Invaded (Alienated, #2)(21)

Elle didn’t spare him a glance. “Why haven’t you showered yet?” she asked Cara in a rush. “The headmaster called a house meeting in the dining hall. You can’t be late.”

Cara checked her pocket to make sure she hadn’t lost her com-sphere. “I didn’t get an alert.”

“You didn’t?” Elle seemed surprised at that. “The message transmitted a few minutes ago.”

Cara shook her sphere and listened for the rattle of loose parts. “Maybe it’s broken.” That would explain why she hadn’t been able to reach Aelyx. “Did the headmaster say what’s wrong?”

Elle cupped her mouth and whispered as if the message were too shameful to speak aloud. “It’s Instructor Helm. His tablet has gone missing—he believes someone stole it.”

“Whoa,” Troy said. “That’s a heavy accusation. Don’t they execute people for theft?”

Elle seemed to notice him for the first time. She scanned his sweaty chest and took a step back. “Yes, but there hasn’t been an execution in many generations. Our people know better than to steal.”

“I’m sure he left it somewhere and forgot.” Cara pressed a palm to her keypad. “I need to grab some clean clothes.”

“Me, too.” Troy nodded good-bye to Elle, but she ignored him. Poor guy.

Elle rushed to the cafeteria, and Cara hurried into her room to gather a towel and a uniform. She stuffed her com-sphere beneath her pillow for safekeeping, but in doing so, she heard it click against another object. She used her fingers to explore, feeling cool, smooth metal. She lifted her pillow and a breath locked in her throat. There, on her mattress, rested a white-rimmed tablet.

Instructor Helm’s tablet.

Oh, fasha. She was toast.

The pillow slipped from Cara’s fingers as she realized what this meant. Helm’s tablet hadn’t accidentally materialized on her bunk. Someone had planted it there to frame her. For a capital crime. Dahla had assisted Helm in his lecture today, which had given her access to his tablet. But Cara had barely exchanged ten words with the girl. She couldn’t hate humans that much, could she?

Cara sank onto the mattress, wondering what to do.

If she returned the tablet to the headmaster and told him the truth, he might believe her, but then again, he might not. She could use Silent Speech to project her feelings of fear, but not to proclaim her innocence.

Maybe she should wipe the prints from Helm’s device and return it to his classroom. The clones and instructors had assembled in the cafeteria, so it could work if she hurried. But what if a latecomer caught her in the act? She’d look guilty as homemade sin inside Helm’s lab with his stolen tablet in her hand. And what about video cameras? She didn’t know if L’eihrs recorded activity in the hallways like at Midtown High.

One thing was certain: she couldn’t leave the tablet here. Whoever had planted it would lead the headmaster to her room. Cara grabbed her blanket and used it to wipe down the glossy screen and the metallic backside, hopefully erasing her fingerprints. She wrapped it in a clean towel and stepped into the hallway, still unsure of what to do.

In a daze, she glanced past the vacant lobby and toward the cafeteria. Maybe instead of returning the tablet to Helm’s class, she should leave it in the bathroom or shove it down the sanitation chute.

Wait, the sanitation chute…

Of course! Why hadn’t she thought of that before? It would take days before anyone discovered the tablet, and even then, no one could link it to her. She scrambled toward the nearest sanitation door and tugged the handle.

“Hello, Cah-ra.”

She flinched, nearly dropping her bundle, and whirled around to find Jaxen approaching from the other end of the hall.

Double fasha.

Jaxen’s smile fell as he surveyed her. “Are you all right?”

Cara clutched the evidence to her chest and stepped away from the chute. What were the odds she could get rid of Jaxen and ditch the tablet before the assembly began?

At her silence, he bent to meet her height, and studied her closely. “Your pupils are dilated, your cheeks are pale, and I can see the pulse racing at the base of your throat. What’s wrong?”

Those odds? Zero. Even if she chucked the tablet, Jaxen would remember this encounter and suspect she’d done something shady. She didn’t have a choice. She had to tell the truth and hope for the best.

“I’m beginning to worry,” he said. “Perhaps I should summon a medic.”

“No!” Cara extended one hand, stopping just shy of touching him. “I need your help. I think I’m in trouble.”

“What kind of trouble?”

“First, promise you’ll listen before you make up your mind. I’m not a liar—I swear it.”

Jaxen didn’t hesitate. “I promise. You can trust me.”

Cara swallowed hard and unwrapped her bundle, revealing what lay inside. “I found this under my pillow. I didn’t take it. Someone must’ve put it there to make me look guilty.”

Jaxen’s brows rose up the length of his forehead. “Who would do that?”

“Who wouldn’t?” she asked. “Half the Aegis wants me gone.”

He glanced at the sanitation chute and back to her. “And you were about to destroy it?”