Page 44 of Divine Oaths

For a second, I thought I’d misheard him. But then it hit me.

He’d said no. He wasn’t going to help me.

“But you’re the one who came to me at Gus’s shop,” I said. “Why go through that trouble if you’re just going to change your mind? Why involve me in any of this if you know how dangerous it is?”

“I’ve done enough, and so have you. Whatever situation you’re in because of my brother and your powers, it has nothing to do with me.”

In my mind, I’d imagined what our reunion would be like. But the man standing before me wasn’t the same as the one I’d saved in the alleyway. Somewhere along the line, I’d imagined a version of him that didn’t exist. And if I’d conjured a false image of Kasem by saving him, now I was witnessing that mirage die.

Before the events in the maze and the woodshop, he’d told me there was something strange happening at Westfield, that there were accidents. He’d known how dangerous it might be. And still, he had come to me. He’d asked me to help predict his death. But now he was walking it back like it had just been a minor mix-up, and that was infuriating.

Unless there was something he was hiding, something that would link to the attack that he didn’t want me to know? My mind raced with possibilities. And then, the answer came.

“You know already,” I whispered. “The people who attacked you. You already know who they are. That’s why when I claimed Alaster was part of it, you let him deny it.”

“It’s not that simple,” Kasem said.

“Yes, it is.” I pulled my phone from my pocket and held it toward him. “You told Honey I was your stalker when, really, I’m here because of you. So which is it? Why have you changed since that night? What are you hiding?”

He wouldn’t look at me. “What was I supposed to say?” he whispered. “That I asked a ‘psychic’ to come to Westfield?”

“That would have been the truth.”

“The Board has enough reason to question my inheritance,” he said. “I don’t need them to add concerns about my sanity as another reason why I can’t claim it.”

He was maddening; never answering questions directly, tiptoeing about everything that mattered.

“Look,” I said, trying to gather myself to keep from shaking some sense into him. “Just tell me the truth. Don’t I deserve that, at least?” I could use my powers on him. I would if it came down to it. But part of me was afraid of what I’d find if I looked into his lifeline again.

For a long moment, Kasem and I faced each other in silence, waiting for the other to break.

“You’re right,” he said. Finally. “I know who the attackers were, from the alleyway and even the maze. But they won’t be charged for it. You’re just wasting your time.”

“Why?” I said. “Because they’re rich white kids from Westfield?”

Kasem laughed, irony lacing his words. “Yeah,” he said. “That and the fact that two of them were already expelled from Westfield, and the other one is dead.”

If he’d meant it as a joke, I wasn’t laughing. But neither was he.

“You can’t be serious,” I said.

Instead of answering, Kasem took my phone. He typed something in the search bar and then an article appeared online in the archived results. It showed three Westfield students grinning in front of a fencing mat. Two of them I recognized from the day in the pawnshop. They’d been with Kasem, jeering him on to ask me out. But the third figure, a man with a buzz cut and bright green eyes, looked familiar yet different.

Slowly, it sank in. From the curve of his round face and the close-cut trim of his hair to his hardened features. In the photo, he was dressed in a gray hoodie and a Westfield blazer.

This was the man without eyes.

He, or some version of him, had been there in the maze, and just moments before, in the tunnels under campus. Except that wasn’t completely possible. Not according to the article.

TRAGEDY AT WESTFIELD: STAR ATHLETE AND AWARD-WINNING SCHOLARSHIP STUDENT FOUND JIGSAWED IN SCHOOL WOODSHOP DURING INSTRUCTION SESSION. TWO OTHERS QUESTIONED IN CONNECTION WITH THE DEATH.

Beneath the photo, it listed the names of the fencing students depicted from left to right: Nathan Rowhouse, Jayson Dafophne, and Peter Tomfry.

The article was dated a year ago.

Everything came into focus. Honey and Joseph reminiscing about covering for another resident assistant last minute. Vivian’s story about the upped security system at Westfield and how Poppy House’s former RA had died in a tragic accident. And then there were Alaster’s comments about Nathan, and how he’d gotten entangled in the wrong circles.

It was all connected.