you needed the toilet after lights out, you pretty much had to plan it in advance. There was no room for holding on and a quick dash off to the dunny at the last minute. You had to stand at attention by your bed, and when the Dorm Warden noticed you and nodded, you could proceed. But if someone had gone ahead of you, you had to wait until he returned.
Luke was praying that people would have to use the toilet tonight. A lot of people. But so far, everything was quiet. Just another night. He sighed and shoved at the lock-pick set, trying to manoeuvre the spiky pieces of metal through three layers of fabric.
From the back of the dorm, he heard a faint groan and movement. He turned his head slightly on the pillow. Jason Taylor was standing by his bed, his plastered arm in a sling.
It’s probably nothing, Luke told himself. He was used to doing that: playing down any hopes that others would come through; it saved time feeling disappointed later. Just because Zac had assured him he’d laced the tea tonight with his powdered mushrooms, it didn’t mean a) that he’d actually done it and b) that anything would come of it, even if he had.
And then there was another urgent rustle of bedsheets from Section One.
They’d had the tea first. This time, it was Adam Friar on his feet by his bed, fidgeting. On his podium up the front, Luke saw Holt give a nod, and Jason Taylor walked up the aisle. Fast. Another groan, and more movement from Section One. Like others around him, Luke sat up to check it out. At the back of the dorm, five more boys stood by their beds. Tua Palau sat on the edge of his bed, holding his gut and rocking.
‘Oh God, I’ve got to go now, sir!’ Adam Friar suddenly broke ranks and began to jog up the aisle.
‘Friar! Back to your bed!’ Holt was now on his feet, torch in hand. He moved towards the steps of the raised platform at the front of the room. Friar froze midway up the aisle, gripping his hands around his stomach, bent forward, moaning. Rustling, stamping and moaning noises now bounced around the room, and Luke grinned as he saw kids from Sections Two and Three now standing restlessly by their beds.
‘Okay, Friar. You can go.’ Holt stood in the middle of the room now. He bellowed out orders. ‘Friar, return immediately when done, and tell Taylor to get his arse back here right now.’
Tua Palau began shuffling towards Holt, his hand over his mouth.
‘Sir -’ he tried.
‘Just get back -’ said Holt, holding out an arm.
Too late. Palau’s hand relinquished its role as gatekeeper, and he projectile-vomited over the Dorm Master.
Dorm Four erupted.
Section One was empty now; all of them had sprinted for the toilet block at the front of the building. Toad Wheeler, last from the back of the room, bolted past Luke’s bed, his eyes wild with worry. All around the dorm boys abandoned their beds and the rules, ignoring Holt, who now looked as green as most of them. Holt had his radio out and was shouting into it, calling for back-up. But Luke knew it’d be a while coming. Almost everyone in Dwight had drunk the tea tonight. With no Coke, chocolate or dessert, hot, sweet, milky tea was something everyone craved. Including the screws. With only four on duty tonight and at least a ten-minute drive from the cop shop, Luke knew he and Zac now had a shot. He threw back his covers and stumbled from his bed, clutching his stomach. The rest of Section Six sat blinking in their pyjamas at the edge of their beds. Jonas, Kitkat, Barry and Hong Lo each called to him as he moved past.
‘Are you all right, Black?’
‘What’s going on, Luke?’
‘Told you not to drink the tea,’ he said in a low voice as he made his way past them. He threw them a quick wave when he reached the inner dorm doors.
Zac was waiting. So was half of Dorm Four, spilling out of the shower and toilet block. The smells, sounds and sights surrounding them almost made Luke’s stomach turn as well.
‘This way,’ he said to Zac.
He led them quickly past the shower block and into the TV room. Although he was certain no one was watching them, he stayed close to the walls. He made it to the main House doors and reached under his pyjama bottoms and into the pocket of his jeans. He pulled out the bent nail and filed piece of metal, and leaned down to the lock on the door.
‘They’ll send someone over here soon,’ said Zac. ‘I hope you know what you’re doing.’
Luke inserted the nail and file into the lock. ‘You know I need to concentrate to do this,’ he said.
He narrowed his focus and sharpened his thoughts into a tight beam and sent them with his tools inside the barrel of the lock. By touch – by slight changes in the vibrations at the tips of his fingers – he found the five tiny pins inside the barrel. He closed his eyes and saw them there. Softly, gently, he rubbed the rake in a minute scrubbing motion backwards and forwards across the pins until he felt the stiffness of their springs yield. Three of them popped backwards, open. Two to go. He tickled them, and then scrubbed harder, but they were sticky in the old lock. He switched to his torque – the nail – twisted it slightly and pushed. Click. The lock engaged. He smiled up at Zac, cracked the doorhandle and stole out into the night. He headed straight for the shadows.
‘Where are you going?’ hissed Zac, skidding to a stop next to him by the bushes on the road opposite the dorm. ‘It’s faster to get to the gates that way.’
‘Detour,’ said Luke. ‘We’re going to Admin.’
‘What? Are you mad?’
Luke ignored Zac’s hisses behind him and ran quietly, crouched low, along the bushes that flanked the main quadrangle. Dorm Four was furthest from the Admin block and they had to run past each of the other Houses along the way. All lights were on in the Dorm blocks, but there was no one walking the road between them. But as they approached Dorm One, the door swung open and Mr Singh stood framed in the glow from within. Luke hit the dirt. Zac was there first. They breathed quietly.
‘Matron will be in Admin,’ whispered Zac. ‘We can’t go there.’
‘No, she’ll come here,’ said Luke. ‘She must have had the tea too, or she would have been here ages ago. Look.’
Along the path ahead of them a torch beam bobbed into sight.
‘She’s got her work cut out for her,’ said Zac.
‘Don’t worry, she’ll call for an ambulance once she hits Dorm One.’
‘Well, that’s comforting,’ said Zac.
They watched Matron move into the circle of light at Dorm One. She and Singh had a rapid conversation and they entered the building.
‘Let’s go,’ said Luke.
They bolted across a boggy, grassed patch, exposed in the moonlight. Zac was first to the back door of the Admin building and Luke pushed past him, his pick set ready.
‘Move over, you oaf,’ said Zac, squeezing an arm past Luke. He tried the doorhandle and it opened. Matron had been too sick or too rushed to worry about re-locking it.
Luke raised his eyebrows and grinned. They were in.
‘Okay, now tell me. What are we doing here? We’re going to get caught.’ Zac was still whispering, but Luke was almost positive they were alone in here. He knew the staff roster inside out. Besides, he couldn’t sense anyone. The corridor was dimly lit. He headed straight for the main office. For a fraction of a second he paused at the doorway and then walked inside. He moved quickly to the wall of filing cabinets.
‘I want my file,’ he said. ‘You want yours – you’d better grab it now.’
‘Why would I want it?’ hissed Zac. ‘What are you wasting your time with this for?’
‘I need to know who I am,’ said Luke. ‘I need to know what everyone else seems to know.’
Pantelimon River, Bucharest, Romania
The very last of the midsummer festivals. A night of forest sprites, faeries and elves. Of love spells. Luck
