The Sinister Sweetness of Splendid Academy

by Nikki Loftin

  I looked away at last, embarrassed by the longing and pain in their faces. I ate the chicken leg as fast as I could, and pitched the bone into the trash.

  “No,” Otto said, and picked it out of the container. “The witch does not allow waste. We grind all the bones here.”

  He fed the bone into a machine that hung on the wall near the back door, and a whirring sound filled the room. I watched as fine sand filtered from the machine and piled up in the bucket on the floor underneath.

  “What do you do with it now?” I asked, but I had a feeling I knew.

  “We wash it, and then it is for the playground.”

  “The playground sand is made of chicken bones?” I felt sick, but the thought of the sand being ground-up chicken bones was better than what I’d thought after I had seen the witches’ broth. “Ick. I ate a whole handful of that stuff.”

  “Chicken bones?” Otto answered after a moment. “Only a very small part.” He wiped his face. Was he crying? Why would he cry now, over a handful of bone scraps?

  Unless . . . what I had thought was true.

  Unless Otto had spent years in kitchens like this, forced by the witches to grind the bones of children into sand. Glittering, white sand that had been drained of every bit of magic, sand that was recycled, remade into a fantasy playground that drew more children near.

  To their deaths.

  Otto spoke again. “I know now how you were able to fight the hunger.”

  “You do?” My voice trembled. I didn’t think I wanted to hear him say anything else.

  “I believe so. The witches’ spells are made from the magic of those children. That the bones would try to reclaim what was once theirs seems . . . possible.”

  I’d been right about the sand after all.

  And now the bone sand was inside me, soaking up the addictive magic in the food. My stomach lurched.

  He reached out and stopped just short of taking my hand. “I do not want to grind the bones of your friend, or of any child. But when I resisted her before, she found ways to make me do it.”

  “Ways?” My mind buzzed with horrible possibilities.

  He turned his head away, like he couldn’t bear to look at me when he spoke. “She tortured my friends. Killed my brother and sister. She visited slow, painful death on all those around me until they begged me to do her will, so their misery could end.” He shook his head once. “If it had been my own pain, I would never have done it. But to watch your sister’s fingers be taken, one at a time . . .” His voice broke. “I was too weak to bear it. She will find a way to force me to grind children’s bones again. Maybe she will use you. Go, now. Warn him.”

  “Be back by three o’clock,” Vasalisa called as I ran for the door. “The witch inspects the kitchens then, and you must not be missing.”

  I left by the back door. Hugging tight to the wall and crouching low under all the windows, I moved as quickly as I could toward the science wing, only stopping once to control my breathing. It wouldn’t do Andrew any good if I hyperventilated now.

  The playground sand—the brilliant white dust that had made me impervious to the hunger—swirled up into a dust devil around me. Now that I knew, I could almost hear voices, hundreds of shouts for Mother, Mother! resonating inside my skull.

  What can I do? I thought, tasting salt tears and grit in my mouth.

  Mother! the sand answered back, stinging my face.

  “First, Andrew,” I replied.

  I opened the door to the science wing and slipped in without anyone noticing me. Or so I thought. I was halfway down the hall when a voice called out, softly. “Lorelei?”

  I spun around, my shoes squeaking on the tile. Thank goodness! “Bryan?”

  “What are you doing here?” He was walking down the hallway toward the music room. “Skipping class? Weird for you, huh?” He rubbed his stomach.

  “I was just going to the bathroom,” I lied. “You?”

  “Just went,” he said, and belched. “Had the runs.”

  “Yuck, Bryan,” I said. “You’re so gross.”

  “Better out than in, right? At least I made some space. I could use a snack.” He continued walking, leaving me there. “Thank goodness they have candy in class. Don’t know why I’m so hungry these days. Growth spurt, or something.” He hesitated. “I hear you have a boyfriend. That kid who was messing with you. Andrew?”

  “He’s not my boyfriend,” I said, wondering if Allison had been spreading that rumor all over the school.

  “Good,” Bryan answered. “He’s not good enough for you. Hurting you? Even if you are a brat.” He took a few more steps down the hall, the moment of brotherly concern past.

  “Bryan?” I whispered after him.

  He turned his head, and I could see that his neck was thicker and softer than it had ever been. He was getting bigger every day. He was probably the second biggest kid in the school, I realized. If I couldn’t save Andrew, Bryan would be next.

  “What, squirt?”

  “Don’t eat too much candy, okay?” I said, knowing how dumb it sounded.

  “Jeez, Lorelei. Do I look like I need a mom?”

  We both stopped as his words filled the silence around us with memories. “Get back to class,” he said after a few seconds, and he stalked back down the hallway toward the eighth-grade classroom. He turned the corner and was gone.

  I waited and waited, with no sign of Andrew. I stayed in the science lab for forty-five minutes, crouched behind the door so no one could see me if they walked past the window. I had finally decided to leave when I saw the doorknob turn. The door opened, and Andrew walked in, looking confused.

  “Lorelei?”

  “Shhh!” I hissed.

  “What in the world are you doing down there?” He looked thinner than he had on Friday; his cheekbones were starting to show. His hair was sticking out in all directions, as usual, and seeing it made me smile. His messy hair seemed so normal, in the middle of the whole nightmare that my life had become.

  “Keep it down,” I warned, and motioned him across the room, as far from the door as we could get. We hunkered down behind the lab station, hidden by the enormous stainless steel table.

  “No one knows you came here, right?” I asked first.

  “Of course not. I told them I had to go to the bathroom.”

  “I didn’t even know if you would get the message.”

  “Well, it took me a while to figure out the two seeds meant two o’clock. Thank goodness I read a lot of spy books.”

  “Why were you so late, then? I only have five minutes before I have to get back.”

  “Get back where? Where have you been, Lorelei? Ms. Morrigan says you went to a special writing class, but I don’t think they even have Special Ed here.”

  I held up a hand. There wasn’t enough time to go into all of it. “Listen, Andrew . . .”

  I stopped when he grabbed my hand gently. I blushed. Was he holding hands with me? Maybe Allison had noticed something I hadn’t. Did Andrew . . . like me? But then I saw his face; he was horrified.

  “Lorelei, what happened to your hand? It’s all red and sore looking. Both of them! Has someone been hurting you?”

  I thought about telling him about the kitchen, and the crab shells, but I didn’t. “No time,” I said, and pulled my hand free. “Listen. I don’t know if you figured this out or not, but Ms. Morrigan is a witch.”

  “Yeah, that’s a nice word for what she is,” he started, but I cut him off again.

  “No, Andrew. You were right. She’s an actual witch,” I said. “Minus the broomstick. You were trying to tell me all along, and I didn’t believe you, but I do now. And I know what they’re planning.”

  “Wait. You’re telling me our teacher is a witch? A magic-spell, black-cat, wart-on-
her-nose, fairy-tale witch?”

  “Since when is this news to you, Andrew? You’re the one who figured it out at first. The candy bowls that never get empty? I’m sorry, by the way. She got a hold of me that day in the hall. I was really mean afterward, but it wasn’t me, exactly. I’m glad you’re okay.”

  Andrew looked like he’d swallowed a bug. “A witch, Lorelei? Really?”

  “Didn’t you know? Isn’t that why you made me eat the bone sand?”

  He slumped back against the stainless steel table leg. “Yeah, I knew they were . . . something. I mean, I figured it was some sort of psychological experiment, you know? Something less crazy. Maybe they were hypnotists, or some sort of cult. That would have been way better.”

  “What happened after the, um, thing on the playground? After I ate the sand?” Had Ms. Morrigan tortured Andrew? What had she done?

  “I got sent home. On the way back home, I told my parents about the bone sand, and they called the principal. She came over to our house and talked to them. After that, they wouldn’t listen to anything I said. I figured she’d brainwashed them or something. That’s why I thought a cult, you know.”

  “The principal came over?” I swallowed. Maybe she was part of it! I didn’t want it to be true, but if she had gone to Andrew’s house alone—he interrupted my growing panic.

  “Yeah, with Ms. Morrigan.”

  “Ms. Morrigan was there, too?”

  He nodded, and the panic faded.

  “I’m pretty sure the principal’s under her spell, too. So it was Ms. Morrigan.”

  “Who did what?”

  “Brainwashed your parents, or magicked them, whatever. It means the same thing, Andrew. For us.”

  “What?” His dark eyes looked as scared as I felt. “What’s going to happen?”

  “We’re going to have to save ourselves. You and I are the only people who can see through her spells, because we ate the sand.” I took a deep breath. “And that’s not the worst of it.”

  “How could it get worse?” Andrew was sweating, even in the air conditioning, and he rubbed a hand over his face. “What could be worse than witches with mind control?”

  “They’re losing their power, Andrew,” I said. “Getting weaker. Haven’t you seen them shaking? They need to eat something to help fuel their spells.”

  “They? I thought you said it was just Ms. Morrigan? Are you sure Principal Trapp isn’t one, too? I mean, it is her school and all. And could Ms. Morrigan really do this on her own?”

  “Ms. Threnody’s a witch, too,” I told him. “No question now. But not the principal.”

  “That doesn’t make sense.”

  I sighed. Why wouldn’t he believe me? “She hasn’t done anything bad to you, has she?”

  “No,” he said slowly, “but she is the principal. It’s her school.”

  “But she works all the time, so she’s not around when they do the worst things, right? And she loves them. Ms. Morrigan,” I revealed, “is actually her stepdaughter.”

  “Then the principal’s definitely in on it, Lorelei.”

  “No,” I insisted, “it’s like my dad and my stepmother. Molly’s evil, too—well, not evil like the witches. But he loves her, so he can’t see any of the bad about her. Love is blind. I thought it was just a saying, but it’s true. They want love so bad, they can’t see what’s right in front of them.”

  He shook his head. “Fine. You said the witches need to refuel. On what?”

  “Well, to start with—you.”

  I don’t know what Andrew was going to say because the door to the science lab opened, and Ms. Morrigan’s voice called out.

  “Hello? Is that you, Andrew? What are you doing?”

  Andrew put a finger to his lips and stood up.

  “Hi, Ms. Morrigan. I was just looking for something I thought I left in here the other day. I thought it might have rolled behind the sinks.”

  “Well, you’ve almost missed afternoon snack. And I told the class this morning, the freedom to roam the hallways has been rescinded for a few days.” Her footsteps clicked across the tile and I froze, my heart beating faster with each step. But Andrew stepped toward her, and she stopped.

  “Why can’t we go where we want, Ms. Morrigan?” he asked. “I mean, we have to ask to go to the bathroom? That doesn’t sound like the Splendid Academy we all know and love.”

  He was joking with her. I had never heard him sound so fake. He laughed. “Did one of the fourth graders get lost in the hall?”

  “No,” Ms. Morrigan said, and I heard them both move closer to the doors. “We just had some concerns about a few of the bigger boys spending so much time unsupervised. They were taking advantage. But I’m sure that problem will be solved shortly.” The door swung open with a swish. “I’ll walk you to the playground. Snack is chocolate-covered cashews today!”

  “I can’t wait!”

  The door closed.

  I wanted to kick myself. I hadn’t told Andrew they were planning to cook him in two days! I hadn’t even given him my phone number or made any sort of plan to meet up, so we could figure out what to do. And now kids weren’t even allowed in the halls. How was I going to get back to the kitchen without being spotted?

  I looked at the classroom clock and almost fainted. It was 2:57. I had to be back by 3:00!

  I ran to the door I’d come in through and peeked outside. Darn it! The playground was teeming with kids, and Ms. Morrigan and Ms. Threnody were both standing off to the side, watching the oldest boys’ football game with particular interest. Probably trying to decide who they’re going to eat after Andrew, I thought. “I hope you choke on a finger bone,” I whispered, and turned to face the long, empty hallway behind me.

  There was no help for it. I was going to have to walk right past the teachers’ workroom and most of the classrooms to get to the cafeteria. I took a deep breath and stepped slowly, trying to look like I had every right to be there. I was just going to the bathroom, I thought, practicing my excuses. Getting a drink of water.

  I passed one classroom, then two. The sign outside the next one said EIGHTH GRADE. I saw Bryan’s name on the list of fourteen students and dared a quick glance inside. Bryan was sitting at his desk, reading a book and eating candy. The teacher, writing something on the chalkboard, had her back to me, so I couldn’t see her face. I started to move past the window, when she turned her head to say something to a student on her side, and I realized I knew her. It was Ms. Morrigan.

  I remembered that girl in the bathroom had said her teacher was a Ms. Morrigan, too, so she must have been in eighth grade. The two teachers had to be sisters, identical twins at that. They looked exactly the same, from the braided blonde hair down to the bright yellow skirt.

  Two teachers like Ms. Morrigan? I cringed at the thought. One of her was enough evil for any school.

  I walked past and noticed an empty plastic bag on the floor. I picked it up; I never could stand people who littered, but at Splendid all the kids did it. It wasn’t like there were any adults around who cared. I looked into the next room, a seventh-grade classroom. There was no teacher in the room, not that I could see, and most of the kids were playing some sort of board game on the rug.

  Then Ms. Morrigan stepped out.

  “I thought I saw you here, Lorelei,” she said, her mouth twisting into what might have been a smile. “How did you leave the kitchens?”

  “How-how . . .?” I couldn’t make the words come out. I had just seen Ms. Morrigan on the playground, and then another woman who looked just like her. Either she was a triplet, or . . . “Are you Ms. Morrigan?”

  Both eyebrows flew up. “She told me you were the smart one, you little toad. I told her you were just another sheep. I was right. You don’t know anything, do you?”

  “I know enough,” I
said. My mind kept returning to the impossibility at hand. How could she be inside, outside, and in more than one classroom?

  Well, duh, Lorelei. Magic. Of course a witch could be in more than one place at a time.

  “What do you think you know?”

  “I know you’re a—” I stopped, realizing that if she thought I knew she was a witch, my life would be over faster than I could blink.

  She grabbed my arm and shook me. “What do you think I am?”

  I spat the words out in the same tone I used when Molly was particularly horrible to me. “I think you’re a witch.” Only I didn’t say witch. I used, as my kindergarten teacher would have said, a rhyming word.

  Ms. Morrigan’s face turned white, and her eyes sparked. I don’t think she was used to being called that. “Who helped you? You’re not clever enough to have gotten out unnoticed without some help.”

  “No one,” I said. Inspiration struck, and I held up the bag in my hand. “We finished the dishes early, and I knew I wasn’t supposed to just sit around. So I left. I’m picking up trash.” She stopped shaking me and looked in the bag. There was a used tissue inside. “I started in the cafeteria, and then worked my way down the hall.”

  “How very industrious of you.” Her eyes narrowed. “Get back to the cafeteria. Our new after-school program starts in an hour, and the children will be coming in for an after-school snack.”

  “Another snack? But they’re eating snack right now.”

  If they kept feeding them this much, the whole school would be ready to cook before Friday.

  Ms. Morrigan leaned down and pinched my cheek, hard. Her sharp-edged nails cut into the skin as she pressed them deeper. I tried not to cry out; she’d like that. It didn’t hurt any worse than road rash, I thought, as she squeezed. No worse than falling out of a tree. I felt something warm trickle down my cheek. Blood.