The Culling Trials 3 (Shadowspell Academy #3)(53)

“Wally?” I spoke to her after the lights were out.

“Yeah?” Apparently, I wasn’t the only one wide awake.

“Why did my blade kill him? I thought…that it would hurt him, but I honestly didn’t think it would kill him.”

Her bed squeaked as she shifted her weight. “Magical blades can do a lot of things, Wild. And that blade might seem like an ordinary hunting knife to you, but whoever made it had magical skill. And they gave you an extraordinary weapon. But I thought you knew that already?”

Magical skill? But my dad had said he was a null, and that he and mom had made the knife together. Or had he just said that so my mom would bring him with her when she ran away from…well, from the Shadowkiller.

The director had said I shared blood with him...how?

Sleep came eventually in fits and starts, and I tossed and turned. I realized only a couple hours in that I had a solution for my lack of sleep. We were just in the wrong room. “Wally, get up,” I grumbled, grabbing my pillow and leading the way.

She mumbled something under her breath but wasn’t far behind me.

The door on the second floor wasn’t even locked. What a bunch of ding dongs.

At least the four of them woke up when I opened the door. “What are you doing here, Wild?” Orin asked.

“Can’t sleep.” I went straight to the bed Pete was on. “Shift.”

“You could say please,” Pete muttered, but he shifted to his honey badger form. I crawled into the bed, and Wally tucked in behind me. Pete lay on our legs. Orin grumbled and moved to the side of the bed, laid down on the floor and flung an arm up. Wally took his hand. Gregory muttered something about crazy girls, but he slid his mattress onto the floor and scooted it close enough that he could reach us. I took his hand.

“And where do I fit in?” Ethan asked.

“Wherever you like,” I mumbled, already feeling sleep pull itself over me. Ethan grunted and then arranged some pillows at the foot of the bed. He leaned back and reached an arm up and over one of my legs. His hand rested on Pete’s back.

I didn’t see him do it, but I felt it. Now that we were together, I could feel all of them, weirdly enough, kind of in the back of my head. They had been my crew, the misfits no one thought would make it through the culling trials, but we were more than that now. No matter what I was, if Frost was even right about me being a Chameleon.

We were family.





Chapter 21





The next day announcements came on loud and clear, snapping us all out of a deep sleep.

“Director Frost has been removed from the grounds due to unprofessional conduct. Director Rufus will oversee the final advancement ceremony. Please be advised that the ceremony will take place in one hour for those who missed it last night.”

I would have rolled out of bed, but the others had me pinned down. I smiled to myself. “Up and at ’em, boys.” I wiggled my legs, disturbing both Pete and Ethan as I let go of Gregory’s hand and saw Wally let go of Orin. You’d think we would have been uncomfortable sleeping like that all night, but no one had complained.

Not even Ethan.

Wally and I headed back to our room and quickly dressed. So the Sandman was taking the director’s spot? Did that mean he would stay on with the academy?

Rory’s words came back to me.

The Sandman. He’s not what he seems. I can feel it. His position in the school is a cover.

Whatever the Sandman’s game was, it wasn’t over. Whatever plans he had, he was in a prime position to execute them now. Cold washed over me. Did he know I was a Chameleon? Was that why he was on my case? I kept my thoughts to myself, unable to spill the beans, even to my crew. Maybe later.

Maybe never.

Dressed in clean jeans, a dark green T-shirt and my ball cap, I headed out. Or tried to. Wally stopped me. “You don’t have to wear that hat anymore, you know. Everyone knows you’re a girl.”

I touched the brim of the hat. “Yeah, I know.” The thing was, they might know I was a girl, but they’d given me wide berth as a boy. And maybe I wanted that respect. I didn’t want to have to go through earning it all over again because suddenly people realized I had boobs instead of balls.

We hurried down to the front hall and into the ballroom I’d rushed out of the night before. In the center of the room a cauldron rose out of a trap door, flames curling up around the black bulbous pot. Steam swirled up from the surface, flickers of light dancing through it.

Wally nodded. “You weren’t the only student who didn’t get to toss their tokens into the cauldron.”

“Crap, I lost my tokens!” I put my hands to my pockets as if I’d find them there.

She smiled and held up a little bag. “My mom sent me with an extra set, in case I lost mine.”

A sigh of relief slid out of me. Ethan was ahead of us, along with Gregory, Colt, Mason, Ethel, and Lisa. Pete and Orin hurried to our side. Okay, Pete hurried, Orin glided.

“I’m kinda glad I missed it,” Pete said. “It’s better this way, just us.”

“Not quite.” I tipped my chin at the kids who’d been missing. They lined up first and I watched, excited to see how this played out. That is until the Sandman strode across the ballroom floor. His eyes were hidden behind his aviators, but I saw the bruise on the side of his face. He’d not escaped the fight unscathed.