Yes, here they all are trying to help me break this spell, even though they think it’s hopeless, even though success may mean they pass over and I never see them again.
And I was still plotting to punish them. It felt wrong. I hated it. But not doing it felt wrong, too. Everyone in this school needed to learn a lesson. I shouldn’t spare them just because I… because I…
I bit my tongue, not ready to finish that sentence.
Ayaz spun around, the compass held against his chest. “This way.” He pointed off into the trees. We started walking. A cold shiver ran down my back as I remembered the last time I walked this same path with a blindfold over my eyes.
Trey and Quinn strolled with insouciant ease, like they knew the fun never started until they arrived somewhere. Ayaz hopped ahead, consulting his map and compass and searching the treeline for landmarks. I kept a pace or so behind him, lost in my own thoughts.
“Are your parents part of the Eldritch Club, too?” I asked Ayaz as he helped me down a stone ledge.
Ayaz snorted. “Unlikely. I don’t think ‘our’ kind are welcome. Vincent Bloomberg and his circle still think Turkish people live in caravans in the desert.”
“Youwere allowed,” I pointed out.
“Only because Trey spent a year building my reputation at Miskatonic. I had to wait for permission – for one of them to anoint me. The Eldritch Club members never wait for permission. They believe the whole world belongs to them, ripe for the picking.”
“Why do you think I have some kind of power?” I blurted out.
“Huh?”
“In the library, you were trying to imply that I had magical abilities.”
“From everything that’s happened, I can’t see any other explanation. Unless you’re a pyromaniac.”
“Don’t say that,” I growled, my throat stinging. I tore away from him, leaping down the stones. The burn on my leg tugged as the healing skin stretched over the muscle.
“Hazel, wait up.”
Yeah right. Because I always do what other people want. Especially when they try—
“Argh!”
Ayaz leapt off a stone ledge and landed in front of me, cutting off my path. I swatted him on the shoulder. That got one of his rare, earth-shattering smiles.
“You’re going the wrong way.” Ayaz pointed further along the ledge. “It’s over there. Also, I’d like to point outyouwere the one who asked about your power.”
“I don’t have any power,” I grumbled.I wish they’d just drop it.“I’m just a poor gutter whore with a heart of gold.I’venever summoned a deity from a cosmic dimension.”
Ayaz shrugged. “Fine. You’re completely normal. Guess we’re walking in silence.”
“Guess so.”
He was as good as his word, staying beside or behind me as we clambered over rocks and jogged between towering trees. Every now and then, his arm would brush against mine, his heat licking my skin.
I hated to admit it, but I’d missed him. We’d been spending so much time together this quarter, studying Parris’ book and working on our witchcraft project. I loved watching Ayaz work – he had a singular focus and a vast intellect that could pick out seemingly insignificant details and put them together into a fully-fledged story. He saw patterns in everything, from the shapes of letters on a page to the configuration of panels on the stained glass windows. And just when he set my mind spinning with facts and details, he’d unleash his wicked dry humor and leave me laughing so hard I’d gasp for air.
“While we’re asking difficult questions,” I blurted out. “Why were you angry at me?”
“I thought we weren’t talking.”
“Was it really about Zehra? Because I’m sorry I didn’t think to ask her more, I was just so desperate to get back in time and I honestly thought I’d hallucinated her—”
Ayaz looked away. “It wasn’t about Zehra.”
“Then why?”
“Because of the movie night,” he whispered. “Because I saw what Quinn and Trey did with you.”
