Wicked Rebellion (Darkwater Reformatory Book 3) Page 4

  The third wall held a nearly empty bookshelf with a wooden box seemingly held in place by bronze unicorn bookends. Weird.

  Blaine sat in a high-back chair nestled beside an unlit fireplace. He waved to the other matching chairs parked on the opposite side of a large coffee table that took up a big chunk of the room.

  I perched on the edge of one chair while Brodin settled easily in the other. Good move on his part to come across as comfortable. Nervousness hitched its way up my spine like one of the centipedes we encountered on the beach when we arrived on Darkwater Island. I kept waiting for something to leap out from beneath my seat or drop from the ceiling and bite me. But I followed Brodin’s example and scooted back on the chair, schooling my expression with something I hoped appeared pleasant, not pinched.

  My uncle snapped his fingers, and a loaded wooden tray appeared in front of him on the table. The spicy scent of grug drifted through the air, seductive and tempting.

  I girded myself for whatever might come next.

  “Muffin?” he asked, lifting a plate of them toward us.

  “No, thanks,” I said. Not eating.

  “We’re all set,” Brodin said, waving the plate away.

  My uncle huffed and placed two onto a small plate, leaving the rest on the tray.

  “Grug, then?” he asked, tapping the pottery jug.

  I shook my head. Not drinking, either.

  “No, thanks,” Brodin said pleasantly.

  Blaine’s lips curled down. With a grunt, he poured a draught of grug into a pottery cup. Steam from the dark liquid drifted upward until it was caught by the breeze blowing through the room and swept out into the foyer. Uncle Blaine stuffed half of a muffin into his mouth in one bite. Crumbs bounced down the front of his frayed shirt as he chewed.

  “No worries. More for me,” he said. He washed the muffin down with grug, draining the cup before refilling it.

  Blinking, I watched as he finished the muffin and ate another.

  When the second was gone, he added two more to his plate, and they were magically replaced on the tray.

  “You’ve come here for instructions regarding your lessons, I assume,” he finally said, leaning back in his chair. His gaze flicked between us. “Or maybe the first?”

  “What lessons?” I asked, leaning forward.

  “Reformatory lessons, of course.” He stuffed in another muffin, this time the entire thing in one bite.

  “Which includes what?” Brodin asked.

  “That is the question, now isn’t it?” Uncle Blaine said.

  Would we have to tease ever answer from him? I bit back my growl. “We were walking around the Reformatory, checking things out,” I said. No harm in sharing that much. “Fog rose while we walked along the main path and, when it lifted, this building appeared.”

  “Switch-bitch,” he said.

  “Excuse me?” I asked with lifted eyebrows.

  “Bitch. Witch. Whatever,” he snapped. His fingers tightened on the arms of the chair. “I see she’s playing her usual games.” He tapped his temple. “Messin’ with your mind is what every switcher is wont to do.”

  This made absolutely no sense. There was no such thing as a switch-witch. They were fairytales. “Are you saying you didn’t want us to come here?”

  “Perhaps I did. Perhaps I didn’t.”

  “That’s not an answer,” Brodin said.

  Uncle Blaine cocked an eyebrow at Brodin. “Yet that is all I wish to say.”

  Brodin grumbled, shifting his feet on the carpet. If he was like me, he was eager to get up and leave. This was going nowhere.

  “How did a switch-witch mess with our minds?” I asked.

  “Hard to say. Hard to say. But if you saw fog, it was hers,” he said. “Not mine.”

  “Yet you opened your door and invited us inside,” Brodin said. “You seemed to be expecting us.”

  “Just because the switch-witch does things, it doesn’t mean it’s not meant to be.” Blaine’s gaze dropped on me like a ton of boulders. “But enough of that. We don’t have much time, and there are details I must outline before you leave.”

  Giving up on projecting relaxation, I scooted forward on my chair to perch on the edge again.

  “You’ll be looking for the correct paths to follow, if I’m guessing correctly, but know right now, I can’t tell you everything,” he said. “I’m not allowed to tell you everything.”

  “Blood bond?” I asked. A guess on my part, but that seemed to be the norm around here.

  “I really cannot say,” my uncle said, his gaze drilling the wall behind me.

  “I’ll take that as a yes.”

  “There are a few things I can say,” he offered.

  “As far as I can tell, you’re not telling us a damn thing,” Brodin said. The look he shot me said if I wanted to leave, he’d be right behind me.

  “You mentioned lessons?” I said to prompt my uncle. “What exactly are we talking about?” Although, I already suspected. There was no one else around. We took one main trail with paths leading into the woods.

  “Each path takes you everywhere and nowhere,” my uncle said. He stuffed another muffin in his mouth and chewed. A burp worked its way up his throat, and he released it, patting his belly. “It’s up to you to decide.”

  The blood bond must be limiting what he could say. Either that, or he enjoyed eluding to things but never outright giving answers.

  “Can I conclude from what you’re saying that the rumors are true?” Brodin asked. “We must complete lessons here at the Reformatory and then we’ll be free to leave?”

  “Mostly,” Uncle Blaine said. “Or not at all.”

  I growled. “This is stupid. If you can’t tell us what we need to know, why are we here?”

  His gaze pinned me in place. “For instruction, of course.”

  “You’re running in circles, Uncle. You’re not instructing us on anything.”

  He dipped his head. “Nice of you to mention our family connection. I haven’t seen you in…” His bushy gray eyebrows knitted together. “Well, I’d say since you were a baby. You’ve grown.”

  “It happens.” Should I bring up my grandfather?

  “I assume Cloven is well?” he said, stealing the thought from my mind.

  “He is, as if my half-sister.”

  He scowled. “Found her, did you?”

  “Shouldn’t I have found her?” This conversation was twisting in every direction but leading us nowhere.

  “No harm in it, I suppose.” He poured himself another cup of grug and took a sip. Settling back in the chair, he lifted one leg up to cross it over the other and held the cup at chest-height. “Back to the instructions.” His gaze fell on Brodin. “If you complete the lessons, you will be invited to leave.”

  “Invited is a weird way to put it,” I said.

  “Would you rather stay?” he barked, making me jump. “We could shove you out the front entrance and leave you to the island, where you won’t last but a minute.”

  As if to remind us of what might wait for us there—beings older than the fae, per my sketar witch grannie—a howl erupted from the woods outside. The sound sent shivers down my spine.

  Brodin and I exchanged glances, and I had a feeling we’d run from here once we left the front door.

  My palms sweaty, I leaned back against my chair. “I need to leave the Reformatory as soon as possible.” Which was the most I could say. “How many lessons and how much time do we have to complete them?”

  As tired as I was, I’d jump back into the catacombs and take more tests if it got me closer to leaving. I had to reach Fleur before my double struck again. The band I imagined around my chest tightened.

  “There is no set timeframe to complete them,” he said. “They take however long they take.”

  “But we’re alone on campus,” Brodin said. “Other kids have come here. If we have unset timeframes, why aren’t others around?”

  My uncle tapped his finger on the lip of
his cup. “What makes you think there aren’t other students on campus?”

  “We haven’t seen anyone,” I said.

  He dismissed my statement with a flick of his hand. After dropping his cup onto the tray, he propped his elbows on his knees and studied my face. “If you haven’t seen them, they must be working hard on their lessons.”

  “Which lessons?” I sighed.

  “Yes, those lessons.”

  This was useless.

  “So, we must complete tests on each path?” I said, trying to maintain some sort of focus in the conversation. If we were here for answers, we shouldn’t leave without them. For all I knew, our time with my uncle was also limited.

  “That might be a solid idea,” my uncle said.

  Damn blood bonds. This must be why he was acting evasive.

  “And once we complete them, we’ll be freed?” Brodin said.

  “What comes in often leaves,” my uncle said. “And what leaves often returns.”

  “That tells us nothing,” I said.

  He nodded. “And everything.”

  “How can we rescue the dragons?” I asked.

  My uncle’s lips twisted. “She’s up to that as well, is she?”

  “As well as what?” I said.

  “Bixby will kill them,” Brodin said, jumping in.

  Blaine nodded. “Those and any others brought here by the foolishness of students. Silly chits, hoping for some sort of miracle.”

  “What do you mean?” I snapped, my irritation rising up to pinch my throat again.

  “What do I mean?” he said. “I really can’t say.”

  “You’re saying lots of dragons have been brought to the rookery?” I asked.

  “Life has a way of delivering.”

  “Why aren’t you stopping her?” I asked, trying to control my irritation.

  “You seem to assume anyone can do so.” His low chuckle rang out. “Bixby is very powerful. More so since she has been consuming the ground bones of dragons. I don’t believe there is anyone who can defeat her.”

  My jaw stiffened. “I will.”

  “Foolish girl.” He shook his head. “You’re a disbarred Seeker, a chit who has lost her elemental magic.”

  “I didn’t lose it,” I ground out. “It was stolen from me, as you probably know.”

  He watched me, and I wondered what he thought, what went on behind his rheumy blue eyes. “How would I know that?”

  “My father took it from me when I was a baby.” A grim thought occurred to me. “Were you in on it, too?”

  “In on what?”

  “The theft of my magic.” I scanned the room as if I expected to find a tiny vial sitting on one of the dusty bookshelves, waiting for me to pluck it up and somehow fuse it back into my soul.

  Light hit the bookshelf—no, the clasp on the front of the wooden box, winked.

  “I know nothing about this,” my uncle said, his gaze following mine. “I see you have discovered your purpose for coming here.”

  “The box?”

  Uncle Blaine shrugged but, for the first time, his eyes twinkled. Was he laughing because he was happy I’d guided us to this moment or was he mocking me? There was no way to know. If I asked, he wouldn’t tell me.

  Rising, I crossed the room and stood in front of the box. Brodin followed, joining me. Neither of us touched it. We learned that lesson in the catacombs.

  “Open the box,” my uncle said.

  “Should we?” Brodin said in a low voice. “No eating. No drinking. I wonder if we should extend that to no touching while we’re at it.”

  I shrugged because, really, how the hell did I know?

  “You won’t be able to leave until you choose,” Blaine said.

  We’d see about that. Pivoting, I strode to the door with Brodin right behind. But before I could lay my hand on the knob, I ran into what felt like a solid wall. The only problem was, there was nothing in front of me.

  “You’ve begun the testing,” Blaine said dryly. “Jumping ahead a step will not get you through the challenges faster.”

  Brodin and I exchanged a concerned glance. More tests. Lovely.

  But I’d do it in a second if… “If we complete the challenges,” I said. “Will we be able to free the dragons?”

  “Why would you want to do that?”

  “To keep Bixby from killing them and using their ground bones to enhance her magic,” Brodin said.

  My uncle scowled. “They can’t roam free. Their true place is back in the catacombs.”

  “How do we return them there, then?” And I wasn’t convinced they couldn’t roam free. Why not? Perhaps the fae world needed dragons again.

  “I’m going to do it.”

  “Do what, chit?” Blaine asked.

  “Free them.”

  He snorted but said nothing. When his gaze fell on the box, I returned to the bookshelf.

  “Open it,” my uncle said.

  One trap led to another but if he was right, we had no choice now except to shove our way forward. Reaching forward, I lifted the lid.

  The inside had been hand-carved with swirling patterns, and in the bottom…

  Leaning in closer, I peered over the edge.

  Five stones lay on the carved surface, nestled in small depressions made to fit them.

  “See one you like?” my uncle asked, a glance over my shoulder showed him studying his nails. This could be another trick, a spell I’d have to unravel.

  A first test.

  Someday, it would be nice to take something at face value without worrying my action or inaction would bite me in the ass.

  “I see stones,” I said.

  “One is yours. Actually, one belongs to each of you. Although, you’ll each have to select it on your own. Don’t take more than one. And do know that when down is up and up is down, you lift your head and look around.”

  He threw the last out casually, but… “What does that mean?” I asked. And how did it apply to anything?

  “It means whatever it should.”

  I growled, spinning away from him to face Brodin.

  “You mean Kylie as well?” Brodin asked my uncle. He mouthed, what should we do?

  I shrugged. He was guiding us into this. Who knew what the outcome might be?

  “You speak of the tree nymph,” Blaine said.

  “Maybe,” I said with a bitter taint in my mouth. “Or was that just a disguise she put on to fool us?”

  “She is a nymph. And a girl. Half of each.”

  Interesting.

  Brodin didn’t appear any more eager than me to select a stone. Each could take us down a path with no end and no way to turn back. Everything here could contain magic, from the building, to my uncle, to the food, and to the stones. We could use it, manipulate it, or it might twist back and do the same with us.

  Switch-witch.

  I wondered… I’d have to ask Jacey and Rohnan if they’d heard of the term before. Answers might lie in that direction.

  “Take one,” my uncle said in a voice reflecting nothing. “I don’t care what you do or don’t do.”

  Yet he said one was for each of us. That we couldn’t proceed further until we’d chosen.

  This reminded me of Stone Selection at the Academy, where each student was presented with what I now saw was our very first challenge.

  My stone—used to enhance my magic—had been taken from me before my murder trial.

  Would the stone I selected here become my new conduit for magic?

  What to do?

  We’ve been led here either by my uncle or the fictitious switch-witch. Was this one big trick?

  I needed out of the Reformatory. Sitting around and doing nothing would not make that happen. To get through this, I’ll need to plunge into a rough sea and wait to see where the current took me.

  Five stones.

  One in gold with flecks of silver sprinkled across it like stars in a golden sky.

  One in deep burgundy, plain with no enhance
ments.

  Another was dark blue with gold flecks in a swirling pattern in the center, reminiscent of a bright yellow sun.

  A fourth was deep green with tiny pink tendrils snaking out from the forest-y center.

  And the final was light brown, simple and plain. No sparkles or adornment.

  “There isn’t much time,” Uncle Blaine said around a bite of muffin. “Switchy will witchy her way around this one soon.”

  “I’ll take a stone,” I said, my fingers hovering over the green. Frustration snarled its way through me. Which to choose? “If you’ll tell me one thing.”

  Brodin’s hand lifted, his fingers hovering beside the blue with the sun. I wasn’t surprised. As an Eerie, he walked through the sky.

  I was called to the brown, for whatever reason. Maybe because something plain might hold the biggest secrets. Silly idea on my part, but I couldn’t give it up.

  “What would you like to know?” my uncle asked.

  I lifted the brown stone from inside the box, feeling nothing when I touched it.

  Had I chosen incorrectly?

  With a small growl of frustration, I slipped it into my pocket. I could look at it later. Right now, I needed answers.

  Brodin took the dark blue stone with the sun pattern and held it tight in his fist.

  We turned to face my uncle together.

  “You had a question?” he asked, his face and voice smooth, but his eyes watched my every movement.

  “Where is my father, Bastion?” I asked.

  “My brother?” Blaine said with a lift of his bushy brows. “If you’ve come here to find him, you’re too late.”

  “What do you mean, it’s too late?” Releasing the snarl I’ve kept nipping off before it broke through, I advanced on my uncle. “Tell me where he is.”

  “Deep in the ground.” His face twisted. “Where he belongs.”

  “He’s in a cave?” This made no sense.

  My Uncle Blaine snorted. “No, chit. He’s dead.”

  Chapter Five

  I stumbled out of the castle behind Brodin, unable to comprehend what I heard.

  My father was dead? Why had the Master Seeker sent me here then?

  My gaze fell on Brodin. Of course. He lied when he said my father would be here at the Reformatory. He spun a tale to keep me compliant until I had completed the task linked to the blood bond promise.