Why, why, why did it have to be Dean who saw me? If it were anybody else, they wouldn’t have thought two things about it.
Only Dean already had a grudge against me.
Only Dean is conniving enough to put the pieces together.
This man has been living in my head rent-free all summer long, when I should have been enjoying my first trip to America—two uninterrupted, blissful months in which the Griffins were overwhelmingly kind to me, including Caleb Griffin, Miles’ little brother, who was so friendly and attentive that Zoe thought he had a puppy-love crush.
I don’t think that was the case. Like Miles, Caleb just likes to prove himself. In this case he wanted to prove what a good host he could be.
Still, we’re friends now, and I’m glad Caleb will be coming to Kingmakers next year.
I shouldn’t have been fretting over Dean the whole summer, yet I could hardly think of anything else. He popped into my head a hundred times a day. He haunted my nightmares.
But my worst dreams featured Rocco Prince.
I’ll never forget the look of pure hatred on his face as the noose tightened around his wrist, jerking him forward. I’ll never forget the way his knife sliced down at me, missing my face by millimeters, before he was jerked over the parapet.
And then the long, strangled howl as he tumbled down . . .
And the birds. The fucking birds.
As we returned from the Quartum Bellum, I saw that flock of gulls wheeling and circling over where Rocco had fallen, screeching like they were screaming my guilt to everyone around. Tattling on me.
They dove down to the rocks, squabbling and fighting as they tore his body apart. Then they rose up in the air again, their beaks stained with blood.
I can hardly hear the sound of a gull without vomiting all over again. Their cry is a constant reminder of what I did. An accusation and a threat. Proof that what I thought could be hidden was instead immediately discovered in a way I never would have guessed.
I rip a comb through my damp curls, trying to clear my head.
I’m in the shared bathroom of the Undercroft, the air full of steam from the students taking their early morning showers.
I found Dean crying in a bathroom very much like this.
Why was he so upset that day?
Why did the death of Ozzy’s mother strike him so hard?
I don’t understand Dean Yenin. I don’t understand why he’s so full of rage and bitterness.
God my head is a jumble of thoughts, none of them pleasant.
Rakel comes to stand at the mirror next to mine, her short, choppy hair already drying, and a towel wrapped around her body. Her face looks blank without her makeup, as if she hasn’t put on her personality for the day.
“What’s wrong?” she asks me.
“Nothing,” I say.
“You look stressed.”
“I’m fine.”
There it is again. Nobody is ever actually fine.
I watch Rakel arrange her collection of brushes and pots, then begin the delicate process of painting her face.
Anna Wilk tends toward classic goth makeup, but Rakel’s oeuvre is much more varied. Some days she looks vampiric with dark red lipstick and chalk-white cheeks. Others she looks consumptive with pink all around her eyes and dark shadows under her cheekbones. And some days, like today, she resembles a wicked fairy with thick black liner, two-inch lashes, and shades of sparkly purple all over her eyelids, cheeks, and even the tip of her nose.
She finishes her look with three different nose rings, a spiked eyebrow stud, and a serpentine cuff that winds up her ear.
“You’re an artist,” I tell her.
Rakel smiles. “Thank you,” she says. “That actually means something, coming from you.”
“I filled half my sketchbook this summer,” I say, with a glimmer of happiness. “The Bean, the Willis Tower, the Ferris wheel . . . now I’ll never forget what I saw in Chicago.”
“You should show me after class.”
I look at my own decidedly less-interesting reflection in the mirror.
I’ve never dressed with much panache. I’m so petite that my clothes swim on me. Half the time I look like a kid playing dress-up. My hair is a mess of black curls. My face . . . cute, I suppose. But nowhere near as stunning as Zoe’s. She’s the beautiful one. I’ve always just been the kid-sister.
“Could I borrow a little makeup?” I ask Rakel.
“Sure.” She shrugs.
I stare at the rainbow array of products, having no actual idea what I’m doing.