The moonlight has moved across the floor, silver rectangles sliding over the desks. The shadows he left behind are fading, retreating to their normal corners, losing whatever weight his presence gave them.
My jaw is warm where his hand almost was, which makes no sense — he didn't touch me, there's nothing to feel — but the ghost of it sits on my skin like a burn.
I don't know what just happened.
He didn't tell me what his mother is planning. Didn't explain whathandledmeans or what happens to grimoires or why the records stop. He came here to interrogate me and ended up cracking open instead, and I don't know if that makes him more dangerous or less.
He's not my friend. He's not my ally. He is someone who has spent weeks making my life hell on his mother's orders, and one cracked mask in a dark room doesn't change that.
But I've seen what's underneath now. And it's not ice. It's not cruelty. It's a person who learned a long time ago that the only way to survive his family is to stop being a person, and he's so good at it that he almost forgot he was pretending.
Almost.
I grab my bag and walk back to Bellamy Hall in the dark, three magics humming behind my ribs and more questions than I started with.
When I get to my room, Brittany takes one look at my face.
"What now?"
"Callum found me after class. Pulled me into a classroom. Wanted to know what I've been researching."
"And you told him?"
"Some of it. He told me to stop."
"That sounds like a threat."
"That's what I said. He said he didn't know if it was."
Brittany raises an eyebrow. "The Bolingbroke heir doesn't know if he's threatening you or helping you. That's reassuring."
"He's scared, Brittany. Not of me — of something. He knows more than he's saying, but he can't say it. His mother has him on a leash so tight he can barely breathe."
She's quiet for a moment. Then: "That's his problem. Not yours."
"I know."
"Do you? Because you've got a look on your face like you feel sorry for him, and I need to remind you that this is the guywho put you on academic probation and sicced three fraternity presidents on you."
"I know what he is."
"Good. Because whatever he's scared of? That's the thing that should scare you too. If the person holding his leash has him this rattled, imagine what she's got planned for the girl she's been grooming."
She's right. I know she's right.
But I'm also thinking about Callum's hand hovering near my face, and the phone that brought the mask back, and the way he saidaffectionlike it was a word in a language he used to speak but had forgotten.
"I'm not going to stop researching," I say.
"Obviously."
"And I'm going to find Concordia Hall."
"Obviously." She reaches under her bed and pulls out a flashlight. Black, with a skull sticker on it. Holds it out. "Tomorrow night. I'll keep watch."
I take the flashlight. It's heavier than it looks.
"Brittany —"
