I leaned forward to rest my elbows on the desk, lacing my fingers together. “He’s also five hundred years old.”
The other Athan snorted with laughter and then promptly tried to cover it up by clearing his throat. Gwen opened and closed her mouth a few times like a goldfish, before settling on a disappointed pout. Poor Edmund kept staring dead-ahead, his face utterly expressionless.
“You owe me fifty dollars, Richard,” the prince said, addressing the second man in the same bored voice, but when I leaned back in my seat I could see he was smirking behind the pages.
He actually bet on someone hitting on Edmund? I couldn’t help but grin, too, at that thought.
Perhaps I was grinning too much, because when I looked up, Christy, Gwen, and Tammy were all looking at me with wide, curious eyes and Gwen’s wagging finger was now directed at the space between the prince and me.
“So,” Christy mouthed. “You two?” Her eyebrows raised and she flicked her ponytail again.
I just frowned at them all and shook my head.
Tammy feigned being insulted and then tried again. “Why are they here?” she mouthed, jolting her head toward Edmund and Richard. I shook my head again. I wasn’t going to give them the answer to that. It would only cause panic.
Gwen, utterly thrilled by this turn of events and its entertainment potential, started making very crude gestures with her hands, exactly like those she had used on Tammy on the first day of school. Christy, sympathetic or sensible, I didn’t know which, rolled up her magazine and swatted at Gwen’s hands. Gwen, disgruntled, snatched the magazine and threw it back at Christy. It landed open in front of her.
Before I could see what the picture was of, the prince had snatched it up, smoothing it back down in front of us. I had to suppress a gasp when I read the headline. It was about Violet Lee and the vamperic Autumnal Equinox ball.
He was scanning the left page, so I scanned the right. I knew exactly what he was looking for and couldn’t breathe until I had finished all three columns. There was an abundance of information about her dress, whom she had danced with, insider “impressions” of her character, but nothing about the Crimson family or what had been inflicted upon her. The gag orders were working just as well for the Varns as they were for the Athenea.
“Ugh! Why are you reading that?” Valerie Danvers asked from the next table, with a wrinkled nose. She looked straight at the prince—she had settled on ignoring my existence since our little “incident.” “Sage like you don’t care about humans like Violet Lee. You just let humans die, like she does,” she sneered, jabbing her finger toward me—I spoke too soon. I exist again.
A lump formed in my throat as everybody turned in their seats toward her, and the prince slowly slid the magazine back across the desk.
“Apologies, Valerie, I didn’t realize you were the paragon of compassion and care,” Fallon said loudly, so the whole class could hear. People laughed cruelly. Mr. Sylaeia, who had half opened the door in preparation for sending her out, closed it again.
“Whatever,” she snapped, picking up an actual book and covering her face with it to read. I glanced back at the prince, who hadn’t moved his penetrating gaze away from her.
When Mr. Sylaeia turned his back, he leaned across the gap between the tables. “Insult her again and I’ll forget that I care about humans,” he threatened in a low voice. Valerie looked like she wanted to spit in his face but huffed and hid behind her book.
When everyone had recovered, Christy returned to Quaintrelle and also seemed to be in a mood to discuss dimensional politics—a lot of Kable’s girls had found a sudden calling to the subject recently. After a while, the topic inevitably moved back to Violet Lee.
“I don’t know why she needs all this pity,” Christy said, fingering the outline of a sketched version of Violet’s dress. “I get that if you didn’t know about dark beings, seeing thirty men get killed would be a shock, but the rest of us humans got over it. They were slayers, so who cares? Bit selfish doing a damsel in distress, if you ask me. Just turn already.”
I averted my gaze away from the table. Up until the previous day, I would have largely agreed with Christy’s summary. It was being dragged out and people were tiring of it. The horrible thing was it was probably better for people to feel apathy toward the Varns’ hostage rather than any united human front of support. That was the last thing we needed.
But now . . . now that I knew I had been sharing in Violet Lee’s shame through the medium of my dreams, I just couldn’t bring myself to reply. She didn’t need any more pitying; she was a pitiful enough creature already.
I felt a light pressure on my elbow beneath the edge of the desk. I didn’t need to look to know who it was, and let his hand rest there for the remainder of homeroom. When the bell rang, I experienced the same sensation of disappointment I had felt leaving Burrator.
As the prince packed up his things, I was surprised to see Richard, not Edmund, stir and prepare to leave with him. The prince didn’t question it and I didn’t think it would be appropriate for me to, either, in front of the others.
As I was unpacking my things for GCSE English—in other words, Mr. Sylaeia’s book on misogyny to finish up, because I was far ahead of the rest of the class—the prince crossed behind me and placed a hand on my shoulder. He pulled a much wider, much more pronounced version of his mischievous smile, which made dimples appear on his cheeks. He said something in Sagean to me, winked, and then strolled out of the room.
Christy twisted in her seat to watch him go, blowing air through pursed lips to produce a low, appreciative whistle in his wake. I watched him go, too, and would have kept staring at the open door if a face hadn’t suddenly appeared level with mine. There was the slam of a bag on the table in the now-free space, but I didn’t dare look.
“You slept with him, didn’t you?” Gwen growled, half getting up on the table by placing a knee on the desk.
I hastily slid back in my chair. “What? No!”
She slammed her palm against the wood; if my hands had not been clenching the chair very tightly, her long, glossy hair would probably have been cinders—sparks were tripping on my fingers.
“Damn! I wanted to know how big his dick is.” She got down and slumped into her chair, folding her arms. “Tell me when you find out. I think you’ve got a way better chance of sucking on it than we do.”
“Quit it, Gwen. Autumn’s not stupid enough to do that,” Tammy said, coming to my rescue. I extended one side of my mouth in a shy smile of gratitude.
“But c’mon, Autumn, put us out of our misery!” Christy demanded. “What were you doing getting out of the same car as Prince Fallon, then? With someone who looked like Prince Alfred driving?” She added emphasis both times she said the princes’ names.
I looked to Edmund for permission. His face was no longer composed and I could see his lips fighting the urge to smile—I don’t know how he was maintaining control listening to this kind of conversation. Catching my eye, he gave a small nod.
“He is living with the duke and duchess of Victoria because they have property here. As I’m the premier nobleperson in the country, it was my duty to welcome them. So they invited me to stay for the weekend.”
Gwen jumped up in her chair and screamed, then swore, turning the heads of the whole class so they were listening. Mr. Sylaeia made no move to regain order. I think it was his way of telling me he had been right. “You stayed with him? All weekend?”
“Yes.”
“You had him all to yourself. I am so, so jel!” She sighed, dropping back into her chair. “He is just so gorgeous, and rich, and—”
“The most famous person on the planet—”
“And intelligent—”
“I can’t believe we spend fifteen minutes of every day with him!”
“And gentlemanly—”
“He surfed in Australia!”
“And rich, and famous—”
“And he had that hottie, Amanda, on his arm
for years—”
“And I bet his dick is like nine inches—”
“If you have all finished listing His Highness’s attributes, I think the duchess would like to bask in her admirable dignity,” Edmund interrupted, silencing the room with his steely tones. A few people gasped. Others shrank back down into their seats. Gwen and Christy bit their lips to suppress their giggles, whereas Tammy paled. Even Mr. Sylaeia raised his eyebrows at me when I glanced his way. Unperturbed, however, he picked up his pen and bounced on his heels as he always did when something especially boring was coming our way.
“Good call,” he praised, nodding in Edmund’s direction. “If you ever get sick of kicking anti-Athenean backside, consider a career as a teacher.”
The whole class laughed. Even Edmund cracked a very small smile.
Once the last chuckle had died down, the lesson properly began and I opened my book, finding my page in the very last chapter. I was hoping to return it that day, and so scanned the text quickly, making sparse notes on anything that might help my A-level. I had read two pages when there was a tap on my arm.
It was Tammy. “What did he say to you in Sagean before he left?” she whispered.
“Oh,” I breathed, looking back down at my page to hide my smile. “He said, ‘maple syrup.’ ”
Before she could question the meaning of that, the fire bell rang. Above its continuous, shrill cry, a few students whooped and cheered. Mr. Sylaeia frowned, flipping his teacher planner open. His expression darkened before he began barking instructions.
I had no need to listen to them as I found Edmund at my side, stiff and hoisting me up. I went to grab my books and bag, but he instructed me to leave everything. One look at his face told me to obey.
This was no drill.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Autumn
Edmund! Edmund, where are you going?” I dug my heels in and attempted to halt him, but it was useless. He had a firm grip on me and I just tripped over my own feet. “Edmund, I have to check in!”
The bell was still ringing, it was all I could hear, and the quad had become eerily empty. The rest of the class had disappeared around the block and onto the tennis courts, which was the rendezvous point where everybody had to be accounted for.
“No, you do not. I have a bad feeling about this. We’re leaving.”
I had other ideas. By hooking my foot around a nearby picnic bench, I was able to wrench free of his grip, very nearly ending up on the ground in the process. He only just caught me, but I quickly broke contact again.
“If I don’t check in they will send out a search party and somebody might get hurt!”
He glared. “When I said ‘gracious lady,’ I wasn’t suggesting that you were canonized! Less saint, more moving, if you will.”
I started moving, but in the opposite direction from him, heading for the earthy red banks to cut through to the tennis courts.
“My lady, you can’t walk away!”
I stuck a hand out and waved him off, continuing. “Yes, I can. My surname isn’t House of Athenea.” As I climbed the worn, makeshift steps, carved out by multiple feet over many years, I heard footsteps behind me.
“They told me you had grown to be milder in your absence and I was beginning to believe it. But you are just as stubborn as I remember you. A true Al-Summers.”
His voice chased my back and I folded my arms across my chest, marching along the path until I decided how to reply. “I don’t remember you.” I didn’t entirely consciously choose to say that, and didn’t mean it to come out so bluntly.
He never replied, and we were soon slipping through a side gate into the enclosed paddock, fenced in on all four sides. There was complete chaos. People were struggling to find their homeroom groups, and judging by the way Tammy, Tee, Gwen, and Christy were all standing together, weren’t making much effort to do so, either.
The prince was easy to spot beside Richard’s bulk. “Dragged Edmund to check in, too, eh?”
I nodded. “What’s going on?”
“Everybody is saying someone hit one of the glass alarms. I don’t sense any fire, and fire is my best element, so I guess they’re right.” He shrugged, wandering to the front of the line as Mr. Sylaeia demanded we get in alphabetical order. I stepped in front of him. Edmund and Richard, despite the statement about the lack of fire, still looked very uneasy.
Mr. Sylaeia scooted down the line and ticked everybody’s name off, handing the register to the secretary, who was moving from one homeroom teacher to another. At the far end, beside the dismantled basketball post, the headmaster was struggling with a megaphone, until it eventually screeched into life.
I stopped listening as soon as I realized he was going to lecture us on how setting the alarms off was unacceptable and dangerous. It had happened more times than I cared to count the previous year, so his choice words clearly had no impact. The rest of the school seemed to have the same thought, as a dull murmur rose to a crescendo right over the top of him as people speculated as to who the culprit could be.
A breeze was beginning to pick up, stirring my hair from behind my ears. But it wasn’t coming from the direction of the river or the sea. It was moving across the gently sloping fields, and somehow penetrating the trees that stood on the banks surrounding us.
I unfolded my arms slowly. “If there is no fire, then what is that?” I muttered.
The prince looked up. “Lords of Earth,” he breathed.
Other people were noticing it, too, and the noise level began to drop.
Floating toward us was what looked like light sea mist, aside from the fact it carried debris from the trees. It clung to the still-dewy ground, barely rising fifteen feet. And with the wind that dragged it along came magic. Cold, moist magic.
I looked at the prince. The prince looked at me. Edmund glared at both of us. Before anybody could say anything, an arm had wrapped itself around my shoulders and was guiding me toward the exit of the paddock. I tried to shake it off, but Edmund anticipated it this time and had a stronger grip. The prince, on the other hand, compliantly trotted along beside Richard.
I threw myself up against his barriers and he didn’t hesitate to let me in. This time there were no scenic hills, just a vast, black space filled with boxes. I focused on shutting down our line of communication so that neither Athan would hear, and then exploded.
“You’re kidding me, right? You’re just going to run away and leave everybody unprotected?”
“What can we do? That is magic, and it’s not any of us. They are in the area, Autumn! It’s not safe!”
“Your Highness, I am a guardian of this school. Are you?”
I tilted my head and examined him across the front of Edmund. I was treated with his wide-eyed communicative expression before he tilted his head and relented.
“Okay, okay, I get it. Just please don’t do anything stupid.”
I wasn’t going to make a promise. “On three.”
When I got to two, I slumped as though my knees had buckled from beneath me, ducking under Edmund’s arm. He dropped down to try and snatch me, but I was gone and his hand only closed around air. People were screaming now, and I dived between them, knowing it would lessen the chances of either Athan casting a spell. The prince did the same; when we reached the fence, he leaped up and grabbed its top, hoisting himself up and dropping over the other side, out of the paddock. I jumped up and landed on the edge, joining him on the ground. All the gates in and out of the courts had already slammed shut on us—Edmund was trying to trap us inside.
Up until that point, the cloud had moved only as fast as the wind could carry it. I had counted on that to be able to skirt its perimeter, because there was no way I was throwing myself, or the prince, into it—I had no idea what it was, or what kind of magic had created it. Even so, it was what it concealed that I was more worried about. Yet as we stepped onto the grass, it suddenly hurtled toward us, and before I could even scream or scramble back, it had swallowed me up who
le.
I felt skin brush my hand and heard somebody yell my name, but that was it. All I could feel was dampness and all I could see was white. I did a half-turn and looked back; I should not have been more than a few meters from the courts and took a few steps in that direction. After twenty, it was evident I was going the wrong way.
I went left. I went right. I tried straight on, sure I must be headed in the direction of the school, or the banks, or something solid and recognizable, but hit nothing. The inevitable pounding of panic in my chest began. I started running but only succeeded in stirring the mist around my feet, which left me unsure of whether I was even treading on grass any longer. When I went to crouch to see, I felt dizzy and couldn’t understand why my hand wasn’t hitting the ground.
There were no consciousnesses, not even those of the humans, within my reach, and a dull, faraway thought in the mist somewhere considered the possibility that the prince had left the dimension, or was dead, because consciousnesses did not just go that quickly. They did not just snuff out. They faded.
“Your Highness?” I whispered. The sound was completely lost. “Edmund?” I whirled around, grabbing fistfuls of moist air, which mingled with the tears that were now falling down my face. “Fallon?” There was still no answer.
“Fallon!” I screamed out of desperation, closing my eyes because the dark was better than the blankness. “Fallon!”
Then came a reply. But it wasn’t in Sagean. It wasn’t even in a Canadian accent. It was stunted and artificial. And it made my blood run cold.
“She is here. Find her.”
Fire sprang to life in the palms of my hands, and I briefly put up a shield around myself but then let it fade again as the mist around me steamed and evaporated away because of the heat. Abruptly, my dull thoughts sharpened and my heart rate slowed as grass behind and in front of me came into view. I quenched the fire and didn’t attempt to shield again, shocked at how foolishly close I had come to being found—igniting that sort of energy was like turning myself into a beacon.
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