CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“GOOD NEWS! GOOD NEWS!” PROFESSOR Ilaria sang throughout the philosophy annex.
For the indeterminate future, James was suspended from lectures, yet he couldn’t escape her.
Her clanging bells woke up slumbering students dorm after dorm.
“Apollōn lives! He will remain within Alexandrius to conquer the Mayrath Seas! Come, let us rehearse!”
It was barely three in the morning and James groaned.
“Violinist Ten! Cellist Five! Lutist one! Prepare the strings!”
James set aside his eulogy before his doors burst with the professor of theater and her wake of smoldering sages and ballistic bells.
As always, before early rehearsals and run-throughs, she bowed deeply, and she kissed his silver rings on his hand with untamed glee.
Then, she delicately placed her lips on his open palm.
She laid a kiss on his cheek by each side of his mouth.
She ran her fingers over the rings with unrepressed delight. “I did it for you.”
James detested whenever anyone touched his rings, Elliott gave them to him.
Beside him, Elliott snored on the mattress, exhausted.
He had the perfect cowlick in his dark hair.
It fell on his brow with unintended careless perfection.
He was in the kind of deep slumber where not even clangorous bells could wake him.
Elliott had vanished all day and he never told James where he’d been, which was rare for him. Elliott could usually never shut up about where he was.
James had to ask Roslyn where he had been. Roslyn leaned in like it was a conspiracy, and she whispered, complicit, ‘He went searching for Lucien Montclair. He thinks Lucien is out to kill you.’
James responded, ‘Lucien won’t kill me. He might try, but he won’t manage it. I’m proficient with a knife.’
‘That’s what I said. Elliott told me you hunt in the countryside every year. Ginger snaps?’
“Oh!” Professor Ilaria gasped at the pair, not expecting the sleeping Elliott. “Am I interrupting?”
James lifted his fatigued eyes. “I take it I am not expelled?”
“You were spared! Provost Tytheridge has sanctioned your continued erudition at AEscwulf College. He authorized your pivotal role in The Paean of the Villains of Winter. He’ll be in the front row!”
“Shit.”
“Merda!” Professor Ilaria corrected on her way out.
Despite the developments, James was cheerier than ever. James sipped from his monogrammed JVW IV mug. His blood teemed with untamed excitement. James would be reunited with his mother soon. He only had one list of items left to attend to.
Bid Finch Hudskin farewell.
Entrust his belongings to Elliott, Kitty, and Finch.
Deliver his eulogy to everyone.
Kill the provost. Kill the provost. Kill the provost.
Die at last.