The Time Loop

Werewolf High #6

Anita Oh

Contents

Copyright

Werewolf High series

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

ALSO BY ANITA OH

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Werewolf High #6: The Time Loop

© Anita Oh 2017

All rights reserved.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events and incidents are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to persons living or dead, places or events, is purely coincidental.

This book, in whole or in part, may not be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, recording or otherwise, without written permission from the author.

To my sisters

Werewolf High series

Book 1: The Truth Spell

A dastardly spell. Mysterious billionaires. An ordinary girl thrust into an extraordinary world.

Lucy O’Connor is more IT girl than “it girl” but even though she’ll never fit in, the scholarship to elite Amaris High is an opportunity she can’t refuse.

The day Lucy arrives at Amaris, she sees her best friend, Sam Spencer. But Sam had died three years ago, on the night that had changed Lucy’s life forever. The more Lucy looks for answers, the worse things get for her, as she makes an enemy of the richest, most popular boy in school, Tennyson Wilde.

When the entire school is hit by a truth spell, it seems like the perfect chance to find out what Sam and Tennyson are hiding, but the closer Lucy gets, the more she realizes that the truth is stranger than she ever imagined.

A Very Werey Christmas: A Werewolf High Short

When Lucy is kidnapped by a creepy old man in a red suit and transformed into a reindeer, it will take a Christmas miracle to sort things out.

Book 2: The Tiny Curse

A powerful enemy. An estranged love. And only one tiny girl to make things right.

Life isn’t going so well for Lucy at elite boarding school, Amaris High. Classes are a struggle. She has no leads on the evil magic user. Sam’s avoiding her, and the entire student population hates her.

But someone hates her more than the rest. Rumors start spreading that lead to Lucy being bullied worse than ever before. Just when she thinks she couldn’t feel smaller, she’s hit with a spell that shrinks her down to only two inches tall.

Forced to rely on Sam, Tennyson and the other Golden to survive, Lucy is determined to get to the bottom of things once and for all. But the more she learns, she finds that being tiny might not be her biggest problem.

Book 3: The Body Swap

A shocking betrayal. An impossible deadline. Everything is about to change.

Lucy's world is turned upside down when she learns that her enemy is the one person she never suspected.

Although she has Sam and the Golden on her side, she no longer knows who to trust. Then, when she's hit with one final spell, she has no choice but to put her faith in the person the she despises the most.

Stuck in Tennyson Wilde's body, Lucy and Tennyson must work together to break the curse or risk becoming each other for real. But in order to fix things, Lucy will face the greatest betrayal of all.

Book 4: The Soul Bond

A new threat. An unexpected ally. And a spark of unwanted power.

Sophomore year isn’t shaping up to be the cake walk that Lucy had hoped. Everyone still hates her. She can’t forgive Sam for his secrets. Her father is back and she can’t forgive him either. There’s been no sign of Hannah, and Lucy can’t help but resent her new roommate because of it.

And Tennyson Wilde is everywhere. In the dining room. In her dorm. In class. Even inside her head. She thinks it’s just a residual effect of being in his body, the fact that she can hear his thoughts, feel his feelings. But the more it happens, the worse it becomes and it seems to be awakening something inside her.

Lucy never wanted powers. She never wanted to be anything but a normal girl, but the longer she stays at Amaris, the more impossible that seems.

Book 5: The Love Potion

A lurking danger. Untamed powers. And a tangled mess of feelings.

Being a werewolf is hard work. Lucy just wants to frolic in the forest chasing butterflies, but real life won’t give her a break. Classes are a drag, classmates even worse. Her dad is trying to kill Tennyson again and being part of a pack has its own problems.

Sam is complicated, Tennyson is a jerk, and her new alpha has no time for her. When a threat on Tennyson’s life goes wildly wrong, Lucy ends up the victim of a love potion, and that’s when things get really messy.

Book 6: The Time Loop

An unbreakable bond. A magical trap. One bad day that never ends.

Lucy is having a bad day. Things are awkward with Sam. She's failing history. One of her roommates is missing and the other is crazy. Her evil dad is at it again, and this time, he's not playing around.

Lucy has a choice: leave the pack or stay trapped in this day forever. What do you do when the only way to save the people you love is to abandon them? Will Lucy fight to stay in the pack or fight to save them?

Chapter 1

It was a special day, a momentous day, and I’d still managed to sleep through my alarm. I could not miss this day. I rushed to get to the meeting place on time, my hair still damp from the shower and my school shirt buttoned up all crooked. Even though it was spring, the morning air was crisp enough to freeze away the last tendrils of sleepiness, and I hurried even faster. I couldn’t miss this. I couldn’t believe I was late.

I was so late that the school grounds were already full of people making their way to and from breakfast, talking and laughing. It was too much bother to dodge around them on the path, so I cut through the gardens to avoid the crowds. Hopefully, he’d still be there. I really could not mess this up.

As I burst through the doors, I saw him and expelled a long sigh of relief. Sam was sitting on the floor of the greenhouse, surrounded by plants and warmth. An elaborate breakfast picnic was spread out before him.

“I am so, so sorry,” I said, rushing toward him.

He smiled up at me. “That’s okay,” he said. “I know you’ve been busy studying for your history test.”

It really wasn’t okay, though. He’d gone to so much effort. All of my favorite foods were there: mini quiches and tiny cakes and fresh strawberries. He must’ve woken up in the middle of the night to get it all prepared, and I’d barely woken up at all.

“Wow,” I said, sitting down opposite him. “This looks amazing!”

“Well, it’s a special day,” he said, handing me a plate. A real plate, not a paper one.

I smiled at him, hoping it looked genuine. “Three months!” I said.

Sam and I had been together for three months, only that kind of felt like a lie. We hadn’t progressed past the awkward kissing stage, and the more awkward those kisses got, the less often we tried. Everything I’d read said that when two werewolves hooked up, they typically liked to touch a lot so they would start to share a scent. I was fairly sure my scent was still all Lucy.

We’d settled into a pretty comfortable routine of hanging out and pretending it wasn’t weird that we weren’t more physical with each other. He didn’t push for us to move things any faster, and I wasn’t sure whether he was being considerate or if he felt weird about it too, and no way would I ask. Not talking about that kind of thing really worked for us.

He’d been making a big deal for weeks about our three-month anniversary, and I knew it was because he was trying to make things work. There wasn’t any alternative. We couldn’t break up now; it would be super weird and anti-climactic after all the build-up. Plus, we loved each other. Even though I didn’t want to get all up in his business, I had no doubt that I loved him. I loved him so much, and it was fun to hang out together all the time. I couldn’t lose him, not after everything we’d been through.

And, anyway, it was probably just something weird with me. I mean, most people want to get it on with the person they love, right? Sam was really good-looking, too, with his warm brown eyes and easy smile. Most people would go there even without the love. So, if there was something wrong with me, I figured the best thing to do was ignore it and pretend everything was okay. I’d kiss Sam, and when the time came, we’d go further and I’d pretend it was what I wanted, because the alternative was too horrible to think about.

“I got you something,” he said.

As he reached into the picnic basket and pulled out a brightly wrapped present, guilt flooded through me. It hadn’t even occurred to me to buy him something. Were presents even a thing for quarter-year anniversaries? Someone should make a list for that sort of thing so I could be prepared and check things off. Though it would probably read more like a list of reasons why I failed as a girlfriend.

“Um,” I said, taking the present from him. It was small, and that meant it was probably expensive and not some sort of cheap novelty gift.

“I know we didn’t talk about presents, so I didn’t expect you to get me anything,” he said, reading the hesitation on my face. “And don’t think that I went out and spent a lot of money on it. Well, you’ll understand when you open it.”

I nodded and started to open it. My fingers fumbled with it, and I couldn’t quite unpick the tape. I didn’t want to rip the paper, it was so carefully wrapped, but the tape was stuck so fast to it that when I tried to pull it away, the paper tore. I bit my lip and glanced up at Sam, but he hardly seemed to notice that I was having trouble. Finally, I got one end of it open and slid out the package. It was a small black box. My stomach churned. There was definitely some sort of jewelry item inside that box, and jewelry meant a level of emotional commitment that I was unprepared for. Some part of me wanted to drop that box and run, but there was no way I could do that to Sam. He was watching me so eagerly that I forced a smile onto my face.

I opened the lid of the box and stared down at the heart-shaped pendant inside. I knew that the locket hadn’t cost much, but at the same time, it was worth everything.

“Oh, Sam,” I said. “You shouldn’t have.”

I’d grown up seeing that red plastic heart around Sam’s mother’s neck. When I was younger, I’d thought it was the prettiest thing I’d ever seen. She used to turn it over in her fingers and watch Sam’s dad across the dining table, her eyes filled with love. I’d thought they were the perfect parents, the perfect family, and the heart pendant seemed to me to be the symbol of an ideal love.

“There were some boxes of things from the house,” Sam explained. “I’d never been able to bring myself to go through them before, but I did last summer. When I saw that, I thought of you, and I wanted to give it to you right away, but it seemed weird to before we were… you know.” He shrugged, blushing.

Tears filled my eyes, and I blinked them away. Sam was so good, so honest. How had he remembered that I’d loved that necklace? How had he even known? I didn’t remember ever telling him.

I reached across and took his hand. “I’m sorry that I’m the worst girlfriend ever,” I said.

“You’re not the worst,” said Sam. “You’re the only girl I’d ever give my plastic heart to.”

I avoided looking at him as I tied the necklace around my neck. The pack bond made things more complicated. I didn’t want him to sense my feelings and assume I didn’t like the gift or didn’t appreciate it. I just didn’t deserve it. I’d gotten super good at controlling the pack bond over the past few months of being with Sam. In fact, I’d gotten much better at werewolfing all around, because I’d been hanging out with Sam so much, and he had to spend so much time on his control. It made life so much easier not to start growing claws every time I got annoyed, and it’d taken less than a week of Nikolai interrupting us at inopportune moments to learn not to let my feelings reach other pack members. It was easy enough, once I got the hang of it, to just disassociate my personal feelings from the link I had with the pack, and it was extra handy at times like this, when something was too complicated to convey without being misinterpreted.

“I’ll take good care of it,” I told him, closing my fingers around it.

He nodded and then started loading my plate up with mini quiches. We never talked about Sam’s mother, not since we’d discovered that she’d been in cahoots with my evil dad. Sam didn’t seem to want to find out, so even though I was curious, I’d never looked into it. Maybe I should’ve. I suspected I had more in common with her than just this plastic heart, but I didn’t want to hurt Sam, and sometimes it’s better not to know the truth.

"So, everyone seems excited about the dance tonight," he said.

I bit into a mini quiche. "By everyone, do you mean Nikolai or Althea?"

Both Nikolai and Althea had been insane about the dance. I'd assumed that all of the Golden would be too cool for that kind of thing, but I was dead wrong. Nikolai was even on the planning committee, but Althea seemed to have decided it was the perfect chance to make me over. I probably would've given the whole thing a miss, but she'd organized a dress and kept talking about makeup techniques and had bullied Sam into asking me, so it had been easier just to go along with it. And I'd never been to a dance before, so I was kind of curious.

"At least tomorrow, everything will go back to normal," Sam said, pouring me a glass of lemonade. "But it should be fun."

I nodded and ate some more quiches. It was a really awesome picnic. The cakes were also delicious. I’d thought Sam had brought along excessive amounts of food, but before long, we had completely demolished it. I lay back, propped up on my elbows and rubbing my full belly. If I didn’t have that history test first up, I’d have seriously thought about going back to bed for a morning nap.

Where are you?

I’d almost started to nod off when Tennyson’s voice in my head jolted me out of it.

You’re going to be late, he said before I could respond.

I checked the time. Eight-thirty. No, I’m not, I told him. Class doesn’t start for another half-hour.

“Tennyson?” asked Sam. “You’ve got that vagued-out look.”

I nodded. Sam never reacted to my bond with Tennyson, never gave his opinion on it, so I had no idea if he thought it was weird that his girlfriend constantly had another boy in her head.

Morning assembly is about to start.

Since when do you go to morning assembly?

Not even I went most of the time, and I didn’t get the special treatment he did. It was always Assistant Head Noel waffling on about something just to hear himself speak. Any important announcements were emailed out, anyway.

Most of the time, Tennyson and I kept a wall up in our soul bond so that our messages could get through but everything else was blocked. No feelings or sensory impressions or anything else. It was more difficult to maintain than holding back with the pack bond, and completely different. Tennyson and I seemed to bleed into each other sometimes, and we had to maintain a hard line between us so we didn’t become lost. Whenever Tennyson was annoyed or frustrated, though, he wasn’t so vigilant about it. He was frustrated now and wasn’t holding back on letting me know.

It’s an emergency assembly, he said. Didn’t you get the messages they sent out about it? Everyone is supposed to be here.

I sighed and finished off the strawberries. “We have to go,” I told Sam. “There’s some special assembly or something.”

We packed up the picnic, but before we left, I caught Sam by the arm. I stood on my tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek.

“Thank you,” I said, toying with the necklace. “This was all super thoughtful.”

He smiled at me and knocked me in the shoulder, then turned to leave.

As I watched him walk through the doorway ahead of me, I resolved to be the kind of girlfriend he deserved.

Chapter 2

Although the greenhouse was set back almost into the forest, it wasn’t far from the main building. We should be able to make it in time. I wasn’t sure what was so urgent about the assembly, but Tennyson wouldn’t be this insistent if it wasn’t something important. I walked so fast that even Sam struggled to keep up with me with his long legs. We were almost to the steps that led up to the main courtyard when I saw someone waiting by the marble fountain. I grabbed Sam’s arm and pulled him behind a bush.

“It’s Katie,” I whispered to him.

I’d managed to avoid my roommate for months. I left before she woke up, studied in the library after classes, then hung out with Sam after dinner and didn’t go back to our room until I was sure she was asleep. She swore she’d had nothing to do with my evil dad’s attack on Tennyson and that she was on my side, but it was safer not to believe her. It wasn’t easy to sleep in the same room as someone I didn’t trust, but after the first time she’d sprung a booby trap by crossing into my side of the room when she was going to the bathroom in the night, I didn’t think she’d try anything. Those poison darts I’d bought from Nikolai wouldn’t have killed her, but they’d sure made her sick for a few days.

“I thought we were in a rush,” Sam whispered back.

“We are, but…” I pointed finger guns to where Katie was pacing beside the fountain. She was obviously waiting for someone, and everyone else was at the assembly, so it was either me or one of her evil contacts. Either way, it was better to be hiding behind the bush.

“It doesn’t look like she’s leaving anytime soon,” said Sam.

It really didn’t. I sighed. We could double back and go through the front entrance, but we’d need to go the whole way around the school for that, and the assembly would probably be over by the time we got there. I sighed and stepped back onto the path.

Any hope I’d had of passing her quietly by vanished as soon as she saw us. She rushed straight up to us, her eyes flickering around wildly.

“You have to leave,” she whispered. “Now. Today. Go! Now. Get off the island, any way you can.”

“Katie, what?” Sam reached out to touch her arm, and she flinched away, twitching and looking back over her shoulder.

I’d never seen her like that before. Even when she was scared or nervous, she’d always held it together, but now she was a wreck. The more I looked at her, the more I could see it: the dark shadows under her eyes, the way her normally sleek hair was frizzed around her face. Whether or not she was telling us the truth, she was in some serious trouble.

“What’s going on, Katie?” I asked her.

“They won’t let me go,” she whispered. “So, you have to get out of here. It’s the only way to stop it.”

Even though she was freaking out, I couldn’t just take her at her word. The last time I had, the whole pack had nearly died.

“Sorry,” I said. “I’m in a hurry. Maybe if you show me some concrete evidence of what you’re saying, I can help out.”

I felt bad, turning away from her when she was so obviously in distress. We’d been friends once, or at least, I’d thought so at the time. But even if I could trust her, I couldn’t trust the hold my father’s evil cronies had over her. Maybe she was freaked out because they were threatening her or mind-controlling her, or who even knew what. I glanced back at her, still pacing in front of the fountain, then headed up into the courtyard.

The heavy doors of the assembly hall creaked as we pulled them open. The only noise from within was Assistant Head Noel’s voice, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying. A few people turned to look at us as we crept in, but most people kept facing the front. The assembly hall was more crowded than I’d ever seen it, so many people that there weren’t even enough seats. I looked around to spot Tennyson and the others, but it was impossible to find them from the back of the hall.

At the front, Assistant Head Noel was standing up on the stage, speaking into the microphone. Beside him was an oversized picture of Hannah Morgan mounted on an easel, with a wreath of flowers at the bottom. It all seemed very ominous.

What’s going on? I asked Tennyson, trying not to let panic overtake me.

It couldn’t be what it seemed like. That would just be too terrible.

I’d tried looking for Hannah Morgan. There hadn’t been very much I could do, but I’d tried. I had no power, no money, no idea where to start, but I’d done everything I could think of to find her. I couldn’t believe I’d failed her.

“In times like these, it’s important to stay strong,” Assistant Head Noel said. “Support each other, rely on each other.”

If that was the kind of thing he was droning on with, I was pleased I’d missed most of the assembly, but still, I wanted to know the facts.

What’s all this about? Answer me, Tennyson!

“You can’t speak to Tennyson?” Sam whispered. “I can’t feel the pack bond either.” He nodded toward the ceiling, to the intricately carved cornices. “I think they’re threaded with silver.”

“The headmistress told me the school was originally built for…” I glanced furtively around, but everyone was still fixed on Assistant Head Noel. “You know, special people. People like us. Maybe this was originally, like, a panic room or something?”

Sam shrugged. “Makes as much sense as anything.”

“Still doesn’t tell us what’s going on here, though.”

Sam gave me a sharp look, which I ignored. Just because it seemed obvious didn’t mean it was. Maybe Hannah had been found and was safe. Maybe her parents had donated money for an extension to the school golf course. We couldn’t jump to conclusions. When she went missing, there hadn’t been any sort of school announcement or acknowledgement, so maybe they were just getting around to that now, almost a year later. Just because there were flowers and people looking sad didn’t mean we should expect the worst. Whatever it was, it seemed as if Assistant Head Noel wasn’t going to give us a nice neat little summary before he dismissed us for class. He just kept rambling on with his well-meaning platitudes. I bet he was the kind of guy who posted those inspirational posts on his Facebook wall, like “Impossible just means I’m possible” and “Life is like photography: we develop from the negatives” with pictures of rainbows and dolphins in the background.

Finally, he dismissed us, and everyone surged toward the doors. I tried to stick around so I could find Tennyson, but the crowd swept me away.

“I’ll see you at lunch,” Sam said. He was getting pulled in the other direction. He gave me a bracing smile before he turned away, and I knew he thought Hannah had come to a sticky end, but I couldn’t believe it.

As I made my way to history class, I kept an eye out for anyone who might tell me what had happened in the assembly. It was kind of depressing how few friends I had, or even people who would reply if I asked them a question. My complete lack of popularity didn’t normally bother me, but today I could see why it might be useful.

My heart leapt when I spotted Fatima across the hall. Even though she didn’t particularly like me, we’d both been friends with Hannah, and I knew she’d at least tell it to me straight. Our eyes met, but before I could make my way over to her, she shook her head and ran off in the other direction. She looked as if she’d been crying, but that didn’t mean anything. They might’ve been tears of happiness at Hannah being found. Or she might’ve done badly on an assignment or something. It wasn’t good to jump to conclusions just because all the facts pointed in a certain direction.

I tried to listen in to people's conversations, but hardly anyone was talking. There were a few mutters of things like, "At least the dance isn't cancelled,” and "What a downer,” but no specifics.

What happened in the assembly? I asked Tennyson.

If you cared, you’d have shown up yourself, he replied.

I sighed. I hated when he got like that.

I got there as fast as I could, I told him. I only caught the end of it.

Don’t you have your history test now? We’ll talk about it afterwards.

But the history test was the last thing on my mind. I knew it was important, and I’d studied super hard for it, but I just couldn’t focus on Nazi Germany. I stared and stared at the paper, but the words made no sense to me.

There was no way that Hannah was dead. The Others had taken her for a reason, and that reason wasn’t just to kill her. They’d taken Sam, and he was still alive. They had made it look as if he was dead, though, so surely that was what was going on here. If there was some sort of evidence of Hannah being dead and that was what all the fuss was over, then it was probably the same thing. There’d been pretty convincing evidence for Sam being dead, but they’d just been doing creepy experiments or something on him and turning him into a werewolf.

I wondered what Hannah would be like as a werewolf. She’d been pretty badass and morally bankrupt as a witch, though awesome as a roomie. I doubted the Others would do the kind of experiments on people that made them offer to pop the popcorn during a Netflix marathon, though. I wondered if their experiments were all that different from my evil dad’s and if there was a link between the two somehow. The Others seemed to want to bring out people’s abilities, whereas my dad and his cronies were more on the side of putting an end to those abilities, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t a connection. The Others didn’t seem human, and I had my own theories about what they were, that they’d started off like me, people with that weird zero gene. People who had cycled through all the types of paranormal creatures they could be until they ascended into a being of pure evil. My only proof for thinking that was a picture I’d seen on a wall in a dream, but that didn’t make it untrue.

And those things had Hannah. I was sure of it. I was sure she was still alive.

The bell rang.

I looked down at my paper. I’d barely written on it, a few one-word answers and some doodles. Not good. I needed to pass that test, or my scholarship would be in serious trouble. I looked between the teacher and my paper, trying to somehow make the answers appear, but nothing happened. The classroom emptied, and I still had no ideas. I couldn’t hand that in. I’d get a zero. I couldn’t get a zero.

“Some of us have places to be,” said the teacher, a fly-in we’d had for a few weeks. He was apparently some genius PhD candidate from an Ivy League school, and he looked as if he resented every second he was there.

I got up and walked toward his desk, my legs feeling heavy. What could I do? I couldn’t hand that paper in.

“I was wondering if I could re-sit the test,” I said as I got closer.

“Are you going to be any less stupid next week than this week?” he asked, snatching the paper out of my hands. “My answer is no.”

He turned and walked away.

I stood in the empty classroom, wondering if this day could possibly get any worse.

Chapter 3

The day definitely didn’t get any better. All through algebra, I worried about Hannah. If the Others had decided to fake her death, what possible reason could they have for it? Even if she was still alive, it seemed like a bad sign. Finally, the bell rang for lunch, and I hurried to meet up with Tennyson so he could tell me what was going on.

I braced myself for bad news as I entered the dining hall. The mood was somber; nobody was talking or laughing. Nearly everyone else had been to school together right from the start, so even if they weren’t friends with Hannah, I guessed it was still a shock. Tennyson and the others were already up on their lunch balcony, so I made my way toward them. Nobody made eye contact with me, which was unusual — I normally got a few filthy looks, at least.

There was no sign of Fatima, and I hoped she was okay. She’d been closer to Hannah than anyone, the two of them and their friend Milo. I rarely saw Milo around at all anymore. We had no classes together, and if we saw each other in passing, he ignored me. He’d never liked me much, right from the start, and there was that one time I’d almost eaten him when I was in wolf form. He had basically accused me of being behind Hannah’s disappearance, he suspected Tennyson was a werewolf, and he was the most paranoid person I’d ever met, so it made sense for him to stay out of my way. Fatima seemed to have moved on to a different friendship group since she’d transferred to Green House, but I hoped at least that she and Milo would console each other over this. They didn’t have the benefit of knowing that more was going on like I did.

I sat down between Sam and Althea and flicked through the lunch menu, even though I knew what I was having. The Friday chef always did amazing things with pulled pork, like grilled mac & cheese pulled pork and roast potatoes stuffed with pulled pork and pulled pork nachos. It was my favorite day of the week.

“So, is someone going to tell me what’s going on?” I said, scrolling back up the menu. “Wait, where is the pork? I only see lamb here. Why is there no pork?” I couldn’t stomach lamb at all, not since the time my little brothers had gotten sick off some bad gyros. Maybe there was an error with the menu.

“Friday chef is sick, I heard,” said Nikolai.

I stared at him in horror.

“Just order the vegan option,” said Tennyson. “Are you interested in Hannah Morgan or not?”

I wrinkled my nose at him. The tofu curry was probably great, but anything would be unsatisfying when you were expecting pulled pork pizza boats. “Of course I’m interested. From the way everyone is acting, I’m guessing Assistant Head Noel reported that she’s dead?”

He nodded. “A body washed up down the coast, and the dental records match hers.”

“They had to use dental records to identify her? That’s not at all suspicious.”

“Not only that,” said Althea, picking at her side salad. “They’ve ruled it a suicide. They claim she jumped off the cliff here, and the tide carried her away.”

“How are people buying that?” I asked. “There’s literally no way they could prove that, especially if she was so unrecognizable that they had to use dental records.”

“Even if we hadn’t seen her disappear from right in front of us, I’d think it was suspicious,” said Tennyson. “Also, announcing it to the entire school the way they did makes me think they have ulterior motives.”

“The headmistress wasn’t there, was she?” I asked. “Is she still on campus?” I hadn’t seen her at the assembly, but she didn’t seem to hang out with the student body all that much.

“I didn’t see her,” Tennyson said.

Nikolai and Althea nodded in agreement.

“They normally make an announcement when she leaves, though,” said Althea. “In seventh grade, we had to have a farewell ceremony, do you remember?”

“Was that when Elisabeth Percy played the harp and sang Taylor Swift’s ‘You Belong with Me’ to Tennyson?” Nikolai asked, laughing. “That was the greatest moment in all of middle school.”

At the look on Tennyson’s face, I heroically forced down my own laughter. “Tennyson would never wear worn-out jeans,” I said in his defense.

“At any rate,” Tennyson said, speaking over the top of Nikolai’s laughter, “someone wants to be sure that nobody is looking for Hannah Morgan. That’s the most logical reason to announce her death.”

“We should find out who informed the school,” said Althea. “It was probably her family, but I’ll talk to Assistant Head Noel this afternoon. He likes me, so he’ll probably tell me everything he knows.”

I felt as if I should be sad that Hannah was confirmed dead, but instead it seemed that it was the closest I’d come to finding her since she’d vanished. Instead of sitting back and waiting for information to turn up, we actually had something to go on for the first time.

Don’t get too excited, Tennyson said, staring at me as my tofu curry appeared on the table. This isn’t necessarily a good sign.

I know, but at least it’s something.

I was distracted from both my curry and my conversation with Tennyson by Sam nudging me with his elbow.

“How did your history test go?” he asked.

I shook my head sadly. “I totally bombed out. I need to get permission to re-sit it, or else I’ll be on academic probation for the rest of the year.”

“Well, that’s easy enough,” said Nikolai. “Just threaten to have his research funding withdrawn, and he’ll soon let you.”

“Thanks,” I said. “Because that’s such a realistic threat from the scholarship kid.”

He shrugged.

“I can’t believe they made you sit a test right after that assembly. Once we explain the circumstances, I’m sure you’ll be allowed to re-sit it,” said Althea. “Mother will step in on your behalf. It’s better for the pack to stay together. You can't leave the school.”

She gave me a small smile. The other three had only just started treating her normally again after the whole thing with the love potion, so I could see why she’d want to keep me around. Nikolai, especially, had been super cold toward her, so it was nice to see them bonding over the dance.

“Yes. In fact, we should see about having you moved to the house next year,” said Tennyson. “It’s inconvenient for you to be in the Red House, especially given your history with roommates. It’s better for you to stay close.”

My belly did a weird sort of flip-flop that I didn’t think was because of the curry. I put it down to being uncomfortable with the thought of living in the Golden House, what with all the priceless things I could potentially break. It was all too easy to imagine a lifetime of indentured servitude because I’d stepped on some antique pocket watch.

“I’m not sure you’ve got room for me,” I said, then shoveled some curry into my mouth.

The conversation moved on to other things. Some guy in her pre-calc class had a crush on Althea and had been sending her creepy poems. Nikolai wanted her to read them to us in a funny voice, but she refused. Tennyson had gotten into an argument with his English teacher about The Catcher in the Rye because he’d said that the main theme was white male entitlement and how Holden had turned it into victimhood, and his teacher thought he was missing the point. Nikolai had gone back to bed after assembly, which explained why he was still wearing his dressing gown.

And, of course, we talked about the dance. Nikolai had been having an ongoing war with Laura Montgomery, one of the Green House girls on the planning committee, about which floral motif was more suitable, cherry blossoms or hydrangeas. Nikolai thought cherry blossoms were too common, and finally he'd beaten her down. Althea wasn't sure which dress she should wear, so could I come to the house a bit earlier to help her decide? I listened to them talk as I ate my curry and thought up ways I could find Hannah.

There’s no point worrying until we have more information, Tennyson said. Nothing has actually changed for Hannah Morgan just because of the assembly.

I wrinkled up my nose at him. I just wish I’d been at the assembly so I could’ve heard what they said. Maybe there was some clue that you missed. You should’ve taken notes.

I’d never be that tasteless.

Your fans might like it. It might add to your mysterious allure.

I have sufficient mysterious allure naturally. I don’t need to add to it. People blog about my mysterious allure. You shouldn’t be dismissive of it.

I smiled down into my curry. I enjoyed it when Tennyson loosened up enough to make jokes.

Hurry up and finish eating. We should go to class, he said. If you're going to be on academic probation, you don't want to be late.

I poked my tongue out at him, then ate a last spoonful of curry. He was probably right; the science rooms were on the other side of school.

"Okay, let's go," I said, pushing away from the table.

“You’ll come by right after class?” said Althea. “I can’t wait to see what you look like once I’m finished making you over!”

Sam smiled at me, and I wondered if it was strange that he wasn’t the one who was excited about seeing me for the dance. It was normal for us, but that didn’t mean that it was actually normal.

Tennyson and I didn't talk as we made our way to class, either in our heads or out loud. Ever since the time I'd saved him from my dad's evil minions, things had been kind of awkward whenever we were alone together. I wasn't sure why. Maybe he was embarrassed that he'd been rescued by such a useless werewolf. Maybe he was awed by my awesome awesomeness. Even with our bond, some things about Tennyson would always be unfathomable to me.

I was in totally the wrong head space for biology. Apart from my thoughts going in circles about Hannah and what to do about my history test and why Sam and I never felt like a real couple, I was also wracking my brains trying to think up some topic to talk about with Tennyson that would last more than two minutes. The teacher was lecturing on evolution, and I half-heartedly took notes.

Do you really think your mother would help me avoid academic probation?

He shrugged. If it gets to that point, I'll speak to her about it.

He went back to taking his notes without even looking up.

Are you excited about the dance?

He didn't respond. I hadn't really expected him to. I knew he thought of the dance as nothing more than a tiresome obligation that he was going to only because of social expectations.

Where do you think they're keeping Hannah? I tried.

Somewhere outside of class, he said. Which is the best place to think about this. I'm not letting you borrow my notes if you don't even try to listen.

I kicked his foot under the table, but he had a point. Worrying about things I couldn't do anything about definitely wouldn't help my grades. I tried to focus on what the teacher was saying, but I still felt hyper-aware of Tennyson beside me. His elbow brushed against mine as he typed, and I could smell that crisp woodsy scent that always lingered around him. It was as if the lack of words between us made everything else more intense. The more I tried to ignore it, the more aware of him I became. I knew it was just the bond messing with me, but that didn’t make it any easier.

His hair had grown a little longer than he usually kept it, and it curled into the collar of his shirt. It suited him better than when he’d had it cut super neat. A lock of it kept falling down over his forehead. It looked soft. He twitched his head, trying to shake it out of the way, and when it didn't move, he brushed it back. Then it fell back across his face again. His hair was so dark, it was like a streak of ink against his skin. His eyes were so blue that they seemed to glow under the florescent lights of the classroom. He was the sort of person you’d never tire of looking at: the strong lines of his face, the shadows and contrasts. It wasn't hard to see why people blogged about him and ran fan sites and Tumblrs and wrote fan fiction about him. If you didn't take his obnoxious personality into account, he was abnormally good-looking. And his personality had its own charms once you got used to it. He was loyal and honest, and more than that, I'd seen into his heart and it was pure and beautiful.

Notes don't write themselves, he said, jolting me out of my thoughts.

He gave me a sideways glance, and I quickly looked away, back at the teacher. I didn't want to give him the wrong idea about why I'd been looking at him. It didn't mean anything. Sometimes the bond was just like that, especially when I got lost in my thoughts.

Put a sock in it, I told him. You need a haircut.

For the rest of the class, I concentrated all my attention on taking notes. I had to get my priorities sorted, and Tennyson definitely wasn't one of them.

Chapter 4

There were a few things I needed from my room before I went to the Golden House to get ready for the dance, so I rushed off after class with the hope that Katie wouldn’t be back yet and I could avoid her. The room was empty, so I dashed around, frantically throwing anything I might need into an overnight bag — toiletries, clean underclothes, anything that might be useful. I wasn’t exactly sure what I’d need. Althea had sorted out a dress, and she had more makeup than anyone could ever possibly use, and I didn’t know what else I’d need.

I threw the bag over my shoulder and was about to get away clean when a Skype call came through on my computer. Only my family ever called me, so I couldn’t exactly ignore it. I sighed and went over to the computer to accept the call.

“Hey, guys, what’s up?” I asked as the faces of my three little brothers appeared on the screen. “I’m kind of in a hurry, so…”

“We need to talk to you about something.” Liam looked super serious.

I dropped into the chair, all my attention narrowing on the screen. “What’s wrong?”

All three of them were there and looked healthy, so I could be sure nothing had happened to them, but our mother? She had a chronic illness, but maybe she’d gotten worse.

“You’re a big stinky liar, Lucy!” said my youngest brother, Hamish. He was bouncing in his seat, looking way less grim than the other two. It couldn’t be anything too awful if Hamish was still smiling, but I had no clue what they thought I might’ve lied about.

“What?” I asked.

Fletcher shook his head but didn’t speak.

Liam leaned forward to type something, and a second later, a link popped up in the chat window. I clicked on it, curious.

“It’s slow loading,” I told them, but a moment later, the picture appeared. Then another, and another.

I’d known that at least one of the girls from Green House was stalking Tennyson and secretly taking photos of him, so I shouldn’t have been surprised that that extended to the other Golden as well. The pictures were of Sam and me. One of us walking through the forest. Another of us sitting together at lunch. All of them were perfectly innocent; you could never tell we were more than friends, but that was definitely not the issue. Sam had been our neighbor for years, until he and his family had all been horrifically killed one night, or so we’d thought. Sam’s family had been like a part of our family, but I hadn’t told my brothers that he was still alive. It had seemed too complicated, and I didn’t want them getting mixed up in the whole supernatural mess. If I had some gene that could be triggered to make me a werewolf or another magical creature, my brothers probably had it too, and there were evil people out there who experimented on kids like us. I wanted them well away from it.

“You don’t understand,” I told them.

“What don’t we understand, Lucy?” asked Liam. “We thought he was dead. We missed him. But you knew he was alive. What about the others? His parents? Gemma? Are they alive too?”

I shook my head. I had no idea what had happened to his parents or his little sister. “I don’t know. I’m sorry, you guys. I was shocked when I found him, and I didn’t know how to tell you. I still don’t understand everything.”

“Is he your boyfriend now?” asked Hamish. “But I like Tennyson. Make Tennyson your boyfriend too!”

“Why is he there with you?” Liam asked. “It can’t just be coincidence.”

I shrugged. “It’s complicated. I can’t really explain it. Maybe when I get back, over the summer…”

Liam shook his head. “Stop treating us like we’re dumb kids. This is exactly what Dad said you’d do.”

My blood ran cold. “What are you talking about?”

I talked to my brothers all the time, and this was the first I was hearing about them being in contact with our father. No good could come of this; there was no way that man had pure intentions.

“You stay away from him,” I said quietly, trying to impress on them how important this was. “He’s dangerous, and you can’t trust him.”

“Well, we can’t trust you, either,” said Liam. “Call us back when you decide to tell the truth.”

He leaned forward again, and the call disconnected. I tried to call back, but there was no answer, and their status switched to offline. I couldn’t call my father and demand an explanation. I’d deleted his number from my phone after he’d tried to kill the pack, and I could see now that that had maybe been a little rash on my part.

I took a deep breath, trying not to panic. Maybe he didn’t intend anything bad for my brothers; maybe I was overreacting. Maybe he’d just wanted to get in touch, see how they were doing.

But I couldn’t lie to myself, not about that. He’d been willing to experiment on me, to risk my life for his own purposes. He had no sense of familial duty. He only cared about himself. There was no way I could trust him with my brothers.

The door to my room banged open, and I almost fell off my chair. Katie was standing in the doorway, looking surprised and even more twitchy than earlier.

“You’re here?” she asked, her voice sounding hollow, as if she wasn’t completely there.

Katie would know how to get in touch with my father, or at least how to get a message to him. I jumped to my feet and rushed over to her.

“Where is my father?” I asked, grabbing her by the shoulders. “How do I get in touch with him? I need to speak to him. Now!”

Katie flinched away from me, and for a moment I worried I’d gone too far, but she didn’t run away.

“The lighthouse,” she whispered. “He’s been expecting you. Go to the lighthouse.”

I let go of her and pushed past her to get through the doorway. As I ran down the hallway, I heard her call after me.

“But it’s better if you leave. Go now! You’re running out of time.”

My heart pounded as I ran through the forest to the lighthouse. My bag thumped against my leg and I sweated and I was going to be late for the dance, but none of that mattered now. All of my problems from earlier paled in comparison to this; the test and Sam and even Hannah – none of it was as important as my family. If my father hurt them, I’d kill him.

Finally, I broke through the trees, and the lighthouse came into view. I couldn’t feel my father anywhere around. I forced myself to go still and honed my senses. There was something, just the vaguest impression of him, so tiny that if I hadn’t been concentrating so hard, I’d never notice. I followed it into the lighthouse, up the stairs, right to the very top.

My father wasn’t there. The impression of him was to my left, on a rickety old table. I moved closer and saw that it came from a phone. I touched the home button on the phone and the display lit up, the background reading, “Dial the first number in the contacts list.”

I rolled my eyes. My dad was way too fond of this espionage BS. But what else could I do? I dialed the number.

“It’s about time,” my father said. “I’ve been waiting for ages.”

“Stay away from my family,” I told him.

He laughed. “But, Lulu, I am your family.”

“What are you planning with them?” I asked, though I knew he wouldn’t tell me, not until he was ready.

“Nothing,” he said. “Not if you’re a good girl and do as you’re told.”

“They’re your children, not your leverage,” I said. “If you hurt them, I will kill you.”

He clucked his tongue at me. That was obviously why he’d decided to do this over the phone — if he’d been there in person, I probably would’ve ripped his throat out. He could say we were family until he was blue in the face, but family tried to protect each other. He was the thing they needed protection from.

“Nobody needs to get hurt,” he said, his voice provokingly calm. “And I’m not about to damage such valuable assets on a whim. But I can make things very uncomfortable for you, unless you agree to do one simple thing.”

“You want me to leave the pack? Not going to happen. Here’s my counter-offer. Stay away from me, and stay away from my family.”

“Or?”

“Else.”

He laughed. “You have until midnight,” he said, then hung up the phone.

Chapter 5

By the time I got to the Golden House, the last thing I wanted to do was dress up and go to a dance. I wanted to arm myself and go to a fight.

“You can’t go through with it,” Althea said after I explained to everyone what had happened. “Do you know what the ceremony involves?”

I shook my head.

“I’ve read that it’s very painful and dangerous, especially if you do it under duress. Joining a pack is a massive commitment. It’s very rare for anyone to leave, and it’s not uncommon for people to die trying.”

Pain and danger didn’t bother me if it would help my brothers, but that wasn’t the issue. If my father knew he could threaten my brothers and I’d jump to obey him, there would be no end to it. I was a well of untapped power. Even I had no idea what I could do, and to give him access to that was unthinkable.

“Your mother did say I was only nominally a pack member,” I told Althea. “Does that make it easier to leave?”

Not that I was considering it; I was just curious. I hadn’t actually made a commitment to anything. I’d just started hanging out with werewolves, and it had happened.

She rolled her eyes. “That means nothing, except that Mother was being nasty. There’s an initiation, and before that, the alpha can choose to reject that person without a ceremony if they don’t fit in with the pack, but that’s the same for everyone. We’ll have yours after school ends. It’s the most effective at the summer equinox, but it’s just a formality, really. It’s actually more of an organic process. You accept the pack in your thoughts and feelings, and we accept you back, and the bond is formed naturally. That’s why you probably don’t feel anything from the pack members you haven’t met, because you don’t know them. The bond is always stronger with pack members who are closer.”

I chewed my lip, thinking.

“As fun as it is to constantly be in the middle of your problems, this dance won’t organize itself, and if I’m not there, we’ll end up with freaking sakura petals everywhere,” said Nikolai. He was already dressed. In a hot pink tux. His hair was styled into exaggerated curls, and he was wearing heavy eyeliner. “I’ll see you losers there.”

“We’ll figure this out,” said Sam, patting me awkwardly on the shoulder. “Nothing will happen to your brothers, I promise.”

I smiled at him, but there was no way he could actually keep that promise.

“He said he wouldn’t hurt them on a whim,” said Tennyson. “That implies he’d rather keep them safe to dangle over your head in future negotiations. It sounds as if he intends a different punishment if you don’t meet his midnight deadline, something that affects you directly.”

I took a deep breath. Tennyson’s simple logic worked far better than Sam’s optimistic promises to calm me down.

“You’re right,” I said.

“Still, I’ll make some calls and arrange protection for your family, just in case. We could relocate them, but that might prompt your father into action.”

I nodded in agreement. “Thank you.”

“Right,” Althea said, then clapped her hands. “Let’s get ready for this dance!”

The next few hours felt like torture. I was poked and plucked and sprayed with toxic chemicals. Well, they weren’t actually toxic and probably not even chemicals, as Althea assured me more than once that she only used cruelty-free, organic products. She’d even stopped modelling for companies that weren’t ethical, she told me as she dabbed stuff onto my face and smeared it around. I wasn’t allowed to look in the mirror until she was completely done, and then she left me there, staring in shock, while she went to get ready.

I did not look like myself, not one bit. For the first time, I actually looked as if I might belong at this school. The dress was amazing, and I didn’t even want to think about how much it had cost. It was pale green, with a full skirt, and the bodice was embroidered with delicate blossoms that wound up my neck and down my arms into sleeves. She had braided my hair into dozens of different-sized braids that she’d wound around my head in various patterns and pinned with bejeweled pins so that it looked like a sparkling crown. She’d given me big, smoky eyes that took up half my face. I looked like some sort of tree sprite or wood elf, not plain old Lucy. Not even plain old Lucy the lycanthrope. I looked like an actual girl, a girl who went to dances and flirted with boys and knew the right thing to say.

Moments later, Althea reappeared. Even though she’d barely been gone ten minutes, she looked better than I did after hours of primping. Her long dark hair hung loose. Her dress was cherry red but simple and elegant, showing off her shoulders and her tiny waist. Her lips were matching cherry red, and they curved into a grin when she saw me.

“You look so beautiful,” she said, obviously getting way more enjoyment out of dressing me up than dressing herself.

“Thanks,” I said. “For everything, I mean. I’ll try not to ruin anything.”

She shook her head. “Don’t worry about it, just have fun.”

We headed downstairs to meet the boys. Sam did a cheesy double-take when he saw me, and I rolled my eyes, but I couldn’t help but be pleased. Tennyson glanced at me and then stared off in the other direction. They both looked so good, Sam in a navy three-piece suit that accentuated his long legs and Tennyson in a black tuxedo. Somehow, the tux made him seem more wild than usual, as if the formalwear was contrasting with his inner wolf in a way his everyday clothes didn’t. It made his hair look more unruly, the lines of his face sharper. It suited him.

“Let’s go. We’re running late,” he said. “Nikolai may have killed people.”

Because the dance was the Spring Fling, they’d decided not to hold it inside in the ballroom. Instead, they’d set up a massive pavilion in one of the outer gardens, just past the old abandoned clock tower. The way was lit up with fairy lights, and everything looked magical as we walked down the path, the music filtering through to us. Even though I had a bunch of things to worry about, in that moment they all dissolved into nothingness. The night seemed heavy with possibility and wonder, and I knew that everything was going to be okay, even if it was just for the next few hours.

The pavilion looked amazing. Nikolai had been right to fight for the hydrangea, their understated elegance suited the night perfectly. The air was filled with their scent. Everyone stopped as we entered the pavilion and turned toward us. For a moment, I wanted to run away, but Sam’s hand tightened around mine and I stood my ground. I had every right to be there, as much as anyone else.

After a moment, they all went back to what they’d been doing, talking or dancing or sneaking drinks from hip flasks full of booze. The gloom about Hannah had lifted, and everyone was in high spirits.

“I assume that you don’t want to dance?” Sam asked me.

“Um,” I said, looking down at my feet. The shoes Althea had put me in were about a zillion inches high and already starting to rub on my feet. “You assume right.”

“I’ll dance,” said Althea, looking toward me to see if it was okay.

The two of them looked so graceful, moving together on the dance floor. I’d thought that for the dance, there would be a DJ or a band, maybe even a famous band, considering the high-profile school, but there was actually what looked like an entire orchestra set up at the edge of the pavilion. All the couples were twirling in complicated patterns that I could never hope to imitate. It was as if I’d stepped back in time. It wasn’t anything like I’d imagined a school dance to be.

“Shall we sit?” asked Tennyson, gesturing toward a small table with a centerpiece of hydrangeas and tiny candles that looked both pretty and like a fire hazard.

I followed him over and we sat beside each other, looking out onto the dance floor. It was nice to just sit quietly, watching the dancers and taking everything in. I could pretend to be someone else, just for a little while.

A light flashed in front of us, and Tennyson let out a low growl.

“For the yearbook,” said the person behind the camera, leaving again before our eyes could adjust.

This isn’t horrible, said Tennyson, then he flagged over a waiter carrying a tray full of drinks.

We sipped our drinks in silence for a while. They were some sort of juice concoction that looked scary but tasted like lime and pear. I vaguely remembered Nikolai raving about it at some point.

Don’t leave the pack, Tennyson said so abruptly that my juice almost went up my nose. I set it aside so I wouldn’t spill it on my dress.

I don’t intend to, I told him. You told me I was welcome here forever, remember?

He shrugged. I don’t think those were my exact words.

You know you guys would probably be better off without me, though, I said. So far, I’ve only brought you trouble. You said it yourself when we first met.

You were a stranger then. You’re pack now.

I didn’t see how that made the trouble any better, but I was pleased anyway.

And, at any rate, Sam would miss you if you left.

I turned to look at him and noticed that his pale cheeks had turned pink. He didn’t mean Sam at all; he meant himself. He should just say so, the big jerk. I pressed my lips together to hide my smile.

My heart seemed to pound in time with the music. I picked up my drink and sipped it. Over in the far corner, I could see Nikolai yelling at someone and pointing upward to where nets of cherry blossoms were suspended above the dance floor, ready to be dropped.

The song ended, and Althea and Sam came over and collapsed into the two free chairs.

“Where did you learn to dance like that?” I asked Sam, laughing as he fanned himself with his hand.

“Alpha Wilde taught me,” he said.

I couldn’t imagine that stern woman doing anything as frivolous as dancing.

“Are you sure you don’t want to?” he asked, pointing back to the dance floor.

I knew he was only saying it to be polite. He’d complained about bruised feet for weeks after we’d danced together in elementary school.

I shook my head. “I think I’d cause someone an injury if I tried,” I said.

“Come on, Lucy! It’s called a dance, not a sit!” Althea smiled at me. “Plus, you look so gorgeous, you should show yourself off.”

The song that had started was slower, and the couples were just swaying on the spot, so if I had to do it, this was the time.

“Okay,” I said, getting to my feet.

Sam led me out onto the dance floor and took me in his arms, keeping a respectable distance between our bodies. It wasn’t exactly unpleasant, but surely I was supposed to feel something more at this point. I should want to get even closer.

Sam turned me slightly, and I caught Tennyson’s eye across the dance floor. The look on his face as he watched us was something I didn’t recognize. I’d never seen him look like that before. It bothered me that I couldn’t decipher that look. By now, I should be able to read all of his expressions. It made me want to pull away from Sam and go to him, to grab hold of him and never let go, not until there was no part of him that was unfamiliar to me, nothing at all left unknown. It made me feel like a stranger in my own home, and that wasn’t right.

We turned again and Tennyson was blocked from my sight, but that feeling didn’t leave me. Sometimes, the bond between us was a little frightening. It was hard to tell which of my feelings were real and which were the bond going into overdrive.

When the song ended, I went searching for the food table. By the time I got back with a plate full of tasty treats, Nikolai was sitting in my seat beside Tennyson, telling some angry story that I bet was about cherry blossoms.

“The creepy poetry guy is coming over,” Althea whispered across the table. “Somebody dance with me, quick!”

Sam swept her away, and Nikolai complained about Laura Montgomery, and I carefully avoided looking at Tennyson. After Sam, Nikolai danced with Althea, and eventually she even convinced Tennyson. I couldn’t help but watch, mesmerized, as he glided around the dance floor. Sam and Althea had been graceful together, and Althea and Nikolai had been dynamic, but this was something else entirely. Tennyson moved like liquid magma, like fire and water melded into one, flickering and flowing. Every movement was purposeful; nothing was wasted. I’d been spending so much time with him that I’d started taking for granted the way that he moved like a panther, but this was so much more than even his usual fluidity.

I wasn’t the only one transfixed by Tennyson. Everyone else there was watching him as well. He was something more than human, more than lycanthrope, even.

“Do you want to take a walk?” Sam asked, sounding far away.

It took me a moment to register that he’d spoken. I couldn’t look away from Tennyson: the way his shoulders strained against his jacket, the twist of his hips as he turned Althea across the floor.

“Sorry?” I said, finally dragging myself away.

Sam didn’t look good. He’d turned pale, and sweat had broken out on his forehead. He was half bent over in his seat with his arms wrapped around his stomach.

“Are you okay?” I asked him. “You didn’t eat the salmon canapes, did you? Because Nikolai got the cheap…”

Sam shook his head. “Something strange is happening. I’m losing control.” He reached out his hand to me to show me his claws.

“Don’t panic. Let’s just take a walk,” I said, standing up and taking him by the arm. It must be nearly midnight. I wondered if this had something to do with my father’s punishment. It would be just like him to threaten my brothers and then attack Sam somehow.

I led him out of the pavilion, past the couples who had snuck outside for some privacy in the gardens and the groups of kids who had started up their own parties. Outside the pavilion, away from all the people, it had turned cold. I shivered, but Sam’s skin felt hot to the touch. We’d just passed by a couple who had left a trail of formal clothes that led to their feet sticking out from the bushes when there was a loud clap of thunder and out of nowhere, rain started pouring down.

I turned to go back to the shelter of the pavilion, but Sam pulled me in the other direction.

“The clock tower!” he yelled over the rain. “It’s closer.”

We took off at a run. Already, puddles had formed in the grass, and my shoes squelched and slipped around. I stumbled and fell to my knees, getting mud all over Althea’s beautiful dress. Sam stopped and turned back to me, already half-transformed. Sam did still lose control from time to time, but he hadn’t for ages, so this couldn’t be a coincidence. He’d been doing so well.

I could see the clock tower over his shoulder, rising up into the stormy sky. A fork of lightning shot out, glowing an unnatural blue. I screamed and tried to climb to my feet. The lightning looked as if it would hit Sam, but instead it crashed into the clock tower, right into the face of it. The moment seemed to last an eternity as that jagged finger of lightning thrust into the clock.

Rain streamed down over us, numbing my skin and weighing me down. And slowly, as I watched, the hands of that clock began to move. That clock hadn’t worked for years. There was some story about it, how it had stopped the moment someone or other had died. But it was working now.

The hands of the clock moved around and around, faster and faster, but that wasn’t even the strangest thing. The hands were moving backwards.

The clock chimed.

I blinked, and it was morning.

Chapter 6

It wasn’t only morning, but I was in my bed. For a moment, I lay there, trying to process what had happened. One minute, I’d been outside and it had been night; the next, it was morning and I was in my room. Maybe I’d blacked out and someone had brought me to my room – that was the most logical explanation. My alarm clock said it was 7:47. My phone buzzed with a message, and I reached out to open it, thinking it was probably Sam telling me what was going on. I hoped he was okay.

The message was from Sam, but it took me a second to register what it said.

“Are you okay? I thought we were meeting at 7:30?” With a smiley face at the end.

The message itself wasn’t anything special, except that it was the exact same message he’d sent me the day before. A heavy weight settled at the bottom of my belly.

“What day is it?” I messaged back.

“Friday,” came the reply, almost immediately, followed by, “Is something wrong?”

I sucked in a sharp breath. Maybe Sam was messing with me, but he knew me well enough to know I wouldn’t find this funny, especially after the threats from my father and his partial transformation at the dance.

What day is it? I asked Tennyson.

Friday, he said. Are you with Sam? Did you get the message about the special assembly? We’ll meet you there.

If it was Friday and they weren’t messing with me, that meant the special assembly was about to start. If they were messing with me, no way would the assembly actually be on. Even though every student in the school would jump off a cliff at Tennyson’s command, Assistant Head Noel took himself way too seriously to go along with a hoax like that.

“Something strange is happening,” I sent to Sam. “I’m sorry, I don’t think I can make it.”

“That’s fine,” he sent back. “I hope everything is okay.”

My heart hurt at the thought of Sam sitting there in the greenhouse all alone, that amazing picnic spread out around him. But if this wasn’t a hoax, if it was somehow Friday morning again for real, I needed to get all the information I could. I’d make it up to him later.

Once, the thought would never have occurred to me that the day might’ve somehow reset, but so many weird things had happened now that it was just as likely as anything else. This was my life now, weird and improbable. I really hoped I was wrong, but my father had warned me that something would happen, and the clock had spun backwards.

I pulled on my school uniform and dashed out the door, barely noticing that Katie wasn’t in her bed.

Like the day before, the paths were crowded. I knew there was no point rushing ahead of the other students – that wouldn’t make the assembly start any sooner – but still, I felt impatient. I sensed that the others were almost at the main school building, so took a shortcut to catch up with them. By the time I found them, they were already outside the assembly hall.

“Do you have any idea what this is about?” asked Althea.

I shrugged. I did, but explaining why would take too long, and there were too many people around.

“Where’s Sam?” asked Tennyson. “I thought the two of you were together.”

I was saved from answering by the doors creaking open.

“Hang on,” said Nikolai. “There’s Laura Montgomery. She needs to be taught a lesson in good taste.”

He shoved me out of the way as he forced a pathway through to Laura.

“He should never be put in charge of anything, ever,” Althea said as she led us into the hall and to some seats near the back. “Oh, this doesn’t look good.”

The three of us stared up at the massive picture of Hannah Morgan.

“Whatever they have to say is probably a lie,” said Tennyson, and I could tell that even though he believed it, he’d only said it to be reassuring.

“Well, I suppose they can’t exactly tell the truth,” I said.

The seats in the assembly hall were close together, and Tennyson’s arm was warm where it rested against mine. A few rows down, I could see Nikolai harassing Laura Montgomery. I wondered if he had a crush on her, poor girl. The hall was filled with the murmur of voices, all talking about the same thing. Why were we there, and why was there a big picture of Hannah beside the podium? Some people didn’t know who she was, and the others were trying to describe her — pretty, curly hair, Red House, quiet. None of them knew anything about her, not really. They didn’t know how she’d been so powerful, or funny, or obsessed with Harry Potter.

Assistant Head Noel stepped up to the podium and began to speak. He started just as he’d finished, with a bunch of platitudes. Grave news, a time to be together and appreciate your loved ones, blah blah. A bunch of words that didn’t say anything.

Except they did tell me one thing. They told me it was Friday. Again.

I tuned Assistant Head Noel out as I tried to get everything straight in my head. Sam had begun to transform against his will. We’d been caught in the rain. Lightning had struck the clock tower and made the clock go backwards. The lightning had been strange; it had seemed to glow blue. I wasn’t sure what time it had been when the lightning had struck, but it was around midnight.

Midnight was the deadline my father had given me before he carried out his threats. I’d been worried he’d hurt my brothers, and while that wasn’t off the table, I was certain he was behind this time reset or whatever it was. I had no idea what possible motive he could have for making me relive the same day again. Maybe he wanted me to die of boredom from listening to Assistant Head Noel.

If it was still Friday, that meant that the phone my father had hidden would still be in the lighthouse. As soon as Assistant Head Noel stopped his jibber-jabbering, I’d go straight there and get some answers.

Tennyson nudged me in the elbow, and when I looked up, he raised his eyebrows. I remembered that we couldn’t brain-talk in the assembly hall, but I figured he was asking if I was okay. I shrugged. There was no way I could explain what was happening with only facial expressions. I wasn’t sure how I’d even do it with words. If only Tennyson, or Althea, or somebody remembered that we’d lived this day before so I could confirm that I wasn’t actually going nuts.

Assistant Head Noel talked on and on. I was glad that yesterday, the real Friday, I’d missed this in favor of delicious foods. Finally, he got up to the part that I’d heard before, and I knew the assembly was close to ending. Just before it did, the hall doors banged open, and Katie stumbled through. She looked even worse than she had on the real Friday. Her eyes darted around madly until they rested on me, and she came staggering toward me.

“I warned you!” she yelled. “I told you this would happen, and you didn’t listen. We’re all doomed because you didn’t listen!”

Whispers broke out, and a few people laughed.

Assistant Head Noel cleared his throat. “Display some decorum, please! This is a time of quiet reflection!”

I stood up and pushed past Tennyson, but he caught me by the wrist.

“It’s okay,” I said quietly. “I know what she’s talking about. I’ve got this.”

My heart pounded as I made my way toward her. Did Katie’s words mean what I thought? It had been the real Friday when she’d warned me. She hadn’t seen me on this day at all. That meant she knew that this was the second time we were living this same day.

I put my arm around Katie and led her out of the hall, waving to Assistant Head Noel that everything was okay.

As soon as the doors had closed behind us, Katie wheeled around on me.

“He’s not going to let us out of this until you agree to his terms, you know that.”

“It’s Friday,” I said. “What day was it yesterday?”

She rolled her eyes. “It was Friday. He’s stuck me in this with you as punishment for siding with you and giving you information.” She sighed, raking her hands through her hair. “Fat lot of good that did. You still blamed me for everything, anyway.”

I shrugged and headed for the stairs. “And I still don’t trust you,” I said. “You could be lying through your teeth right now. I’ve got no way of knowing.”

She followed me down the stairs. “You have to go to him and agree to leave the pack. Why do you even care? You can still be friends with them. It’s not such a big deal.”

I didn’t answer her. I had too much to think about.

Katie’s words meant that my dad was definitely behind the day being reset. It was good to have it confirmed, but at the same time, it sucked that I had to deal with him. He was the most stubborn jerk I’d ever met, even worse than Tennyson. I wasn’t sure what his play was, how he thought making it Friday again would convince me that I should go along with him. As far as threats went, it lacked a bit of punch.

I didn’t even want to think about how he’d done it, how he’d managed to manipulate the time-space continuum. Maybe creating another Friday was just a test run, a warmup. Maybe next time he’d send me back to the Dark Ages, to some time before the internet. I shuddered. Surely, not even my evil dad was that evil. I’d seen that show, Outlander, and I definitely did not want to go back in time to somewhere without heating or plumbing or basic civil rights, no matter how hot the guys were in kilts.

I put it out of my mind. No point worrying about it until I knew for sure that that was what he intended. Though maybe I should start keeping some penicillin in my pocket, just in case.

Katie followed me through the forest as I headed to the lighthouse. I thought about what she’d said, about my leaving the pack. Was I being selfish? I didn’t think so. If I left the pack, I’d be playing right into my dad’s hands. And she was wrong – it wouldn’t be the same. Maybe I would still be friends with them, but I’d be an outsider. Even though I wasn’t actually a werewolf, they were the closest to whatever it was that I was. Without them, I’d be totally alone, with no protection against whatever horrors I’d need to face when I evolved into whatever I’d become next. And no protection for anyone else, either, if I became something awful. Even though I hadn’t been in the pack for very long, the idea of leaving filled me with a cold dread that went far beyond the rational.

“Just tell him you agree,” Katie said as the lighthouse came into sight. “You don’t know the things he can do, that he’s willing to do.”

She shuddered, and just for a moment I considered the possibility that she wasn’t playing me like a fiddle. But whether I trusted her or not, I wasn’t going to just cave in to my father’s demands.

“That’s exactly what you’d say if you were in cahoots with him,” I said, opening the lighthouse door. “Maybe you should stay outside.”

“No way! This involves me just as much as it involves you. You’re going to tell him that I had nothing to do with anything, that I never tried to help you or gave you any information, and that he needs to get me out of this.”

“I’m going to tell him to get us all out of this,” I said, and started climbing the stairs. Man, couldn’t he have hidden his stupid spy phone somewhere closer to the ground?

Finally, I got to the top and found the phone. Katie stood at the top of the stairs, scowling, with her arms folded across her chest. I dialed the number for my father, but the phone just beeped and the call dropped out. I looked down at the display. No signal. That was weird. That had literally never happened before on the whole island. We were hooked up with some special high-tech connection that was off the grid and never went down on account of how the kids were all from rich, important families.

It was definitely only Friday, not Friday in 1821, so there shouldn’t be any problem. I’d been able to message Sam just fine earlier on the school messaging app.

I looked over to Katie to ask if she knew what was going on, but before I could get any words out, the phone rang in my hand. I stared down at it. Still no signal and yet the phone was ringing. That was just creepy.

I answered the call.

“About time,” I said, parroting back his words from the day before.

He gave a little laugh. “I did warn you that there would be consequences if you didn’t obey me.”

“Well, as far as evil plots go, this one is kind of lame,” I told him. “I mean, sure, wearing those shoes to the dance again will be kind of painful, but it’s not exactly life-threatening, and Sam didn’t even fully transform, let alone hurt anyone. What exactly is the point of sending me back to the morning?”

“Oh, my baby girl, I thought you’d have put it together already. I haven’t merely sent you back a day. This is just the second Friday of many. I’ve created a time loop over the whole island. Until you agree to leave that filthy pack, you’re going to live the same day over and over again. You’re stuck inside this day until I choose to break the loop.”

I almost dropped the phone. How was that possible? Resetting a day for everyone as a one-off was one thing. There were physics and stuff that could prove that was possible. But a time loop? For just this island? That would take some serious mojo. I could hardly even wrap my head around the concept, let alone implement it. Even as I felt sick at the thought, I couldn’t help but be a tiny bit impressed by my dad for pulling it off. I’d thought he was just the bumbling idiot type of evil, but this took him up a notch.

“I don’t know what you’re saying about Sam, though. Sam Spencer? If he’s acting unpredictably, that’s something I need to know.”

I ignored that, filing the information away to deal with later. If he hadn’t caused Sam’s transformation, then something else had and it might happen again. We’d need to deal with it as a pack.

“So, it’s like a time prison?” I said. “And what happens if I just sail off the island? Does the whole thing just dissolve?”

He huffed a laugh. “You can’t get off the island,” he said. “If you try, the day will just reset.”

I didn’t think I’d take his word for it. Leaving the island would be the first thing I tried.

“You can’t even contact anyone off the island. Time out here moves at the usual pace. Here, it’s Saturday already, and tomorrow it will be Sunday. You’re being held in a place apart from the rest of the world, in a different time. Your link to us has been severed. The only reason I can contact you is because I maintain the loop. I’ll keep this phone line open and call you whenever you need to contact me, but you can’t call out otherwise.”

The whole thing hurt my head. I couldn’t even watch Doctor Who sometimes because it messed with my brain too much, and this was way more confusing.

“And how about if I suddenly change my mind after ten thousand days? Will we all come out like thirty years older?”

“You won’t last ten thousand days,” he said. “But, hypothetically speaking, it would just become Saturday for you, and you and the rest of the world would be the same, as if the time loop had never happened. Think of it as if you’re in a bubble, and once the bubble pops, it’s as if it was never there.”

I snorted. “So, you’re basically saying that we’re immortal, and anything we do has no consequences? Great punishment, Dad.”

He went to say something, but I cut him off. Nothing he had to say could make me change my mind.

“I will break this time loop,” I told him. “And when I do, I’m coming for you.”

Chapter 7

Katie complained the whole way to the train platform.

“If you’re not going to be helpful, put a sock in it,” I told her, walking ahead. “Is that scooter of yours still there?”

It had been a few months since the time Katie and I had snuck out of school, and anything might have happened to it in that time, but she nodded.

“It won’t do any good, though. You heard what he said. It’s just going to reset the day.”

“And if we don’t try it, and in thirty years we happen to leave the school and it bursts the time loop bubble, you’re going to feel like a big idiot,” I told her. I sighed and fell into step with her. “You used to be way more gutsy. What’s up with that?”

She shrugged. “What do you think? When they came for Tennyson Wilde and there were all those traps you’d set up, it was obvious that you’d been warned. Your dad is one of the leaders, so you get special treatment. When your dad is angry, he punishes you like this.” She waved an arm around. “For the rest of us, our punishment is more old-school style.”

She winced just at the thought, and I didn’t want to ask anything more. It was still in the back of my mind that I couldn’t believe anything she said, even though she seemed genuine. Not that it mattered; there wasn’t a lot of harm she could do, anyway. Not when it would all be erased when the day reset and it was Friday morning again.

We reached the entrance to the train platform and walked down the stairs. The scooter was in the same place it’d been when we’d snuck out, and I wheeled it out onto the tracks.

“You don’t have to come if you’re worried,” I told her. The scooter couldn’t be that hard to ride, right?

Katie shook her head. “No, I want to see what happens.” She pulled on the helmet and swung her leg over the seat.

“Where were you this morning, anyway?” I asked her. “You weren’t in bed.”

“I went to try to contact your father yesterday morning, to try to stop all this. So, when the day reset, I was in the forest.”

As she started up the scooter, I thought about what that meant. Her day didn’t start when she woke up, but mine did. It actually sounded as if her day restarted when I woke up, which probably meant that the magic of the loop was connected to me. That made sense. It was meant to be a punishment for me, but it would be helpful to know that sort of thing when I got into the technicalities of breaking the time loop.

It was the strangest sensation. One moment, we were speeding down the tracks on the scooter — and the next, I was in my bed, waking up. I jolted forward, still feeling the momentum from the scooter, like waking up from a dream that you’re falling. So, no luck with the train tracks.

Next, I tried to go by water, thinking maybe there would be a loophole with the whole “no magic across running water” thing, but my evil dad had obviously found a way around that. After all the hassle of stealing a dinghy from the yacht club and rowing myself out to sea, I woke up in my bed again.

I sighed and stared up at the ceiling. It was going to take some time to figure out how to break the time loop, but, luckily for me, time was the one thing I had in abundance. Might as well make the most of it.

I picked up my phone to message Sam. “Sorry, I’m running late. Be there asap!”

Don’t bother with the special assembly, I told Tennyson. It’s just going to be Assistant Head Noel droning on with a load of fake information about how Hannah Morgan is dead.

What? How do you know?

I had a whole day ahead of me, and no matter what I did, nobody would remember tomorrow. That was like the most awesome free pass ever.

As I rushed to meet Sam, I noticed three of the nastiest girls from Green House just up ahead. I snuck up behind them and let out a shrill scream.

“Rats!” I yelled. “Everybody run!”

They screamed and flailed for a moment, stamping their feet as if they were trying to climb up off the ground and into the air.

“Oh em gee, there’s one in your hair!” I yelled, ruffling Charlotte Du Pont’s hair.

She took off at a run down the path, screaming and waving her hands in the air. The other two followed. It was amazing.

Once I’d stopped laughing long enough to walk again, I took off down the path. Time was a-wasting, and those tiny cakes weren’t going to eat themselves.

Sam was sitting in the exact same spot that he had been on the first Friday. In a way, it was as if he’d been sitting there for days, I thought. I shook my head. If I kept thinking stuff like that, I’d go crazy.

“This is amazing,” I told him. “You’re amazing.”

“Well, it’s a special day,” he said, handing me a plate.

I grinned at him and loaded up my plate with cakes. I could literally sit there all day and eat cakes, and none of the calories would count, not even in that way where it was like, “I got this free, so the calories don’t count,” or “I have my period, so the calories don’t count,” or “it’s the middle of exams, so the calories don’t count.” The calories for real didn’t count. Best repeating day ever!

“Oh, hey,” I said, swallowing a mouthful of cake. “I know we didn’t talk about presents, but…”

I obviously hadn’t had time to buy anything for Sam for our quarter-year anniversary, but no way was I going to let him catch me unawares a second time. While I was getting dressed, I’d spotted a copy of The Hobbit poking out from under my bed. Sam loved The Hobbit, and I knew he didn’t have a copy of his own, so I’d shoved it into my bag. It wasn’t a first edition or anything special, but already, I was a way better girlfriend than I had been.

“Sorry it’s not wrapped,” I said, handing it to him.

He smiled and ducked his head. “Actually, I’ve got something for you too.”

He pulled out the box with the heart pendant in it. Even though it was the second time he’d given it to me, it meant just as much.

“Sam, this is amazing,” I said. “Are you sure it’s okay for me to have this?”

“Of course,” he said. “What other girl would I give my heart to?”

He was such a sap. Even though it was another day, he still used the same line. It made me smile, and I leaned toward him, across all the delicious picnic foods, and kissed him. It was only a brief kiss, a peck, really, and it felt just as weird as the other times I’d kissed him, a bit like kissing one of my brothers. But it still felt like the right thing to do.

“Let’s just skip classes today and eat cakes,” I said, sitting back and reloading my plate. “And mini quiches. We don’t want the quiches to feel left out.”

He laughed. “Don’t you have your history test?”

I shrugged. “As if Hitler ever did anyone any good. Cakes are way better.”

I ate my way through all the delicious picnic foods, and just for a little while, I let myself forget that I had any problems bigger than whether I could fit in more mini quiches. Once all the food had been demolished, I flopped to the ground, rubbing my belly.

“So, what’s up with you?” Sam asked after he’d finished laughing at me complaining about a bellyache. “It’s not like you to dodge your responsibilities, especially not something as important as school.”

I looked up at him from where I was rolling on the ground. For a moment, I didn’t want to tell him. I’d stuck him, along with everyone else, in this time prison. Even if every day was like the first time for them, it didn’t make them any less trapped. I didn’t want to add one more thing to the ever-growing list of supernatural BS that Lucy has inflicted on everyone. But it didn’t seem right not to tell him, either. I had all this prior knowledge of the day. It put me at an unfair advantage.

“Okay, so it’s like this,” I started, struggling to sit up with my belly full of cakes. “We’re stuck in a time loop.”

“Right,” he said, nodding. “I have no idea what that means.”

“I’ve lived this day before,” I explained. “This is actually the fourth time, kind of.”

He raised his eyebrows, and I could tell he was hovering in that midway point between not understanding and not believing.

I took a deep breath, trying to think of the simplest way to explain it.

“So, my dad has cursed the whole school into reliving the same day over and over, only I’m the only one who remembers it each time. Well, and Katie.”

“Like Groundhog Day?” Sam asked.

I snapped my fingers and shot him with finger guns. “Exactly! Or the Supernatural episode where Dean keeps dying.”

“Or when the nerd trio curse Buffy and she has to keep trying to sell that evil mummy hand thing.”

Sam was quiet for a moment, chewing his lip. “Okay, so in all of those things, they had some sort of problem they had to solve, something they weren’t seeing and had to realize, before time would start moving again, right?”

I shrugged. “I don’t think it’s going to be like that with my dad. He wants me to leave the pack, and unless I do, he’s going to keep us here.”

“So, we need to find a way to stop whatever magic your dad is using. We should tell the rest of the pack.”

We should, and I would eventually, but once the whole pack got involved, we’d need to start working on how to fix things. First, I wanted to just enjoy myself a bit.

“Later,” I said. “I’d like a little nap first.”

The greenhouse was warm, and the blanket and cushions that Sam had brought along were soft and comfortable. One tiny nap wouldn’t hurt. I closed my eyes and snuggled down.

Then it was morning again and I was in my own bed.

I spent a few days catching up on my Netflix queue. It was weird how Netflix was fine but I couldn’t use email. I could read Facebook posts and even like them, but I couldn’t comment or message. Every time I tried, the page reloaded and that got frustrating fast. Whatever my dad had done to block communication, it was super specific, so I just gave up and went back to watching Netflix. But eventually even that got boring.

One day, I interrupted Assistant Head Noel’s assembly and treated the school to my world-class beatboxing routine. In my history test, I drew an awesome picture of the mean teacher as Hitler. I hid in the bushes on the path from the Green House to the dance and sprayed all the mean girls with shaving cream. I learned to play the banjo and dyed my hair black. Anything I’d ever been too afraid to do, anything I hadn’t had the time for, I could do with no worries.

One day, when I was lying in bed trying to learn to speak Italian, Katie stormed in and threw back my covers.

“Get up,” she said.

“Scusami?”

“You can’t just ignore what’s happening. You have to stop playing around and fix this. Just because you think this is some sort of game doesn’t mean your father does. Doesn’t mean anyone at the corporation does. He’s not going to let you just sit here, doing whatever you please. The longer you take, the worse it will be in the end.”

As much as I wanted to pull the covers back up over my head and ignore the whole situation, I knew she was right.

“I wish I could trust you,” I told her. “I wish I could ask for your help with this.”

She shrugged. “You’ve made your choice. Don’t expect me to cry about it.”

I spent the rest of the day trying to figure out the best way to tell the others, then the next morning I messaged them all to meet me at the greenhouse. No point wasting all those tiny cakes, and I knew that Sam wouldn’t mind if something major was happening.

Nikolai didn’t take the news well.

“Wait, so I’ve done all this work for the dance, and it’s for nothing? Tomorrow, nobody will remember the dance because tomorrow will be today again!” He paced the floor, his face turning an unpleasant shade of purple. “I may as well just let stupid Laura Montgomery have her stupid cherry blossoms!”

“Well, that’s a half-empty way of looking at it,” I said. “Shouldn’t you think that people get to enjoy your hard work over and over, instead of only once?”

“The dance is hardly the issue here,” said Tennyson. “We need to figure out exactly how this magic works if we want to find a way to stop it. Tell us everything you remember about the first day this happened.”

I told them about the assembly and my classes. I told them about the call from my brothers and every detail I could remember about the conversation with my dad. I told them about the dance and Sam losing control, and then the storm, and how the clock had spun backwards. I told them about how I’d spoken to my father again and how every time I tried to leave, the day reset again.

“So, I went with the strappy shoes?” Althea said when I was finished. “I’d been thinking the ankle boots.”

“Again, the dance is hardly the issue,” said Tennyson.

I smiled at Althea. Normally, she was the first one to put forward helpful suggestions, but she’d been so focused on the dance. It kind of made me happy in a way that she’d put so much thought into it on my behalf. I knew that at least part of it was that she still felt guilty about the love potion and wanted to make it up to me, but I hoped that she genuinely thought of me as a friend as well.

“The magic is obviously connected to me somehow,” I said. “The day resets to the moment I woke up for both me and Katie, so he’s obviously linked it to me somehow.”

Althea nodded, and I could see by the way her shoulders tensed and the lines of her face pulled sharp that she was slipping into business mode. “That makes sense, but I’m not sure if it helps us. He’s probably used blood, and because he’s your father, he could substitute his own for yours for something like this. That’s probably why Katie can remember too, because of her parents’ blood.”

I’d kind of hoped there would be some amulet or something that he’d slipped into my pocket which could just be smashed and the spell would be broken, but of course nothing was ever that easy.

“If the headmistress was still here, we could ask for her help, but she wasn’t at the assembly,” I said, thinking of all those books in her office on weird subjects. She had books on literally everything; surely, one of them would have something on time manipulation in it. The Wilde pack library had a bunch of great stuff too, and a lot of it was kept in the Golden House, but most of that was archaic magic. This seemed like something new, something my father had made up in his creepy laboratory.

“I’ll go find out if she’s on campus,” said Sam, getting to his feet and touching me on the shoulder. “Her secretary likes me, so even if the headmistress isn’t around, I might be able to convince her to let me look through the books.”

“Good idea,” said Althea. “I suppose we can’t contact anyone outside of the time loop?”

I shook my head.

“So, there’s no point trying to get outside help. I’ll go through the books we have here, and maybe you and Tennyson should go to the clock tower and see if you can find anything out of place. That seems to be where it all began. And Nikolai…”

“Nope,” said Nikolai. “Today isn’t even real. Nothing I do will make any difference. I’m going back to bed.”

Althea sighed. “And, Nikolai, you have an existential crisis. Great, very helpful.”

Nikolai just grunted. I could see his point, but as the person who would remember, I couldn’t just go back to bed. I had to try to find a way out.

Chapter 8

For some reason, it wasn’t awkward to be alone with Tennyson as we walked over to the clock tower. Maybe because it was like Nikolai said: it wasn’t a real day. Nothing we did mattered. We could make as many mistakes, say stupid things or do things we’d never dream of in a million years, and tomorrow it would all be erased. If anything too awful happened, I could just take a swim out to sea and wake up in my bed and start the day fresh. So, I just relaxed and enjoyed my walk. Tennyson wasn’t like the banjo or dying my hair, but it was nice to have a safety net.

“You’re enjoying this,” Tennyson said as we walked through a rose garden.

It was rare for him to speak aloud when it was just the two of us, but kind of nice in a way. There was a sort of smoky quality to his voice that made it pleasant to listen to. Not that I’d ever tell him that – his head was big enough.

“Well, it’s far from the worst curse I’ve ever been under,” I said.

He sighed. “Yes, you are rather hapless.”

“Hey!” I said, elbowing him in the ribs. “I am not! I’m full of hap! I’m... happy!”.

I laughed at my hilarious joke, but Tennyson just shook his head.

“Are you though?” he said so quietly that I wasn’t sure I was supposed to hear.

Normally, I wouldn’t have responded, or maybe I would’ve lied, but today had no consequences. And he looked so earnest that it was impossible not to be honest in response.

“I’m not unhappy,” I said. “When I first came here, I was. I was so miserable all the time. The only thing that made it bearable was Hannah.” I sighed. There were so many things that I wasn’t happy about, but even on a day with no tomorrow, some of them were too dangerous to talk about, especially with Tennyson. I couldn’t exactly start opening up to him about how uncomfortable I felt about my relationship with Sam. For a start, he’d run for the hills.

“You feel guilty that you can’t save her, but there’s nothing more you can do. You have no way of finding them, and even if you did, you couldn’t defeat them.”

“So, I’m weak and ignorant? Thanks. You’re awesome at cheering people up.”

He turned his face away, so I knocked my shoulder into his arm to show him I was only kidding and let him know through our bond that I actually did feel better. It always seemed as if I hadn’t done enough for Hannah. I’d just gone on with my life when I should’ve been out there searching for her, but really, I didn’t even know where to start.

“Plus, there’s the fact that I seem to attract every sort of bad magic around and my father is some sort of evil Doctor Frankenstein and I’m evolving into an unidentified monster. Apart from that, though. Things are peachy.”

“Peachy?” Tennyson said.

I nodded. “Very peach-like.”

“I don’t hold with stone fruit,” he said. “It gives me stomach cramps.”

The path left the rose garden and turned into a more open space with raised flower beds and bench seats. From there, we could see the clock tower.

“It looks normal,” said Tennyson. “But I haven’t spent a lot of time on this side of the grounds.”

There were a few people around, excused from class to prepare for the dance. They were all chattering excitedly, carrying boxes or chairs or other equipment. Their day hadn’t changed from the first time they’d lived it, and it probably wouldn’t until the loop was broken. They seemed unreal to me as well, like actors going through the motions in the background of a movie. You could fast forward or rewind and they’d still be there, saying the same lines with the same expressions on their faces.

“Can you see if the hands are moving?” I asked. I squinted, but I couldn’t tell from there.

“Where were you when the lightning struck?”

I looked around, trying to judge. It had been difficult to tell in the dark whether we’d been heading back toward the school or the forest. I looked between the pavilion and the clock tower, trying to get a feel for where it was. For the first time since I became a werewolf, I realized just how much I’d come to rely on my special senses — you couldn’t scent out something if it hadn’t happened yet. I could tell that Tennyson was having the same issues.

“I think it was over here,” I said eventually. “There were couples making out around that arbor and some kids over there smoking pot, and we headed past them and over this way.” I retraced my steps as best I could. “I think we were around here when the storm started.” I pointed to an area just ahead of us. “There wasn’t much in the way of shelter, so I think it was around here.”

We both looked around, scouring the ground. What we hoped to find, I had no idea.

“Then the storm started, so we ran for the clock tower.”

“Wouldn’t the pavilion have been closer?” asked Tennyson.

I shrugged. I’d thought so too, but saying so felt disloyal to Sam, somehow. As if I’d be choosing Tennyson over him.

We made our way toward the clock tower. Although it was a bright spring day, the face of the clock tower was in shadow, and I still couldn’t tell if the hands were moving.

“Do you know the story of the clock tower?” Tennyson asked me.

I shook my head. “I know that it apparently stopped when some guy died.”

“I’m not sure if it’s true. It’s very dramatic,” he said, glancing at me from the corner of his eye and giving me one of his rare smiles, tiny and fleeting. “You know that the school was founded by two of the strongest families, one of sorcery and the other of lycanthropy? It was one of the periods in history when we weren’t fighting with magic users. We had quite a strong alliance. They built the school as a sanctuary for people like us to be educated, as both our kinds were relentlessly persecuted at that time. When we’re younger, it’s harder to control our powers, so we can give ourselves away unknowingly. Obviously, there can be humans in every family, so they came up with the house system, White for humans and Golden for the rest of us.”

That was more or less what the headmistress had told me as well. “Because segregation always works so well.”

His smile reappeared, a little wider, and I wondered what I’d need to do to make it into a grin. Or even a laugh. His laugh would be something magical.

“So, twenty years or so after the school was built, there was this girl in White House, from the sorcery family. Rosalind. You might’ve seen her portrait in the hallway outside the headmistress’s office. They say it’s not a good likeness because her beauty was too magnificent to be captured, but I have no way to verify that. She fell in love with one of the Golden, Constantine, who was in line to be alpha of the Wilde pack. They allegedly had quite an epic romance until she fell ill with some fever or other. It was long ago, before things like sanitation and modern medicine, and she could not be saved even with the combined talents of sorcery and lycanthropy. When she died, Constantine was so moved by grief that he climbed to the top of the clock tower, where they used to meet, and ended his life. There are countless stories about how he did it – silver blade through the heart, poison – but people seem to like the one where he throws himself from the top of the tower and is impaled on a sharp branch of a rowan tree. Why they would have grown rowan trees here when everything about them is toxic to both lycanthropes and magic users, I do not know.”

I stared up at the tower, now right before us, and tried to imagine this couple meeting there, dressed in medieval clothes but otherwise not too different from us. He’d been Tennyson’s ancestor, so I imagined they looked alike. He’d have been brave and dashing and haughty, and the poor human girl probably never stood a chance against him. Once he’d swept her away, she’d never have been able to see anything else. He’d have taken up her entire vision, filled her heart completely.

“They say the clock hasn’t functioned since, but they left the tower as a monument to the two of them and their love.” Tennyson’s voice was soft as he looked up at the tower, and when he turned to me, my heart skipped a beat. My brain was still back there with the doomed lovers, and for a moment I was confused about who we really were. “But of course, he probably broke something in the clock while he was up there rampaging in grief and then nobody ever bothered to fix it. People just like to assign meaning to things that don’t have any. Have you found anything odd?”

I shook my head, pulled out of my daydream by Tennyson’s brash reality.

“The clock hands definitely aren’t moving,” he said. “I think we should go up.”

After that weird moment where I’d gotten us confused with the dead couple, I kind of didn’t want to go wandering into their special place with Tennyson, but there was no reason I could give him to refuse.

“Are you sure it’s safe?” I asked as he pushed open the little wooden door at the base of the tower. The hinges of the door were almost rusted closed, and they squealed when he pushed. The tower was dark and full of cobwebs, not to mention probably the ghost of an angry werewolf.

“I’ll test the stairs,” he said. “They may have rotted.”

I waited outside for a moment until he called that it was fine. It really didn’t feel fine. It felt creepy and probably not useful, but I followed him anyway.

“Stay close behind me,” he said quietly as we made our way up. “The stairs seem fine but I’ll keep testing them as we go.”

Even though the entire situation was super creepy, for some reason his words made me feel safe. I grabbed hold of the back of his sweater as we climbed up so he wouldn’t get too far ahead. It was the school uniform black V-neck sweater, but his felt way softer than mine, probably some sort of ethically-sourced cashmere. It felt warm from being close to his skin.

As we got closer to the top, light filtered in, and I could see where I was walking. I let go of Tennyson, thinking it would be weird to hold on to him when I didn’t need to for safety. I wasn’t sure what I’d been expecting when we came to the little room at the top of the tower — something super gory, maybe, or else a shrine to the dead lovers. What we found was way too ordinary. In the hundreds of years since the clock had stopped, people had obviously clued in that it was a discreet place to hang out if you wanted some privacy. There were empty beer bottles, cigarette butts and chip wrappers all over the floor. Someone had been ambitious enough to drag an old sofa up those stairs, even, and I did not want to know what some of the things were that had stained the cushions.

“I don’t know how long I can stand this smell,” Tennyson said, holding a hand over his nose and mouth. “Do you see anything odd?”

I didn’t want to look too closely at anything, but I made my way closer to the back of the clock face. If there was anything related to the time loop in there, I figured it would be near the clock face, maybe even attached to it somehow. I trailed my hands over the cogs, all the workings of it, but nothing seemed out of place.

“I mean, technically, the lightning hasn’t struck it yet, so there could be something that hasn’t appeared yet. Maybe I should come back tonight, during the storm?”

“The spell is ongoing, so anything related to it would be outside of the loop. Like you and Katie. If there’s nothing here now, it won’t change later.”

I didn’t know how much of his explanation was based on facts and how much on his wanting to leave the smell, but it seemed legit. I turned away from the clock, back toward Tennyson, and my reply was caught in my throat. Maybe it was being there, in that place, with my mind all messed up over the time loop and the old stories, but the way the light filtered through the clock and fell across his face seemed to make him glow. He looked otherworldly, as if he wasn’t really there and I was only glimpsing him through a veil. He was beautiful, but it terrified me. He looked insubstantial, as if he might vanish completely the next time I blinked. He looked like a ghost.

“Let’s get out of here,” I said. “We’re just wasting time.”

Chapter 9

Althea and Sam were deep into the research when we got back to the Golden House. The headmistress wasn’t on campus, but Sam had scored everything relevant from her secretary, and Althea had made some good finds in the library there. Tennyson joined them, and the three of them made notes, which I then had to memorize, as I was the only one who would remember the next day. I wasn’t sure if it was lucky or not that there wasn’t all that much written on time manipulation, so I didn’t have a lot I needed to do. I set about memorizing book titles so I’d know which ones we’d already read.

“It’s so weird that we won’t remember any of this,” said Althea. “I mean, I could do anything right now, and the only person who would know would be Lucy.”

I nodded. “We should call for more cakes.”

“When I was five years old, I snuck into Mother’s rooms and played dress-ups with her things, but I knocked over a perfume and spilled it on her favorite Chanel dress, and when she discovered it, I told her it was Tennyson.”

Tennyson’s eyes went huge. “I cannot believe you are finally admitting to that now, when you know I won’t remember. That is cowardly, Althea. It’s unworthy.”

She shrugged. “You should get your secrets off your chest, too,” she said. “It’s very cathartic.”

“I have no secrets,” he said, staring down at his book, but I noticed those two pink patches appear on his cheeks again.

“You’re totally lying!” I said, pointing a finger at him. “There’s no way you can’t tell us now!”

Don’t encourage her, he said.

But I really want to know!

Even though his head was bent down toward his book, I could see that he was smiling again. I wondered if that was his own Tennyson way of cutting loose with no consequences, smiling twice in a day. I wasn’t sure why he’d hide it, but I liked that I was one of the few people he allowed to see it.

“I know!” said Althea. “Why don’t you tell us all why you refuse to transform. It might help you get past the mental block.”

She didn’t seem as if she was saying it to be mean, just genuinely curious. The question had probably been burning inside her ever since he’d gotten his ability to transform back and hadn’t used it. I wanted to know too, and even Sam was leaning forward in his seat.

“It’s not a mental block. It’s a conscious decision,” he said, his voice tight.

“Really?” said Althea. “And what prompted that decision?”

Tennyson pressed his lips together and didn’t reply, and eventually Althea gave up and went back to her research.

Nikolai breezed in and then back out on his way to the dance, and the bell rang to say cake had arrived. It grew darker, and I read the list of book titles over and over, trying to burn them into my brain. I kept one eye on the clock so that I wouldn’t be caught by surprise when the day ended.

“Okay, this is it,” I said when it was almost midnight. “It’s about to happen.”

The three of them stared at me, and I could feel their fear. I reached out and grabbed Sam’s hand, and then Althea’s. It felt as if they were about to blink out of existence, and in a way, they were. They’d never be these exact people again, with the same memories of this day. My eyes met Tennyson’s across the table, and I wondered if I’d see him smile again tomorrow.

Then everything was gone and I was in my bed again.

Once again, I messaged everyone, and we met at the greenhouse and ate cakes and mini quiches as I caught them up.

“So, maybe today, rather than research, we should try out a few theories from what we learned yesterday,” said Althea.

“No way,” said Nikolai, and I braced myself for another defeatist rant. “This is the perfect opportunity to mess with people! We can bet with them on the outcome of things and make predictions in spooky voices!”

Cake for breakfast definitely had a good effect on Nikolai’s mood.

“And I can tell everyone that Tennyson waxes his monobrow and that red makes Althea look sallow.”

“Or you could shut up before we test the theory that anyone who dies today stays dead,” Althea said, raising her eyebrows at him.

He smirked at her, obviously not deterred from his evil plans.

Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised, but not even Nikolai suggested that the simplest way to solve the problem would be for me to leave the pack. There wasn’t even a hint of it, as if the thought didn’t occur to them. In the interest of fairness, though, I felt I should bring it up. Every fiber of my being revolted against the idea, but I couldn’t be selfish if everyone thought it was for the best.

“How could you even think such a thing?” Althea snapped, surprisingly angry.

“A pack isn’t something you can just throw away when it becomes inconvenient,” said Nikolai. “Are you really so selfish that you’d just cut us off like that at the first sign of trouble?”

I stared at them in confusion. I’d expected some polite rejection of the idea, but they were acting as if I’d suggested doing something to hurt them, not myself.

I understand why you said this thing, but it is not an option, said Tennyson.

“Hey, guys, you’re misunderstanding her,” said Sam. “She’s new to all this, so she’s got no way of knowing how the whole pack thing works.” He turned to me and smiled. “When you join a pack, it’s like…” He paused for a moment, trying to think of how to explain it. “It’s like a drop of water in a pond. That drop contributes to the whole, and if it’s removed, the entire pond is diminished.”

“That’s a terrible way of explaining it,” said Nikolai. “It’s like this cake, here. It’s a cake, right? But if I take a bite out of it, it’s not a cake anymore, it’s just part of a cake. It’s no longer whole. It’s imperfect. Though very delicious.”

Tennyson shook his head. “It’s not like an object. It’s more like sleep, an entire night’s sleep. If you’re woken up early, the entire quality of the sleep is less.”

“No,” said Althea. “It’s more like…”

“I get it,” I said, waving my hands. “It’s like something that was whole is no longer whole. Sorry, I didn’t realize it would affect you guys as well.”

To be honest, someone should’ve maybe told me that joining the pack was such a big deal before they were just, like, oh yeah, you’re in the pack now. I’d thought it was like signing up to a mailing list, not to the mafia. There was no unsubscribe button here. Not that I minded; I just liked to have all the information before I made a decision that would affect the entire outcome of my life for the rest of forever.

“I think we should interrogate Katie,” said Nikolai. “I don’t believe that she’s not in on it, and even if she’s not, she might know more than she’s letting on.”

I picked up a mini quiche but then put it back down. I’d eaten so many that they’d lost some of their appeal. “Well, I vote that someone else does it. You’re too soft. You could barely interrogate Olivia Hearst without crying about it, and Katie is about a hundred times tougher than her.”

“I’ll do it,” Althea said with an elegant shrug. “I’m fine with violence. There’s a bunch of other things we can try, too, rituals and counter-spells. I say two of you work on that and the other two on research.”

I kind of felt bad for Katie that Althea was tracking her down. Out of everyone, I thought Althea would be the most relentless, but she wouldn’t do anything unnecessary and we needed to know the truth.

Nikolai and Tennyson headed off to start on research.

Good luck, I told Tennyson. You know he’s not going to do any work at all.

After the three of them left, I helped Sam pack up the picnic.

“I suppose if you’ve done all this before, my present won’t be a surprise.”

I smiled at him. “It’s still really thoughtful. I’m the only girl you’d give your heart to.”

He gave a little laugh. “I guess I’m not that original.”

“You don’t need to be. You just need to be Sam.”

He smiled at me, his special smile, the one that lit up his whole face. There must’ve been something wrong with me, because that smile didn’t make my belly flip or confuse my head or anything. But I was pleased he was smiling, anyway.

A horrible thought occurred to me as I stood there with him smiling at me. It was the pendant. His mother’s pendant. Sam’s mother had been in cahoots with my dad and they were both evil. I’d been right about there being a magical object we needed to break to end the spell.

I smiled back at Sam and tried to act normal until I could make an excuse to get away. I couldn’t tell him, not when he’d been so thoughtful. Not when he was finally getting over everything.

Once I was back in my room, alone, I smashed that pendant into pieces. I waited but nothing changed. There were no magical lights. Nothing felt different. Everything was the same, except that I sat there with the broken pieces of that heart held in my hands. It felt like something bigger than it was, smashing that heart.

But the next day, it was whole again.

The next few Fridays followed the same pattern — breakfast together, then rituals and research. Katie avoided me, even more so after Althea’s interrogation. No matter what we tried, nobody could get any information out of her, so she either knew nothing or had no intention of talking. Either way, we didn’t know any more than when we’d started and I’d lost her as a friend for good.

After we’d exhausted all the possibilities we’d read about, we got creative. As usual, that didn’t go so well for me. Mixing magic with the laws of physics was not for the faint-hearted. There was one day where nobody could use words containing the letter E, and another where I got stuck in wolf form, but luckily, when each day reset, so did the effects of the rituals.

“I think we’re overlooking the fact that it needs to be physically linked to me somehow,” I said, floating around the ceiling of the Golden common room after the ritual had taken away my connection with gravity.

“I think we can’t rule out the importance of the lightning striking the clock tower, either,” said Tennyson. “I know that last time we were there, you said you couldn’t see anything strange, but maybe we need to be there at the moment the lightning strikes.”

I was about to argue with him, to say that he was the one who had said that was pointless, when I realized something. I’d started leaving out any information that we’d not found useful because otherwise it took me half the day to catch them up to speed, and that particular bit of information wasn’t useful.

As I gaped at him, gravity suddenly came back into play, and I dropped heavily to the floor.

“I didn’t tell you about that today,” I said from the floor. “How did you know?” I pulled myself up into a sitting position. “Tennyson, do you remember?”

The rest of us stared at him as confusion settled across his face, his furrowed eyebrows, his pouty bottom lip, head leaning on a slight angle.

“I thought I didn’t, but now… There are small things, just day-to-day, ordinary things that might have happened any time.” He sighed. “It feels like trying to remember a dream. The more I focus on it, the more it slips away. I remember Nikolai saying I wax my eyebrows, and I remember Lucy at the top of the tower, and dancing with Althea at the Spring Fling. But it’s just flashes of images. There’s nothing concrete that I can recall.”

“What about you guys?”

The other three shook their heads.

“Nothing. Yesterday was Thursday. That’s everything,” said Althea.

“Tennyson, what time did you wake up this morning?” I asked. A terrible idea was beginning to bloom in my mind.

“7:47,” he said. “That’s when my alarm is set for.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose. What could this mean?

“Lucy?” asked Sam. “What’s wrong?”

I couldn’t answer him. I couldn’t put it into words. Not when it was so terrible.

“She thinks I’m the link,” Tennyson said, staring at me in horror. “Not her. The spell is linked to me somehow, and that’s why I can remember. Her father has somehow used me to channel the magic needed to create the time loop.”

As I heard the words said aloud, I knew it was true. I’d been right when I thought there was an enchanted object I had to break to end the loop, and that object was Tennyson.

Chapter 10

There was one thing I’d been putting off doing, one last resource that we hadn’t tapped out. Even though we couldn’t contact anyone outside of school, I knew my father was somehow monitoring his spy phone in case I tried to call him. I stormed out of the Golden House and was well into the forest before I realized that Tennyson was following me.

This doesn’t have to mean anything, Tennyson said. Just because I’m connected to the loop doesn’t mean I will be harmed in any way. We can research it, find out if there’s any precedent for this kind of thing. You need to calm down, or you’ll be of no use to anyone.

He was right. Nothing good ever came out of acting from anger. I’d messed up far too many things because I’d let my emotions overrun my reason and thoughtlessly rushed in.

I stopped walking and turned to face him. He took me by the forearms and ducked his head to stare right into my face. That ridiculous lock of hair flopped across his forehead, and I wanted to reach up and brush it away. Maybe I even would have if there hadn’t been the slightest possibility he’d remember.

“We’ll get through this,” he said. “Just like we’ve gotten through everything before it.”

I nodded. Like the day in the clock tower, just the sound of his voice made it seem as though everything would be fine. We were safe. We were protected. Nothing could harm us. I knew that was a lie, just something I was telling myself to ward off panic, but it comforted me anyway if he was the one saying it.

“I still want to talk to him,” I said. “I won’t mention anything about you. I’ll just try to make him mad. He might give something away that we can use. We don’t have many other options left.”

“Fine. I’ll come with you,” he said, and we started walking through the forest. “Then we can try the lightning thing later. Maybe we should even go to the dance. I know Nikolai and Althea are disappointed we’re missing it.”

“Nikolai will only spend the whole time following Laura Montgomery around, complaining about cherry blossoms,” I said. “He should’ve just asked her to the dance instead of torturing her about it.”

Tennyson laughed. It was only a tiny laugh, more a huff of breath than anything, but still I chalked it up on the tally I was keeping of things I needed to remember once this had all vanished.

My dad had obviously been waiting for me to call. I’d barely picked up the phone when it started to ring. However he was monitoring me, he was doing it pretty closely. Tennyson stood opposite me, his eyes steady on mine as I answered the call.

“So, you haven’t solved the mystery yet, Nancy Drew?” my father said.

“I don’t know what that means,” I told him. “And I just wanted to tell you that we’re all quite happy as we are. Nobody else even realizes they’re stuck here, and as for me, well, one day is a lot like another anyway. At least this one isn’t full of unpleasant surprises. I could just keep on living here literally forever. There’s good food and good weather and good friends, so I have absolutely no incentive to agree to your terms. I can do anything I like and there’s no repercussions. So, nice try and all, but I’m never going to leave the pack.”

My dad laughed. “Is that right?” he said. “So, in all your research on trying to break the loop, you never once came across what happens if you stay in there?”

I knew he wanted me to ask what would happen and I didn’t want to play into his hands, but I needed to know. The question just burst out of me.

“What?” I said.

“Well, out here, life is still moving on. The world is still turning, and you’re on that world. At the moment, you’re avoiding time, but it will catch up with you eventually. You’re not immortal in there, and time doesn’t like to be cheated. You can’t just use magic for free. There’s always a cost, and this kind of spell is expensive. One day soon, the loop will start to warp, and people will begin to vanish. Where will they go? Will they just fall out of the loop? Will they fall through time to be lost somewhere? Will they die? Just wink out of existence? Well… I guess I can only leave that up to your imagination. But as someone who knows the answer, let me tell you that your imagination can’t even begin to picture how awful it will be for them.”

Tennyson’s eyes widened in horror, but I wasn’t so easily convinced.

“You’re lying,” I said. “I’ve called you out on the hole in your plan, so you’re making this up to cover yourself.”

He laughed again. “I’m flattered that you think I’m powerful enough to maintain such high-level magic indefinitely, but the truth is, to do this, there need to be sacrifices.”

It took a moment for his words to sink in. “What are you saying?”

“People will vanish from the time loop. That energy needs to go somewhere. It may as well go to a useful purpose.”

I felt sick. I was actually going to vomit. I thrust the phone toward Tennyson as I bent over, clutching my stomach. How could I be related to this man, who cared so little for anyone else that he’d use up human lives like AA batteries? Over the sound of my retching, I heard Tennyson speak to my father, but I couldn’t make out what he said. After a moment, he started awkwardly patting my back.

“I’m okay,” I said, straightening up and wiping my mouth. I hadn’t actually thrown up, but I didn’t want Tennyson to catch me drooling.

“You look flushed,” he said. “You should drink some water. Will you be okay to get back to the house?”

I nodded, though I felt shaky on my legs. I wasn’t so sure I was okay to do anything.

By the time we got back to the house, Althea and Nikolai were in full preparations for the dance.

“Fine,” I said as Althea herded me into her room to get ready, although it was really the last thing I felt like doing. “But I am not wearing those strappy shoes.”

I showered and dressed, and as I let Althea primp me, I actually started to feel a bit better. We’d been in pretty harsh situations before, but Tennyson was right: we always managed to get out of it relatively unscathed. I mean, I was a werewolf now with a mind link to Tennyson, but we were all still alive.

“So, did you find out how he used Tennyson as a link to the time loop?” Althea asked as she did my makeup.

I couldn’t actually reply while she painted my lips, so I just made a noise in my throat that sounded vaguely negatory. I was pleased that I hadn’t discussed Tennyson’s link to the spell with my father. I didn’t want him to know that we knew Tennyson was involved, because it would only add another level of things he could threaten me with. And as far as we knew, it might not have even been intentional on my dad’s part. He didn’t have any magical DNA, so whatever power he was using was either stolen or scientifically manufactured, which meant he didn’t necessarily understand all the underlying technicalities. I mean, I could heat up a frozen dinner, but that didn’t mean I could build a microwave oven. Giving him that information would just mean he’d find a way to use it to his advantage.

Althea finished my makeup and stood back to inspect it. I could’ve told her what my dad had said, but what would be the point? It would only worry her, and it wasn’t as if she could do something about it. I’d tell her tomorrow at breakfast, and we could add it to our ever-growing list of things we couldn’t do anything about. For tonight, she might as well enjoy the dance.

We wore different dresses than we had the first time. Mine was amethyst purple and had a kind of Victorian feel, with a high, lacy collar. Althea wore a black sheath dress that looked dramatic with her dark hair and red lips. This time, my shoes were way more comfortable, tan lace-up boots that I’d be able to run in if I needed to. When we met up with the boys, they were all wearing the same outfits as last time, except for Nikolai, who was eye-catching in his orange damask tuxedo with lacy cravat.

“This is fantastic!” he said. “If we do this enough times, I can wear every suit in my wardrobe!”

He practically skipped out the door. Some days, he was a lot more stressed about the dance than others, but now that I had a larger sample size, his moods seemed random and not related to breakfast cake.

Tennyson fell in beside me as we walked, giving me a curious look.

There’s nothing we can do about it tonight, I told him. We may as well let everyone have a good time.

That color suits you, he said in response.

For a moment, I wondered if he was speaking in some sort of code, but then why would he, when he was speaking in my mind? He was probably just being polite.

Thanks, I said. Formalwear suits you.

He gave a little nod of thanks, and I could see the edges of that smile twitching his mouth.

“It’s going to be the best night ever!” Nikolai was saying up ahead, tap-dancing his way along the path. He made his way over to a group of girls from Green House. “There’s no tomorrow, everybody! Live like there’s no tomorrow!”

“He is going to cause so much trouble,” I said.

“But only for the next few hours.”

The pavilion looked just as amazing as it had the first time. The cherry blossoms were pretty, petals floating down from the top of the pavilion.

“I assume you don’t want to dance?” Sam asked me.

I was about to refuse, but then I figured why not.

“I don’t know the steps,” I said.

“Make them up!” said Nikolai. “No tomorrow, remember?”

So, I let Sam lead me onto the dance floor and we danced some complicated dance that probably took years of lessons to learn properly. I stepped on Sam’s feet about a hundred times, but he never once flinched or said anything. He’d obviously matured a bit since sixth grade. Nikolai twirled Althea around close by, to a different dance completely, making couples scatter out of their way.

I looked around to see if Tennyson was dancing with someone. I didn’t like the idea, somehow. All the girls who followed him around were so grasping, only liking him because of who he was and how he looked, without really knowing him. If they somehow got the chance to be with him, they’d probably sell the story to the press the first chance they got. They weren’t the sort of girls he could trust. It made a hot flare of indignation burn in my chest. But then I spotted him at the edge of the dance floor, and the burning died down. He was staring out onto the dance floor, watching all the couples. I caught his eye and smiled, but maybe it was hard to see in the dim evening light, because he turned away.

It didn’t take me long to tire of dancing, so I left Sam with Althea and went to sit at the table with Tennyson. A group of girls were gathered close to where he was sitting, whispering behind their hands and glancing at him. When I sat down, they moved away.

“Are you nervous about tonight?” he asked.

I shook my head. “Worst case scenario, I get struck by lightning. Then I’ll wake up and it will be this morning again. Well, that or I’ll be dead, in which case the time loop will probably be broken and you’ll all be saved.”

“That’s not funny.”

I shrugged. I wasn’t really kidding.

Tennyson was in a strange mood and not really chatty. Anything I said, he just replied to in monosyllables, so I gave up and watched Nikolai attempt to dance with every person there. He was really having the time of his life, I thought as I watched him grab Mr. Porter’s hand and drag him out to the dance floor, grinding his hips obscenely in the air as he somehow paired Mr. Porter off with Mrs. Pritchard and then danced away into the crowd.

Eventually, the night cooled off. It was getting late, and I had to go. The others looked as if they were having fun, and I didn’t want to disturb them.

“I’m going to the bathroom,” I told Tennyson, getting up from my seat and feeling like Cinderella.

He rolled his eyes. “You’re a terrible liar.” He got to his feet and started walking out of the pavilion.

“You don’t have to come with me,” I said, hurrying to catch up. “It’s not as if you’ll remember what happens.”

“Yes, but I may be able to provide a keen insight into what happens. The only two people to have witnessed it are yourself and Sam, and neither of you have my background in the paranormal.”

I didn’t argue. I didn’t actually mind him coming along. Walking into a storm to be hit by lightning was the kind of thing that was better with company.

We made our way through the gardens and past the people milling around, in the general direction of the clock tower. Beyond the glow of the pavilion, the night was dark. If I’d had normal human eyes, I’d barely have been able to see Tennyson walking beside me. As it was, I stayed close to him, as if he could stop the night from swallowing me up and spitting me back to the morning.

Although clouds covered the moon, there was no sign of the storm. We made it to the clock tower, but there was no rumble of thunder, no flash of lightning.

“Maybe we’re early,” I said.

“We could climb up,” he suggested.

I shook my head, shivering at the thought of trying to climb those cobwebby stairs in the pitch-black night. “I’m sure here is close enough.”

And if it wasn’t, we could try again tomorrow.

We waited in silence, but still there was no storm, no rain, nothing. I marched on the spot, trying to stay warm.

“Here, take my jacket,” Tennyson said, but I waved him off.

“I’m fine,” I said.

He shook his head. “You’re always so stubborn.” He turned to face me, catching my hand, and suddenly I didn’t feel cold at all. “Lucy, you have to promise me something.”

I held my breath. I would’ve promised him anything, but I never found out what it was. The next moment, I blinked and woke up in my bed. It was morning. Again.

Chapter 11

I’d been super creeped out by the fact that there had been no storm, but Althea thought it was a good sign.

“Has the weather changed any other time?” she asked me over the picnic breakfast.

I was so sick of mini quiches, it broke my heart. My actual heart, not the heart pendant that Sam only gave to me sometimes, probably because I kept crashing the picnic breakfast with unpleasant news.

“We normally just stay in and research until I go back to the morning, so I haven’t noticed any big changes,” I said, trying to think. The storm had been so sudden and right before the loop reset, it seemed as if I’d notice if it was suddenly different, but I couldn’t recall noticing it any other time but the first. “I honestly can’t say for sure. I do know that Sam only transformed on that first night though.”

She nodded slowly, as if she was collating the data in her head. “Sam’s transformation was probably caused by the electricity in the air, that’s happened before and would explain why he’s been fine every time since. If the storm only occurred on the first day, before the loop actually began, that increases the likelihood of the storm being a product of the creation of the time loop.”

“Does that help us at all?” asked Sam. “If there’s no evidence at the clock tower of the time loop, then it doesn’t really tell us anything.”

It seemed as if it should be meaningful information, though, so I filed it away with all the other stuff I had to remember to tell them each day.

You look tired, said Tennyson.

Probably because I haven’t slept in about a zillion Fridays.

Even though my body woke up each morning after a full night’s sleep, I didn’t actually get to experience that sleep. I wonder if I’d go crazy, like those stories you hear about soldiers they keep hopped up on pills so they stay awake for weeks at a time when they’re on missions. It might not be affecting me physically, but I’d been around spooky stuff long enough now to know that the physical body wasn’t necessarily the main player. Maybe I needed sleep on a psychic level or something. I didn’t say that out loud, though, in case Sam decided we should meditate some more.

Can’t you nap?

If I nap, then the day resets.

That’s very depressing.

He wasn’t wrong, but it was better not to think about it.

“If we’ve exhausted all the research, then the only thing I can think to do is for Lucy to be inside the clock tower when the day resets,” said Althea. “Even if there’s no storm, maybe she needs to be there at the moment the loop is activated for the daily reset. Probably Tennyson, too, if the theory about him being linked somehow is true.”

“No way,” I said. “You clearly haven’t seen how spooky that clock tower is inside. There is no way I’m climbing those stairs in the dark. It’s a total death trap.”

“You could go early and wait,” said Sam.

“You’ll miss the dance,” said Nikolai. He’d eaten my share of the mini quiches and had moved on to the cakes. He was clearly on one of his stress eating days. “Not that it matters for you, really. But people will be disappointed if Tennyson isn’t there.”

Sam clearly didn’t care if I didn’t go to the dance either, but Althea looked disappointed.

“Nobody will even know tomorrow that I wasn’t there,” said Tennyson.

I was a little surprised that he agreed so easily. “It really smells,” I told him. “And it won’t be a very interesting way to spend the evening.”

He shrugged and pulled the plate of cakes away from Nikolai. “You’ll throw up shortcake all over your tux if you don’t stop. And I’m sure it won’t be any duller than watching a bunch of people circle around the dance floor.”

“If I can’t eat cake, I’m leaving,” Nikolai said. “I have to go and check on my hydrangeas, anyway.”

I drifted through the rest of the day without much of a goal. Messing with people seemed less fun now that I knew any of them could vanish at any minute. As much as I didn’t like most of my classmates, I didn’t want them sucked into my dad’s evil time vortex machine or anything. The others went to classes, so I went along too. I sat my history test and ate curry for lunch and listened to the biology lecture, but none of it seemed real. It seemed like a rehearsal.

I watched everyone else in my classes in a way I never would’ve before, actually noticing things about them. The way Olivia Hearst passed her charging bank over to Charlotte Du Pont when Charlotte’s laptop battery went flat without even looking up from her notes. The way Troy Hathaway went through and liked every single post on his grandmother’s Facebook page. I only ever thought of these people when their lives intersected with my own, but they were all real, actual human beings. They had families and friends and their own reasons for doing the things they did. It wasn’t fair for a giant pause button to be hit on their lives, even if they didn’t realize it. It wasn’t fair for their lives to be constantly in danger just because my father was a jerk.

After class, Tennyson and I went to the Golden House to watch the others get ready so we could head over to the dance with them.

“No, that won’t do at all,” Althea said when we started to go into the common room rather than get dressed. “Just because you don’t get to go to the dance doesn’t mean you should miss out on dressing up! Come on, that’s the best part!”

Tennyson gave in easily — years of being Althea’s brother had probably trained him to pick his battles. I didn’t want to be the only one in my school uniform, so I followed Althea into her room and let her do her thing.

“I get sent so many dresses from designers that I never get a chance to wear them,” she said. “If only I was the one stuck in the time loop so I could try them all out! Now, tell me which ones we’ve worn before, so at least one of us can wear something new.”

She chose a pale pink dress with a sweeping skirt and a lace overlay of silver flowers that made her shimmer like a fairy princess. Because I was going to be climbing a spooky tower, she decided I should wear black, and started flicking through all the black dresses on her rack.

“Something that will be easy to climb a rotting staircase in,” I suggested. “Nothing I’ll trip over in. And something warm! It gets really cold out there later.”

The dress she pulled out had a simple bodice with a sort of feathery ankle-length skirt, and a furry capelet to go over the top. I was worried it might make me look a bit like Jon Snow, but Althea assured me I’d look way more like Sansa.

“You look quite good in black,” said Althea. “Even though your skin is so pale. I like the dramatic contrast.”

“That’s probably only because you’re, like, a makeup wizard,” I told her.

She left my hair down, with only a few sections pulled back into some sort of braided bun thing that looked very complicated but took her about five seconds to do. With her own hair, she twisted it up into a series of crown braids that only added to the fairy princess effect, especially with the delicate jewelry she’d added — I was fairly sure that all those sparkles were real diamonds.

“We look stunning,” she said, staring at our reflections in the mirror once we were ready. “It’s such a waste that you’re going to be stuck in that tower in the dark. Alone with my brother. Just the two of you. Alone in the dark.”

She elbowed me in the ribs, just in case I hadn’t gotten her meaning. Which I had, loud and clear. It wasn’t the first time that she’d implied that kind of thing about me and Tennyson, but it was easiest just to ignore her. Anything she’d picked up on that had led her to such assumptions was from the soul bond, but it was impossible to explain that.

“I thought you were against that kind of thing,” I said. “You know, in case you end up as alpha.”

She blushed and turned away. I knew it wasn’t nice to remind her of something she felt guilty about, but at least it stopped her from making any other creepy comments about me and Tennyson.

When we got downstairs, she decided we needed to take a bunch of photos so that her awesome makeover wouldn’t be wasted. It seemed mean to remind her that the photos would just vanish in a few hours anyway.

We walked toward the dance together, the five of us. Nikolai was excited again and yelling about no tomorrow. This time, he was wearing a top hat and a monocle and was carrying a cane. Sam walked on up ahead with Tennyson, chatting quietly.

“It’s starting to get you down?” Althea asked.

“Sorry,” I said. “I don’t want to ruin your night with my moping.”

She shook her head, and her whole body made a tinkling sound. She really was the embodiment of a magical creature. “You don’t get to go to the dance. You should be allowed a little bit of moping.”

“It’s fine,” I said. “It’s just that all these things keep happening, but none of you remember them. It kind of feels like nothing’s real. I’m not real, you’re not real. None of this is going to have existed tomorrow. It’s going to be overwritten.”

“You’ll remember it,” she said. “So, it will still mean something. But I can see how it would become frustrating. And lonely.”

The boys were waiting for us up ahead, so we hurried to catch up, then Tennyson and I watched as the other three went off to the dance.

“Are you sorry you can’t go?” he asked as we began to walk toward the tower.

“I’ve been before,” I said. “You?”

“You obviously don’t read my blog,” he said. “The Spring Fling is at the very top of the ‘Worst Things About Spring’ list.”

“I thought Althea wrote your blog for you.”

“She’s always tried to take credit for my wit and charm.”

I raised my eyebrows at him. “Is that so? Does that mean the list of ‘Worst Things About Freshman Year’ was all you as well?”

“I have no memory of such a thing,” he said. “I do recall that around that time, my blog was quite frequently hacked by people with malicious intent.”

When I glanced at him from the corner of my eye, I caught the best of his secret smiles yet. It was almost too wide to be called secret, enough to bring out a half-dimple in his cheek.

Night was just beginning to fall as we reached the tower. We lit the flashlights on our phones, and Tennyson forced open the door.

“Perhaps you should take my hand as we climb,” he said. “For safety.”

We linked fingers, and he led me into the tower. Even with our flashlights, it was as if the shadows swallowed up any light. The tiny windows were coated in centuries of grime that made them too opaque for light to filter through. I’d thought with our enhanced vision, we’d be able to see a bit, but the darkness was impenetrable.

Tennyson climbed the stairs before me, his light aimed at the next step, and reached back for me. I aimed my light at our feet and kept a tight hold on him, scared that if I let go, I’d vanish into the darkness. There was no sound but our footsteps and our breathing, both of which became heavier the more we climbed. It seemed as if we were climbing forever with only that small circle of light to guide us, just the two of us clinging to each other within a vacuum.

When we finally came to the top of the stairs, it was almost a surprise. I’d been convinced we were stuck in an endless darkness together.

“Be careful,” he said, still not letting go of me and shining his light around the room. “There are broken bottles and other rubbish on the floor.”

It was too dark for him to see the floor without his light pointed directly at it.

“You remember?”

“I remember you standing by the clock with the light streaming in behind you,” he said. “The rubbish just seemed obvious.”

We made our way carefully across the room, slow, careful steps in the patches of clear floor. We’d brought a blanket to sit on, so when we reached the sofa, I took it from the tote bag I was carrying and spread it out over the filthy cushions. The smell was just as bad as before but he didn’t mention it, so I did my best to ignore it.

When we sat down, he took my hand again, and I didn’t object. I welcomed the comfort of it, and it didn’t mean anything. Pack members touched each other all the time. I knew Sam wouldn’t find anything weird about it. He knew I’d die before I betrayed him. If it did mean anything, all it meant was that we were comfortable with each other as pack members, whatever else Althea might think.

We arranged our phones so that one light shone toward us, illuminating our faces, and the other faced out into the room so we could see if anything weird happened.

“What else do you remember?” I asked him, mostly so we weren’t left alone in the darkness.

“Hmmm,” he said, tapping one of his long fingers against the back of my hand as he thought. “I remember you in that purple dress, dancing with Sam. I remember when you lost gravity. I remember when you spoke to your father.”

We both fell silent, thinking about what might happen – what would probably happen if we failed to get any useful information tonight.

“There is an eerie quality to this room that may make our wait uncomfortable,” Tennyson said.

“Don’t talk about it,” I told him, squeezing his hand tight enough to hurt. It was all too easy to imagine the ghost of Constantine Wilde appearing before us, resenting our presence in his grief. “Nope, not thinking about it.”

Tennyson huffed something too short to be a laugh. “I told you the legend of Rosalind and Constantine, didn’t I? When we came here before.”

“Jeepers, Tennyson. Don’t talk about it!” I lowered my voice to a whisper. “What if he can hear you?”

I suddenly felt as if we were in the prologue of a TV show, the two dumb kids who wander into a ghost-infested tower. Our guts would splatter all over the walls, and then the opening titles would flash up. I did not want to be those dumb kids.

“Oh, listen!” Tennyson said.

“Stop it!” I said, and tried to pull my hand out of his.

He gripped my hand tighter. “No, nothing like that. The dance!”

I let myself be quiet and focused on the world outside. Then it floated in, the music from the dance. If I concentrated, I could even hear the occasional peal of laughter or excited yell, but once I’d heard it, the music didn’t stop.

“That’s nice,” I said. It made me feel less as if we were alone.

We sat and listened, there on that filthy sofa, hand in hand and waiting for something to end.

I fell into a kind of lull, sinking against Tennyson’s side rather than the back of the sofa. He was warm and nice-smelling and surprisingly soft. I could just stay there in the dark with him. I was so tired. Tired of living the same day over and over. Tired of mini quiches and thoughtful gifts and forcing a smile. All I wanted was sleep.

“Don’t fall asleep,” Tennyson said softly. “The day will reset, and we don’t have long to wait now.”

“What time is it?” I asked. There was no way to judge in that room, where the passage of time seemed meaningless.

“Almost time for the reset,” he said. “Maybe fifteen minutes or so.”

I’d been out for longer than I’d thought. “Sorry,” I said. “I’m not the best company.”

“You’re not the worst,” he said.

The music outside had gotten louder, or maybe my thoughts were just quieter. It was a slow song, and there was something about it that made the hair on my arms prickle.

“We could dance,” said Tennyson. “Get your limbs moving so that you wake up. If something happens, you may need to be alert.”

His words made sense, so I agreed.

“Fine, but if I get tetanus from being stabbed by some stoner’s empty beer bottle, I will not be happy.”

“You’re a werewolf. You can’t get tetanus,” he said, pulling me to my feet.

“You said werewolf!” I said, slightly breathless from how tightly he was holding me. “The term is lycanthrope.”

I could feel every point where our bodies touched in heightened detail: the hard muscles of his forearm pressing into the small of my back, the solid bulk of his chest against mine, the way our fingers interlaced, his thumb softly stroking mine. His breath ghosted across my cheek, and I wondered at him that he could breathe at all; it seemed to me that all the air had been sucked out of the room.

“Nikolai said there’s no tomorrow,” he said lightly as we swayed from side to side.

“There is for me,” I said. “Always.”

He started to say something else, but then the music stopped. We both froze in place, waiting. There was no thunder. I could hear no rain, no sound at all outside of the room.

A blue light appeared, and Tennyson let go of me as he staggered and fell.

“Tennyson!” I yelled, grabbing him and trying to direct him onto the sofa.

The blue light grew brighter, and Tennyson started twitching. His eyes rolled back in his head, and the twitching became more violent until his entire body was convulsing. I stared at him helplessly. There was nothing I could do but make sure he stayed safely on the sofa and didn’t fall onto broken glass, but soon the convulsions became so strong that I could barely hold him down. The light grew brighter and brighter until it was almost blinding.

Tennyson stopped moving, his body frozen awkwardly in place, the whites of his eyes still showing.

“One has been taken,” he said in a voice that wasn’t his own.

He sagged back onto the sofa, and the light grew so bright that I couldn’t see at all.

Then I woke up, back in my bed. It was Friday morning again.

Chapter 12

“What do you mean, ‘one has been taken’?”

For once. it was Tennyson asking me the questions, not Althea. The five of us were sitting around the breakfast picnic again. Cakes and mini quiches again. Recapping all the previous Fridays again.

“You didn’t exactly go into detail as you were writhing around, foaming at the mouth.”

“Did he actually foam at the mouth?” Nikolai asked through a mouth full of mini quiche.

“No, but his eyes were rolled right back in his head like…” I tried to roll my eyes back so only the whites showed.

“Ew,” said Nikolai.

“Ew, yourself,” said Althea. “Eat with your mouth closed.”

“I suppose he meant that someone has gone missing,” said Sam. “We need to find out who.”

“Why?” asked Nikolai. “It’s not as if we can bring them back.”

“I suppose if we can find out who it is, we can possibly learn some details about the spell,” said Althea, going straight into deduction mode. “For example, if someone is missing, but nobody remembers who they are but Lucy, that would mean the magic is working retroactively as well. That’s an entirely different type of magic from simple time manipulation, much more malevolent. It would mean we couldn’t trust anything we know at all.”

“Just a moment,” said Tennyson. “Are we not going to address the fact that I somehow became a conduit for dark magic?”

I could sense his anxiety and what was behind it.

“It’s not your fault that someone is missing,” I said. “You didn’t cause them to be taken. You weren’t an instrument in it. You just delivered a message.”

Althea opened her mouth to say something, and I knew she was going to argue that we couldn’t know that was true. I shook my head slightly at her so she would know not to say it. If Tennyson was, as he’d said, a conduit, then it was likely that the “energy” my father had stolen, the human life, had travelled through him. He was in no way to blame, but the fact remained that energy couldn’t travel without a conductor.

“We just won’t go back to the clock tower again,” I said. “It had never happened before, and I’m sure it only did because we were at the place where the lightning struck.”

Althea opened her mouth to speak again and then bit her lip.

“So, for now, we should maybe research magic that uses a conduit to see if we can stop Tennyson from being used again, and find out who is missing. It’s best if you do that, Lucy. We might not know. Do you think your roommate might help you? You said she is stuck in the same way you are.”

When I thought about it, I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen Katie. She was never there when I woke up, and most of the time, I was with the Golden. She’d made it pretty clear she wanted nothing to do with me, so I hadn’t exactly been seeking her out. I’d just been assuming that she was part of my father’s plan and he’d gotten her out somehow, but if she was stuck the same as I was and not actually evil, it would be horrible for her. She didn’t have anyone else she could go to at school, not anyone who’d understand. Only me. And I totally hadn’t been there for her.

“I’ll find her and ask,” I said.

“I’ll help Lucy,” said Sam. “I can get all the class rolls and see who’s absent, and then Lucy can check them to see if anyone isn’t on there who should be.”

That actually took most of the work out of it for me, and I smiled at Sam gratefully.

Katie wasn’t in our room. She wasn’t in class. She wasn’t in the library or the forest or the lighthouse. I tried to track her by scent, but there was nothing. It was as if she hadn’t been anywhere on the island for a long time, definitely not that day.

“So, she’s evil,” said Nikolai. He was slumped in the biggest chair in the Golden common room, his legs dangling over the arm. It was one of his “life has no meaning” days, not a “no tomorrow”. Try as I might, I couldn’t find any factors that were consistent in causing one or the other, and I’d been through all possible variables.

“She might be the person who vanished,” I said, feeling like I needed to stand up for Katie. Nobody else there had ever liked her, and if she’d vanished, then my father hadn’t gotten her out. She’d been just as trapped as I was, and I hadn’t helped her at all.

“Even if she is, she’s still evil,” said Nikolai. “And if someone has to vanish, it’s better that it’s an evil someone.”

“It’s not better,” said Althea. “When something is that awful, there’s no better.”

Tennyson was barely speaking. He looked pale and preoccupied. I wished I could sit beside him, hold his hand and comfort him, but the closeness of the night before was gone. It had never happened. I couldn’t just assume that today’s Tennyson would welcome it.

Eventually, Sam came in with the class register and that day’s roll call. He’d already verified that everyone who was absent was genuinely absent and still on the island, so together the five of us went through the lists of names, cross-referencing them with all the class information we had. There was a spreadsheet on my laptop from the previous year that had everyone in the school listed, and they all matched up. There was nobody missing, not unless it was a freshman none of us knew. We scoured all the freshman information we could find, but everyone seemed to be there.

“So, it’s Katie,” I said, feeling sick to my stomach. When had I last seen her? What had I said? It was so long ago that I couldn’t even remember. I wondered where she was now, if she was still alive.

“Wow,” said Nikolai. “You are not lucky with roommates, are you? Maybe you should request a single room next semester so nobody else mysteriously vanishes. Oh, hey, I wonder if you’ll be the prime suspect in the investigation!”

“That’s enough, Nikolai,” said Althea. “This isn’t funny.”

“I know,” said Nikolai. “Any one of us could be next!” He slouched down farther into the chair so we could only see his hands and feet. “Help! Oh, no, I’m being eaten!”

“Enough!” said Tennyson, getting to his feet. There were dark shadows under his eyes, and he was even more pale than before. He glanced around at us, and all of a sudden, I knew exactly what he was thinking. He didn’t need to send anything through the bond; I just knew. He turned and fled from the room.

Without waiting even a second, I followed him. When I caught up with him, he was at the front door.

“Don’t you dare,” I said, the words so full of emotion that they stuck in my throat. “I know exactly what you’re thinking, and there is no way I’ll let you.”

“You can’t stop me, Lucy,” he said, sounding anguished. “I have to die, so I can’t be used to channel the magic or take anyone else’s life. It’s the only way to fix this. You know that.”

“I know nothing of the sort,” I told him. “If I have to shackle you in the dungeon myself, I’m not letting you sacrifice yourself. We’ll find another way.”

“There is no other way,” he said, his voice barely more than a whisper. His eyes pleaded with me to let him go, but I’d rather die myself.

“I’ll find a way,” I told him, using all my strength to pull him away from the door, back toward the common room.

But there was only one way. It was the only way there had ever been. If it was a choice between that or Tennyson’s life, it was really no choice at all.

I got him back into the room, and from the looks on everyone’s faces, I knew they’d heard every word.

“I have an idea,” I told them, pushing Tennyson down into a chair. “Do not let him out of your sight.”

My mind raced as I ran through the forest, trying to find some other way. We had tried everything, tapped out every resource at our disposal, left no stone unturned. Maybe some last-minute solution would pop into my head, something we’d overlooked, something all too obvious once we realized it, but there was nothing.

Nothing but surrender.

I hardened my heart as I climbed the stairs of the lighthouse.

I got to the top and picked up the phone. I could do this. My heart was hard like a lump of coal. I didn’t even have a heart. I was cold and numb and logical. I was so logical that I was Spock in The Wrath of Khan. Tears prickled my eyes, and I took a deep breath. I could do this. It was for Tennyson. It was for the pack. It was for the whole school, and their families and everyone who would miss them if they all suddenly vanished. The needs of the many had to outweigh the needs of the few. Or the one.

I hit the call button and wiped my eyes.

The sound of my father’s voice when he returned my call was like poison in my ear.

“Hello, my precious daughter! How goes it, this fine Friday?”

“Is Katie dead?” I asked him.

“Well, that depends on how you define death, I suppose. Does anyone really ever die? Does anyone ever really live? Something to think about during your endless days.”

Hard heart. The needs of the many. Deep breath.

“I accept your terms,” I told him. “But you have to agree to leave the pack alone after this. No more messing with them. And I want one more day. One final day to set everything right.”

The line was silent, and for a moment, I worried that he’d hung up, that he’d rejected my offer. Maybe he didn’t want me on his team anymore; maybe he just wanted to torture me. Then, finally, he laughed.

“That works for me,” he said. “It will give me time to gather the other leaders. Very well. Be at the bottom of the cliff below the lighthouse at 11:55 tomorrow night. But, Lucy, I warn you. Don’t try anything. I’m not the only one involved in this, and there are eyes on your brothers. At the first sign of funny business, those eyes will become daggers.”

“You’re really filling me with confidence about teaming up with you,” I told him. “Don’t worry, I have no intention of going back on this. 11:55 tomorrow, I’ll be there.”

I ended the call, then collapsed to the floor. My heart wasn’t hard. I could barely breathe. And putting the needs of the many before my own didn’t stop my tears.

Chapter 13

When I woke up on the last day, I was ready. This was the real Friday, the one that would stick. Everything had to be perfect.

I messaged Sam to say I was on my way, then hunted around under my bed for my box of precious things. It only took me a second to find what I wanted — a picture of Sam and me with my little brothers and his sister. It was in a white frame, and I’d hidden it away when I found out Sam was alive because I didn’t want him to see it and get sad. But if he was okay, if he’d dealt with everything enough to sort through his family’s things, then it was something he would appreciate. I dressed, then made the effort to brush my hair, and after thinking about it a second, I used some of Katie’s mascara and lip gloss. I’d looked so different after Althea’s makeovers that I kind of wanted to try it for myself, and it didn’t look terrible.

I got to the greenhouse in record time. It seemed kind of strange not to be meeting the whole pack there, but since it was the last day, I didn’t want them to know about the time loop. I wanted them to think it was just an ordinary Friday. It would be easier that way. I’d explain everything they needed to know to them another time, if there was one.

“Hey, sorry I’m late,” I said, sitting down beside Sam and kissing him on the cheek. It might be our last day together, so I’d be a real girlfriend for him to the best of my ability.

“Hey there,” he said, smiling at me with a slightly puzzled look on his face. “Are you okay?”

“Just excited about our triannual anniversary!” I said. “Is it triannual? Or quarter-annual?”

“Three months probably works,” he said, drawing back to look into my face. “Are you sure you’re okay? It’s really Lucy in there, right?”

I laughed and started piling food on my plate. After this, I’d probably never eat mini quiches again, so I could do it this one last time. “What do your werewolf senses tell you?”

“Well, you definitely eat like Lucy,” he said, laughing.

I wrinkled up my nose at him.

It was nice to hang out, just the two of us. Sam was so easy to be around when I didn’t have to worry about girlfriend stuff. Every time I reached out to try to touch him, he got that puzzled look again, so I stopped trying.

When we finished eating, I sat there awkwardly, waiting for him to bring out the pendant. When it seemed that he wasn’t going to, I pulled out the picture from my bag.

“I’m sorry it’s not wrapped,” I told him. “I know we didn’t talk about presents, but I wanted you to have this.”

A genuine smile broke out on his face when he looked at the picture.

“Is this the day we went to the beach?” he asked, looking up at me.

I nodded.

“We’re so young! Hamish is still a baby! You got so sunburned, remember?”

“I’ll never forget,” I said. “Those were practically third-degree burns!”

“It was a good day,” he said wistfully. “Thank you for this.”

He cradled the frame in his hands for a moment, then carefully placed it in the picnic hamper, arranging things around it so it would be safe.

“I actually have something for you, too,” he said.

I opened the box and took out the pendant, my eyes filling with tears. I blinked them back. If I lost control now, I wouldn’t be able to get through the day, and I had to do everything perfectly.

I could do it, I told myself. I’d had enough practice. I just had to not think about what would happen later, not wonder if this was the last time Sam and I could be like this — not just as a couple, but as friends and packmates. I’d lost Sam once before, and I’d thought it was the worst thing that could happen, but now I was going to lose everything.

“This is so thoughtful, Sam. I always loved this necklace.” I pulled my hair back and let Sam fasten it around my neck. “I’ll take good care of it.”

“Of course you will,” he said. “That’s why you’re the only girl I could ever give my plastic heart to.”

Where are you? Tennyson asked, right on cue. You’re late.

For a moment, I thought about not going to the assembly and just staying there with Sam. It would be nice to hang out for that extra half-hour. But I had to do everything properly, and this time, I was determined to listen to everything Assistant Head Noel said, no matter how boring it was. Any little clue that might drop could help, especially once I was behind enemy lines.

We’re on our way, I told him.

“Tennyson?” asked Sam. “You’ve got that vagued-out look.”

I nodded. “There’s some special assembly. Did you get a message about it?”

Sam shrugged. “I didn’t check. I suppose we should get going.”

We packed up the picnic, but before we left, I caught him by the arm. “Thank you. This was all super thoughtful.”

On the first day, I’d kissed him on the cheek, but today he was holding the picnic hamper between us in the crook of his elbow, and it would’ve been horribly awkward to even try.

“I’m glad you liked it,” he said, hurrying out the door as if he was afraid I’d try something.

There was no Katie waiting for me by the fountain. No Katie anywhere. If I’d just listened to her on that first day, none of this would’ve happened.

We made it to the assembly hall just as Assistant Head Noel started speaking. It was the same as every other time: the picture of Hannah, the hushed crowd. We were too far from Tennyson and the others to sit near them, so we hung in the back. It was hard to stay focused on the speech. He really said a lot of words without saying anything. But my efforts were rewarded.

“…Body found on the coast near the town of Portsea…”

Portsea. That was where Katie and I had gone on the day we snuck out of school, where we’d met up with the other kids whose parents worked with ours. It had only been a tiny town, but I remembered the sign as we rode in. There was no way that could be a coincidence. Even if it hadn’t really been Hannah’s body, it had been somebody’s body, and it was connected to my father’s work.

“Are you okay?” Sam whispered.

I forced a smile and nodded. I couldn’t think about it right now. It was my father’s corporation that had planted the body, that was trying to stop anyone from looking for her. It wasn’t the Others at all. This was something important, something I’d need to think over carefully from all angles, and I couldn’t do that just yet.

When the assembly ended, Sam went off to class, but there was something else I had to do first.

“Fatima!” I said, pushing through the crowd to get to her. “Wait up.”

When she saw me, for a moment she hesitated, as if she was going to pretend she hadn’t seen me right to my face. But it was only for a moment. I pulled her aside into a little alcove.

“Don’t believe any of that,” I whispered to her. “It was all lies. Hannah is alive. Don’t look at me like I’m crazy, I have proof. She’s alive, and I’m going to find her.”

Fatima looked torn, but then she sighed. “This is one of those weird things that happen here and nobody ever talks about, isn’t it?”

I nodded.

“Well, I don’t want to be involved in it, whatever it is. But thanks for telling me. I hope you’re right and that you find her.”

She gave me a tight smile, then turned and rejoined the crowd. It hardly seemed as if she cared one way or another, but I figured that was just her way. She was always super abrupt, but she was honest as well.

I hurried to get to history class, and this time I aced the test. I sat through algebra, and at lunch I ate the curry and listened to Althea and Nikolai talk about the dance. It was all so normal that it made my heart ache.

In biology, I took notes so diligently that Tennyson thought I was angry with him, and I had to spend the last half of class convincing him that I wasn’t.

After class, I went back to my room. It seemed strangely empty without Katie there, even though I’d been avoiding her for months before the loop. The first time, I’d gathered up things I might need for the dance, but this time, I packed the things that I couldn’t leave behind. A picture of my family. Tennyson’s old hoody. Nothing that would make my father suspicious, but things that would remind me of what I was leaving behind, why I was doing this. I couldn’t guarantee I’d ever be back here, so I had to prepare.

I was just deleting my browser history when a Skype call came through. It startled me so badly that I whacked my leg on the edge of the desk. It was my brothers, a call from outside the loop. This meant that it was truly over. My father had kept his word.

“You guys…” I said as my brothers’ faces appeared. I’d never gone so long without talking to them before, and now they were right in front of me. “Look at you guys.”

They exchanged a glance that I’d seen a million times before, their “Lucy is crazy” look. I’d obviously gone crazy with missing them, because I found even that adorable.

“We need to talk to you about something,” said Liam.

I dropped into the chair, remembering what the call had been about on the first day.

“About Sam,” I said.

Liam nodded.

“You’re a big stinky liar, Lucy!” said Hamish. He grinned at me.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you that Sam was still alive,” I said. I braced myself for their reactions, but I had to tell them the truth. The time had finally come. “Sam’s family – they were mixed up in something very dangerous, and I didn’t want our family involved. But you have to listen to me.” I met Liam’s eyes, and he leaned forward in his seat. “Our father was involved too. He still is. I understand if you want to stay in contact with him, but you need to be careful. Don’t accept anything from him. If you meet him, do it in a public place with a lot of people around. Don’t let anyone into the house until you hear from me again unless they know the code word, even if they’re someone you know. The code word is…” I tried to think of something meaningful but random. “The code word is Constantine. If they don’t say that, lock the doors and call the police right away. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Liam stared at me for a long moment and then nodded.

“I think so,” he said.

“We’ll be careful,” said Fletcher.

“Tell Tennyson, where is my bike!” said Hamish. “I need a bike!”

“I have to go, and I don’t know when I’ll be able to contact you again,” I told them. “If you don’t hear from me after a week, contact Tennyson. I’ll send you his number. He and the others will look after you if anything happens to me.”

“Anything like what?” asked Liam. His eyes looked panicked, like he’d just woken up from a nightmare. “What’s going on?”

“I have to go stay with our dad for a while,” I said. “I don’t know how long.”

“Tell him I want a bike too!” said Hamish. “Two bikes! And a puppy!”

“I’ll contact you as soon as I can,” I told them. “And just because I’m gone is no excuse to eat burgers for every meal!”

I hung up before they could reply. It felt awful to worry them like that, but it was better that they be worried and cautious than ignorant and dead. I shut down my computer, took a last look at my room, then left so I would have time to stash my bag near the lighthouse before getting ready for the dance.

Everything was all in a flurry when I got to the Golden House. Nikolai was running around shirtless, singing to himself, and Althea was buried under a pile of dresses. This time, she dressed me in a pale silver dress that was so light and floaty, it seemed as though it was made of moonbeams and flower petals. She pinned up my hair with delicate little pins that sparkled when I moved. For herself, she chose a vintage beaded golden dress that swished when she walked and had apparently been worn by some old Hollywood actress at some iconic moment. She had a long wrap to match and white gloves and pearls, and with her hair curled and her makeup done, she really looked as if she could’ve stepped out of some old movie.

Nikolai had gone for the top hat and monocle look again, which suited him the best of all the outfits I’d seen him in. Tennyson and Sam both looked perfect, even though their outfits never changed. For the first time, I actually felt filled with anticipation about the dance.

“Tonight is going to be perfect,” I said as the five of us headed out.

“Of course it is,” said Nikolai. “I organized it.”

I was pleased that he’d waited for us instead of going ahead as he did sometimes. I liked it best when the five of us were together. As the music filtered through the gardens toward us, that night in the tower came rushing back to me, particularly the feeling of Tennyson holding me so close. That would never happen again, not after what I was planning to do.

But I was wrong.

Because this was the last Friday, I danced with Sam. I danced with Nikolai. And when Althea pushed us together, I danced with Tennyson. I stood rigid in his arms for a moment, terrified that he would remember. I didn’t know enough about that kind of magic to know if once the loop was broken, all the effect it had had on him would be gone too. But if he did remember, he didn’t show it at all.

If you don’t want to dance with me, don’t, but it’s a little ridiculous to just stand there.

“Sorry,” I said, and started moving.

Of course it was a slow song, though less haunting than the one in the tower had been. This song felt bittersweet.

A light flashed in front of us, and Tennyson let out a low growl.

“For the yearbook,” said the person behind the camera, leaving again before our eyes could adjust.

It seemed so bizarre to me suddenly that a moment in time could be captured like that, held frozen forever.

You seem strange today. Not yourself.

There was a lie on the tip of my tongue. Tell him I’m upset about Hannah. Tell him something else. Anything but the truth. But I never wanted to lie to him.

I think it’s just that I’ve finally started to realize what it means to be part of a pack.

He smiled. A real, actual smile. Such a smile that erased all the others from the tally I’d been keeping in my heart. It lit up his entire face, made him glow. That smile was like sunshine. And it was for me.

He tightened his arm around my waist. I’m glad, he said.

I was glad too, even if it couldn’t last.

Chapter 14

I made an excuse when everyone was distracted by Nikolai starting a conga line and slipped away. I’d be cutting it close to meet my father on time, but the thought of leaving had been so unbearable that I’d had to summon up every last bit of resolve to drag myself away. I had to do this, for my family and for my pack. There was no choice.

The forest had never looked so dreary, and the night air was chilling. I tried to trick myself into thinking this was nothing out of the ordinary, just some foresty hijinks, but with every step, my heart grew heavier. The more I tried to think of some way out of this, the more impossible it seemed. I had no idea what would happen once I met up with my father. The last time he’d taken me away, it hadn’t gone well. He’d drugged me and tried to have his creepy science experiments done on me before I managed to escape. This time, I couldn’t even try to get away, not without endangering my family. It was like one of those traps where the more you struggle, the tighter the ropes pull in around you.

I came out of the forest near the lighthouse. It shone out into the night like a symbol of the steadfast and true, calling home the lost. In reality, it had been nothing like that for me. It had always been a place of woe. Nothing good ever happened there. I’d been kidnapped, betrayed and cursed. Maybe it wasn’t such a bad thing that I was leaving the school. It hadn’t exactly been a walk in the park.

As I approached the cliff, something grabbed me from behind. I yelped, not even able to get out a full scream before the familiar woodsy scent overwhelmed me.

Tennyson.

His strong arms wrapped around me, pulling me in to him, my back pressed against his chest. I closed my eyes. Just for a moment, I forgot everything else. Why I was there, why he had come after me, all of it. I just let the moment be. He was so warm, so strong. I could rest there, inside his arms, and everything would be fine.

But that was a lie.

If I stayed there, it would destroy us all.

“I know what you’re doing,” he said quietly, so close to me that the words rumbled against my skin. “You’re going to your father. You’re leaving the pack.”

“You can’t stop me,” I whispered. “I have to do this.”

He tightened his arms around me. “There has to be another way.”

“There isn’t. We’ve tried everything.”

“I remember,” he said quietly. “I remember everything.”

“You have to forget,” I told him. “There’s too much at stake here. The pack. My family. You. I can’t risk all that. You have to let me go.”

I had to leave. I couldn’t keep my father waiting. But there was no way I could pull away from him.

I turned in his arms, holding on to the lapels of his jacket and looking up into his face. Even though my own misery was reflected in his eyes, I thought he’d never looked more beautiful.

“I told my brothers you’d watch out for them, if I can’t come back.”

He nodded. “Of course.”

My father said there were men watching them. I gave them a code word so they know who to trust. Constantine.

“I’ll make sure they’re safe,” he said, his voice low.

“I’m going to destroy him,” I whispered. “If it’s the last thing I do.”

Tennyson shook his head. Just come back, he said.

I closed my eyes and leaned in to him, my forehead resting on his chest. I wanted to memorize every detail of this moment. I didn’t know when or even if I’d see him again, and even if I did, nothing would be the same. We wouldn’t be pack. If my father had his way, we might not even share our bond.

The thought of the bond being severed was so terrifying to me that I couldn’t think about it, not if I wanted to function. So, I focused on his warmth, his smell, the softness of his jacket under my fingers, his hand on the back of my head. If I could, I would melt into him, become a part of him, then nothing could ever take me away from him again. He was more to me than pack. More than family. He was something there was no word for.

I breathed out a shaky breath and then pulled away.

“Portsea,” I said. “The town where they found the body they claim was Hannah. Katie took me there to meet some others whose families are involved in my father’s company. I’m not sure if that’s where they’ll take me, but there’s definitely something there that needs to be looked into.”

He nodded but didn’t say anything.

“Once I leave, I’m not sure how long until…” I shook my head. I couldn’t say it. “You may not be able to sense me. I probably won’t be able to communicate with you. It’s safer if you don’t look for me.”

He grabbed me by the shoulders, shaking me lightly. “You know I can’t promise that. Wherever you are, whatever he does to you, I will find you. I won’t stop until you’re safe.”

“There’s no point in me doing this if you’re just going to get yourself killed,” I told him. I stepped away from him, smiling. “Idiot. Go back to the dance. Have fun. Forget about me.”

I turned, picked up my bag from the bushes, and walked away from him, but before I got to the edge of the cliff, he called out my name. I turned back hesitantly, not sure I’d be able to turn away a second time.

“You’re like the moon tonight,” he said. “You’re beautiful. You’re glowing, and you changed me.”

I had to turn away so he couldn’t see the tears shining in my eyes. I turned away, and I vanished over the cliff.

Chapter 15

It wasn’t my father waiting at the bottom of the cliff, but two people dressed all in black with hoods pulled low over their faces. They didn’t speak; they simply directed me into a boat and sped me away from the island. I sat silent, numb with cold and fear and misery. I had no idea where I was going or what would happen when I got there. I only knew what I was leaving behind. Tennyson’s words echoed in my head, and I clung to them like a talisman.

When we got back to land, they herded me into the back of a van, and my fear started to overtake everything else. It wasn’t only fear of the unknown, of what lay ahead, though I doubted anyone was ever taken anywhere good in the back of an unmarked van. It was fear of the thing inside me, of that ever-changing power. I could feel it stirring, and the greater the distance I was taken away from my pack, the stronger the stirring became. The last time it had exploded, I’d been able to channel it into something productive, something beautiful, and I’d made the golden tree. I doubted anything could grow in the place I was going.

It seemed like we spent hours in that van. I’d barely eaten since lunch, just a few nibblies at the dance, nothing substantial. It seemed too much to hope that my father would have a welcome feast ready for me.

Finally, the van stopped, and the minions dragged me out.

We were inside some sort of nondescript warehouse, a big room with concrete walls. I could’ve been anywhere in the world. As far as evil lairs went, it was disappointing. They led me through a door and then down a series of hallways, all equally indistinguishable. Finally, we went through another door and into an office, where my father was sitting behind a large but mostly bare desk. He said something to the lackeys in a language I couldn’t even identify, and they backed out through the door, leaving the two of us alone.

My father wasn’t looking so good. There were big puffy bags under his eyes, and he had broken capillaries all over his face. Maybe his work was getting to him. Or the strain of the time loop had been too much. It served him right.

“I’m glad you could make it, Lulu. You look very pretty.”

I sat down in the chair opposite him, folding my arms over my chest. “So, what’s the plan, here? Are you going to keep me in a cell like last time, too drugged up to move?”

He shook his head. “No. You’re here of your own free will, and I’m sure you’ve been given enough incentive to follow procedure.” He picked up a glossy pamphlet and held it out to me. “This is the company handbook. The ceremony will take place in a few days, on the Spring Equinox. Try to have it memorized by then. It’s going to be a big event. All the leaders will be there, a lot of very important people. It would be nice if we could impress them.”

I didn’t take the stupid handbook from him, so he placed it on the edge of his desk. “A lot rides on you doing your part here, Lulu. Please understand.”

“If you hurt my brothers, I’ll kill you,” I told him, using the full measure of my powers to impress him with how serious I was. “If you hurt my pack, I’ll torture you and then kill you. Please understand.”

His eyes widened a little, so I knew he knew I wasn’t kidding.

I crossed my legs and leaned back in my chair. “Got any food?” I asked. “Your lackeys weren’t exactly hospitable.”

He nodded and pressed a button on his phone. “I’ll have someone show you to your room, and they can bring you something. We’ll talk more in the morning.”

But in the morning, he was nowhere to be found.

My room wasn’t a cell. It was more like a cheap hotel room with a small bathroom. The door wasn’t even locked. I figured there must be silver or something in the walls, because I couldn’t feel the pack bond or communicate with Tennyson. The lackeys had searched my bag and confiscated my phone, but everything else was in there, so I showered and changed and then decided to go exploring.

Exploring, I soon realized, was not as easy as it sounded. All the hallways looked identical. I’d tried to memorize the way from my father’s office to my room, but when I tried to get back there, I was in a hallway with no doors. I decided to keep wandering at random, and at some point I’d find something interesting. The place was cold, almost refrigerated, but at least Tennyson’s hoodie was so oversized on me that the sleeves fully covered my hands. I let the familiar smell comfort me, determined to keep on in the inhospitable environment. Most of the doors were locked, and the ones that weren’t led to storage closets or empty rooms, but I kept going. The place wasn’t infinite; at some point, I’d have to either come back to my room or find something interesting.

I found an elevator that had buttons down to seven stories’ worth of basements, but I needed a swipe pass to go to another floor. Maybe all the interesting stuff was somewhere else, and that’s why I was allowed to walk around freely, but there had to be emergency stairs somewhere, surely.

The whole time I wandered, I felt that power swirling inside me. It was as if it was held inside an egg, almost ready to be born and giving the first few tentative taps as it woke up. Even if the power was ready, I sure wasn’t. I didn’t want an egg full of power, though I sure would like an omelet.

Or anything.

Maybe not mini quiches.

Most of the doors looked the same, all painted an ugly bottle green, so when I came to one that had a symbol on it, a triangle with a small circle above the top point, it really stood out. Even with my powers being repressed, I could sense that whatever was behind that door was important. It was powerful.

The door was locked, of course, but I had super strength. Maybe if I forced it, I could get it open. I jiggled the handle, trying to work out which was best, to push or pull, when a lackey appeared beside me and started ushering me away.

“So, there’s something really good in there, hey?” I said.

The lackey didn’t respond. I wondered if my father had cut their tongues out or something. I pressed myself close to the wall as we walked, popping a claw out from my oversized sleeves to mark the wall with a cut each time we turned a corner. I needed to see inside that room. I’d just need to be more sneaky about it.

We ended up back at my father’s office. Like the night before, the lackey left, and I sat in the chair.

“I was looking for the breakfast buffet,” I told him. “The service here is not good. I give it one star.”

“There’s a bell in your room. If you need anything, you can ring. If you’d read the handbook, you’d know that.”

I sighed and picked up the handbook, which was still on the edge of the desk. I might as well read it, I figured. It was days until the ceremony, and it wasn’t as if they had Netflix.

“Your evil lair is super boring,” I told him. “You should look into some interior design ideas. You know, you can restyle your home without breaking the bank. Katie used to love those home makeover shows. Maybe if you hadn’t killed her, she could’ve given you some tips.”

“I quite like the spartan look,” he said, ignoring the point I’d been trying to make. “I find it encourages productivity. If there’s nothing to stimulate the mind, the mind stimulates itself. It’s an ex-military facility, you know, so it’s perfect for our needs. After the last time you visited, I figured we couldn’t be too careful. The walls have been reinforced with silver, in case you changed your mind, but that’s obviously not for decoration.”

I shrugged but didn’t say anything, hoping that if I stayed silent, he’d keep talking. He was the kind of guy who loved the sound of his own voice.

“Your mother and I used to argue about that all the time. She loved to pick up little knick-knacks and things, but they were just clutter. How is she?”

I shrugged. “I’ve been at school all year, but apparently you’ve been keeping in touch with the family, so you tell me.”

“I haven’t been to the house,” he said. “And your brothers are very obstinate boys.”

I smiled, proud of my stubborn little buttheads.

“They wouldn’t give me any information about her, but surely they’d tell you if her condition had changed.”

I narrowed my eyes. He seemed way too invested in this. “What did you do?” I asked him. “What did you do to my mother?”

He shrugged. “Nothing. Not for a long time, anyway. I’m merely observing.”

Suddenly, I was sick of his BS. I had to be there. I had to go along with his ceremony. I didn’t have to be civil about it.

“Where’s Katie?” I asked him. “And where’s Hannah Morgan? I know you’ve got her. You didn’t fool anyone with that faking her death stunt. You know, there’s a word for old men who kidnap young girls and use them for their own amusement.”

I expected some sort of flippant comment, but his gaze slid off to the left for a moment before he collected himself. It was no surprise that he was hiding something, but he was worried, and that meant I was close. I wondered how close, exactly.

“What did Katie’s parents say when they discovered what you’d done to her?” I asked, hoping that the more I pushed, the more he’d give away, but I’d gone too far.

“It was their idea,” he said, smiling coldly. “Everyone who works for the corporation is equally committed. We know when we sign up that there may be sacrifices. I knew. Ruby Spencer also knew.”

My blood ran cold at the mention of Sam’s mother, but I needed to push as much as I could.

“She’s not dead, either, is she?”

I held my breath, waiting for his answer.

“You know the answer to that, don’t you?” he said. “You know that she’s like you, that you’ll become what she became.”

He couldn’t conceal the nasty edge beneath his words. It was refreshing to have him be honest with me for a change.

“The Others,” I said.

He nodded.

“What are they?” I asked him. “What are we?”

For a moment, I thought he wouldn’t answer. His face was like thunder. But then he relaxed, and his smile was sharp enough to cut.

“You’re experiments gone wrong. You have that strange gene, yes; that was why you were selected to take part in the program, but you didn’t react as we’d hoped. You, Ruby Spencer, others like you. All the Others.”

“You created them,” I said. “You made them into monsters.”

He nodded. “They evolved and gained more and more power until we couldn’t control them. We had no way of holding them, and when they broke free, we had no way to get them back. Most of our resources are now taken up with trying to hunt them, rather than applying them to our original objective, but I’m hopeful that we’ll soon be back on track. Once they’re back under our control, we will be unstoppable.”

His words made the power inside me rise up as if it was ready to strike out at its creator. I wanted to let it. I wanted to tear him down, along with his whole evil organization.

“What gives you the right?” I asked him through gritted teeth.

He shrugged. “Nobody ever actually gives you rights. You have to take them.”

I was thinking seriously about taking away his right to breathe.

“What are you trying to do here?” I asked him. “What is the point to any of this?”

“Isn’t it obvious? We need to create the perfect being. Something pure and flawless that we can use to eradicate all the dirty creatures that parade around wearing human faces.”

His eyes shone with cold hatred.

My father was basically Hitler. Well, that was just great.

Chapter 16

I spent the next few days alternately reading the handbook and plotting how to get into the room with the symbol on the door. The handbook was terrifying. I hadn’t been far off mark with the Hitler thing. There was a lot of stuff in there about purity and cleansing, and it was disgusting. I didn’t need to memorize that kind of garbage. I’d hoped there would be something useful in there, something that would help me get out of this whole mess, but it was all racist propaganda against non-humans. There was even a list of “preferred terminology” so people could perfect their racist slurs. If Tennyson was offended by the word werewolf, I couldn’t imagine what he’d do if someone called him a mangy mutt, and that was one of the tamer ones. Still, I learned the whole thing by heart, even though it made me sick. It was always better to know your enemy.

Getting into the room would be easy enough, I decided; I just needed the right timing. The hallways were obviously being watched. Nobody had appeared while I was wandering around. I’d seen a few of them here and there, going about their business, but they’d all left me alone until the moment I tried to enter the room. The corridor had been empty moments before, so it made sense that there were cameras. I took a few short walks, several times a day, following the scratch marks I’d put on the walls. The cameras were small and subtle, but once I knew what to look for, I noticed that they were at the points where the hallways intersected, facing in each direction. There was also one in my room. It gave me the willies to think of those creepy old men watching me. I decided to only get changed in the bathroom, after I’d done a thorough search for cameras in there.

So, I needed to avoid the cameras and then get into the room. My plan was to knock out one of the lackeys and steal their clothes. That way, I could walk the hallways without anyone caring where I went. The problem with that plan was that I’d need to do it without it being caught on the camera in my room. I had no internet to hack into it, and it would seem obvious that I was up to something if the camera in my room suddenly stopped working.

Once I was at the door, I was sure I could force it open, providing it wasn’t booby-trapped with silver. I just needed to iron out those few minor details. I figured I still had a day or so before the ceremony to figure it out. Right before the ceremony would be the best time to do it, when everyone was distracted.

One of the lackeys entered my room without even knocking. I thought they were bringing me my lunch, but this one actually spoke.

“It is time,” it said in a voice that sounded neither female nor male, neither young nor old. “Leave everything and come with me.”

I started to panic. The power inside me spiraled out of control, as if it was reaching out for something safe to latch on to. As if it was searching for Tennyson. The power seemed to cry for him in a way that I couldn’t. But he wasn’t there. He could never be. Even his scent had faded from his hoody.

“But it’s not until tomorrow,” I said, standing in the middle of the room and staring at the lackey stupidly. “It’s too early.”

The lackey said nothing more, just turned and walked out of the room as if they trusted that I’d follow. Which I did. I didn’t exactly have many alternatives.

“Where are we going?” I asked the lackey, hoping that since this one actually had a tongue, they’d answer me. “Do you know what the ceremony actually involves?”

My hopes were in vain. The lackey kept walking as if I wasn’t even there. It led me into the elevator and down to the bottom floor. That seemed like a bad sign.

The doors opened, and we stepped out onto what could only be described as a large viewing platform. It was dimly lit, with men in suits gathered near the back, interspersed with a few scientists wearing white coats and holding clipboards. There was a glass wall at the front of the room, with rows of chairs lined up facing it. The lackey walked toward the glass wall, where my father was standing alone, looking down at something below. I’d thought that, if anything, he’d been schmoozing with the bigwigs, but he seemed lost in thought.

As I approached him, I could see what he was looking at: a large, white-tiled room with a series of symbols painted on the tiles. Creepy symbols, like they wanted to summon Satan. Only, that kind of evil was probably too low-level for them.

“Oh, Lucy, you’re here. Good.” My father nodded distractedly. He hardly seemed to notice where he was. “All the preparations are in order,” he said to the lackey. “Take her to be cleansed.”

“I don’t want to be cleansed,” I told him. Cleansing sounded painful and not fun. “I’m plenty clean enough as it is.”

He nodded again, turning back to the window. “Good, good.”

The lackey led me out a door and down some stairs into a dimly lit room that must have been off to the side of the tiled room.

“Enter,” it said. “Bathe. When light returns, dry by the air and dress in the sacred robe, then enter the white altar.”

For a moment, I didn’t take in what it had said. Its speech pattern was a little strange, and I wondered why. It had no identifiable gender, no distinct way of walking, nothing defining about it at all. I wondered if it even had a face under that hood. The thought struck me that maybe this was another failed experiment. My father clearly required obedience from his creations, and this one did exactly as it was told.

The lackey gestured for me to enter the room, and I did, but I really didn’t want to. Terrible things were about to happen, and if I could delay the start of them for long enough, I’d never have to go through them. The lackey turned and left the room, closed the door firmly and left me there alone.

It was a small room with a round pool in the middle. There were dome-shaped lamps set into the walls, giving off a warm glow. A strange humming noise came from them. To the left of the stairs was a door that obviously led out to the tiled room. On the opposite wall was a hook with a robe hanging from it, and beneath it a bin for my old clothes. There were mounds of salt scattered in the corners of the rooms, with more symbols drawn into them.

The humming got louder, and two long pipes lowered down and began to expel clouds of smoke. I was fairly sure they hadn’t gone to all this trouble just to gas me first thing, and if that’s what they were doing, there wasn’t a lot I could do about it. The smoke smelled citrusy and not terribly lethal, so I figured it was just another part of their dumb cleansing ritual.

After a brief but thorough look for cameras, I undressed and stepped into the pool. The water was warm but not hot, and I could smell the salt vapors coming off it. The pool was big enough for me to starfish out and not even touch the sides. In other circumstances, it might have even been nice.

The water was deep, about waist height, and because of all the salt, I was quite buoyant in it. It was impossible not to float; it actually took quite a bit of effort to keep my limbs under water. I just went with it, letting the water take my weight. Occasionally, I’d bump into the sides, but then float off again into the center. I tried to forget everything outside of the pool for a moment and drift.

Then the lights went out.

I reacted instinctively, thrashing around and getting salty water in my eyes and up my nose as I tried to crouch in a defensive position. My eyes stung, which made them water, which made them sting even more. I wanted to wipe my face, but there was no towel, only my clothes, and I wasn’t sure I could find them in the absolute dark.

I went completely still. They couldn’t shut off my hearing, so if someone was in there with me, if they were to somehow enter, I’d at least hear it. And even with the citrusy smoke, I’d be able to scent them.

With that thought, I began to relax a little. If someone were to enter, they’d let in some light. It would be impossible for me not to know. There had been nobody there when I’d entered, and there was nowhere for them to be concealed. Even all the silver embedded into this place couldn’t dull my innate senses. Nobody was about to attack me. I wasn’t under threat. At least, not any threat that I was unaware of.

I lay back again and floated on the water. In the complete darkness, it felt as if I was in space, weightless and staring into infinity. My mind began to empty, but at the same time, in that moment I was aware of everything. Everything made sense. I had complete clarity. I somehow knew that everything that had happened and everything that would happen was part of a larger plan. Everything was as it should be. Things had happened exactly as they were supposed to. I could see it all laid out before me, in the vastness of space. I could see my part in it, and everyone else’s part. And everything was beautiful.

I had no idea what that smoke was that they were pumping in there, but it sure had relaxed me.

In the darkness, I saw the five of us, our little pack within a pack. We shone like tiny lights, like multi-colored fireflies, red and blue and green and purple and yellow. We flickered around each other, pulsating. I wanted to reach out and touch those lights, but I felt too relaxed to move.

The power inside of me spoke, and I knew it wasn’t my enemy. It was just another part of me. I had to accept it, to grow with it, so I could become who I was meant to be. That wasn’t scary or evil; it just was.

We have a job to do, it told me. Let me help you do it.

I wanted to know more about the job. I wanted to know everything the power could tell me. I had access to all the secrets of the universe, right there in front of me, and I wanted all of them. But before I could immerse myself further, the lights came back on.

I blinked in confusion. I’d completely forgotten where I was. It felt as if I’d been gone for a lifetime but also only for a few seconds. As I came back to myself, I noticed that humming sound again. It had been there the whole time, but I’d tuned it out. Everything was as it had been, but I felt different.

Slowly, I climbed out of the pool. I felt light-headed, so I leaned against the wall. The lackey had told me to air dry, I remembered. That felt like it had happened long ago. Already, the details of what I’d seen, the things I’d known, were slipping away. All I remembered were the fireflies and the feeling of total wellbeing. The power inside me seemed stronger than ever, and I wondered if that had been my father’s intention, or if that quiet part of me that had woken up in there was just trying to protect me.

The salt dried on my skin and I brushed it away, then pulled on the robe. I couldn’t put this off any longer.

This was it. The ceremony was about to begin.

As I opened the door out of the room, I could feel all the eyes in the viewing room looking down at me. I pulled the damp robe tighter around myself. The starkness of the room terrified me. I didn’t want to enter it. It seemed too white, as if anything that touched it would fade into the whiteness. It was the same feeling I’d felt in the darkness of the tower with Tennyson, only at the same time, completely the opposite. The symbols stood out starkly against it, the bright red of fresh blood.

I glanced up at the viewing room and saw my father staring down at me. A few of the scientists and men in suits had taken their seats, but he was still standing. It looked as if he was waiting for something, probably for me to try to escape. But that time had passed. There was no way out of this now. I wondered if that had been why the ceremony was earlier than I’d expected, so that I’d run out of time for any escape I might’ve planned.

There was no point thinking about it now. The only way left for me to save my family and my pack was to go through with this, like I’d promised.

One of the lackeys pointed me toward the blood symbols, and another positioned me in the right place. This was it. It was really about to happen, but it didn’t feel real. The power inside me thrashed around, trying to break out, trying to end this, but I couldn’t let it. Not yet. I had to go through with the ceremony, or this all would be for nothing.

There were a lot of lackeys now, and they formed a circle around me, beyond the edge of the symbols. Except for one, who stood in front of me.

I don’t know what possessed me to do it. Maybe it was some small form of rebellion. Maybe it was curiosity. Maybe I thought that after the ceremony, I’d never get the chance to do it again, but I reached forward and pushed back that lackey’s hood.

“Katie?” I said, my voice breaking a little.

Only it wasn’t Katie, not really. Her eyes were completely white, like Tennyson’s had been when he was channeling her energy. There was no recognition on her face, nothing that showed she was even aware that I’d pulled off her hood, or where she was or what was happening. She wasn’t Katie anymore. I didn’t even know if she was alive. My father had burned up everything that made her Katie when he used her life to maintain the spell. Every one of my enhanced senses said that Katie was gone and now she was just a shell. I understood now what my father had meant when I’d asked if Katie was alive and he’d given me that cryptic response.

I bit down on a sob. I wouldn’t let them see me react to this, not all those awful men up there who had done this to her, who were doing this to me. But I’d get them back for it. I’d make them pay.

She grabbed my arm and pulled back the sleeve of my robe, then, before I could do anything, she slashed a knife across my skin. I cried out and grabbed my arm, trying to stop the bleeding, but there was too much. The blood streamed out, dripping down onto the older blood of the symbols, bright, wet red against the darker dried. And as my blood flowed down, the symbols began to glow.

Katie stepped back, moving to join the circle, and the lackeys started to chant. I couldn’t understand what they were saying. It didn’t sound like any language of this world. The louder they chanted, the brighter the symbols glowed.

And then the pain hit me. I thought I’d felt pain before, but that was nothing compared to this. It felt like tendrils of fire had wormed their way into every atom of my body. They wrapped around me, through me, until they had me in their grasp, and then they pulled.

I dropped to the floor, writhing in pain, screaming, but the pain didn’t stop. On and on it went, until it became the only thing that existed, the only thing that had ever existed. Up and up it built, but it never reached a crescendo; it just built higher. There was no end to it. I thought that at some point, I’d black out, but that point never came, only more pain. The tendrils became knives, stabbing at me, shredding my flesh, gouging out my innermost parts. They took and they took until I had nothing left to give. When I was finally empty, the pain stopped.

It was a different kind of waking up than coming out of the pool. That had been coming into light; this was looking out from the darkness. I’d thought that the silver in the building had stopped me from feeling the pack bond, but now that the bond was truly gone, I realized that it had only been muted before. Now that it was gone, I was hollow. The pack bond had been connected to every part of me, so when it was ripped out, every part of me had gone with it. There was nothing left.

I lay there on the tile floor, on the smeared symbols, in my damp robe that was covered in blood, and I didn’t care. Nothing mattered. The men in their white coats looked down on me and made notes on their clipboards, and I didn’t care. Everything I cared about was gone. I was alone. A tear dripped down my face and onto the floor, mingling with the blood.

In the viewing room, the men began to applaud.

Chapter 17

I don’t know how long I lay there. I didn’t care. None of the lackeys came to move me. I didn’t even know if they were still there. I couldn’t be bothered raising my head to check. The cut on my arm throbbed, but I let it bleed. What did it matter? Nothing mattered.

All that time, I’d taken the pack bond for granted, thinking of it as secondary to my bond with Tennyson. I hadn’t realized how deeply embedded in every part of me it had become. I’d been so stupid. But still, I couldn’t regret my decision. In spite of all the pain I was in, as much as it felt as if I’d been cut open and all my insides scooped out, it had still been the right thing to do. By losing the pack, I’d saved them. Everyone would be safe now. My dad would leave them alone. They’d be off his radar. It was all worth it.

The thought gave me the strength to sit up. I was alone in the room; all of the lackeys were gone. The symbols had completely vanished. Except for the pool of watery blood around me, the tiles had returned to white. There were still some people up in the viewing room, but they weren’t looking at me anymore, now that the entertaining part was over.

The power inside me rose up, and I remembered those words inside my head. We have a job to do. Let me help you do it.

I was ready to accept that help.

I closed my eyes and let the power take over. It filled me and flowed out of me until it surrounded me completely. I knew the power would change me, but that didn’t matter now. There was no appeal in being a werewolf without a pack.

As I rose to my feet, one of the lackeys came through the doorway to the cleansing room and approached me, but I raised my hand and it stopped. I had no way of telling if it was Katie or not. I wasn’t even sure if it mattered when it was something that didn’t have an identity. It backed up until it hit the wall, and then it stayed there, and I could feel why. Because it was only the shell of a person, my power filled it with my will and could control it. That was how my father had been controlling them, but his power was nothing compared to mine, just something weak and stolen. I could control armies if I needed to.

“Find Hannah Morgan and bring her to me,” I told it. She was somewhere in the building, I could feel it, somewhere close. Through my power, I showed the lackey everything that Hannah was so it could identify her. If she was one of them, she wouldn’t be Hannah, she’d be gone. They wouldn’t recognize her. If she was one of them, it was better not to know.

The men in the viewing room had begun to stir, crowding back around the window. Apparently, I was interesting again, but their presence was unimportant. I could crush them all, but that wouldn’t stop the evil work they were doing. They gasped and backed away as I rose up from the floor, the blue glow of magic carrying me through the air toward them. When I reached the glass wall, I passed right through it.

The suits stumbled out of my way. One of the scientists was filming me on her phone. My father wasn’t in the room, but even he didn’t matter right now. I had one goal: whatever was behind the door with the symbol on it. Anything else was just an obstacle.

The magic carried me toward that door, my feet a few inches from the floor. I felt it filling me up, taking up all the spaces where the pack bond had been. It couldn’t replace the bond but it healed me, made me whole again. Down hallways, back up to the main floor, the magic guided me. Concrete objects meant nothing to me; matter was nothing more than a concept that could be broken down and rearranged as I pleased. Nothing was impossible for me.

I was invulnerable.

I touched the door, and it dissolved into the air. I entered the room. The walls were lined with screens. The screens showed everything. These people were watching everything, everywhere. I could see my house. The dining hall at school and the lighthouse. Both the Red House and the Golden. And that was only a few of them, one small corner in the vast room. So many places I didn’t know, buildings and people that were being watched. This had to stop.

I raised my hand toward the screens, and they blinked out. Not just the picture, but the cameras on the other end. The knowledge of the cameras. But that wasn’t enough. I couldn’t crush the intent behind this whole thing; there was no magic that could cure bigotry or hatred or fear. The most I could do was to set them back so far that they’d be discouraged, to destroy enough of this corporation that it would seem like a defeat.

There was a vibration behind one of the walls, the hum of their main server. So much information was stored there, dangerous information. I closed my eyes, envisioning that server, all that encrypted information. Inside the server, there may have been nothing but a series of ones and zeros, but magic wasn’t binary, and information was power. Everything was energy, and I could control it. I could take whatever I needed and leave them nothing.

But that wasn’t the power that had called to me. It wasn’t what they were so carefully guarding. There was something more important.

In the middle of the room was a large glass dome with flashes of light and color swirling around inside it. That dome was the core of my father’s power, the source of his corporation’s power. Energy radiated from it in waves, drawing me to it. This was the trunk of the tree that all the branches stemmed from. Maybe I’d never be able to kill the roots, but I could cut the tree down to the ground.

I placed my hands on the dome, the blue glow of my power surging as it came into contact with the glass. The flashes within the dome rose to the surface, and I cried out in horror as I realized what was inside.

It was Katie. It was an old homeless man and a runaway boy. It was workers who had disobeyed, anyone who had opposed my father and what he stood for. It was all of the lackeys whose empty bodies were walking around the facility, doing his bidding. It was lives, lives of people and animals, lives that my father had stolen so he could use their energy for his evil work.

My power rushed forth, battering against the glass until it shattered. I stood back in awe as those flashing lights broke free. They swirled around me for a moment, hundreds of them, maybe more. I could feel them, feel their life force, their energy. I could feel Katie. I hoped she could forgive me. I knew that she couldn’t go back to her body but I hoped she could at least be free.

The lights flared brilliantly bright for a moment, and then they were gone.

“What have you done?”

I turned to see my father standing in the doorway, a gun in one hand and an orb of magic in the other. The last magic he possessed.

I didn’t answer him. I didn’t need to. There was nothing he could do to me anymore, and there was nothing I needed from him. He obviously suspected as much, because he pointed his gun at me and fired.

When the bullet hit the edge of the glowing blue light around me, it turned to dust.

Anyone else would’ve run away, but my father was so filled with hatred that he couldn’t see logic anymore. He launched the magical orb at me. It flared brightly when it reached me, and then I absorbed its power into my own.

“You cannot hurt me,” I said, my voice sounding distorted through the wall of power surrounding me. “I’ve already defeated you.”

He shook his head. “No, you can’t. Your brothers…”

“Are safe.” I knew it somehow, could feel it.

“We have your blood,” he tried. “We can use it, perform rituals with it.”

But all his threats meant nothing to me anymore. He’d already taken the most precious thing from me. He’d stolen my home, the one place I’d ever really belonged. He’d taken my pack.

“Enough,” I said. “You have lost. Submit.”

“And if I don’t?” he said. “Are you going to kill me, Lucy?”

I couldn’t kill him. I couldn’t kill any of them. It might have been easier; they would be out of the way for good, not able to infect anyone else with the poison of their beliefs. But my father setting me on a dark path didn’t mean I needed to walk it. I might have been pre-programmed to become one of the Others, and maybe it was inevitable that I would go to the dark side at some point, but I’d put that moment off as long as I could. As long as I had self-control, as long as I could make my own decisions, I wanted to do the right thing.

But before I could answer him, he crumpled to the floor. And standing behind him was the Wilde Alpha.

“Well, come along, then, you troublesome girl.”

Alpha Wilde looked as flawless as the last time I’d seen her, a year ago: her dark hair pulled back into a tight bun, not a speck of dirt on her Chanel suit, and her face pursed like she’d been sucking lemons. How she’d gotten into a secure ex-military facility without a hair out of place was as much of a mystery to me as her being there at all. She made a small tsk-ing noise and then turned away, as if my very existence was an irritation to her, like the buzzing of a fly.

I followed her, my feet a little closer to the ground than before.

“Since you elected to leave my pack, I am not actually obligated to clean up your messes,” she said, already halfway down the corridor. “However, we have restrained all of the organization’s leaders and are in the process of freeing the captives. The proper authorities have been notified and are on their way. They will deal with the aftermath. I have arranged your transportation back to school before they arrive, so they will remain unaware of you. Until you learn to restrain these powers of yours, you don’t want to call attention to yourself. You can wait downstairs until you leave.”

I followed her into the elevator, and we rode it down to the bottom floor. When the doors opened, I didn’t get out. I didn’t want to see that room again.

She didn’t notice when I didn’t follow her, walking toward a tall bearded man and giving orders. The bigwigs and scientists were gathered in the middle of the viewing room, hands tied behind their backs and gagged. The lackeys were gone. Their bodies had vanished along with the lights of their energy; I could feel that somehow. There was a group of people sitting on the floor near the wall, wearing white robes similar to mine. They all looked like refugees, skeletal and dazed, with eyes too big for their faces.

“Lucy?” said a small voice.

My heart leapt in my chest as I turned toward it.

“Hannah?” I whispered.

She was so thin, I barely recognized her. Her hair hung down limp and greasy instead of bouncing into curls, and her normally rosy cheeks were ashen. But she was alive. I’d tried so hard to keep my emotions pushed down through all this, to ignore the horror of it all, but at the sight of her, I couldn’t stop the tears from flowing down my cheeks.

“You’re alive,” I said. I didn’t know how or why but she was there and alive. Any explanations could wait.

“You’re floating!” she said, keeping a wary distance.

I didn’t blame her. The last time she’d seen me, I’d been pretty mad at her, and my father had been torturing her for information. A lot of trust needed to be rebuilt between us, but she was alive, so we had time to do it.

“A lot’s happened since you’ve been gone,” I told her. “I have magic, and they’ve started serving vegan options in the dining hall. It may take you a while to catch up.”

She smiled tentatively. I really wanted to know what had happened to her, where she’d been taken and why she was there, but she looked so fragile that I didn’t want to break her.

Alpha Wilde approached us, and Hannah flinched away.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” I told her as she retreated back to the group of captives.

“Maybe I’ll see you at school,” she said, then she sat down, melding into the group of gray, terrified people so much that I could barely tell her apart from the rest of them.

“It’s time for you to go,” said Alpha Wilde. “I don’t want my children being mixed up in your kind of trouble. Now that you’ve deserted the pack, it’s better if you stay away from them. Now, follow James, and he will show you out.”

She started to turn away from me, but I stopped her. Or rather, my power stopped her. The blue light lashed out at her and froze her in place. Her eyes glowed red, and I knew she was furious at my nerve, and also surprised by my strength. Not afraid of it, just surprised.

“I didn’t want to leave the pack,” I said. “I still don’t. Let me rejoin. Please.”

For a moment, she didn’t answer me, and my heart filled with hope. If she’d only say yes, everything could go back to normal.

I pulled back my power, wanting to seem humble and non-threatening.

“You made the decision to leave,” she said. “Once a bond is broken, it can’t simply be repaired. You’ve brought nothing but trouble and danger to this pack since the day you started at that school, but because my children and their friends had already forged a connection with you, I had no choice but to accept you. Now, I do have a choice, and I choose to keep my people safe. Stay away from them, Lucy O’Connor. Stay away, or you’ll regret it.”

And this time when she turned away, she didn’t look back.

Chapter 18

I arrived back at school in the dead of night. Everything was quiet, serene. Everything but me. The power was still roiling inside of me, twisting and writhing, looking for somewhere to settle. But more than that, Alpha Wilde’s words kept replaying in my head. Stay away.

I walked aimlessly across the grounds. I didn’t want to go back to my room, not when Katie would never be returning. I’d found one roommate and lost another. Even though her soul had been set free, it was still gone. She was still gone.

My father had done so many awful things. I hoped he’d be sufficiently punished.

Where are you? I know you’re back.

I stumbled on the path, filled with relief at the sound of Tennyson’s voice in my head. I’d worried. I hadn’t been able to feel him, so I hadn’t been sure. I knew our bond was different from the pack bond, entirely separate, but it had felt as if everything had been taken. I should’ve known he’d still be there, that not even the darkest magic could take him from me.

Still, I couldn’t respond to him. I had to stay away.

You idiot. I can see you glowing from here.

A moment later, something hit me. Before I could react, something else hit me from the other side. Althea and Nikolai. That was why my power hadn’t responded to them: they hadn’t been a threat. They wrapped their arms around me, laughing.

“Why would you do something like that? We could’ve found another way.”

Tennyson had obviously explained everything to them. Nikolai called me some very bad words. Sam and Tennyson were standing a little way down the path, watching us. Sam had a small smile on his face, but Tennyson looked almost as bad as the captives from the facility. His face was gray, and his eyes looked haunted.

“There was no other way,” I said. “It was complicated.”

“Your brothers are safe,” said Tennyson. “And your mother. They’ve been taken to a secure location.”

“Thank you,” I told him, my heart swelling in gratitude.

Althea tucked her arm through mine and started to lead me toward the Golden House. It struck me how much she was like her mother. They looked so much alike, and they had the same bearing and regal manner. I wondered how Althea had turned out so nice.

I stopped walking, and her arm dropped away.

“I can’t,” I said. “I can’t go with you. We’re not pack anymore. You should stay away from me so you don’t get involved in any of this anymore.”

It hurt me to say it, like the echo of a wound. I could feel all the places they’d been ripped away from me.

“You’ve been talking to Mother,” said Tennyson.

I didn’t have to confirm it for him to know it was true.

“Well, that’s just stupid,” said Nikolai. “Your evil father has been taken into custody, so we’re not under any more threat from you. You should just rejoin the pack.”

He said it so easily, as if it was just a matter of my wanting to.

“I asked, but she said no.” I stared down at the ground, not wanting to see their faces when they realized that I’d never be part of their pack again, that they had no obligation to be near me.

“She doesn’t speak for us,” said Tennyson. “She may be the alpha, but I promised you once that you’d always have a place in my pack, and I have no intention of breaking that promise. As far as I’m concerned, nothing has changed.”

Nikolai nodded emphatically.

“Exactly,” said Althea. “Plus, once she knows that you and Sam are together, she’ll change her mind. There’s quite strict etiquette about that sort of thing. Plus, she won’t want to risk you joining another pack and taking him with you. Don’t worry, I’ll convince her.”

Sam still didn’t speak. He didn’t seem angry or hurt, but he didn’t join in with the others saying they wanted me to stay in the pack, either. It was so much more difficult now that I couldn’t sense him.

“We should do something about all that blue light,” said Tennyson. “You can’t stay like that.”

He had a point. I couldn’t exactly show up to class all glowy. The power seemed more stable now, especially compared to the last time I’d had to channel it into something, when I’d become a werewolf. I wasn’t sure if it was because I accepted it now or because last time I’d been forming my bond with Tennyson as well, but there was no sense of urgency about it. I probably could’ve stayed in that in-between state indefinitely, in that point before I settled into my new form, whatever that was to be.

“Are you scared?” Althea asked as we gathered around the base of the golden tree, where I’d channeled my power the last time.

I shook my head. “Whatever I become, I’ll have you guys to help me deal with it.”

“Not if you turn into a withered old hag with boils all over your face,” said Nikolai. “Then I’m outie.”

I placed my hands on the tree and let my power flood into it. The tree felt warm, even though it was a cool night. It welcomed my power, accepted it gratefully.

“Oooh,” said Althea.

I glanced up and noticed tiny blue flowers blooming all over the tree.

I thought that would be it. I’d funnel my excess power into the tree and it would be stored there, but as the last of it drained away, I heard something heavy thud onto the ground at my feet. My hands fell away from the tree trunk, and I glanced down.

It was a long, thin sword, faintly glowing blue. There was a brilliant blue stone embedded into the hilt.

“Pretty,” said Nikolai. “And you’re no more of a hag than usual, so, bonus!”

Althea stared down at the sword. “It seems you have work to do yet.”

I wasn’t sure what she meant, but we had time to figure it out. Even if I couldn’t feel them through the pack bond anymore, that didn’t have to mean anything. It was just a technicality. We were pack in all the ways that counted.

Althea and Nikolai headed inside, but Tennyson lingered for a moment, giving me a long look. I wanted to stay by his side, for him to erase all the hurt and misery of the past few days – but I couldn’t ask that of him. What I wanted from him was too much.

Don’t ever do that again, he said as he turned toward the house. Don’t ever leave without intending to return.

And then I was alone with Sam.

I’d put this off for too long. I should’ve done it the moment I realized there was no chemistry between us. I’d wanted to make our relationship work so badly that I thought I could force it, but that just wasn’t possible. It wasn’t fair to him, and it wasn’t fair to me. I’d thought I was doing the right thing, but really, I’d just been a coward.

“Sam, I…”

He shook his head. “Come sit,” he said. “You look as if you’re about to fall over.”

We sat on the garden bench looking up at my tree. The tiny blue flowers seemed to sparkle in the moonlight.

“I’m glad you’re okay,” he said. “I wonder what you are now.”

I shrugged. “It will probably take a little while to figure out. It’s different than last time.”

“I’ve been worried about you,” he said. He took my hand in his, so warm and big. “Even before you left, that last day you were acting strange. I wanted to tell you then, but it didn’t seem like the right time.”

I glanced at him curiously, and he gave me a small, pained smile.

“I love you,” he said, squeezing my hand. “I love you more than anything, but this isn’t working. I don’t know if there’s something wrong with me, but there’s just something missing.”

I nodded, relieved that he’d been the one to say it. “I know.”

“You’ve noticed it too?” He let out a long breath. “I really thought there was something wrong with me. You’re the only girl I could ever love, and even then, I still couldn’t…”

Something occurred to me, and not for the first time. He always said the same phrase. He always said “the only girl.”

“If you felt like that about someone,” I said, “someone who wasn’t a girl, that still wouldn’t mean there’s something wrong with you, you know.”

He nodded. “I know,” he said. “But I’ve never felt like that about anyone.”

I bumped shoulders with him. “Well, that’s still okay. Maybe that’s just normal for you.”

Something inside me let go. There had been a secret worry that I’d never admitted, not even to myself. He and Tennyson were awfully close, and there had been times I’d suspected Sam’s feelings were more than brotherly. But if Sam didn’t want Tennyson, then it was okay.

“I suppose I should give you your heart back, then,” I said, smiling at him to show I was okay with everything.

He shook his head. “I still want you to have it. Keep it safe for me. And even if we’re not together, we should still say we are,” Sam said. “To the alpha, I mean. We can’t lose you from the pack.”

I leaned against him, resting my head on his shoulder.

“Let’s worry about that later,” I said.

“Still friends?” he asked me.

“Always,” I told him.

Friends with Sam was so much better. Friends with Sam was right.

Because it had become obvious to me that there was only one boy I could ever love. It wasn’t the soul bond that had caused my feelings for Tennyson, because even when it was blocked, those feelings were still there. I couldn’t blame the bond or use it an excuse for how I felt anymore.

There was only one boy I loved. And that boy was Tennyson Wilde.

END BOOK 6

Werewolf High #7 will be out late 2017

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ALSO BY ANITA OH

Werewolf High #1: The Truth Spell

A Very Werey Christmas: A Werewolf High Short

Werewolf High #2: The Tiny Curse

Werewolf High #3: The Body Swap

Werewolf High #4: The Soul Bond

Werewolf High #5: The Love Potion

Werewolf High #6: The Time Loop

Acknowledgments

Thank you to Kathryn for sharing your wealth of knowledge.

Thanks to Carol Davis for editing.

Deranged Doctor Designs, my cover is awesome.

Hannah, Liam and Morgan, thank you for letting me steal your names.

Sandy and Laurie, thank you for all your help, support and advice.

Thank you to everyone who has continued to read and support this series. You guys are the best!

About the Author

Anita lives in Melbourne, where she is a full-time servant to her two dogs. When the dogs give her a break, she writes books. Anita likes books about kick-ass girls and hot boys who fall in love while defeating evil.

Anita's favourite things include: cake, coffee and karaoke. Her special skills are sleeping and marathoning TV shows.

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www.anitaoh.com

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