by Sofia Daniel
The headmistress bent over double and retched into the trashcan. My stomach muscles spasmed in sympathy, and I tore open the ginger mints. I might not be fond of how the woman conducted the academy, but she did allow me to maintain the family home.
A clang of metal hitting the floor made my stomach flip, and the thud of a body hitting the floor made my heart jump into my throat. I rushed around the desk to find Mrs. Benazir lying on the her side with her hair caked in vomit.
“Mrs. Ben—”
The crack of something heavy hitting my skull made everything go black.
Chapter 14
A persistent ringing in my ears forced me awake, followed by the chattering of my teeth. My head pounded, and it took several moments for me to realize that something terrible had happened, and I wasn’t in the Cumbria Royal Infirmary.
I opened my eyes to perfect darkness and inhaled a noisy gasp. Had I lost my sight? Blinking made no difference, and neither did rubbing my eyes with the back of my numb hands.
“Shit.” My voice echoed as though I was in a largish bathroom, making me wonder where the hell I was, how I had gotten there, and who had put me in this situation.
And most importantly, why was I so calm?
Maybe I was drugged. Because I shouldn’t be calm in a situation like this. It took a moment to pull myself to my feet, and when I raised my head, a wave of dizziness forced me to bend forward, brace my hands on my knees, and dip my chin onto my chest.
Who the hell could have done this to me?
The last thing I remembered was Mrs. Benazir lying on the floor of her office with her own vomit seeping into her hair. Someone attacked me from behind and must have brought me here. But why?
I checked my body for injuries. Nothing hurt except for my head, and my clothing was still intact. None of this mattered because I couldn’t see a thing.
Inhaling a cold breath of stone-scented air, I took in what I could of my surroundings. Water dripped somewhere close by, and the ground felt silty underfoot. A cold breeze blew across my face, carrying with it the faint smell of wood smoke.
If I had to guess, I was in a cave.
With my hands splayed out in front, both for balance and to protect me from crashing into a wall, I edged forward in the dark and listened out for the sounds of movement or heavy breathing.
Who could have known I would be in Mrs. Benazir’s office? I’d told Prakash and Leopold. My hands flailed uselessly in the air as I took my first few tentative steps. Miss Claymore had set up the meeting, and Cormac had been in the room when she had shouted out the demand.
My stomach dropped. So had the entire Board of Governors, including Mr. Byrd. What he said to me? If I didn’t sign the document, I wouldn’t like what would happen next.
A whimper reverberated in the back of my throat. Bianca had come to my room this morning, and I’d slammed the door in her face. Was this Mr. Byrd’s doing? If so, why hadn’t he killed me to protect his dirty secret?
A gust of wind blew in from above and to the left, and I turned in the direction of the frigid air, hoping it would lead me to an exit. With each step, the temperature plummeted, but with each step, I felt closer to some kind of freedom.
I pulled closed the lapels of my blazer with the numb fingers of one hand in an attempt to preserve some warmth and continued toward the source of the wind.
A stream of silvery light on my left made my heart soar, and happy tears filled my eyes. I could see! The next gust of wind chilled the tears on my face, making me wipe them away.
Up ahead, beach ball-sized boulders piled up to a narrow opening, and beyond it lay a snow-covered landscape. With my heart in my throat, I hurried toward my escape and crawled up the stones until I freed myself from the cave.
Icy wind swirled around my body, penetrating my bones.
“F-fuck!” I wrapped my arms around my chest, squeezing my breasts together to form a barrier of warmth around my heart.
The mountains’ dark silhouette against the star-lit sky told me I probably hadn’t left the Lake District… but with such biting cold, I might as well be in Iceland.
The sound of a car driving past several feet above caught my attention. Thankfully, no one had forced alcohol down my throat this time. As murder attempts went, this one was half-assed. I climbed up the slope, shivering and chattering my teeth with every step.
Eventually, I reached an empty one-lane road and trudged along its edge.
I must have walked an hour before the road lit up with headlights. I waved my stiff arms, hoping the driver didn’t speed up thinking I was some kind of mountainside specter.
The car slowed, and a bearded man wound down the electric window of the passenger side of his car.
“H-hello,” I said through teeth that wouldn’t stop chattering. “C-can you call the police, please?”
His thick brows lowered. “What are you doing wandering about on your own at two o’ fucking clock in the morning?”
“Someone attacked me, and—”
“You’d better come inside.” He pressed a button, making the central locking of his car click. I stepped back, Mom’s warning ringing in my ears to never get in the car of a strange man.
“I won’t hurt you,” he said.
“Look… I-I don’t have my ph-phone,” I said. “Please, could you call the police. There’s been a crime.”
He rolled his eyes.” Stand out in the cold if you want.”
I stamped my feet and breathed hard, hoping he wouldn’t get annoyed and drive away.
The man reached for his phone, pressed 9-9-9, and put the receiver to his ears. “Police… I’m on Hard Knott Pass…. The one in Cumbria, yes…. There’s a young girl in school uniform wandering about.” He pressed the phone to his chest. “What’s your name?”
“Willow Evergreen.”
He repeated my name to the operator. “Yes. Of course, she’s breathing. She just told me her name. Someone attacked the girl and left her out on the mountain to die… No, there aren’t any wounds, but exposure is a cause of death, isn’t it?” After a long pause, he said, “Alright, alright. I’ll relay the message.”
“What did they say?”
“They’re sending out a squad car. It can take up to an hour and a half, though. Do you want me to call someone else?”
My shoulders drooped. I didn’t know any of the boys’ numbers off by heart. Would anyone be manning the phones at the academy in the middle of the night?
He pinched the bridge of his nose and let out a weary sigh. “I can’t leave you out here waiting for the police in the cold. Why don’t you come inside and warm up? I have a daughter your age, and if someone left her out to the elements, I’d never forgive them.”
I swallowed hard. What choice did I have? My body already felt half-frozen from the elements, and not even a sauna and a bottle of brandy could penetrate this bone-deep chill. I must have lain in that freezing cave for half a day before waking. Maybe this murder attempt hadn’t been so half-assed, after all.
“Thanks.” I opened the door, scooted into the front seat, and pulled it shut.
The man turned on the fans to full blast, and the warm air made my skin tingle. “Better, isn’t it?”
I nodded. “Thanks.”
“Need a drink?”
I shook my head. Right now, I was too frozen to even think about sustenance. Raising my hands to the warm air vents, I wriggled my fingers to get the circulation going. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the man staring at me as though I was some kind of bizarre creature that had never experienced a fan.
The locks clicked shut, and he pulled out of the roadside.
My stomach dropped, and I turned to the man. “I thought we were waiting for the police.”
He continued driving without a word.
Palpitations squeezed my heart and warmed me up from the inside. “What are you doing?”
“No one’s coming.” He cast me a cursory glance.
“What?”
&
nbsp; “I didn’t call nine-nine-nine!”
He sped down the dark road, his headlights only illuminating the nearest fifty feet of track, which wound and twisted at an alarming rate. The man either had a death wish or knew this road so well, he could afford to drive recklessly.
“S-slow down,” I cried.
The man revved up his engine and accelerated up a steep slope. Less than five minutes later, he drove through a familiar stretch of road and whizzed past the entrance to Brittas Academy.
Fear grabbed my stomach in its punishing grip and squeezed a loud gasp from my lungs. Soon, we would reach the dangerous hairpin turns, and we would tumble to our deaths. I screamed at the man to stop, but he roared with laughter.
I was going to die. In a madman’s Toyota Corolla. A sharp right turn sent me lurching to the driver’s side. My stomach heaved, and I pointed my head into his lap. Vomit spewed out onto his gearbox, his pants, and all over the synthetic leather seats.
“Fucking bitch.” He punched me in the face.
My head snapped back, and pain radiated across my jaw. My stomach swirled, and I swayed toward him and released another spray of vomit on the side of his face.
“You filthy beast!” He screeched the brakes to a halt.
The click of the central locking resounded in my ears and made my heart soar.
“Get out,” he roared.
In one simultaneous movement, I opened the door, dove out of the car and squinted at the number plate. P155ER 69. There was no need to memorize it. The abducting wretch had bought a personalized plate that looked like ‘Pisser 69.’
With my stomach still heaving and vomit on the hem of my skirt, I trudged back to the academy. It took an eternity to walk up the slope, around the turns, and down the long driveway. But when I reached the courtyard outside the imposing Georgian building, I could have knelt and kissed the ground if my limbs weren’t so already stiff with cold.
The double doors of the main entrance were locked, so I walked around to the side and let myself in. Warm, beeswax-scented air filled my nostrils and made my nerves endings tingle with a mix of relief and pleasure. Dim lights from four sets of stairwells illuminated the hallway, and I walked toward the one leading to the west wing.
“Who’s sneaking about out of curfew?” asked a harsh voice.
“Mr. Blunt?”
The caretaker emerged from an alcove, holding a powerful flashlight. He took one look at me and staggered back. “Bloody hell, what happened to you?”
“Call the police… please.”
He scrambled into the back pocket of his overalls, pulled out a phone, and made a stuttering call to the emergency services. “Um… You’d better sit in the infirmary while I wake up Miss Claymore.”
“Thanks.”
The caretaker scrambled down the hallway, nearly tripping as he looked at me over my shoulder. I wrapped my arms around my middle and ambled to my destination.
The absence of biting cold in the building did nothing to warm me. My joints felt stiff as I lowered myself into the infirmary seat, and I wrapped my arms around my chest, trying to preserve some body heat. I needed a pile of blankets and a pile of naked kings.
Miss Claymore was the first to arrive, wearing a thick fleece dressing gown that reached her ankles. Long, black hair hung down to her shoulders in a way that made me think I’d seen her like this before. I shook off those thoughts and focussed on the deputy headmistress’s stricken expression.
“Miss Evergreen, what’s happened?”
“Someone hit me over the head in Mrs. Benazir’s office and moved me out of the academy.”
Her eyes widened. “When? I found her passed out and was there all afternoon and in the evening.”
“It happened just after she fell.”
She placed a hand over her mouth. “You were early to our meeting?”
“I—” My numb hands dropped to my lap. “I thought I’d been on time.”
“Alright. Did you see who attacked you?”
I shook my head. Whoever hit me from behind hadn’t even made their presence known. “I woke up in a cave on the mountainside.”
“Where?”
“B-beneath a blasted oak a few miles away from the school.”
Miss Claymore’s face dropped, and she lowered herself into the seat next to mine. Her dark eyes darted in all directions, as though she was making rapid-fire calculations. “In which direction?”
“South.”
“Are you sure?”
My stomach tightened. Had I said something wrong? Or was there something significant about a tree blasted in half by lightning. “Why?”
She shook her head.
Before I could press for details, Mr. Blunt arrived with a tray laden with steaming mugs of tea and a plate of sticky buns. “In case you need warming up, Miss.”
“Thank you.” My fingers were so numb, and my hands shook so much, I could barely wrap them around the mug.
“Here.” Miss Claymore picked up the mug and held it to my lips.
I took several sips until the warmth of the tea radiated through my insides, but no matter how much I drank, my bones remained frozen to the marrow.
After half an hour, feeling returned to my fingers, and I could drink the second mug without help. Miss Claymore sat at my side, her hawk-like eyes monitoring my every move.
Mr. Blunt also brought heavy, fleece blankets, and Miss Claymore wrapped them around my legs and shoulders. Within five minutes, trapped heat radiated back into my body, causing every nerve ending to tingle painfully.
The police arrived about an hour later, and I gulped hard. Would they have taken so long if I’d been stuck halfway up the mountain? A male and female officer asked a bunch of questions about what had happened, then they took my statement and asked me to hand over my uniform for forensic evidence.
“Willow,” said the female officer. “Can you think of anyone who might want to hurt you?”
I nodded. “B-Bianca Byrd, a—”
“She’s one of the classmates you identified from the assault by the pond,” she said. “I’m assuming Geraldine Hill is also on the list of suspects.”
I froze for several heartbeats. Had the policewoman looked me up on her database? Maybe she would take my complaint more seriously if she knew there was a track record of murder attempts. “And her father, Mr. Byrd.”
“Do you have a full name for him?”
I turned to Miss Claymore, who tapped her smartphone. “Windermere Byrd.” She passed the phone onto the policeman, who jotted down his contact details. “I believe he has visited the academy multiple times in the past weeks.”
“Why?” asked the male officer.
“He took on a voluntary role of the academy’s solicitor and which awards him a place on the board of governors.”
The policewoman jotted something down in her notebook. “When did the board last convene?”
“Last night,” I whispered. “And he called a meeting earlier in the month with Mrs. Benazir, his daughter and me. He told me to call off the sexual assault charges against Bianca.”
“Did he?” The policeman’s voice hardened.
“Yes, sir.”
“And the headmistress…” He glanced into his notebook. “Mrs. Benazir witnessed it?”
“Most of it.” My throat dried. I couldn’t utter what I had seen when I returned for my bag, but I added, “He grabbed me last night after the Board of Governors’ meeting and he… He had an erection. Then he told me that if I didn’t sign a document his daughter would give me, I wouldn’t like the consequences.”
The female officer exchanged a significant glance with the male officer. Hopefully, it meant that they would question Mr. Byrd as soon as they left the academy. “Thank you, Willow. Is there anything else you’d like to add?”
I shook my head. “If something comes up, do you have a number for me to contact?”
The policeman pulled out a card from his pocket and wrote down a string of letters and dig
its. “Please refer to this incident number when you call.”
“Thanks,” I croaked. How many incident numbers did I have to my name? They were mounting up.
Miss Claymore placed a long-fingered hand on my wrist. “Would you like something else to eat or drink before you go to bed?”
I shook my head. Right now, I needed a long, hot shower. Anything to warm up the chill still lingering in my bones.
I slept through breakfast and my first few periods, not wanting to leave my cocoon of pajamas, a nightgown, and a dressing gown. I slept under my usual blankets, comforter, and a rug, but it wasn’t enough to reverse half a day of being exposed to the elements.
A cleaner opened the door and whispered a hushed apology, but I didn’t open my eyes. She let the door click shut and turned her key in the lock.
Later, someone knocked on the door, and I ignored them. The knocking became more persistent, and I groaned at whoever it was to go away.
“Willow?” said Leopold. “Let us in.”
Closing my eyes, I dozed off. Right now, I had no patience for any of the boys’ secrets.
Male voices muttered outside my door, and an argument broke out. Cormac had probably joined the kings and tried to make them go away. I stuck my head under the blankets and blocked out their voices.
I’m not sure how much time passed, but more voices outside my room broke me from my slumber.
“Are you sure about this, Mr. Brunswick?” asked a nervous, male voice.
“Willow is my girlfriend, and she hasn’t received medical attention for her injuries. What if she’s been bleeding internally since yesterday?”
After a pause, the male voice said, “I’ll call Dr. Forrester.”
“Fine,” said Leopold.
Sometime later, the key turned in the lock, and the doctor shook me awake. He led me through a series of tests where he took my temperature, examined my extremities for frostbite, checked my reflexes, and asked me a bunch of questions to make sure I wasn’t confused. I slurred out my answers, and he deemed me well enough to start classes after a few days of rest.
