Page 56 of The Knight

Okay, sono onecould get completely sick of all those books, not unless they're a monster. But it does start to become a little repetitive. I video chatted with my mom, Wally, and Jade back home, but it isn't the same as being there. Pacing the confines of the buildings I'm allowed to be in makes me feel like an animal in a cage.

What chafes the most is that I’m not even sure Cole is right about the danger to me. After all, Georgia is testifying, and he claims that the Syndicate doesn’t go after their own. Surely there’s no point in taking out me, the second witness, as long as Georgia’s bruises and moneyied family speak for themselves.

Doing my best to look presentable, I grab my jacket, put a scarf around my neck, and greet Lukas at the door. "So, you're springing me. But I can't imagine anywhere on campus is possibly cold enough to justify dressing for cold weather. Itisofficially spring, you know."

"You'll see. It's a surprise." Reaching out, he takes my hand, and my stomach does strange, flip-flopping things. "I figured you'd be getting cabin fever by now, so I thought a little vacation was in order. And since you can't leave campus... well, you'll see. I've got it all planned out. Just come with me."

He leads me through the halls of Rosalind, seeming not to care at all that boys aren't supposed to be allowed in here. Warm spring air hits us as we walk down the front steps towards the campus paths, as all around us the world blooms to life, heat and sunlight returning to Great Falls like a flower's petals unfurling.

"You know, it's a little unseasonably warm," I comment, as I feel a trickle of sweat go down my back, right between my shoulder blades. "I'm starting to regret my outfit."

"Let's hurry, then." Pulling me along in his wake, he starts half-jogging down the path. I grumble, but he just aims a grin back at me and goes faster. "You can do it, Brenna!"

Laughing, I follow along with him as he kicks the pace up to a full-out run. The spring sun seems to beat down on me, turning my scarf into a nightmare around my neck. Soon enough, though, Lukas is slowing down, then stopping, leading me right to the athletics building.

"I've never been in here," I confess, staring at the lettering that readsColeridge Athletics Facility."It doesn't have a cool name like Carthage Library."

"But there's cool stuff inside."

I look at him curiously, and he raises his brows at me as he scans his ID to open the doors and let us inside.

"You haven't figured it out yet?" Motioning for me to go first, he gives me a bright, childish grin. "C'mon, Brenna. Surely you know by now what we're about to do."

I'm about to shoot back an annoyed response when a blast of cold air from the center washes over me, carrying a particular scent with it, and I realize all at once. "The indoor skate rink."

"Yep. That's exactly it." He walks in behind me as I drink in the chill air, the smell of winter somehow still lingering despite the warmth breaking over the world outside. "I thought maybe you could use the distraction. Plus they're melting it tomorrow to make way for spring and summer sports, so."

"I didn't even know the school had an ice rink. It seems so..."

"Upper class of us?" Lukas runs a hand through his hair. "The school also has a water polo team and an off-campus equestrian barn."

To think, they could've created more than a handful of scholarships a year, instead of devoting so much money to useless sports. No one at Coleridge is going to become a horse trainer or Olympic figure skater—not when they have trust funds at their disposal and companies to co-found on their eighteenth birthdays.

Still, as I walk over towards the lockers and spot a whole collection of extra skates, just sitting there and pristine for use, I find that I want more than just to hate Coleridge and all it represents. I want to forget my worries. To indulge in a little silliness with a boy who has kind eyes and cares about me enough to bring me to all this, just at the moment when I was feeling the worst.

"Thank you," I tell him, "but I can't skate."

"That's what I'm here for."

Lukas shows me how to tightly lace the skates up to my ankles, enough so that my feet will be supported, not so tight that my blood flow is cut off. He has his own pair of skates in one of the lockers, because apparently the ice rink is open to students who reserve it on the weekends, and he's one of those students.

Softly, he says, "I always loved ice skating. My mother used to bring me down to the frozen pond near our house in the winter, back when we lived in Brussels the second time around. She taught me and my stepsister how to believe that the ice would hold us up, no matter what."

"You sound like you miss her. I'm surprised you didn't go home for the break."

He grimaces, shaking his head. "Which home? My father spends all his time at the embassy in DC, or with my stepmother at her home in Rhode Island. My mother is always flying from London, to Paris, to Rome, checking on all of our warehouses and marketing campaigns. Harrington Foods is more her child than me. Now that I'm old enough to take care of myself, she expects me to do just that."

"I'm sorry," I tell him, surprising myself by really feeling it. "That must be hard."

Lukas considers my words. "It is, but it isn't. I know they love me. They show it in other ways, by making sure I'm always well-fed, educated, and traveled. My mother would cross the whole world in an instant for me if she thought it was what I needed. My father would probably bring down the whole US government to protect me. But neither one of them will ever hold me while I cry. It's a different kind of love."

The kind of love the blue bloods have. A love where you send your child away to a strange and unfamiliar place, so they can have the best education in the world—even if they cry themselves to sleep at night. I can't imagine what it's like to go to a boarding school as a child. Even now, at the age of seventeen, I miss my mother in a way so unfamiliar to me that it aches deep inside. I wouldn't have been able to do this at twelve, or worse, even earlier.

Lukas helps me out onto the ice, laughing a little—not mockingly—as I walk around the rink with my ankles buckled like a newborn deer and grasp onto the railings at all times. He shows me how to balance the blade beneath me, and tells me stories of his childhood in Belgium as he takes my hands and guides me out onto the ice.

I fall. More than once. Each time the pain is a little less, although I don't know if that's because I'm learning how to fall better, or just because my ass cheeks are going numb. Lukas never laughs at my clumsy movements, and slowly, with his hand taking mine, I start to feel more confident. I venture further out onto the ice.

After about an hour or so, when we're both feeling the cold and the effort of propelling the human body on top of frozen water with just blades beneath us, we head off the ice and shed out jackets. Lukas walks along the campus with me, pointing out the places where birds are building their nests and squirrels frolicking in high branches.

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