Page 210 of Blood of Hercules
Augustus turned around and stomped back to the front of the classroom, without a word of explanation for his bizarre behavior.
“What was that?” Drex whispered under his breath, eyes wide as he looked back and forth between me and Augustus.
That was a rabid racoon and a foiled assassination attempt.
I opened my mouth to respond, but I forgot how to speak, and no sound came out.
Foreign voices whispered in my periphery.
My vision unfocused.
I couldn’t see a darn thing.
Manic laughter trickled from my lips, but it wasn’t funny. Nothing was.
Reality was unraveling at the seams.
At the front of the classroom, Augustus cleared his throat and resumed lecturing. At least, that was what I assumed was happening because his mouth was opening and closing, and he was writing on the chalkboard.
I blinked.
Time twisted and warped.
“Alexis, can you help me with this for a second?” Drex called.
I startled awake and realized we were on a break, studying in the library (the other boys were sitting at the table; I was lying in front of the fire, studying the back of my eyelids).
Groaning, I got to my feet.
“Noooo,” Nyx moaned beneath my toga as I moved away from the warm hearth.
Shuffling behind a bookcase, I pulled her out of my toga (while trying to make it look like I was just stretching). I laid her in front of the fireplace. “I’ll return for you.”
“Please don’t,” she hiss-mumbled.
I chose not to be offended as I staggered over to Drex.
A few hours later, everything got hazy again.
I was walking (stumbling as Drex pulled me forward by the front of my toga) down the narrow dark corridor toward the menagerie.
How did I get here? Are we going to see the animals again?
Augustus led at the front, and the six of us followed. He stalked through the icy darkness, unbothered like the cold didn’t dare touch him.
My teeth chattered so hard my jaw ached.
Every step sent sharp pain jolting down my spine, which was abused from sitting hunched over for hours.
Augustus stopped abruptly, and the six of us bumped into one another. Moans echoed in the dark.
No one was well.
Augustus threw open the menagerie door. “Everyone, inside,” he ordered.
We shuffled forward.
“Except Alexis,” he said.
