RIOT HOUSE

by Hart, Callie

  “We need to call the police,” she mumbles into my shirt.

  “I know. We will. But first we need to find Elodie. I don’t want her to end up on this slab next to Mara. Let’s search the rest of the cave and—”

  A loud CRACK! echoes down the passageway behind us—it sounds like a rock, skittering along the ground and hitting the wall. Mercy and I trade a stunned look. “Hide,” she hisses. But it’s too late. There is nowhere to hide. The cavern is where the cave ends, and it’s empty apart from the plinth.

  So, I do what I should have done a long time ago.

  I turn and wait to face down a monster.

  50

  ELODIE

  Carina lets out a strangled cry. That’s how I know something bad waits for us up ahead. The walls of the passageway close in, swearing they’ll crush me to death, as Doctor Fiztpatrick pushes me from behind, shoving me through an opening in the cave. And my heart stops dead in my chest.

  Wren.

  His eyes widen when he sees me, full of terror, and then they go utterly blank. At my back, Doctor Fitzpatrick lets out a hollow, surprised bark of laughter. “Well, well, well. Look who it is! We were just talking about you, weren’t we, girls? Mercy, too. Wow, we’ve got the whole gang.”

  Wren stares at me, his jade eyes working their way up from my feet, travelling over my body; I can tell that he’s assessing me for injuries. I give him a quick shake of the head to let him know I’m okay. He steps forward, sliding his hands into his pockets. Such a normal, everyday Wren gesture. “What’s going on, Wes? What are you doing?”

  “I’d have thought that was obvious,” the doctor replies. “We seem to have ourselves a reoccurring problem. These girls keep on crawling out of the woodwork, trying to come between us. I take care of one and another just pops up.” He chuckles. “It’s like whack-a-mole. Lucky for us, I was always good at whack-a-mole. Why don’t you grab hold of Carina? Keep her quiet while I take care of Elodie.”

  A glimmer of disgust works its way onto Wren’s face. “What fucking planet do you live on, old man? I’m not keeping anyone quiet. For fuck’s sake, untie their hands. What’s wrong with you?”

  Doctor Fitzpatrick’s head jerks back. There’s a streak of dirt on his cheek. Down his left-hand side, too, where I gave him hell when he yanked me back up onto my feet. His bottom lip wobbles, the way a child’s mouth works when they’ve just skinned their knee and they don’t know if they should cry or not. “You don’t need to talk to me like that. I’m trying, okay? I’m just trying to do what’s best for us. How are we supposed to be together when you keep getting distracted by these whores?”

  “You’re not in your right mind,” Wren whispers. “You need help.”

  “You’re the only one who can help me now. Help me take care of these two and we’ll let your sister go. She’s family, right? You won’t say anything, will you, Mercy? You understand why this needs to happen. You were the one who told me about Mara in the first place, right?”

  He sounds so desperate. His demeanor now is so different from the show he puts on in his classroom; it barely makes sense that this is even the same person. I spin around, putting my back to the wall of the cavern while Doctor Fitzpatrick’s distracted. Quickly contorting my hand, making it as narrow as possible, I twist my wrist from left to right, working the twine down over my hand a millimeter at a time.

  Mercy’s as white as a sheet. She looks from Wren to Doctor Fitzpatrick, her whole body shaking uncontrollably. “I—I didn’t—know this would—happen.”

  I almost have my hand free.

  “Why bother pretending, Mercy?” I spit. “You’ve hated me from the moment you came back to Wolf Hall. You’ve been a raging bitch since day one. Just go, for fuck’s sake. Get out of here.”

  Mercy jumps. It’s as though she’s forgotten I’m even here. Wren frowns, but he quickly understands what I’m doing. “Yeah, Merce. You’re family. Blood’s thicker than water, no matter what. So just…go. Don’t breathe a word of what you saw here tonight.”

  Fitz watches the exchange, eyes quick, shifting from one person to another. His presence was always so domineering and powerful in class. He was master of his space, and he oozed confidence. He’s twitchy and weird here. I’m nervous just looking at him.

  “Fine.” Mercy swallows. “Whatever. Like I care anyway. I’ll see you back at the house, Wren.”

  I pray to god Mercy’s figured out that she needs to call the cops the moment she gets reception on her cellphone. She needs to be able to find her way back to the road first, though, and I honestly don’t think she’ll be capable. She shuffles around the perimeter of the cave, eyeing Fitz warily.

  I ought to keep my mouth shut, but of course I don’t. “Wait. Why not just let Carina go with her? Carina’s got nothing to do with this. She doesn’t care about Wren. I’m the only one you have a problem with.”

  Fitz flips over the bowie knife in his hand, grinning manically. He shakes his head, disappointment on his face. He cuts Mercy off, moving to block the exit of the cave. “You guys are terrible actors. Mercy, I expected better of you. You’ve had actual training in this. You embarrass yourself. Get back with your brother. Go on, go.” Mercy flinches when he raises the knife, showing her the blade. She’s back beside Wren in a flash, and I don’t blame her either—the evil glint in Fitz’s eyes is fucking demonic.

  “It seems we’ve arrived at a bit of an impasse, wouldn’t it, class? Wren, you’re unwilling to admit your true feelings. Mercy, you can’t be trusted, even though you should have your brother’s best interests at heart. Carina, you’re a victim of circumstance, and Elodie, well, Elodie just plain needs to die. So, where do we go from here?”

  “There are four of us.” Wren glances at me out of the corner of his eye. “And only one of you. The chances of you managing to hold us all off before we put you down are pretty slim.” He shifts forward, holding out his hands in a calming gesture. Horror tugs at Fitz’s features. “What are you talking about? I’d never kill you, Wren. I love you. It’s just the girls that have to go.”

  Both of my hands are free. I drop the twine, readying myself.

  A cruel and terrible smile plays over Fitz’s face. “I’m not worried about three skinny little girls. And I don’t think you’re going to hurt me,” he says. His attention’s all for Wren. He’s dazed, fanatical, fixated on him. It’s sad, really, that he’s this sick over him. And he is sick. The things he’s done to try and win Wren… The things he’s willing to do…

  Fitz jolts sideways, rushing toward me. The ugly, brutal knife he drove into my bed is raised in his hands, prepared to strike. Fear electrifies me. Time slows. I’m ready for him. I wait until the last second—

  “No!” Three different voices shout at the same time, the word ricocheting around the cave. Wren hurls himself forward, reaching to grab the man…but Carina’s closer. I watch, feet frozen to the floor, as she throws herself at him, but her hands are still tied behind her back. She has no means of stopping him, other than to angle her shoulder and piledrive into his body.

  I already know what’s going to happen before it plays out.

  Fitz will see her coming.

  He does.

  “CARINA, NO!”

  He’ll have time to turn.

  He does.

  He’ll be waiting for her when she collides with him.

  He is.

  The knife will—

  The knife—

  I can do nothing but scream as Fitz spins the blade over and thrusts it upward, right into Carina’s stomach.

  51

  WREN

  Carina, Carina,

  Sweet little Carrie.

  Mother hen of the fourth floor.

  This is precisely why Harcourt designated her protector over all new female students. Because she’s selfless, and she’s brave, and she’s willing to sacrifice herself to ensure the safety of others. I see it now.

  The blade finds its mark, disappearing up to the guard,
and a wet, rattling gasp flies out of Carina’s mouth. A deranged laugh slips out of Fitz as he cradles Carina’s head in his hands, catching her as she slides off the blade. He seems morbidly fascinated by her expression, as her eyelids flutter with surprise. I’m still moving toward them, covering ground. I get there in time to stop him just before he drives the knife into her stomach for a second time. Elodie’s right there, too. She grabs Carina by the arms, dragging her out of the way as I bulldoze Fitz to the ground.

  “GET OFF ME!” he roars.

  He’s older than me, not to mention bigger, but I’m stronger. A bright slash of pain sears up my arm. Blood spills over my skin, crimson and gushing, but I don’t let go. I wrap my arm around his throat, my feet kicking in the dirt, fighting for purchase as I try to get behind the bastard. If I can only get him in a proper chokehold, I’ll be able to cut off his air supply. He’s fighting like the very devil himself, though, and he won’t drop the fucking knife.

  “Carina! Oh my god, Carina!” Elodie lifts her, yelling to Mercy. “Untie her hands! For fuck’s sake, don’t just stand there!”

  “Accept—it—Wren!” Fitz snarls. “The job’s—half—done!”

  My hand is so slick with my own blood that I lose my grip on his wrist. Fitz seizes the opportunity and slashes back, over his head. The razor-sharp steel catches me on the crook of the neck, another lash of agony burning bright and hot, but still I don’t let go. Fitz whimpers, flailing, stabbing backwards again and again. I scramble, twisting to avoid the point of the weapon.

  “Let GO! It’s not supposed—to go like—this!”

  I don’t give a fuck how it was supposed to go. I finally manage to get myself behind him. I tighten my hold around his throat, using my other arm as leverage to apply pressure. “Stab me all you like, Wes. I’m not letting go until you’re down.”

  “You can’t—let them—take me,” he growls.

  Another cut to my forearm. One to my thigh. Another to my side.

  Fitz’s movements begin to slow. The knife clatters to the floor. His fingers lock around my arm, trying to prize it loose, but there’s no way in hell he’ll succeed. I won’t let him hurt anyone else. I’ll bleed out here in the dirt, holding the fucker down until my very last breath, before I allow him to hurt one more person because of me.

  “She’s not breathing! She’s not breathing!” Mercy’s piercing cry fills my ears. The next thing I know, Elodie’s standing over us and the knife is in her hands.

  “Evil…sick…twisted…” she pants.

  I expect that she’ll gut him from stem to sternum, but she doesn’t. She spins the weapon over, holding it by the guard, and brings the heavy metal handle crashing down on Fitz’s head with a sickening crack.

  52

  ELODIE

  The motherfucker’s out cold.

  I snatch up the twine that bound my hands, as well as the length Mercy just ripped from Carina’s wrists, and I toss them to Wren. “Make sure he can’t go anywhere before I end the bastard.”

  Even after my father killed my mother and trapped me inside that box for days, I never thought I’d have the courage to kill him. Without a shadow of a doubt, I will murder Wesley Fitzpatrick if he so much as stirs in the next few minutes, though.

  Carina shivers, her hands shaking as she holds them against her stomach. Mercy thought she wasn’t breathing, but she is. Her gasps for air are shallow and raspy, though, and it doesn’t sound good. She hasn’t said a word, just stares up at me, terrified, with the whites of her eyes showing as her blood flows sluggishly out of the nasty looking wound in her stomach.

  “We have to get her back to the academy,” I say.

  “We—we shouldn’t move her. We should get help,” Mercy moans.

  Wren shakes his head. “She won’t make it. Here. I’ve got her.”

  Carina lets out a frightened, pained cry as Wren scoops her into his arms and lifts her from the cold cave floor. We’re moving before I know what’s happening. Fitz is still unconscious when we leave him, hog-tied and lying face down on the ground.

  The forest presses down on us, dark and foreboding. Wren doesn’t say a word. He orients himself, panting, and then takes off at a run with Carina in his arms, heading for the academy.

  Even carrying Carina, his breath labored and short, he’s much faster than Mercy and me. I don’t feel the tree branches lashing at me. I feel no pain when I stumble and fall. I keep my eyes locked on Wren’s back, and I keep on running.

  I lose my shoes.

  Relief hits me in a dizzying wave when we reach the road. The soles of my feet tear against the black top as I charge after Wren. He doesn’t falter. Not for a second. We’re still so far away from the academy, though. Too far. I think about the jagged knife wound in Carina’s belly, and I begin to lose hope.

  We’re not going to make it. Wren won’t. There just isn’t time.

  A car horn cuts through the night, startling me half to death. For a horrible second, I think it’s Fitz, escaped from the cave somehow and burning toward us up the road, but then Pax’s charger screams past us, gunning for Wren. The tires squeal as the car screeches to a halt, and I catch a flash of bright blond hair.

  Mercy’s fifty feet behind me, but I hear her shout. “It’s Dash!”

  I pause for her to catch up. “How did he know?”

  She puffs, shrugging. “I texted him back in the cave. I didn’t know if it went through. I—”

  She trails off, fighting for oxygen. It doesn’t really matter how Dash knew. He showed up. I’ve never been so grateful to see the bastard. I’m so exhausted, I can barely keep my feet underneath me when I reach the car. Dash has Carina in his arms and he’s lying her on the back seat, cursing like a madman. His face is grey, his movements frantic.

  “Get in the car, Wren!” he yells. “Right fucking now!”

  Wren weaves, staggering into the side of the car. “I’m okay. Just take her. Don’t wait for the ambulance. Go!”

  I realize just how bad he looks when he drops down on one knee. Oh my god. Holy shit, holy shit, he’s covered in so much blood. There’s a gaping would on his shoulder, and his t-shirt is sliced clean through. His arms have been cut to shreds.

  Dashiell slams the rear door closed, shaking his head. He grabs Wren roughly by the arm, dragging him upright. “Get in the fucking car this instant, Jacobi. You’re on death’s door.”

  “I’m—right—I’m—ffffine,” he slurs. Then his eyes roll back into his head, and he passes out in Dashiell’s arms.

  I didn’t see his injuries back at the cave. I was so focused on Carina, and now it looks like he’s…it looks like he’s gonna…

  He ran.

  He ran through that forest to save Carina, and the entire time he was bleeding out, too. I cover my hands with my mouth, stifling back a sob. This isn’t fucking happening. It can’t be.

  Dash manhandles him into the front seat of the car and finally acknowledges our presence. “Are you two okay? Can you get back to the academy from here?”

  I nod, even though I don’t know if it’s true. “Go, Dash. Run every red light. Just don’t let them fucking die.”

  53

  ELODIE

  The police office murmurs into her radio, all business, as yet another cruiser tears up the driveway toward Wolf Hall Academy with its lights and sirens blaring. There are five patrol cars here now, though most of the cops who arrived with them are gone. They ran into the forest, heading south for the craggy knuckle of rock that can now be seen above the treetops in the early morning light, looking for the cave.

  “And that’s it? That’s the whole story?” the officer asks, narrowing serious eyes at us, as she clips the radio back onto her belt. She introduced herself as Officer Haynes Hartung, but told us to call her Amy. “A teacher did this? Your English teacher? Because of a student?”

  Mercy’s in shock. She nods dumbly, staring at the steps in front of us. “Yeah. My brother. He carried Carina, but he—she—”

 
“I’ve just heard from one of the officers down at the hospital,” Amy says. “Both the boy and the girl are in rough shape but they’re stable. The girl would have died if she’d gotten there any later. Whatever your brother did, young lady, he saved her life.”

  Something inside me snaps in two. I haven’t been able to breathe until now. Getting coherent words to form and come out of my mouth has been close to impossible, but hearing this news—both Wren and Carina are going to be okay—pushes me into hysteria.

  I start crying, and I can’t fucking stop.

  Mercy puts her arm around me, and the two of us sob.

  One by one, disheveled students in frightful looking costumes begin to appear on the road, walking back up to the academy. Dean Harcourt ushers them each inside, telling them to go and wait in the cafeteria for someone to come and talk to them.

  At nine in the morning, a crew of police officers emerge from the forest with Doctor Fitzpatrick hanging limp like a rag-doll between them. I hear the words ‘resisting arrest,’ and ‘psych hold’ but I don’t really process much after that. Around midday, a bunch of guys in white coveralls that look like HAZMAT suits load a blue body bag into the back of a coroner’s van.

  That’s when the detective arrives and begins asking us questions that I’m too numb to answer. Mercy does most of the talking. She knows more than I do about Mara anyway.

  After that, we’re taken to the hospital to be checked out. Aside from a few cuts and scratches, as well as the soles of my feet being in a sorry state, there’s nothing really wrong with me. I don’t fight them on it, though.