Chapter 7 #3
‘Absolutely … not!’ I huff, pulling it up the final steps. He steps back as I push it to my own bedroom door with a flourish, dusting my hands on my trousers.
He shrugs. ‘I’m a patient man, DeWinter.
You’ll seek my help at some point. In training, or in the Ordeals themselves, you’ll need me.
In the meantime, I just love listening to all those foul words spill from that beautiful mouth of yours.
’ Before I can release a torrent of more choice words, he closes his door, chuckling, and leaves me to face the trunk alone.
I shove it inside my bedroom and kneel down on the floor in front of it.
It hasn’t occurred to me until this point that if the Collector, the man who I believed was my uncle, has sent this, it might not contain anything good.
Hesitantly, I open the latch, trying to control the tremor in my fingers.
It pops open and I throw myself backward.
When nothing jumps out, no terrifying thing happens, I take a deep breath and pull myself together.
Then I scramble forward, push back the lid and find …
clothes. Books. Makeup. Notebooks and keepsakes and the teddy I used to keep in this very trunk.
I run my fingers over the plush velvet lining the bottom, fingertips lingering on the smooth gold initials – E.D.
– that I know are stamped there, worn slightly at the edges from the times I have brushed my fingers over them.
I gasp softly, fingertips slipping over a well-thumbed deck of cards, and I swallow the sudden lump in my throat.
The deck we used to play with: me, Dolly and Banks.
This trunk contains my most cherished possessions.
Sifting through the items, I find an envelope with my name written on it.
The spidery lines of ink are chillingly familiar.
This is from the Collector. I press my lips together, tearing it open without bothering to reach for the letter opener on the desk.
Inside is a single piece of paper, again written in his own hand:
In time you will understand.
I will be waiting.
In time I will … understand ? How he made me sign a contract, robbing me of my childhood and my free will?
How he terrified me with the punishment of the vault, how he forced me on assignments, placed me in immediate danger countless times that left me hollowed out with fear until I had to be stronger?
I completed the Crucible; I made it here.
I didn’t die, in fact the worst part of the past few days was the assignment he sent me on.
And Dolly … my Dolly … I hiss, closing my hand around the note.
I tear it in half, then half again, ripping his words up until they are nothing but squares of singular smudged letters.
And I will be waiting ? I draw my hand into a fist, shaking. Nothing that happens now, nothing I discover will change the fact that Dolly is dead.
Nothing.
The cold in the room wraps around me like a shawl, suddenly dousing my anger.
Even though he hasn’t said it in so many words, he believes I will fail.
That I will leave Killmarth and be at his mercy once more.
The very fact that he’s sent this trunk here so swiftly is a warning shot, a reminder that I am not truly free of him.
The window whips out, then back again, breaking into my thoughts, clattering against the frame over and over.
‘Bloody thing,’ I mutter, rubbing my eyes.
The sound of footsteps and the harsh tones of Mrs Parnell rise up from outside.
I get up off the floor, cross to the window and peer down into the deep dark.
I can make out shapes, maybe two dozen people, all trailing along the steps from the castle that lead to Hope Hall.
They must have had to wait in the town until low tide when they could cross. The rest of the hopefuls have arrived.
That damn window clatters in the frame all night long, leaving me to wake far too early with an ache deep in my bones from the damp chill permeating this island.
Grumbling, I shuffle over to the trunk and dig through until I find my running shoes.
I pull on a tight-fitting, long-sleeve top, and the supple leggings I train in, then drink straight from the tap in the bathroom before throwing the ice-cold water over my face.
Instantly, I’m awake, blinking into the mirror above the basin as I tie back my hair, ready for my usual morning routine.
Lastly, I tuck my switchblade into the waistband of my leggings.
I still know little of the nature of these Ordeals.
The sky’s deep darkness is fading into grey and mauve as I leave Hope Hall, breath clouding in front of me as I begin my run anti-clockwise.
There are no defined trails, so I leap across rocky outcrops, dodge around brambles and listen to the pull and rush of the waves.
I discover a series of walled gardens, but don’t dare enter when I hear the kitchen staff laughing and gossiping, preparing for the day.
Further around, I find the jumble of homes that must belong to the permanent staff, then further still, the gates I entered through.
Pausing to suck in a breath and stretch out, my gaze travels over the walkway through the sea, then over the small town beyond.
There’s another town further around the coast that seems bigger, more lights and homes crowded around the bay there, with a quay and boats in a harbour.
I sniff, not wanting to go near those gates, not wanting to tempt fate and keep running.
At breakfast, I don’t speak to any of the other hopefuls, instead keeping my head down to linger over porridge and tea, gleaning what I can about my rivals.
From their conversations, they all seem pretty concerned with who is first generation, second, third, and I realise they’re all ranking each other on how we might perform in the Ordeals.
A few glance at me, but I guess I’m the outlier.
All they know is that I crossed the courtyard pretty early on, but that could have been down to Alden Locke.
I don’t fit into a clique; I didn’t go to school with any of them.
I’m an unknown and, for now, I prefer to leave it that way.
I spend the rest of the morning preparing.
I unpack my trunk, then slink up and down the stairs of Hope, counting the number of floors and closed doors.
I can’t get a sense yet of how many of us there are.
There are eight floors in Hope Hall, but I hear whispers at Gantry that many rooms sleep two or even three, with hopefuls either forming alliances with the other occupants, or marking them as rivals.
The places as scholars in Killmarth are clearly highly sought after, perhaps because they’re funded by the Crown, or perhaps because they’re limited.
I realise I am fortunate indeed to have my own bedroom and a door I can lock; at least I can sleep soundly.
But now I’ve gotten away from the Collector, I have to keep my place here.
I have to prepare and research as I usually would for any assignment.
The rest of my day between mealtimes and listening to the other hopefuls, I move like a shadow around the college, mapping it in my head.
The first rules of my training at the Collector’s hand are to familiarise myself with my surroundings, to get a sense of the exits, the resources, the pitfalls.
The castle is vast, wide corridors giving way to half-hidden staircases, to alcoves and deep window seats crowded with faded cushions.
There are four halls for scholars: Gantry, Fetlock, Godolphin and Darley as well as Hope Hall for hopefuls and Keeper’s Hall where the offices and library and the faculty reside.
The diamond-paned windows overlook the gardens laid out in levels that I ran around at dawn, leading down to the cliff edge, some obscured by hedges and wind-battered trees.
There is a trophy room in Fetlock, one of the other halls, filled with cabinets.
It’s set just off the main corridor, and as no one is around, I take my time searching the shields and cups, faint hope flaring in my chest. There are lots of mentions of first-generation hopefuls going on to be commended as scholars, and I wonder if my last name will be amongst them, but it’s not anywhere.
A ‘Winter’ briefly snags my gaze, but as soon as I see it is not ‘DeWinter’, my heart sinks and I leave the room, disappointed.
Perhaps it will not be as simple as I thought to find evidence of their time here.
I’m not even sure what I expect would happen if I did find something.
Either way, they are gone. It’s possible that even the markings of their time here are no more than past dreams and dust.
There is even an old chapel to the gods, a smattering of candles burning in the corners, pale wax dripping down their sides.
I light one, placing it by a depiction of Gallant the fair and wise as he strikes unseen foes in the storm-coloured clouds, a spear crackling with lightning in his hands, gold light flaring around his form.
I don’t worship as they do in Alloway, but I’ve always had a soft spot for Gallant.
Every story in the Attestations of the gods of our world show Gallant being a force for good and for the people.
Aline is always by her hearth, and Argus seems to have a liking for killing and meting out justice.
But in this chapel, they’re depicted in a way I do not often see, in vivid colours, Aline in the fields, running her hands through sheaves of corn, a glinting knife in a holder at her waist, Argus in a troubled ocean, the waves parting around him as he stands before a dark mass with glinting eyes.