Page 121 of Bad Winners (Lochkelvin Academy)

“We need to win,” Rory repeats again, and I’m shaking my head in a kind of frozen shock, because how could someone I love have gotten in so deep, have gotten this so badly wrong?

“This isn’t… this isn’t winning,” I tell him in a delicate voice, because I’m still the same girl who tied a red ribbon around her throat and hoped. “This is wrong.”

“I’m not offing myself any time soon,” Rory says coldly, yanking his sleeve back down. “It’s blood extraction, that’s all.Myblood. I’m using it to tide the rituals over until Samhain, when finally I won’t have to use myself as a pincushion.”

I meet Finlay’s green gaze and see my concerns reflected back at me.

“We need to win,” Rory says again, oblivious to our distress as he storms on ahead, his gleaming black shoes crunching over leaves and twigs. “And to do that, we need more than luck on our side. We needmagic.”

“He’s out of his mind,” I tell Finlay quietly, my heart hurting.

“He’s daein’ it because he cares,” Finlay replies, though he sounds tired, exhausted. “When you got jumped by Li, everythin’ changed. He’s been on a mission ever since. He thinks Antiro’s intruded on the school.”

We follow Rory to the edge of the loch, and I look across the water to the small area of land on the other side. This is where Rory was, I realize, all those many months ago, throwing stones into the loch. Sitting cross-legged and asking me if I dance.

How different the world seems now. How long ago.

“I’ll tell ye one thing,” Finlay murmurs as he observes Rory carefully, watching him climb up onto the sharp jutting rock that hangs over the loch, seemingly with the sole aim of pouring his blood into the water. “Samhain cannae come fuckin’ quick enough.”

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