It was hard to sleep. The cushion on the chair was comfortable enough for lazing about but I had a zillion thoughts racing through my head. Literally everyone in the school hated me, so anyone could be behind it. It hadn't just been a random attack; it had been targeted at me specifically. It had been meant to kill me. Wow, somebody wanted me dead. That was maybe the most terrifying thing ever. How was I supposed to sleep? Sleep left you completely defenseless. Sleep had always been my friend, maybe my best friend after food, but I couldn't rely on sleep to keep me safe. The person who had attacked me had broken into the Golden House before. Their magic could penetrate any walls. Nowhere was safe.
I crept over to the edge of the cushion and squeezed down in the crack between the arm of the chair. I didn't know if hiding would do any good against magic, but it made me feel better to be in a small space. For a while, after my dad had left, I hadn't slept. There was nobody in the house to protect our family. What if something happened? I had to keep awake to keep us safe. And then when Sam's family had been killed, I'd spent the nights under my bed, wrapped up in my blanket with just the top of my head peeking out so I could keep my eyes on the door. I knew it wouldn't really do anything against an attacker if they broke in, but there was nothing else that I could do. This was the same sort of thing.
I don't know how long I lay there in the darkness, trying to make myself part of the chair, but it seemed like forever.
And then it happened. The thing I feared the most.
Someone, a shadow, opened the door and crept into the room. No alarms rang, no security detail burst into the room to save me, just the dark form of someone moving toward me. I bit down on the side of my hand to keep from screaming.
"Lucy, it's me," Sam whispered. "I just wanted to make sure you were okay."
"I'd be more okay if you weren't creeping around giving me a heart attack," I snapped, but I wasn't angry really.
"I know you didn't want to stay in my room but if you like, I will just sit over here while you get some sleep. You can pretend I'm not here but I'll watch the door and keep you safe."
His words were like a sleeping potion. My brain immediately stopped chasing itself around and curled up like a sleepy puppy to rest. My heart felt as if it was growing too big for my chest and I wanted to tell Sam how much it meant to me, for him to know exactly how I felt and what I needed, but I was asleep before the words made it out of my mouth.
I woke up to see him curled in a ball at the foot of my chair, a big furry wolf, fast asleep with his head on a cushion. I wasn't mad that he'd fallen asleep when he said he'd watch the door. It wasn't really about watching the door, even I knew that much. It was about feeling like someone had my back, feeling as if I wasn't alone, that there was someone to share the weight of responsibility.
I had zero energy to go to class. Being tiny really took it out of you, but we had to track down Astor and get this whole mess sorted out. If I didn't get biggened soon, the school administration would notice, for one thing. I'd lose my scholarship if I had too many absences recorded.
"We're doing this as a pack," Tennyson Wilde said as the five of us headed up to the school after dinner. "We don't know what weapons he has at his disposal, magical or not. We will approach him cautiously, isolate him and try to reason with him. Do not engage in any physical altercation with him unless he attacks first. Do not reveal your powers to him. Be mindful of your surroundings and anything that seems out of place. Remember, our objective is to find the person behind the magic."
"We know," Althea said, rolling her eyes.
Sam carried me safely in the front pocket of his bag. Watching the four of them together like this, striding up to the school like a team of superheroes heading out for a mission, it struck me how different Sam was to the others. They carried themselves with an air of absolute confidence. Whether it was because they'd been born as wolves or born rich or what, there was absolutely no hesitation in anything they did. Sam, on the other hand, he was all stooped posture and second guesses.
He seemed twitchy as he followed the others, and I wondered if he was okay, if this kind of thing would be too much for him, but I figured they wouldn't bring him along if he couldn't handle it. Probably, it was only me that freaked him out and evil polo wizards were okay. He'd never been great with confrontation so he was probably just twitchy about that.
As we approached the aquatic complex, they discussed their plan of approach in hushed voices.
"Sam, you should hang back with Lucy," Althea said, and the others nodded agreement.
"Nikolai has the sharpest senses, so he should locate the target and then fall back with Althea to form a line of defense. Survey the perimeter for any sign of the magic user. I'll approach Astor directly and begin negotiations."
I wasn't sure if Tennyson Wilde was planning a military operation or a sporting tactic but I hoped he knew what he was talking about. In my experience, guys like Astor had no idea about their actions having consequences, because they'd never had to deal with any consequences before, and so they thought they could do whatever they liked and get away with it. That made them dangerous and unpredictable.
He was in the main pool area, not swimming, just sitting by the pool, watching the water. He was still fully dressed and looked as if he were waiting for something. When Tennyson entered, Astor looked up and smiled. It seemed obvious that he'd been waiting for us.
"I knew you would come," he said. "You think you're so smart. So much smarter than everyone else, so much better."
I rolled my eyes. Poor little rich kid.
"You think you can make a fool out of me and get away with it? You think that stupid commoner can get away with it? I don't care who you are, who your family is, nobody makes a fool out of Remington Astor and gets away with it." He stood up to yell his words at Tennyson, his face red and vein on his thick neck pulsing.
Tennyson Wilde didn't react, just stood silently, watching him. To be honest, I knew how infuriating it could be to get into an argument with Tennyson Wilde, but Astor wasn't doing himself any favors.
"Your little girlfriend has been missing for days and nobody even cares. She could vanish from the world forever and nobody would notice. And what will you do then?"
"We know what you did," Tennyson Wilde said. "And we know how you did it."
"Ooooh," Astor said, waving his arms around. "Look who knows so much. Do you know how to break the spell too? Of course you don't, that's why you're here."
Even from the back, I could tell from the set of Tennyson Wilde's shoulders that he was rolling his eyes.
"There's nobody else here," called Althea.
Astor laughed. "And nobody else coming."
"So what's the point of this?" Tennyson asked. "What do you want from us? Tell me your terms and if they are reasonable, we can negotiate."
Astor laughed meanly. "Terms? You think I want to make a deal with you? You think there's anything you could give me more satisfying that being rid of that stupid little bitch? Better than seeing the look on your smug face after I stamp her out? You gotta be kidding me, something that good doesn't even exist."
Tennyson took half a step forward and then stopped himself. "For your own safety, I suggest you reconsider."
Astor snorted. "You're threatening me now? What are you going to do, turn into a werewolf and rip my face off?"
As one, I felt the five of us suck in a sharp, shocked breath.
"Go on, do it. There are cameras filming this entire thing. You want the world to know what you are, that your whole family are filthy animals?" He laughed. "The only thing better than getting rid of your commoner whore would be taking you down with her."
So many things happened at once that it was impossible to keep track of what was going on. Sam let out a ferocious growl and lunged forward, sending me flying. There was a flurry of movement from the shadows, Nikolai and Althea, but I couldn't tell what they were doing as I flew through the air. Wow, I was up high. It was going to be a bitch when I hit the ground. The noises from below were awful, growls and tearing, ripping sounds, but I couldn't turn to see what they were from, whether Sam was okay, whether they were ripping Astor to pieces. I wasn't so sure if I cared if they were, considering he had every intention of ending me, but I did wonder if the spell could ever be broken if he was dead.
Before I could give it too much thought though, I landed. Splash, right in the middle of the pool.
Chapter 12
I was a strong swimmer. We lived near a river and my brothers were little troublemakers, so I made sure I was a good enough swimmer to pull someone to safety if they got in trouble. This was something new to me though. This was like being dropped right in the middle of the ocean, with nothing to cling onto for support. This was really, really scary.