A Lesson in Vengeance(90)

“Think one of the housemates killed her?” Ashby says, and my breath freezes in my chest.

I can practically see Liu shaking her head. “What a weird lot. The outfits. The vocabulary. Did you see the way that one girl reacted when I asked what Clara did for fun? I might as well’ve asked if Clara liked torturing small puppies in her spare time.”

“Well, it is Dalloway,” Ashby says dryly. “You heard about this place? Apparently they’ve got some real secret-society-flavored shit going on. I’m talking like séance parties, Satan worship…”

No one worships Satan at Dalloway. No one even believes in any of the magic—no one except me.

I can’t listen to more of this. I slip away from the door, back up the stairs toward my room.

I only make it to the second floor.

Ellis stands on the landing, a slice of shadow in all black. She lifts an envelope in one hand and arches a brow. “We need to talk.”



* * *



—

Ellis leads me back into her bedroom, shutting the door behind us with a jab of her elbow. The air in the room feels alight with electricity, sparking and shivering between us like a lightning bolt that started a forest fire.

“What is this?”

She holds the letter aloft. My eyes glance off my own handwriting, which looks even less like Ellis’s from this angle.

She has positioned herself between me and the door—there’s no escape, short of hurling myself out the window, that doesn’t involve passing close enough for her to grasp my arm.

Ellis had promised she wouldn’t hurt me, not unless I forced her hand.

Only I just tried to frame her for Clara’s murder. Does this count as forcing her hand?

You can’t believe Ellis’s promises anymore, I tell myself.

“It’s a letter,” I answer, keeping my voice low in an effort to sound firm and controlled. “You started this game, Ellis. Don’t act like two can’t play.”

Even from here I can see the way Ellis’s shoulders rise and fall with swift, shallow motions. Her usual calm has been whittled away, revealing something brighter—something dangerous.

“I never put that letter in Clara’s room,” Ellis says, although I can’t think of any other reason why she would have found this one. “I told you I wouldn’t. I promised I wouldn’t try to frame you unless you made me. Why would you do this, Felicity? Why?” Her voice arcs upward in pitch, louder.

I glance toward the window, but the police cruisers are already pulling away from the house, descending the narrow lane toward campus proper. Everyone else is in class. There’s no one to overhear.

“You’re the reason I came to this school,” Ellis says all of a sudden, and my attention snaps back to her. I take a quick step away, toward the bed. “Did you know that? I read about you in an article on Alex’s death. I didn’t care about the Dalloway Five. I wanted to write about you.”

She says it like that’s an excuse—like I should soften into her arms and forgive her.

But all I can think now is…what Ellis must have thought of me. How pitiful I must have seemed to her: the girl who may or may not have killed her friend, the girl who believed in ghosts, the girl who went mad. And I’ve proved her right, haven’t I? I’ve proved Alex right, too.

I meet Ellis’s gaze and feel something cold close around my heart, a feeling like a door slamming shut.

“No,” I snap, starting toward her abruptly enough that Ellis rears back, even though I never reach for her, never close my fist. “No. I won’t let you destroy my life for entertainment. I’m not Melpomene, to inspire your next great and tragic art. You don’t have the right.”

Ellis’s cheeks have gone pallid. She stands out against the backdrop of her quick-darkening room like a ghost in the night. “Is that so?”

For the first time, I think she might actually kill me. I can see her the way Clara must have seen her in that moment—a vengeful spirit ascended from hell, charging ceaselessly toward annihilation. My gaze flicks over to the épée hanging from its hook on the wall, equidistant from both me and Ellis.

And Ellis, it seems, has the same idea.

We both lunge for the sword at the same time, but Ellis—who has spent years training for this, has poured hours into practice at the gym, soaking her lamé with sweat in pursuit of mastering this sport—gets there first.

“Stay where you are,” she demands, poised in perfect posture with the sword outstretched, its blunted tip inches from my face.

“Or what?” I laugh. “These swords aren’t sharp. What are you going to do, poke me with it?”

But Ellis doesn’t move, her gaze fixed, unblinking, around the vicinity of my shoulders.

She holds the blade with her right hand. All those times I watched her practicing forgery…She isn’t left-handed. I could never have faked her handwriting, and she made sure of it.

My chest hurts with every breath I manage to take. And there’s no way to know what Ellis is thinking: If she is even now calculating the worth of leaving me alive. Or if she will invite me on a final Night Migration, if my body will curl up with Clara’s corpse and Alex’s ghost in the ruined grave.

I can’t stay here.

I dart forward, but Ellis is faster. It’s a simple motion, a flick of her wrist, and pain erupts on my cheek. I stagger back, one hand rising to touch the blood that drips down my skin.