I frowned when I noticed his fur was matted and felt a bit rough. It seemed Oberi hadn’t been brushed all summer, which made me sad… because it meantshewas sad. Oberi didn’t ask to be groomed when my other half was feeling down.
Oberi barked and panted happily. Usually, he didn’t visit me until after I got back from training. It was unusual for him to find me this late at night, since he usually spent the night with her. He must’ve noticed something felt off.
“It’s okay, boy,” I told him. “I’m safe.”
I noticed your lost ass needed saving,Oberi cracked.
I frowned. He could get sassy when he wanted to. “I need to find Eddie. Can you lead me to him?”
Oberi barked. I placed my hand on his back, and he guided me through the halls. I heard voices ahead, and I figured we’d entered one of the cellblocks. Oberi slowed and guided me into what I figured had to be one of the cells.
“Charlie?” Eddie asked, sounding surprised. I wasn’t so good with voices, but Eddie and I had spent a lot of time together over the summer. I’d learned to recognize his voice easily. “What are you doing in my dorm? Curfew’s in two minutes.”
“Something’s happened,” I said breathlessly.
Eddie’s bed springs squeaked as he jumped up from his bed and shut the door. He spoke in a hushed tone. “What is it? Have you found something on the keys?”
I scoffed. At this point, I wasn’t sure we’deverfind anything. “It’s not that. You heard the alarm?”
The fabric of Eddie’s uniform rustled as he crossed his arms. “The whole prison heard it. Wait… you weren’t involved in that, were you?”
“No, but I heard what happened. One of your buddies escaped.”
“Fuck,” Eddie growled under his breath. He sounded exasperated as he sat back down on his bed. “It was Gavyn, wasn’t it?”
“No idea,” I said. “All I know is that it was an Elf. He overpowered the guards and stole some of their powers. I thought you said none of the Elves at the Institute were strong enough for that.”
“We weren’t,” Eddie admitted. “But Gavyn’s been training with his magic all summer, in secret.”
The lock on Eddie’s door clicked, and I knew there was no leaving now. I was stuck in here with him all night. Not a big deal, since the guards never checked my bed anyway. I figured I might as well get comfortable. Oberi guided me to the chair beside Eddie’s desk, and I sat.
“You sound upset,” I remarked. “I thought you’d be happy for him. You’re always talking like you want to get out of here.”
“Of course I do, but not like this.” Eddie sighed. “After the Elves were captured in Forevermore, we got together and talked about our options. Gavynalwayswanted to get out. He talked about it constantly. But none of our magic was strong enough, and we knew we wouldn’tbecomestrong enough to get everyone out at once. We needed to practice first. We agreed to stick together, seeing as we don’t know where to find the rest of the Elves. The deal was either we all go, or no one goes. Gavyn apparently did not listen.”
“But if one Elf gets out, so can the rest of you,” I remarked. So couldI, since I was part Elf. For once, I actually had a spark of hope.
Unlike me, Eddie was realistic and logical. “We’re still pretty young Elves, and while we can dosomemagical manipulation, it’s not enough to get all of us out. That’s why we agreed to stick together. Even our illusion magic is shit. Gavyn has betrayed us. Even if we did get out of the gates, we’d have to be strong enough to get off Darke Island. There’s a ward around the whole island, you know.”
Hell, he was right. Even though I hoped Gavyn was strong enough to overpower that somehow, too.
“One Elf escapes, and the Warden is going to come down on the rest of us,” Eddie pointed out. “You just watch.”
I didn’t want to believe that Eddie was right. I wanted to believe we had a chance at getting the hell away from here, where the Warden couldn’t run his experiments on us, and where he’d never figure out what I was— an Elf prince, and a demigod.
But it didn’t take long before Eddie’s suspicions were confirmed. The next morning, a letter slid under Eddie’s dorm.
“All students are required to attend an assembly in the Room of Mirrors at eight a.m. sharp,” Eddie read aloud to me. “Anyone not in attendance will be given an infraction, and a six-hundred-dollar fine will be charged to their account.”
Hell, a fine that huge would put most students’ accounts in the negative. Most of us made less than ten dollars a month, working the shitty Work-Study jobs they forced us into.
“Can the Warden do that?” I questioned. “Charge a fine?”
“I don’t want to find out,” Eddie remarked.
I didn’t want to attract the Warden’s attention. Once Eddie’s door unlocked, we went to the cafeteria to get some food, then headed to the Room of Mirrors. It was the same room where the Warden had hosted his welcome speech my first day here, and where the Villain’s Ball was held after the Darke Games every year. The vast room was used for various school functions, but it got quite crowded when the whole student body was packed inside.
Bodies pressed in on me from all angles. Oberi stayed close to my side in his husky form. He seemed calm and relaxed, which worried me, because he hadn’t been this way since beforesheand I had broken up.
