“Somebody that hates you, though that doesn’t narrow the pool of student suspects, does it?”
“Kick me while I’m down, Giselle.”
“Someone who knows your sister,” she added lazily.
Hailey turned away, covering her face with her hands and sobbing quietly.
“What are you doing—stop that.” Giselle threw down her magazine and jumped up.
“Just give me a second,” Hailey said in a muffled croak between sobs. When a weight pressed the bed next to her, Hailey looked up. There sat Giselle, looking pensive as if she were balancing her tush on a bed of nails.
With her eyes darting around the room, Giselle sat stiff as a board. She drew a loud breath, stuck her jaw out, raised the shoulder nearest Hailey, and said, “She was really pretty.” Then she stuck her hand out like a robot and mechanically patted Hailey on the back.
“Giselle, you’re scaring me.”
Giselle grinned as she stood up, looking wholly proud of herself.
“Next time you get a Nasty Gram, take it to the Dead Letter Office at I-MET—they can tell you who sent it.” Giselle looked down at her roommate. “I’m sure you’ll get more.”
“Good evening, Pádraig,” sneered a voice from the shadows, as Fin trudged into his room. It’d been an arduous evening on the ice, and Fin was in no mood for Envoy lunacy.
He flung his door shut and flipped on the lights.
“What do you want, Cobon?” he asked, sounding drained as he dropped his duffel on the floor.
“Reciprocation. Is that too much to ask?” Cobon scowled as he emerged from the corner. “Three thousand years I’ve endured this place. I have ferried energy for billions of you ungrateful humans—I was a servant before I was imprisoned here—”
“—try not to spit all over my room when you speak,” Fin interrupted.
Cobon glared at him.
“All I ask is for a little obedience.” Cobon leaned menacingly forward, but then he smiled cheerfully, straightened up, and shook his head.
“Let’s not argue, Pádraig. I only came for a chat, you see, I was in the neighborhood delivering a personal message, when I had an epiphany.” He paused as he surveyed Fin’s room, wiping his finger across a bookshelf then rubbing it with his thumb before he continued.
“The Envoys don’t belong here, Pádraig, you know that. They—we, I mean—have to go home, and that girl.” He extended a flat hand toward Fin’s door. “She must die.”
“Why don’t you just find a chump to kill her, then?” Fin said, detached. “You know…like you did Holly…” He threw his keys on his dresser and grabbed the remote.
“Didn’t you know?” Cobon answered excitedly. “I already have!” Then he sighed. “Well,” he said flippantly as he made himself comfortable on Fin’s recliner, “in a manner of speaking. My brothers have grown weary of my methods. If I were to take another life before its time, they may very well turn on me. Besides, a wicked human would never make it past Asher, he protects her, you know. Thisperimeterhere—it ensnares the wicked, sets off the alarms—no, Asher would intervene.”
Cobon stood and paced thoughtfully around the room.
“Oh, I tried a few roundabout ways to kill her already.” He tapped his lip. “She just won’t die.
“But! If she were to take her own life, then…” Cobon held his arms wide and shrugged gleefully.
“Suicide?” Fin scoffed. “Perhaps you haven’t met Hailey.”
“Oh, butyouhave, slave.” He lowered his head and pointed at Fin. “You’re my chump.”
Fin shook his head, one eyebrow raised. “So, what—are you going to kill me, Cobon? Right in front of her? Make her think I’m dead…?”
“Oh, no. No-no-no…she’s far too resilient for that, no, this requires something far more…destructive.”
Cobon stood, tenting his fingers together, walking pensively around the room.
“To destroy a house, you cannot simply crush it—it is too easily rebuilt. No…you must wreck the very foundation on which it stands. She trusts you, Pádraig. She loves you. And you know how to destroy one who loves you…”
