“The Crusader’s actions to intimidate us into submission will not work. We will not cow at the sticks they throw at our outer walls. For the sake of students’ safety, the academy is on lockdown until the situation’s been dealt with.” She nods her head and starts to turn away, as if that’s simply the end of it.
But Veronica’s shrill voice calls out after her. “How long is that gonna take?” She glances back at the front doors. “Some of us have places we need to be.”
Headmistress Evanora looks even more tired. “The city watch is already on its way. I’m sure it’ll be dealt with swiftly and efficiently.”
Beside me, Puck snorts in disbelief. “Yeah right,” he whispers, “she’s talking about the same city watch, right?”
I lean in closer. “What do you mean?”
“He means,” Nicholas says, glancing over our shoulders at the moving shapes outside the window. “That this isn’t going to be over anytime soon.”
Any remaining hope of the Crusaders disbanding soon disappears by the time the sun’s finished rising over the nearby roofs.
I spend the next hour or so nodding off against Nicholas’ shoulder in a nook the boys secure for us in the dining hall. We’ve all been ordered to stick together here downstairs until the danger has passed.
The regular tables have all been cleared away, the zombie servants interrupted in the middle of their preparations for tonight’s solstice ceremony. Bloody garlands hang from half the ceiling and great golden tapestries are forgotten, bundled in corners while the student body sprawls out on the floor complaining of lower-back cramps.
Puck tries valiantly to stay by my side, but every time my eyes flutter shut he looks like he’s about to take flight. Eventually he takes to trailing Merlin as the head of our class makes his rounds shushing people and threatening to give them detention every chance he gets.
Sometimes, I wonder what I even see in that boy.
And then I get a glimpse of his smooth, strong jaw . . . and I remember. Nearly any sin can be forgiven with a sharp enough jawline.
I expected the shadows of the night before to dissipate with the morning sun, but when my eyes flutter open for the last time and see dozens of students getting up to press their faces to the glass—that little bit of hope I had starts to waver.
And when I join them, it disappears entirely.
After so many hours the Crusaders should have let up at least a little. But from just my first glance, there still has to be over a hundred outside. Maybe twice that. They move in a terrifying frenzy, never sitting still, teleporting back and forth along the wall so it’s impossible to keep track of their actual numbers.
All that’s certain is that though they’ve been at this for hours, there’s no sign of them slowing down.
Nicholas slips his hand into mine and squeezes tight. Puck spots us and steps back up beside me, unusually quiet. Even Merlin stops telling the first-years not to smudge the glass long enough to shoot me a worried look.
“You think this has to do with your mom’s visit tonight?” Nicholas whispers.
I bite my lip, but I don’t answer.
I mean, it’s too much of a coincidence for it not to be. I knew there had to be a reason Bedford was in town when we saw him last night, but I never imagined a full-on assault. Headmistress Evanora seems certain there’s no chance of them breaking through the magical barriers, but I’m not completely convinced.
With only hours left before I’m due to meet my mother outside by the lake, I leave the boys in the dining hall to visit the headmistress’ office.
Unfortunately, I’m not the only one who’s had this idea. It seems that just about every professor, head of class, and at least three zombies also seem to have something pressing to ask at just the same moment.
By the time I reach the top of the stairs, Headmistress Evanora is trying to wedge the door shut in at least a dozen people’s faces without seeming overly impolite. It’s clear from her exhausted, worn-out expression that she’s at her very own wits-end.
But I dare push her a little closer. I have to. These Crusaders are here because of me, after all.
“Please, please everyone!” Evanora calls out over the many questions. She waves her arms up over her head while I stand on my tiptoes at the back to try to get a better look. Through the crack in the door, I can make out Abacus’ shadow standing inside by the window. He still looks grave, but not necessarily surprised.
I wonder for the first time if he knew this was coming. Is that what Bedford wanted with him last night? A final warning, an opportunity for Abacus and Headmistress Evanora to hand me over in order to avoid unnecessary bloodshed?
Evanora waves her arms again. “I assure all of you, your questions will be answered with due time. For now, please focus on keeping the students calm and away from the gates.”
She goes to slam the door shut, but I dart through to the front and jam my foot in the way.
Pain shoots up my leg and down my toes, but I force a grimace through. “Headmistress!”
Her calm exterior crumbles a little when she looks down at me. She knows I’ll not be so easily dismissed.
“Miss Davies,” her voice is as tired as she is, “I’m happy to see you’re safely inside, but now is not the time . . .”
“Headmistress,” I start again, before she can finish telling me to basically fuck-off with the rest of them, “please. If this is about me, and I think it is, I deserve to know what’s going on.”
She looks like she’s going to still turn me away, but Abacus’ voice floats out to us from inside. Through the crack in the door, I can see he’s still staring out the window but his reflection in the glass looks back at me.
“Let the girl in,” he says, and Evanora relents. She opens the door just wide enough for me to shimmy inside, and then slams it shut before anyone else can try to follow.
It’s been a couple of weeks since I was last in her office. Months now, since I was last in here with Abacus present.
I stand awkwardly in the middle of the room while the headmistress moves to pour two drinks from a decanter behind the desk. She hands one to Abacus and is about to sit down with her own when she glances once my way. She makes a to hell with it all expression and pours a third drink—this time, for me.
When she does finally settle down into her chair, it’s with a long, exhausted sigh. “The council is going to be furious when they hear about this,” she says, leaning into the palm of her hand and squeezing the bridge of her nose. “Crusaders surrounding a school, threatening to overrun it. It’s unheard of.”
“Times are changing. I doubt this is the last we’ll hear of such things,” Abacus says. He’s still looking out the window, watching the tops of the walls for any sign of a breach.
I can’t wait any longer. “It’s me they’re after, isn’t it?” I blurt out.
Abacus and the headmistress don’t even try to hide it. No furtive glances, no carefully worded explanations. They just both nod.
“Yes,” Abacus says plainly. “They’re after you.”
Since I don’t know what else to do, I let out a nervous laugh. “But why today?”
Now Abacus and Evanora do exchange a glance.
“That’s what we’re trying to figure out,” the headmistress says with another sigh. “Maybe they hoped our defenses would be down in preparation for tonight’s ceremony.”
“Or, more likely, to prove a point,” Abacus adds. “To show off their numbers when they can’t be ignored. Try to scare us into submission.”
I look down into the dark liquid in the bottom of my cup and take a tentative sip. “What is it they’re demanding, exactly?”
I try to sound casual, or at least as casual as one can be in a moment like this, but I think my voice wavers a little. At least, it’s enough to make Abacus’ eyes flicker over in my direction.
It’s he who answers.
“They’re demanding we turn you over to them,” he says. “As Evanora said before
. . .”
“No, I mean, how are they saying it? What are their words exactly?”
Headmistress Evanora just looks more drained but Abacus gives me a strange look.
“I believe,” he says, “the exact phrase they used was, ‘give us the abomination, or we’ll come in and take it ourselves’.” He watches me as I process what he says. “So unless you have something to tell us . . . some other ‘abomination’ they could be referring to . . .”
He trails off, and I quickly shake my head.
“N—no sir. Of course not,” I say. But of course, that’s a lie.
Sure, the Crusaders would love to get their hands on me. But my mother, on the other hand, is the true prize. To think she was supposed to show up here, today, of all days . . .
And is still supposed to show up. After all, there’s no way to reach her to tell her otherwise.
If only I’d thought to get more enchanted papers from Edgar when I was at Highborne.
Even though the glass in my hand is still mostly full, I set it down on the end of the headmistress’ desk. I can’t be drinking at a time like this.
I choose my words carefully. “Should we still go through with the solstice ceremony, then?” I ask. “Wouldn’t it be wiser to put it off?”
Canceling it would give me more time to meet with my mother by the lake, if just to warn her away. It was a bad idea to agree to participate in the first place, but now it’s bordering on dangerous.
“And let the Crusaders think we’re scared?” Evanora says, looking up from her desk. “I think not. We go on as planned. Professor Hardbloom has kindly offered to take over the role of head officiant, since the original won’t be able to make it.”
Shit.
I lick my lips. “But—”
“Please, Wren,” the headmistress says, closing her eyes. “Everything is in hand. The best thing you can do for yourself, and for everyone else, is to go back downstairs and join the others preparing for the ceremony tonight.”
She says the last part almost pleading, and I can’t argue. I nod to her, and then Abacus who’s still watching me carefully, and leave them alone in the office. Once outside in the hallway, I have to stop and collect myself.
Shit. Shit.
How did the Crusaders find out about our plans? I just wish there was some way to reach my mother and call our meeting off.
As it is, I have no choice but to find a way to meet her despite the Crusader’s onslaught.
I just have to hope that the preparations for the ceremony keep the rest of the academy busy for me to slip away, unnoticed. Maybe our attackers will tire by day’s end and I’ll be able to stay out of sight of the Crusaders as well. It’s a small hope, and I fear, a futile one. I’ve seen the looks on Crusaders’ faces before, and they don’t back down easy.
But unfortunately for them, neither do I.
Chapter Thirty-Two
When I return to the dining hall, it’s a frenzy of movement in preparation for the ceremony later. Professor Hardbloom, now anxiously awaiting his role as head officiant, can’t keep his bony fingers still. He keeps wiping his sweaty palms across the embellished fabric of his cloak, leaving darkened streaks across his thighs as he practices the gestures at the front of the hall.
Even though the decorations could easily be hung with a single well-flicked wand, we’re set the task of doing it all by hand. It’s a thinly disguised way to keep our hands and minds away from the attack outside, but it works. If anything, it at least makes the hours pass.
The closer it gets to sunset, the more furtive looks the boys shoot my way. Merlin is convinced if I take one step outside onto the grounds I’ll be immediately turned to ash or something, but I made it very clear that if he gets in my way I’ll never speak to him again. He relents eventually but made me promise to turn back at the very first sign of danger.
Which I’m not going to do. There’s danger all around us, literally encircling us. If I turned back at the first sight of it I’d never even make it out the door.
At last the hour comes.
I know the moment has arrived when Veronica appears in front of me. She’s a vision herself—her skin colored with a golden shimmer and her hair somehow like twice as long and fluffy as it was this morning. I’d forgotten to use this opportunity to torture her for a few last, precious seconds, but she doesn’t look even the tiniest bit grateful.
She just sticks out her hand, a drab white shift thrown over her arm, and fixes me with a snarl-like-smile.
“It’s time, little virgin. Unless you want to ruin this for me too.”
I get a small rush from the words, knowing the title no longer applies to me. I think Nicholas sees the flush in my cheeks, because his redden too.
It takes me a couple tries to get to my feet, they’ve grown so numb from sitting on the hard floor. All around us, teachers and students have started gathering up the blankets on the ground. In their place, thousands of candles are being arranged in careful patterns meant to channel the energy of the night into the impending ceremony.
Like moths to a light, Merlin and Puck are at our side in an instant.
Veronica bares her teeth at them too. “Don’t worry, I’m not here to bite. One last act of servitutem before I become the goddess, and you,” here her smile actually turns genuine, “are sacrificed.”
“Thanks for the reassurance,” Merlin says, catching my arm before I follow her out. He leans in closely, his voice whispering low in my ear. “I know I can’t stop you, but be careful.”
When I pull back, he’s not the only one fixing me with a cool stare. Both Puck and even Nicholas look anxious at his side.
Nicholas reaches out to touch my shoulder. “Don’t do anything stupid.”
“Meaning,” Puck adds, “don’t do anything I would do.”
I’m about to step out into the hallway with Veronica when I feel another tug on my elbow. It’s Puck again. He pulls me aside alone this time, making Veronica sign loudly and pout by the door.
Puck brings his lips so close to my ear it makes the hair on my neck tingle. “Take care, Wren. If you get hurt tonight, I’ll never forgive myself.”
His words make a lump rise in my throat, but I tug my arm out of his grasp and make myself stand up straight. “Stop it,” I hiss, not able to meet his eyes. “Everything’s going to be fine.”
I still can’t look at him, or Merlin, or Nicholas when I walk away . . . because I know, no matter what happens, that isn’t true.
Everything isn’t going to be fine. Even if Crusaders weren’t clamoring at the gates, and I wasn’t about to sneak out onto the grounds to meet a wanted witch, I’d still be about to discover who I am. What I am. And whatever that answer may be . . . I think fine will never be the right way to describe it.
Because one way or another, part of me dies tonight.
Even though I’m slightly suspicious that Veronica is leading me into the bathroom to murder me herself and just be done with it, she performs her final duties with surprising grace.
For her, that means she only sticks me about a dozen times with pins and the tight braids she winds around my head only pull about a hundred hairs from my scalp. Whereas her transformation took the better part of the afternoon, even without the things she supposedly left at home, it’s been less than ten minutes by the time she’s shoved me in front of a mirror to admire her handiwork.
Fine by me. I might look exceptionally homely next to the veritable goddess that’s Veronica right now, but at least it’s bought me a little extra time to try to sneak out to the lake.
Thanks to the Crusaders and their little protest, I’m going to need every extra second I can get.
That’s why I get so antsy when Veronica suddenly seems concerned with a stray hair poking out at the back of my neck.
“Stop,” I say, swatting her hand away when she goes to adjust it for the third time.
She purses her lips. “Look, it’s not my fault you’re just ugly . . . but if that br
aid looks anything less than perfect when you walk up to that altar, then so help me god I’m going to kill you myself.”
My opportunity to sneak out doesn’t arrive until she’s finished plucking every stray hair from my head. She leaves me, sore and anxious, to take her place in the first half of the ceremony.
I watch through a gap in the door until she and the rest of the teachers playing officiants have slipped on into the dining hall. The sounds of the opening ritual carry out into the courtyard and hallways as I head towards the snow-covered grounds.
It’s a sort of eerie noise. It’s discord and chanting, a sound that should be jarring . . . but instead, it’s haunting.
With the entire academy attending the ceremony, the rest of the hallways are strangely empty. Even though I’ve spent the last several months’ worth of weekends alone here, it feels different tonight.
Call me a cynic, but there’s something about hundreds of angry witches being out for your blood that really puts a damper on the mood. It doesn’t help that the statue of Warlock Grave puts off an extra frosty chill when I pass by. I still swear that statue hates me.
I’m almost surprised when a door in the back hallway lets me straight out onto the academy grounds. I’d expected them to be locked, or at least guarded. Headmistress Evanora must really trust the magical barriers she has in place. Lights from the candle-lit dining hall flicker out across the snow. It crunches loudly underfoot, frozen over after last night’s storm.
An unease settles in my chest as I dart across the grounds. I try to follow Puck’s instructions, sticking to the shadows whenever possible as I make my way to the far side of the lake where the trees and hedges grow close to the outside of the water.
My own breath streams out in a thick fog in front of my face.
This is it. This is the thing I’ve been striving towards, working for, waiting for. And it’s all hidden somewhere along the shores of this dark lake.
My feet don’t slow until I near the shore on the other side. Here, there are enough trees to keep myself out of sight from prying eyes. The sounds of the crowd outside are broken up between the branches of the trees, leaving intermittent silence pierced only by distant, muffled cries.
Dark Witch: A Paranormal Academy Romance (Academy of the Dark Arts Book 1) Page 29
