Page 32 of Taste of Thorns (The Firestone Academy #3)

Chapter Twenty-Nine

T horne

Things between us are mended – or so she thinks. The truth is, I know that the damage inside myself is so severe it can never be repaired or patched up. I am broken. And I can never be fixed.

Not even by her.

It’s why I have spent nearly every one of my evenings lurking in the darkness, watching her unseen, following her out to the forest and observing her lessons with the professor.

She’s becoming stronger, summoning the light more easily and controlling it more competently. Learning spells he teaches her. Practicing the wielding of her magic.

Tonight, though, I am not following our thrall. Instead, I am following the Hardies.

We’ve been taking turns to spy on them – discreetly. It’s been more than dull. The three shadow weavers are brain dead, cruel, and occupied with their own importance. Kratos especially spends an awful lot of his time preening in front of the mirror, or listening to his new thrall sing his praises.

That or they’re in the common room, telling stupid stories, snorting with laughter and drinking until they fall over.

Why anyone would entrust these three to help them with plans to usurp the Empress is beyond me.

Tonight the three are lingering in the empty common room after everyone else has left, talking to each other quietly, and gulping on large tankards of frothy ale.

At midnight, the academy clock strikes and they stagger to their feet, yawning and stretching their arms over their heads.

I follow them down the tower and out into the cold night.

They set off together along the pathways and I think my watch shift has come to an end.

Except, tonight, instead of walking together back to their tower, Kratos peels off from the others, wrapping his coat around his body, pulling his hood over his head and striding in the opposite direction, out toward the marshland, thick wisps of mist blowing over the barren land.

Where is he going?

I pick up my pace, concentrating on not losing him in the haze. The shadow weaver mutters to himself as he walks, his voice far more hushed than his usual foghorn. But it’s nothing of interest, just nonsense talk about sports teams and betting odds.

He’s halfway across the boggy marsh land, the snow melted here by the damp, when I spot another figure walking towards him, tall and slim. Kratos spots them too, but it doesn’t cause him alarm and he doesn’t alter his pace or direction. Soon the figure joins him.

Henrietta Smyte.

What is Kratos doing meeting up with the Smyte twin late at night in the middle of the marshland? The two have never exactly been friends; they’re barely acquaintances.

They greet each other, continuing their path across the marshland, slowing as they reach the far side.

I peer through the darkness. A dark figure stands in the curling mist and the Hardy brother and the Smyte twin stop in front of them.

The figure wears a long cloak or coat that disguises their shape, the hood pulled right over their face.

I cannot make them out in the mist. Man?

Woman? I can’t be sure. I strain my ears trying to catch their voices but it is of no use, they have wrapped themselves in a silencing spell.

I curse that it was my turn this evening and not Dray’s.

With his nose, he’d be able to pick out the scent of the stranger Kratos and Henrietta stand talking to.

Although it is mostly the stranger that talks, the others say the odd word but mostly they nod or shake their heads in unison, each one of them looking cowed, even Kratos – his usual arrogance diminished.

Who is this stranger?

The meeting lasts no more than a quarter of an hour, small packages exchange hands quickly – so quickly I don’t get a chance to understand what they are – and then Henrietta and Kratos turn and make their way back across the marshland.

I linger, stepping closer to the stranger.

They lift their chin and I have the impression, though I can’t see their face, that they are peering my way.

But they can’t see me, my shadows wrapping me in darkness, and after a minute, the air around them cracks and they disappear into time and space, displacing away.

I wait another moment to see if anyone else will appear, to be sure the stranger has definitely left. Then I sprint across the marshland and back to our tower, my shins covered in mud-splatter by the time I reach the door, my boots caked in it too.

I crash through the door, calling Beaufort and Dray’s names.

My shifter brother appears in the doorway wearing nothing but sweat pants, a slab of ham hanging from his mouth.

“What’s up?” he asks as Beaufort descends the stairs and arrives in the hallway too.

“You were right,” I say to them both. “Something is going on with the Hardies and the Smyte twins are involved too.”

“You work out what it is that’s going on?” Dray asks, tearing his teeth through the meat.

I shake my head. “They met with a cloaked stranger out on the marshland–”

“The Hardies or the Smytes?” Beaufort asks.

“Kratos and Henrietta.”

“And who was the stranger? Was it Kratos’ father?”

“Or one of the silent shifters?”

“I don’t know; it was too dark and too misty to see and they were using a silencing spell so I couldn’t hear either.”

“And your nose is shit,” Dray says, with his mouth full, “so you couldn’t catch their scent.”

“But you could?” I point out.

Dray’s eyes light up and then he’s cramming what’s left of the meat into his mouth and yanking down his pants.

“Show me where,” he instructs, already transforming to his wolf-form as he steps through the door.

A couple of minutes later, we’re back out in the swirling mist; it’s much thicker than it was and I struggle at first to find the direction, then Dray picks up Kratos’ scent and we follow his footprints across the boggy land, stopping when they come to a halt at the place where he met with the mysterious stranger.

“It’s a long way out from the academy,” Beaufort observes, as Dray sniffs at the earth, his nose pressed to the ground. “They obviously didn’t want to be seen.”

“Or heard,” I add.

We both look eagerly at Dray’s wolf; he’s sniffing and sniffing and by now I’d expect him to be shifting back to human-form and crowing over us both. Instead, he pads in circles, huffing and growling and clearly becoming frustrated.

Finally he shifts back, standing butt naked in the freezing fog.

“What did you find?” Beaufort asks him.

“Jack shit. The only scents I can smell are Kratos’ and Henny’s.”

“You’re sure about that? It’s not buried–”

“I’m sure,” Dray growls. “They must have wiped it away. Because if it were here, I’d find it.”

I look back towards the academy, hardly visible through the shifting mist. “They knew we were watching,” I say.

“You wanna go beat the crap out of the Hardies again?” Dray asks, a grin spreading over his face.

“No point,” Beaufort says, “they won’t talk.”

“But you know who might with the right persuasion?” Dray says, still grinning.

Beaufort groans and raises his eyes to the heavens.

“Henrietta.”