“What? Do you guys know something?”
“Another child was taken earlier that same day, from a former student on sabbatical,” the provost admitted.
“It was the other girl Trevor knocked up, wasn’t it? The fae girl.”
“It was, yes.”
“Don’t you see? That’s all the more reason to tie Monica to this,” I argued. “She had personal beef with both of them. Maybe… maybe she wasn’t actually Bound? I mean, could her dad have paid someone off?”
A low growl reverberated in Sebastian’s chest. “No. Simon and I were both there as witnesses in the Conclave’s meeting chambers when they performed the ritual. King Oberon, Archmage Mubarak, Fenrir Nanuq, and Queen Nadezka were all present.”
“Oh.” Crap, so much for that theory. No way were Simon and Sebastian on the take, and four reigning members of the Conclave wouldn’t be bought. “Is it possible something went wrong?”
Sebastian’s expression softened, eyes sympathetic. “I watched the color fade from her hair, Skylar. She was absolutely mortal. You have to be mistaken.”
“But I’m not. Please believe me. It was Monica. You had to hear what she said to me. After riding a semester with her as my mentor, I…. She had this way of making everyone feel like shit and talking down to us, but when Scary was there, it was like… she didn’t look like Monica, but she felt like Monica. It’s a feeling I can never forget.”
“Simon, can you please do a phone check on Miss Cunningham?”
“Of course.” Simon pulled out his phone and stepped outside the office.
For a moment, I simply stared down at my lap and waited. No one spoke, but I felt the provost’s gaze, like a heavy weight on my shoulders. When I looked up, she had the same frown on her face. She looked… tired. Knowing I’d failed her, after all the trust and faith she’d placed in me, cut deep.
“Are you kicking me out of the sentinel program?”
“No, Miss Corazzi. Not today, at least.” Riordan sighed and rubbed her temple. “I will be noting this in your record, however, and hope you will have taken this as a hard lesson learned. Protocol exists to protect not only you, but those around you as well.”
“Yes, ma’am, I do. I’m…” Tears burned behind my eyes. “I just wanted to save Anji’s friend. There was a baby in the house, and I… I just wanted the baby to be safe.”
The provost’s stern features softened. “I know.”
“The sentinel office is doing everything they can to find both babies,” Sebastian added.
Simon stepped in before I could ask anything more about the situation, and one look at his face was more than enough to know something wasn’t right.
“What did you find out?” Riordan asked.
“Mr. Cunningham says he hasn’t seen his daughter since June.”
Sebastian grunted and mumbled something under his breath before speaking in a louder voice, “And it didn’t occur to him that he should report her missing?”
“Apparently, since we took away what made his daughter ‘special,’ he didn’t think it concerned us. Nor anyone else, for that matter. I rang up a contact at the precinct, and no missing person’s report was ever made there either.”
Monica’s dad was a first-rate asshole. I couldn’t imagine my parents ignoring me, even if I did something stupid enough to get my powers Bound. They didn’t love me because I was fae; they loved me because I was their daughter.
My fleeting empathy dissolved. Having shitty parents didn’t excuse Monica’s crappy attitude and racist behavior. Pilar was proof enough of that.
“What does this mean?” I asked.
“It means, Miss Corazzi, that I suggest you focus on your studies and schoolwork. And, I would suggest, that for the remainder of the break you consider staying on campus.”
That was a dismissal if I’d ever heard one. She may as well have grounded me and sent me to my room. I rose from my seat and dipped my head. “Thank you, I will.”
Because leaving campus meant I’d have to face Gabriel, and I wasn’t ready to endure his disappointment too.
25
A Million Dreams
Pilar charged into my room around noon and threw open the curtains, letting in the blinding light. I recoiled beneath the blankets until Liadan dragged those off me.
“The hell are you both doing?”
“Getting you out of bed. Oh God.” Pilar shrank back and waved a hand. “The funk. Get into the shower now before we throw you in, clothes and all.”
It had been two, maybe three days—I wasn’t sure anymore—since New Year’s Eve, and I’d missed out on plans with Gabriel to lay in my bedroom, unable to face him or anyone else. I was so mortified that when the small welcoming party of Liadan, Pilar, Holly, and Victor—I think he must have moved in, because he was always in our place—greeted me after the meeting in Riordan’s office, I headed to my bedroom and didn’t emerge for anything but food. Not that I’d eaten much.
“I don’t smell.”
“I beg to differ. Water has not touched you since you went into the infirmary.”
“I’m not—”
“Holly, get her.”
Before I had the chance to acquiesce, a hard arm circled around me, my feet were off the floor, and I was deposited in the shower. Maybe a couple seconds had passed. “Fine! I was planning to shower anyway.”
Once I stripped out of my tank and shorts to stand beneath the hot spray, it had a domino effect. I washed my hair, untangled my curls with my shower brush, and made the effort to shave my legs. By the time I brushed my teeth and emerged in a towel, Pilar and Liadan had worked magic on my room. The open window let in a refreshing breeze that was the embodiment of winter and spring blended together, like mint, berries, and flowers had some kind of chilly, fragrant baby.
I breathed it in.
“Feeling better?” Pilar asked.
I nodded.
Holly was in the doorway, shrinking back from the bright sunlight. “We tried to give you time, but we were all worried about you, dude.” She turned to the others. “Come on, guys. Let’s give her a chance to change.”
“But if you do not come down to talk to us, we will be back,” Pilar threatened.
Liadan flashed me a smile, and then my three roomies filed out and shut the door.
After donning comfy leggings and an oversized PNRU athletics sweatshirt featuring our griffin mascot, I traveled downstairs. Holly deposited my winter coat around my shoulders.
“I don’t want to leave campus.”
When Pilar tapped my snow boots with her wand, they appeared on my feet in a golden flash. “We are not leaving campus. We are meeting Ben at the student center for lunch then taking flowers to Anji and Sai.”
“Oh.” I chewed my lower lip. “Maybe I should—”
Then gentle Lia stared me down. “You’re delivering flowers to Sai, and that’s final.”
I blinked. “Well, okay.” I’d scrub the bathroom tiles with a toothbrush for her at this point after the way I’d fucked up.
Hustled across the snowy courtyard by a group of pushy but very loving, well-meaning friends, I kind of floated along in a daze, surrendering control and letting them guide me to the deserted recreation center. Ben sat in one of the chairs with a pile of pizza boxes, way too many for just us.
I knew the moment Gabriel arrived, because I heard his soul before I even saw him. He stepped into view with Julien and Victor on his heels, entering the recreation room through its other set of doors.
Shit. I wanted to see him, and I didn’t.
Lia squeezed my hand. “Sorry, we didn’t warn you, but Gabriel was worried. He bribed us to lure you out.”
I swallowed and nodded, my voice a mere whisper. “How much was I worth?”
“A hundred, but I would have done it for free.”
Gabe took a step toward me but stopped and tucked his hands in his pockets, looking suddenly unsure. And I felt like the world’s absolute worst girlfriend for avoiding h
im. I’d lost count of how many times he’d tapped his beak against my window or texted to ask if I was okay.
After a few steps bridged the space between us, I wrapped my arms around his waist. Gabriel hugged me close and laid his cheek atop my head, all without saying a word. But it was enough, his warmth surrounding me like the missing piece of a puzzle my friends had already started assembling.
I didn’t resist when he guided me away to the edge of the recreation room. “How you holding up, Sky?”
“Fine, all things considered. Hey, listen—”
“It’s all right.” He cupped my chin. “Just glad you’re back now.”
“I thought you’d be mad at me.”
“Oh, I’m furious, but fury isn’t what you need right now. You learned your lesson.”
I hugged him again.
A few yards away, Julien and Victor were in an argument with Ben over his double bacon, ham, and pineapple pizza not being real pizza, but Pilar took his side. “It may not be real pizza, but it is delicious.” Then she took a deliberate bite from one slice and sat down with Ben to share from his box.
At the beginning of our freshmen year, she wouldn’t have been caught dead with our group.
Gabriel and I rejoined them and each took a slice from Ben’s box at his invitation.
“Heathens,” Julien said with a good-natured smile.
We stuffed our faces and caught up on campus gossip unrelated to my shitstorm. Julien offered a few juicy tidbits about who was dating who among the faerie students, and Victor told us about a fist fight between one of the mages and a vampire.
“Simon assigned them both to trash detail for the entire semester.”
“I guess I should count myself lucky not to be joining them.” I sighed and tossed my bunched-up napkin into an empty pizza box. “Especially after what I told Riordan in front of him.”
“What was that?” Ben asked, perking up at the slightest whiff of additional gossip.
“That the Scary Godmother is Monica.”
They all stared at me, the room so quiet I could have heard a pin drop. Gabriel’s brow creased, and Pilar’s eyes went round as saucers.
Holly set down the pizza slice she’d been holding. “Ha, ha, quit playing. Seriously though, what did you tell them?”
“Exactly what I said. When she had me on the floor, she was gloating about crap and she mentioned Gabe. I couldn’t believe it myself, but it was her. I’m sure of it.”
“Dude, if Monica was Bound, how the hell could she be a darkling? The Binding ritual removes all magic, down to the most minute trace.” Ben frowned and rubbed under the edge of the bandage wrapped around his left hand.
Liadan swatted his arm. “Don’t mess with it.”
“It itches.”
“You’ll make it worse.”
After grumbling under his breath, Ben stopped and turned his expectant gaze back to me. “Well? You can’t just dangle us over a cliff after making a claim like that.”
“I have a theory.” When all eyes turned to me, I continued, “A few weeks ago, I was hanging out with Anji when another sentinel told her a werewolf named Sheldon turned up dead at a farm. He’d murdered the family there and… eaten several of them.”
“Besides being disgusting, what about it?” Pilar asked.
“That’s how shifters become darklings,” Gabriel answered. “Eating their kills.”
Victor’s dark brows knitted together. “He was also Bound, but the cause of his death was inconclusive. Nobody knew what killed him.”
“What if the cause is magical? What if he was so desperate to un-Bind himself that he was willing to risk murdering and devouring a human being?” Pilar gave a little shudder as I concluded my suspicions.
Gabriel jolted upright in his seat. “Edmund was busted in the middle of a child abduction. Valravns need to eat a heart to go to the dark.”
“More powerful if it’s a child’s heart,” Victor said.
“No, it couldn’t be.” The corners of Julien’s mouth dipped into a severe frown that didn’t belong on his usually cheerful face. “If such a thing could be undone, the Conclave would know of it, would they not?”
“Why would they know if no one has tried?” I countered.
His frown deepened. “People have had centuries to attempt it.”
“When you’re Bound and your powers are gone, you have no reason to try.”
“Well, whatever the cause, we should all be concerned. Hell, I can’t believe it’s Monica causing all this chaos,” Ben said. “I dunno. In a way, I’m kind of let down it wasn’t some major badass.”
Gabe scoffed. “I can believe it. It makes a weird, sick sort of sense. I mean, look at everyone who was involved.”
“So, let’s humor this theory and assume Edmund broke into that kid’s room for a late-night snack,” Victor said. “What the fuck does a faerie do to restore their gift? Last I checked, most don’t go over to the dark by eating people, and Monica was an aos sidhe. It’s not the same as Julien deciding to eat a surfer or a fisherman.”
“Darklings still retain their glamours, though it’s twisted. But they don’t gather dust like we do,” Lia said, speaking up for the first time in the dark conversation. “They have to take it from others.”
Ben snapped his fingers, at least he tried to, but his finger pads were all blistered and he ended up biting back a swear. “Your Dream Boxes.”
“Yeah.”
Victor wiped his hands off on a napkin and rose. “Okay, as much as I wanna call bullshit on the entire idea, it has some merit. Anything is possible when magic is involved. You mind if I head over to the field office and tell Sebastian?”
“No, go ahead.”
Gabriel got up too. “I’ll go with him. Meet you guys at campus medical?”
I nodded, sort of petrified. Ben had only been in the hospital for about a day before they released him, and Liadan hadn’t been hurt at all, but Anji had some vertebral damage that required delicate care.
And then there was Sai. He’d been impaled through the back and had a collapsed lung because of me.
Wiping palms as damp as a swamp against my thighs, I crossed the campus with them to the medical center.
“Two visitors at a time,” Nurse Kristi warned us.
“Oh, come on, Nurse Kristi. Please? Can’t you look the other way just this once?” Holly held up a pizza box. “We brought these for them.”
“He shouldn’t be eating pi—” The bear shifter nurse sighed and waved her hands. “Go ahead. But I’m kicking you all out in fifteen minutes, you hear?”
“Thanks, you’re the best.” And because we had more than enough, I set one box on her desk, and from what I observed during numerous visits to the medical center, the nurses didn’t take nearly enough breaks. They were always caring for us students, mending someone up, applying stitches, or doling out potions and medications of some kind. Being magical didn’t mean we all had flawless health.
“I’m going to go see Anji first,” Ben said. “You know, give you some privacy with Sai.”
“Me too,” Lia added.
“Oh, okay.”
She guided me to a door, and then they all disappeared into another room farther down the pristine corridor.
Damn.
Bearing the sole mushroom pizza, because Liadan said Sai didn’t eat beef, I knocked on the hospital door. A quiet voice bid me to enter, so I stepped inside to find the older student reading a book in bed, the curtains drawn and room dimmed save for a single light.
A week ago, when I’d last seen him, he’d had a hint of color and vitality in his face, but blood loss had robbed him of that, turning his skin ashen gray. He looked gaunt and sickly, his cheekbones more pronounced than usual and black hair lank against his brow.
“Hey… I wanted to see how you were doing and to save you from the lousy clinic food.”
Sai raised his attention from the novel in his lap to me, and to my surprise, he actually smiled. “Skylar, I am
pleased to see you up and looking well.”
“Really? I thought I’d be the last person you wanted to see.”
Sai shook his head. “I’m not upset with you.”
“But you almost died because of me. If I’d listened—”
His weak chuckle ended in a grimace and him pressing one hand against the bandage covering his chest. “We saved the girl. She would have died if we waited for sentinels to arrive. It’s a fair trade. I’m a little hurt, but she is alive.”
“A little hurt? Dude, there was a spike in the middle of your chest.”
“Not quite the middle, and it missed my heart, which is all that matters.” He grinned. “What can I say? I’m a tough bastard. The doctors think I’ll be out of the bed in a week or so.”
“Just in time for classes to start.” When I set the pizza box on the bedside table, his blue eyes lit up.
“You are a true blessing.” He dipped his head then gestured to the bedside chair before tearing open the box like a ravenous shifter instead of a vampire. “The nurses and Doctor Kalarjian have kept me on a liquid diet the entire week. I never thought I could miss solid food as much as I do now.”
“Ew, no fun.” Then again, a liquid diet for a vampire couldn’t be that horrible. Holly seemed to enjoy her blood bags well enough, but I’d also seen her nom way too many orders of fries and bacon cheeseburgers.
He wolfed down two slices before speaking again. “Were you in much trouble?”
“Well, I’m not expelled at least.”
“But…?”
“But yeah, and I should be. Look what happened to you and Anji due to my stupid decision to charge in.”
“We made a choice. You didn’t twist our arms.” When he reached for the big cup of water nearby, I flew off the chair to pass it to him. “Which Simon acknowledged when he visited the next day. Supposedly on my deathbed, and he comes in to rant at me about irresponsible behavior. That I am a role model who should have guided you better.”
“But you can’t control us. You were—”
“Had I truly wanted to stop Anji from barging in, I could have. And so you see, neither you nor I alone are responsible for what happened. We all take blame and share the burden when a poor choice is made. This is what it is to be part of a sentinel team.” He slid another slice of pizza from the box. “I hope there was another of these for Anji.”
The Scary Godmother: The Paranormal University Files: Skylar, Year 2 Page 27
