So, on Monday morning, who wore the key to breakfast? After all of that, who won key week?

Great question.

First thing we did on Sunday morning was find Adrian.

“Why are we bringing this to Willowa instead of Saint Niveus again?” Marina drawled, keeping pace with us as we made our way down towards the grove, looking for Adrian.

“We’re not,” Andie said through gritted teeth, but none of us quite told Marina to fuck off for some reason. Maybe we could all sense that she wouldn’t listen to us anyways hahaha.

We caught him emerging from the labs right as we were about to barge in again.

He only looked surprised for a moment.

“Ah.” He eyed the five of us with an expression on his face like we were five dazed rodents his cat had dragged in. “You five been anywhere near Bellhoof today by chance?”

We had not, and not one of us was planning to go.

We’d sort of hoped that the events of Saturday night would be at least partially veiled in mystery, but we’d wildly underestimated the rate at which gossip travels at Palefish. By breakfast on Sunday morning everyone knew exactly what had happened.

“You swore you’d tell us what happened to Robert Pennington and his friends if we got you the key,” Rook said.

Adrian scoffed. “And you didn’t bring me the key did you?”

Rook held the key up, hanging from the tip of his finger and Adrian at least had the decency to look impressed. He reached for it and Rook snatched it back into his fist.

“What happened to them?” I demanded.

Adrian looked between our faces for a moment, and then laughed disbelievingly and pushed between us, started striding on up towards the grove. “I never said I’d tell you what happened,” he said.

I skipped to keep up with him, furious. “Yes you did!”

“No, I didn’t,” he said flatly. “And I know that because I don’t know what happened to them. No idea.”

“You said you’d tell us what you know,” Rook rumbled keeping his pace easily and Adrian tossed a hand vaguely, brushing us off.

It was Marina who finally ran around him and stood in his path arms crossed, a stubborn, arrogant expression on her pretty face.

Adrian came to a resigned halt.

“I’m not going to tell you,” he sighed. “And frankly, I have bigger things to worry about. Keep the stupid key. I hope you enjoy it.”

I can’t say I was surprised by that. It was absolutely not a fair trade. Like, random key that means nothing to anyone except a bunch of competitive college kids, in exchange for the details of 5 violent, secret deaths? Please.

“You can’t just not tell us,” I said, even though he obviously could.

“What do you think we’re going to do, replicate their research?” Bass said and Adrian let out a squawk of disbelieving laughter.

“Listen, if someone had told me that you five would get the key — or hold your ground against Saint Niveus juniors for that matter — I wouldn’t have believed them, I admit. You’ve got some pretty serious magic — a witch, correct?”

Bass nodded.

“And at least one wizard,” Adrian added with a slight smile towards Marina, who lifted her chin haughtily. “But I don’t care who you are or what you’re capable of, you’re not going to replicate their research. Not if they left you detailed instructions. No one can replicate that study.”

“But you will?” Marina asked and that wiped the amusement right off Adrian’s face.

“It’s not about that,” he snapped, and I realized — we all realized, I think — that she’d struck a nerve. Maybe that was why he added with another bark of humorless laughter, “or hell, maybe you will. Any of you ever killed anyone?”

I happened to be looking towards Marina, so I saw her expression freeze, saw her eyes flicker almost imperceptibly, just the barest bat of her eyelashes.

Bass said, “Uh, no?” at the exact same time that Rook said, “What did you say?” There was something sharp in his voice, that made me twist to look at him.

Adrian laughed. “Oh, maybe! Maybe you have!” The prospect seemed to give him some wry delight. “Well in that case — any of you got any kids?”

“What the fuck?” Bass said, oblivious to the ice that seared through me. “What is your problem?”

Adrian sneered. He was dripping with this ugly, bitter sarcasm. “No kids? That’s no problem, what about raising the dead, any of you raised the dead lately?”

A fist closed in my chest.

“Ah, now you start to understand,” Adrian said, misreading my expression. “Robert and Katharine were into magic beyond your wildest imaginings, and you think you’re going to what? Solve their deaths like good little hunters?” He laughed again, humorlessly. “Take your key, go play your games with all the other kids, and get out of my way.”

He pushed past Marina and stormed up the hill towards the Cathedral.

We all stood there, gazing after him. I felt like I’d swallowed a bucket of sink water.

Then Marina said, “Well, fuck him then. Let’s take it to Saint Niveus.”

But we didn’t. That evening a hassled looking Bellhoof junior called Martha Boatwraith approached us at dinner.

The table all around us fell silent, leaning forward to listen in.

“According to Professor Sorely, you’re on Polecat duty?”

We nodded glumly.

“Meet me down at the stables when you’re through,” she said. She was giving us a look like we were all criminals, and to be honest, by the time we were with poor Polecat, I was feeling like she might not be wrong.

Poor little creature’s a nervous wreck. He won’t let any of us so much as reach a hand into his hutch to feed him.

“He’s been like this all day,” Martha said reproachfully.

We weren’t much use, watching the upperclassmen trying to coax him out of his hutch while he growled and snapped at them. At the end of the evening, before we went up to bed, I tugged at Rook’s sleeve, and as if he’d known already what I was going to do, he passed me the key.

“Make sure you’re back here for feeding before the run!” Martha called after us as we left the barn.

But I don’t think any Bellhoof students are holding a grudge. On Monday morning the whole school twisted to look every time a senior came in to breakfast, craning to see who’d won the key, but no one came in wearing it. It wasn’t until lunch that everyone figured out that somehow, mysteriously, Polecat had the key back, and that for the first time in the history of the school, Bellhoof had won key week.