Roger that, Tag replied.Update us if anything changes.
My brows knitted together. “What could possibly change?”
“Hmm…” he mused as Manik sent back a thumbs-up emoji. “He could wake up?”
“Manik’s not coming back,” I guessed, switching on my flashlight. “You’re going to have him monitor Daniel for the rest of the night, aren’t you?”
“Preferably without blinking,” he deadpanned when the two of us entered the woods to find Alex. Twigs and other forest floor remnants crunched under our feet, and little animals luckily scattered and scuttled away before I caught them in my beam. Tag cleared his throat. “We wasted so much time on the hill trying to figure out where he was, Lily. That type of clusterfuck can’t happen again. Not if I—or in this case, Manik—can help it.”
“But he knows where the Almanacs are,” I warned. “If we cut him out…”
“He won’t tell,” Tag said. “Once you join the Jester, you’re loyal to the Jester.”
True, I thought while we walked in silence, feeling surer of myself now that we knew Daniel was snoring into his pillow.
“Alright, here we go.” Tag slowed to a stop several minutes later and shined his light to reveal a raised plank walkway. The entrance to the sculpture sanctuary, which had been a collaborative project between one of Ames’s old art classes and faculty volunteers. And Headmaster Bickford, naturally. Forget a landscape architect; she had impeccable taste and a vision. “Butit’s turned intosucha headache,” she’d complained once, and my mom and I had cracked up because the whole point of the sanctuary was to promotetranquility.
The walkway led to a hexagonal deck surrounded by students’ work. Some sculptures were abstract and impressive, others abstract and awful (but because they were so abstract, you couldn’t put your finger on why they were so awful). True talent and tradition were there too. Certain Italian- and Indian-inspired pieces were so lifelike it was beautifully haunting.
All the sculptures were artfully arranged in the area with viewing benches rounding the deck and a bubbling fountain in the center, one filled with wishes. You weren’t supposed to toss coins in, but students did it anyway. I remembered Tag flipping in a shiny penny during the final days of sophomore year. Pretty much everyone on campus had gathered in the Circle to watch the senior prom processional, but we’d slipped into the woods. “What did you wish for?” I’d asked and rolled my eyes when he refused to tell me.
Or else it won’t come true!
“Yes, it will,” I said, sliding my arms around his waist. “Don’t be so superstitious, Smoosh.”
Tag laughed and threaded his fingers through my three-second braid before kissing me. We’d been dating a year; we were mad for each other. “I wished to take you to prom,” he said afterward. “You know, when it’s our turn—senior year.”
I playfully swatted him. “What a wasted wish! Of course we’re going to prom together. I mean, who else would I go with?”
Tag shrugged. “Somebody.”
“Nobody,” I corrected. “The answer isnobody.”
The corners of Tag’s mouth twitched.
“You’remy prom date,” I told his glinting green eyes, a smirk on my face. “Because, Tag, you know you’re the—”
“Hey,” someone said, and I snapped back to attention to see Alex leaning against a nearby tree. “We have a situation.”
“A situation?” I asked. “What do you mean? The situation’s under control. Manik texted that Daniel’s asleep.”
“Yes, I saw, but now we haveanothersituation,” Alex clarified. “Aproblem.” He dropped his voice. “Listen.”
Only ten seconds passed before Tag tightly inhaled and my spine straightened, both of us hearing laughter. “It’s coming from the end of the walkway,” I whispered. “Someone’s here.”
“More likea lotof someones,” Tag whispered back. The three of us listened to at least five or six voices going back and forth. We were far enough away that their conversation sounded like gibberish, but it was clear each participant was male…andyoung. For every deep voice, there was a high-pitched one.
“Might as well alert Manik,” Alex grumbled. “Daniel might be asleep, but there was still a jailbreak from Mack tonight.”
No way, Manik said after I texted that a bunch of freshmen boys had snuck out of Macalester.Daniel has our kids on lockdown. It must be the sophomores. You know their prefects do nothing.
I sighed. Being an Ames prefect was a J-O-Bjob. You werea mentor, an older sibling, and police officer all at once. You dealt with the fears, the tears, and the cheers. It was a huge responsibility, so I hadn’t understood why Daniel had applied for the position last spring. “You’re already running for president,” I’d commented while he sped through his application and I color-coded Latin flash cards. “Why this too?”
“Because what if I don’t win the election?” he’d posed. “You know I need to pad my résumé for Harvard. If I’m not president, prefect is the next best thing.”
I hadn’t said anything. Maybe because I had always pictured Tag and Alex as the freshmen prefects. They’d talked about it a lot over the years. But now Alex was running against Daniel for president, and everyone knew he and Tag were a package deal. If Alex didn’t apply to be a prefect, Tag wouldn’t either.
“What if you get both?” I asked. “Then what?”
