Chapter 20
The following day, as I neared the back terrace of the school after flying lessons, I heard footsteps but didn't bother to look behind me until I heard Scarlett’s chuckle. She bumped my shoulder as she brushed past.
“How was your night, bottomdweller? You look tired.”
Don't respond. Don't respond, I told myself, struggling to remain calm and collected. She was trying to rile me, and I shouldn’t let her.
“Wherever you go at night, it’s a shame you haven’t been scooped up by the street sweepers yet,” she crooned.
My blood heated. She knew I’d been sneaking out, but it appeared she didn’t know why. I let out a long breath and stared at the grass. Don’t look down so much, Ari, my brother used to tell me. People will think you’re afraid. I forced my gaze up and kept walking.
“You know,” she said, stepping in front of me, “I'm surprised you even thought you had a chance of being a rider here. There are rules for how things work at Cardan Lott.”
“Let me pass,” I said as calmly as I could.
She giggled again, pressing her fingers to her lips. “Rush’s father is particular about who and what he lets near his dragons. His father and my father are friends,” she added with a little bounce on the balls of her feet.
Fear blazed hot and hurried up my spine. Did Scarlett know the truth about me, about Myth?
“Stop,” I said, unable to call up any other word.
“I’m only telling you the truth. You'll never make it here, Arivelle.”
The words pounded against my chest like brass-knuckled fists.
Scarlett spun on her heels and marched away, her blond hair whipping out beside her as Mabel and Yvonne, her two closest friends, chittered like squirrels as they hurried after her toward the back terrace.
Turning to ascend the stairs, Scarlett peered down at me, her hand poised on the stone banister as her two ladies-in-waiting floated up the stairs, arm in arm.
She waited until I was only a few steps away before she said, “Your blood is worth less than the wild dragon they killed out there.”
I froze.
Like a debutante entering her first society ball, she rose to the terrace as if on wings, her steps making no noise at all.
Reluctantly, I followed, not knowing where else to go and wanting nothing more than to flop on my bed until the bell for dinner. Eyes focused on the doorway that led back into the school, I didn’t see the object headed my way until it hit my shoulder.
With a yelp of surprise, I hopped out of the way and braced myself for an attack. The absolute wrong thing to do.
Laughter erupted across the terrace. I turned narrowed eyes on the cackling students until my gaze snagged on the item that had hit me. My nose sensed it before I could admit what it was.
A hardened lump of dragon dung lay on the stones near my feet, cracked in half and now emitting a foul stench across the otherwise pristine space.
My jaw fell open as I realized what was now on me.
I stepped over the dung, heading for the door, but I couldn’t fight the desire to turn, to look, to see if I could pick out who had done it.
But when I glanced at the crowd of first and second years, I couldn’t tell who had thrown the refuse.
I doubted Scarlett would ever touch it, even to chuck it at me, but I wouldn’t put it past her to tell someone else to do it.
They had all turned away now, their attention already reabsorbed in themselves.
The atrium was mercifully empty, but the sudden shroud of solitude threatened to break my composure.
I sucked in a deep breath, blew it out slowly, and hurried in as ladylike a manner as I could back to the Ruby dormitory, envisioning a bath, and then my bed as a refuge.
Missing dinner was a sacrifice I was willing to make to avoid seeing Scarlett again tonight.
But rather than solace, I saw Luther standing at the entrance, talking to a girl in his year whose name I didn’t remember. I pivoted mid-stride, hoping he wouldn’t notice me, and set my sights on the library instead. It would suffice as a haven in a moment of need.
“Hey, you there!”
I kept walking.
“Hatchling! Address your elder.”
Heart beating madly, I turned, swallowing my discomfort and plastering on a bored expression.
Luther strolled forward, hands hidden in his robes. For a moment, I flinched as I imagined him drawing out something else to throw at me. “Whoa, there. A little jumpy?” He surveyed me up and down. “Were you headed in?” He tossed his head back toward the house door.
I shook my head. “Library.”
He crinkled his nose, stepping back. “What’s that smell?
” He raised one hand to his face. “Are you serious, Miro? Do you have no self-respect?” He walked backward, putting space between us.
“Don’t come back in my house until you’re cleaned up.
” His voice was louder now, drawing the eyes of the half-dozen other students in the hall.
Lifting one finger, he leveled it at me.
“I mean that, Miro. New rule: if dragon dung girl tries to enter House Ruby in those clothes, she’ll be forced to sleep on the school roof again. Alone.”
“But how…” I stammered, not knowing where I’d find clean clothes outside my dormitory.
“Roof, Miro,” he repeated, loudly enough that no one in the hall missed it. He vanished into the house common room with a small flourish that was met with a smattering of applause from those watching.
I waited until dinner in the Great Hall was over, biding my time in the empty library.
I’d picked up a book that sounded interesting, Blood Wars, but it turned out to be only a dissertation on the long and convoluted history of dragon breeding.
I’d attempted a few lines on my end-of-term poetry assignment, but I’d given up after every line I tried included the word blood or fury.
Finally, I found Vanya in the hall and called her into an empty classroom.
“Where were you?” she asked, scanning me up and down, eyeing the smear on my shirt. Then she pinched her nose.
“I need to borrow a shirt.”
A few minutes later, I was wearing one of Vanya’s shirts as we stole back into the common room.
I kept my head down, not wanting to make eye contact with anyone.
Luther wasn’t in there, but Shep was, reading quietly in the corner, and he looked up as we raced past. He could tell Luther I’d abided by his stupid rule.
As soon as we passed through the common room, Vanya and I ran to the girls’ bathrooms. I allowed myself a long, luxurious bath full of bubbles scented with lavender.
I even indulged myself and dropped in some of the flower petals that rested in basins along the wall.
I’d never taken such a lavish bath in my life, and in a way it felt wrong, wasteful, and yet it felt like the only way to scrub off what had happened.
I scoured away the smell and the dirt, imagining that their laughing faces were washing away too.
I was grateful that I didn’t encounter Luther as I slipped back through the common room and ascended the stairs to the girls’ dormitory.
Vanya smiled at me when I entered. She set aside our current literature text, a sweeping epic about the knights who once paraded this land, defending it from rogue gods who attempted to reestablish their once powerful thrones among men.
The story was part myth, part history, and Professor Siva enjoyed quizzing us on which parts were which.
“Ari,” Vanya said, her eyes averted, one hand pressed to her closed book. “I’m sorry for what happened today.”
I shook my head. “It wasn’t you.”
She finally looked up at me. “I know. But it shouldn’t have happened.” She sighed. “I’m glad you’re a student here. I don’t think you’re…” She cut herself off, color flooding her cheeks.
“Think I’m what, trash to be thrown out?”
She cringed. “People like that, the ones who look down on others, are all the same. My family is the same way.”
My brows rose as I sat on my bed facing her. “But royals are above everyone else.”
Instead of laughing, she curled forward as if I’d slapped her. I reached out a hand to apologize, but she cut me off.
“In some ways, they are. But if I told you the half of what my family is really like, you’d be the one throwing dung at them.”
I was speechless for a moment. Trying to lighten the mood, I said, “But I’d get beheaded or something if I did that, so, I think I’ll leave those tactics for Scarlett and her awful friends.”
Vanya’s wide, dark eyes lifted slowly. They were sparkling with unshed tears, and I wondered what I’d said to make her so upset. I pulled my feet up into my bed and hunted for another subject. “So my poem is going to be awful…”