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I’m not immune, either, though I certainly get it much less than Arabella. The gremlins genuinely seem to be targeting her on their master’s orders. When Rory looks at her, there’s a coldness in his gray eyes that almost frightens me. It makes me relieved not to be in his sights for once.
I end up with a greater understanding when one of the gremlins yells, “On behalf of His Royal Highness,” before slamming a bauble decorated with snowflakes into the back of Arabella’s head.
It’s sweet, in a way, that Rory’s doing this on behalf of Luke. All because of Arabella’s controversial presentation in politics. He’s standing by his friend, even if it is a ridiculous, violent way to wreak revenge.
When one pretty glittering bauble ends up flying toward my face, Danny bats it away with expert reflexes.
“Yes!” he crows, jumping up and down and taking me with him. “Did you see that? I punched it clean out the air!”
It’s the worst of the bauble assault that comes for me, and I narrow my gaze at Rory, wondering why. How one minute I can be treated like the lowest of the low, and then the next mostly ignored. If he could stop blowing hot and cold, or just stop blowing at all, it’d really make me feel saner.
But maybe I still am insane, especially when being attacked byonebauble is enough for me to think this is an unusual softening from the chiefs. In actuality, they’ve likely temporarily rerouted their dislike for me onto Arabella for what she dared to say in politics. It’ll probably shift back to me when she sics her aunt on them.
The walls of Lochkelvin become suffocating. It’s been so long since I went outside that I find myself doing just that during one of my free periods.
Instead of going down to the loch, I wander around the castle, following the winding path of the main road. There’s a small enclosure to the right that I’ve never explored, so I crunch my way across the frozen ground to get there.
The grass is silver these days and the trees are mostly naked branches, though the forest by the loch is still thick with leaves. It still obscures the loch like the creepy dark entity it is. It makes me think of the grounds as a living, breathing thing, a sentient beast protecting the loch. Maybe Hallowe’en is the end of the loch until spring. It doesn’t seem as farfetched when standing here in the crisp winter air, noting the stillness and the silence despite there being hundreds of maniacal kids in the castle up the hill, pelting Christmas decorations at each other.
When I drop my bag on a tree stump, I take a deep breath and stretch my body.
It’s been too long.
And then I begin to dance.
