Killing November

by Adriana Mather

  Families—there’s that word again. When I questioned Layla about it, she acted like I was being intentionally annoying. Conner clearly assumes I know what it means, too, and I’m not sure I want him to know that I don’t. I nod as if I’m following.

  “All students have the same required core classes,” Conner says. “And the choice of special electives like accents, martial arts, coding, boxing, archery, and horticulture. While levels of specific skills vary within each year of students, there is a strict divide between the elemental-level students in their first two years and the advanced-level students. If an elemental-level student cannot transition properly to advanced-level expectations, they are not permitted to stay.” Conner pauses in a way that makes me think he wants me to understand the gravity of his words.

  “And because I’m seventeen, I’m guessing I’m in my third year and therefore an advanced-level student?” I say.

  “You are. Now, we’ve been assured that your physical skills are sufficient. But the core class that links everything we do here is history. Unfortunately, you have missed two and a half years of lessons that not only reveal the stories of the original Families but also analyze the major historical events they influenced. It’s the strategy discussed in the context of these historical events that will shape your education here. Headmaster Blackwood only hopes that your tutors have been good enough that you do not slow down the other students. As I said, excellence is a must.”

  History Is the Teacher of Life now makes perfect sense as the school motto. Also, I’m pretty sure my dad would kill me if he spent a ton of money to safeguard me in a remote private school only to have me sent home because I failed some cryptic history class. I rub my hands together. “And if I wanted to do some independent studying just in case? Is there a book I could read or something?”

  Conner frowns for so long that I cough in the hope that the sound will make him stop staring. “I fear that if you don’t realize there’s no written record of that history, it may be altogether impossible for you to survive here with the other students.”

  The word survive sends a chill through me. So I laugh. I laugh because I’m good at it, because it’s been my lifelong go-to in order to make people feel at ease, and because I get the distinct impression that I just revealed my hand and need to recover—fast. “I didn’t mean a book about Family history. I meant a book that might help me with, you know, the subtleties.”

  He huffs like he’s unsure, but the threat has disappeared from his eyes.

  “Or anything else you can think of,” I say. “I’m all ears.”

  He relaxes into the pillows behind him. “Well, now, that is something you will just have to figure out for yourself.”

  I open my mouth to respond but catch myself. What a jerk.

  Dr. Conner stands. “Now if you’ll follow me, I have one final thing for you to do this morning.”

  I get up off the plush couch and push my braid over my shoulder.

  Conner pulls two chairs away from the wall and sets them up facing each other. I wait for him to sit down, but he doesn’t. Instead, he straightens his vest and stands behind the chair on the right. “Sit, please, in whichever seat you like.”

  The chair he’s not standing behind would put my back to the door. I don’t know if it’s a feng shui thing or not, but it’s always bugged me to sit with my back to an exit. However, there’s no way I’m going to sit in the seat he’s standing two inches behind. I glance around, and instead of choosing, I sit on the floor with my back against the wall where the chairs originally stood.

  I don’t bother to explain my actions and he doesn’t ask. No “I gave you a choice” speech this time, either. He just jots down more notes.

  After a moment, Conner hands me a piece of paper with eight squares of color on it. “Please mark each color with a number, one being your favorite and eight being your least favorite. No need to overthink it. Just choose which colors you enjoy the most.”

  I stare at him. First all those odd questions, and now a color test?

  Conner offers me a pen and a pencil.

  I take the pencil and mark a 1 next to yellow and a 2 next to green. They remind me of the sun and the trees and are exactly the opposite of being in this gloomy gray building. I mark a 3 next to red and the pencil breaks in my hand; the entire point comes off. I look up at Conner, who is watching me carefully and without surprise. He makes no effort to offer me the pen or a different pencil.

  Is he waiting to see if I’ll ask for help? Screw that. I stick the pencil in my mouth and bite into the wood. Then I pull bits of it off with my fingernails until the exposed lead forms a crude tip and I continue marking the colors. Conner watches my every move.

  I stand up when I’m finished and hand it back to him.

  He nods at the paper, like it’s telling him things he already knows. “You may go,” he says over his shoulder as he walks back to his desk.

  “Can I ask you something?” I say. “Was that food you offered me okay to eat?”

  Conner turns around and pulls a small vial of something from his blazer. “The antidote,” he says, and smiles.

  I stare at him in horror. I figured the food might be part of the assessment, but I didn’t actually predict that the guy who’s been charged with making sure I acclimate here was going to poison me.

  He takes a seat at his desk. “And now you must go,” he says. “I have a schedule to keep.”

  I grab the door latch. I can’t get out of his office fast enough.

  I RUN MY fingertips along the cold, uneven stone walls as I follow Layla down the stairs in silence. I asked her about the seat choice and the pencil thing, but she only asked me what actions I took. Which in turn had me wondering what information I would be giving away if I told her. So I shut up.

  Layla leads me through the tapestry-lined foyer I walked through last night on my way to Blackwood’s office. She stops in front of a broad wooden door and a young guard opens it. The guard is dressed in the same leather armbands and leather belt that the guys who escorted me to my room last night wore.

  “Thanks,” I say as I pass the guard, but she doesn’t respond. I grumble under my breath.

  My upset disappears, though, the moment my boot touches the soft grass in the rectangular courtyard. The temperature instantly drops, but not as harshly as I would expect for December. Of course the inside temperatures are lower than I’m used to, so I might not notice the difference the way I normally would. The humidity feels similar to home, which doesn’t tell me much about where I am, considering that many parts of Europe have winter climates comparable to what I have in Pembrook. And the air is thick with the earthy smell of damp soil and moss that’s reminiscent of being deep in a forest.

  The perimeter is lined by ancient oak trees with enormous trunks, which doesn’t give me any clues, since oaks are also common throughout Europe and North America. But despite the lack of info I can glean from them, they are stunning. Their tops have been carefully groomed to create a dense arched canopy over the entire space, dappling the light on the ground. Thick vines hang from the branches at a variety of lengths, making the whole thing a Peter Pan–esque fantasy jungle gym.

  I run my hand along one of the vines and give it a tug. “I guess this place isn’t all bad,” I say between dry lips, realizing my mouth has been hanging open as I’ve been taking it all in. Catching flies, as Emily would say.

  “This courtyard is used as part of our athletics program, and it’s strictly forbidden to climb the vines without an instructor present,” Layla says, squarely putting the kibosh on my desire to shinny up them. But even she can’t completely dampen this moment for me.

  “When is that class?” I ask.

  “Tomorrow,” she says.

  “For juniors and seniors, or for everyone?” I take a deep breath, enjoying the scent of freshly cut grass and b
ark.

  “We don’t use grade standings like that. Fifteen- and sixteen-year-olds are considered elemental. Seventeen- and eighteen-year-olds are advanced,” she says. “And we don’t share classes with the younger students. Generally, they have a lighter schedule than we do, giving them more time for practice.”

  I nod. That fits with everything Conner told me. “Question: If everything here is so secret, how do people apply for college? I’m guessing there are no transcripts from this place.”

  Layla looks at me like my question is ridiculous. “If we go to college.”

  “Why go to a prep school described as only admitting the best if you don’t plan on going to college?” I ask.

  “And why waste four years studying inane subjects in college when you could just say you went and be done with it?” she counters.

  My eyes widen. So then this isn’t some bizarre supplementary prep school with a focus on survival skills, like I thought. It’s the only education these kids seem to think they need. But what kind of a career can you possibly plan on having if your main skill sets are in weapons, history, and deception? Spies? Assassins? Secret service? I want to think I’m wrong and that Dad would never send me here if that were the case, but I honestly can’t understand Layla’s reply. “So what does everyone do if they don’t go to college?” I ask carefully.

  She looks at me sideways. “Whatever our Families need us to do,” she says, and turns around. “Try to keep up. We still have a lot to cover.”

  I follow her to a gap in the wall of trees, trying to figure out if there is a better way for me to ask what I want to know without getting a cryptic answer or frustrating her. The part that’s making me most uncomfortable is that from what I’ve heard and seen today, this doesn’t seem like the type of place where you pop in for two weeks and leave. I’m now convinced that my dad omitted something important, and I really don’t like the uneasy feeling I’m experiencing as a result.

  We pass through an arched doorway formed from vines and into a garden bursting with color. It, too, has a thick tree canopy, well groomed like the last. Only, instead of vines for climbing, this courtyard is decorated with garlands of royal purple berries and white flowers. Purple profusion berries, if I remember correctly from the plant books I’ve always hoarded and refused to let Dad donate to the library. Giant, moss-covered rocks have been sculpted into benches, and blue, purple, and white flowers are arranged in intricate patterns.

  “The garden lounge,” Layla says with pride. “Students are allowed to spend free time here during daylight hours. The snow can’t easily make its way through the thick tree canopy, and since there is a hot spring that runs under the school, we get to enjoy the flowers nearly all year round.”

  Off the top of my head I know that the UK, France, Iceland, Germany, and Italy all have hot springs, and I’m sure there are more that I don’t even know about, so again the school gives nothing away about its location.

  “This place is phenomenal,” I say, breathing in the sweet flowery air. But I can’t fully enjoy it because I’m still hung up on the spy/assassin worry and my dad.

  “We have a resident horticulturist who teaches an elective in botany and also works with our poisons teacher,” Layla says. “He never plants anything lethal in here, though,” she adds, registering the look of concern that I’m sure flashed across my face. “That greenhouse is located in the outer perimeter.”

  “The outer perimeter?” I ask.

  “Between the school and the outermost wall,” Layla says. “Only select faculty members have access to it. It’s also where the food is grown and the dairy cows and hens are kept.” She points to another archway visible through the wall of trees. “Through that way is an open field. There’s an archery class in there right now.”

  “By open, do you mean with no tree canopy?” I ask.

  She shakes her head. “All outdoor space is camouflaged. There are even trees planted on the school’s roofs, and vines on its walls.”

  I blink at her, and for the first time it really sinks in that I’m in an ancient building no one knows the location of, with no easy way for me to contact the outside world. “And that’s to…keep the locals from spying on us, or to hide us from airplanes?”

  “Actually,” Layla says, looking skyward, “they say there’s a kind of high-tech camouflage netting that encases the school and reflects radar, making the entire building nearly undetectable and appear like nothing more than a hill.”

  I’m now convinced that whatever Dad was trying to protect me from by sending me here must be really dangerous. Which only makes me worry about him and Aunt Jo. I’m seriously regretting not pushing harder to make him tell me the specifics.

  Layla heads for the archway she just pointed at and waves her hand for me to follow.

  And I do. “I thought you just said there was a class in there?”

  “I did,” she says, and enters the next courtyard with me right behind her.

  I gasp.

  To our left, five students in identical stances brandish bows and arrows. Behind them, another ten or so await their turn. And to our right is a wall affixed with wooden targets, not bull’s-eyes but a series of Xs no bigger than a quarter.

  “Release!” says a wiry woman with high cheekbones. She wears an all-black version of the outfit we’re wearing.

  Five arrows whiz past us so fast that I feel the wind on my face. They securely lodge in the top line of Xs. Not one is amiss.

  “Easy enough,” says the teacher.

  I swallow. I can’t believe how good they all are.

  “Now try it with movement,” the teacher says, and I detect a French accent.

  One of the archers steps a few feet in front of the rest, and his gaze makes me just as uncomfortable as it did when I talked to him earlier—Ash. He gives Layla and me a knowing grin and spins a leg out to the side in a fast kick as he releases an arrow in midair. It not only lands in an X, it hits it so perfectly it splits the X in half.

  My mouth opens. “That was incredible,” I say to Layla.

  The teacher turns and looks at me. “Since you’re talking during my class, I assume you would like to try to top that.”

  And before I can get a word out, an arrow whizzes through the air and punctures the grass at my feet. I reflexively jump backward. A bow comes next.

  “Um, I don’t—” I start.

  Layla snatches the bow and before I can finish my sentence she’s loaded and shot the arrow. She not only hits the board, she splits the arrow her brother shot in two. “It won’t happen again, Professor Fléchier,” Layla says.

  Fléchier—French for sure, but also related to Fulcher in Old English, meaning “maker of arrows.” I’m starting to realize these professors’ names must be pseudonyms, given their literal meanings.

  There’s the sound of metal hitting metal and I look back at the target board. Another arrow is lodged in the same entry point as Ash’s. The guy who shot it is tall, with hair that’s bleached white and the type of confident posture that makes it hard not to notice him. He winks at me and I smile before I can consider it.

  Layla practically pushes me back through the archway and into the flower garden. “How dare you embarrass me like that!”

  I stare at her in awe. “I’m pretty sure I embarrassed myself. You, on the other hand, split an arrow in half. And after seeing that, I’m seriously regretting having pissed you off.”

  “There are rules, alliances, manners,” Layla says, clearly annoyed with me. “You never interrupt a teacher. And especially not…Professor Fléchier is…Do something like that again and I’m demanding a roommate change.”

  I press my lips together. I’ve never seen another student get this mad about talking in class. And I’ve also never seen a teacher react like that. I’m not only out of my element here, but my instincts are all wrong. “I�
��m sorry, Layla. I really am. I’m just not used to the rules here yet.”

  Her expression relaxes a little and she straightens out her already straight cloak. “That’s the second time you’ve apologized to me today.”

  I half smile. “You’ll know it’s really bad when I start buying you presents,” I say. “My best friend used to keep an ongoing request list.”

  Layla looks at me curiously. “Let’s go,” she says in a tone that tells me she’s not really mad anymore.

  She weaves through the flower beds toward the far wall, where gray stone peeks out between the tree trunks, and pushes through a wooden door. I reluctantly leave the cushioned grass, running my hand over a tree trunk as I go. A guard shuts the door behind us. He has an odd scar above his right eyebrow in the shape of an X. Even though he doesn’t say a word, he doesn’t try to hide the fact that he’s scoping me out, either.

  Layla gestures at the high-ceilinged foyer with shields mounted on the wall and a statue of an armored knight. “We’re now in the south side of the building. These shields commemorate some of the most important achievements our Families have made—minus the past two hundred years, of course.”

  I take a good look at the shields. Conner’s comments about history play in my mind. But the last time I asked Layla about Families head-on, she got annoyed. Plus, that guard hasn’t taken his eyes off me and it’s giving me the creeps.

  “And you know who all these shields belong to?” I say as though I doubt her knowledge.

  She scoffs and points to my left. “That one represents Aśoka’s most trusted advisor, that one Alexander the Great’s lover, Julius Caesar’s aunt, Cleopatra’s best friend, Akbar’s cousin, Peter the Great’s councilor, Genghis Khan’s strategist, and Elizabeth the First’s chambermaid. Need I go on?”