Page 149 of Storm of Shadows

The shadow hesitates, then creeps closer, right to my fingertip. A mere millimeter separating my flesh from the wisp of magic. I can feel its heat. I stare up into its depths utterly captivated.

“You’re really quite something, aren’t you?” I say. “Thank you. For helping me.”

I don’t know who I’m thanking or why they helped me. However, there’s no doubt in my mind that someone did help me.

The shadow floats in place for a minute longer, then glides away towards the fountain at the center of this maze. It swirls around and around the stone monument. It’s trying to tell me something.

With a lot of effort and even more pain, I stumble up onto my feet and hobble that way.

The aroma of burned hair and flesh lingers in my nostrils. What the hell must I look like? If it’s half as bad as I feel, then hideous, most definitely hideous.

The shadow floats by the trickling water of the fountain and as I inspect closer I spot a crystal spinning under the water. I understand what I have to do.

“Thank you,” I whisper a second time and then I reach out and take the cool crystal in my hand.

Immediately, the ground beneath my feet jerks away and the world around me spins and then I land with a thud on solid ground.

“Finally.”

I blink and find the second half of the gruesome twosome standing right in front of me, a pen and clipboard in his hands. We’re somewhere out in the academy grounds and the sky above us is already black with night.

“What the hell happened?” he grunts with annoyance. “Didn’t you hear my whistle? You’ve been in the maze for over two hours.”

“I-I-I have?” I say. “Shouldn’t I have been whisked out after one?”

“Exactly,” he snaps, with even more annoyance, scribbling something on his board. “Your completion of the maze won’t count. You were out of time.” He glares at me as if I might dare to challenge him. I’m not going to bother. After all, someone helped me in there. Helping others is against the rules – yet, if anyone found that out, I’m sure I’d be the one to be punished.Then again, I’m sure Madame Bardin is going to find a way to punish me anyway. I don’t trust that promise of hers one bit and I doubt she is the type of person to take kindly to being beaten like that.

“Can I go?” I say.

“Huh?” he says, still scribbling. “Yeah,” he waves his hand in my direction without looking down at me again, “if you’re injured at all, take yourself along to the clinic.”

I wrap my arms around my body and set off back to my room. The air is frigid, making my already injured muscles ache and my teeth chatter together. Every step is painful. Tears snake down my face and drip off my chin.

Yet, there’s this peculiar warmth in my stomach, one that’s urging me back to my room. I pick up my pace and hurry along.

The main campus is busy with people tonight. The ball to celebrate the completion of the first trial won’t happen for a few days yet – everybody needs time to recover. But that hasn’t stopped people from partying already. Several are out on the paths, drinking, talking, going over the trial. Some are wrapped in bandages. I can hear music wafting from the towers, more chatter and laughter too.

I have a strong desire to find Fly and Clare, swap stories and take a swig or two of Fly’s liquor. This strange sensation has other plans though and soon I’m rounding the corner to my own tower.

Rounding the corner and halting.

There are three figures lingering at the entrance.

Beaufort, Dray and Thorne.

Chapter Sixty-Five

Beaufort

“You’re sure she’s safe?” Dray says, kicking at a loose pebble on the pathway as he leans against the walls of her tower.

“I told you what I saw. She has to be.”

Only problem is, by our calculations, the girl should have been back from the trial over an hour ago – sooner if, like most of the commoners, she was in danger and had to be fished out. Rumor has it, less than a fifth of the students completed the maze – most of the shadow weavers.

So where the hell is she?

We’ve already searched for her in the commoners’ clinic, their canteen and the rooms of both her friends. Hell, Dray even went back and looked for her in our tower on the off-chance she headed that way – probably in the hope we’d heal whatever injuries she most probably has picked up.