I put down the book I’m reading—Pride and Prejudice—for my Conversational Arts class. We’re supposed to read the novel and be prepared to lead a five-minute conversation about it with a classmate drawn at random next week, but I just can’t focus. I keep reading the same page over and over: Elizabeth overhearing Darcy insult her at the ball. It makes me think of Sebastian. And then I think of the ocean waves in his eyes and how I’m sneaking out to meet him after Kash falls asleep—he owes me a tap dance, after all. And then I lose my place and have to start the scene again.
“Thanks, Kash, but I don’t know if going to Brambleton will make me feel better,” I tell her. I stretch my arms over my head and fake a yawn, hoping she’ll take the hint and wrap up her nighttime beauty regimen a little quicker.
It works.
“Well, just think about it,” she says. She ties her hair up in a messy bun, then clambers into her bed on the other side of the room—a room the size of my grandma’s lavish, custom closet back home in Westchester County. Her pink, fluffy comforter rustles as she pulls it up to her chin.
“Aren’t you going to wash your makeup off?” she asks, looking over at me expectantly.
Crap. Of course she’d notice. At least she hasn’t realized that beneath my own blankets, I’m wearing the least pajama-like pajamas I could find—selected in preparation for meeting up with Sebastian later: black yoga pants and a star-speckled tee shirt. I’m not ready for him to see me in anything too embarrassing, after all—even if he is humiliating himself for my sake.
“I’m too tired,” I tell her.
“Okay if I turn out the light, then?” Thankfully, she doesn’t challenge me.
“Sure.”
The room goes dark, aside from the faint glow of the fairy lights suspended over the window—Kash’s idea, the same ones we’ve had since freshman year, when we moved in together. And it’s quiet, aside from the never-ending rain pelting the window. After a few minutes, I hear the addition of a new sound: Kash’s rhythmic breathing—part snore, part sigh. She’s asleep.
Time to make my getaway.
Boys are so uncommon at Brightling Academy that I never even thought about where they might house one until today, when Sebastian promised to show me his newly acquired tap-dancing skills. His dorm room, he told me, is on the tenth floor—the same as the teachers’ apartments. It’s not as posh as one would assume, he said—not considering the tuition rate and the opulence of the rest of the building, anyway. Still, in almost four years at Brightling, I’ve never been above the ninth floor. I wouldn’t know.
That’s not where he and I are meeting tonight, though. Instead, we’re meeting at the base of the main staircase in the foyer—the same one where he sat waiting for me, where he took my hand and walked me to Poise and Charm class the other day. I use the flashlight on my cell phone to navigate through the darkened halls, past my resident advisor’s room, and to the elevators that descend to the classrooms and administrative offices below.
The chime announcing the elevator’s arrival and the rumble of the door as it slides open seem so much louder in the night, without music playing and the chatter of twenty girls in their rooms filling the space. I hold my breath, waiting for my RA’s door to swing open—to get caught. But a moment after I step inside the elevator, the door slides closed again, and I’m off. Normal breathing resumed.
“Sebastian?” I whisper his name into the dark as I descend the grand stairway. There’s no sign of anyone else moving around the building at this hour, and for a second, as my feet hit the bottom step, I think maybe he tricked me—maybe this is some sort of prank. I unlock my phone, hands trembling, to text him, but as soon as my fingertip glides along the screen, I feel a hand on my shoulder.
“Bianca—”
Stifling a shriek, I whirl around to see him standing behind me.
“Sorry—I didn’t mean to scare you,” he says quickly, in a whisper only vaguely quieter than his usual tone. “Nice pajamas,” he adds, with his self-assured grin, as his eyes skim over my hips and thighs. His words may sound sarcastic, but I think he actually does like the slim fit of my pants on my frame.
Just in case I’m misreading him, I go on the defensive. “Yeah, you too.” I smirk and brush my hand against the shiny pair of tap shoes tied together and slung over his shoulder. “I hear all the socialites are wearing tap shoes to bed in France, so this is very fashion-forward of you.”
Sebastian’s smile widens, and he chuckles. “I thought it’d be easier to change shoes once we get there than to wear them and get caught being out after hours.”
I raise an eyebrow and put my hands on my hips. “Well, what are you waiting for? Put them on now that I’m here—you promised me the performance of a lifetime,” I tease.
He glances around the dimly lit foyer and dampens his lips. “Not here,” he tells me. “Come on—this way.” Seeing the coast is clear, he tugs on the sleeve of my sweatshirt and starts towing me deeper into the shadows of the hall.
“Where are we going?” Now I’m speaking in loud whispers, too.
“The auditorium,” he tells me. “I promised you a proper show, and I meant it.”
The idea of sitting alone in the auditorium—having my pick of seats and watching my own personal dance recital starring the novelty that is Sebastian Greenbriar—should make me smile. It should make me laugh and feel special. It should make me excited—not just for Sebastian’s performance, but for what it might mean that he’s shared it with me. Me, of all the girls at Brightling.
But it doesn’t. It makes me freeze where I stand and turns my stomach to knots. I’m not ready for him to enter the auditorium yet. I don’t want him to see the display set out against the far wall or read my grandmother’s name on the plaque above it. I don’t want him to put the pieces together. I like the way he looks at me now, without knowing about my family and what’s expected of me—the legacy I have to uphold. I just want to be an ordinary girl to him for a bit longer. A Muse like any other, including him.
“That’s too much, Sebastian,” I say. I pull on his hand, like an anchor dragging him to a standstill. “We’ll get caught.”
He stops short, startled by my reluctance. “It’ll be fine—don’t worry,” he protests, shaking his head as if confused by my reaction.
I open my mouth to argue again. To tell him we should just call it off and go back to bed. But the sound of approaching footsteps in the hall make me choke on my words.
“I fear we’ve been ignoring the signs for too long, Evangelina,” says a voice, calm but firm. It’s Ms. Applegate. “We’ve known this day would come for a while now.”
“Gloria expressed the same concern to me the other day,” Headmistress Fothergill replies, “and I agree with you both. It’s impossible to deny these events are connected now. It was easier to overlook before, when it was simply a matter of lower enrollment at Brightling, less creative advertising, and repetitive entertainment—the same types of songs and movies over and over again. But it’s hard to deny now, with the more traditional fine arts under attack as well.”
Their words grow louder, more distinct—as does the shuffling of their slippers on tile as they walk through the corridors, doing their final check of the building before turning in for the night. In a moment, they’ll find Sebastian and me, standing here, just a few paces from the auditorium. My pulse thunders as wildly as the storm outside.
“We have to hide,” I whisper to Sebastian—a real whisper this time, not the false veil of secrecy in our tones from before.
Stuffing my cell phone into the pocket of my sweatshirt, I loop my arm through his, pulling him deeper into the shadows, around the corner and out of their path. We huddle together, crouched behind the trophy case that dominates this section of the hallway—the array of plaques, ribbons, and statuettes commemorating the achievements of Brightling students long graduated. Chorale championships. Dance competitions. Art shows. My mom’s name is probably inscribed on something in there—m
y grandma’s, too. But I don’t risk looking. I can’t. We’ll be seen. So we wait. As long as Ms. Applegate and the headmistress don’t turn down this corridor, they’ll never spot us.
“There was the theft of the Laffitte, and now the attack on Brambleton. What do you think will be next?” Ms. Applegate asks the headmistress as they pass.
“I believe the claim that ‘songbirds will cease to sing’ follows,” is the response. “The omens so far have been described in abstract terms, so I assume it’s a reference to human singers, not actual songbirds. Maybe a choir—or an opera troupe, perhaps …?”
“That would make sense. We should keep our guard up. The events seem to be taking place closer and closer to Brightling … You don’t suppose our girls are in danger at all, do you?”
I picture Headmistress Fothergill bringing her hand to her heart and rubbing her eyes behind the sharp angles of her cat glasses. “I sincerely hope not, Felicity,” she replies. The strain in her tone is unmistakable. It’s the voice of a woman speaking about her nightmares. “I’ll do everything in my power to protect Brightling Academy and its students.”
“As will I.”
“I’ll consult with the Board of Nine in the morning. They will be able to offer further guidance.”
As their voices trail off again—a sign of them moving on, down another hallway, where they’ll discuss more worries—I can barely breathe. My lungs seem trapped beneath my rib cage, just like the trophies behind glass beside me, unmoving and hard.
“Bianca …” Sebastian’s voice is soft. Eerie. Tentative. As if he’s not quite sure he’s saying my name right.
“Something terrible is happening, isn’t it?” I whisper, looking up into his face. “And we’re not safe from it, even here?”
He shakes his head, and his hand finds mine in the dark. He entwines our fingers like the ivy that clings to the side of the building by the garden. His touch sends a shockwave through my system. A sharp electric jolt, like lightning, that ripples over my skin and pauses my heart. I swallow hard, trying to choke down the dryness in my mouth just as much as I’m trying to mask my shock. I’m not sure what surprises me more: the conversation we just overheard, or him holding my hand.
Either way, tap dancing in the auditorium suddenly seems like a very silly idea.
Chapter Seven
I met Kash the first day of school. My new roommate. Some of the other girls on our floor were used to boarding schools. It didn’t phase them. But not Kash and me. This was the first time either of us had been away from home for more than a few days at a time. As we unpacked our bags and boxes, we barely talked—even to our parents, who lingered to help us. I didn’t want my mom and dad to go. I didn’t want to be left alone with this stranger—the small, quiet girl from Connecticut who seemed to have more pairs of dancing shoes than underwear.
My grandma was there, too. Daphne Harper. The legend—translator of the Lost Scroll of Clio and Brightling’s former headmistress—returned to her kingdom to witness the ascension of her sole grandchild to the role ordained by her ancestors. She tried to keep a low profile. She didn’t want to detract from my special day, she said. So she wore a scarf over her head and lingered behind me. But a couple of people noticed her anyway. Including Kash.
“Are you really related to Daphne Harper?” Kash asked, wide-eyed, later, after they’d left.
I hesitated. This was what I didn’t want. Assumptions. Expectations. Preferential treatment. “She’s my grandma,” I confessed softly, cringing, waiting for the barrage of questions to follow, as they often did.
Kash simply grinned and, seeing the discomfort that must have been so plainly written on my face, shrugged nonchalantly. “Cool. I won’t tell anyone if you don’t want me to.”
I looked at her, grateful, knowing I’d just met someone who understood me without effort—and feeling like I’d already made a friend. “That would be great. I want to be able to be me, you know?”
She nodded. “I totally get it.”
That was when she told me about not being able to walk as a kid. A secret traded for a secret. We’ve been keeping each other’s secrets ever since.
Which is why I don’t hesitate to tell Kash about what Sebastian and I overheard Headmistress Fothergill and Ms. Applegate talking about last night.
I wait until we’re alone, until it’s just the three of us—Kash, Sebastian, and me—with no one to eavesdrop. The last thing we need is for Zelda Mackey to blab to the whole school—or for Aurelia Ketterling, with all her superstitions, to exaggerate and catastrophize the whole thing. Besides, advertising that Sebastian and I were sneaking around after curfew seems like an equally disastrous idea—the kind that could put my chances of graduating even more at risk … or, at the very least, prompt a completely different set of rumors about what, exactly, we were doing together so late.
“I don’t understand—why were you downstairs after hours again?” Kash asks. Her face is pinched in confusion as she stares at us from across the table. In the last five minutes since we’ve started telling her what we overheard, she’s gnawed her pen cap so much it’s practically flat.
I glance at Sebastian, seated between us at the round table tucked in the corner of the library, and feel heat rise in my cheeks. That’s been happening a lot today. I think it has something to do with last night’s hand-holding escapade. Not that I want to tell Kash that.
“It’s not important—just forget about that, okay?” I tell her impatiently, eager to get to the point. “The important thing is that something’s going on. Something big—something even bigger than a connection between the fire at Brambleton and the disappearance of the Laffitte painting. Something that could impact us here, at Brightling, too.”
Kash shakes her head, confused. “But it sounds like Headmistress Fothergill is consulting with the Board of Nine. They won’t let anything bad happen to us. We’re students.”
I throw my hands up in the air and let out a heavy sigh. “That’s only part of the point. It sounded like a series of events—or omens, I think the headmistress called them—have already happened, and there’s more to come. We should try to figure out what’s going on. Maybe we can help somehow.”
“I highly doubt we’ll be able to help,” Kash says. “It sounds like the headmistress and the Board have everything under control. We’ll just get in their way.”
She pauses and gives Sebastian a sideways glance, like she wishes he wasn’t around to hear what she has to say next. “Besides, Bianca,” she adds, lowering her voice to a grave whisper, “if you did find out anything worthwhile, you’d have to tell them you broke school rules by breaking curfew and spying on the headmistress. Do you really want to risk what could happen if you do that?”
The risk of not graduating, she means. The risk of getting held back a year, if not expelled altogether.
I shake my head and glare at her. She knows how I don’t want my predicament to become common knowledge. But before I can say anything, Sebastian is running his hands through his already messy hair with frustration.
“Kash, they’re not telling us what’s going on,” he says. “But if we knew, we could do something to protect ourselves, at least. You don’t want to just sit around and wait for something bad to happen to us, do you?”
“Of course not,” she tells him. Her face falls, a wounded expression on it, and her bottom lip quivers. “I don’t want anything bad to happen to anybody. But I don’t want to get in trouble, either.” She looks to me for help then, hoping I’ll take her side. “I don’t think you want to either, right, Bee?”
I lean back in my seat and cross my arms over my chest. “Sometimes doing the right thing means bending the rules a little.”
The pen in Kash’s hand falls to the table with a soft thump. I have a feeling that her heart is doing the same inside her chest. “All right, I get that you want to act. You always do this—you start charging forward without thinking things through. This time, though, just please promise me
you’ll be careful, okay?”
I want to argue with her. I want to tell her I’m not impulsive. But I know better. There’s more evidence to prove her point than mine. Chasing the dark-suited man the other day wasn’t my finest moment. And there have been others before that—like the time I inspired a group of vandals to stop graffitiing over a mural … or when I cut class last year to join a protest for better school funding for the arts.
So, I don’t put up a fuss. I simply nod. “Okay.”
Satisfied, Kash nods and manages a weak smile. “I just worry, Bee, that’s all.”
She taps the surface of her cell phone, propped on the table beside her copy of our Inspiration Practicum textbook. The screen flickers from darkness to light, and the time stands out in bold, white numbers. It’s later than I thought. Apparently Kash thinks so, too.
“I have to get to Exotic Languages now,” she explains as she scoops up her books and packs her bag. “See you after?”
I nod, though she doesn’t seem to notice, and in a moment, she’s gone, rushing toward the exit.
“Sooo, it looks like it’s up to you and me to save the world, I guess?” Sebastian says.
Now that it’s only the two of us, I’m hyper-focused on everything about him. The way he digs in his pocket for a butterscotch. The crinkle of the wrapper as he removes it and pops the candy into his mouth. The half-grin that tilts his face as he stares back at me, equally fascinated, throughout it all.
I wonder what he’s thinking about.
I wonder if he’s mulling over everything we overheard … or if he’s remembering how we held hands last night in the hallway.
Which makes me start thinking about his hand. The way our fingertips locked like adjoining pieces of the same puzzle. The strength of his grip, how it made me feel safe and comforted. And the fact that I wished he didn’t let go a minute later, when we got up to go back to our dorms.
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