I fixed my eyes on the ceiling. “If you have a point, please just say it. My head is killing me.”
“When you graduate—if you graduate—you will join a team. You will need to trust the people on that team and they will need to trust you. For the next two and a half years, the class of 76 is your team. None of you have the luxury of remaining isolated. You’re going to have to make the other first-years see you as more than just a Crow.”
“That wasn’t part of our deal.”
“It is now.” Bard rose to his feet. “You can start with the two first-years waiting outside.”
He was halfway to the door when my voice stopped him.
“Was Olympia’s family really in Reno?”
“Yes.”
“Jesus. Why would you put me in her class?”
Bard’s tone was almost wry. “You may recall that I had very little choice in the matter.”
“You could’ve said no.”
“And risked my funding when the budget comes up for renewal next year? True enough. If you hadn’t convinced me otherwise, I might have done just that. But I chose to believe that you could be more than your power.”
“I am.”
“Prove it to your classmates. Prove it to Olympia Kennedy. Help her move past the blind hatred and fear that could derail her career before it even starts.”
“That’s a hell of a lot to ask.”
“Welcome to life as a Cape, Damian. There are no easy missions.”
CHAPTER 40
I was still chewing on the dean’s parting words when my next visitor came in. When Bard had said there were first-years waiting to talk with me, I’d assumed one would be Vibe, looking for a little bit of emotion-deprivation time, and the other would be Silt. With Unicorn dead, they were the closest things to friends I had left on campus.
Instead, I looked up into the bearded face of my roommate, Jeremiah. “I brought a change of clothes,” he said, waving the stack of grey sweats in his hands.
“What?”
“I figured you’d rather not walk back across campus half-naked.” He nodded at my bandage-covered chest. Given the mess I’d made of my back—again—they’d had to cut my sweatshirt right off of me.
I eyed the fresh clothes warily. “Where did you get them?”
One bushy eyebrow went up. “From your closet, obviously.” Stonewall shook his head. “I’m not sure where you put the rest of your clothes. All I saw in there were school sweats… and a couple of old t-shirts.”
I pulled myself up to a seated position, ignoring the way the skin on my back pulled. “Stay out of my stuff. Stay out of my fucking life.”
He tossed the neatly folded clothes down onto the foot of my gurney. “I guess gratitude was too much to ask for, huh?”
“You think I should be grateful?” Just that quickly, Bard’s words of advice were forgotten. I gripped the edges of the gurney to keep from doing anything stupid, feeling the metal edges biting into my palms. “To you? After the shit you’ve pulled?”
“What the hell are you talking about, freak?” In six months, I’d never really seen Jeremiah angry, but from the way his voice had dropped to a low growl, that was about to change.
“I know, you asshole! All about your group project. That you’ve been fucking researching me!”
Someone as dark as Jeremiah Jones can’t really go pale, but he took a half-step back. “How—?”
“Because I’m not a fucking idiot, that’s how! I’m not an idiot, and I don’t want your fucking charity.”
“They’re your fucking clothes, you asshole. This isn’t charity.”
“Then what is it?” I sneered.
“It’s me protecting the campus from being blinded by your lily-white ass,” he shot back. “And maybe letting you know that nobody thinks you had anything to do with Shane’s death.”
I rolled my eyes, but before I could say anything, he just kept on going.
“And sure, you’re right about our project being on Crows, and that you were originally a part of it,” he continued angrily, “but we decided a few days ago not to use you in our presentation.”
That sucked some of the fire out of my anger. “Why?”
“Because we’re training to be Capes, you asshole! Capes save people. They don’t make things worse for them. Even when those people are dicks who really, really deserve it.”
“Capes save people?” With all that had happened over the past few days, it took me a moment to place where I’d heard that before. “You’ve been talking to Kayleigh.”
“Vibe? No. It was Poltergeist who put her foot down.” Jeremiah shifted uneasily. “She was right though.”
“Yeah, she was.” If I lived to be one hundred, I was never going to figure Tessa out. “None of you had any right to dig up my past.”
“It’s public information,” he began.
“It’s my life! My family. My history.”
“I know.” When someone Jeremiah’s size sighs, it’s hard not to hear it. “I get it. I’m sorry.”
For a long moment, the only sound came from the big man shifting his weight and shuffling his feet. It was my turn to sigh.
“Whatever. It happened and it’s over with. It’s not like killing your whole group will change that.” I rolled my eyes again as he swallowed hard. “That’s a joke. I’m pretty sure someone would stop me before I could get all of you.” That was also a joke… but apparently he didn’t see the humor in it. “So you’re sticking with the project topic?”
“Yeah. There isn’t time to find a new one—”
“Fine.”
“—and we’ve already spent weeks on our presentation, and…” He trailed off. “Did you say fine? You?”
“My dad killed my mother.” It was the first time I’d said those words aloud since arriving on campus, and they hurt. The fact that I was saying them to someone I didn’t even consider a friend just made it worse. “And he’s nothing compared to the real Black Hats. I’m here so I won’t go nuts… so I can maybe even do some good, but nobody knows whether that is going to work.
