Page 68 of The Kiss Of Death
“Symphony No. 10 in E minor, Op. 93,” I whispered, the melody still lingering in my mind.
Mr. Morgan confirmed my answer.
Part II. The Allegro.The crescendos mirrored the rising panic in my chest, the staccato of gunshots punctuating the music like a grim chase for survival. I could feel myself hiding behind the sofa, hands trembling as I covered my ears. The dissonance of the music turned macabre, the silence that followed the gunshots echoing like the darkness of a haunted mansion, and I—
“Good answer.” Mr. Morgan snapped me back to reality. I had missed a question. I needed to focus. “Another point for the Tacticians.”
I ignored the pain in my chest, locking horns with the Tactician girl for the next few rounds, determined to maintain my focus despite the lingering ache. The Pioneer boy was fast, too fast even, since he stumbled upon two incorrect answers. The Guardian girl was smart but not as assertive as we were.
“Now, for the final, we’ll have two duels: Tactician against Unifier. Five-minute break, and then it’ll be a sudden death.”
One wrong answer and the game would be over.
“How do we determine which one goes first? It has a disadvantage—”
“I will.” I cut off my Tactician’s opponent. “Let the best woman win.”
She scrutinized me like a boxer sizing up her opponent before a match. “Let the best woman win indeed.”
I immediately retreated to a quiet corner. I couldn’t face Yas’s and Sylas’s hopeful smiles right now. My palms were clammy with sweat, my breathing unsteady. I retrieved myphone and focused on my notes, but Levi’s voice shattered my concentration.
“I don’t want you to win. I want you to destroy her,” he ordered his pet. “No pity, darling.”
I couldn’t suppress a scoff.Darling. So ridiculous. He knew I could hear him.
I stormed past them, reclaiming my spot on the stage with determined strides, my footsteps echoing on the hard parquet floor. The Tactician girl took her place in front of me. She ran her fingers through her blond hair, and a shimmer of gray caught my eye. She wore a ribbon.
My ribbon.
The one Levi stole from me on my first day.
My mom’s ribbon.
My gaze shot daggers at Levi, seated in the first row. He hooked an ankle across his knees, his sharp scowl etching on his face.
“Excuse me, where did you get that ribbon?” I blurted out. “It’s beautiful.”
She grimaced. “It’s just a piece of tissue. From a gift.”
“Oh.”
I wasn’t an angry person. I would not let him mess with me.I want to smash his head on a tombstone and ship him to Venus under a sulphuric acid rain and—
“Class, let’s get back to the competition because the choir concert is starting soon in the cathedral! Are you ready?” the chancellor said. “Miss Larovski, what did the first graduated student of Pantheon achieve?”
“The steam power locomotive,” the Tactician girl said.
“Miss Mercier, what legend surrounds the roof of the library, and why is it considered cursed?”
“A ghost is supposed to inhabit it. Morticia Zakaria ended her life because of a broken heart with the Hungway’s oldestfounding member. He was the worst thing that could have happened to her.” I couldn’t help but narrow my eyes at Levi. “As fate would have wanted, he died a few weeks later from a heart attack. Some believe it’s because Morticia was haunting him like the Corpse bride.”
Silence settled, a point was won.In your face, Levi.
“Miss Larovski, can you name the secret societies that have operated within the walls of the university a decade ago?”
“The Gentleman’s Horseman, a men’s club established in 1809.” That said club had instilled the Hazing Night on those grounds. She won another point.
We continued to battle for the next ten questions, none of us retracting. There were no more than seven students inside, and most of them had already left.
