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“Do you live here?”
He nods, his blond hair flopping back and forth.
“Where do you live? Do you live with your family? The Sisters?” I ask.
“I live with my mother,” he says. “She lives in the basement.”
“You live in the basement?” Kat asks incredulously. “Here at the school?”
Simon is breathing hard, his eyes looking wild. “No. Yes. My mother, she lives in the basement, I live in the dorms. I have my own room.”
“Who is your mother?” I ask Simon. “What is her name? Is she a teacher here?”
He stares at me with large, rounded eyes. He’s terrified.
“I have to go now,” he says. He moves around me, quick as a wink, and then he’s running past Kat and Brom who make no effort to stop him, and it’s probably for the best.
“What a peculiar child,” I comment, glancing at the both of them. “What do you make of him?”
“I wasn’t even aware the school had a basement,” Kat says.
“Any of the buildings could,” Brom says. “Crane, you said when you met with Sister Leona in her office, that was underground, underneath the cathedral.”
“That’s right,” I say slowly. “But from what I saw, it was just two rooms down there. Leona and Ana’s offices. Nothing else.”
“Then that means the same things could exist under the rest of the buildings,” Kat points out. “Perhaps there are tunnels connecting them. Maybe a lot of the staff live there. We have the school nurse, the cooks. Crane, you said you only have two other men in your wing. Professor Daniels and the custodian. But some of the cooks are men. Where do they live?”
I can’t believe I never questioned that before. “I suppose I thought they lived in Sleepy Hollow. Quite obviously they don’t,” I grumble.
“Then that settles it for now,” Kat says. “His mother might be a teacher, might be a nurse. I’m not sure it’s worth thinking about.”
But she gives me a look that tells me she knows I’m going to be thinking about it anyway.
“We better get going,” I concede with a nod. “The dark is starting to fall faster these days. Like a blade.” I demonstrate by running my finger across my throat, staring at Brom as I do so.
The three of us head across the misty school grounds, Kat going her own way, Brom and I going the other. I want to be selfish and ask her to spend the night with us, but with Brom the way he is, I don’t want to put her at risk. She also deserves a good night of sleep, something I won’t be getting. Not tonight, not ever, not until Brom is free.
“Crane?” Brom whispers to me.
I wake up slowly, blinking at the near dark, at the faint candle in the corner nearly melted in a puddle of wax. I realize I must have fallen asleep, after all that talk about never sleeping again. I feel Brom squished beside me on my bed, his chest at my back, the cold feeling of the chains on my skin. I’d been sleep-deprived for too many days trying to keep my eye on Brom, and I guess it finally caught up to me.
“I fell asleep,” I manage to say, my head too groggy for my liking.
“I know,” Brom says. “You were snoring.”
“Oh.”
“But listen…” he whispers.
I hold my breath, straining.
I hear nothing except Brom’s breathing at my ear.
“What?” I say after a moment.
“It was the woman,” Brom says. “The dead teacher. She went past the door.”
I shiver and get out of bed. “I have to admit, I don’t mind that I slept through that.”
I go to the door and unlock it, poking my head out into the hall. A trail of blood gleams along the floor, and I can’t help but think about the stableboy for some reason. There’s a memory deep inside my mind that wants to surface, something about what he said that feels like a grave about to be unearthed. But the more I try to focus on it, the more it stays buried.
I hear the clink of Brom’s chains and my heart skips and I whirl around, prepared to see him rushing toward me, the Hessian in full effect. But instead, he’s standing at my desk, naked, and staring out the window.
“Brom?” I say, closing the door quietly and locking it. “Don’t tell me that she scares you, too. We need one of us to be brave when it comes to ghosts, and I’m not sure I’m cut out for it.”
He doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t move.
My heart thumps uneasily.
I slowly move toward him, my hand outstretched for his shoulder.
“Brom?” I say again, more forcefully.
I place my hand on his shoulder and he doesn’t flinch, still facing the window.
I walk around him and see that his eyes are completely black, swirling in inky shadows, like they had when he was possessed. I gasp, quickly looking around for my gun, not wanting to take my eyes off him for long.
