer the door right away.”

“I had music on while I was braiding my hair,” she mumbled against me, tipping her head to the side. “Lo-lo, are you okay?”

“Yeah. Yup, I’m fine.”

“Then why are you squeezing me like I’m the last bit of toothpaste in the tube?”

I huffed a laugh and forced my arms to relax. “Right, well ... just one of those mornings where I don’t know my own strength, you know?”

Her blue eyes squinted up at me, no doubt seeing more than I wanted her to. “Right. But you’re okay? Because you scared the heck out of me.”

“I’m fine.”

Her hands went to the other side of her head, braiding the remaining half of her hair. “You know what fine can stand for?” she glanced around and lowered her voice to a whisper. “Frucked up, insecure, neurotic, emotional.”

“I should never have told you that,” I forced a smile. “I’m good, Opie. I just feel like I hardly see you.”

“Because we’re in different classes.”

“I know that. But even at meals.”

Her smile was genuine. “We have different friends.”

“Right. Well, maybe you could sit with me for a meal today.”

She finished her braid. “Sure. Breakfast then? Krishna and Phoebe like to sleep in anyway.”

“Okay, breakfast it is. Thirty minutes?”

She backed me toward the door and rolled her eyes. “Perfect. That’s how long it will take for my heartbeat to go back to normal after you scared the crap out of me with all that banging.”

She shut the door in my face, and I shook my head. A familiar voice tugged at my ears, and I turned to follow it. His voice drew me forward, the Irish lilt a soothing drawl I could use right then.

Liam.

He might know what happened with Lucy. If they found her broken body ... or if she’d disappeared ...

Hurrying, I caught up to him, grabbed him by the arm and yanked him sideways into a small classroom. He spun as he fell through the door, his fingers flashing into a rune, wrapping me in a body bind.

My arms and legs locked together, but with a quick jerk of my arms and legs, I busted free of it.

“Shit, Harlow!” Liam reached for me, helping to steady me. “I’m so sorry!”

“No, it’s okay,” I ran a hand over my face. “With everything that’s been going on, I get it. That was foolish of me to sneak up on you like that.”

He cocked his head to the side. “What do you mean everything that’s been going on?”

I didn’t think he would lie to me, but was it possible he didn’t know about Lucy?

“Harlow, whatever it is, you can trust me. I will do everything I can to help you.” His deep-brown eyes were sincere.

I hoped I was reading him right.

“You don’t know about Lucy?” I leaned against a table and crossed my arms, holding myself tight.

He frowned. “Lucy who?”

I took a deep breath and let it all out in a rush.

“Lucy is a girl who died last night. She was outside my room, looking for help. I tried to help but then Tarquinius, Nikita, and Typhon showed up, Typhon was covered in blood, and the girl was terrified and she ... she asked me about her parents and then she threw herself out the window of the seventh floor. Tarquinius called her a wraith, but she felt just like a normal girl to me.”

I sucked in a breath and stared at Liam, watching him. Emotions rippled across his face, shock at the front followed by anger.

“No one has said anything to me.”

“It was awful. She was so distraught. She said they used her up. That she was empty.” If I thought Liam looked angry before, it was nothing to the shadow of fury that rippled over his features. “Liam?”

“That’s ... fruck, Tarquinius sent me to the village, to guard the far edge last night. Said he thought Nocta might send another spy, or an attack –”

“Wait, what do you mean, another spy?”

He shook his head. “Slip of the tongue. He wanted me on guard, so that I wasn’t here.

They had to have known that Lucy was going to show up in the school.

But how is that possible if ...” He paced in front of me, one hand on top of his head, the other tapping against his leg, keeping time with his steps. “Do you think they could have known?”

His question caught me off guard. “I ... I don’t know? They were looking for her, they showed up right after she did. Liam, what happened to her? What did she mean by she was empty?”

His shoulders slumped. “I don’t know how much I can tell you, Harlow. I don’t want to put you in more danger. I don’t want to see you hurt. You or your friends. Or Opie.”

I swallowed hard, seeing that connection between Opie and Lucy again, as crazy as it was. “Why would you think Opie is in danger? Could she somehow end up like Lucy? Out of her mind, forgetting everyone?”

“I don’t know, Harlow,” he said, his voice gentle. Kind. But it did nothing to the terror that his words had sparked in my heart.

If what happened to Lucy could happen to Opie ... whatever control I’d had over myself was gone in a wash of fear so all-consuming that the world blacked out. My vision faded and I fell forward. I might have hit the floor, I don’t know. I just couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t see.

And then I could see, and everything was moving too fast, I was too hot, someone was talking to me, trying to soothe me.

Liam cast a rune against my skin, the same one he’d used to calm us when digging around for a Quirk, but it did nothing. If anything, it seemed to skitter off my skin in a shower of sparks.

I pushed away from him, across the floor until I was under the table, my head against my knees as I fought to find some semblance of control.

Table.

Floor.

Liam’s voice .

Fingernails dug into my palm.

“Breathe, Harlow. Just breathe.”

I ignored him, not because he was wrong, but because I almost had it. And I was frucking embarrassed. “I’m meeting Opie for breakfast.” I spoke, but my words were slurred like I’d been drinking.

I wobbled to the door and was out before he could say anything else.

The dining hall wasn’t packed, and I managed to get a plate full of food by labelling everything in my head.

Toast.

Eggs.

Bacon.

Fruit.

Jam.

Orange juice. Last thing I needed was a hit of caffeine when I was this far into an attack.

I slid into a seat next to Opie. She grinned at me, and I focused on the fact that she was okay. That she was safe as long as I was sitting next to her. It eased the bands that had wrapped themselves around my chest a little.

But it was only when a particular teacher strode into the hall, his black cloak billowing out behind him that I took my first full breath. Because as much as I wasn’t sure of a lot of things. I knew one for sure.

Typhon would protect Opie.

And as stupid as I felt admitting it, after all he’d done ... despite Lucy ... despite the thirteen-year-long ache in my chest caused by him ...

I knew he’d protect me too. As if his life depended on it.

Which meant if I ever wanted to be able to move freely around Neverthorn and get to the bottom of the mystery wrapped around Lucy, I had no choice but to break the bond between us.

No matter what it took.