by Laurie McKay
Tito nudged Caden’s elbow and smiled. “And I’m the one you’re mad at?”
Caden didn’t smile back. “I expect better from you.”
Once inside, the girls went to visit the bathroom. Tito leaned against locker twelve-three while Caden wiped down unlucky locker twelve-four. “Brynne and I will distract everyone at lunch,” Tito said.
“How?” Caden grabbed his reading book. Another pink note fell out.
“Don’t know yet. I’m thinking it’ll involve magic.” Tito bent down and picked up the note. “What’s this, bro?”
Caden motioned to the neat stack of pink notes in his locker. “More trash. Someone keeps dirtying up my locker. I suspect it’s Derek.”
“Huh,” Tito said, and held up the note. There was writing on the outside this time. “It’s pink and it says ‘PLEASE READ ME.’ Sounds too polite for Derek.”
The first bell, the warning bell, rang. If the note wasn’t meant as an annoyance, Caden was curious. “What does it say?”
Tito unfolded it. “It’s a heart with your name in the middle. Below it, it says ‘Do you like me? Circle yes, no, or maybe.’ Signed, Emma A.”
Caden considered. “I don’t know Emma A,” he said. “Circle maybe.”
Tito reached into his bag and pulled out his purple pen. “She’s a sixth grader.” He used the locker door as a desk. He circled the word with the m and a. Then Tito wrote something on the note.
“What did you write?”
“That you like someone else, but if you change your mind, you’ll let her know.” He handed it back to Caden.
“I don’t like someone else.”
“Get Tonya to give it to her,” Tito said, ignoring him. “What is it with you and the sixth graders, anyway? They all seem to like you.”
“My allies Ward and Tonya are in the sixth grade. They are an honorable group.”
“Well, the seventh graders don’t like you much at all. But we have to put up with you half of the day, so we know you better,” Tito said.
“Nonsense,” Caden said. “They like me. They just don’t know it yet.”
Derek walked up then. He stuck his hands in his pockets and fidgeted.
Tito glared at him. “What do you want?”
Derek leaned closer. “Mr. Rathis keeps calling my mom.” He spoke near a whisper. “I thought he just wanted free legal advice, but Saturday he took her out to dinner. Do you think I should be worried about her?”
Indeed, Derek had once seen Rath Dunn threaten Caden with his dagger. He knew Rath Dunn’s true nature. He had reason to be afraid. “There is none more dangerous than Rath Dunn,” Caden said. “You should be very worried. Be careful.”
Derek looked pale. “My mom likes him.”
Tito glanced at his cell. “We’ve got to get to class.”
Caden peered at Derek. “We are trying to expose him.” Then Caden thought of something else. “What type of advice did he want?”
Derek took his hands from his pockets. He crossed and uncrossed his arms. “He wanted my mom to look at his employment contract.”
Caden turned to Tito. “Why would he have a lawyer look at that?”
Tito frowned. “To try to get around it?”
“Mom’s great at finding loopholes in contracts.”
“Try to keep her away from him,” Caden said. “Do whatever you have to do.”
“Yeah,” Derek said, and squeezed his hand into a fist. “That’s what I was afraid of.”
After Derek left, Caden said, “His mother has been annoying Ms. Primrose again.”
“Yeah,” Tito said. “She wrote one of those letters, too.”
“Rath Dunn is using her.” As Caden turned for his class, he squared his shoulders and looked at Tito. Better to part ways with forgiveness. “Also, I’ve decided not to be mad at you.”
“Great,” Tito said.
“But only because I may die tomorrow.”
Tito scrunched up his face. His expression became shrewd. “Bro, don’t die tomorrow. For that matter, don’t die today, either. That’s an order.”
In Caden’s morning literacy class, Mr. McDonald seemed to have taken Ms. Primrose’s warning that they needed to learn something seriously. He tried to engage them, but no one was in a good mood. Ward scowled at Mr. McDonald. Tonya stared at her lap.
“You kids need to be good this week,” Mr. McDonald said, but he’d abandoned them in the bee swarm. Such cowardice was hard to forgive.
Caden’s computer flashed words, but he wasn’t paying attention. His mind kept wandering. It was Monday. He’d but a day left to complete the quest. He was cursed. And one of his brothers was a traitor.
It was the last thought that he couldn’t quite believe. He thought about the last time he’d seen Valon and Maden. It was the day before their father, King Axel, had sent Caden away in the middle of the night.
The snows had been heavier than usual, the temperature colder. The castle was draped in dark silks. It was six months since Chadwin’s death. Since then, their father had been more distant than usual. He spent most of the days in the gardens staring at the frosted tulips and ice shrubs, or in his private room in the Western Tower.
First-born Valon and second-born Maden practiced indoors in the fifth training room. It was the largest of the ten training rooms, and the most ornate, with a vast domed ceiling and a floor tiled in marble. Three open balconies overlooked the practice area. Caden watched them from the second one.
Seventh-born Jasan stood to the side of the practice area, where the white marble switched to a dark stone border. His arms were crossed and his expression grim. In the center of the floor, first-born Valon and second-born Maden faced each other.
Valon was tall and lean. He held himself with the same gravity as their father. In one hand, he grasped a long sword. Its hilt was embedded with star sapphires and its blade looked sharp like a dragon’s tooth. He clutched a ruby-encrusted dagger in the other. Gifted in leadership, he always moved with intent.
Three strides from him, Maden held a two-handed broadsword. It was massive and Caden doubted any of his other brothers could have lifted it. Maden swung it with ease.
Valon dodged, then countered. They broke apart and stared at each other.
“You should know your place,” Valon said, and he smiled a king’s smile.
Maden smiled back at him and charged. “You won’t win this time.”
Clang, clang, clang.
Jasan watched from the side. He seemed distraught.
Valon’s and Maden’s weapons clashed again. Had Caden not known better, he’d have thought it a real fight, not a practice. From across the balcony, Caden sensed movement. He saw their father peering down from the other side. He looked from Valon to Maden, then to Jasan.
Had the king known then that one of them had betrayed Chadwin? He’d sent Caden away that very night. Had it truly been to protect him? Maybe he’d just wanted Caden out of the way.
“Hey, pay attention,” Mr. McDonald said. He reached over and tapped Caden’s computer screen. “Stop daydreaming and read it, Caden.”
Both orders. Caden paid attention. He looked at the computer. A brown mare was pictured above the words. The meaning took a moment to come. “The . . . horse . . .” Caden started. “Horse” was a word he liked. It made him think of Sir Horace. The computer voice was in a kindly mood today. “The horse runs.”
He beamed and smiled at Tonya. “I read a sentence,” he said.
She blushed behind her glasses. “G-good.”
“I guess you are getting better,” Mr. McDonald said. “Try the next one.” Caden did as he was ordered for the rest of class.
At the changing bell, Mr. McDonald pointed Caden toward the front door. “Meet on the front lawn for your science class. Mrs. Belle is taking you on a nature hike.”
It was shocking how much warmer it was outside. The air smelled of earth. Some of the students leaned against the small retaining wall. Derek caught Caden’s gaze. He
looked like he wanted to say something, but turned away when his friends walked up.
Mrs. Belle beckoned them with her bloodred fingernails. The one on the fourth finger was shorter than the rest. Perhaps a bit shinier, too. As if it had been filed and repainted. “This way, people,” she said.
Caden had found a fingernail backstage. Mrs. Belle might be as guilty as Mr. Creedly, Ms. Jackson, and the others.
Brynne nudged Caden’s shoulder. Her eyes were bright with mischief. She looked like she could hardly contain her excitement. “It’s almost lunch,” she whispered as Mrs. Belle took them around the building. “Tito and I will distract them.”
“And Jane and I will seek evidence,” Caden said.
“That’s the plan,” Tito said.
They walked past the auditorium. A small crack meandered up one wall. Caden touched it and it felt hot. Odd.
“Caden, come along,” Mrs. Belle said. “There’s nature to discover.”
He did as told. The trees and grass on the slope were now black and rotted like the dead forest farther down. Jane stopped and stared at the trees. “Is this what Ms. Jackson did to my mother?”
How could Caden answer that? Jane’s mother had fallen prey to the lunch witch. Burned-out husks and brittle bodies were all such dark magic left. Still, none of them had been there when Jane’s mother had been taken. “I don’t know,” he said.
For the briefest moment, Jane seemed near tears.
Tito put his arm around her shoulder. “You were asleep when they took you, and you didn’t feel anything.” His words didn’t really seem to make Jane feel better. “So, you know. No suffering, right?”
“She’ll regret what she did to my mom,” Jane said.
Mrs. Belle made them gather around a particularly rotten-looking oak trunk. It seemed to Caden the only nature they were discovering was grimy dead things.
Near the oak’s roots, she dug into the ground with her red nails. On closer inspection, one of them had definitely been recently broken. Within moments, she unearthed beetles with shiny blue backs. “Even among rot, life finds a way. And it’s important to understand the insect world. People often underestimate its value.” She brushed dirt off her wrinkled skirt. “When we understand,” she said, “we can team up with it. Exploit it.”
Was she thinking of Mr. Creedly when she said it? From what Caden had overheard in the blown-up science room, he suspected it was so. He caught his friends’ gazes. If Mrs. Belle was allied with Mr. Creedly, did that mean she was against Rath Dunn, Mr. Bellows, and Ms. Jackson?
After the lesson, they trudged back toward the school and the cafeteria. Caden lingered near Mrs. Belle. He needed to know how she was involved. “Mr. Creedly caused the bee swarm,” he said.
Mrs. Belle tripped on the grass. “What makes you say that, Caden? That was deemed an accident. It’s springtime, you know. Nature and hormones are abuzz.”
“I found your broken red fingernail backstage soon after.”
The class walked up the hill, but she stopped and turned to face him. “Red is a very popular color. What makes you think it’s mine?”
“I think you helped him,” Caden said. “Why?”
She started walking fast up the hill. “I don’t know what you could mean.”
“Tonya was targeted. So was I.”
She stopped and smiled sweetly. “You’re both fine.”
They’d survived due to luck and a magical whisk. It wasn’t that he expected Mrs. Belle to be on his side, but she’d been nice to him, then she’d helped a monster. Caden felt his blood boil. Betrayal. That’s what he felt. His life seemed full of that right now.
Caden had to find out what she knew. He only had a day left. “You helped Mr. Creedly sabotage the spelling bee. Admit it.”
“Caden . . .”
“Tell me why or I’ll show Ms. Primrose the fingernail. She wants someone to eat. I bet I could convince her that you’d be a satisfying dinner. Are you feuding with Rath Dunn or Mr. Bellows? Did you endanger countless innocent people to make them look bad? Tell me or else.”
The breeze blew down the hill. Mrs. Belle stared at him. “Calm down,” she said.
It was an order, but no order could change his emotions. Still, he tried to quell his temper. “Just tell me why.”
“Fine. But quiet.” She laughed nervously and too loudly, then waved to the other students like nothing was amiss. “Look, I like it here. I like teaching. They destroyed my room and tried to blame me.” The rest of the class was almost to the building. “So we ruined their little spelling bee. Like the gas accident, nothing can be proven.”
“But why did they attack your room?”
“They know I’m loyal to Ms. Primrose. Only the foolish and brash wouldn’t be.”
“You’re on opposite sides,” Caden said.
“I’d rather serve Ms. Primrose than Rath Dunn or Ms. Jackson. That’s all. Several of us feel that way. None more than Mr. Creedly.” She glanced at Caden. “But as you’ve discovered, Mr. Creedly is jealous of you. So be careful.”
So the teachers were split. There were those loyal to Ms. Primrose and those loyal to Rath Dunn, and it was those loyal to Rath Dunn who had caused the gas explosion. Those loyal to Ms. Primrose had caused the swarm in retaliation.
There was a mutiny brewing among the teachers. The villains were destroying the school. He just needed more proof. He needed evidence that damned Ms. Jackson and Rath Dunn.
Mrs. Belle touched one of her bloodred nails to his hand. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want you or any of the students hurt in the swarm.”
He held her gaze. “Yet you did nothing to help me.”
She said nothing. There was nothing she could say. They walked up the hill in silence.
The cafeteria smelled like baking breads and spring vegetables, and nothing of the mayhem Caden knew Brynne intended to bring. One wall of the cafeteria was carved from the mountain. It was granite, roughhewn, and speckled with flecks of gold-colored mica. Across from it, large windows overlooked the downslope of the hill. Last week, there had been oaks with new leaves and blooming cherry and dogwood trees.
Now, the trees were black, the grass sickly. Caden turned from the eerie sight and ran his hand over the wall made from the mountain. It felt cool and solid. Unlike the auditorium stones, which were oddly warm. Under the background noise, he heard something low and rumbling like thunder—or maybe like a dragon’s growling stomach.
Ms. Jackson stood behind the serving line. Her skin and hair glowed with health. Her dark eyes sparkled. She scooped locally grown collard greens. Truly, the lunch witch was evil. Rath Dunn stood beside her serving squash risotto and Cornish hens.
“Oh, the distraction I’ve got planned,” Brynne said. She was happiest when she was about to cause trouble. “Are you ready?”
“Yep,” Tito said.
Jane had returned to her stoic, confident self. If she didn’t burn herself out enchanting kitchen utensils and office supplies, she had a good future as an Elite Paladin. “I am,” she said.
No one had asked, but Caden was also ready. He and Jane waited by the side of the serving line, near the wide doorway that led into the kitchen proper. A partial wall hid most of the cooking area from the front.
Caden watched as Tito plopped down at their usual table. Brynne slid into the chair beside him. She slyly motioned to Mr. Bellows at the teachers’ table. He’d been foolish to glue her hair to her chair. With a flick of her finger, his tray slammed into the ceiling. Risotto rained down. The small cooked bird splatted onto his head.
Almost every student and teacher in the cafeteria looked at Mr. Bellows. The table of sixth graders who always waved at Caden lost their trays next.
Rath Dunn walked out from the serving area. He dodged a flying cooked bird. “What is this?” Ms. Jackson stepped out as well. She didn’t dodge the risotto pummeling her face.
Jane gave Caden a thumbs-up sign. Unlike in the Greater Realm, where it was an obscene gesture, in Ash
eville it meant “well done.” Still, Caden didn’t give Jane a thumbs-up back.
Instead, he whispered, “Let’s go.”
They darted past the serving counter and ducked behind the partial wall. The counters were metal, open, shining, and clean. The floors were without crumbs. In the science room, Brynne had found runes under the countertop. Caden leaned forward and looked at the underside of the counter. He tilted his head.
There was nothing.
Squeals and laughter came from the eating area.
Jane was crouched near the spoons and spatulas. Caden motioned to himself and to her, then pointed to the back area where there was a large refrigerator and pantry. Jane signaled for him to wait.
She reached in her shirt and pulled out her enchanted ladle. With an expression like wrath, she switched it with the one Ms. Jackson used for chicken soups, spaghettis, and other witchy brews.
Caden raised a brow.
Jane scooted over to him. “You’ll see.”
Whatever Rath Dunn and Ms. Jackson were up to, whatever they had plotted while leaving the city limits for their farm-fresh food, it appeared they wanted the school involved. They wanted it to happen here. There had to be evidence in the cafeteria. This kitchen was the witch’s lair.
The plants had died recently. If she’d been casting spells, there should be evidence.
Caden peeked into the pantry. It was filled with breads, fruits, and vegetables. Evil or not, Caden had to appreciate Ms. Jackson’s housekeeping and healthy foods.
Jane opened the refrigerator. Her face lit up. “Gross things,” she said.
Caden looked inside, too. The shelves were filled with dead birds wrapped in plastic and rodents in ziplock bags. There were stacked tubs of grasshoppers, flies, and tofu. In the back, there were jars containing hearts and intestines.
“Spell ingredients?” he said. Maybe Brynne would know their purposes. However, according to Rosa, Ashevillians didn’t eat dog, cat, or rodent; they didn’t allow the gross things on these shelves in their restaurants. If that was true, he was certain they wouldn’t be allowed in the school.
