The Oxford Inheritance (12 page)

“Okay,” Cassie agreed.

Evie gasped in surprise. “Really?”

“Really.” Cassie laughed at her shocked expression. “I'm in.”

MERTON COLLEGE WAS HIDDEN DOWN A COBBLED BACKSTREET
lined with old-fashioned streetlamps. The traffic and city noise from High Street faded as Cassie followed Evie up to the main gates, their footsteps clattering on the uneven paving stones.

Cassie looked around, intrigued to go behind the walls of another college. When they ducked through the wooden gatehouse, they emerged into a small courtyard. While there was a chapel, and wings of sandy brick three stories high, manicured quads and squares radiating out from the long pathways, it was nothing compared to the scale and grandeur of Raleigh's great spread of buildings. Instead, the college was thick with history, age showing in the thin slit windows carved deep into the buildings they passed, the faint curve of the buckling supports, and the scarred cobblestones underfoot.

“It was built back in the thirteenth century,” Evie explained.

“Before Raleigh?”

Evie nodded. “There was a big rivalry when Sir Walter Raleigh moved in. He got the lands as part of his reward for his naval victories, and he swore he'd built the grandest college in the city. It wasn't as prestigious as it is now,” she added. “People were suspicious of academics. With the church and Crown in such upheaval, it was dangerous just to be associated with the colleges.”

“I guess that's why so many groups gathered in secret, right?” Cassie said.

Evie nodded, leading them across the courtyard. “All it took was one wrong lecture, and you could be brought up on charges of heresy or treason. It's why it's been so hard for me to find original source materials. I thought the college would have plenty among Raleigh's archives, but they were all pretty cagey with their correspondence. Nobody talked about their meetings at all, even though I know from secondhand sources that they all met regularly, every month here at the college, sometimes more.”

Cassie was just about to ask more about these group meetings when the bells chimed through the courtyard for dinner. They joined the crowd heading up the stone staircase to the grand dining hall. She tugged awkwardly on her hem. Evie had insisted on lending her a dress for the occasion, and although Cassie had rejected all the wispier chiffon outfits, she had finally submitted and accepted the loan of a simple dress in deepest black silk. The bodice hugged her torso, but she was several inches taller than Evie, so the hemline skimmed several inches above her knees. Even swathed in her usual thick down coat, with her formal robe layered over the top, Cassie felt exposed, vulnerable to the brisk winds that played around her. Still, as she glanced around at the other students and diners slowly filing into the building, she was glad of the outfit, and Evie's simple gold bangle on her wrist.

Inside, the dining hall was wood-paneled and imposing. After weeks at Raleigh, Cassie was used to the style: high arched ceilings and long tables running the length of the room, adorned with heavy silver place settings and vases brimming with white roses and lilies.

“Evie!” The call came from across the room, and Evie quickly led them through the crowd. The Mandeville group was clustered at a table near the head of the room: Paige, Olivia, and Hugo with a few others, all of them dapper in formal suits and glittering cocktail dresses.

“You made it.” Hugo rose to kiss Evie on the cheek. “You didn't say you were bringing company.” His eyes drifted over to Cassie. “Good to see you again, Cassie.”

Cassie tried not to react to his dark stare. “You too,” she murmured, busying herself by taking off her coat and carefully folding her scarf into a small, neat square as the others exchanged their usual round of air-kiss greetings. She was so focused on ignoring Hugo that she was startled to hear someone greet her by name.

“Cassie, good to see you again.” It was Miles, Cassie recognized, the blond man from the drinks mixer. He was wearing a suit with a small red bow tie, and he reached to shake her hand enthusiastically. “How are you settling in? Any three
A.M.
breakdowns yet?”

“Not yet.” Cassie smiled. “But it's early days.”

“Don't say that,” Evie scolded. “She's doing great. I can't imagine it, getting plunged into everything without any time to adjust. We all at least were freshers first.”

“Are you crazy?” Miles asked, eyes wide with drama. “First year was the worst. I nearly dropped out half a dozen times. I was going to go set up a surf shop in Brazil,” he told Cassie, pulling out a chair for her to take her seat.

“Why didn't you?” Evie asked, moving to a free place beside them.

“No, Evie, you're here with me,” Olivia interrupted, patting the free space beside her. Evie obediently circled the table as Hugo spoke up, answering for Miles.

“Because he hates the water and can hardly swim.” Hugo slid into a seat directly across from Cassie. He met her gaze with a small knowing smile. “Don't listen to a word of it. Last month he was convinced he should go live in an ashram for a year.”

“I should,” Miles protested, shaking out his cloth napkin with a dramatic gesture. “Inner calm would serve me a whole lot better in life than this bloody doctorate.”

They all laughed, and Cassie felt herself relax, just a little. She'd been wary, bracing herself for the same chilly indifference she experienced from her classmates in her tutorials at Raleigh, but instead, the group seemed welcoming and warm.

“That's a cute purse,” Olivia remarked from Cassie's other side, as the waitstaff began to circulate with wine and water.

Cassie glanced down at the only part of the outfit that was her own, a small box clutch with gold detailing. “Oh, thanks.”

“Vintage?”

“Uh, yes.” Cassie had found it for a pound in a thrift store on Cowley Road.

“The best things are.” Olivia sipped her wine and glanced around the room, eyes drifting over the crowd. “Lewis,” she called out. Cassie watched her flutter a wave to an older man. In his thirties, he wore the traditional professor's tweed jacket and a boyish, eager grin that stretched across his face as he hurried over to their table, jostling a waiter on his way.

“Sorry, so sorry,” he stammered in apology, arriving at Olivia's side with flushed cheeks. “Liv, if I'd known you were coming . . .”

“Last-minute thing.” Olivia shrugged, leaning up to kiss him lightly on both cheeks. “Come sit by me.”

Lewis looked conflicted. “I have guests.”

“They can take care of themselves.” Olivia's mouth curved downward into a pout. “You know how these things bore me.”

“I . . . of course! I'll be right back.” Lewis all but sprinted across the room.

Olivia turned back to the table and caught Cassie's observant stare. She gave a tiny shrug, her lips curving in a smile. “Sweet man. I had him for tutes last term.”

“He's a professor?” Cassie was surprised. Olivia must have been twenty at the most, and from his clear adoration, she would never have guessed the man was her teacher.

“Oh yes, an expert in Renaissance art history,” Olivia replied.

“That's not all he's an expert in,” Paige added with a wicked grin.

Cassie dropped her voice, turning to Miles. “I didn't realize staff could date students.”

“Not officially,” he replied, smirking. “It's frowned upon. But no one pays attention to the rules. Especially Olivia.” He gave her a meaningful look. “Playing with fire, that one. If the tabloids found out . . .”

“Why would journalists care?” Cassie asked.

“Her father, of course.” Miles took in her blank look. “You don't know? Mandeville Senior is head of the opposition in Parliament. Striking distance from the prime minister's office come May, if the polling's to be believed.”

“Oh.” Cassie looked back across the table, where Olivia was whispering in Evie's ear, the pair of them flushed and giggling. “I didn't realize.”

“Everybody here is someone,” Miles continued, pointing around the table. “Paige is really Lady Pembroke, heiress to half of Gloucestershire. Harry's parents run an aeronautics company that supplies the armed forces, and Sasha's family runs one of the largest shipping companies in Europe.”

“What about you?” Cassie asked.

“Me? I'm practically a peasant,” Miles joked. “Aristocracy fallen on hard times, as my mother likes to say. We're up to our eyeballs in debt, will probably go into foreclosure on the estate before the year is out.”

Cassie took in the crowd, wondering if they were likely suspects for the School of Night. They seemed more concerned with cocktails than any shadowy rituals, but they certainly fit the bill when it came to exclusive backgrounds.

Soon, the diners were all seated, and an elderly man seated at the dais table rose to his feet. A hush fell over the hall.

“Welcome. Professors, students, honored guests. Welcome to Merton.” He paused, and everyone bent their heads. “
Oculi omnium in te respiciunt, Domine. Tu das escam illis tempore opportuno. . . .
” As he murmured what were clearly familiar words, Cassie looked around from under her eyelashes. She was struck with the sense of history, of continuity to these solemn words, how they had been performed week
after week for hundreds of years, the faces the only thing that changed in the great hall. How many times had this incantation been made—the silver candlesticks lit, the words echoing through the cavernous space as if passing back through history itself?

Cassie's eyes met Hugo's across the table. All heads around them were bent, cast low for the grace, but his gaze was steady on hers. Again, Cassie felt that instinctive shiver, a strange sense of recognition passing between them. She snapped her eyes down as the incantation drew to a close, determined to ignore him. He belonged to Evie. He shouldn't be looking at her like that.

“
Per Jesum Christum dominum nostrum, Amen.
”

“Amen,” the crowd murmured, and then noise and chatter swept through the hall. Waitstaff came out, dressed in formal black outfits, expertly balancing heavy silver trays carrying the first course, and at every table, diners greeted their seatmates and refilled their glasses of wine.

“Red? White? What's your poison?” Miles asked, holding a bottle in each hand.

“Red, thanks,” Cassie answered. “But only a little.”

“There's no such thing.” He grinned, continuing to pour, until her glass was almost full. “To Oxford.” Miles raised his glass in a toast, and around the table the others followed suit. “Long may we enjoy its bountiful fruits.”

“Some, longer than others,” Olivia murmured with a pointed look at her cousin.

Hugo laughed. “To Oxford.”

AFTER DINNER, THE GROUP HEADED FOR THE OXFORD UNION
buildings across town, piling into black cabs along with their coterie of friends and hangers-on. Dinner had been a parade of delicious, elegant food, a far cry from Cassie's usual snatched takeout. They'd started with pheasant and persimmon salad —“Bird shot on the college lands,” Lewis informed them proudly—followed by filet of beef, rich and bloody. By the time the waitstaff cleared their dessert plates, which had contained tiny meringue cages filled with cream and fruit, Cassie was sitting easy in her chair, laughing along to Miles's eccentric future plans, and Paige's account of walking the runway at Paris fashion week the previous fall.

She'd accepted the invite out of curiosity, wanting to learn more about the group and maybe even the mysterious School of Night, but to her surprise she found herself enjoying the evening, lulled by the wine and friendly chatter that enveloped the group. Cassie's usual sense of being other, somehow, adrift from her fellow students and their cut-glass accents, melted away under the twinkling chandeliers, until she felt the warmth of being included, on the inside at last. She sat sandwiched between Miles and Evie in the cab after dinner, the city slowly passing outside the windows in a blur of shadows and neon streetlights, until they were ejected, stretching, on a familiar patch of cobbled street, close to Blackwell's and the other shops of the high street that now sat empty and still.

Cassie was confused when the cab stopped on the street close to Blackwell's and Miles directed them down a backstreet to a Victorian-
style redbrick building. “This is the students' union?” she asked. “I thought that was across town, in the big concrete block.”

“They're both called the union.” Hugo looked amused as they approached the entrance, lined with crumbling pillars and an elaborate stone portcullis. “There's a general union organization, but this is a private, members'-only club.”

“They're famous for the debates,” Evie added. “They've had all kinds speak here: prime ministers, presidents, even Madonna.”

Cassie looked around with interest as they filed inside. The decor was more of the English hunting style she'd become so used to since arriving in Oxford, wood beams overhead and dark leather wingback chairs arranged around low antique coffee tables. Groups of students and older adults clustered in corners, enjoying their evening drinks.

Cassie paused, recognizing the thickset outline of Sebastian's shoulders among them. The scene at their tutorial felt like weeks ago, though it had only occurred that morning; now he was at the bar with a couple of other athletic-looking boys. He glanced across the room, eyes widening as he saw her there. Cassie couldn't resist fluttering a wave in his direction. Sebastian's expression darkened.

“Cassie?”

She turned. Evie was waiting for her, gesturing to a staircase beyond the bar. Cassie caught up with them, leaving Sebastian and his friends behind.

Cassie followed the group upstairs to a private lounge. “The personal
domain of the Union president,” Miles told her grandly. Cassie looked around curiously, drinking in the scene. Here, the party was already well under way: music playing loudly, people clustered on couches and lounge chairs, passing around wineglasses and cut-glass tumblers.

She followed Hugo and Olivia as they cut through the crowd, greeted by cheers, backslapping, and air-kisses. It wasn't just Raleigh they ruled, she noted, but here too: people stepped aside to make room
and the couch was vacated for them. Soon, Cassie too was seated in the center of it all with a tumbler of fine whiskey in her hand.

“Glad you came?” Evie smiled, curled on the sofa beside Hugo.

Cassie nodded. “Thanks for dragging me out.”

“My pleasure.”

“How about a little bump?” Miles took a slim sachet of white powder from his breast pocket, then cut the lines of cocaine on the glass-topped coffee table. He took a first snort, then offered his rolled banknote in their direction. “Evie?”

Evie blushed and shook her head so fast her hair shimmered in the lamplight.

Olivia laughed. “Not Miss Genevieve,” she drawled. “She's a good girl, aren't you?”

Evie flushed again, cheeks pink. “I have an early meeting with my supervisor!” she protested as Olivia bent her head and inhaled, tracing the neat line along the glass.

“She's kidding; we envy your virtue.” Hugo dropped a casual kiss on Evie's forehead before his gaze slid over to Cassie. “What about you?” He arched an eyebrow, looking smug, as if he expected her to decline too.

Cassie felt an itch of rebellion. She usually steered clear of chemicals. Alcohol, drugs, they were all too dangerous to her hard-won self-control. But tonight, she was already off her guard. What harm would it do?

“Sure.” Cassie held her hand out.

Hugo's lips curled with surprise. “Well, well, well.”

Cassie ignored him, bending her head to feel the first fierce spark of the drug hitting her bloodstream. She only did half a line, but it was enough to bring the memories rushing back: the sharp itch of adrenaline, the restless burn beneath her skin. Her heart raced as she lifted her head again, finding Hugo's gaze still fixed on hers.

Her skin prickled. Cassie looked away and turned back to the group.

“Hartwell will get treasurer,” a short, stout man was saying. He already had the look of middle age about him, even though Evie murmured that he was still a finalist at Christ Church. “And King president, I'd bet the house on it.”

Miles must have caught Cassie's confusion, because he leaned in to translate. Apparently, Union politics was a hotbed of bribery and corruption, with students using whatever means they could to win a seat on the various steering committees and organizing associations. “Bloody hacks, running for office. Can't see the point myself.”

“That's because you don't do anything that involves getting out of bed before noon,” Olivia replied, getting up. She picked her way over the coffee table on bare feet and collapsed with a laugh on the other side of Evie, snuggling in close.

“I don't know why it's such a big deal,” Evie remarked. “I can't imagine wanting to be treasurer or first secretary, or whatever it is. Nothing but boring meetings and budgets, on top of regular college work.”

She laughed, but Olivia's expression turned stony. “It's experience, for later in life. And the status, too. Being president of the Union really means something.”

“To whom?” Hugo countered. “The head of recruiting at Deloitte? Your future boss at Barclays?” His voice was scornful. “Forgive me for not wanting to join the herds on a fast track to their investment banking fortunes.”

Olivia flickered her eyes skyward. “We're just saying if you're going to hang around here for God knows how long, you should at least do something constructive.”

“It's called a doctorate,” Hugo drawled, but Cassie could see the faint tension in his jaw. Although his body was draped casually on the sofa, one arm propped on the brocade-covered arm, there was a certain air of power about him, an intensity that was winding tighter by the moment.

“I don't see why you're so against it,” Olivia snapped back. “You're too old to be rebelling just for the sake of it. You have to grow up some time.”

“That, my dear cousin, is entirely up for debate.” Hugo downed the last of his scotch and unfolded his limbs from the seat. “Now, I'm off to get another round, unless that's not constructive enough for you?”

He headed for the bar. Evie leaned forward for a moment, as if she wanted to go after him, but then sat back, watching him with an anxious expression. “You shouldn't push him like that,” she told Olivia. “You know how it winds him up when you talk about politics.”

Olivia looked impatient. “Then he shouldn't be so sensitive. He's next in line to a fucking dynasty. He's meant to be a member of Parliament already or at the very least some local government hack.”

There was something bitter in Olivia's tone. “What about you?” Cassie asked. “Why don't you run for office?”

Olivia face snapped closed. “Don't be ridiculous.” She laughed, but her eyes were like steel. “It's like Evie says, why would I want to spend my time on all that boring stuff when I could be out having fun?”

The conversation moved on, but Cassie watched Olivia. She'd recognized something new in her, a flash of frustration. Ambition thwarted, perhaps, or even jealousy.

Had anyone ever considered her next in line to the dynasty, or was that fate for Hugo alone? He and Olivia seemed so different, but they were more alike than they probably knew. Cassie had watched them all evening, and now she had new insight into their world. Each of them struggled against invisible restraints; Olivia, overlooked when it came to the political legacy; Hugo, bitter under that same weight. Cassie wondered what it would be like, to move through life with such high expectations. A name to live up to. A duty to fulfill. People had only ever thought the worst of her, a badge she learned to wear with grim pride.

“All this election stuff,” Cassie said deliberately, spying an opening. “Isn't it all decided in back rooms anyway? I heard that the results were fixed by those secret societies.”

There was silence. Cassie suddenly realized all eyes were on her.

“Which societies?” Miles asked.

“I don't know.” She tried to laugh it off. “Some guy in my tutorial was just going on about how it was rigged, how everything was run by those groups.”

“God, I wish,” Miles snorted. “It would save us all the torment of this bloody campaign season.”

“Or they could do it the old-fashioned way,” another guy piped up. “Pistols at dawn on the commons, winner takes all.”

The conversation moved on, and Cassie let out a private sigh of relief. She'd been clumsy, saying something outright like that. She had to be more careful; she didn't know what she was dealing with yet.

She waited until attention was elsewhere then excused herself, slipping away in search of the bathrooms. The bartender pointed her down a long passageway that, like most hallways in Oxford, was lined with old photos and portraits, reminders of the generations who built and crafted the legacy current members enjoyed. Cassie thought of Olivia and Hugo, and the Mandeville legacy they were both so sensitive about. She'd never had a family to navigate like them.

But perhaps she did.

Cassie paused, realizing for the first time that if—when—she found her father, there would be a family to go along with him. She'd never even known her grandparents, but she could have a whole sprawling network of strangers linked to her by blood: cousins, aunts, uncles. A history, a legacy of her own.

“Enjoying our illustrious forbearers?” Hugo's voice behind her made Cassie jump.

“You scared me!” She stepped back. He was too close in the narrow hallway, his eyes dark on hers. “Why are you always sneaking up on me like that?”

“Me?” Hugo looked amused. “You seem to be the one making a habit of wandering where you're not supposed to be.”

Cassie remembered the night she broke into the vaults. She looked away. “I didn't realize this was a private area,” she said quickly, covering.

“You're fine,” Hugo replied. “If anyone asks, you're with me.”

“And the Mandeville name opens doors around here?”

He shrugged. “It has its blessings. And its burdens,” he added, with a dark look. “Just ask Father.” Hugo nodded to one of the portraits. A blue-eyed student stared back, stiffly holding a ceremonial gavel.

“Union president, nineteen ninety-four,” Cassie read the inscription.

“Grandfather's up here too, somewhere back there.” Hugo pointed down the hallway. “A couple of uncles. My aunt Beatrice. Cousin James.”

“But not you.” Cassie recognized something in his voice, almost wistful.

“Not I.” Hugo gave her a twisted smile. “I never even ran.”

“Why not? It sounds like you'd have it sewn up. The great Mandeville legacy,” she added lightly.

Hugo shrugged. “Legacy is a curious thing. When people have expectations . . .” He stared at the picture, deep in thought. “I wonder sometimes if I'm fighting destiny even trying to go my own way. Or if it's better just to give in and accept that my fate was set before I was even born.”

Cassie felt a chill. She'd wondered the same thing, many times. If her mother's curse would be her own; the madness and instability already encoded, deep within her DNA. She could run forever and still not escape that terrible day, the stain of blood on cracked porcelain. “I don't know,” she answered softly. “Maybe all you can do is try.”

Hugo turned back to her, his expression thoughtful. “Why are you here?”

Cassie froze. “What do you mean?”

“Here, tonight. Partying like . . . like you're one of us. You're not.”

Cassie tensed. “I'm here because I was invited,” she replied, icy. “Why? Am I not important enough to enter your hallowed halls? I'm sorry that my ancestors don't merit a place on your walls, but—”

“That wasn't what I was saying,” Hugo tried to interrupt.

Cassie shook her head. “I know exactly what you meant.” She gave him a scornful look. “You know, for someone who is so ambivalent about
his own legacy, you're pretty quick to judge everyone else's.” She turned to stride away.

“Wait,” Hugo said. She didn't stop, but then he was in front of her again, blocking her path. “Really, I didn't mean it like that. I just meant you're different, that's all.”

“Fine.” Cassie shrugged, still tense, her heart racing.

“Listen, do you want to get dinner sometime?” Hugo asked.

She paused with a shock, certain she'd heard him wrong, but Hugo seemed sincere, hesitant even as he continued, “Or a movie maybe. I've seen you out by the art-house theater in Jericho; we could see a film, this week perhaps.”