I raised an eyebrow. “I did not know that. The website wasn’t exactly forthcoming about that particular part of the school’s history.”
A muscle tugged at the corner of Ayaz’s mouth. Was that the beginning of a smile? My heart thudded, but I couldn’t dear hope. “The school was founded by Thomas Parris, the son of the Reverend Samuel Parris who was responsible for a lot of finger-pointing during the trials. Rumor has it that following the trials, the good Reverend was haunted for the rest of his days by the innocent souls he condemned. They invaded his body and mind, made him hurt himself, and made him frightful to others. Thomas Parris did everything he could to free his father of these malevolent spirits. When he exhausted the resources of the church, he turned to Jewish mysticism and then to the very dark magic against which his father had fought.”
I leaned forward, enraptured by Ayaz’s voice and this insane story. “Parris’ occult studies and the strange people he attracted started to gain attention in Salem. There were stirrings that he had been corrupted by the lure of witchcraft. All his studies were in vain, for Samuel Parris died that winter in agony, passing a small sugar plantation in Barbados to his son. Thomas Parris fled Salem, sold the plantation, and came here. In his diaries, he said that this site called to him. He spoke of a sign from the spirits that he should have this land and that he should build a great house that honored his pagan gods.
“Parris built this house based on the principles of sacred geometry, designing it to align with heavenly bodies and for certain rooms to draw energy from the earth in order to channel spirits and other things. He dug underground caverns and tunnels into the bedrock, and worked sigils into the architecture – sigils are symbols that represent certain demons or gods, and it’s believed that by drawing them the magician has a degree of control over the being.”
“You mean this whole building was like a demonic house of worship?” I asked. “What’s the sacred geometry about?”
“It’s like this.” Ayaz tore off a sheet of paper. His hand flew across the page as he drew a quick outline of the school – the wings and the central buildings surrounding the courtyard, the fields and the long, winding drive. He added a U-shape to indicate the peninsula. Over this, he added a series of swooping lines and symbols. He finished it by linking the corners of the buildings into a crooked five-point star.
“Some of this I’ve seen in Parris’ diaries, some I figured out from stuff I learned in alchemy class. But basically, Parris thought of his home as this conduit of energy. He wanted to communicate with beings from other dimensions or whatever. But the building also had to be able to contain these demonic energies. He couldn’t very well call up all these dark things and just let them loose upon the world, so his home also had to serve as a prison. Hence why your room only has that one, tiny window covered with bars.”
“You’re telling me that my dorm room used to be a prison cell for demons?” I scoffed. “If you’re trying to scare me, this is not the way to do it.”
“Demons, and other things.” The gravitas in Ayaz’s voice drew me in. He seriously believed this stuff. “In Parris’ diaries, he speaks about communing with the ‘other’ gods – the gods who guard the feeble gods of Earth. Ancient Gods of gods who have fallen into a deathlike sleep but whom he hoped to awaken. He invited magicians and occultists from all over the world to his home to attempt to summon these Great Old Ones. Like all good occultists, they threw violent parties and held orgies under the stars. The newspapers reported strange happenings in Arkham village – herds of cattle mysteriously dying, earthquakes that seemed to originate from the house on the hill, reports of participants in Parris’ rituals carried away to asylums, turned insane by what they had seen.
“Eventually, the locals in Arkham got sick of all the strange happenings and of the influx of weirdos heading up the hill to dance naked in the moonlight. They stormed the house one night, set fire to it, threw Parris off the cliff, and ran his coven out of town. The place lay abandoned for a hundred years or so, until some ancestor of Trey’s bought it and turned it into this school.”
I spun the page around to face me, picking out details of the drawing. Ayaz had rendered the school beautifully, even adding architectural details like the carved gothic arches and gnarled trees along the edge of the cliffs. “You’re quite a good artist.”
“How would you know?” he snapped. “You’ve probably never even been to an art gallery.”
“My best friend is a tattoo artist. Instead of shutting away his art in elitist buildings, he drew it on people’s skin.” I shrugged as if it was no big deal. “Actually, I should say that hewasa tattoo artist. He’s dead now. He died trying to hide from bullies like you. The only thing I had of his was his journal – you know, that notebook you destroyed in the fountain for the amusement of your loyal subjects.”
“I didn’t ask for your life story,” Ayaz snarled. I nodded mutely.I guess that conversation is over. We got to work building out a plan of our project based on the knowledge we already had about the trials and what we needed to research. Ayaz jotted notes, his hand moving across the page in swift circles as he doodled a plan for our presentation. Then we each opened our books and worked in silence.
A few moments later, a pen tapped against the page under my nose. I looked up, startled.
“That wasn’t me,” Ayaz said, his expression unreadable. “I didn’t destroy your friend’s book.”
I searched his face for any sign that he was messing with me, but he was, as usual, impossible to read. All I saw in his eyes was barely subdued rage. Was that anger for me, or was it about something else entirely?
I shrugged, because what was I supposed to say?
“I don’t go in for property damage,” Ayaz added. “That’s more Trey and Courtney’s style.”
“You’re more of a maggots-in-my-breakfast and tar-my-hair guy,” I shot back, my hand flying to my head again. “Sorry, if you’re looking for some kind of moral high-ground, you’re not getting it from me.”
“I didn’t touch your hair. That was all Courtney.” Ayaz looked away. It was odd, almost as if he didn’t want to think about the maggots. Well, tough. I didn’t want to think about them either, but the vision of their wriggling bodies entered my mind every morning as I took my seat in the dining hall.
“Even if you weren’t the one who tarred my hair or destroyed the journal, you stood there while they did it. You didn’t stop them. Seems like I’m the only one around here standing up to the bullies at this school, and look what I have to show for it?” I pointed at my head.
“Trey’s not a bad guy,” Ayaz said.
I snorted. “You’ve met him, right?”
“There are things you don’t know.”
“Fine, whatever. What I do know doesn’t exactly fill me with warm fuzzies.”
“Courts is a piece of work. Tillie and Amber will follow her lead. But Trey… he and his family kind of adopted me when I came to this country, when I was alone. He’s like a brother to me. He has his own issues. There’s more to him than what you see.”
I snorted. “Oh yes. I’d love to have a heart-to-heart with Trey Bloomberg, find out what deep secrets in his heart make him want to torment me. Are you going to be an artist?”
Ayaz bristled. “That’s a swift change of subject.”
“Yeah, well, maybe I don’t want to waste the one mildly pleasant conversation we’d had talking about Trey fucking Bloomberg. I’m dying to know what people are going to do when they’re done with this stupid school. Are you all going to be fucking monarchs in the real world, too? Answer the question. Artist, or maybe architect?” I pointed to the perfect floorplan in front of me.
