Darke Academy 4: Lost Spirits (15 page)

Sir Alric hung up and turned to his desk, taking a vial from a drawer and mixing its contents into a crystal tumbler of water. ‘Miss Bell, I hope you have a good explanation for all of this.’

‘I have … an explanation,’ she mumbled.

‘Miriam McEwen will be here directly. You know her from your fencing classes, I believe; she’s physically strong and she does not have a Few roommate at present. She’s up early as she’s on the rowing team, but she’ll just have to miss training today. When she arrives she’ll take this drink, and you will feed from her. No argument; I’m not presently interested in your moral scruples. Now, start talking. You have ten minutes.’

Cassie’s stomach lurched, but she had no option. Beginning with her meeting with Katerina near the hunting lodge, she told him everything – haltingly, her voice occasionally dropping to a whisper, but she left nothing out. When she reached the part about breaking into his office the previous night, her throat dried up altogether, and she had to knock back the rest of the water before she could continue. The confession was so painful she had to pause to regain her breath; she remembered that she had to explain about Marat, too, and his odd behaviour. That would have to wait – and besides, it was the only part of the tale that didn’t quite make sense. She’d let the rest sink in first.

Sir Alric had gone very still, and his face was deathly pale. Cassie’s heart felt like a shrivelled thing in her chest. For long moments, she thought she was going to get away with it. She thought, very fleetingly, that he was too shocked to speak.

And then he exploded.

‘I have striven for years to keep those artefacts out of the wrong hands. Years! And now you, Cassie Bell, have just handed them over.’

‘I’m sorry. I … I had no choice. I—’

‘You always have a choice! Do you have any idea what you’ve done? No! No, you obviously don’t, because no one with even a solitary brain cell would do something so stupid. You wanted your boyfriend back, so you’ve handed over all us Few to get him. Every damned one of us, Cassie!’

She had never, never seen him lose his temper like this. Crushed into silence, she waited for him to yell again, to break the awful tension in the air.

He didn’t. All she could hear was his furious breathing.

‘What will they do?’ she managed in a small voice. ‘The Svenssons?’

He made an angry, despairing gesture, but when he spoke again his voice was lowered. ‘I don’t know. I daresay we’ll find out soon enough, thanks to you.’ He tightened his fists, and when she dared to meet his eyes she saw that they were misted with red. He breathed hard, calming himself. ‘What do you think they wanted with the artefacts? Did they say anything? Think, girl. Think of anything that might help.’

‘I don’t know … they didn’t explain.’ Cassie’s voice shook. ‘But … the Urn, when it glowed – there was something about it. It seemed to … I don’t know, give them some kind of extra power. They were drawing strength from it. The light was like … like a living thing.’

‘Living?’

‘Yes. Maybe there are still spirits trapped in it? From way back, when the Eldest fed on—’

Sir Alric held up his hands and shook his head, frowning. ‘I’ll do the thinking from now on, Miss Bell.’ He paced the room. ‘As for Ranjit Singh—’

There was a hesitant knock on the outer door that stopped him. Startled, they both glanced at it, and Sir Alric barked, ‘One minute, Miriam.’

He lowered his voice, leaning menacingly over Cassie. ‘All I can do is try to undo the harm you’ve done. Minimise it, at least. Listen to me, Miss Bell. I’ll have to leave the Academy to attempt to locate the Svenssons, or at least try to determine what it is they have planned. I will go to the lodge at Mount Kenya, because that’s where I stored all the related documents after that last – unsuccessful – break-in. And I take it, since it was unsuccessful, that you weren’t the culprit.’

Cassie shook her head. The break-in. ‘There’s something I’ve got to—’

‘I don’t want any more apologies,’ he interrupted bitterly. ‘I had sent the documents to Mount Kenya for safekeeping. Not the artefacts, because I didn’t want to let those out of my sight. I realise now that I shouldn’t have been so foolish. But I didn’t allow for treachery quite like this.’

Cassie couldn’t speak.

Sir Alric straightened and went back to his desk drawer. He threw a key into her lap, and she caught it, eyes widening as she recognised the carved symbols.

‘That, as you will remember, is the key to Jake’s old room. Ranjit may as well stay there. He should take time to recuperate, since his life has been bought so dearly. Of course,’ he added savagely, ‘he can’t even use the Tears to aid his recovery, since Jake has those at the lodge. But I daresay you will find some means to tend him, Miss Bell. And make sure no further disturbance occurs.’

Cassie nodded, keeping her lips tightly shut. She wanted so desperately to be back with Ranjit now, to remind herself why she’d done this terrible thing in the first place. She couldn’t think straight any more.

‘One more thing,’ Sir Alric said. ‘I’ll help you get Mr Singh to his new quarters. But once there, you will not get involved with him in any romantic way. For once in your life you will do as you are told. There’s no chance of you splitting from your spirit, now that you’ve given away the means to do it.’ He sounded almost spiteful, and for once she didn’t blame him. ‘So you will keep your spirits apart. For once in your life you will consider the impact of your actions on the rest of the Few, and you will restrain your impulses. Do I make myself clear?’

‘Yes,’ whispered Cassie. If he didn’t let up, she thought, she was going to faint, and that would be the ultimate humiliation.

He stared at her. ‘And now, you’re going to feed.’ He strode to the door, and his voice was suddenly warm and welcoming and perfectly civil.

‘Good morning, Miriam. Thank you for coming so swiftly. Can I offer you a vitamin drink. This won’t take long at all.’

Much later, Cassie sat on the edge of a chair in what she still thought of as Jake’s quarters, gazing at the sleeping Ranjit.

No wonder Sir Alric had let rip at her. And no wonder he’d done it before she fed. Now, restored with poor Miriam’s unwitting help, Cassie’s mind was racing again, and she could feel the old energy trickling back, the old defiance.

She’d deserved it; she knew that. What she’d done was unforgivable. But it had also been unavoidable. Now she just had to start fixing things …

Rising, she went over to Ranjit’s bed and sat down on the edge, stroking his hair and his face and the arm that lay on top of the covers. It was lean and pale, but still muscled, and the fist was clenched in his sleep.

By the time Ranjit had been brought up here, Sir Alric was a little more his old cool self. He’d calmed down enough to do some explaining; maybe, despite his fury, he’d realised that explanations could still stave off disaster more effectively than keeping secrets.

‘Your spirits have always been ruthless, the pair of them,’ he’d told her as they stood looking down at Ranjit. ‘Ruthless and, as you know, tremendously powerful. And always, always passionately connected. At the very heart and soul.’

‘So what was so wrong with that? What happened?’ By that time, she was already feeling strong enough to question him again.

‘Your spirits’ first incarnations were mortal dynastic enemies. They were sworn to crush one another in battle, yet their love was something that couldn’t be resisted. You may imagine the diplomatic chaos that ensued. The chaos, and the carnage. Treachery, passion, conflicting loyalties, and the utter confusion of their people and their armies. The Few that originally housed your spirits learned to combine their powers, thereby multiplying them exponentially. Together they were irresistible as a force of war, but their soul-deep rivalry could no more be denied than their soul-deep love. They quarrelled, they fought, they went to war once more; and yet they could not stay away from each other. The spirits that had once combined, collided. Their empires and their armies and their nations: all were turned to dust.’

Cassie had swallowed. ‘Both sides?’

‘Both. And not merely once. The first time, as I seem to remember from the records, it was the host of your spirit who finally plunged a blade into the chest of her lover – the Knife of the Few, as it happens – but you are aware how strong your spirits are. He survived long enough to escape into a new host – I believe your spirit made sure of that, by having a new young host ready and waiting – and he eventually retaliated in your next incarnations. In three different generations of spirit-birth, history repeated itself. He has murdered you almost as often as you have murdered him.’

Cassie had swallowed.

‘Whenever your spirits came together, they were deadly both to other Few and to the human race. They were too alike – like an atom that had been split. Perhaps, once, they were a single spirit, divided somehow. But now they are two: forever … in love. And forever at war. The war part, humanity can handle, just. It’s the passion behind their power that is deadliest of all.’

‘What about Estelle Azzedine? The old woman, I mean, not her spirit. Why wasn’t she trying to rip Ranjit’s clothes off when I met her in Paris and got into all this mess?’

‘She would have,’ he’d told her grimly, ‘if I’d allowed them to ever meet. Remember, Ranjit had been host to his spirit for only a few years by then. Before that, Estelle was the lover of his spirit’s previous host.’ He added, matter-of-factly, ‘She killed him, of course.’

‘So … Oh God, is that why she chose me? So that she could be close to Ranjit again?’

‘It was one of many factors. It didn’t escape anyone’s attention that he was attracted to you even before you became Few. Well, Estelle got her way in the end as you know, despite my efforts to stop it. But believe me, this will end badly. If you fail to listen to me, that is.’

‘But it’s our
spirits
you’re talking about here!’ Cassie had blurted. ‘It’s not Ranjit and me who do the killing, it’s them!’

‘You
are
your spirits; they are you.’ His eyes were cold and hard. ‘There is no difference. Accept it, and we might be able to control the collateral damage. Disobey me, give in to your desire for Ranjit, and there will be carnage. Again.’

Cassie had repeated his words to herself, over and over again. She believed Sir Alric absolutely, she couldn’t deny it. In this she trusted him; she remembered Katerina’s taunts about the things she hadn’t been told; and more vividly than that, she remembered the violent wildness that stirred and flared into fire whenever she’d touched Ranjit.

Oh, she believed Sir Alric, all right.

Obeying him? That was another matter entirely.

So their spirits must never be together. Fine, and fair enough. But Sir Alric be damned;
she and Ranjit
could and would.

She’d blown it by giving away those artefacts, and she was even more angry with herself than Sir Alric was. But damn the Svenssons, and damn their plans. She’d find them, and get the artefacts back. Cassie clenched her jaw determinedly. She didn’t care how long it took: she’d free herself from the spidery, choking clutches of the Few spirit inside her.

T
he corridors seemed alien and strange, teeming with normal school life, echoing with the shouts and chatter of students who were thinking of nothing but lunch. It all seemed to Cassie like life on a distant planet.

She wasn’t even hungry herself, but she’d been determined to grab something from the dining room that might tempt Ranjit when he woke again, properly this time. It was a moment she was desperate for, but at the same time she wasn’t sure how he was going to react to everything that had happened. She just hoped Ranjit would be OK. For the first time she’d found herself resenting Jake, resenting the fact that he’d had the Tears, that he’d even taken the remainder with him so that nothing was available for Ranjit.

But Jake had nearly
died
, Cassie reminded herself. And it was Ranjit who’d done that to him.

It never got any easier wondering how on earth things were going to work out for the best. Clutching a soft roll and some cheese wrapped in a linen napkin, she turned into her own corridor, worrying for the first time about the other type of hunger Ranjit would inevitably have by the time he woke up…

Cassie was so distracted by her thoughts that she let out an involuntary gasp as she saw a figure standing in front of her. Richard was standing at her door, hand raised as if he’d only just knocked on the door, or was about to. As she arrived he turned, and gave her a broad surprised smile.

‘Cassie! There you are. Where have you been?’

She hesitated. ‘It’s a long story. Can it … ah … wait?’

He stepped closer, trying to catch her eye. ‘Well, I’m here now,’ he said. ‘And you look like you could use someone to talk to?’

Cassie hesitated – if there was anyone to unload all this stress on, it was Richard.

‘Come on, Cassie Bell,’ Richard said with a raised eyebrow and an encouraging smile. ‘You’re up to something, and I want to know what it is. You weren’t anywhere to be seen yesterday. You weren’t at breakfast this morning, and you cut Maths. Maths! What’s wrong with you, gorgeous? Are you sick?’

‘As if,’ she blustered. ‘I’m tired, that’s all. After the field trip.’

‘Alice made it to Maths,’ he scolded. ‘And you weren’t up till six on Monday morning, canoodling with Yuri in his tent. Well, not unless things got more interesting than even I had heard …’

‘No!’ Cassie gaped, drawn in despite herself. ‘I wondered where she’d got to …’

‘And now you know. Which means you owe me. Come on, seriously. Spill.’

She watched him, biting the inside of her lip. This felt like the other half of that conversation they’d started yesterday morning at Mount Kenya: the one about him always being there when she needed him. And she did trust him.

‘Richard, I’m in trouble.’

‘That much I guessed. Do you need a feeding source? I can always offer Perry again, he does have some uses after all …’

‘Well, now that you mention it, yes. But it’s not for me,’ she began.