Page 61 of Cruel Saints (Lochkelvin Academy)

“No, I mean thereisa big song and dance. Music, chanting, we sing the Lochkelvin school song while dancing in circles. Someone gets chosen to enter the forest. That kind of thing.” He shrugs. “It happens every Hallowe’en. It’s just a daft ritual some stupid rich person made up that’s managed to get passed down the generations.”

It’s Danny’s casual tone that unnerves me. Midnight chanting at a creepy old school? Yeah, that sounds perfectly normal.

He gives me a sly grin. “They say it’s not just the spirit realm that’s wider here at Hallowe’en. Emotions are meant to be more open, too. But personally I think that’s a cop-out when you’re dealing with hormonal teenagers at a late-night party.”

“So… that means we’re going?”

He nods, running a hand through his soft brown hair. “I told you, you don’t get a choice. I have a costume I’ve worn every year since I started Lochkelvin. It’s so boring. They don’t really let you switch it up.”

I raise an eyebrow. “What is it?”

Danny begins to look shifty. “It’s, uh… Well, at Glenbroath, you had to be a baby animal. And I was a little squirrel with tufty ears. And now at Lochkelvin, well, I guess I’m a larger squirrel.”

I stare at him for a long moment but it doesn’t seem like Danny’s joking. “You’re going to Hallowe’en dressed as a squirrel?”

But Danny shakes his head. “No, notdressedlike. For that night, you have tobecomethe squirrel. You’re the embodiment of that animal’s spirit, and you represent it for the entire night. It’s all about how everything comes together in our world, nature and animals and mythology.”

This sounds creepier the more Danny talks but he doesn’t seem to think there’s anything weird about it.

“Obviously you won’t be a squirrel,” he adds hastily, as though this is what my problem is. “I don’t know what you’ll be.”

“So you don’t get to choose?”

“No. The school provides for you.” He shrugs. “It’s not like we can buy anything here, though most folks use the October break to go shopping for extra bits and bobs. You can put in a costume request, certainly, but that doesn’t mean it’ll be accepted. It’s about the image you present to the world, not who you want to be.”

And here I thought Hallowe’en would be as simple as dressing up as a ghost in a white sheet with cut-out eyeholes and calling it a day.

“But Arabella said she was already planning her costumes with the girls.”

Danny’s mouth quirks. “Well, it helps when you’re related to the person who decides these things, right?”

As I glance around the dining hall, it seems like the whole school has been possessed by Hallowe’en fever. The girls have never looked so animated before, except for when they decided to trash the chiefs’ dorm. And the chiefs are more relaxed than ever, like the prospect of a party is just what they need.

It makes me wonder what everyone else’s costumes are.

And then I wonder what hideous thing Lochkelvin will decide is the right costume for me.

But I don’t have to wait long, because a package is delivered to my bedroom that very evening.

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