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“How?” I ask, mystified. “I wasn’t lying, I really don’t have a costume.”
“That’s weird,” Danny says, rubbing a paw over his tufted ears. “I’ve never heard of that happening.”
“Who do I take it up with?” I ask, wondering if it’s Baxter who dispenses these stupid outfits as a punishment. But then, if itwerea punishment, surely she’d have given me the worst one. Not… nothing. There’s no way, in her sadistic glee, she’d have let me off the hook. “Because if I don’t have to wear some stupid outfit, then I think I may just thank them.”
“Finlay said he doesn’t have anything, either,” Danny says with a frown. “I thought he was joking, but… maybe it’s true.”
“And Luke? Rory?”
“I haven’t seen Rory all day, but Luke…” Danny’s face darkens. “Yeah, Luke got something.”
At my raised eyebrow, Danny doesn’t elaborate. “You’ll see for yourself,” he mutters, looking nervous. “Come on. Let’s head downstairs. The others are waiting.”
* * *
“In my first years of Lochkelvin,” Luke murmurs in a slow, measured voice from the foot of his bed, “I was the red dove of my family’s crest. Then last year I was a peacock. I find tonight’s costume somewhat ironic.”
The thing is… he doesn’t have a costume. One single prop had been delivered to his bed: a plain gold crown, which he twirls meditatively between his long fingers, as though the idea of it is difficult for him to comprehend. Glancing up at me, he says, “Did you know peacocks are considered a sign of bad luck? I should have known then that it’d be the year from hell.”
“Why do none of us have costumes?” I ask, glancing from Finlay to Luke and down to my Lochkelvin plaid skirt. “Is it because we should have detention?”
Beside us, Danny The Squirrel rolls his eyes. “Yeah, well, count yourselves lucky,” he says after withdrawing his huge buck teeth from his mouth. “And Luke has a crown, which is more than you two.”
“A crown isn’t a costume, surely.”
“Naw, it’s a political statement,” Finlay mutters, eyeing the simple crown with suspicion. “Whit else’ll set aff the anti-Luke brigade mair than that?”
Luke perches the crown on top of his head, and at once it feels like a bold, subversive act. I can’t help the small gasp of surprise that escapes my lips as I see Luke then, determined and noble with an expression entirely befitting of a crown. “To be fair,” he drawls, “I am terrifying enough to them in my natural state. Adding a crown to the mix seems wholly unnecessary.”
“Aye, we’ve a’ seen ye in yer scuddies,” Finlay says cheerfully, before reaching over to pluck the band of gold off Luke’s head. “I dinnae think ye should, in a’ honesty. Feels like a trap.”
Luke narrows his eyes at him as the crown leaves his head. “I should rather ask Rory’s opinion on that instead,” he murmurs haughtily.
“Aye, ‘cause he’d gie ye the permission ye’re wantin’,” Finlay points out, remaining unconvinced. “Ye know fine well he’d be amused by this.”
“And where is he, anyway?” I ask before another argument can break out. I speak directly to Finlay, because if anyone in this dorm would know, it’s him.
“He… likes taeplayat Hallowe’en,” Finlay says, his words a tiptoe around a truth. “He does a lot o’ prep work doonstairs.”
I swear Finlay enjoys speaking in riddles far too much. I don’t know if he’s trying to insinuate that Rory is busy decorating Lochkelvin with Hallowe’en paraphernalia or if he’s indulging in a bit of manscaping.
Luke reaches back and grabs the crown from Finlay’s hands. “Samhain is a time to embrace wildness. If I can’t be myself tonight, when will I be able to again?”
Finlay shoots me a look as though he craves back-up, but I shrug. “It’s just one night,” I say, though even I feel nervous watching Luke in a gold crown, its metal polished to a high sheen, Luke’s face at peace with it adorning him. The whole existence of it feels secret, forbidden. “And it’s dark outside, anyway. Maybe no one will notice.”
The look Finlay gives me at that moment is beyond reproach. “This is madness,” he states plainly to Luke. “It’s just askin’ for trouble.”
“Victim-blaming, Fin, really?” Luke asks in a mild voice, standing from the end of his bed with the elegance of raising himself from a throne.
“Aye, happily, when ye’re bein’ a fuckin’ idiot.” But Finlay grits his teeth as he watches Luke cross the dorm. “Why would he risk his neck like this?” he wonders quietly to me and Danny before leaping over to Luke’s side, as though determined to protect him no matter the cost, no matter the idiocy behind the act.
“Because he still has his pride,” Danny answers, “which is the one thing Antiro is determined to take from him.”
Finlay gives him a grim look but a flash of understanding slips across his face.
As we make our way down to the grounds, it seems like Luke’s crown attracts every pair of eyes we pass. Each set goes on a swift upward journey, from Luke’s face, as though outraged he could exist worry-free on a night like tonight, before traveling to the band of gold around his forehead. Mouths plummet. Even the portraits seem to track us, disapproval shining glumly from ancient pigments and paints. Unexpectedly, it’s only Danny’s presence that makes things better, lighter. With Danny dressed so flawlessly as a giant squirrel beside Luke, it has the effect of alleviating any tension, scuppering any kind of violence from those we pass. Perhaps, then, Luke’s addition of a crown is regarded more as comedy in the vein of Danny’s squirrel costume — a statement so absurd that it’s unlikely to be taken seriously. At least, not as seriously, mercifully, as Luke ending up in the medical wing. With Danny there, providing a weird sense of levity, an excuse to pin laughter upon, Luke remains shielded.
And really, you have to admire the nerve of it. To walk around wearing the crown as though it’s his birthright, even now. Perhaps, to some, there is humor in his tenacity.
