The Secret of Spellshadow Manor by Bella Forrest (classic english novels txt) 📗

Thinking or talking about their families was just a recipe for pain. It scared Alex to realize he had already found himself constantly trying to push thoughts of his mother aside in an attempt to keep himself together—he was already utilizing Aamir and Jari’s method to cope with the separation.

But he could not end up like them. He could not.

“What do you think?”

Alex blinked, looking up just in time to see Jari and Aamir staring at him, both of their faces similarly demanding.

“Think about what?” he asked, pulling his mind back to the present.

“The design,” Aamir said, stabbing a finger at the little metal bug in Alex’s hand. “I think the methodology employed had some serious flaws.”

“At least it didn’t just give up and die,” Jari said.

“It lived too much.”

At this last note, Alex noticed that the student down the table, who had been fastidiously ignoring them, nodded sharply. Alex shrugged.

“I think it’s better to move than get stuck in one place. At least something happened. Here, let me see…”

Jari beamed at him, and Aamir sighed, running his hands through his hair. For a moment, his eyes seemed to glaze, looking at something else, somewhere else.

“I suppose,” he muttered.

There was a clattering from the walls, and the clocks began to chime, a cacophony of deep, booming notes mixed with high, tinny clinks.

“Curfew?” Alex asked, holding his ears.

Aamir continued to stare into space, so Jari stepped in to answer the question. “Yes,” he said. “We’ve got to get back to our rooms.”

“What if we don’t?” Alex asked, thinking of his after-dinner strolls in the garden.

Aamir shook his head, snapping out of his apparent trance. “You want to be back to your room before curfew,” he said simply.

“Hm,” said Alex. Another non-answer from Aamir.

As the trio made their way toward the door, Aamir suddenly stopped and threw out a hand. “Wait, wait,” he said, turning to Alex. “You don’t still have the beetle, do you?”

Alex nodded, holding out his hand to reveal the little clockwork creature, its legs now completely still.

Jari winced. “Ah, good point,” he said. “Alex, you can’t take those with you outside of the lab. They’re considered contraband.”

Alex proffered the item to Jari, who took it to the back of the room and put it in a little box labeled Petra. Then he came back to Alex and clapped him on the shoulder.

“Off we go, then!”

When they reached the room, Jari skipped across it in one bounding step to flop magnificently upon his mattress, bouncing once before landing on his back. Aamir watched him with a disapproving sigh, then looked at Alex as if to say, “Well, no helping that.”

“Here,” he said, reaching into a pocket and rummaging around. He pulled something out, and pressed it into Alex’s palm.

It was cold and firm, with a pleasing weight. Alex looked down to see a screwdriver, complete with a set of bits. He looked up at Aamir, surprised. Aamir pressed a finger to his lips and gave him a knowing look.

“You looked…happier. More at ease, near the machines,” he said. “I know how hard that can be when you first get here. Hell, it’s still hard now. So take that. It’s minor—I doubt you’ll get in much trouble for getting caught with it.”

Alex turned the screwdriver over in his hand, admiring it. This could be a very useful tool at some point. And Aamir was right, too—he had momentarily forgotten his constant tension in the lab, and focusing on something besides escape had been almost meditative for him.

“If you don’t want it,” Aamir said, “I can always take it back and—”

“No,” Alex said quickly. “Thank you. I appreciate this.”

A rare smile cracked Aamir’s lips. He gave a quick thumbs-up to Jari, who was sitting on his bed with an attentive expression.

Alex flopped backward. Well, Natalie had been right. He had learned a couple of new things about the manor, and it felt good to be on friendlier terms with his roommates. They certainly seemed excited about it.

But he still wasn’t sure he wanted to trust them with his secrets.

As he waited for Derhin’s class to begin the next day, Alex prepared himself for yet another awkward session where he would stand out as exceptionally incompetent. It was a disconcerting feeling, given that all his life he’d always been one of the, if not the, top student in his class.

“I can’t believe you still aren’t doing well,” said Jari later in Derhin’s class, shaking his head. “You and Natalie seem closer than ever. You’re always in the library together, or practicing at the tables. You shouldn’t still be having so much trouble!”

Aamir looked pensive, but said nothing.

Professor Derhin cleared his throat, a noise that was somewhere between a smoker’s rasp and the cry a mouse might make if stepped on by a steel-toed boot.

“Now that the class is actually here,” he said, eyeing some latecomers, “I think we can begin. However, first off—Webber, I’d like you to come to the front of the room.”

Alex almost didn’t register what he was hearing. He looked up at Professor Derhin with an uncertain expression, and the man waved with uncharacteristic enthusiasm. “Come on,” he said. “I’ve decided that today is the day we break that little block of yours.”

Alex felt his blood run cold.

He was supposed to have more time. He’d had an idea that if worse came to worst, and they were still at Spellshadow by the time his “few weeks” grace period was over, he’d ask Natalie to fake his magic. But he hadn’t discussed it with her yet because he was supposed to have at least one week more to go. He shot a look over his shoulder and saw Natalie wearing an anxious frown.

Crap.

“Up, up,” said Derhin, clapping his hands.

Alex rose to his feet, his eyes flicking around the classroom. Everywhere, eyes were focused on him. He became keenly aware of the cold in his bones, that cloying, ebbing feeling of emptiness. He had no magic.

“Sit on my desk,”