Page 69 of Witchlore
“Because it’s fun, right?” I say. Carl looks at me with a panicked expression on his face. “It’s fun to feel like you’re the most powerful person here, like you’re the one everyone respects and you’re the one who can make or break people. Well, news flash, Carl…” I pick up my bag and pull it on my back. Carl hasn’t moved; he’s watching me like I’m dangerous, and suddenly I do feel dangerous to him. The truth is powerful. “Being a gropeywankerisn’t sexy and it doesn’t make you less of a patriarchaldickjust because you only want to shag boys, okay?”
With that, I turn to leave.
“You’re a fuckingmurderer,Orlando!”
I feel the rush of a spell coming toward me; I can smell thesugary nastiness of it and I know I can do nothing to stop it. I turn to face it so at least everyone in the common room will see I was defenseless, but suddenly, someone is beside me, moving their fingers, and silvery magic shunts a stack of chairs between me and Carl’s spell. Carl’s eyes widen. I turn to look at the blond boy I thought was Carl’s boyfriend. His high cheekbones are flushed, and the diamond ring on his finger is shimmering with a silver sheen as his trembling fingers hold the position of Atlas’s Grip, glaring at Carl.
“Now everyone knows,” he says to Carl, who is too shocked to speak. Then he turns to me.
“Thank you,” he mutters under his breath. “I thought it was just me.”
I realize then that the shifter in the book was right. No one changes the bad things in the world for us. Sometimes, we have to stand up against the bad things, to be honest about how they’ve hurt us, because maybe other people, people we would never expect, have been hurt, too.
“You’re welcome,” I say, nodding and walking down the stairs. For the first time since I started college here I feel like people are seeing the real Carl Lord. Perhaps they’re also seeing the real me, too. It’s a shock, but now this thought doesn’t make me afraid.
I ride on the high of standing up to Carl all day. I take a moment to message Bastian about it.
Just so you know, I stood up to Carl. I told him he was a gropey wanker.
Bastian responds with a video of René doing what Bastian calls “a victory dance.” I’m about to walk into Ezra’s and buy us both celebratory coffees when someone taps me on the shoulder. I flinch and turn, expecting Carl or one of his crew, maybe wanting to make trouble, but it’s only Kira.
“I need to talk to you about something,” she says, looking particularly earnest today in a pair of clear-rimmed glasses.
“Don’t you think you’ve said enough already?”
“Fine, don’t listen to me, but you need to read this.”
Kira reaches into her bag and pulls out a flat blue file. It’s got no stickers or cats doodled on it, so I know it doesn’t belong to her.
“What is that?” I ask, my throat dry.
“It’s Bastian’s personal file.” Kira shifts awkwardly and looks down at her shoes. “From college.”
“You stole his personal file?” I stare between her and it. “Why the hell would you do that?”
I realize it must be something bad for her to take such a risk, for Miss Goody Two-Shoes to actually steal a file, but something inside me rebels against it. I don’t want to know. I’m happy; why can’t I just stay this way?
“Because you need to know the truth.” She pushes it into my chest and walks away.Oh, no, you don’t,I think wildly. I follow her past the street art peeking out from the alleyways, a riot of reds and blues and faces and eyes, and down into the pedestrian area in Stevenson Square. It’s busy as usual; some people are sitting on the brightly painted breeze blocks beside Fred Aldous to vape or drink takeaway coffees, and they stare as I chase Kira, but I don’t care.
“Hey, hey!” I catch up to her and grab her shoulder, pressing the folder back against her chest. “You don’t get to decide what Ineed to know! This is a massive violation of his privacy; I won’t take it!”
“Then you have to hear it!” Kira’s voice is louder than I have ever heard. Her glossy black hair is pulled up into a high ponytail today and it swings furiously as she faces me square on, the file clutched against her chest. “He was kicked out of his last college in London. He did dangerous magic there, too.”
“You just think it’s dangerous because you can’t do it!” I exclaim. “You’re prejudiced against his coven!”
“No, because he killed another student!” Kira yells back. “A shifter student!”
“That’s—that’s crazy, don’t say shit like that.” I shake my head, my stomach churning. My mouth feels slimy. I wonder if I’m going to be sick and instinctively look around for somewhere I can throw up, eyes darting over the mulch of yellow leaves under my feet, the drain stuffed with cigarettes and mud.
“It’s not crazy. He did a spell and someone died.”
“Oh, and that makes someone a killer, does it?” I choke out, glaring at her. “I knew you felt that way about me, I knew you blamed me for her death—”
“This isn’t about Elizabeth!” Kira slaps the file against my hand but I refuse to take it, stepping back. “Read the file.”
“No, it’s a lie—”
“It’s not a lie. It was a really unpredictable ancient spell, something to do with resurrecting the dead.”
