The Nightmare Dilemma (Arkwell Academy) (28 page)

Eli faced me. “This isn’t where we’re supposed to be, Dusty.”

“I know.” The words came out listlessly. I was suddenly so tired, as if I’d run twenty miles without stopping and hadn’t eaten for days. All I wanted was to sit down and rest. But I couldn’t. Eli was right. “I’ll try to fix it.”

I closed my eyes and focused on manipulating the dream. I felt the magic respond, but it was weak and insubstantial, like trying to build a sand castle with dry sand or a snowman with powdery snow. No matter how I pressed and pulled and forced, the shape of it wouldn’t stay.

Finally, I gave up, making a sound somewhere between a shriek and a groan. “I can’t do it. It just. Won’t. Go.”

Eli didn’t say anything, but I could feel his gaze on me. Frustrated and growing desperate, I strode away from the edge toward the center of the tower where I knew the plinth would be. If I couldn’t manipulate the dream, then I would work on the block. No time to waste.

The fog grew denser the farther in I walked, soon becoming so thick I couldn’t see more than a foot in front of me. I pressed on, and in moments began to suspect something was wrong. In every other dream, I would’ve reached the plinth by now, but there was no sign of it. I walked on. Sooner or later I would reach the other side of the tower at least.

I was right. Except as I stepped through the fog, it wasn’t the other side, but the same side. Eli was standing right where I’d left him. I’d managed to walk a circle, missing the plinth completely.

I didn’t know how that was possible, except this was a dream. A place where
anything
was possible.

I stepped up beside Eli. “You try changing it.”

He rubbed his chin, mulling it over. “Okay.” Then he closed his eyes, and he held his hands rigid at his side, no doubt mimicking the way I did it.

Nothing happened at first. But then the wind began to pick up. The fog swirled around us. I expected visibility to drop even more, but to my surprise the wind seemed to be dissipating the fog.

Out of the corner of my eye, something bright caught my attention. I turned toward it automatically, walking closer to the edge of the tower. But I didn’t lean against it, the memory of plummeting over the side all too vivid.

I didn’t need to get to the edge to see what the bright thing was. The top of one of the trees was on fire, the branches like a thousand torches bound together. Soon more of the trees caught fire, not from the wind blowing or any other natural phenomenon. They just ignited as if from the inside.

“What’s going on?” Eli said, opening his eyes. He turned and surveyed the scene.

I glanced at him. “You’re not doing this?”

He shook his head. “If I am, it’s not on purpose.”

I started to reply, but a loud rumble went through the tower and the floor began to shake. Beyond the wall, one of the trees fell over with an ear-splitting crack.

Eli and I both backed away from the edge. But it didn’t matter. The rumble grew louder, the stone beneath us breaking apart. It split right down the middle, right where we were standing.

We turned to look at each other, the same thought going through our minds. Then we reached for each other just as the tower began to fall.

*   *   *

We woke with our arms wrapped around each other, our quick breaths mingling, our panic mutual from a brush with death inside the dream.

I started to roll off him, but Eli’s grip tightened. I froze and then gave in, letting my body relax into his. For once I didn’t question it. We didn’t speak, didn’t move. Just held each other, finding comfort in the embrace and acceptance in our shared silence.

25

Loyalties

For the first time since it had started, I reported the tower dream in my dream journal. I did it as soon as I got back to the dorm. The fire and the tower falling seemed too meaningful not to tell Lady Elaine, especially not now that we suspected something would happen at Beltane. I even mentioned how the tower was originally my dream, and how the plinth that was supposed to be there was missing. Then I sat and waited for an IM from OracleGirl. Surely she would have something to say about it.

Only she didn’t. Not that night and not the next morning when I checked it again. I didn’t know if I should be relieved or worried by her lack of response, so I ignored it instead. Either there was a hidden meaning in the dream or there wasn’t. It wasn’t as if Lady Elaine had to tell me one way or the other. For all I knew, in the last few months all of Eli’s dreams could’ve been pointing to this impending doom at the Beltane Festival.

Or maybe Paul is lying
.

I knew it was possible that he had made up the stuff about his uncle for some unknowable reason, but I wasn’t about to drive myself crazy worrying about the what-ifs. He
hadn’t
made up the stuff about Britney. I knew the key to solving this was finding out the reason she was involved.

Clinging to this certainty, Selene and I decided to make Melanie and the Terra Tribe our priority today.

“I figure we leave lunch early and try to catch her in the upperclassmen’s cafeteria,” Selene said as she ran an ivory-handled comb through her dark hair. “If that doesn’t work, we ditch gym early and wait outside of her last class.”

I froze in the process of applying my mascara, afraid I would give myself raccoon face if I didn’t. “Why not try and catch her during breakfast?”

Selene sniffed. “Would you be inclined to cooperate so early in the morning?”

“Good point,” I said, and then resumed applying my mascara.

To my surprise, Paul was waiting for us in the foyer when we came down the stairs. I couldn’t tell for sure, but it seemed like Frank and Igor were giving him the evil eye, their spears pointed a little lower than was usual. Paul on the other hand seemed completely unconcerned about them. He flashed a dazzling smile at me the moment he saw me.

I smiled back, automatically. For a brief second all the bad history between us vanished, and he was the Paul I first met—smart, handsome, and obviously into me.

“What’s up?” I said, coming to a stop in front of him.

“I just found out this morning that the Terra Tribe is holding their next meeting tonight at eight in the theater house.”

Selene frowned. “How do you know?”

Paul shrugged. “Spellbook isn’t the most secure site around. I hacked into their page and saw the announcement.”

I beamed at him, thrilled that something had finally gone right. “That’s perfect.”

“Hmmm,” Selene said, sounding less enthused by the idea.

I turned toward her, surprised. “What’s wrong?”

She folded her arms over her chest. “Nothing. I just think we should give Melanie a chance to help us first before we resort to spying on them.”

I frowned. “We’ve spied and snooped on other people, and it’s not like the Terra Tribe has exactly been innocent.”

“I’m not saying we shouldn’t go through with it, but we should spy only as a last resort. We wouldn’t want anybody spying on us when we’re doing stuff in Room 013, after all.”

I started to point out that we weren’t involved in anything potentially dangerous to other people, but then decided not to as I realized that to an outsider we probably did look like we were up to nothing good half the time. What with breaking into crypts and stealing books from the boy’s locker room.

“You’re right. We’ll talk to Melanie first.”

Selene nodded. “I hope she cooperates.”

“Me too,” I said.

But I should’ve known better.

*   *   *

“Why do you want to know?” Melanie slammed her locker door closed so hard, the ones next to it shuddered from the impact.

“We already told you,” Selene said, in her most patient, persuasive voice. After a failed lunchtime attempt, Selene and I had finally managed to track Melanie down after classes. Good thing Coach Fritz let us out a few minutes early. Given the look on Melanie’s face the moment she spotted Selene and me, I knew for sure she’d been avoiding us. The knowledge stung. A couple of months ago, I’d been her hero.

“We’re just trying to help Britney,” I finished for Selene.

Melanie glared. “Britney’s already got all the help she needs.”

“What do you mean?” asked Selene. When Melanie refused to answer, Selene dropped the softness in her tone. “Come on, Mellie. Why are you treating us like pond scum? I thought we were friends.”

Melanie’s glare faltered then faded. But her manner remained cool. “We are, but … things aren’t so easy as they used to be.”

Melanie looked at me, her huge eyes suddenly watery, but I didn’t think it was from sadness. “We’re just getting tired of always being the victim.”

I arched an eyebrow. “Who’s we? And victim of what?”

“Naturekinds is who.” Melanie thrust out her chin. “First Rosemary was murdered and now Britney’s been attacked twice. She was in a
hospital
. Who does that?”

Selene and I exchanged a look. We had a pretty good idea who, but neither of us was about to mention that to her. Finding out another witchkind was behind the most recent attack on her kind wasn’t going to do us any favors in getting her to talk.

“But Britney survived,” I said. “My mom saved her.”

Melanie shrugged. “If Britney hadn’t been there in the first place, she wouldn’t have needed saving.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Selene said. It was a good thing she’d spoken first, because my response would’ve been more along the lines of
Thanks a lot, you ingrate
.

Melanie ran her hands over the bottom of her blouse, smoothing nonexistent wrinkles. “There’s just a lot of talk among the naturekinds about”—she seemed to search for the right word—“independency from the other kinds.”

Selene’s brow furrowed. “Like setting up separate institutions just for naturekinds? Like schools?”

“And hospitals.” Melanie tapped her foot. “Britney’s mom hadn’t wanted her to go to Vejovis in the first place, but the government officials insisted on it. The idiots. But Britney’s safe now. She’s in a secure location surrounded by her own kind only and nothing bad has happened to her since.”

Nausea burned in my gut. The attitude behind these events was so wrong, so
regressive
. It was just as stupid as the witchkinds harassing Eli for being a Conductor. “But you’re acting as if the attack on Britney was
because
she’s a naturekind.”

“That’s because it was.”

“No, it wasn’t.” I bit my lip, hesitating. “We don’t know why she was attacked yet, but I doubt her kind had anything to do with it.”

Melanie stood up straighter, emphasizing how much taller she was than Selene and me. “She wasn’t attacked by a naturekind, that’s for sure. And that’s what matters.”

I was unable to keep my temper in check any longer. “All the bad stuff lately has nothing to do with kinds. Rosemary wasn’t the only one Marrow killed, remember? He murdered Mr. Ankil, too, a
witchkind
. And my great grandmother, a
darkkind
.”

A crimson stain spread over Melanie’s cheeks. “You’re just a halfkind. You wouldn’t understand. You don’t know the first thing about
loyalty
.”

I raised my hand, ready to curse her. Sweat broke out on my skin from the waves of anger rippling through me. I’d never been so insulted, so outraged in my whole life. I knew about loyalty. And it had nothing to do with someone’s kind.

“You’re nothing more than a mule,” Melanie said, taking an ominous step toward me.

I moved to defend myself. “Flig—”

An invisible pressure seemed to wrap around me, forcing my hand down to my side before I could cast the jinx. Across from me Melanie too was struggling against some unseen force holding her in place before she could fire her own spell at me. Selene was caught as well, but she wasn’t fighting. She seemed frozen in shock.

“That’s quite enough of that,” a rough, male voice said.

I craned my eyeballs as far to the right as I could and saw Captain Gargrave walking toward us, his staff held out before him, the ruby winking in the lights overhead. He came to a stop a few feet from us, setting the end of the staff down on the floor with a hard clack.

“Fighting is against the rules,” Gargrave said.

“No kidding, Captain Obvious,” I said.

All the color blanched from Gargrave’s face only to surge back into it, tomato red. I exhaled, wishing like hell that he’d used the gag spell on me. I had a feeling my sassy response didn’t bother him half as much as the unintentional captain pun. I mean, how often is the person you say something like that to an
actual
captain?

“Detention, Miss Everhart,” Gargrave said. It might’ve been my imagination, but it seemed as if the magic holding me tightened its grip. My breathing grew shallow, and I began to feel lightheaded. “Seven o’clock. In the kitchens.”

Great,
I thought, remembering the Terra Tribe’s meeting tonight. The timing couldn’t have been worse.

I started to complain, but then stopped, keeping my big fat mouth shut for once.

As usual, too little too late.

26

The Terra Tribe

The only good thing about scoring a detention in the kitchens was … wait … nothing. There was nothing good about it. Predictably, the kitchen staff assigned me dish duty. I spent more than an hour loading dirty plates, goblets, and silverware into a giant metal machine that had developed a prankster personality from the animation effect. This meant that every time I turned my back on it, the dishwasher sprayed me with warm soapy water. When I shouted at it to stop, it sprayed me in the face. With the dirty water.

I tried to console myself by remembering that at least Selene, Eli, and Paul were still available to check out the Terra Tribe’s meeting tonight, but it didn’t help very much. I desperately wanted to be with them.

At half past eight, the kitchen manager—a witch who would’ve made a perfect Mrs. Claus with her white hair, prodigious belly, and red cheeks—told me I could leave. I bolted for the door, pausing only long enough to flip the bird over my shoulder at the stupid dishwashing machine. As I escaped through the door, I thought I heard it make a gurgling noise that sounded suspiciously like laughter.