The Chain (The Secret of Spellshadow Manor #3)(73)

“What is that?” she asked, pointing at the book in his hand.

“A book Elias gave me,” he replied.

She sighed sadly. “You shouldn’t trust him, Alex. I know he’s useful, but you can’t trust a word he says or a gift he gives—promise me you’ll be wary of him?”

Alex nodded with vigor. “I don’t trust him either! I just have to hope there’s some good in him somewhere, that’s driving these visits and all the information he gives me.” Swiftly, he tucked the book into the waist of his pants.

Ellabell shook her head. “I don’t think that’s why he does it. Anyway, we should be getting back. The others were missing you.” A worried look passed across her face, quickly hidden behind a half-smile, and she took his hand in hers.

As they wandered back toward the villa, Ellabell’s words left Alex a little uncertain. He knew she was right, but he also knew how much better he seemed to feel after many of Elias’s visits. They were his only window into the unknown, and, as much as Alex hated to admit it, he looked forward to them. Although it made him feel somewhat ashamed, part of him was glad Elias was still around.

As they grew closer to the villa, however, he began to feel a strange sensation prickling at his skin, raising the fine hairs on his arms. It was an uncomfortable feeling, as if there were eyes on him, peering through the darkness in his direction. Shrugging it off as Elias, he tried to ignore the sensation.

On his way over the wall, with Ellabell already over and down the other side, out of sight, Alex paused for a moment and darted across to one of the statues that lined the battlements. Glancing around, he no longer sensed eyes on him. Elias must have gone back to whatever it is Elias does, he thought. Reaching up, he tucked the book into the folded stone arms of the chosen statue, pushing it right back into a natural well that dipped at the back, perfect for the safe-keeping of Elias’s gift. Alex still wasn’t sure how scrutinized they would be within the villa walls, but he figured the Headmistress and her cronies were less likely to find the book here than if he stashed it away in his room somewhere, where they’d have easy access to it.

He’d return for it when he had a better idea of how safe they were.





Chapter 29





Elias’s words plagued Alex, as they had a nasty habit of doing. Lying back on his bed, staring at the ceiling, his mind was drawn to the faint movements of the older boy in the room next door. It pained him to think it, but he knew he had to confront Aamir on what Elias had alluded to; with everything going on, if there was anything Aamir wasn’t saying that could be helpful, Alex needed to know.

Dragging his feet, he moved out into the hallway and paused in front of Aamir’s door, his knuckles poised above the wood. Softly, he knocked.

“Come in,” called Aamir.

Alex stepped inside, his reluctance made all the more difficult by the grin that lit up Aamir’s face. He didn’t want to have to question Aamir again, but the pull of what Elias had said was too strong.

Closing the door gently behind him, Alex wandered over to the desk and sat in the chair opposite to where Aamir was sitting, at the edge of his bed. Instantly, Aamir’s face fell, seeing Alex’s grim look. It was no doubt a look he had seen before, so he knew what it meant.

“There are some questions I need answered, Aamir. I hate to do this to you, but I can’t leave this room without asking them,” muttered Alex.

Aamir rolled his eyes as if to say “not again,” but Alex wasn’t going to let it go this time. Elias’s words had given him a renewed desire to dig into the wells of Aamir’s untapped, hidden knowledge. But that made Alex wonder at Elias’s motivations for telling him about Aamir in the first place. Had he even been telling the truth? Ellabell’s warning flashed in his mind: “You shouldn’t trust him.” Alex knew he was about to see how far Elias could be trusted.

“When were you taken to Spellshadow Manor?” he asked, not wanting to jump in with the big queries. There was still a lot he didn’t know about Aamir, he realized, glancing at the older boy with his copper skin and dark hair.

Aamir seemed surprised. “What?”

“When were you taken to Spellshadow Manor?” he repeated.

Aamir frowned. “I must have been fifteen, maybe,” he replied after a long, thoughtful silence. “It seems so long ago, now.”

“Do you remember it?”

Aamir smiled sadly. “Some of it. I remember being out in the garden. It was hot, and the sprinklers were on. I’d been reading, I think, and I heard something. There was a fence behind the trees, where the garden backed onto a field. Perhaps it was a whisper—I can’t remember, I just know something distracted me and I put down my book and went to investigate. I remember my grandmother calling to me from the veranda, but I was already in the shade of the trees, trying to find whatever it was… That was the last thing I remember before the manor. My grandmother’s voice calling me and the sound of sprinklers. Funny, the things you remember.”

“Do you miss it?” Alex wondered, trying to picture Aamir’s world before Spellshadow.

“Of course I do,” he breathed, as if there were a great weight upon him. “I miss it every day, but if you think about it all the time, it will drive you mad. I tried that once—it was more painful to remember than to forget.”