Chapter 18 #2
“It’s—” Lanz looks at me again, and the pain I see in his eyes is stunning, shocking, like he feels terribly badly for me even though he doesn’t even know me.
“Elena,” he says. “Elena Shalott—she has some kind of vendetta against Gwenna, and?—”
“I’m not trying to steal you from her,” I interrupt. “I mean, you’re not even hers. I don’t know why she thinks that.”
“It’s not that,” Lanz says. “She says she’s from the same town as you. Nearby. Where there was a church…” He chews his lip, eyebrows held high, waiting for me to react .
And I don’t. I can’t.
My body has gone cold.
“Does anybody want to explain?” Kai says after a moment, tapping his hand with a cigarette against the counter. “Or…”
“It’s not my story to tell,” Lanz cuts in. I know he’s looking at me even though I can’t look up from the counter. “There was an…accident. A fire.”
I clench my fists in my lap and stare hard into the marble, as if I could crack it open and find a hiding place, just with the power of my gaze.
I can feel it. All of them staring at me.
And I can’t read minds, but I know for sure what all of them are thinking.
Did she?
I wonder the same thing.
Here’s what the official report concluded.
A combination of faulty wiring, outdated sprinkler systems, and poor ventilation left the church a veritable tinderbox. It was only a matter of time before an accident like this happened. And it was an incredible stroke of bad luck that someone was inside at the time.
Here’s what Dr. Riggs theorized.
After the divorce, I started sleeping less and less, and whatever sleep I did get was less than restorative.
This chronic state of exhaustion left me more vulnerable to latent psychological issues breaking through.
At the same time, as sleep treatments failed and the insomnia only seemed to get worse, I became attached to the idea that my only salvation would be through divine providence, granted through prayer—a result, he claims, of too much Catholic school.
Finally, I reached a breaking point in the form of full-on spiritual psychosis—a not uncommon form of dissociative break, often preceded by a fascination with things like ritual, purity, and religious doctrine.
Comorbid disorders, such as pyromania, are atypical but not unheard of.
St. Catherine’s was certainly full of candles.
And here’s what I remember.
Waking up surrounded by fire, my skin melted halfway down my arms. Bleeding.
But no pain. Never any pain. I could watch the pieces of my body shrivel and burn as easily as watching TV. Like it was all happening to someone else.
The cure to all wounds.
The vessel of vessels.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” I say, short and clipped.
“Fair enough,” comes Kai’s voice. “Everyone’s entitled to their secrets.”
To my surprise, no one objects.
Slowly, slowly, I raise my head.
“But what does that have to do with Elena?” Kai goes on.
Lanz breathes out hard. “If what she told me is true, then…it’s personal for her. What happened.”
This—this I don’t know.
Don’t understand.
“What do you mean?” I ask him. “I don’t even know Elena. Didn’t, until I came here.”
“She…” Lanz hesitates. “She said her dad was a building inspector? And he…they lost everything. The legal charges.”
Realization carves into me like a dagger.
The person they found liable for the fire. For the accident . The building inspector whose name I only knew by initials from sealed court proceedings, who Mom only referred to as “him” or “the responsible party.”
That was Elena’s father.
And it ruined him.
I ruined him .
“I wouldn’t be surprised if she tried to hurt Gwenna again,” Lanz goes on. “Worse.”
At that, Kingston snaps into motion.
“Then you shouldn’t be here,” he says. “Not at Caliburn. Not for your own safety. Not for…”
“What?” I say it so loudly my voice cracks. “Leave? What?—”
“You’ve already been targeted. Made seriously ill.” Kingston’s voice drops to a dangerous calm, his eyes locked with mine. “You think that’s nothing? Or are you calling one of my most loyal team members a liar?”
“I’m not! I’m not.” I tighten my hands into fists again. “I’m not doing that,” I say, “but I’m not leaving. You can’t tell me to leave. I won’t. This school is all I have.” The words crack as I speak them—not something I meant to say aloud, but it’s too late now.
Four pairs of eyes bore into me.
Something wells up inside me—humiliation, panic—and it’s too much. I stand up abruptly, the chair falling behind me. “I have to go.”
I wrench myself free, dart out of the kitchen, through the hallway, out the front door, into the quad that’s deceptively sunny and happy and green—a perfect collegiate day like it’s trying to taunt me.
I squint into the sunlight, the pounding of last night resurging in my temples, the pulsing pain in my ankle shooting to my heart with every step.
Poison? I think. That can’t be right. Even if she…
But if she knows, then…
No. That doesn’t mean I have to…
But if they know, then …
I’m not crazy.
I can’t leave. I can’t.
The quiet of the early morning canvas makes everything feel exposed, tripwired.
As I cross to Broceliande Hall, I mentally rehearse, prep myself: shower, change, maybe slip out for a cup of coffee at Holy Grounds.
Lay low—the lowest I’ve ever laid. Go to my place in the library and hide in my alcove.
I round the corner to Broceliande and slow my steps.
There’s a crowd gathered outside. Girls in pajamas, everyone whispering frantically, eyes wide, and glances darting everywhere. There’s a tangy, acrid smell in the air. Heavy, familiar.
Smoke.
I break into a run, ankle be damned. The crowd parts for me, almost like it was expecting me.
And I race into the hallway and up the stairs, leaping, flying, until I get to the room, our room. And Morgan’s there, but not inside, just at the door, hanging back.
She turns at the sound of my footsteps, and her eyes go wide.
“Gwenna,” she gasps. “You…oh thank God, you’re all right. It didn’t…”
“What didn’t?”
Instead of answering, Morgan just takes a step back, her arms clutched to her chest. I advance a half step at a time and look into our dorm room.
Or what used to be our dorm room.
Because now all I see is…nothing.
At first, I’m confused, wondering if I’ve lost consciousness, blacked out entirely, because that’s all there is around me: black.
But slowly my brain parses the information: not black.
Gray.
Gray everywhere, like a blanket of snow, or a blanket of…
Ash. It’s ash.
Everything—my clothes, my books, my comforter and blankets and pillow, everything that Morgan owned—someone burned them up and dumped the ashes in the middle of the floor. And on top of it, a single sheet of paper with a handwritten line:
See how you like it.