The Assassin Game (11 page)

“What if someone sees this page when you're looking at it?” Anvi asks. “It seems really risky.”

“Well, you'll obviously do your best to prevent that from happening,” Vaughan says. “We all have our designated World Wide Web time, so a teacher or nonplayer is not necessarily going to think anything is amiss if they catch a glimpse of the page. But if you're completely inactive on your machine for sixty seconds—no browsing, typing, scrolling—Crypt will redirect to the school home page. Emergency? Then hit Escape or End, and it's an instant kill switch back to Umfraville Central.”

“Tell us about the messaging,” Tesha says. “How does that work?”

“Thank you for asking.” Vaughan clicks on a link and a box appears at the bottom of the screen. “This is your normal Umfraville intranet IM box. Crypt just cuckoos into this box. It drops your Killer IMs in here, both public and private messages.” He looks at us. “Only difference is your public Killer messages are also available to view on Crypt, as part of your news feed. Got it? This way, when you're logged into Crypt, you can be working on something totally legit and still have one eye on the Game.”

“You've really thought of everything,” Rick snarks.

“Nice of you to notice,” Vaughan says.

“Tell them about the tracking,” Alex says quietly.

“Ooh, I will!” Vaughan claps his hands. “OK, folks—so if you click on this little map icon, you can see which users are online at which locations.”

He clicks, and a map of the isle of Skola pops up. There are a couple giggles. It's been designed in a blocky, pseudo-medieval style, very Minecraft. There are even little people walking around, clutching books.

“So cute!” says Whitney, beaming at Vaughan. “And really clever. You built this all yourself?”

Vaughan nods, trying to look cool, but I know him well enough to guess that he's bursting with happiness.

The map is fun. There's Main House and then the various satellite buildings—the boys' dorms, the studios, classrooms and laboratories, the library quad and studies, the theater, rec center, and staff quarters—and then the pool, playing fields, and amphitheater.

“You can zoom in and out.” Vaughan shows us. I lean in and see the caves marked and the causeway to the mainland. Vaughan has clearly spent time exploring the island—when did he have the chance? Every beach and wood is depicted, and the fields to the north of the island have little cube sheep and cows in them.

“Tracking. How does it work? Well…” Vaughan clears his throat. “As we are all painfully aware, there are only four reliable locations you can get on to the Umfraville intranet with Wi-Fi: the quad, the computer science lab and nearby classrooms, Marcia's newspaper office, and now here in the caves. But just for the extra frisson”—Vaughan's eyes light up—“on this map, I've included every workstation in the school.”

“Meaning what, exactly?” I ask.

“Meaning…” Vaughan's eyes are twinkling in the candlelight. “Any hardwired machine that is connected to the school intranet is also fair game, potentially. The PC in Ezra's office, for example, or Mr. Flynn's Mac in his cottage”—he winks at me—“if you can access any of those to spice things up a little, by all means, do. You'll show up on the map as a little red skull, tagged with your username, and we'll all know where you are.”

“I don't get it,” Martin says, shaking his dark, spiky head. “Why would we want tracking anyway?”

“Because we get to know who is where and when,” Marcia answers for Vaughan. “If you know users A, B, and C were online in the library at the time of a Killing in the ballroom, you could potentially guess who those users are and eliminate them from your suspect list.”

“That's only the beginning,” Vaughan says, then nods to Alex. “Our Grand Master has made the decision not to activate tracking now, but when he does…” Vaughan lets out a low whistle. “Hold on to your hats…”

“OK.” Alex slaps the table. “Everyone, you have twenty-four hours to log on and create your profile. Then look out for the first post from me.”

He stands up and reaches for the velvet bag on the table. “Rick, kill the generator. It's time for our main event. We need to vote.” He walks into the alcove and pulls back the curtain. There's an audible gasp from us apprentices as we see the altar for the first time. It's bigger than I expected. A dark wooden central pillar holds multilevel shelves, staggered at random like branches of a tree. Each shelf is lit with votive candles and is laden with photographs and trinkets from Games past. There are curly-cornered pictures of old Guild members: kids in masks with wicked smiles on their faces. There's a pewter goblet, its rim crusted with something terrible, a school tie fashioned into a hangman's noose, and a shiny, black “bomb” with a fuse sticking out of it. The yellow skull is on the uppermost shelf and around it are piles of bracelets, cut from the wrists of poor victims long ago.

Alex empties slips of paper from the velvet bag into a big brassy bowl at the altar and turns around to us. “When it is your turn, take a slip, write a name, and place it in the velvet bag. If you don't know who the Killer is, write anything—Elvis, Mickey Mouse—but write something. If you know who the Killer is, write his or her name down. But be very sure, because if you guess wrong, you're out of the Game.”

We take our turn, in order of when we were harvested. I'm last. I get to watch everyone walk into the alcove, kneel, and scribble something. Some people are really quick, some ridiculously slow. Finally, it's my go. I kneel on the dark cushion placed on the cold, sandy floor and take a slip of paper. I reach for the Pen of Doom—an oversized wooden stick with skulls carved into it. It is heavy and unbalanced in my hand, and as I clutch the end, my hands are slippery with cold sweat. I feel everyone's eyes on my back. Do I know who the Killer is?

I do not.

I write: Santa Claus

After I've scribbled it, I pause, mainly because I wish I could think of something wittier. But that's it. I fold the slip once, twice, three times.

I place the slip in the bag. It's half-open, with a few of the other pieces of paper visible. I try to make out writing, but everyone has been thorough with their origami.

Alex is standing, waiting for me to finish as I exit the alcove.

“I'll read the votes,” he announces to all, then steps inside the alcove and pulls a curtain across.

We watch the curtain and listen. The sound of the sea in the background is very eerie—not so much waves hitting the shore, more a kind of low rumble, echoing through the caves. I strain my ears. Maybe I'm just imagining it, but I believe I can hear the sound of paper against paper, Alex unfolding, examining, discarding.

He laughs quietly. Clearly somebody's suggestion was wittier than mine. A minute later, there's another low guffaw. Then nothing. We wait. And wait some more. Then it gets a little ridiculous. Alex is taking more time to read everything than we took to write it all in the first place. Has he fallen asleep? Gone missing down a rabbit hole? I look at the bottom of the curtain, trying to see some movement of feet, a shadow, something.

Suddenly the curtain is drawn back, and I stifle a scream.

A cloaked figure, wearing a mask, holding a flaming bowl of fire in front of him.

“Ashes to ashes! Dust to dust!” Alex has his ceremonial voice on again. It's actually quite funny, but we apprentices jump a mile. The others get to smirk at us.

Alex lowers the bowl to the ground, then scoops up a pile of sand, extinguishing the flames. He stands, cloak and mask still in place. He extends his arms to his audience.

“There were no correct votes cast at this Summoning,” he booms. “But I did appreciate ‘Killer Kardashian' and ‘your mum.'”

There's laughter, and Alex unmasks, de-robes, and chucks his stuff down on the table.

“The Killer lives to Kill again. And the rest of you are playing it safe so far. Class adjourned!” he says, normal voice back now. “Profile up, and I'll see you in cyberspace.”

We leave gradually, on the lookout for any non-Guild who might spot us. Vaughan is one of the first to dash out. I'm slightly disappointed. I wanted to congratulate him on joining us, make up for my half-arsed reaction when he told me at the pool. I'm not the only female whose hope is blighted; Whitney and Emily in particular look grumpy.

I linger until Daniel has gone, until only Alex and Carl are left, and then I get the heck out. I get halfway up the cliff path, and I can't see a single soul around me, Guild or otherwise. The light is fading. I put my hands in my pockets and draw out my key ring. Sometimes it gives me courage to hold my study room key in my hand like a dagger. But it's not there. I stare at the key ring as if I'm suddenly going to locate the key on the ring. My two small gym locker keys are there but no room key. Damn. I've been meaning to replace the fob for a while now; it's not the first time the catch has come undone. Did the key come off in the cave when all that stuff dropped out of my pocket? Damn and double damn. It's nearly dark now. Marcia has a key, of course, but she's probably going to be more difficult to find than my key. Nothing for it. I retrace my steps, wishing I'd brought a flashlight to help in the twilight.

By the time I reach the caves, all is in darkness, and the salty air is muzzled by the smoke of recently blown-out candles. I didn't pass Alex and Carl on the cliff path. Where can they have gone? Maybe there's another route that I don't know about, but it's slightly spooky that they somehow slipped by me.

There's dim light in the outer chamber, but the inner cave is completely dark and silent. If it was gloomy outside, it's pitch-black in here. Panic begins like a gripping feeling in my chest. I want to get my key and get out. I feel my way along the wall past the generator, and once in the Place Most Holy, the only way to proceed is to get on my hands and knees and crawl until I get to where I was sitting. I find what I think is the right crate and feel in the sand. Metal, a jagged edge. There it is! Muttering a prayer of thanks, I turn and make for the exit to the first cave, where I can stand up and use the wall to get out.

And then I hear it. A banshee, keening desperately in the distance. I freeze, hands against the wall behind me.

The sound comes again—not a cry or a moan but more like a low, hopeless wail. I breathe. Come on, Cate, think logically. Is that a seal? There are sometimes gray seals on the rocks around here; they make ridiculously spooky noises. And then those stupid seabirds. Maybe it's one of them?

And again.

No, this is human—live, sad human. I gingerly edge along the wall toward the light of outside, and the noise gets louder. Oh crap. It's here, in the caves somewhere, back in another passageway or chamber, somewhere I've yet to discover—inside. I stop again and listen closer. There are sobs and snuffles and low, desperate wailing.

It's Vaughan.

I recognize that cry. Because crying, like laughter, doesn't really ever change. The voice gets deeper, older, but the cry is the same. I heard it when he fell off a wall and scraped his arm when he was seven. I heard it in my head when I left that day in my dad's ridiculous sports car.

I think about going to him, somewhere back there in the darkness. Why is he crying? Did he not just get everything he wanted? To be part of the Game? To launch Crypt and wow us all? I move off the wall in the direction of the sobs.

Then they stop. I stand still. Did he hear me coming?

I listen hard and wait. All I can hear is the sea. I take a step in the direction that the sobs were coming from, but something stops me again. A chill sweeps through me. Was that really Vaughan? I begin to doubt. I feel the hairs rise on the back of my neck. I want to call out, but suddenly I don't want the thing that was making those noises to know where I am. My breathing sounds horribly loud, and I'm sure that whoever or whatever is crouching in the darkness knows exactly where I am. Maybe it's the Killer. Maybe he or she saw me come back in here and is tempting me back into the cave to finish me off, like a siren in the waves. Maybe I only imagined it sounded like Vaughan because he's on my mind constantly at the moment.

Whatever, I'm not going to hang around. I turn and stride out of the cave toward the half light. And then when I hit the beach, I start to run, and it's only when I have sprinted three quarters of the way up the cliff path and have to stop to catch my breath that I turn around and look at where I have come from.

There's a shadowy figure on the beach below looking up at me. I watch, trying to make out the face, but it's an amorphous blob. And it doesn't move. Stupid, it's a rock.

I gulp in air, then take off on my burning legs again and don't slow down until I see the yellow lights of the school buildings pooling out into the darkness.

Later at tea, Vaughan is at a table, laughing and engrossed in conversation with Alex, Carl, and Marcia. Rick sits elsewhere with non-Guild.

I must have imagined it
, I think as I see his beaming face. He's loving this. He's right there, in the thick of things with the most popular kids. Exactly what he wanted. It can't have been him crying in the cave.

So who was it?

Early—very early—Sunday morning: unconscious but still in the land of the living.

Asleep, I know the hand is going to be placed on my arm before I feel it. Somehow, in dreamland, I sense him in the room with me. My body is dead to the world, but my head is flicking through lost images of us as kids—nettle stings, a burned hand from a sparkler on bonfire night, a trip to the beach, and a dead crab. And then suddenly, there's the hand on my arm, and I'm awake and in my dorm bed, and the clock is reading 1:23 a.m.

Vaughan gets into bed with me. Without asking, as if it's the most natural and innocent thing in the world. I shift over in the single bed, like this happens every night. The bed is small, and I feel the cold of the wall on my back as I press against it, away from him. His body radiates a ferocious heat, as if he has run all the way here. My arms are in front of me awkwardly, as if I'm protecting myself from him getting any closer. Our legs touch, briefly, before I draw mine back. He is fully clothed, jeans, sweater. Thank God.

“You found a way in, then,” I whisper to him. I expect a smile, but I think his face is serious. His head is on the pillow beside mine, but I can't see his eyes properly, just the general contours of his face and the outline of hair against the dimness of the room behind.

He nods.

How different from when Alex was here on this bed with me. That felt thrilling, dangerous, but this…this is better. Vaughan feels like an equal. Vaughan feels like home.

“It's tonight, isn't it?” he whispers. “My initiation.”

“Oh. I don't know,” I croak. “No one's said anything.”

He shakes his head slightly. “They wouldn't. Not to you. But it must be tonight, no reason to wait any longer.” He lifts himself up slightly, whether to look at the clock or the door, I'm not sure. I realize the room is quieter than it should be. I sit up a little too and look across the room at the other bed.

“No Marcia,” Vaughan says. “That's a sure sign. I should…go back and wait, I suppose.” But he doesn't. We both relax down into the bed again, side by side. My eyes have adjusted now, and I can make out the worry on his face. I'm sure I can feel his heart beating through the mattress. Suddenly the years strip away, and it's like we're eight again. He's scared.

“I thought you wanted this,” I whisper. It sounds weird and awkward to me, like I'm talking about us being here, together, in my bed.

“I do!” His eyes close, and he lets himself breathe. “But you know. I'm no masochist. I just want it over.”

I want to hug him, hold him close, and tell him that it will be all right, but I can't because, obviously, we're not eight, and we're in bed. And also, because it might not be all right. I have no idea what Alex and the Elders have planned for him, but I do know that they will not make it easy.

His eyes open again. We wait for one of us to speak, for me to reassure him.

“I should go,” he says finally. We listen to each other breathe, although I think I'm probably holding my breath. His eyes bore into mine, and I'm almost overtaken by the urge to put my mouth on his and kiss away his worries. It's terrifying.

I open my mouth to say something—anything—to break this moment, and suddenly he's moving again and out of the bed as quickly and silently as he got in, and he's leaving the room and leaving a huge empty space in my tiny bed. I exhale. I wish I could have said more, anything to help. Or just something to make him stay in bed with me, because it was nice. It strikes me that they'll come for me before they come for him; I hope he doesn't meet them on their way. Not long now.

I shift onto my back, one hand moving onto the warm place where he was lying. I like the warmth.

• • •

“Get up. It's time.”

Marcia's standing over me with a flashlight. I can only have closed my eyes for a few minutes. I hope she didn't see Vaughan leaving. I should stall the Guild to give Vaughan time to get back to his dorm, but then my gaze moves to the clock and it is beaming out 3:02 a.m. I must have fallen asleep.

“Now, Cate!”

I dress quickly. “What are you going to do to him?”

Marcia doesn't answer me. I shiver, reaching up to the door hook for a coat and scarf. She pushes past me, opening the door, flicking the flashlight off, and looking both ways before padding down the corridor without a backward glance. She's wearing her Elder cloak and it billows out behind her as she moves. I follow, like she knows I will. She barely pauses all the way down the stairs, pulling her hood up and out into the night air, across the open, toward the woods. There's a half moon, enough light to see where we're stepping. I catch her, because I'm faster, and because my adrenaline is pumping.

“Where are we going?” I hiss.

“We need to hurry.” She switches the flashlight back on and takes the left path toward the studios. We're heading to the cliff path—going to the cave? We clear the trees, the gorse our only cover now, following the path toward the sea. A startled seabird flies somewhere above and ahead, announcing our presence with alarm calls, leading us down to the beach. But then at the point where we should start our descent, Marcia continues left, along the cliff top. I slow down. The promontory. The cliff top.

“Come on!” Marcia urges. “They will have started already!”

I stop in my tracks. Because all at once I know what they're going to do to him and why Marcia is bringing me late to the party.

“Marcia, he can't swim.”

She stops too, looks back at me. “Sure he can. At the second Killing…everyone said he jumped into the pool.”

I shake my head. “In the shallow end. He can't swim. He can't swim!” I grab the flashlight from her and set off, hurtling along the sandy path as fast as I dare, heading for the promontory. I can't see them yet, as there's a slight incline before the path dips down toward the part of the cliff that juts out into the sea, but I know where they are, exactly where they are.

A few years ago, there was an unusually hot summer, and a bunch of kids thought it would be fun to do some tombstoning. There's a place on the cliff promontory where you can climb down a yard or so and find a natural launchpad off into the sea below. It's maybe a thirty-foot drop, and below is a reassuring patch of lighter blue that indicates no rocks. A natural diving pool, you might say. Well, if you were totally off your rocker you might say that. But jumpers have to be careful, because there's only one spot that's safe to hit; too far left or right and you're fish food on the rocks below. I was just a new girl, too young to be included, but I saw them do it because it happened more than once that summer, and everyone got wind of it. And then of course, the staff heard, and it stopped happening. It was a phase, and not one that held much attraction when the sea temperature dropped several degrees back to deathly cold, and the penalty for jumping was expulsion.

And now, this is Vaughan's initiation. Alex is going to make him jump.

I reach the brow of the hill, and before I know it, I'm on them. Dots of light moving around the ground, a couple lanterns. The apprentices are huddled, watching, and the Elders and Journeymen stand around at the cliff edge, their cloaks blowing slightly in the breeze.

I can't see him.

“Vaughan?” I mutter. “Vaughan!” This time, it comes out as a shout. The Elders turn to look at me, and as they part, I see him there, in the middle of them. His bare skin stands out against the black of the cloaks, the black of the night, and the sea stretching out behind him. He is stark naked. Standing, hands tied in front of him, feet tied also. I scan the hooded figures, looking for Alex, but all is a blur. I find my breath, and my voice again. “Are you going to make him jump?”

Nobody answers me, and it's all the answer I need. Then I hear Rick's laugh.

“No!” I yell.

“Cate,” Marcia is at my side. “It'll be OK.”

“No it won't!” I say, striding up to the group. Rick steps forward and puts a meaty hand out to stop me. I strike it away with a strength that rarely presents itself. He yells at me, pumped up and ready to grab, but Alex pulls him back and walks toward me.

“Don't interfere, Cate,” he warns me. “There has to be an initiation.”

“But not one that will kill him!” I yell back.

Alex guffaws. “Don't be overdramatic, Cate.”

Marcia is behind me again, her hands are on the top of my arms, squeezing them reassuringly. “Let it happen,” she breathes in my ear. “He'll be fine.”

“He won't be fine!” I shout at them all. “He can't swim!”

Alex frowns.

“Yeah, right. We saw him jump in the pool.” Rick again.

“He wasn't out of his depth,” I say. “You make him jump, he'll drown.”

“Alex,” Marcia says under her breath. “If it really is true he can't swim, we shouldn't make him jump.”

Alex sighs and bites his cheek. This is not going according to plan, clearly.

“Come on, man!” Rick says to Alex. “We'll untie him.” A knife blade flashes from his pocket, and Rick bends to cut Vaughan's feet free. “He can doggy-paddle back to shore!”

“It's not that far, and look, it's as flat as a millpond.” Carl assumes the voice of calm. “Cut his hands too. He gets in trouble, we pull him out.”

“Oh, 'course you will!” I cry. “Are you completely thick? He can't swim a stroke, and he'll drown!”

Vaughan just stands there, not meeting my eyes, staring at the ground. Rick cuts his hands free, reluctantly, and Vaughan doesn't move a muscle, doesn't even shiver.

“Ask him!” I try, desperately.

“Well…” Alex is irritated. Because it will be a big step down if he doesn't follow through. Not to mention a royal pain in the arse to think up something else. “Vaughan, can you swim?”

Vaughan raises his head and looks past them, right at me.

“Like a fish.”

“Ha!” Rick is jubilant. “In the drink! In the drink!”

“He's lying.” I feel the panic rising in my chest. “Vaughan, don't be stupid. Tell them!”

Vaughan smiles at me, like he's just seeing me for the first time, then takes a step backward, toward the sea and oblivion, then another, until he is standing right at the edge, back to the sea. All the time he looks at me.

“Jump! Jump!” Rick shouts. A couple others join in.

“No!” My voice is choked, not loud enough. “Not from the top, no one jumps from the top!”

“Jump, you loser!” Rick calls again.

Vaughan smiles at him, lifts his arms out to the side, and gives Rick the one-fingered salute.

Rick runs into him and gives him an almighty shove. The force propels Vaughan in a straight line out over the edge, and for the weirdest split second, he just seems to hang midair, Wile E. Coyote with peddling legs, and then he's fallen out of sight, as if he was never there.

We all listen for the splash. There is none. Everyone runs to the edge, looks down, but there's no clear view straight down. Even with the flashlights dancing on the water below, we can't see anything.

“Where is he?” I gasp. And then I'm running, back the way we came, and then cutting down the cliff toward the beach, not knowing if I'm on any actual path or if I'm forging my own and am going to be meeting my death on the rocks below. I'm aware of people around me, see Alex overtake me, feel his panic match mine. He doesn't want an actual death on his hands; he probably wasn't going to make Vaughan jump, just taunt, threaten, humiliate. Alex just puts things in motion and washes his hands of the consequences. That's more his style. We scramble down the cliff side and find the beach below, then sprint across the sand toward the sea, Rick and Carl hot on our heels.

There is no splashing, no cries for help, only the sound of the sea gently lapping the beach.

“Vaughan!” I cry.

“Shut it!” Rick spits at me. “Someone will hear you!”

I don't care. I throw off my coat, kick off my shoes, and wade into the water, the icy cold slashing me around the legs. “Vaughan!”

Everyone is on the beach now, and flashlights scan the water. One of them finds a pale shape, hunched over a rock at the bottom of the cliff face. It is not moving.

“There!” I shout, and more flashlights join the one on the shape. “Vaughan! Are you OK?” I can't see his face. The beams of light dance on the pale shape like fireflies, and I think I can make out the curve of his back, his feet, one arm flung out behind him awkwardly. I try to look for the red of blood or for the rise and fall of breath, but he's too far away and the flashlights are too weak.

And we all just stand there. Alex, Marcia, and Carl have joined me, knee deep in the lapping water. For all this talk of jumping in to rescue Vaughan, we are all just standing there, because there is no panicked drowning, and the water may well be flat, but it is very, very cold. What's done is done. He's on the rocks. Either he fell on them and is probably dead, or he scrambled onto them and he's probably all right. I hate myself for hesitating.

“Alex!” a voice hisses from behind us. “Someone's coming!”

That's enough to make us look around. Martin is standing halfway up the cliff.

“I saw a car's headlights, and somebody shouted!” Martin has everyone's attention. “We need to get out of here!”

As soon as he's said it, bodies get themselves moving. Cockroaches scurrying from the light. I grasp Alex's arm. “Help me get Vaughan.”

Alex doesn't reply, but Carl is wading toward the shore. “Alex, we have to go before they come.”

Marcia tugs at my hand. “Come on, Cate. We can't hang around.”

I turn on her. “What are you talking about? Vaughan is hurt. We have to help him!”

Her eyes flash. “How? If someone's coming, they can help him.” And then she's splashing back to solid ground, and I'm picking my jaw and my heart off the ground. I can't believe it. I search the fleeing figures for Daniel, without much hope, and I come up short. I'm not even sure he was here to begin with. Only Alex stands by, panting, eyes darting up at the cliff, looking for the mystery person that is surely going to end his career at Umfraville.