Page 46 of Architecti
Shit.
It would have been more convenient if both Midnight and the woman she’s talking to were in another house.That means we’ll all be living within the same damn walls.
When the sorting is finished, Alistair takes the House Mortis students, and Professor Helena Stroud takes the House Vitalis cohort.She’s our resident head of Theoretical Death Studies.A short, white woman with a scowl for days, I’m convinced her heart is made of steel, and she has a list of strict expectations for her students as high as the Celestial Library.
Which leaves me and the smallest group.
“I guess that means you’re the lucky group.Keep up,” I say.
“Wait, what about our bags?”The girl with turquoise hair says.She’s wearing yellow shorts with brightly coloured flowers, platform trainers and a boyfriend-fit, tie-dye jumper.The combination makes my eyes hurt but my heart warm.I eye her, indicating I want her name.
“Oh, erm, Lex.Nice to meet you.”She holds out her hand.I shake it.
“Your bags will be taken to House Inferos.Let’s go.”
I manage one step before the earth rumbles.
One of the students with Professor Stroud shrieks.It’s like gunshot.One student screaming after another.
The ground tremors harder.Several tiles slip and fall from the roof of the Hall of Unfinished Business.I grab Midnight and the two students standing beside her and pull them into the heart of the courtyard as far away from buildings as possible.I glance up at Finis Tower in the heart of the campus.Its soaring peak is visible far above the rest of the buildings.Slate tiles clatter from the roof.
The air fills with sandstone dust as the integrity of the buildings around us fails.
Stroud catches my attention, her eyes flick over my shoulder.I turn and peer in that direction, my eyes widening as I back our huddled group up, fast.
“WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT?”a girl shouts, pointing behind me.
Midnight cranes her head around and stiffens in my grip.The Veil has torn,again.A rip at least six feet high in the middle of the courtyard.
This is not good.
The ephemeral fabric flaps in the wind.It resembles shimmering air to the eye, but something is off.Usually, the edges are torn and frayed, flapping like loose curtains.But these are sliced, cut neat and tidy like cake; a detail I file away for later.
Behind the fabric lies the underworld.
Dark, mountainous, barren.
Acrid heat billows from the tear.It’s dry, choking and stinks.Fungus fields stretch as far as I can see.And lurking between the slimy black stems are the dark forms of wraiths and ashspawn.
“Shit,” Midnight breathes beside me.
It snaps me back to attention.
“Stroud, get the students out of the courtyard,” I bark.She nods, flying into action.
“Alistair,” I yell, waving him over.He pushes his huddle of students towards Stroud and races across the square towards me.
“Go,” I bark at Midnight and her two friends as the air fills with a pungent scent: sour milk, cigarette breath and fetid meat.
Wraiths.
“Lex,” Midnight cries out, pulling her friend out of the way.
But Lex releases a strangled cry, “Bastien!”
The blond man next to her crashes to the ground.His eyes flit from Midnight’s to Lex’s to mine, and then he’s yanked and sliding along the cobbles.Dragged by his ankle towards the Veil.A wraith clings to his leg, but it’s weak, necrotic.
Its leathery body is curled, skeletal and wrinkled like dried fruit.Flakes of skin shred with every laboured step it takes.Bastien kicks and lashes out.But even weak wraiths are stronger than mortals.And this one has sunk its claws into his calf.
