Page 35 of Wicked Salvation

The Headmistress looks the most angry.

Her body’s weathered by age—deep wrinkles in her face, gray hair pulled back in a severe top knot. She can’t be more than five feet tall. But she’s a spitfire, and it’s all in her eyes. They’re sharp, severe. That, coupled with the fact that she rarely smiles, makes her seem twice as tall. I’m standing at the top of the steps, watching her approach me.

Her shoes click against the stone steps.

Today, she’s dressed in a floor-length dress that looks like it belongs to another era. Yet I can tell it’s well made—gold embroidery and stiff, expensive fabric. She stops right beside me, turning her head to look up at me.

I exhale, letting the smoke drift between us.

She opens her mouth to say something, but I speak first.

“Be careful of the next words you speak, Guinevere,” I whisper to her. “You might have given your entire life to this school, but you and I both know that it hardly matters.”

Her face turns red. Fire rages in her eyes.

But her lips stay sealed, and a macabre smile twists my features as I take another puff. Guinevere was appointed by my family decades ago. Yet she knows I have the power to remove her on a whim. I just never had the desire to.

I wanted to leave this place quietly.

Then Eden happened.

There are a few heartbeats of silence between us, during that time more students start to gather to watch the Archbishops fall from grace. I look around, a foolish part of me hoping to spot that coily head of auburn hair. But of course she isn’t here.

If I had to guess, her mother saw the article and told her to stay away from it. I push the thoughts down as deep as I can. Part of me knows that I’m doing thisforher, but I’m also doing it to hurt her—and I don’t want to deconstruct the complexity of that thought right now.

I turn my attention back to Guinevere Moreau.

“What is it you want, Lord Augustine-Beaumont?”

This time, I blow smoke directly in her face. She keeps her composure still—I guess years of leading this place made her feel like an impenetrable fortress. Yet here I am, with a wrecking ball, threatening to destroy it all.

“What are you talking about?”

She narrows her eyes. “I know this is your doing.”

“Is that an accusation?”

Guinevere huffs. “No it is not, my Lord.Whoeverdid this—” Her gaze grows harsher. “—I’d like to know their motive. Do you have any idea who might be behind this?”

“I’m not sure, Headmistress,” I say with a menacing smile. “But whoever it is, they seem to have a vendetta against this institution.” I push off the wall, standing to my full height and look down at her with thinly veiled disgust. “If I had to guess, this is just the beginning.”

I walk away before she can reply.

Despite the cannabis, I feel anxiety climbing up my throat—I’ve been smoking more, yet my anxiety is still pressing at the edges of my consciousness.

Fuck.

I duck into the empty chapel and into the nearest room—the sacristy.

It starts small, it always does.

A flicker behind my ribs, like someone lit a match in my lungs and forgot to put it out. I’m pacing the length of the room. I just crossed the first thing off my list—I should feel powerful. But my skin is too tight.

My breath is too short.

The silence presses in.

And that’s when I surrender to the feeling, because I know there’s nothing that I can do right now other than ride it out. Itdoesn’t come all at once, but when it does, it doesn’t feel like fire anymore.