Crimson Frost (Mythos Academy #4)(12)
Author: Jennifer Estep

"Gwen," Metis said, coming over to stand beside me, her phone in her hand. "Your grandmother just texted me. She’s waiting for you."

I snapped out of my thoughts. "Thanks, professor. I’ll go see her right now."

Metis nodded, then pulled me away from the others. "I don’t want you to worry about any of this. Nickamedes, Ajax, and I will take care of everything. We’ll make sure that Linus and the rest of the Protectorate follow the rules. We’ll protect you. Okay?"

Emotion clogged my throat, making it hard to speak, so I just nodded instead. Metis and my mom had been best friends back when they’d been students at Mythos, so I knew that the professor meant every word she said. I just wondered what it would cost her to get me out of this mess-if she even could.

Chapter 5

I promised to call Daphne later, and she told me that she and Carson would be at weapons training in the gym in the morning just like usual. I said good-bye to my friends and followed Metis up the stairs and out of the math-science building. It was even colder now than it had been during the assembly, and the main quad was deserted. By now, the other students would have gathered in the dining hall, library, or their dorms to talk about what had happened.

The professor walked with me across campus, with Alexei trailing along behind. He didn’t speak to us. In fact, he didn’t make a sound. His clothes didn’t rustle, his boots didn’t thump on the cobblestones, his breath didn’t even steam like mine did in the cold. Creepy.

We finally reached Styx Hall and stopped outside the dorm.

"Just try to just relax and put this out of your mind as best you can, okay, Gwen?" Metis said. "And know that Nickamedes, Ajax, and I are working as hard as we can to get the charges dropped."

I nodded. "I’ll try. Thank you. And I want to say that I’m sorry for all this. I never thought-I never thought something like this would happen." My throat tightened once more, and that was all I could say.

"I know, and it’s not your fault, none of it, no matter what the Protectorate thinks. Remember that."

Metis squeezed my arm, turned, and headed back up to the main quad. Alexei left too, following her, but I wasn’t alone. Inari was outside the dorm, leaning against a tree right below my dorm room windows. He still wore his gray robe, and that, along with his black hair and dark eyes, made him seem like just another shadow that had been splashed across the landscape. Looked like the Protectorate wasn’t joking when it came to keeping an eye on me twenty-four-seven.

I used my student ID card to get into the dorm and walked up the steps to the third floor where my room was, stuck in a separate turret from the rest of the building. To my surprise, an older woman was on her knees outside the door to my room, a rag in her hand and a bucket of soapy water on the floor next to her.

"Grandma?" I asked. "What are you doing?"

Geraldine Frost looked up at me with violet eyes that were the same color as mine. She must have come straight here from her afternoon readings because she was still wearing what she called her Gypsy gear-a white silk blouse, black pants, and soft black shoes with toes that curled up. Colorful scarves were wrapped around her body, and the silver coins on the fringed ends jingle-jingle-jingled together with every move she made. She usually wore a scarf as a sort of headband, but today her iron-gray hair was loose around her wrinkled face.

Grandma was a Gypsy just like I was, which meant that she had a gift just like I did. In Grandma’s case, she could see the future. She made extra money telling people’s fortunes out of her house in nearby Asheville, just like I used my psychometry to find things that had been lost, forgotten, or stolen.

Not anymore, I realized with a jolt. Given what had happened at the amphitheater, no one on campus would ever hire me to find missing items again. That shouldn’t have mattered to me, but it did. Sure, tracking down lost cell phones and stolen bracelets wasn’t the most exciting or glamorous job, but it was mine-it was part of my magic, it was part of me being, well, me. Now, it was just another thing the Protectorate had taken away by accusing me in front of the entire academy. I wondered what else I would have to sacrifice before this was all over with-and if it would really end up costing me my life.

I pushed those troubling thoughts away and stepped closer to her. "Grandma? What’s going on? Why are you scrubbing at my door with that rag . . ." My voice trailed off as I realized why.

MURDERER. KILLER. REAPER BITCH.

Those words and other, even nastier ones had been spray painted across the door and the surrounding walls in bright paint-Reaper-red paint.

"I’m sorry, pumpkin," Grandma Frost said, throwing the rag into the bucket and getting to her feet. "I was hoping to get it cleaned up before you saw. Don’t worry. They just painted the walls. They didn’t get into your room. I checked already."

I stared at the door and the walls. I could feel the anger radiating from the ugly, ugly words just as I’d felt it roll off the crowd at the amphitheater. I knew that if I leaned forward and ran my fingers over the paint, that the emotion would intensify, and I’d feel what the other kids had when they’d written those words-all their terrible hatred of me.

Suddenly, it was all just too much. My disastrous date with Logan. The Protectorate arresting me, then announcing the charges to everyone. Linus telling me the penalty for my supposed crimes was death. It was all just too much. Hot, scalding tears streamed down my cheeks even as I tried to hold back the wrenching sobs that shook my body from head to toe.

Grandma’s arms closed around me, and she started rocking me back and forth. "Sshh. Sshh. It’s okay, pumpkin. I’m here now. Everything’s going to be all right."

I held on to her that much tighter and just cried and cried and cried. Letting it all out. My worries, my fears, my anger. Slowly, my body-shaking sobs died down to a steady stream of quiet tears, and then, even those dried up. I wiped the last of the tears off my flushed face, stepped back from Grandma, and stared at the ruined door, trying to ignore the empty, hollow ache in my chest.

"I guess Metis told you what happened," I mumbled.

Grandma nodded. "She did."

Sighing, I opened the door, and we stepped inside. A bed, a desk, some bookcases, a TV, a small fridge. My dorm room looked like any other, but I’d added my own personal touches, like the posters of Wonder Woman, Karma Girl, and The Killers that hung on the wall, and the framed photos of my mom that stood on my desk, right next to a small replica statue of Nike.

I stared at the statue, wondering if the goddess would open her eyes and give me a sly wink like she sometimes did, letting me know that everything was going to be okay. But the figurine remained still and frozen in place. I sighed. It seemed that Nike wasn’t too happy with me right now either. At least she wasn’t bowing her head and looking away from me like all the statues had earlier.