“Don’t be foolish,” Ness beseeched him. “There are Divellions on your scent! Besides, there’ll be no trains this time of night. We’re safest at the Academy.”
“We’re safest in Port Dalton,” he contradicted.
Port Dalton. My heart skipped a beat. Home. That was what I’d wanted all along. Wasn’t it?
“We need to catch the first train out of here tomorrow,” Sam decided.
Ness wavered. “If you really want to leave, I can’t stop you. Though, I should tell you,” she added, “I would be very sorry to see you leave.”
We fell into a pensive silence.
I listened to the crunch of leaves beneath our feet as we trekked through the moonlit woodland. Would we really leave Phoenix Holt? Surely getting away from this madness was a good thing, wasn’t it? But if I honestly felt that way, then why did my eyes start to sting? Could it really all end here? Would I never see Jaxon again? Or Ness, for that matter?
One thing I did know for sure was that, at that moment, I was grateful for the darkness, because it hid the tears that began to roll down my cheeks.
#
We arrived at Averett Academy in record time. The old building was unlit, and in the darkness, the surrounding wall was more oppressive than it had ever been, throwing long shadows across the lawn.
Sam stiffened as we approached.
“These soldiers,” he said, making air quotations around the word ‘soldiers’, “you do realise that they’re out to get me?”
“No.” Ness shook her head adamantly. “I assure you they’re not. The boys are driven by primal urges. You challenge them, and they strike back. But they will not seek you out. Not like Divellions.”
I hastily wiped the tear tracks from my cheeks, anticipating the artificial light of the manor.
“Is there any way to stop the Divellions?” I asked.
“The boys are able if need be,” Ness replied. “Although I’m hoping it won’t come to that. If we keep out of sight, then eventually the Divellions will move on.”
“Can’t we stop them?” Sam pressed. “If we’re witches, why can’t we do something about this?”
“Our power lies in potions,” Ness explained. “There are very few potions strong enough to take down a Divellion. Our best chance is with muscle. That’s the boys’ expertise.”
Sam looked crestfallen. “I’ve got muscle!”
“Not the amount we’d need, dear.”
“Then what have we got?” he grumbled. “Potions? Flowery, lame-ass tea?”
“That’s not all,” Ness disputed as we made our way towards the manor. “There is one other power a Ballester has. We call it the link. Every one of us has a built-in tracking chip, if you will. An inherent link that connects us all to one other witch. It’s a natural skill passed down through the ages.”
“Like a navigation device?” I offered.
Ness chortled. “Yes. But a natural one.” She gazed wistfully at the stars above. “Have you ever been sure about a person’s whereabouts, even though it’s impossible for it to be so? Every Ballester is linked. My link was Wilber, and his was me. That’s why, I suppose, we could never truly lose contact. I always knew where he was, in a roundabout sort of way.”
I frowned. “I think it must have skipped a generation, because I don’t—”
“Sophie,” said Sam.
“What?”
“No. Sophie,” he repeated, sounding amazed. “I always know where you are. I can’t explain it, and it’s not exact, but I always know. That’s why I wasn’t worried when you went missing from school the other day. I just knew you were heading back to the cottage. It’s something I’ve been able to do for as long as I can remember.”
Ness chuckled. “Didn’t you ever think to question it?”
“No. I just thought I was, like, really smart.”
Ness smiled broadly. “That’s it, then. Sophie is your link.”
I’m his link? I massaged my temples. So, I’m a link now? And why don’t I have this super psychic link power thing? I barely know how to find myself, let alone someone else.
Ness heaved the main doors open and ushered us into the school.
We bundled into the candlelit reception area. The vast stairway was ahead of me, and the two lower-floor corridors were to either side.
I took a moment to compose myself. But there wasn’t much time for respite, because Mr. Garret came charging down the staircase like a torpedo.
“What’s the word?” he asked, joining us at the foot of the stairs.
Even in the weak lighting, I noticed that his complexion was sallow and one of his tufts of snowy hair was standing a little askew.
“No sign of Divellions,” Ness reported. “But I’d rather be safe than sorry.”
“Quite right,” said Mr. Garret. He pushed his glasses up along the bridge of his nose. “I did say, didn’t I, Ness, that the children should be told. It wasn’t right that they didn’t know. I said that, didn’t I?”
“And I told you that I would not go against Wilber’s wishes,” Ness shot back.
Mr. Garret grew flustered. “Yes. Quite right. Of course.” Evidently he struggled with confrontation.
“Though I’m not sure you were so eager to abide by those wishes, Mr. Garret,” Ness remarked. “Sophie already knew about the Divellions from your lesson.”
My teacher groped for a defence. “I was under the impression that it was only the witchcraft we were not to disclose.”
Is everyone in on this secret? I wondered, dazed. It seemed that the only person who didn’t know who I was, was me. And perhaps Sam.
As Ness and Mr. Garret talked shop, something caught my eye. It was a figure, concealed amidst the web of shadows. I hadn’t noticed him before, but Jaxon was standing rigid, halfway up the staircase. He gripped the banister with one hand.
Our eyes met.
In that brief instant, I felt as though I’d shared everything with him. Somehow I knew he was able to see far beyond my eyes. He saw straight through me, decoding what I’d held inside: the panic, the remorse, the desperation…
I resisted the urge to run to him.
But I couldn’t bring myself to look away. I was frozen. Only he existed to me. The rest of the world had dissolved away. Somehow he gave me comfort beyond words.
At least, until Ness placed her hand on my arm, jolting my attention back to her as if I’d been struck with a taser.
My breath caught in my throat.
“Sophie, dear,” Ness said kindly, unaware of Jaxon’s presence. “I’ll show you to your bedchamber. And Sam,” she said, motioning to him, “you, too. You’ll all be sharing a room tonight. Todd’s already there.”
The words scarcely registered with me, but I trailed behind as Ness, Sam, and Mr. Garret walked side by side upstairs. As we passed Jaxon, Ness gave him a fleeting smile, but nobody spoke. I glanced back at him, hoping for further reassurance—but this time, I only saw dread in his eyes.
Chapter Nine
Whispers in the Night
I dragged my fold-out camp bed across the room, repositioning it as far away from Sam and Todd’s beds as possible. Fortunately, the bedchamber that Ness had selected for us was large enough to allow for such a thing. It was more or less how I’d envisioned a manor house bedroom to be: spacious, with high ceilings and ornate furnishings. Above our heads hung a chandelier light fixture, although it wasn’t particularly glamorous because three of the bulbs were missing and the one that remained flickered erratically, illuminating the cobwebs that spun from it.
Before our arrival, someone had offloaded the three camp beds into our room, along with a couple of ratty-looking sleeping bags and pillows, and what appeared to be a box of surplus camping equipment: a torch minus the batteries, a mini saucepan, and half a dozen tent pegs.
Yeah. Thanks.
I hadn’t had a chance to explore the manor, but it was plain to see that the Academy was enormous. On the way to our designated bedroom, I was astoun
ded by the endless chain of closed doors. Ness singled out a couple of bathrooms and a kitchenette, and suggested that we make ourselves at home. Once we were safely inside our bedroom confines, however, we opted to stay put, not exactly jazzed on the idea of socialising.
Alas, cabin fever set in faster than any of us had expected.
We tried to go to sleep, but mostly, Sam and Todd bickered amongst themselves. I imagined they were both too wired for sleep. I, on the other hand, lay on my slender camp bed, staring up at the dismal ceiling, generally in shock.
Over the past few weeks, my life had changed beyond recognition. So much so that I wasn’t even sure who I was anymore. My world had turned upside down, and I knew it would never restore itself. At least, not to how it had once been. I felt like I was floating through some strange gravityless planet, longing for someone to lasso me back down to solid ground.
Who am I?
“Ow!” Todd wailed from across the room.
Oh, that’s right. I was a sister. I sighed wearily.
“I didn’t touch you!” Sam protested.
“You kicked me!” Todd whined.
“I didn’t kick you! I nudged you.”
“With your foot!”
I sighed again, louder this time. “Can’t you both just go to sleep? It’s late.”
“I’m trying,” Todd complained. “Sam keeps kicking me.”
“So move your beds farther apart,” I grumbled.
In the darkness of the room I heard a scuffling, followed by another yelp from Todd.
I pulled my pillow over my head, but it did little to block out the fracas.
“What’s your problem?” Todd yelled.
“What’s yours?” Sam retorted.
“I didn’t do anything!”
Sam laughed, acrimoniously. “Oh, didn’t you? Didn’t you?”
“What did I do?” Todd protested.
“Go to sleep,” I implored them. “Now’s not the time.”
To my surprise, my request was followed by a few minutes of blissful peace. I should have known not to trust it.
“How would I know what you did?” Sam said lightly, returning to the dialogue as though there’d never been a pause. “I’m not the one who you share your secrets with.”
Oh no, I thought. Not now.
Todd was silent.
“Nothing to say?” Sam noted. “Bet if Wilber was here you’d talk to him. That’s how it was, wasn’t it?”
“I-I-,” Todd stammered.
“Yeah, that’s right,” Sam interrupted. “The cat’s out of the bag. The whale’s out of the aquarium. The goose is out of the—”
“Okay, I get it!” Todd cried.
Another silence.
I found myself wondering how that sentence would have ended. I considered asking, until I saw Sam’s silhouette sitting upright.
“Is it true?” he demanded. “Did you really know?”
“It’s not what you think,” Todd replied. He was sitting upright now, too.
“Oh, really?” Sam scoffed. “Did you, or did you not, know that we were witches?”
Todd hung his head. “Yes,” he said quietly. “I knew.”
For a second, I couldn’t believe my ears. It was true. Todd had known all along.
“Then why the hell didn’t you tell us?” Sam exploded. “I’m your brother!”
“Wilber asked me not to. He made me swear.”
“So?” Sam spluttered. “I’m your brother! And it was my right to know, anyway. This isn’t just about you and Wilber.”
I lay in my bed, watching the scene play out. I didn’t feel betrayed like Sam did, but I was certainly confused. There had to be some sort of explanation.
“Why didn’t Wilber tell us, too?” I asked.
“He didn’t tell me,” Todd clarified. “Well, not really. I kind of found out by accident.”
Sam and I waited for him to continue.
“Do you remember the Orionids a couple of years ago?”
Huh? I wrinkled my nose. The Orion-who?
Even in the diffused light, I could see that Sam’s expression mirrored my own.
“You mean, like, the cookies?” Sam asked.
Todd carried on, “No. It’s a meteor shower. I stayed up late and took my telescope onto the roof to watch for it. Anyway, at about three in the morning, I heard mumbling coming from Wilber’s study. I thought it was odd for him to be awake at that time of night, so I climbed down to the ledge to get a closer look. The study window was open, and I heard Wilber on the phone to someone called Ness. At first I thought maybe he had a girlfriend or something—”
“Eww!” Sam and I groaned in unison.
“Right,” Todd went on, “but then I heard him talking about spells and witchcraft. Anyway, I ended up listening to the whole conversation. Normally I don’t like to eavesdrop, but I couldn’t help it. I thought he’d lost his mind. He was rambling on about a phoenix spell, or something like that. And he kept saying the name Jesse. Get Jesse. Give Jesse another chance…”
Jesse, I thought, and frowned. Where have I heard that name recently?
“The worst part was,” Todd continued, “by the time the phone call was over, Wilber was sobbing. I didn’t know what to do. I mean, he was crying. I had to do something. So I climbed through the window and told him I’d heard everything. After that, he opened up to me. We talked all night, actually. He told me about his sister, Ness, and his mother, Sulinda. He told me about Phoenix Holt, and he told me that we, the Ballesters, were witches.”
“And you didn’t think to tell us?” Sam challenged, though his voice had less of an edge to it now.
“I wanted to tell you! I wanted to wake you up and tell you there and then. Both of you,” Todd added. “But Wilber begged me not to. He said it was too risky. He was worried that Sam might do something reckless, and he couldn’t bear to lose him. He couldn’t bear to lose any of us. He made me promise that I’d forget all about it.”
“And did you?” I asked.
“Of course I didn’t! It was all I could think about. But as the years passed, I let it fade to the back of my mind. In a naïve way, I never thought it would come up again, until…” he trailed off.
“Until we moved here,” I finished for him.
Sam let out a long breath, then flopped back onto his camp bed.
It was a while before any of us spoke again.
Sam was the first to break the hush. “I’m still mad at you for lying to me,” he said to Todd.
“I know.”
“And I’m also kind of mad at you for telling Ness that we’d been in her apothellcary room,” he added.
“Apothecary,” Todd corrected. “I had to. She was worried.”
“Actually, Todd, you’ve been double crossing me a lot lately,” Sam mused. “For starters, I know you took my last pair of clean socks.”
“I did not!”
“Oh,” Sam drawled. “So they sprouted legs and walked onto your feet, did they?”
As the boys debated back and forth, I closed my eyes. I didn’t know what to think. I wished Wilber had told me these things himself. I wished he was there to tell me them now. But more than anything, I wished that I could wake up to find that this had all been just a bad dream.
#
As the hours passed by, I was still no closer to sleep. I’d tossed and turned, punched my pillow, counted sheep—all the classics. And yet, I was more awake than I had been three hours earlier. But what incensed me most of all was that Sam and Todd both slept soundly on their side of the room. Their ability to shut off their minds so easily baffled me beyond words.
By the time I’d reached my umpteenth pillow punch, I knew the game was up. I untangled myself from my sleeping bag and sat upright.
Having not had the chance to pack an overnight bag, I was restricted to the stiff pair of jeans and a now-creased white top that I’d been trying to sleep in. I combed my fingers through my hair, doing my best to untangle the tendrils.
Or so I’d thought.
I crept out of my bedroom and my hands flew to my mouth.
Jaxon stood in the hallway, with what I was suddenly able to recognise as the bearing and stance of a soldier. There was a small oil lamp at his feet casting a wavering and subdued orange glow.
“What are you doing out here?” I asked, quietening my voice and closing the bedroom door behind me.
We were alone in the dimly lit corridor. It was the sort of late-night meeting that many would consider ‘too perfect’—a cloak-and-dagger sort of time reserved for illicit lovers and secret rendezvous, where the darkness liberates reticent hearts.
“Are you okay?” Jaxon asked. His voice was low and careful.
“I don’t know,” I replied honestly.
For a short while, we were silent.
“I don’t know who I am,” I elaborated at last.
Jaxon smiled, although his expression seemed guarded. “I know who you are, Sophie.”
I gazed at the planked floor beneath my feet. “Do you know… what I am?”
He thought about it for a moment. “Yes. Do you know what I am?” he returned the question.
“I know that you’re some kind of soldier,” I replied. “Do you know that I’m a…” I struggled to spit out the awful word, “witch?”
“Yes.”
I studied his face. It held no judgment or shock of any kind. His scar crossed the bridge of his nose and disappeared into the shadows on his jaw.
“Doesn’t it bother you?” I questioned.
“No.”
“I keep thinking there must be some mistake.” I searched his expression for answers. “I’m not a witch.”
He met my eyes but said nothing.
I leaned back against the wall. “At least, I didn’t think I was. And now, I find out that there are Divellions hunting me—”
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