He whirled on me, his eyes wild. “You have no idea what difficult even is.”
“How dare you talk like you know what I’ve gone through.”
We held each other’s gazes, our breaths the only sounds.
“My room was searched,” he finally said, voice barely above a whisper.
My brows rose in surprise. “Did they find your journal?”
A quick head shake was his answer, and, strangely, I felt a surge of relief. “I don’t keep it in my room anymore. Sorry, but I didn’t trust you.”
“Don’t blame me for this,” I hissed at him.
He leaned back against the wall and stared up at the ceiling. “The next night race was canceled. Looks like someone turnedin the date to the authorities, and Vaughan has warned all the upperclassmen to stop the races.”
“There won’t be any more?” I asked, disappointed.
“No, there will be more. This happens almost every year. They just need to plot a new course.” He glanced down the hall, as if he’d heard something. “The next one was postponed. End-of-semester thing now.”
“So, we can’t do your little test, then?”
He snorted. “There are a few more things I can try here. Tomorrow night. Unless you and Shep have plans?”
A quick, embarrassed laugh burst out. “No.”
“Good.” He crammed his hands in his pockets as he strolled away.
A fine layerof frost crunched under my feet as I hurried up the path to the lair one morning in the eerie pre-dawn stillness. My breath fogged in front of me, and my stomach growled from hunger. All the running and strength training we were doing had increased my appetite tenfold. For the past few weeks, nights in the lair with Covington had reduced to a once-a-week thing as the weight of end-of-term essays and projects had piled on. With someone clearly watching Covington, we had to vary the times we met, and the days. The Hunt, at least, had moved on, finally declaring the school grounds safe from wild dragons.
Myth was curled up on the ledge in his den when I arrived. I spoke softly to him as I approached, not wanting to alarm him. But his golden eyes were already open.
“I know, it’s too early for this. I don’t want to be here, either,” I said to him, noting his deliberate stillness.
He snorted, sending a pair of sparks into the air. Inside his den, the temperature was much warmer, the stone walls holding in the heat radiating off of him. Overhead, his skylight was shut against the cold.
“You mean you don’t love our little rendezvous?”
I whirled around, startled by how silently Covington had approached. He looked as if he hadn’t slept at all, hair falling from its usual perfection, eyes puffy and dim.
“You look awful,” I said.
He paused, placed a hand over his chest, and scoffed. “Your manners are truly delightful.”
Without any more pleasantries, he withdrew a glass bottle, this one apparently an empty bottle of some form of alcohol, and set it on the ground.
“Don’t tell me you drank all that before coming here?”
His grin was looser, his eyes bloodshot. “And if I did?”
My arms crossed. “I’m not going to tell Myth to shoot sparks at something that was just full of liquor. Besides, your breath might cause the whole room to explode.”
He laughed, but it was a dry sound. He moved toward the platform where Myth rested and leaned against the stone, one elbow propping up his weight. “Funny, Miro. But we don’t have time for your prickly sense of humor.”
Narrowing my eyes at him, I spotted a bruise reaching up from his poorly buttoned shirt. “Are you…all right?” My hand darted up to my collarbone.
His weight sagged, and he stumbled against the platform. Myth quickly spun, his snout now facing Covington, his tail sliding down to the floor.
“You’re not okay,” I said, stepping forward but unsure what to do.
