Kiss of Frost (Mythos Academy #2)(9)
Author: Jennifer Estep

was probably long gone, and I hadn’t gotten a look at the license plate.

The bus made my decision for me. Just as I’d taken a few tentative steps back to Grandma’s house, the vehicle pul ed up to the curb and the door opened. I bit my lip. As much as I wanted to run back to the safety of Grandma Frost’s house, I didn’t want to be late for my shift at the library either. Nickamedes already watched me like a hawk. I didn’t want him to know the real reason I was late al the time. I don’t know what I’d do if I couldn’t see my grandma whenever I wanted to.

So I sighed and trudged onto the bus. I peered out the window the whole ride back up to Cypress Mountain, but I didn’t see the black SUV that had almost mowed me down.

No, that’s not quite right. I saw lots of black cars-I just couldn’t tel if the person who’d nearly plowed into me was driving any of them.

But what worried me most was the fact that I couldn’t figure out whether or not it had been an accident.

The bus final y reached the top of Cypress Mountain and rumbled to a stop across from Mythos Academy. I got off, sprinted across the street, and slipped through the academy’s iron gates, which were stil closed and locked.

For once, I was glad the sphinxes were there, perched on top of the wal and glaring down at me. Sure, the statues made me uneasy, but they were also supposed to keep the academy safe from Reapers. The sphinxes would keep whomever was after me from fol owing me onto campus. At

least, I hoped they would. But even that hope was better than nothing.

I stood there inside the gate, breathing hard and staring out at the street, wondering if I’d see a black SUV rol by.

But the only vehicle in sight was the bus, which slowly lumbered away from the curb to start its trip back down to the city.

Maybe it had just been a careless driver after al . I hoped so

-oh, how I hoped so.

"Come on, Gwen," I whispered to myself. "Get a grip." It might have just been my imagination, but it seemed like the dul , brown, dried-up leaves in the trees above my head whispered back, even though I knew it was just the winter wind whipping through the branches.

Right?

Stil nervous, I stuck my hands into my jacket pockets and hurried past the dorms and up the hil . If Mythos Academy had a black, beating heart, it would be the upper quad. Five main buildings ringed the area-English-history, math-science, the dining hal , the gym, and the library-al sitting at the edges of the quad, like the five points of a star.

Normal y, in between and after the day’s classes, students gathered on the quad to gossip, text on their cel phones, and see who was hooking up with whom. Not now, though. Since it was so cold, everyone was inside already, studying in the library, hanging out in their dorm rooms, or eating dinner in the dining hal

. Usual y, the emptiness of the quad wouldn’t have bothered me, but tonight, it did.

The sun had already vanished for the day, letting the night’s shadows ooze over everything, like black pools of blood. The trees on the quad were bare, except for a few stubborn leaves that rattled together like bones every time the wind touched them, and the swaying tangles of branches reminded me of skeletons strung together.

Maybe I was stil a little shaken up from almost getting run over. That had to be the reason I was thinking about things like blood, bones, and skeletons.

I shivered, tucked my head down into the col ar of my jacket, and walked on.

The Library of Antiquities was the largest structure at the academy and took up a good chunk of the upper part of the quad, serving as the top point in the star of buildings. The library simply had the most of everything-the most floors, the most balconies, the most towers, the most parapets. Al put together, the building reminded me of a sinister castle.

But the thing that creeped me out the most were the statues.

They could be found on al of the buildings at Mythos, but there were more of them on, around, and in the Library of Antiquities than on the rest of campus put together.

Gryphons, gargoyles, Gorgons, dragons, a Minotaur, and other mythological creatures that I didn’t even know the names for. The statues covered the library from the bottom balcony, which wrapped al the way around the building, to the top of the roof, with its towers and their swordlike points. And they weren’t just simple stone figures. No, the statues al looked, wel , violent, with big eyes, bigger teeth, and razor-sharp claws.

Maybe it was my Gypsy gift, but I always felt like the statues were watching me and tracking my steps with their open, angry eyes, just like the sphinxes at the front gate.

That if I so much as brushed them with my fingertips, the cold monsters would somehow spring to life, leap out of their stone shel s, and rip me to pieces.

It wasn’t a good feeling.

I pul ed my gaze away from the two gryphons positioned on either side of the gray stone steps and hurried into the building, through a short hal way, and past the open double doors that led into the library itself. Instead of walking down the wide, main aisle toward the study tables and offices, I turned and headed for a quiet area in the back.

My spot, as I’d come to think of it, wasn’t much to look at.

Just another patch of floor in between the tal bookshelves that fil ed the library’s many levels. Once, there had been a glass case here, one of hundreds that were scattered throughout the library and ful of artifacts-weapons, jewelry, clothing, armor, and more

-that had been used or worn over the years by various mythological gods, goddesses, heroes, vil ains, and monsters.

Now, the case was gone, smashed to bits in my fight with Jasmine Ashton, although Vic, the sword who’d been inside it, was safe in my dorm room.

But the empty spot where the case had been wasn’t the only thing of interest. I tilted my head, looking up at the person I’d come back here to see: Nike, the Greek goddess of victory.

Wel , it wasn’t real y her, of course-just a thirty-foot-tal statue carved out of white marble. Statues of al the gods and goddesses from al the cultures of the world ringed the second-floor balcony. They were separated from each other by slender, fluted columns and stared down at the first floor of the library and al the students studying below. Every god and goddess you could think of was here. Norse ones, like Sol, Thor, and Freya. Greek ones, like Ares, Zeus, and Apol o. Egyptian ones, like Anubis, Ra, and Bastet. And tons more gods and goddesses who I’d never heard of before I’d come to Mythos.

The only one who wasn’t represented in the circular pantheon was Loki, the Norse trickster and chaos god, and there was an empty spot where his statue would have been.

Loki had done a lot of bad, bad stuff back in the day, like getting another god kil ed, trying to take over the world, and blah, blah, blah. They didn’t build statues of you when you were the equivalent of a comic-book supervil ain.