Initiated

by Steffanie Holmes

  “What happened in that meeting?” I demanded.

  “Exactly what I expected would happen,” Trey said. “Courtney had already got to all the other student members. She gave a speech about how the sanctity of the club was in jeopardy, that I had been in charge for too long, and that we needed new leadership to usher in a new era at Miskatonic. She had a stack of support letters from senior members, including my father. That basically sealed the deal. I had a few votes – Paul and Nancy and a couple of others. Quinn and Ayaz might’ve been able to swing things around, but neither of them was there.”

  “Ayaz wasn’t there?” I swirled around to face him. Ayaz dropped his gaze again, avoiding me, avoiding all of us.

  “No… I didn’t even know about the meeting. I skipped out on afternoon classes. I went out to—” he shook his head. “It doesn’t matter where I went. The point is, I wasn’t there when you needed me. I’m sorry, bro.”

  “It wouldn’t have mattered.” Trey’s voice was flat, emotionless. He was doing what he always did – holding all the darkness inside, keeping it to himself. It was the only way he could retain control.

  “I tried to get there, but Courtney…” I coughed, gripping Quinn’s shoulder. “I could have done something.”

  Quinn winced again, but he wrapped me in his arms, pulling me against his chest, so my head rested on his ruined shoulder. He let out a long, slow breath as his fingers stroked my hair. He didn’t try to kiss me or lighten the mood with a dumb joke. He just held me and I held him, in a way I hadn’t been held since my mother was alive.

  This isn’t your fault.

  “I hate that you’re getting beat up because of me,” I murmured.

  He coughed. “Don’t do that. Don’t blame yourself, Hazy. Dad doesn’t need you to give him a reason.”

  “Why was your dad even at school today? Doesn’t he have a job? Why do all your parents care so much about this stupid club and about what you guys do here? They’re the ones who—” I tried to say trapped, but my tongue wouldn’t form the word. I reminded myself that Greg was in the room, and changed what I was saying. “—sent you to this school in the first place.”

  “Because we represent our family honor.” Trey grabbed the first aid kit and started rooting through it. He pulled out a sachet of burn relief cream and another dressing. “Even though we’re—” dead, I finished for him in my head “—invisible to the world, we are supposed to make this school a miniature representation of the world order. I thought that as the King of Kings, I had the power to decide who would rise and fall, but I miscalculated. I’m just as expendable as the rest of you. We can’t count on the protection of the Eldritch Club any longer.”

  Gritting his teeth, Trey rolled up his sleeve. I gasped. Where his Eldritch Club tattoo had been, there was now an ugly patch of charred flesh.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  ”Look what Hazel did to my hair!” Courtney screamed, waving a bottle of doctored shampoo in Ms. West’s face. “She put chemicals in my shampoo and now my hair is falling out!”

  “Is this true, Hazel?” Ms. West steepled her fingers and leaned over her desk, eyes sweeping over me with a mixture of curiosity and disdain.

  “You can’t prove anything,” I shot back, leaning back in the hard chair that faced Ms. West’s desk. I was no stranger to the chair. It had cradled my ass many times since I arrived at Derleth.

  “I can so.” Courtney grabbed my bookbag. I yelled and grabbed for it, but she dumped it out on the floor. Books, pens, and Turkish Delight candies I nicked from Ayaz’s kitchen scattered across the floor. Courtney grabbed a bottle of shampoo and dropped it on Ms. West’s desk.

  “Get one of the chemistry nerds to test that.” Courtney folded her arms and smirked at me. “I bet it’s got all sorts of weird stuff in it.”

  Ms. West pushed her glasses down her nose, regarding the bottle with interest. “Hazel, is this true?”

  I shrugged. I didn’t care if they knew. What were they going to do to me? What was a little detention when they already planned to feed me to their god? “She got what she deserved. I only did it because she poured tar all over my hair,” I shot back. “I was nearly sick from the fumes and I had to cut off all my hair. Personally, I think she got off lightly.”

  “That’s not true,” Ms. West said. “The first week you arrived on campus I took you to Old Waldron. She cut off your filthy dreadlocks. They were a health risk for the student body – we couldn’t have a lice outbreak.”

  “No, Courtney and Trey broke into my room and put tar in my hair.”

  “Do you mean Trey, your boyfriend?”

  “He’s not my boyfriend. And she filled my locker with rotting meat and—”

  “Stop,” Ms. West snapped. “I’ve heard enough of your baseless accusations, Hazel. I don’t need to remind you that you were the one reprimanded for throwing meat around in the halls. You admitted that you put that meat in your own locker so you could deliver it to Courtney’s dorm.”

  “Her bullying is out of control.” Courtney folded her arms and stuck out her lower lip. “I just don’t understand why Hazel hates me so much.”

  “You being a vile, manipulative bitch might have something to do with it,” I pointed out.

  “Hazel, that’s enough.” Ms. West stood. Her black skirts swirled around her feet as she held open her office door. “Thank you for bringing this to my attention, Ms. Haynes. Please, return to class. Derleth Academy has a zero tolerance policy for bullying. You and your parents can rest assured we will be dealing with this issue.”

  Courtney flashed me a pitying smirk and flounced out of the room, leaving me alone with Ms. West.

  I expected the headmistress to yell at me. Instead, she knelt down beside me. Her eyes swam with this weird look that someone who hadn’t seen her try to throw a student into the void might mistake for kindness. “Hazel, I’m concerned about you. All your teachers are. You’ve been lashing out ever since you arrived at this school. I’ve had many scholarship students arrive at Derleth with a chip on their shoulder, and none of them had your history of trauma. Derleth could be a turning point in your life, a chance to cast off the cards you’ve been dealt and make a fresh start. We want to help you, but we can’t do that if you fight us at every turn.”

  “What is this shit?” I narrowed my eyes at her. “Drop this concerned teacher act. This school isn’t a ‘fresh start,’ it’s a death trap.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, dear.” She placed her icy fingers over my hand. “You’re clearly still dealing with unresolved trauma from your mother’s death. I think you may need to speak to a professional. We can arrange that—”

  I flung myself out of bed. My feet tangled in the sheets, trapping me under the blankets as I fought to wrap my hands around Ms. West’s neck and choke the life out of her. It took me a few moments to realize that I was no longer in her office, but in my own bed in my cold dorm room, and that the whole altercation with Courtney had been another strange dream.

  Scritch-scritch-scritch. The rats in the walls circled overhead. I smiled. That sound had become a comfort. It centered me, brought me back to where I belonged.

  The dream haunted me as I swung out of bed and gathered my things for the shower. I closed my hand around the bottle of shampoo I’d stolen from Courtney’s room when I’d replaced hers. That was weird. It was like I’d entered another reality – one where I was the bully instead of Courtney. Except that it was all kind of true. Hearing my own actions thrown back at me like that gave me a sick feeling in my stomach.

  Or maybe that was just the residual impact of being poisoned.

  I can’t believe I’m thinking this, but if you’re listening to my thoughts, Great Old God, I’d like to go back to the hate-filled nightmares, thanks.

  Or maybe the dream was telling me something else. I bent down and checked the gap between the desk and the wall, where I’d hidden the things I’d collected so far for my final punishment plan. I was buil
ding a decent stash. All I had left to do was set a date.

  I needed an event involving the whole school. But the second quarter was drawing to a close, which meant exams were starting next week. There were no school dances or parent days until next quarter. Could I wait that long?

  Would I survive that long?

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  When Trey and I reached the library during our free period, we discovered his ‘usual’ table had been usurped. Tillie flashed us a satisfied smirk as she opened out her books, and Derek cracked his knuckles, daring us to make a scene.

  Trey’s back stiffened. He stepped toward them, but I yanked him down into a nearby chair. “What are you doing? Derek is eighty percent neck. He’ll smash your pretty face into a pulp.”

  “This is a direct hit on my power,” he hissed. “I can’t show weakness.”

  “It’s a table,” I said, the words burning my damaged throat. “Get over it.”

  Trey glanced over his shoulder. Tillie laughed at something Derek said. She went in for a hair-flip but seemed to forget she was wearing a beanie to cover her ruined hair, so all she succeeded in doing was looking like she had a neck cramp. I started to laugh, but that hurt my throat even worse.

  “You’ve got to stop thinking like a monarch,” I said to Trey. “You’re not one of them anymore. Ninety-nine percent of people don’t have a special table in the library, and you don’t see them crying about it. We’ve got more important things to worry about, like what’s up with Ayaz and where he went the other day when he should have been at the vote.”

  “I talked to Ayaz. He isn’t a problem.” Trey slid his math book across the table and lowered his voice. “Did you find Andre?”

  I let out a sigh of relief. “Yeah, he came back to Greg’s room that night. He said he’d been hanging out with someone and hadn’t even heard about the meeting. So that’s a relief. I hope they don’t—”

  A huge book slammed on my desk, startling me out of thought.

  “Fuck!” I threw my pen at Ayaz. “Don’t just throw books at people without warning.”

  “I found something.” Ayaz slid into the seat beside Trey and started flipping through a dusty book. “I went back to the cave where you saw Zehra, but I couldn’t find—”

  “Whoa.” I held up my hands. “Back up the Ayaz-wagon. Are we talking again?”

  “We were always talking,” he snapped.

  “No, we weren’t. You flounced out of the library the other week and haven’t spoken a word to me since. We lost a week of study because you’ve got your head stuck up your ass. So what gives?”

  Ayaz and Trey exchanged one of their meaningful glances. “I had some shit to work out.” Ayaz softened his voice, his words like velvet. He tapped the book in his hand. “Do you want to hear what I found?”

  “Yes. But first… you said you went to the cave. Was this during the Eldritch Club meeting?”

  His eyes darkened. “Yes. If I’d known they would pull that stunt, I never would’ve—”

  “It’s fine,” Trey said quickly. His hand cupped his wrist, where his tattoo had been burned off. “It would’ve happened even with you there.”

  Another meaningful glance between them. I wished I could be inside their heads. I bet it was a real circus in there. Ayaz met my eyes, the intensity of his stare starting a fire blazing across my chest. “Hazel, I couldn’t find any trace of that sigil you saw.”

  “It was there, I swear it. And it lit up when the fire started.”

  “I believe you, but I didn’t see it. And that made me wonder why.” Ayaz turned the book toward me and pointed to a symbol on the page. “Is what you saw something like this?”

  I squinted at the circular sigil. It did look familiar – seeing it in the book made me realize that it had been different to the others I’d seen around the school. The shapes and lines inside it were a unique style. “I think so? Honestly, I might not remember all the details perfectly, considering that at the time I was a little bit busy running for my life.”

  But Ayaz wasn’t listening. “It wouldn’t be exactly like this one, because it’s unlikely what you saw was ever written down. We never found a sigil like this in Parris’ book because it’s not one of his sigils. It’s the sigil of another magician. Rebecca Nurse. She used to be part of Parris’ inner circle, but she later became one of his biggest detractors. She went on to study medicine, even though she was forbidden to practice as a woman, and she became an early agitator for abolishing slavery.”

  “What does it mean that her symbol is drawn in a cave on Parris’ land?”

  Ayaz threw up his hands. “I don’t know. I have a theory, but you’re not going to like it.”

  “It’s got to be better than long division,” I slammed my textbook shut and leaned across the table, running my hands along the edge of the image. “Hit me.”

  “Parris doesn’t detail what caused his falling out with Rebecca, but I’m willing to bet they argued over the Great Old God. We know Parris wanted its power, but maybe Rebecca wanted to send it back where it came from? Anyway, I think that maybe Rebecca was using her sigils to plant some kind of weapon – something that could destroy the god or bind it so Parris couldn’t use its power. If she did, then she might have placed some spell on the sigils so that no one in Parris’ inner circle could see them.”

  “Sigils? You think there’s more than one.”

  “From what I can make of this, there has to be.” Ayaz ran his hand over the book. His fingers brushed mine, and a surge of heat ran up my arm. “My guess is she didn’t finish whatever spell she was trying to work, because otherwise, the god wouldn’t still be here. But maybe that sigil you saw is all that’s holding the creature in its prison.”

  “That’s a whole lot of maybes. Get to the part I won’t like.”

  Ayaz cleared his throat. “One of two things happened – either someone destroyed the sigil, or there’s a reason you can see it and I can’t. It might be because you weren’t yet a full member of the Eldritch Club, because you hadn’t completed the initiation, and neither was Zehra. But there’s only one way to find out.”

  “Oh no, no way.” I jerked my hand back. “I escaped that once. I’m not going back.”

  “It’s our only choice.”

  “Take someone else. Take one of your grotto girls. You could have a little party on the way.”

  He shook his head sadly. “You know that I can’t. It has to be you. For all we know it has something to do with your power.”

  “Power?” I feigned innocence. “What power?”

  “Come on, Hazel.” An edge cut through Ayaz’s voice. “I read your file. I know you’re lying about the fire.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I folded my arms across my chest. My thumb found the scar on my wrist, pressing into it so hard it hurt. I faced off against Ayaz and Trey, who both tried to stare me down – one with eyes of ice, the other with a fire blazing inside him.

  “Really?” Trey smirked. “Because you told the police that your friend went to find your mother to tell her you were being hurt by a gang, but the gang followed him and threw a molotov cocktail through a window in the apartment complex. And yet, the police found accelerant on your hands.”

  No.

  That’s my secret. And I’m not giving it to either of you. I’m not trusting anyone, ever again.

  “I don’t have to listen to this.” I stood up and slammed the chair back into the table. “I have to go.”

  For the rest of the day, I fumed in silence. My final class was English Lit. I sat with Andre but he ignored all my notes asking him about where he’d been disappearing to. That was one of the advantages of being mute – you got to keep your secrets.

  The bell rang. I gathered up my things and walked toward the door. Tillie stuck out her foot and tripped me up. I went down hard, books flying everywhere. My knee cracked against the marble floor. Tillie’s friends tittered. Well, all except for Loretta, who packed up her b
ooks without a word.

  “Look at her, down on her knees,” Courtney smirked. “Where she’s most at home.”

  So we’re back to this then.

  After classes, we had another rehearsal for the school production. I met Greg at his locker and we walked over together. Safety in numbers. He’d been tripped up in one of his classes, too, and someone had squeezed some kind of cooking oil through the vents in his locker, ruining his books. He didn’t tell me what people had been saying, but the barrage of insults hurled at us as we walked through the halls gave me a fair idea of what he was enduring right now.

  “Well, popularity was fun while it lasted.” Greg plastered a fake smile across his face as we made our way into the auditorium and up to our usual seats.

  “I’m not sure we were ever really popular.” Ayaz’s eyes burned into my back as I sat down and flipped through a script. Courtney had been making lots of changes lately, mainly involving shrinking down my scenes and giving herself more stage time with Trey. I sighed as I noticed another of my numbers had been cut.

  “Ayaz is giving you serious puppy eyes, honey,” Greg grabbed the script out of my hands. “Go talk to him.”

  “They’re not puppy eyes. More like a rabid dog.” I lunged for the script, but Greg held it out of my reach. “I’m not speaking with him right now.”

  “Sure you aren’t. Go. It’ll be here when you come back.”

  Sighing, I made my way down to the front row, where Ayaz and Trey sat together, their heads bent in whispered conversation. Courtney glared at me from on stage, but she couldn’t stop me talking to them without making a fuss that Dr. Halsey could see. I slumped down beside Ayaz, catching a whiff of his opium and incense scent. My head spun as the two of them looked over at me – a pair of icicle eyes swimming with pain, and two dark orbs that churned with a rising storm.

  Over the course of half a year, they’d gone from my bitter enemies to my allies to… something more. They’d both kissed me until I was breathless, turned my insides out, and danced on the edge of insanity with me. They’d both sacrificed so much and I… I didn’t know what to do with all the emotions that swirled around inside me.