Chapter 3

At seven the next morning, I went back to Blood Thorn Academy to pick up my transcripts.

I had barely entered the administration building when someone laughed behind me.

“Well, look who it is. Blood Thorn’s top student.”

A group of girls blocked the stairs.

The one in front was a new friend of Mira’s.

Her eyes traveled over me before landing on the camera around my neck.

“So this is the famous camera? The one with all those precious childhood memories?”

She grabbed the strap.

I caught her wrist.

“Let go.”

“Relax.”

She raised her voice deliberately.

I had won that camera in a competition when I was ten.

It had grown up with me, capturing nearly every important moment of my childhood.

Most of the footage on Adrian’s hard drive had been filmed with it.

The girl smirked.

“You grew up with the four most powerful heirs at Blood Thorn and started thinking you were some kind of princess.”

Another girl laughed.

“Too bad they all chose Mira now.”

“Cassian only dated you to get you to Ravenwood. And you actually thought the heir to the Blood Throne was in love with you.”

More students stopped to watch.

I looked down the hall.

Cassian and the others were standing there.

Dante held Mira’s graduation files. Julian was checking her paperwork. Adrian carried her breakfast.

Cassian saw me.

He frowned. But he didn’t move.

As heir to the Blood Throne, he didn’t even need to speak. One look from him would have shut everyone up.

Now someone had her hand wrapped around my camera strap, and he simply watched.

Mira hurried over.

“Please, stop. Avery’s just upset.”

The girl holding my camera snorted.

“You’re too nice, Mira. She’s jealous because you have them now. She wouldn’t even help with your graduation video.”

Mira’s eyes immediately turned red.

That finally brought Cassian over.

But he stepped in front of Mira.

“Avery, if you’re angry, take it out on us. Don’t make Mira feel guilty.”

Before I could answer, the girl behind me yanked the camera strap from my neck.

The camera hit the floor.

Hard.

“Oops.” She smiled. “My hand slipped.”

I bent down and picked it up.

I was about to turn around when Cassian spoke.

“Take your camera and go home, Avery. Don’t start something here.”

I looked at him.

So humiliating me in public was okay.

But if I fought back, I was causing a scene.

Fine.

The car from Ravenwood would be here tomorrow.

I wasn’t wasting my last morning at Blood Thorn on them.

I collected my transcripts and left.

Half an hour later, I had just changed when someone pounded on my front door.

The four boys walked in with Mira.

“Where’s the pendant?” Dante demanded.

“Mira was wearing it this morning. Now it’s gone.”

I leaned against the door.

“And?”

Adrian’s expression turned cold.

“You were the only one near her at school. Who else would take it?”

Before I could answer, he walked straight into my bedroom and started opening drawers.

The others joined him.

For eighteen years, they had entered my room without knocking.

I used to think that meant we were close.

Now I understood.

They had simply never believed I was allowed to keep anything from them.

Dante opened my closet.

Only a few clothes remained.

His brows pulled together.

“Why did you pack everything?”

My chest tightened.

Julian glanced at my suitcase and answered for me.

“She’s trying to scare us.”

Adrian laughed.

“Seriously, Avery? Running away from home?”

None of them considered that I might actually be leaving.

Cassian picked up the Ravenwood acceptance packet from my desk.

His eyes barely touched the cover before he shoved it under the corner of a crooked table.

“Ravenwood doesn’t even start until fall. Where exactly are you planning to disappear to?”

He hadn’t read the words beneath the academy seal.

CLASSIFIED FIVE-YEAR RESIDENCY.

Before I could say anything, I caught movement beside my desk.

Mira slipped a hand into her sleeve.

The bloodstone pendant appeared between her fingers.

I watched her push it into the narrow gap beside my desk.

A second later, she gasped.

“Found it!”

She pulled it out and looked at me, cheeks flushing.

“Avery, you could’ve just asked for it back.”

Her voice softened.

“You didn’t have to steal it and make everyone search for it.”

“I didn’t take it.”

Her eyes filled with tears.

“I just found it in your room.”

“I watched you put it there.”

Mira started crying.

Cassian’s face hardened.

He didn’t ask her what happened.

He didn’t ask me either.

He had already decided which one of us he believed.

I was too tired to explain.

I was about to tell them all to leave when Mira noticed my computer.

Adrian’s hard drive was connected. I had plugged it back in that morning to make sure every file had finished uploading to my private cloud.

Her eyes lit up.

“Avery, can you use those footage to make a reel for me? I just want something for my graduation party.”

“No.”

I closed the laptop.

Mira’s face fell.

Dante stepped toward me.

“What’s the big deal? I thought Adrian asked you to make the video.”

“He asked. I said no.”

I looked at Mira.

“And I’m not cutting myself out of my own childhood so she can pretend it was hers.”

Tears spilled down her cheeks.

“Forget it. I don’t want you guys fighting because of me.”

Cassian suddenly reached past me and opened the laptop.

“Mira just wants a video. You don’t want to be in it? Fine.”

He took the mouse.

“Then we’ll take you out.”

“Cassian. Don’t touch my computer.”

He ignored me. He selected every folder with my name on it.

I reached for the mouse.

Adrian caught my arm.

“They’re just a few videos, Avery. It’s not that serious.”

Cassian hit DELETE.

The progress bar raced across the screen.

My first combat trial.

The night I turned thirteen and the five of us sneaked into the human city alone.

My sixteenth birthday, when Cassian looked straight into my camera and promised that one day, when he became King, I would be his Queen.

Gone.

Cassian released the mouse.

“There. Problem solved.”

Then he looked at me.

“You won’t be in any of our videos from now on. Happy now?”

Maybe he only said it to hurt me.

He had no idea how soon it would become true.

He ejected the hard drive and pushed it toward me.

“Now you can make the video without yourself in it. Finish it tonight. Don’t make me ask twice.”

Then the five of them left.

My phone lit up.

RAVENWOOD CLASSIFIED PROGRAM

Transport arrives tommorw.

I stared at the closed door.

Eighteen years together.

Eighteen years I had mistaken for a bond none of us could break.

And even now, not one of them realized I was leaving for good.

I closed my laptop and zipped my suitcase.

Soon, those eighteen years would be just like the videos Cassian had deleted.

Part of my past.

Nothing more.