What do you think, Elle?she wrote last night. And again, popping up just now,Seems like Elle must be getting lots of beauty sleep.
My fingers tighten around the phone. Is she trying to provoke me into answering?
They could be regular friendly comments… but Stella heard me talking about sneaking out last night. I told her it was only a ploy for the police investigation. She could have been testing to see if I’d answer last night to judge whether that was true.
An icy ribbon winds through my gut. We don’t really know anything about the “she” Kenneth referred to other than she persuaded him to go after me. He was a pretty mild-tempered guy… Any of my friends could have bullied him into it.
They were all sitting with me when I got poisoned. Other Elodie saw at least Stella the evening before her murder, during the Bloom special practicum.
I want to shrug off the unnerving prickles of suspicion, but they’ve already dug in as deep as a kamaitachi’s razor claws.
I can’t trustanyonearound me, can I?
No one except my matches. And even with them, it’s hard to say exactly how far.
I set down the phone without replying. It’ll be more useful to see how my supposed friends react when they see me at school if I haven’t already confirmed I’m alive and well.
I drag myself out of bed, too groggy to force myself through my usual exercises and drifting through a veryundisciplined meditation. By the time I’ve suited up in my academy uniform and downed a hearty but healthy chef-cooked breakfast, the haze in my head has started to clear.
My most immediate enemy is gone—nothing but scraps of stuffed dog floating out in the lake by now. I can handle whatever comes next.
I have to, or it’ll be my matches’ lives on the line as well as my own.
It feels strange pulling on my silk gloves, covering the mark emblazoned on my palm. I press my fingertips against it and head down to the waiting car.
Yesterday’s constant rain has left the air damp and the green muddy enough that most of the students are avoiding it in their fancy shoes. I spot Stella, Cadance, and Mia standing in a semi-circle on the broad, granite-tiled front walk: light auburn braid, golden ringlets, and platinum pixie cut ducked close together.
In the hazy sunlight that filters through the thin layer of cloud, their pose strikes me as ominous. What are they gossiping about without me?
Walking over, I paste on a smile. IfIseem weird, I can’t expect them to act normally no matter whether any of them is involved in my attempted murder.
Mia catches sight of me first, with a typical cheery grin and wave. I don’t know how she packs so much upbeat energy in her tiny frame, but there’s nothing suspicious about her reaction.
Cadance acknowledges me with a tip of her head and a bored expression, because presumably it would be uncool to act as if she’s more than slightly happy to see one of her besties.
And Stella…
Does her brow knit for a second before she offers me her usual gracious smile?
She turns toward me immediately. “Is everything okay? You didn’t say anything in the group text.”
Is she worried about me or wondering what I actually got up to last night?
I wave off her concern. “I just slept a lot—still recovering from the poison, I guess. Had to rush to get here in time and figured we’d talk now.”
Her gaze lingers on me as if evaluating my answer, but our conversation is interrupted by Madison arriving with a flip of her white-blond bob and a cup carrier holding four coffees.
“Oh,” she says when she sees me, with a bit of a grimace. “You didn’t say anything so I thought maybe you’d already gotten your own.” She hesitates. “You can have mine if?—”
I hold up my hand. “No, it’s fine. I got my caffeine fix at home.”
She looked unsettled because of the coffee situation, but not that I’m here at all. Of course, any of these women could just be putting on a solid performance. Only a couple of months ago, Other Elodie and them pretended to make friends with one of our classmates just to get details on a designer purse sale.
As Madison passes around the drinks, we meander toward Thesan Hall. My gaze roves over our schoolmates, watching for any trace of surprise or hostility.
I’m surrounded by potential enemies. I guess that’s been true all along, but my awareness of it presses in on me more than it ever did before.
I never saw Kenneth coming. What else might I have missed?
