“Oh my god,” I say. “Why didn’t you tell us there was a cold room?”
“I didn’t know,” Ivy said. “I just guessed that there would be some room here colder than the others, and once I asked for it, he’d know which I meant, even if it wasn’t really a thing.”
“Dang,” Jaxon says, shaking his head. “That was a gutsy move.”
“I can’t believe it worked,” Krista says as she flips a switch on the wall, illuminating the lower stairs and the hallway beyond.
We all pause on the stairs, not moving down. It’s quiet here. No teachers, no students. Krista shivers and rubs her arms.
“Damn, it’s cold,” she says.
I nod in commiseration. It is definitely cooler down here than upstairs.
“No,” she says. “Really cold. It’s freezing.”
I close my eyes and take a deep inhalation through my nose, trying to focus on any unpleasant scents. There are lots of smells down here. Over everything is a scent of clean. Like someone scrubbed everything with Pledge to try and cover another smell. Under that, it’s like I walked into a pharmacy. Lots of earthy smells like plants and even...dried fish, maybe?
There really must be a room of herbs and other items down here. I try to push past it to see what else is here.
That’s when I smell it. A smell that almost makes me gag. Something dead. Something big. Something that’s been here too long.
“She’s here,” I say. “I can smell death.”
Everyone shivers, and no one makes a move down the stairs.
“I’ll go first,” Jaxon finally says, and we all let him.
“We should hurry,” Ivy says. “Mr. Hamilton will certainly ask Ms. Boucher why she sent us down here.”
“There is an herb room,” I say. “But even if we take stuff from there, Ms. Boucher won’t lie for us.”
“Then why did you say her?” Krista asks.
“I don’t know. It was just the first name that came to mind.”
“Let’s just hurry,” Jaxon says. “Ivy, there is the herb room. You and Krista grab a few things. Madison and I will keep looking for Giselle.”
Ivy nods and opens the door to the herb room. My nose is not prepared for the smack in the face I receive. I cough and wave the smells away. I can’t help but glance into the room. It looks like an old school apothecary, with tall shelves of small drawers, each clearly labeled, and open barrels of many other items, including the dried fish and other items I smelled but couldn’t identify.
“I bet the students who study traditional medicines knew about this place,” Jaxon says, “but none of us did.”
“I wonder how many more areas of the school there are that we don’t know about,” I say as we walk on after Krista and Ivy enter the herb room.
There are several other doors down the hallway, but I can tell which one is housing Giselle not only from the smell, but also from the cold emanating from the room.
“The AC must be turned down to zero,” I say, rubbing my arms, already cold before I even open the door.
“This isn’t being caused by an air conditioner,” Jaxon says. “This is magic.”
“Magic?” I ask, and Jaxon nods as he reaches out and turns the handle to the room. We both step inside.
The room is dark, but the smell of death is so strong I nearly burst into tears. But if I did, the tears would probably freeze to my cheeks, it’s so cold.
“Who could do this?” I ask Jaxon.
“A Craig witch could suck all the heat from the room,” he says as he looks around for a light switch. “Or a Grier witch could cool the air itself. Or an especially talented Brewster witch could lower the temperature of the water vapor in the air.”
“So, basically anyone except an earth witch,” I say.
“Well, that’s not true,” he says as he flips a switch. “We could probably cool the earth surrounding the room, but that might be a little more limited depending on how many walls and floors are touching earth.”
The room is empty except for herbs on the shelves, but there’s another door deeper in the room. I pull on it, but it’s stuck.
Jaxon comes to my side. “I can open it, but once I do, we have to be quick.”
I nod, and Jaxon uses his magic to create an earthly vibration that cracks the ground around the door. As the earth splits, the building resettles and the door pops open.
“Clev—” I begin, but an alarm sounds.
Ivy rushes up beside us, while Krista runs back to the door to keep a lookout.
“You triggered a natural disaster alarm, Jax!”
“We needed to get in,” he says. He flips on the switch, revealing a large walk-in closet, and everyone gasps.
Giselle is lying on a table in the middle of the room. My hand flies to my mouth. I can’t believe her body is here, in the basement of the school, like some kind of morgue. Her dark skin contrasts with the cold sterile light of the room, giving her a sickly pale pallor. She’s wearing what looks like a white hospital gown and is covered with a white sheet.
“This...this is wrong,” I finally mutter. “She shouldn’t be here.”
“That’s one hell of an understatement,” Jaxon says. “But...we need to do more than look at her. We need to find evidence she was killed.”
He takes my hand, and I notice that he’s much warmer than I am. I let his warmth bring feeling back into my fingers as he leads me toward Giselle. I can’t help but suck in a breath once we are both standing next to her.
“I’m so sorry this happened to you,” I whisper to her.
“So...what do we do now?” Jaxon asks.
I shake my head. “I have no idea. I’m not a medical examiner. I don’t know what I was expecting to find.”
Giselle’s body suddenly sits up. I scream. Jaxon slaps his hand over my mouth.
“What is it?” he asks, whispering harshly in my ear.
“Can...can’t you see?” I ask, my mouth muffled behind his hand.
He removes his hand, and Giselle’s stiff neck turns so she’s looking at me. Her eyes are open, but the irises are black. There’s nothing in that empty gaze.
“See what?” Jaxon asks, looking right at Giselle.
“She...she’s sitting up,” I say.
“What?” he asks. “Who?”
“Giselle,” I say. “She’s sitting up, looking right at me. But her eyes are...soulless.”
“I just see her lying there,” he says, and his eyes are facing where Giselle’s head would be if she were still lying down. “We don’t have a lot of time, though. With the emergency alarm, they’re going to start trying to account that all students are safe.”
Ivy grabs my forearm. “She must have a message for you. Ask her. Quickly.”
“What do you need to tell me?” I ask Giselle. “Who killed you?”
Giselle’s jaw clenches, and I think she’s trying to open her mouth to speak, but she can’t. It’s like her teeth have been glued together. She reaches up and touches her cheeks in despair. Then she points across the room. I look, and I see a black duffel bag.
“She’s pointing to that bag,” I say, motioning toward it.
Jaxon takes my hand and leads me toward it. I slowly unzip the bag. Inside are the clothes Giselle was wearing the day she died: a short skirt, a long-sleeved silk top, and pointy black heels, along with her undergarments and jewelry. There’s also a sickly sweet smell.
“Is that perfume?” Jaxon asks.
I shake my head. “She wore some designer perfume,” I say. “But this smell...I sensed it when I found her body.”
I close my eyes and focus on the smell. I wish I would have known about this power when Giselle died. The smell might have led me straight to the killer. The smell is flowery, but not something I can identify straight away. It’s something familiar, though, as if I have smelled it somewhere else. But it’s not rose or jasmine. Mama prefers lily of the valley, and it’s not that.
“Hey, look,” Jaxon says.
&n
bsp; I open my eyes and see that he’s holding up one of Giselle’s shoes. He runs his finger along the sole, then he runs his fingers together. I touch the shoe as well, and my fingers are greasy when I take them away.
“Something slippery,” I mumble. I sniff the substance, and the flower smell is stronger. I shake my head and suppress tears. “Someone killed Giselle."
“We already suspected that,” Jaxon says, rubbing my shoulder.
"But now we know it,” I say. “Someone must have put this stuff on the stairs, causing her to slip and break her neck. It wasn’t even an accident! It was on purpose. What monster could have done that?”
When I look back at Giselle, she’s lying down again.
“Guys,” I hear Krista call from behind us. “We need to go.”
“Right,” Jaxon says, and he repacks Giselle’s stuff and grabs my hand to lead me out of the room.
“Wait!” I say. “Should we take the shoes?”
“Someone might notice them missing. Let’s just go,” Jaxon says. “We found what we came for. We need to get out of here before we get caught."
I’m not sure we should leave the evidence behind, but I follow the others out of the room. We turn off the lights and shut the doors as we head back to the stairwell. The alarm stops, and when we reach the stairs, we freeze.
Waiting for us at the top is Ms. Brewster.
Chapter 25
“Miss Whittaker,” Ms. Brewster says, looking down at the four of us in surprise. “Whatever are you doing down there?”
“We needed some herbs,” Ivy says, holding up a small bundle of various dried flowers in her hand. “For...a potion.”
“I see...” Ms. Brewster says. “But it’s not safe down there without an elder to escort you. Please, do come up.”
We all gulp, then one at a time, we ascend the stairs, hanging our heads. We’ve been caught and will certainly be punished. Maybe I should tell Ms. Brewster what’s going on. She always suspected that something unnatural happened to Giselle. Now I know for sure she was killed. If there is a murderer running around the school, Ms. Brewster should know about it. Besides, I certainly don’t want the others to get in trouble.
“Ms. Brewster—” I start to say, but she cuts me off.
“The rest of you go to your rooms or your classes,” Ms. Brewster says. “Wherever you are supposed to be.” She flicks her hand, and the door to the basement closes behind us. She snaps, and the door lock clicks. “I need to speak to Miss Whittaker alone.”
“No,” Jaxon says. “It was my idea.”
“It was all of us,” Krista says, not letting Jaxon fall on his sword.
“What are all of you talking about?” Ms. Brewster asks.
We all go quiet. Is she not talking about sneaking downstairs into the room Giselle is being kept in?
“I need to talk to Madison about her mother. So, if you don’t mind, please get to class. The natural disaster drill is over.”
“Mama?” I ask, and my heart starts racing. “What’s happened to Mama?”
“Madison.” Ms. Brewster puts her arms around my shoulders and leads me away from the others. “I’m sorry to tell you that your mother has had a terrible relapse.”
“What?” I look back, but my friends are gone. I sure could use them now. “What...what happened? Is she… Did she overdose?”
“I’m sorry,” she says, “I’m not an expert on drug use. I just know what the doctors at the facility told me. She had a relapse and had to be taken to a hospital. She’s alive, but they are having to detoxify her and keep an eye on her for a few days.”
My head is spinning so hard that I have to lean against a nearby wall. I thought she was dead. But she’s alive. But she could still die. Coming down off a bender can be deadly. But as long as she is at a hospital and the doctors are monitoring her, she should be able to come down safely.
I feel nauseous as I ride the wave of emotions that always follows being told that Mama has had a bad drug night. I hadn’t even thought much of her since she went into the treatment center. I assumed she was safe. But she could have died, and I wouldn’t have been there...
“How?” I ask Ms. Brewster.
“Pardon?” she asks.
“How did she get the drugs?” I ask. “The residents couldn’t even make phone calls. How could she have gotten so many that she nearly overdosed?”
Ms. Brewster shakes her head. “As I said, I only know what the doctors told me.”
“Why did they call you?” I ask. “I’m her next of kin. Why didn’t they call me or Mrs. Hernandez?”
“I am sure they only want to protect you and thought it would be better if you heard the news from me.”
I bite my tongue. I know Ms. Brewster is trying to be nice—but I also know she’s spouting bullshit. I’ve been on the receiving end of these phone calls many times over the years. I’d been getting them since I was too young to even know what an overdose was. It makes no sense that the hospital would call Ms. Brewster and not me. I don’t know what is going on, but I don’t like it.
“Umm...so where is she?” I ask. “I guess I should go to her.”
“She’s at the Chippewa County Hospital,” Ms. Brewster says. “And I understand if you need to leave…”
“But...?” I ask.
“I don’t want you to worry about your schoolwork at such a time,” she says. “You need to take care of your family.”
“What about my schoolwork?” I ask. “I thought I was doing okay.”
“You have made such progress, my dear,” Ms. Brewster days, squeezing my arm. “But you are still frightfully behind. And I am afraid that if you leave, it will become impossible to catch up. I’m sorry.”
“So...I have to choose either my mother or my education?” I ask, incredulous. “You know there is only one right answer to that.”
“I know,” Ms. Brewster says. “Which is why I am so very sorry. You show such potential.”
“Then let me stay,” I say. “You can’t really be so callous as to banish me from school when my mother is in the hospital.”
“I’m sorry,” Ms. Brewster says, and the sympathy from before seems to have fled from her. She seems cold. Determined. “But it simply wouldn’t be fair to the other students to allow you to stay when they have all followed the rules and worked so hard.”
“Me being here doesn’t take any of that away from them,” I try to argue.
“Madison, please,” she says, holding up her hand. “Don’t make this any harder than it has to be. I suggest you return to your mother and forget any hopes you had of being a witch. If you want, I could bind your powers so you don’t have to worry about them accidentally hurting anyone in the future.”
I have to blink to make sure I heard her correctly. “You can bind my powers?”
“I wouldn’t do it except in extreme circumstances,” she says. “It’s difficult. Painful. But if that is what you are worried about, I could do it for you.”
“No,” I say quickly, so quickly I even surprise myself. I back away from her toward the main staircase. “I’m fine. I just need to think…”
“Take all the time you need, dear,” Ms. Brewster calls after me.
I rush up the stairs and down the hall to my room, then shut and lock the door behind me.
“Giselle?” I say.
The blinds to the window flutter, and the overhead light flickers. I’m sure she’s here. She might not be able to manifest, though, if her little stunt in the basement took a lot out of her.
“I know you were killed. I’m sorry. I’m going to do what I can to help you, but...my mama... I’m all she has. I need to figure out what to do.”
The light flickers furiously, as if someone is flipping the switch on and off quickly.
“Stop that,” I say. “I know you’re frustrated, but I am too. I can’t just abandon my mama. Would you?” The lights stop flickering, and I breathe a sigh of relief. “Just give me time to figure this out.”
I lie on my bed with a heavy sigh. I can’t believe I’m not packing a bag already, but I’m exhausted. Overwhelmed. I know someone killed Giselle, but there still isn’t anything I can do about it. What was it Ms. Boucher said about scent? It’s the strongest sense connected to memory. I must have smelled those flowers before—and not just on the day Giselle died. I close my eyes and concentrate on the smell, trying to remember where I had sensed it before, but my mind is just turning in circles. I keep going back to Ms. Boucher’s class, then back to Mama, then back to Giselle in the basement.
I sit up and rub my face. No point in wallowing around here, I guess. Might as well get ready to leave. I can’t believe Ms. Brewster is going to totally derail my...witchiness...if I leave. I mean, what am I supposed to do? Not go to my mother in the hospital? And what was that about binding my powers? Screw that. I’m a witch! And if Ms. Brewster won’t let me continue my studies at her snooty school, I’ll find another way to study. There have to be other schools of thought out there. Or other kinds of magic even.
When I open my bag and set it on my bed, my stomach clenches. Down in the corner is a crumpled-up piece of paper. Without opening it, I know what it is.
See you at three!
The note my mom wrote the day before everything went to hell. I take a step back and sink onto Giselle’s bed.
Why is everything so complicated? Should I really throw away my chance at learning all I can about being a witch just because my mom couldn’t stay away from drugs for a day? Would Mama give up any opportunity for me?
I cuss out loud when I realize the answer is no. I mean, she won’t give up drugs for me. She’s never sacrificed anything for me. Why should I sacrifice my life for her?
I jump up and close the bag, shoving it back under my bed. Sorry, Mama, this is my life now. You’ll have to make it through without me this time.
“Don’t worry, Giselle,” I say. “I’m going to find your killer, and then I’m going to help them—whoever they are.”
I shut the door behind me and go downstairs to Krista’s room. I’m not surprised to find Jaxon and Ivy there too.
“Hey!” they all ask, crowding around me. “What happened?”
Curse of Stone (Academy of the Damned Book 1) Page 23