He nods as we back against a tree in the middle of the quad. And wait. Teddy keeps looking toward the Atlantic.
“This will all be different any second,” he says, and I hope he’s right.
But I’m not just hoping for peace. Or a new, better leader.
I’m hoping that, if and when this chaos subsides, I’ll see the boy I’ve been trying not to be too obvious about looking for. Ben Zin. His dad’s mansion is all the way on the other side of the woods, toward the village. Is he there now? Does he know I’m back? Is he, as Teddy suggested, being punished for helping me escape last night? Will I, too, be punished?
For the last few weeks, I was neighbors with Ben. I lived in the attic bedroom of a house that belonged to Gigi Malone, who sadly took her own life last night. She asked me to throw her body in the ocean, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. I had to go to Valedictorian Hall, where my vial of blood was stored, and free myself. If I’d stayed, if I’d done what she’d asked, or if I’d gone to Ben’s like he’d asked, would this mess have happened?
“Who’s the new headmaster?” I ask Teddy. “You saw him?”
A woman’s shout interrupts me: “There he is!”
The hollering and smashing stops. We look toward the small dock just north of the dorms, just south of the cliff. There, a caravan of canal boats like you might see in Venice is being nudged against the dock by thick, burly rowers in red-and-white striped shirts. The men and women that fill the boats are dressed like members of the most spectacular circus; they begin, one by one, on shaky feet, to come ashore.
Students file onto the quad, veering away from the unstable staff as they do. I spot my archnemesis, Harper Otto, quickly; it’d be impossible to miss that red-haired Southern beauty queen, especially with her entourage of too-perfect followers. She sees me and mouths, “Murderer.” Behind her, someone I like even less—Hiltop P. Shemese, whom I didn’t expect to see again—shuffles out of the woods, smoothing her short bangs and bobbed hair as she flicks a glare at me, a glare that morphs into a thin grin. She offers a little clap for Teddy. Only when she’s turned back to the caravan do I smack Teddy.
“I thought you said Mephisto was gone,” I say. “Hiltop’s obviously still here.”
“Villicus is no longer in control of Cania. Even if he hadn’t been demoted, the parents wouldn’t have stood for it after seeing him chase a student down like he did you. But Mephisto will never leave this place, and so his avatar Hiltop remains.” He shoots me a pointed stare. “Until we destroy him—and his replacement—he will be here in whatever form he can skulk around in.”
“And how do you propose we destroy him? What’s the plan? I’m not exactly a demon slayer. Unless I can paint him to death, I’m not gonna be much help.”
“I don’t know the plan yet.”
“Sorry, what?”
“Patience, Miss Merchant,” he hisses. “You’re rushing like a common demon. We’ll work on it shortly. There’s time.”
“Here’s an idea: let me go home, and come get me when you’ve got a plan.”
He points hard at the people around us. “Don’t talk so loudly, and don’t look so familiar with me. I brought you back here against your will, remember?”
“How could I forget?”
“Well, then, you’re supposed to hate me. Play the part.”
That shouldn’t be a stretch.
“And remember,” he says so quietly I have to read his thin lips, “no one can know about my secret identity or our plan, when we create it. Tell them I put you in an unbreakable coma. Tell them whatever you must. Fight for the Big V to make them believe it. But do not let on that I’m involved in anything, Miss Merchant, or I will be killed. No one must know. Trust no one.”
“So I’ve gone from discovering secrets to keeping them?”
“Let’s hope so.”
Teddy stands on his tiptoes. Everyone is leaning and jumping to see over the heads of the crowd, to see the man of the hour. Playing the part of a loyal follower of Mephisto, Teddy grumbles that he thinks he can see “that egotistical little freak.” So our new headmaster has a big ego? I’m not sure that distinguishes him much from Villicus, who was anything but humble.
I watch Hiltop from afar and realize that I’d be a fool to believe that she—the only remaining avatar of Mephisto—is going to take this upheaval lying down; she’s probably already knee-deep in a plot none of us can imagine.
“Dia Voletto. He’s here,” Teddy whispers to me as he points at a man. “See his boldly tattooed arms—I believe you call those sleeves? That’s his mark; his followers wear tattoos the way Mephisto’s followers wear jewels. Those tattoos represent their powers.” He charges on. “Look at him. You’re not looking! Come, get closer and you’ll see little tick marks all over his body. That’s how he keeps track of his legions of followers. Anne, come. See your new headmaster. Tell me what you think of him.”
But I’m not paying attention to Teddy. Or to Dia Voletto. Or even to Hiltop.
Because Ben has just walked into my line of sight.
IN THIS MOMENT, I CAN’T HELP BUT WONDER IF MY RETURN to Wormwood Island isn’t the best thing that’s ever happened to me. Demons aside. Devil Destruction Challenge aside. Medically induced coma that could kill me aside.
Ben and his dad, Dr. Zin, the recruiter for Cania Christy and a former plastic surgeon, are walking in what could be slow motion directly across from me, only steps from me—and they don’t know I’m here. I want to call out, but more than that I want to pause time and simply look at the guy I thought I’d never see again. Ben, with his precisely brushed ashen hair. Ben, with his uncannily green eyes, eyes the color of a breaking wave in a Turner shipwreck painting or the sky in a Cézanne seascape. He is tall, his back is straight, and his chin is held high, like his mother must have told him to hold it back when she was alive, and his sister Jeannie was alive, and his life was headed on a different course. Back before a drunk-driving accident brought him to my family’s funeral home and changed everything.
Around me, everyone is saying, “Look, look.”
I watch Ben and Dr. Zin pass me by. It’s only when Dr. Zin falls against a sophomore girl that I realize this is not the picture of a father and son out for a walk. It looks like Ben’s hoisting Dr. Zin up, like his dad might fall over at any moment.
“What do you think of him?” Teddy nudges me.
“I think he’s drunk.”
“Voletto?”
No, not Dia Voletto. Dr. Zin is clearly intoxicated. I close my eyes, certain he fell off the wagon after learning about the reckless, destructive escape plan his son was involved in. Now I can see the far-reaching effects of what we’d tried to do: Dr. Zin nearly lost the only child he has left, the son he chose over his daughter. And, without question, Ben will be punished for helping me. What might that punishment be? The worry about it could easily push a recovering alcoholic like Dr. Zin beyond his will to be sober.
I call Ben’s name. But the crowd is too noisy.
Taking me by the arm, Teddy ushers me in the opposite direction, through the throngs, up to the front of the crowd where Hiltop is quietly observing