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“No—”
“You will be silent.” He didn’t shout or raise his voice, and still, he quieted me better than if he had. “You are a liar. Whether you are lying to conceal the truth of your power, the truth of what you did to Galen Teresi, or lying to hide both remains to be seen. I have no patience for liars, Miss Galanis. We are in a war for our very survival, and if we cannot trust the soldier standing beside us, we’ve already lost.”
His midnight-black eyes bore holes through mine. “I will give you one last chance to share why you did not finish your education, how you could enter my school so ignorant of the monsters around you and the tricks they play, and who really killed that demon.” My palm slipped through his grasp. “I’m listening.”
Holding his gaze, not a word passed through my lips.
Drakos gave nothing away as the silence pressed. He simply watched me from across the divide—all but his eyes cloaked in shadows.
I jumped when he spoke. “Stavra, it seems Miss Galanis isn’t in the mood to be forthcoming. Kindly escort her to the reflection room where she’ll have the clarity to think on what we’ve discussed, and hopefully make a different choice.”
“Yes, Headmaster.” Rounding the desk, she held out an arm. “Come, Aella.”
I leaned away from her. “Go where? What’s the reflection room?”
“It’s exactly what it sounds like. A place where you can think without distractions. The commander can come with us, if you like.”
“Oh... Okay,” I said, resting my palm on her wrist.
We were a quiet trio leaving the headmaster’s office and walking down another oppressively white hallway. The clash was even more glaring after sitting in the dim, black-and-gray hole known as the headmaster’s office.
Madame Remis led us out into the main hall, then through the doors hiding the classrooms. This corridor was much like the dorm hall. It narrowed to push us closer together.
“This way.”
Battle Strategy. History. Self-Mastery. Combat. Field medicine.
I read what my missing course schedule had yet to tell me—the lessons I’d be taking at the academy. In a few hours, I’d pass through these doors again with my classmates, and we’d be one short.
Tears prickled behind my eyes. I was completely human. Completely Aella. And I still got a man killed. Apparently I didn’t need to be a monster to hurt my people.
I was a danger to them all by myself.
“Why did you not recognize the smell and therefore the child for what it was?”
I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t know, Galen. I’m so sorry.
We came to a stop in front of a small, wooden door wholly out of place among all the stone, marble, and white. Madame Remis gestured for me to go ahead of her. “Careful on the steps.”
Her warning was understood with a single look down, down, down. A spiral staircase twisted through the bowels of the school, leading to what—I couldn’t see.
“What’s down there?” I asked, backing away.
She smiled at me. “The reflection room, Aella. As we said. No one is trying to trick or scare you.” Remis gently pressed on my back, moving me on. “After you.”
I thought about arguing, but in the end, I picked up my feet and continued down. A place to sit and think didn’t sound so bad right now. It’d give me time to think of a better explanation for Drakos when he asked how that demon died. It would also give me a chance to craft an apology that would never be good enough for the guy who cradled Galen’s body, yelling for his brother.
Another small wooden door awaited us at the bottom of the stairs. I was the one who opened it, setting foot inside a dim, windowless room—
—with nothing inside.
Well, not nothing exactly. There was a lone chair pushed against the wall beside a three-legged table. On it sat a covered plate and a goblet of water. Turning in place, I landed on the metal statue leaning on the opposite wall and kept going. There was nothing else to see.
“This is the reflection room?” My voice echoed strangely. “I’m meant to stay down here. For how long?”
Madame Remis’s smile held. “Aella, please sit.”
I did so, feeling more and more disturbed in the prison-cell space. Was this a trick? Was this where they were holding me until Jason returned with his twenty-man guard to take me to Kuna City? My stupidity got a Titan novice killed. If there was any reason Headmaster Drakos wouldn’t want a traitor around, I just gave him one.
