by Anita Oh
He kicked Astor in the ankle to wake him up.
“We mind our own business, Miss O’Connor. I assume that’s a foreign concept to you. Pipe down now and do your quiz or it will be an automatic fail.”
He looked no more tired than usual and had skillfully evaded my questioning. That put him as top suspect in my book.
I caught up to Tomlinson Myer at dinner. He was a tall, heavyset boy with an abnormally round head. His eyes were red and faraway, and he had a strong patchouli smell. It seemed pretty obvious why he knew so much about funny drugs, he looked as if he’d taken all of them. Still, I had to ask.
“Did you do something to make everyone tell the truth?” I said.
He looked up from his steak dinner. He didn’t seem to register I was there. “I set fire to a mouse once,” he said. “I thought it would be funny but it wasn’t funny.”
“Right,” I said.
Tomlinson Myer pushed out the chair beside him for me to sit down. “My father wants me to take over his corporate empire but I just want to be free.” He looked up at me. “I ordered all this food but I can’t eat it. Will you help me?”
Tomlinson Myer was a bit of a dick but he shared his food with me and told me his life story. I wasn’t sure if he was being so truthful because he had to be or just because he was very, very stoned, but either way, I was convinced he wasn’t the culprit. And that he would never again harm another animal.
He walked out with me, then waved me off and headed into the gardens in the opposite direction, toward the Green House. When I turned to head back to my house, I kind of wished Tomlinson Myer had stuck around for a while, even if he was a dick. One dick was way better than a whole bag of dicks, and that’s what I saw in front of me.
Tennyson Wilde stood by the fountain, waiting for me.
I sighed and approached him cautiously. He seemed different and it took me a moment to pinpoint why. He wore a pale blue shirt that was perfectly tailored to his tall, rigid frame, and that matched his eyes. He held himself with the type of confidence that only money could buy, but there was something off. His hair was still tousled, but less artfully than usual. There were dark circles under his eyes and he was even more pale than usual. He normally stood unnaturally motionless, but now he tapped his foot against the paving stones. He held a black briefcase, and he clenched the handle so tightly that his fingers had turned white.
“This has gone far enough,” he said. “Withdraw at once.”
I wrinkled my nose, wondering what had brought this on all of a sudden.
“This is getting old,” I said. “I’ve got better things to do than explain to you for the millionth time that I had nothing to do with this, so please just leave me alone.”
The dumplings Tomlinson Myer had shared with me churned in my stomach. I knew I shouldn’t have forced myself to finish them, but it was too sad to leave them on the plate. They’d feel unloved. I wondered if I could throw up on Tennyson Wilde’s shiny shoes. Then, at least, my dumplings would have a noble end.
He gave an exasperated sigh and laid the briefcase down on the side of the fountain.
“I knew it would come to this,” he said.
For a moment, I panicked. What did he have in there? Was it some sort of high-tech weapon? He was going to vaporize me or melt my brain or erase me from existence.
But the briefcase wasn’t a weapon. Not in the way I thought.
“Leave this school,” he said, turning the briefcase so I could see the rows and rows of pretty money. “End the spell and leave this school and never see Sam again.”
“And you’ll just hand over all that cash?” I had to be sure that was what he meant.
I stepped closer to the money, barely even realizing what I was doing as I reached out a hand toward it.
“This money would be yours.”
There was a lot of money in that briefcase. Stacks and stacks of hundred-dollar bills. I could feed my family our whole lives with that money, probably my family’s families, and their grandkids. Feed them on some fancy-ass food. I could feed us all forever and pay off the mortgage and my mom’s medical bills and send all my brothers to college, and there would still be some left over for fripperies.
In the movies, when people are offered a briefcase of money, they always have some high moral reason for declining – true love or justice or whatever. That’s because they’re in the movies and the harsh realities of life don’t concern them. In real life, there’s precious few morals that are worth more than financial security, and anyone who doesn’t believe that has never really been poor. Sure, Sam meant a lot to me, but did he mean as much as never losing another night’s sleep worrying over how we’d all eat until the end of the month, or whether Hamish would be bullied because his hand-me-down shorts were too small, or if Liam would drop out of school to earn money even though he was the smartest kid in the world, or if we’d have to choose between keeping the house and paying Mom’s hospital bills?
I would take that money in a second if I could. It didn’t mean I didn’t care about Sam.
“I can’t,” I said, the money blurring in front of my eyes as tears filled them. “I didn’t cast any spell. I didn’t cause this. I don’t know how to end it.”
Tennyson Wilde snapped the briefcase shut.
“I believe you,” he said.
But that was no comfort at all as he carried all that pretty cash away.
Chapter 10
It was a dark time for me. The darkest time of my whole life, maybe. Well, maybe not my whole life, but to have all I’d ever wanted offered to me and then snatched away, it did funny things to my mind. I went back to the house to curl up in bed. It was just too sad, thinking about all that money and how Tennyson Wilde obviously didn’t appreciate it, would just hand it over with no thought or feeling. It should go to a home where it would be loved. That money really should be mine. I would do right by it.
I didn’t get out of bed for days, except for bathroom breaks. It wasn’t just the money but my stomach felt awful as well. It went on too long to just be from too many dumplings. I had no will to eat, no will to do anything. I didn’t know if it was a chemical or a virus or a spell but I couldn’t bring myself to care. What could I do? I’d done all that investigating and it had been for nothing.
Not nothing, whispered a buried, resilient part of my brain. You know some stuff.
I blinked my eyes open. It was daylight. I didn’t know which day, but it seemed like afternoon. I smelled bad. The room smelled bad. I was hungry. Things were looking up.
I knew some stuff. I was sure that it was Mr. Corbett. Maybe, just maybe, if I got him to stop it, I could negotiate with Tennyson Wilde. I might even be able to get visitation rights with Sam thrown in, which was better than what I currently had, which was diddly with a side of squat. I’d go on an epic witch hunt, and then everything would be coming up Lucy.
I planned it all out while I showered. I’d take the information I had to Tennyson Wilde and try to open up negotiations. I didn’t have any concrete proof of anything, not enough for him to hand over the cash, but I could get his thoughts. He probably had some sort of secret police at his disposal to investigate Mr. Corbett and take him down. Or at least the polo team. I wasn’t greedy, if it was just the information, I didn’t need the whole briefcase of money. Though, if he wanted to give it away, I would take very good care of it and love it like my own flesh and blood.
It was later than I thought by the time I got outside, night falling quickly as it seemed to here. I hurried to the Golden House and swiped the card that Nikolai had given me over the sensor.
“Place your index finger on the sensor,” the voice said, but after it scanned me, it said, “Lucy O’Connor, Red House. Access: denied.”
I should’ve expected as much, but it was still a setback. I pressed the intercom button by the gate impatiently. It was growing cold and my belly still felt weird, and I wanted to be back in my bed.
“It’s Lucy, open up,”
I said into the intercom.
There was no response. Jerks. All the lights in the closest tower were on, so it wasn’t as if they weren’t there.
“Your hair is stupid, Tennyson Wilde,” I said. “Your eyebrows look like caterpillars and you aren’t very nice.” I really wanted to say his face looked like a butt, but that was a lie. There wasn’t really any fault I could pick with his face. The jerk.
I was just working up to some real zingers when I was cut off by a piercing howl. It made my heart freeze in my chest, the sound of that howl, the raw pain in it. It reminded me of the scream that I’d heard, that night. I thought about my wolf buddy, who had helped me out, and I hoped it wasn’t him. It was such an anguished sound.
The howl rose again, even more harrowing this time. Without thinking, I rushed toward the sound. The wolf was clearly in pain; it obviously needed help. I didn’t know what I could do, but I couldn’t leave it alone to suffer.
I followed the sound into the woods, not taking any path but heading directly for it. The forest was dark and overgrown, trees hanging so low I had to duck as I ran. Even by the light of the full moon, I could barely see my way, the forest was so dense. The howling grew louder as I ran deeper into the forest, so loud it seemed to fill the air. I felt as if I breathed it in and held it inside of me, until it became a part of me. The pain of the wolf became my own pain, like a bone-deep ache.
I stumbled out of the forest, and was not surprised when I found myself in the glade where the wolf had led me to Sam, where I’d first met the Wildes. The place had a special quality that lent itself to strange events. And what I saw in front of me was definitely strange.
Tennyson Wilde knelt in front of the howling wolf, his hands buried deep in the fur of its neck, whispering to it, trying to quiet it. Althea and Nikolai hovered behind him, as if afraid to approach. The wolf continued to howl, inconsolable. No matter what Tennyson Wilde did, the wolf cried and cried.
It was the same brown wolf, my wolf buddy. It seemed different, bigger, more wild, but I could tell it was the same wolf. I knew it, just as I knew in my heart what I was witnessing, despite not wanting to believe it. Perhaps deep down I’d known all along, and that was why I had trusted the wolf. Even as it twisted in Tennyson Wilde’s grasp so that I could see the mark, I knew it. The mark on the side of the wolf’s neck, that it had kept hidden from me before – it was more than a coincidence. The white mark in the brown fur, the shape of a heart. Just the same as the scar on Sam’s neck.
My brain didn’t want to accept it, but as the wolf pulled out of Tennyson Wilde’s hold and toward me, there was no mistaking it. No mistaking those eyes. Green with flecks of gold, shining like the sun. Sam’s eyes.
“Impossible,” I whispered, backing away. “Hallucination. Possibly a dream. A hoax. Something logical.”
The wolf snarled at me.
“You need to leave,” said Althea Wilde, just as she had that first day. I wondered if maybe she hadn’t had a good reason then too, because she was definitely talking sense right now.
My wolf buddy had been friendly the other times I’d met it, but now its hackles were definitely raised. It had stopped howling and it growled low in its throat. A warning.
I backed up to the edge of the clearing, over to the path. Just as I got to the tree line, the wolf slipped out of Tennyson Wilde’s hold and lunged for me.
I turned and ran.
I ran as hard as I could. I didn’t turn back, but I was sure the wolf was at my heels. I could feel its breath against the back of my neck, and every moment I thought it would pounce, and I’d feel its paws on my back and its teeth on my throat. My legs ached and my lungs burned, but I didn’t stop running. I sweated so much that my glasses slipped off, so I stuffed them in my pocket, but still I didn’t stop running. Not even when I got clear of the forest. I just kept running and running, with no thought to where I was going, only to putting as much distance between me and the wolf as I could.
I didn’t stop until I got right up to the school, and then I jumped into the fountain and waded to the middle, then climbed right up to the very top. I sat in the fountain with the creepy cupids and tried to catch my breath. I was fairly sure wolves couldn’t climb, but I wasn’t sure about werewolves. I put my glasses back on and scanned the gardens carefully for any sign of movement, twitching at every little sound. The school was dark, everybody safely back in their houses after dinner. In the distance, I could see the lights of the Red House and I wished I was there. As my panic began to fade, I wished I’d found a spot that was less wet and cold to hide out, but I waited a little longer, just to be safe. Nobody ever got eaten by a werewolf from playing it too safe. I assumed.
The full moon was high over the forest, lighting the grounds, so I saw clearly when the dark figure emerged from the trees. I jolted and my heart began to pound again, but it was only Tennyson Wilde.
“Why are you in the fountain again?” he asked.
“More like why are you not in the fountain?” I said. “Fountains are the places where you don’t get eaten by wolves.”
“I don’t know what evidence you’re basing that on,” he said, staring up at me. He looked almost amused. “But he was never going to eat you. You know that. You should go back to your house now. Do not speak to anyone of what you saw.”
The fountain was just as slippery and dangerous as the last time I’d found myself in it, but I clambered my way out to confront him.
“Nuh-uh, buddy,” I said, wading toward him. I wasn’t as wet as last time though I was covered in slimy stuff and muck, but I didn’t even care. “This is your big secret, right? The thing you’d do anything to hide? Well, I want some answers, or I can’t guarantee I’ll help you keep your secret.”
He folded his arms over his chest and glared at me like I was a bug. “What do you want to know?”
Wow. That was a big question. It threw me for a moment, and I sat down on the edge of the fountain to think about it, dripping and squelching as I moved. I wanted to know everything, but what did I want to know the most?
“Is Sam okay?”
“No.”
It struck me like a punch to the face. I’d been so angry at Sam since I’d found him alive that I hadn’t really thought about how much I cared about him, how much he meant to me.
“And your presence here does not help.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “You can’t keep blaming me for everything.”
“My family found Sam two years ago. He was wild, feral. We’ve tried to rehabilitate him and we thought he was ready to come back to school, though he’s still very volatile. He’s triggered by minor things, inconsequential things, but you remind him of his old life, and that makes him more vulnerable.”
It made sense, but I hated Tennyson Wilde for saying it.
“But you’re like him too? All of you?”
He shrugged.
I didn’t want to say the word, to have it as an irrefutable truth, but I needed to know for certain.
“Werewolves?”
He rolled his eyes. “That is a very crude, inaccurate, gender-biased term. We are lycanthropes.”
I shrugged. I was cold, my belly hurt, and I was getting impatient with him. “But you still turn into a wolf on the full moon, right? So it’s all semantics.”
“The moon does not force us to change. The moon is our guide, our power, our energy. We are stronger when the moon is full. It helps us control our powers – we are not controlled by it.” He sighed. “Except for Sam. His case is unique. But it is up to him to decide whether to share that with you.”
“You’re all a bunch of werewolves.” Something else clicked for me as well. “And we’re under a truth spell. None of this is science.” I didn’t want to believe it, struggled to hold on to the last shreds of logic – it was a bad dream, a prank, but I had no choice except to give in to it. It was magic. I gaped at Tennyson Wilde as my entire belief system crumbled beneath my feet.
He loomed over me, fallin
g completely into shadow. “I think you’ve imposed on my goodwill enough for one night. Please return to your house.”
I still hadn’t told him about the information I’d found, but I didn’t really feel like negotiating with him anymore. I didn’t know what I wanted, except to be safe in bed and to forget the whole night had ever happened.
As I got up to walk back to my house, the sound of howling wolves rose up around me. I shivered and hurried home.
Chapter 11
Assistant Head Noel had said that when you rule out the impossible you were left with the truth, but more and more, the impossible was becoming fact. I’d always relied on logic when things were falling apart, on concrete evidence, what was real. Even if everything was a total mess, there were still particular rules that the universe was governed by. It made me feel safe.
Only, it was a lie. I didn’t know what to believe anymore. Werewolves. Witchcraft. Everything I’d ever thought about the world was wrong, all my fundamental systems of belief. I wondered what else I had wrong. The sick feeling in my stomach got worse and worse.
It was tempting to just stay in bed. To pull the covers over my head and ignore all of it. That was what everyone else was doing. But I couldn’t. I knew the truth now and I couldn’t hide from it. There was magic. It had gotten inside of me. The blue magic spark chased the truth around and around my belly, churning everything up, and the more I tried to ignore it, the sicker I felt.
I sent Tennyson Wilde a message with my findings from the poll. I didn’t know if he’d get it – he probably had everyone in the school messaging him constantly – but I figured he probably had his own investigations team and data analysts or whatever, so he may as well have as many of the facts as possible. It was in his hands now, I decided.
I hadn’t seriously considered witchcraft as a cause for the truth telling, so my research in that area was seriously lacking, but when I did an Internet search all I found was fan fiction and people trying to sell phony spells. It was the same for werewolves, only with less spells and more porn. Any information I found seemed made up. When I went into my messages, there was a school-wide notice saying classes had been canceled indefinitely due to the superflu, so I headed to the library to research werewolves. Even if there was nothing legit, at least paper books didn’t have flashing sparkle animations in the background like those fake spell sites.