Chapter 22
Twenty-Two
Morgan
Istraighten, scanning the trail like I’ve missed something. Goosebumps immediately prick my skin. I must have somehow gotten turned around and only thought I followed their tracks exactly.
Because, clearly—
People don’t disappear this way. Not unless they went lemming style off the side of the mountain, and I didn’t think we were close enough for them to miscalculate. Otherwise, there was nowhere for them to go.
Besides, Kieran does not make those kinds of mistakes. He isn’t brash and reckless. Not like me. I scan the dim light with my back pressed to the tree. Nope, they’re definitely gone.
The whisper of the wind has no secrets for me to discover anymore.
Kieran strikes me as the type who takes too much pleasure in control for a surprise to happen. He has his own secrets and he’s tight lipped about them.
Frost sinks into my bones. Only the creak of limbs overhead breaks the silence. There are no more clipped voices to follow. Panicked, I take a gulping breath and turn around to retrace my steps, the lines across my brow permanently grooved.
What do I know so far?
I know that Kieran and his buddies don’t want anyone to know what they’re doing. They met at night to avoid detection and snuck out of the castle when the mood struck.
What do they discuss? Are they trying to stay ahead of classes and hold their own training sessions?
If so, why didn’t they make use of his private gym? Surely they wouldn’t be interrupted there. Ether knows I haven’t been.
My fingertips skid across the rough bark of a gnarled aspen tree. Knots form where only smoothness should be and my touch finds the whirls inherently. I hold tight to the trunk and breathe through the adrenaline rush.
Maybe it’s a meeting of his devotees? I instantly dismiss the idea.
If that’s the case, then Evie would be right there, riding his back like Kieran is her mount. The picture in my head makes me giggle but the sound never makes it past my teeth.
Maybe they’re discussing new forms of torture, to crush those people they find lower than them.
Hmm, now, that has merit.
My blood chills further and ice pumps through my veins. I take a wide step and stumble, my fingers locking and a muscle in my thigh spasming. My breathing rushes faster on my way back up to the castle.
Without the presence of other people, even when they don’t know I’m here, the night takes on a harsher contrast, the shadows deeper and the wind hungrier. There are sounds in the darkness I hadn’t heard before and somewhere in the black sky, something roars.
I practically sprint the last several feet onto the stone terrace and press my hand to my galloping heart.
Sneaking around is going to get me killed. Note to self—do not take another midnight stroll, alone or otherwise. It’s not a good idea.
My ragged nerves wail like they’ve been flayed. I straighten and lift my chin to the sky, pinpointing several of the constellations I used to mark from home.
There is the scorpion, to the south, with a long bright curve of stars marking the tail.
And to the east a little bit, I catch the brightest star in the sky that marks the point of the warrior’s spear. Eventually, my eyes fully adjust and my lungs calm enough to fill.
I’m close enough to the castle to see the window panes and the mirror reflection of the stars winking on spotless glass. No thanks to me. But the side door I followed Kieran and Astrid out of has snapped shut in the wind.
Numb fingers require extra coercion to wrap around the handle. I pull the door open and slip inside, even the familiar coolness of the hallway almost warm compared to the night. Warmth slicks along my skin.
Tiredness presses me fully against the wall, the press of so much stone on stone caving in around me. For some reason, the ceiling of the main hall which usually soars overhead has been lowered like someone has flicked a lever.
I thought the expanse of open sky was crushing?
Now I’m buried alive.
Everything here tamps me underfoot, bug style, and I’m the roach refusing to die.
“Hurry, you fool,” I mutter.
I wasted enough time on a ridiculous errand. I need to get downstairs quickly. The hours have steadily marched toward dawn while I fooled around with my fear of the dark.
Soon the others will be up and ready to work. Breakfast has to be settled, beds made, laundry washed and monitored.
Cresting the top of the stairs to the basement doesn’t settle me. My skin is too tight and the nerves prickle and remind me with every breath that they aren’t easy to erase.
“Well.” Mrs. Milkin steps up and blocks the base of the staircase before I take my final step to safety.
We stare at each other and only one of us is breathing heavily.
“Isn’t this a surprise,” she whispers.
Caught. Out of chances.
Those two things land like twin slaps before my head fills with staticky white noise. My mouth fills with acid.
I tower over her, the stairs adding several feet to me, but Milkin is the one in control and she always has been. She holds my fate in her pudgy hands.
“I’m aware this isn’t the first time you’ve snuck out, Miss Whyte.
” She stares at me with the victory of a cat who knows she’s at last caught the fattest mouse between her paws.
“The others tell me you’re rarely in your bed at night.
Wilhelmina says you return near dawn most days of the week.
Is this why you can’t accomplish your chores? ”
There’s nothing for me to say to make this any better. I’m out of excuses.
My breath heaves out of my body but it’s the only thing that can escape. Milkin won’t accept excuses—she’s heard them all already.
“It seems to me there is nothing to do about you, unless we chain you to your bed. And I find myself opposed to the idea. I have enough to do without adding another chore to my list.”
Her glee is a palpable scent in the air when she takes a step forward and draws the edges of her white and blue flowered robe over those heaving bosoms. The fabric belt pulls tight beneath them, the seams straining.
“This was your last chance,” she says a bit louder. “I thought you understood it. We’ve been more than patient with you. At the end of the week, you’ll be sent to the mines.”
It hits me at once. There will be no more training and no more reading. Nothing but manual labor until I die from a tunnel collapse. Or worse.
Milkin must recognize the play of emotions on my face. She takes another step toward me, and her features screw up in a twisted smile, toad-like.
“I’ve heard awful things about what happens to pretty women in the mines. The stories alone would make you beg to stay here scrubbing floors.”
Milkin takes great pleasure in her ability to reduce me to silence with just words.
“You’re trying to scare me.” I hold my ground.
Her hand darts forward and yanks me off my feet, fisting in my nightdress. My feet skip over the last two steps until I land eye level with her, my ankle at an awkward angle.
“You’d be smart to take heed, girl.” Her tone borders on indignant.
If she’s planning on giving me a verbal beatdown before sending me to my doom, then I’m not going to give Milkin the satisfaction of begging for mercy. I won’t plead with her to reconsider because I’ve used up her patience to the last drop.
“I’ll be fine,” I scoff.
I know some people from Fallkirk who were sent to the mines, caught on the wrong side of one of the King’s mercenaries. Maybe I’ll be able to find them, reconnect with them.
Milkin arches a thin brow and hauls me behind her through to the maids’ quarters. Her grip is iron. “At least they’ll know exactly how to handle you there.”
“Handle me?” I throw back, stumbling. “Like I’m an animal?”
A thread of fear twangs loudly beneath the bluster. And I’m sick of staying strong through it.
Milkin stops at the threshold to the main room and lets me go abruptly. I land hard against the wall, glaring at her.
“If you’d acted your part, then I wouldn’t be forced to take these drastic measures,” she replies with a sneer. “This is on your head, missy.”
Her curls are done up on the top of her head and stuffed beneath the cage of a bonnet. She puts me in mind of a mouse woken from sleep, changed by a spell to make her full sized.
“I tried my best with you, Morgan, I truly did. You refuse to fall into line and these are the consequences of your own actions.” She draws up taller. “You have no one to blame but yourself.”
I match her expression before she sees me trembling. “Why wait until the end of the week? Send me off right now. Or do you want me to work until I bleed for this place, and then send me packing?”
“If you were a good worker, that might be the case. As it is, the only thing you do well is argue. There’s no place for your attitude here. Everyone toes the line. We work together to make this academy run smoothly. The rules are simple. You can’t even follow them. Now get to bed.”
She’s not used to being disobeyed and for a long moment, we stand there at an impasse. Neither one of us is willing to budge.
The shaking in my limbs finally gives me away. Even though Milkin won’t break eye contact, she’s somehow aware of it, every last tremble down to the way my toes curl in my ruined slippers.
“I’m not supposed to be here,” I say. My voice cracks.
There’s no softening on Milkin’s face. There is nothing to give her away or indicate any latent sympathy for me.
“We all have our place,” she repeats before turning away.
Milkin disappears, not caring what happens to me or what I do. If I snuck back out, right now, would she send someone for me? Would she let me go, not caring whether I lived or died before my departure from DragonSpear?
Deadened legs take me over to my cot, past the rows of other bunks and sleeping maids. I sag onto creaky springs and drop my head in my hands.
“You really did it now, Morgan.” Faye rolls over and regards me from her side, her guileless blue eyes like two glowing orbs in the darkness.