Page 19 of Wicked Dove (Institute Thirteen #1)
“Correct,” Grimm says, nodding in confirmation.
Perhaps they should place it in a safer location.
I don’t like the idea of that being in the same room as some of these people.
As if my mind conjures her, I spy Willow in the red section.
Her gaze is already fixed on me, narrowed and challenging, like she’s hoping to get her hands on the damn box and aim it in my direction.
“Do you know who created it?” Grimm asks, pulling me from my creative thoughts, but even though the question is aimed at the same girl, his eyes shift to the seat behind me and to the right.
Thorne.
“The Shadow King,” Gardenia murmurs, almost afraid to say the words, but if Grimm notices, he doesn’t acknowledge it.
“Excellent,” he hollers, confirming her answer, and his stare shifts from Thorne.
“It was the work of Goddard himself. Does anyone know how to open one?” he asks, and the room remains silent, not even Gardenia has an answer for this one.
“I’d like to say that’s a good thing, but sometimes, desperate times call for desperate measures, and this, my dear students, is a desperate measure.
Once opened, the one who lifted the veil of magic is bestowed one whisper, and that whisper will direct the flames of Hell at their command. ”
“What will it do once it reaches its mark?” a guy from the blue section calls out, and Professor Grimm’s eyes light up.
“It burns.”
I gulp down my nerves despite his answer being the obvious one, and my gaze darts to Willow, who grins.
“How do I acquire one, Professor Grimm?” she asks, eyes still latched onto mine, and irritation coils through my veins. She bested me once; I can’t let that happen again.
“They’re restricted for a reason, Miss Willow.”
“Not to my mother,” she retorts, a challenge to her tone, but Grimm doesn’t seem to heed the warning.
“Yes, to your mother. To us all.”
“So why show us?” Gardenia asks, and Grimm points a pleased finger in her direction.
“Because evil roams the exterior of The Vale. Rebellions are hellbent on bringing us to our knees. Despite the best efforts of The Sanctum, I’m sure one day they will get closer than we wish, and on that day, we may need to call on such a thing.
Now, I’m going to pass the device between rows.
You each have five minutes within your section to attempt to open it,” he exclaims, making his way to the opposite end of the room first.
Willow’s eyes gleam with excitement, eager to unleash the magic and make me its target.
Instead of watching her and giving her the audience she desires, I turn my attention to Ocean.
“Rebellions?” I ask, keeping my voice low, and she hums, but a response comes from my right before she can speak.
“There has to be a balance somehow, Petal.”
I want to pretend he doesn’t exist, but his statement has piqued my curiosity. “A balance?” I ask, turning to face him. My tongue swipes across my bottom lip as I spy his scar, but it’s safer to look at that than his eyes. They’re a beacon to my demise. I already know it.
“Of right and wrong,” he states, and I frown. “It’s impossible to have a world built where everyone stands on the same morals; all you can do is choose what matters to you.”
He says it so casually, it leaves me off-kilter.
“In this world, I don’t know what matters to me, and I hope I’m not here long enough to find out,” I admit, earning one of his megawatt grins.
“Actually, maybe if the rebels break in, they can let me out?” I add, watching the sparkle in his eyes dim slightly, but before I can read too much into it, grumbling from across the room echoes around us.
“No! Bring it back!” Willow snarls through clenched teeth, but Professor Grimm ignores her, along with the rest of the room, as if they haven’t caused uproar.
“Maybe next time, Miss Willow,” he states before moving along to the blue section.
Everyone from Institute Two scurries around the device, and I divert my gaze. “I don’t think I want to know what happens when it opens.”
Ocean scoffs. “Don’t worry, they always start at section one and end with us, which means we won’t get a chance to try before someone else finds the solution,” she explains, leaving me torn over whether I like that fact or not.
“I almost miss your cuts, Petal,” Rion states, snapping my gaze to his. It takes a second for me to understand what he means, but then he brushes the side of his finger over my cheek and I quickly whack him away.
“You’re ridiculous,” I grumble, and he pouts.
“We could have been matching,” he insists, drawing my eyes to his throat again.
“I can’t say that I’m not glad we’re not,” I mutter, but there’s something about the way he grins, like he’s proud of his mark, that stirs something inside of me.
Another wink and he turns to watch the blue section argue over what to do, but I notice the slight bop to his head, like he’s got a melody no one else can hear.
“What are you bopping your head to?” I blurt, immediately regretting it when he turns that megawatt smile back to me. Only this time, he tilts his head further around to tap at his ear where there’s a wireless earbud.
“That’s the most real-world thing I’ve seen since I got here,” I admit, blinking in disbelief. Sure, there are other everyday things here that resemble home, but that’s almost relatable.
“Do you have them?” he asks, and I scoff.
“I could never afford them,” I state, hating the fact that I don’t like the taste of the truth on my tongue as I recall my wired Dollar Tree earbuds that I would connect to Walker’s old MP3 player.
Everyone at school would connect theirs to their cell phones, but that would require owning one that had the capability to connect to the Internet or download apps.
“Want to listen?” Rion asks, offering me the other earbud, and I shake my head.
“I’m good.”
“I have good taste in music,” he insists, and I roll my eyes.
“I’m sure you do, but I’m—” Before I can finish my sentence, he brings the earbud close enough to my ear for me to hear a familiar tune.
“Wait, is that…” I lean in closer, my eyelids falling closed as the song takes hold of me. I can’t speak as the chorus thrums through me, but when it leads into the next verse, I blink at him in surprise.
“You listen to country music.”
“Good, huh,” he states, wagging his eyebrows, and I bite back a smile.
“This guy is actually my favorite,” I admit, and his eyes widen a fraction in surprise.
“You have excellent taste.”
I press my lips into a thin line, but he knows he has me hooked as he places the earbud correctly in my ear. I don’t say a word. I don’t dare. Instead, I focus on each group as they get their hands on the device, only to fail when their time is up.
One track leads into another, and another, until Professor Grimm is carrying the Emberlock to the purple section.
“Holy crap, we actually get to try,” Ocean breathes as I take the earbud out and offer it to Rion. Another wink and he pockets them, turning his full attention to the device that is placed on the desk in front of me.
“I’m sure Thorne can do it,” Ocean states, glancing behind us, and I almost follow her line of sight before I remember myself.
“I’ve never seen one before,” he admits, and I fail to hide my surprise.
Instead of focusing on the rest of Thirteen, I focus on the Emberlock, scared enough to trigger an overwhelming level of intrigue. Running my hand over the top, outlining the golden engraving, my gaze casts across the room, where Willow glares at me.
The moment our eyes clash, I recall her lashing out this morning.
That same anger and rage that coiled inside me in that moment overwhelms me once more, ricocheting through my limbs with a ferocity I can’t seem to simmer until a click rings through the air, pulling my attention back to the box in front of me.
“That’s it,” Professor Grimm exclaims as the latch opens and the lid flips forcefully.
Fire spreads into the room, rippling with chaos and destruction as it swirls like a vortex down to the bottom of the auditorium before barrelling toward the opposite end of the room.
Everyone screams as it heads for its target, Willow, but before I get to bear witness to her torture, Grimm snarls at the top of his lungs with the box in hand. “Defeatus!”
All at once, the fire is gone, but the fluttering of my heart rate remains.
“Holy shit, Elodie,” Ocean says in a mixture of awe and disbelief, and I don’t know whether to be proud of myself or mortified. Either way, my idea of going about The Vale as an unknown entity is not working in my favor so far.
“That’s it, Miss Elodie. You must speak to the box, offer it your rage, and let it be the decider of whether your fury is worthy of its flames,” he states as the bell chimes through the air, dismissing the class.
Everyone launches to their feet, ready to get out of here, but I don’t take a single step before Willow appears in front of me with her hands on her hips and her eyes narrowed into slits.
“You’re going to pay for that.”