28. The Pact
The Pact
Ididn’t end up sleeping much.
I set three magical alarms, and passed out on top of Bones’s duvet for a few hours before three different magical alarms went off, one of which transfigured one of Bones’s footstools into a tall, matronly-dressed skeleton with a pumpkin for a head that shook me vigorously when I tried to doze back off, and eventually resorted to torture.
I’d known I would need more than the usual alarms that morning.
I’d promised Miranda I’d meet her right after breakfast in her and Jolie’s rooms in Valarian.
I wasn’t about to screw that up, not after she’d taken that first step to come to me, taking the chance I wouldn’t be willing to make amends.
I hadn’t fully admitted to myself just how much I’d missed her and Draken.
I’d missed Miranda especially, and not only because she’d been my roommate and one of my first friends in Magique.
I’d missed her.
I’d missed her obsession with primals and rare magical creatures, her adorable and utterly unique clothing style, her inability to keep her room tidy, her artwork, her never-ending optimism, her fierceness, and most of all her empathy and her warmth.
Loneliness nearly suffocated me after Bones melted through that wall.
I’d been feeling pretty damned lonely for a while now.
I knew I had no one but myself to blame, but knowing that didn’t help.
In any case, I refused to be late, even if I was barely conscious.
Breakfast began at seven o’clock on Saturdays.
On Sunday, it started at eight and went until eleven, but on Saturday it began two hours earlier and ended at nine.
I tried to let myself sleep from about five until eight-twenty, but I struggled to get out of bed at the first cacophony of alarms. I finally forced myself up at eight-thirty-five, when the skeleton began banging pots and pans together it must have found in the kitchen.
I’d fashioned the spell to be utterly ruthless when I cast it the night before.
I staggered into the shower, and stood with my eyes closed under the hot water.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to stay in there as long as I wanted, either.
I’d only stood there for maybe four minutes when the skeleton began making noise in the other room, and I worried it might tear up the kitchen if I didn’t get out soon. I smacked my cheeks a few times, turned off the water, and wrapped one of Bones’s huge, gold-colored towels around my body.
Exactly seventeen minutes later, I jerked open the glass door on the east side of the tower, my reddish-gold wings strapped on my back.
I knew I could probably walk to Valarian and still catch Mir and Draken as they were heading back up to the dormitory floors.
They would wait for me, especially given how late they left last night, but I didn’t want to be anything even approximating late, and it took over fifteen minutes just to get from the top of the tower to the glass doors on the east end of the south corridor.
I wouldn’t get there until at least nine-thirty, and that wasn’t going to work for me.
It was the last thought in my head before I jumped out the window, gasping a little in those few seconds before my wings caught the air and I soared upwards again.
I angled them into a swooping turn to get around Malcroix Mansion’s main tower, and straightened my flightpath once I could see Valarian just past the first years’ college, all its windows shining with sunlight.
I’d forgotten everything, I realized.
I’d brought no books, no bag, no food, no water, not even the invisibility charm Alaric gave me that I hadn’t left the tower without in over four months.
I didn’t even think to grab the snake bracelet Bones gave me and wrap it around my wrist. I wore a silky green tank top that clung to my upper body, because I’d had the presence of mind to remember it was supposed to be hot that day, loose beige trousers, a belt, Bones’s cat ring, and sandals.
I’d remembered to feed Wraith, at least, but I knew she’d be peeved when I came back to the tower and smelled like Jolie, Draken, and Miranda and she hadn’t been invited.
Next time, I promised myself silently.
I swooped around in a curve to reach the back entrance to Valarian.
The fewer people who knew I was here, the better.
Right as I landed lightly on the grass near the steep row of steps, I heard the bells chime inside for the end of the morning meal.
I was packing up my wings, folding them into the kind of backpack shape they formed when they weren’t in use, when the door opened in front of me, and a group of students piled out, all of them laughing.
They stopped dead when they saw me, and stared.
I stared back, feeling the blood drain from my face.
It was Nicolai Panzen, or “Pants,” as everyone called him, Scarpen Maskey, better known as “Scar,” Norrick Voltaire, nephew of the headmaster who just got ousted for being a member of Dark Cathedral, Christian Orrin, who I’d once gone on a horrific date with as a first year, Vlad Mordopast, another royal with Dark Cathedral ties, and Elysia Warrington, Bone’s ex-girlfriend.
I knew every one of them.
None of my experiences with any of them had ever been good.
I probably felt the warmest towards Elysia, or the least hostility anyway, which was laughable considering she’d probably stab out my eye as soon as look at me.
I knew Bones had some fondness towards her, so maybe that was it.
Or maybe it was simply because she hadn’t actually tried to stab me yet, and a number of the mages in front of me actually had tried to hurt me in one way or another, some of them more than once.
“Well,” Norrick said, stepping heavily down the steep steps on black, thick-soled boots. “What have we here? I haven’t seen this little mongrel in an owl’s age.”
His eyes gleamed with excitement as he looked at me, and alarm bells immediately went off.
I stepped back, and shook off the wings I’d just taken off, gripping the strap in one hand.
I knew they had me, though, as far as that went.
There was no way I’d be able to get the wings back on and take off in time to keep them from dragging me back down to the ground.
I took another handful of steps backwards as Pants, Scar, and Christian, and Mordopast ran quickly down the steps to join Norrick.
Only Elysia stayed at the top of the stairs. She frowned and scowled in my direction like I smelled bad, and the odor offended her sensibilities even from ten feet away. Even so, I found myself looking at her, seeing her as my own hope for any kind of assistance.
I don’t know what look I had on my face, but something in it caused her to avert her gaze. She stared off to the side, her eyes stony, her thin arms folded. If she felt any misgivings about the five royals coming for me, it didn’t show in her expression.
She seemed to be making it clear she wasn’t going to do anything about it.
ALARIC! I called out frantically, using my mind. ALARIC! I NEED HELP! GET HELP! Thinking, I switched tacks. CORVID! I’M AT VALARIAN!
I’d never used Blackstone’s first name before, not ever.
I hoped, if anything, it might annoy him enough to pay attention.
I was still backing up, and now I was moving faster.
I didn’t want to turn my back on them, but I broke into a half-jog, half-run, doing my best to widen the distance between us so I could get the wings back on my back. I gripped them in both hands without taking my eyes off the five mages, and tried to unfold them.
Which is probably what caused Norrick and Pants to rush me.
I panicked, and sped my legs, and the combination of moving backwards, trying to keep my eyes on them, and trying to get the wings functioning, ended up being too much.
I stumbled, tripping over a loose rise of earth and grass.
The field fell into a slope behind Valarian College, a slope that overlooked the Faerie River.
The path to the bridge was further down, closer to Grathrock, where it was less steep.
Here it was just thick, tall grass, slippery in the remnants of morning dew, dotted all over with wildflowers and mole burrows and granite rocks.
I slid partway down the slope, and the wings got knocked out of my hands. I grasped for them, trying to catch hold of the slippery feathers, but they got caught on something and I missed before I was down to the next flat area in the field.
I got back to my feet at once, as soon as I stopped sliding, but it was already too late.
The five mages had run when they saw me fall, galloping down the hill to meet me there when I wrenched myself back to my feet. I had my hand up, poised for a mudra, which is probably the only reason they hadn’t rushed me yet.
I fought to think of a spell, something that might work on all five of them at once. I had things that would definitely deal with one of them, possibly even two of them, but five wasn’t something I’d trained for.
Someone I knew had trained for those odds, though.
BONES! I grasped for his presence, feeling for any hint of him left over in my magic from the previous night. BONES! WHAT DO I DO? THERE ARE FIVE OF THEM! HELP ME! I NEED HELP!
Like with Alaric and Blackstone, only silence answered.
PROFESSOR QUICKSILVER–– I tried next.
“Here, kitty, kitty,” Norrick cajoled, grinning at me with his wide, doughy face. He lifted a finger, beckoning me closer. “Let us have some fun, now.”
Scar began circling me from the other direction, a smirk toying at the edges of his lips. “Listen to your betters, mongrel. You must be lonely without Bones’s cock around to suck. We’ll won’t hurt you too bad, if you play nice…”
Pants burst out in a high-pitched laugh.
Christian Orrin, my ill-fated date, grinned at the other three, bouncing on his feet. “You have no idea how long I’ve waited for a bit of payback with this slag,” he gloated. “I’m first. You’ve got to admit, I’ve earned it more.”