Page 268 of A University of Betrayal

Then, I opened the door and stepped inside.

The candlelight was already magically lit – as always – and the candles had not yet burned out after all these years. A trick my uncle never wanted to talk about and my father ignored, even though we all knew it had something to do with Quatura magic.

Monkeys Spinning Monkeys

Kevin MacLeod, Kevin

Bayla jumped up from the desk and I heard a drawer fall into a compartment. Julian came out of the sitting area with the fireplace to see what had happened.Ihad happened.

“Emely...What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same.” I looked at him challengingly, but then turned to Bayla. “And you!”

Bayla looked at Julie, who shrugged apologetically. “I didn’t have time to warn you. She just passed me by...”

Bayla looked back at me. “It’s not what it looks like.”

“I think that’sexactlywhat it is,” I said sharply.

“She knows,” Julian stated, running his hand through his hair indecisively. “I just didn’t know you knewthatmuch.”

“You knew, and you didn’t tell us?” Julie asked, looking at him with a look of disbelief. Bayla did the same.

“She overheard us,” Julian explained to his accomplices.

“Sometimes I wish I could turn that hearing off, but I can’t. And you were talking so loudly about it, it was only a matter of time until someone found out.”

They all stared at me as if I’d just told them I’d seen that Alice girl in the East Wing.

“Just understand me. This is important. I’m certainly not staying in your stupid manor twiddling my thumbs when there’s a mystery screaming to be solved.”

We all wheeled around as Larissa appeared in the doorway, clearly at the edge of her nerves. The moment she spotted me, she stiffened and looked at Julie.

“What’sshedoing here?”

“Aren’t you supposed to be standing guard at the west entrance?” Bayla asked desperately.

“Isn’t Julie supposed to be keeping watch in the east wing? And anyway… why does it smell so chemical here?” Larissa replied.

I bit my tongue.

The spray paint.

“What on earth ishedoing here?” Julian asked and Julie immediately backed away, bumping into my uncle’s globe as someone else suddenly appeared in the doorway.

The one she was referring to stepped out from behind a visibly annoyed Larissa.

“Meet my babysitter,Miles DeLoughrey.”

I froze into a pillar of salt, ready to crumble into a billion pieces as soon as he caught sight of me.

“Your worried brother,” Miles murmured in a serious tone before eyeing Julie, Bayla, then Julian, and then... he spotted me.

“You.”

I winced.Hewas fuckinghere,for whatever reason, andI’d spray-painted his car a few minutes ago.

“Miles. Could you please stop being so loud? We don’t want to blow the whistle,” Larissa grumbled.

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