Page 62 of Strength of Desire

“What?” A bolt of fear stabbed through me. Did Sebknow? How could he? Were my feelings about Cory that obvious? Had I been that transparent?

“Cory Dawson,” he repeated. “One of the freshmen. Short, brown hair, kind of frail looking.”

“I know who he is,” I said, heat filling my chest. “But no, I haven’t seen him. Why would I have?”

I sounded way too defensive, and Seb’s brow furrowed.

“Were you in the ballroom? I thought you might have seen him in there.”

“Oh.” The tightness between my shoulderblades eased. He didn’t know. Of course he didn’t. There was nothingtoknow. “Yeah, I was there. But I haven’t seen him.”

Not in a while, anyway. Not if you mean outside of my own fucked up imagination.

I didn’t say that last bit out loud.

Seb looked worried. “He was supposed to meet me for a lesson for Fifth Hour, but he didn’t show up. He’s never missed before. I waited for half an hour, then checked his room and the rest of the manor. I even checked outside. I’m sure some students decided to hunt for that ridiculous spring tonight, even though they’re supposed to stay inside. But I wouldn’t have thought Cory was foolish enough for that.”

“So he misses one night,” I said, forcing myself to talk about Cory calmly. “He’s obviously around somewhere. Just talk to him about it in class tomorrow.”

“It’s not like that,” Seb said. “These lessons are important. He can’t miss one, or—” he broke off, shaking his head. “I need to find him.”

It dawned on me, suddenly, what Seb was talking about. He was the one helping Cory learn to control his powers, because I’d refused to do it when Isaac had asked. This wasn’t just any lesson Cory was playing hooky for.

Maybe Cory needed to dream every night. Argus had said it was often like that, in the beginning. I wasn’t sure how much that piece of information could be trusted, given the source, but my tolerance had grown with time. But if Cory’s hadn’t—

My gut twisted. If Cory missed a scheduled lesson, that could be very bad. I ought to help look for him. Seb was only in this position because I’d forced Isaac’s hand. But I needed to find Isaac, too.

I opened my mouth to apologize to Seb, but before I could speak, something cracked through the air around us, shattering the stillness. Seb’s head whipped around.

“Was that—”

“A gunshot,” I said, my stomach dropping. I knew that sound too well. “Yes, it was.”

Seb looked uncertain. “Should we find Isaac? Or go see…”

He trailed off when he saw me shake my head. “I’ve been looking for Isaac for the past twenty minutes. I can’t find him anywhere.”

A second shot split the air, and my whole body tensed. Seb was right. More than likely, a group of students who didn’t believe they were in any danger, or thought they could handle it, had decided to hunt for the Spring of Irylis, despite Isaac’s insistence that all Imbolc activities were to be held inside this year. Which meant that who knew how many of them were out there in the woods right now—as shots were being fired.

Would Cory be in that group? There was only one way to find out.

“You stay here,” I told Seb. “If you can find Isaac, good. If you can’t, find Hans and Autumn and the other wardkeepers and let them know what’s happening. I’m going out to check.”

“You can’t go out there alone.”

“I’m not going to stand around arguing with you,” I said. Isaac was missing. So was Cory. I’d found one of Argus’s coins in Sheridan’s room today. And now, there were gunshots in the woods. “Do what you want. I’m going to look.”

I pushed past Seb and settled into a run, my legs carrying me down the path towards the gym. Whatever was happening out here, my gut told me it was no good. A few seconds later, Seb caught up to me, his breath coming out in hot little puffs that disappeared in the night air.

“You can’t—” I began, but he didn’t let me finish.

“I care as much about this school as you do,” he said. “And you could use some backup.”

“Fine.”

Behind the gym, the path split, and I jerked my head, nodding towards the left. “You take that one. I’ll go right.”

“But if you need—”

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