All Chapters of CHASED BY FOUR MATES AT WOLFORD ACADEMY: Chapter 81 - Chapter 90

GideonSix guards stood on the Pentagon steps, and my hands were open at my sides.I had to keep telling them to stay open. It was one o’clock, an hour after Xavier signed his name in front of the whole school, and the Pentagon was fuller than it had been at dawn. Four first-years had just carried the big oak lectern out of the dining hall. It was heavy, and the school crest was carved on the front. They set it down at the foot of the steps, and Elvira would stand behind it when she read the rest.Mrs. Pruitt had doubled her patrol that morning. Six guards held the steps, and six more walked the edge of the ground. The nearest guard, a man twice my age, put his hand on the lectern and began to drag it back toward the doors.I stepped in front of it.I did not touch him. I stood between him and the wood with my hands open and my arms down. Everything in me wanted to close them. My jaw ached from holding it shut. I could have moved him in one push, and then Pruitt would have had what sh

ElianoThe lectern wood was warm from the sun under my palm.I had been standing behind it for less than a minute, and my hand already wanted to leave it. I had pushed my sleeve up past my wrist before I walked out here, and for the first time that day nothing was covering it. Four hundred students could see my bare hands. I left them where they were.Sir Albert stood at the bottom step with one hand on the rail. Up close, he looked older than he had at breakfast. Gideon had stepped aside to let him through, and Albert had not gone any farther than the first stone. He looked at the lectern, then at me, then up the steps at Elvira.“The students called this gathering,” he said. “The students may speak first. You have eight minutes in all. When the tower bell rings, I will answer.”Mrs. Pruitt opened her mouth. Albert lifted two fingers, and she closed it.“Eight minutes,” he said again. “Begin.”Nobody moved. I looked at the faces in front of me. I had walked past most of them in the

ElviraThe page landed on my plate beside the bread.It was seven o’clock, and the dining hall was louder than I had ever heard it. Students sat on the tables, the benches, and on the floor. They were arguing about Sir Albert and what he said about resigning. I sat at the end of a long table with a plate of bread I couldn’t eat. I hadn’t been hungry since dawn.A clerk in a brown vest stood over me. He worked for Mrs. Bellarie, who ran the paperwork for the Sealing, and he didn’t look at my face.“From Mrs. Bellarie’s office,” he said. “Item Seven. Please read it.” He left before I could ask him anything.It was a single page, printed and stamped. The heading said Item Seven: Sealing Moon List. My name was in the third row. Next to it, in small black letters, were four words.Consent of guardians: received.I read it twice. I had not written to anyone about the Sealing. I had not asked anyone to answer for me. Somebody had signed my name onto a form without telling me, and the school

ElianoMy father’s car pulled away from the gate at ten past ten, and I was already running.I didn’t look back at it. I had sat through three hours at a long table with a linen cloth and silver knives, and my father had said almost nothing. He had asked the waiter for water. He had asked me if my coat was warm enough. Near the end, he set down his glass and said, “You will not stand at that lectern again.” That was all. He didn’t say her name. He didn’t say anything about the school, the Flame Roll, or the word I had said out loud in front of four hundred people. I said, “Yes, Father,” because the other answer would have started something I couldn’t finish in a restaurant.Now I ran up the long path with my coat open and my hands shaking. I had spent the whole evening holding still, and my legs were glad to move. I reached the boys’ wing, climbed to my room, and sat on my bed in the dark. I was too angry to turn on the lamp. I had no idea who I was angry at.—⨝—At eleven o’clock, so

ElviraThe stone against my cheek was cold on one side of my face and warm on the other.I lay still and tried to work out why. My eyes were open, but I couldn’t make sense of what I saw. The stone was dark and rough with a crack running across it. My head hurt behind my eyes, and my mouth was dry and tasted bitter.Then I remembered the hand.I sat up so fast that the room turned. I pressed both palms to the floor and waited for it to stop. The stone was colder under my left hand and warmer under my right. I didn’t understand that yet. What I understood was that I was not in Room 68 anymore.I checked myself, because that was the first practical thing to do. My arms moved. My legs moved. My head had no bump that I could find. I still had my coat on, buttoned wrong, and both my shoes. Nothing was broken or bleeding. Whoever had taken me had not wanted to hurt me, and I did not know if that was good news.Then I looked up.The room was round. It was about the size of my dorm room, with