Spycraft Academy by B. Miles (little readers .txt) 📕

was necessary. What surprised him was the strange things Delcan did whilst naked.

He fixed his hair, over and over again, moving the same artfully placed wave from the front of his brow to the top of his head. Once he decided on which place was perfect for his blonde lock, he stood in front of the mirror and made faces. He smiled, grinned, smirked, frowned, sneered, snarled, and everything in between. Then he slapped his cheek. He slapped his other cheek. He did it a few more times until his flesh was red beneath his perfectly sculpted five-o-clock shadow.

Sam was long past uncomfortable by that point and had the urge to call everything off because he did not sign up for watching Delcan in such a private moment. Whatever issues the blonde had, they were obviously deep enough that they came out when he looked at his reflection. Delcan might have been a piece of work who deserved a taste of his own medicine, but even he deserved some form of privacy.

Luckily, the blonde finally threw on some clothes, blew out his candles, and left before Sam lost his nerve.

Sam counted three hundred seconds to make sure Delcan didn't return for anything, then he moved. He wrapped his shadows around him like a heavy coat and dashed the short distance between the bush and Delcan's window. The open grassy area to either side of him was little more than a narrow alley of greenery. The sea was directly behind him—the sheer drop into the water was only a short, leisurely stroll from where Sam was.

He grabbed the lip of Delcan's window and slowly stood from his crouch. There was a tiny space between the two glass panes, and a hook on the other side kept them shut tight. Sam reached into his old, patchy utility pouch strapped to the back of his belt and grabbed the end of his curved lockpick.

There was a noise and without hesitating, Sam dropped back into a crouch and rolled back to the shadow of the bushes. For a moment, he thought it was an animal; instead, a long human shadow stretched past the corner of the building.

The only function this area served was separating the campus from the open water. Nobody would be socializing, fetching something, or using the slim lawn to get from one point to another. The only reason anybody would be lurking about was because, like Sam, they were up to no good.

There were two types of 'no good': mischief, and malice. Sam was in the business of mischief tonight, relatively harmless save for causing a bit of irritation and wounded pride. He wondered which one his fellow was engaged in.

The figure emerged into the open air, wrapped from head to toe in a tight black outfit. It was clearly a man by his shape: slim torso, no breasts, narrow hips. He had a mask on that completely obscured his face, though it had to be thin enough for him to see through. The man looked from one side to the other, completely passing over Sam.

The first thing Sam thought was 'Apelles.' The moody spymaster had the same build, the same carriage as this man, and Sam didn't like the man to begin with. There was something so off about Apelles...now maybe Sam knew why. Still, it would do no good to settle on the stranger's identity so quickly. There were, after all, many tall and gangly men in the school.

Without warning, the man bolted away like a hare.

Sam knew he should stay out of whatever was going on. Following suspicious, cloaked men to unknown locations has never worked out in his favor. He had plenty of scars to attest to that.

He looked at Delcan's window.

But what if the man had malice in mind? If he hurt somebody and Sam had a chance to stop him, could he live with the knowledge of his cowardice and inaction?

What would Mattie think of him if she knew? Worse, what would his mother think?

Don't do it. You'll get hurt. Just close your eyes and pretend it didn't happen. Everything will be okay when you open them. He told himself that many times over, but the voice had been so much younger the last time he heard it.

The sound of the crashing water, just yards away, dulled until it was lapping against the rocks. No, not rocks, wood. A woman's scream. An old man's rasp. A loud splash. The cold stone against Sam's back, the burning tears smeared across his cheeks and the hard press of his hands to his eye sockets. That voice, telling him to close his eyes and stay still, telling him not to try.

Sam thumped his head with the heel of his hand and screwed his eyes shut as his stomach lurched. He didn't know that memory. He'd never seen it before. Everything was blurry, but he knew that if he pushed hard, the blurs would take form and he couldn't let himself see them because it would hurt too much.

His stomach rolled and bubbled, upupup his throat. He took a shuddering breath and focused on the present, yanking himself from cloudy memories. He thought about what that man could be up to, he saw him twisting a knife into somebody's gut, saw him pushing a woman off the sea cliff, saw him snapping a man's neck.

"Damnit," he hissed and took off after the man.

The man kept to the shadows, which wasn't difficult on a moonlit night.

He led Sam along the back of the campus, around the side, and then he stopped.

The campus as a whole was cradled in the protective arms of the heavily reinforced towers and ramparts, every small building and stall within the walls. That is, every building save for the administrative building squatting a short distance away. It must have been built after the school, almost as an afterthought, and positioned as if it were a comma separating the first clause of the forest from the second clause of the campus castle.

That