Chapter 48
Chapter Forty-Eight
B riony
I’m half tempted to wait around a corner and then creep back into the library and track down that book. The more I think about it, the stranger it seems that it took so long to find the right place in the library and was quick to find my way out. As if the library itself wanted to stop me in the first place and then throw me out in the second. That can’t be right, though. My mind must be playing tricks on me. I was just frustrated and not concentrating properly on my way in.
However, though I want to go back, I have a funny feeling Professor Tudor will be waiting for me there again, ready to turf me out if I try. I’m going to have to be clever about sneaking back in – some time I know he’ll be distracted – although who knows when that will be.
Do teachers have lives? It’s not like the academy is situated near a town or any other form of entertainment. There’s the moor, the forest and the distant train station – probably not so bad if you enjoy train spotting, which I doubt very much Fox Tudor does. No, he probably enjoys torturing students slowly and cruelly down in his dungeon to pass the time. Yep, I’m really looking forward to my detention.
Admitting temporary defeat, I set off towards my room to change into my tracksuit for the next lesson. Detention with Professor Tudor will be bad enough, I imagine it will be unbearable with the gruesome twosome. Halfway there my day gets even better when my period comes on and I’m forced to dash up the stairs as fast as I can.
Once I’ve cleaned myself up, taken some painkillers for the cramps I know will be incoming anytime soon, and changed, I hurry down to the field. I’m hungry and, with my period too, feeling pretty faint.
“Are you okay?” Fly asks, as I sidle up to him in the line along the field, Clare hovering at his other side.
“Yeah, why?”
“Professor Tudor, I thought he was going to blow the classroom to smithereens when he discovered you weren’t in class today.” He shivers and holds his hand to his chest. “I actually feared for my life. That man is terrifying.”
“Was it you who told him where I was?” I say, glaring at him.
“No,” he says, “cross my heart. And I’m telling you, I was shaking in my boots when he grilled me.”
“How did he know then?”
He shrugs. “Sixth sense.”
“He is a shadow weaver,” Clare points out.
“Yeah,” I say, bending down to tie my lace. “I had no idea he was.”
“What do you mean?” Clare asks me. “All professors are.”
“Oh,” I say, jumping back up, “he came from Slate Quarter. You’d think one of our own turning out to have powers and making it as an academy professor would be big news back in our Quarter – the thing of legends. But I never heard anything about it.”
“He came from Slate Quarter?” Fly says, staring at me in astonishment.
“You don’t need to sound so surprised,” I say, “we’re not all feeble dunces. The occasional one of us makes it out of the shithole.”
“But a shadow weaver. That’s … that’s …”
“Weren’t you listening in his class? Some students from other Quarters do end up having powers.”
“Yeah,” Clare says, fiddling with her sweater, “but no one actually believes it. No one’s ever heard of anyone who it’s actually happened to.”
“Well, it happened to him.”
“Nah,” Fly says, shaking his head adamantly. “You must be mistaking him for someone else. Someone who’s like him.”
“I very much doubt there are two men, both in their early thirties called Fox Tudor.”
“Then, he must have had shadow weaver blood – his mom or dad must have been a shadow weaver.”
“I don’t think so,” I say, thinking of Fox’s parents – two of the most ordinary people you could meet.
“It doesn’t happen otherwise,” Clare insists.
“Maybe his dad isn’t who they say he is,” Fly says, waggling his eyebrows.
“Right,” I say, “because shadow weavers are always passing through our Quarter and having illicit affairs with very ordinary, very dull women who live there.”
“Are they?” Clare says, surprised.
“No,” I tell her. “I’d never seen a shadow weaver in the flesh until I came to the academy.”
“Oh,” Clare says.
“It has to be something like that,” Fly insists. “People like us don’t develop shadow weaving powers. It doesn’t just arrive out of the blue.”
“Then why tell us otherwise? Why put us through those lessons?” I point out.
Clare shrugs. “To give us hope or something.”
“Hmmm,” I say, not convinced, because I know Fox Tudor doesn’t have a drop of shadow weaving blood in him – I’m sure of that – and yet he has the power.
Just like …
“Anyway, what happened when Professor Doom and Gloom found you?” Fly says, interrupting my thoughts. “I thought the next time we saw you, you’d have no fingernails or something.”
“I don’t know yet. I have detention with him tonight.” Fly and Clare both shiver. “It can’t be any worse than hanging out with the Princes – or not hanging out with them more to the point.”
Both Clare and Fly look at me.
“They keep leaving me and going off to parties, remember?” I say, neglecting to remind my friends about what happened when they returned.
Of course, I give myself away with a blush. Something Fly happily points out.
“I’m not blushing,” I insist. “It must be a hot flush. I just got my period.”
“Urgh,” Clare says. “That’s the worst.”
“Can we change the subject?” Fly says, lowering his voice.
“So we can talk about sex and blowjobs but not periods?” I tease.
“It’s just … I don’t …”
I laugh. Stopping when the twin professors come marching towards us with amusement on their faces. This probably won’t be good. Physical exercise is the last thing I feel like doing right now. The cramps have kicked in and all I want to do is curl up on my bed with a hot water bottle and my dog. None of those things are options though. My dog is hundreds of miles away, I don’t have a hot water bottle and I’ve already cut class once today and will be suffering the consequences later. I also doubt a note from the nurse will cut it. I think you could lose a limb and be gushing blood from an open wound and they’d still have you undertaking drills.
The drills today are especially evil. If it was running around the grounds again, I’d probably be okay. Instead, it’s circuits – sit-ups, press ups, burpees – the lot.
Of course, the shadow weavers and the Iron Quarter kids find the whole thing a breeze – even Fly seems to be coping all right. I, and most of the other kids from Slate and Granite Quarters, are not. My entire body screams with pain, my lungs burn and I want to die.
“Come on, you lazy fucks,” one of the twins screams obnoxiously close to my ear, “move your butts. You’re not even trying.”
I yank myself up for another sit up, peering through my knees at the group of students that are finding this incredibly easy. Stanley is among them, of course, smiling and laughing as he does a series of press-ups one handed. I wish I had shadow weaver abilities because I’d use them to kick out the supporting arm and have him landing flat on his face. I smile to myself at the picture in my mind.
“If you’re smiling, you’re not working hard enough,” the twin yells at me. “Come on, Madame Bardin is convinced there’s Iron material among some of you weaklings – we’ve only got to get you trained.”
Despite my ability to run fast, I know I don’t have what it takes to be assigned Iron Quarter. I can’t lift anything more than a couple of pounds. I can’t jump over rocks. I definitely can’t wrestle guys twice my size to the ground. This is a waste of time and is only going to result in more aches and pains.
Past Stanley and his new friends in Iron Quarter are the shadow weavers. Most of the girls aren’t even trying – they haven’t broken sweat and are gathered around gossiping. I note they aren’t being shouted at. Among them are the Smyte twins – Henrietta and Lynette – both looking innocent, like butter wouldn’t melt in their mouths – and not like they tried to kill me this weekend.
The boys, as well as one or two of the girls, however, are showing they are just as fit and just as strong as the kids from Iron Quarter. Probably because their diet has been considerably better than ours.
I spy Dray in among a group of shadow weavers, laughing as he works at sit-ups. I watch him snap up his body and peer over his knees, meeting my gaze immediately. He grins and winks at me and I roll back down to lie on the grass and stare up at the sky. When I drag my body up for another sit up, Dray isn’t looking my way anymore and I spot Beaufort off to his side, concentrating as he lifts weights that look like boulders above his head.
Thorne isn’t with them and it takes me a while until I find him further out on the field, running sprints backwards and forwards, driving his body, his focus intense.
I roll back down again, my body tingling with that sensation from Saturday.
Desire?
I can’t deny the three men are attractive. Especially when they’re all hot and sweaty and looking impressive as hell.
But I don’t want to feel desire for them. I don’t want to feel anything but hate.
I grit my teeth and snap back up, three more times to complete the set and move on to a round of star jumps.
I doubt I look impressive. I suspect I look like a woman close to death. Flushed and messy and smelly. I glance at the shadow weaver girls with bitterness. Not a hair out of place, not a single bead of sweat broken.
Finally, when twin one blows his whistle and tells us we’re done, I collapse down on the grass and attempt to catch my breath.
Clare hunches over her knees and peers down at me. She’s bright red, and panting fast.
“You … coming … changing room,” she huffs out. I shake my head. I won’t be risking those changing rooms ever again. “Then … see … you … canteen.”
I peer up at the clock and groan. It’s already six o’clock. Three hours that torture session lasted. Three hours! No wonder I feel like I’m dying.
“I have my detention at seven,” I tell her. “By the time I’ve hobbled back to my room and cleaned up, I don’t think I’ll have time for dinner. I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”
Clare nods and limps away, moaning and groaning as she does.
I lie exactly where I am, staring up at the rapidly darkening sky, trying to find the energy to move.
“You want a hand up?”
I flip my head to one side and find Dray Eros, towering over me and holding out his hand.
He licks his lips, eyes traveling over me. “Or do you want me to join you down there?”
“I wouldn’t if I were you,” I say. “I stink.”
“I thought we’d already established that you smell really damn good.”
“Not right now I don’t.”
He squats down. “I’d like to lick the sweat off you.” He glances over his shoulder. “I have a feeling it would piss off Beaufort though if I were that fucking public. Maybe later, huh?”
“Later?” I say.
“It’s Wednesday, sweetheart. You know what that means.” He winks again, stands and offers his hand out a second time. “Up we go.”
“Not yet,” I say, “it hurts too much.”
“So you’re just going to stay there?”
“Until I can move again, yes.”
“What’s wrong?” Beaufort says, appearing beside his friend and staring down at me with a frown. My hot skin seems to grow even hotter as he stares down at me – a mix of desire and anger sloshes around my tired body. He hasn’t apologized about that argument. In fact, he hasn’t spoken to me at all and I haven’t spoken to him. I thought we were ignoring each other.
Obviously not, Beaufort Lincoln doesn’t seem to hold a grudge.
“Nothing, I hurt everywhere so I’m just going to lie here until I can move again.”
“You can’t stay out here, it isn’t safe,” Beaufort says.
“She’ll be fine,” Dray says, lifting his chin out towards the field. “Thorne’s here.”
“Is Thorne even watching her?”
“I don’t need babysitting,” I point out. I’m ignored.
“Thorne’s always watching her,” Dray says, which is the most nonsense thing the crazy bastard has ever said. Apart from that weird little warning, the dude has hardly acknowledged my existence.
Beaufort lifts his gaze out to the field and I follow his example. Thorne’s still out there, driving his body backward and forward across the field.
“What the hell is he even doing?” I ask.
“Making himself hurt probably,” Dray says, like that explanation makes any sense. “It’s his favorite pastime.”
“Right,” I mumble.
“You’ll be safe with Thorne out here,” Beaufort says, “but when he leaves, you leave, understood?” I stare at him, refusing to give my consent. “Understood?” he growls.
“Sure,” I say, too tired to argue.
“We’ll see you later.”
What? No apology? No attempt to patch things up?
Nope, just back to treating me like they always do.
“Seriously?” I say, closing my eyes. When I open them again the other two shadow weavers have gone. In fact, everyone else has gone, leaving just me and pain-boy out here in the dusk.
I roll my head to the side. It’s not just my muscles that hurt, the cramps are really painful now and I have a feeling moving is going to make them worse.
Through the darkness, I spy Thorne’s large figure. He’s no longer running. Instead, he stands with his arms outstretched, his shadow magic streaming across the field. His shadows aren’t silvery like Beaufort’s, they’re jet black – like the deepest part of the forest back home where the branches of the trees all tangle overhead, black like the darkest of winter nights. They streak across the space, and even from this distance, I feel their power, despite their darkness, a warmth brushing against my skin.
I can’t read his face over the distance, but I can tell, by the stance of his legs, by the way he’s bracing his body, that he’s using all his strength to shoot those shadows across the field. Or maybe it’s not that at all? Maybe he’s using all his strength to wield those shadows, to control and bind them.
I shiver, thinking of my sister. Maybe Fox is right. Shadow weavers can unleash their powers out here with no restraint and no precautions. Maybe it would have been easy for her to take a wrong turning, to stumble somewhere she shouldn’t have been, and end up caught in the crossfire.
No! Amelia was smart and careful. I just can’t believe it.
With a dramatic groan, I roll up to sit and then heave myself up onto my feet.
My detention starts in twenty minutes and I have no desire to turn up a sweaty, broken mess.