Flunked (Fairy Tale Reform School, #1)(38)

“And my family is most grateful for that.” Jax runs a hand through his hair, which is the color of corn. Like the corn I know now he obviously doesn’t sow. “You saved me from blowing my cover. But no, the princesses don’t know who I am. Before FTRS, I was away at boarding school since I was five. The princesses wouldn’t recognize me if they tried, and Rapunzel, well, she had that whole locked-away-in-a-tower thing for a while. No one’s seen me on royal grounds in years.” He looks at me carefully.

“That’s where you come in. I’ve been watching you the last few weeks. You’ve got the skills to get out of jams and fight fire with fire. You could help me stop the villains from the inside.” I give him a look that could fry fish. “I’m serious!” he protests. “You’re a royal hater. None of the teachers would suspect you of working with the royals.”

No. Way. “I’ve got my own family to worry about. I could care less what happens to the royals.”

“But don’t you care what happens to this royal?” he asks quietly. “I thought we were friends.”

Jax really thinks of me as a friend? It’s been a long time since I’ve had one that isn’t related to me. My family is all I’ve had for so long.

“You’re not the first to hate me because of my title,” he adds as a breeze makes the vegetables in the garden sway. “It doesn’t say anything about who I am. I care about my family just like you do, and I want to stop these villains before they can destroy our kingdom.”

“That’s just it,” I complain. “I can leave. This week! Get out of here and go home where my family is safe. Why should I stick around and help you?”

“If you think they’re going to stop at our school, you’re wrong,” Jax says darkly. “Even if you don’t care about Kayla, Maxine, Ollie, or the other kids here, think of your family. They’re not safe ’til we stop the villains.”

Anna, Han, Hamish, Felix, and Trixie. Five reasons to go home immediately.

And five reasons to stay and help Jax fight.

“You’re a thief. I am a liar. Think of all the kids in here we could get to help us. Never send a hero to do a villain’s job.” Jax grins mischievously. “This is a job for our kind, and you know it.”

In Enchantasia, I wouldn’t trust Jax as far as I could throw him. But inside FTRS, maybe who someone really is can be totally different from who you think they are. “Okay, let’s say I decide to stay and help you for a bit—and I’m not sure if I am yet. Where do we start?”

Jax exhales slowly. “With your roommate.”

“Kayla? Why?”

“You’re a thief. Read the signs,” Jax says. “Your roommate is hiding something, and I have a feeling it has to do with what happened on Royal Day. You saw how she fell apart in the gym. She knows who’s behind it. I’m sure of it. How else would she know how to stop the gargoyles?” He grabs a fistful of radishes and shoves them in his pocket. “I think we can get through to her. We have to.”

All the unexplained absences, the illnesses, how irritable Kayla gets. Maybe Jax has a point. “We’re going to have to find her first. She wasn’t in the dorm or at dinner. The Pegasi have been grounded since Royal Day. Where could she be holed up?”

“If I screwed up and didn’t want to be found, I’d go to the last place anyone would expect to find me.” Jax thinks for a moment. “What’s the one class Kayla despises?”

“Stargazing,” I say. “Maybe she’s in the observatory.”

“See that?” Jax beams. “You’re helpful already.” He steps out of the garden through the bookcase and beckons me back inside FTRS’s treacherous walls.

I stare down the hall into the unknown, hoping for the best but expecting the worst. We’ve all done some pretty bad things to get thrown in here. Nothing as bad as plotting with a villain, but maybe Kayla is looking for a friend to dig her out of whatever mess she’s in. Could that friend be me?

Jax and I make our way into the dome-shaped room a few minutes later. Outside, the sun is setting and the sky is a smattering of red, yellow, and orange. The room feels cold and the torches are unlit, giving the open space an eerie feel. Telescopes are set up near the windows. Star charts and maps are rolled up on empty chairs, and astronomy constellation charts hang on the walls like paintings. Scaffolding lines a wall where someone is installing extra magical security measures.

“Kayla? Are you in here?” Jax tries. “Gilly and I want to talk to you.” Silence. Jax frowns.

I look up. A duct above us is missing a grate. I think of how Jax and I shimmied through one just like it that day we were caught by the gargoyles. “Maybe that’s because she’s up there.” Jax’s mouth breaks into a smile, revealing a dimple I never noticed near his left cheek.

“I like the way you think, thief.” He rolls the scaffolding over to the hole in the ceiling and starts to climb. I follow. Within seconds we’re at the top, peering inside the dark shaft. I can just make out a pair of loafers.

“Kayla?” I call. The shoes shift slightly. “We know you’re here. Can we talk?”

“No.” Her voice is hoarse.

“We’ll wait you out,” Jax tells her. “We have all night. We already locked the doorway where the duct lets out so that you can’t become a flight risk.” He winks at me.