Chapter 110

KATHERINE.

I got to my feet and walked over to the door, opening it to glance at both ends of the empty hallway before closing the door again, locking it behind me. ‘So what exactly am I looking for here?’ I thought as I faced the office once more and after glancing around, I decided to check the drawers for any files that looked interesting first. I moved behind the desk and opened a drawer to find office supplies like sticky notes and paper clips. The next drawer was the same, containing pens and highlighters, but the next drawer contained folders that were obviously student records. ‘Perfect.’

I quickly pulled out the folders of the students that had gone missing and were now dead, but a quick look through them revealed that they only contained normal student information. My shoulder sagged and I returned the folders before noticing there was a leatherbound notebook at the back of the drawer. It looked old and I glanced at the door again even though it was locked before grabbing it, and I opened it to see that it was a journal. The writing at the beginning of the book wasn’t that of Professor Helton’s, it was that of a person whose name was written at the top of the page – Jenet Hellaton – and they had written the months of the year. Under each month they had written ‘10 students’ next to a date, and ‘Found’ next to a couple of dates. Jenet kept recording like that for five years and the next person that wrote in the book in the same format Jenet had written was Professor Norvin Hellaton; it took a couple of moments for me to realize that was the name of the Professor that had practiced dark magic in Blackwood. The one that had killed Blackwood when he tried to stop him.

I furrowed my brows and kept going through the book which had records for every year and for every three years after 1916, the Hellatons that wrote in the book mentioned the names of the other schools – Dumein and Staerdale – with that same recording format. With that, it became clear that they were recording the students that had gone missing every month in these schools and the day they were found, and my heart pounded in my chest as I kept reading. Then I got to the page of a new recorder, and the name at the top of the page along with the fact that I recognized the handwriting made me suck in a breath. Professor Lucas Hellaton.

Hellaton, Helton. They changed their names. I didn’t know when since they didn’t record anything except students going missing and being found, and my stomach churned as the words, ‘It’s who we are’, came to mind again.

‘Oh my God.’

****

A Hellaton had always been present in Blackwood, Dumein, and Staerdale whenever students went missing, and Professor Norvin Hellaton had practiced dark magic. Those were the two facts in my mind as I sat in the campus quad at night, and it was easy to put two and two together. I still didn’t want to believe that Hunter was involved, but the evidence I found pointed otherwise and it made my heart tighten in my chest. I heaved a sigh and unlocked my phone just as a student from a higher-ranking pack sent a link to my department’s group chat with a message that said ‘Updated!’ along with a couple of laughing emojis. My brows tugged together and I clicked the link to see that the website contained a list of students in Blackwood that had gone missing and had been found dead later.

An unsettling feeling washed over me as I clicked the current year and as I scrolled down the list, a familiar name caught my attention – Isabella Grantham. It took me almost a minute to remember where I’d seen her name – her student file had been one of the files in Professor Helton’s office whose name had an ‘X’ next to them. She had been one of the students that went missing last year and her body had been found at the beach which students were forbidden from going to this year. According to the note under her name, she had drowned, and I scrolled down a bit before my eyes widened at her picture. I recognized her! She was the ghost I’d seen in the old clinic, hiding under the bed when that violent child spirit attacked me.

‘Wait… If she drowned at the beach, why was her spirit at the old clinic? She should be haunting the beach instead and the beach was miles away from the old clinic.’

My phone began to ring, snapping me out of my thoughts, and a small smile crept onto my face when I saw that it was a call from Uncle Lander before I answered it. I’d already told him, Aunt Vivian, and the pack’s council about what happened last night – Noah and his friends trying to kill me, and me stumbling upon the bodies of the missing students. I didn’t tell my uncle about Blake leaving me with Noah and his friends though, and upon learning what happened last night, my uncle and my aunt had wanted me to come back home. The council didn’t want that since they still thought I hadn’t found my mate, but they acknowledged that the school was dangerous with a murderer loose in it, and I had sided with them instead because I couldn’t just up and leave now.

“Kathy!” came Kit’s excited voice and my smile widened. He hadn’t been at home when I called this morning and Uncle Lander had told me he’d make sure I talked to him before I slept. Hearing his voice now already made me feel better and I wished I could easily decide to go back home.

“Hey, Kit. How are you?” I replied before he began to excitedly tell me about what he did yesterday and today and what he’d be doing tomorrow. I began to walk to my dorm while he kept talking and by the time I was only meters away from it, I’d already forgotten all my worries.

“I have to go to bed now, Kathy,” he said in a sleepy voice and I bobbed my head before we said our goodbyes. As I ended the call, I suddenly got a prickling sensation at the back of my head, like I was being watched, and I glanced over my shoulder to see no one there. Well, there was someone there– there were a lot of students still moving about, but I didn’t see anyone who could be watching me, and after another glance around, I resumed making my way over to Stavenger Hall. After less than a minute of walking, I came across Poppy. She was sitting on a bench with her head resting on her knees and the way her shoulders shook told me she was crying. I didn’t need to think hard to know that it was because her brother and his friends had been expelled from Staerdale and ‘huge’ sanctions had been placed on her pack. Watching her now, I couldn’t help but feel bad for her… just a little bit.

I remembered what happened after Noah tried to kill me and set my mouth in a hard line as I was once again reminded that Chelsea was dead… and the Helton’s had something to do with it. I came to a stop on the path before glancing in the direction of Hunter’s dorm – Tegan Hall – and I swallowed. I still didn’t want to believe he had something to do with ‘it’ and I stared in the direction Tegan Hall was, I decided I was going to go find out now.

Poppy lifted her head from her knees at that moment and she scowled at me before wiping away the tears on her face. “What are you looking at, bitch? You must be so happy with yourself,” she said and I frowned because I was the one that almost got killed but she still thought she was the victim in this situation. Then I fixed her a look and began to walk towards Tegan Hall.

‘I take that back. I don’t feel bad for her at all.’

****

The door of room 202 of Tegan Hall was slightly opened when I got there and I slowly pushed it all the way open. Looking inside, I didn’t see anyone, and both beds were pristinely made, reminding me that Hunter had a roommate who was Theo. our kiss flashed through my mind and I pressed my lips together before clearing my throat and walking into the room, shutting the door behind me.

“Hunter,” I called out as I walked further into the room, glancing around the room. It wasn’t hard to figure out which half of the room belonged to Hunter with the art hanging from the room and the sketchbooks on the desk, so I moved in that direction. “Hunter,” I called again, expecting him to walk out of his dressing room anytime soon, but using my advanced hearing told me I was the only one in this room. I returned my attention to Hunter’s desk and narrowed my eyes at his books, wondering if he’d drawn anything else related to Chelsea and those nine students, before I made my way over to his desk and began to go through the books. A couple of minutes later, I was done searching his desk and bookshelf, even under his bed, and I had come up with nothing – nothing to prove that he had something to do with what happened to those students and nothing to prove that he didn’t. I didn’t even find the sketchbook that had had sketches of those students, all I found were sketchbooks that were filled with his haphazard stroke drawings.

I let out a harsh breath and glanced at Theo’s side of the room, wondering if Hunter could have hidden something there, and after spotting a sketchbook on Theo’s desk, I walked over to it. The sketchbook was new so there was nothing in it and the next thing I did was open his drawers. In the last one was a leatherbound book and after a little while of going through it, I froze as I realized what I was holding. It was a spell book… a dark magic spell book.

“What the fuck?” came a low, angry voice from behind me and I immediately glanced over my shoulder to see Theo standing there. His expression was a mixture of surprise and extreme anger while he stared at the book in my hand, and my heart slammed against my chest as I dropped the spell book. I hadn’t even heard him come in.

“Theo–”

His gaze snapped to mine and his eyes suddenly turned red. “Why the fuck are you going through my stuff?”

“Theo, I–” I moved to the side, stumbling a bit as he began to advance on me before glancing at the spell book which was now on the ground. “That’s a dark magic spell book.”

“None of your fucking business is what it is.” I’d never seen him this angry and I felt like I’d fucked up at a colossal level. I’d gone through scenarios of what our conversation would be like at our first meeting after we kissed, but none of them had looked like this in my mind.

“I–I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. I just…” I trailed off, still trying to figure out why Theo was with a spell book and what he could be doing with it. “I don’t understand.”

His eyes blazed with a deeper shade of red and I swallowed. “Get the fuck out, Katherine.”

I blinked at him and tightened my hold on my bag before walking past him, heading towards the door. When I got to it, I glanced at him again. “I’m sorry, Theo.”

But he didn’t look back.