Mags & Nats 3-Book Box Set Page 5

  The car didn’t stop until it reached a metal gate. The driver rolled down his window to talk to the men in the security booth. One of them laughed, and they waved at each other like this was just another day at the office.

  The barbed wire-wrapped gate rolled back. Three cameras turned to follow the squad car’s progress as it rolled forward. I caught sight of the sign posted above the fence.

  Federal Correctional Institute of Boston, the sign read.

  I had read about this place. It was a maximum-security prison, and the only prisoners kept here were ones who had been accused of breaking a high law. It was a small building, which made sense because none of the prisoners stayed long. High crimes were tried within a few days, and those who were convicted were immediately sentenced to death.

  I felt like I was going to be sick again.

  I forced myself to breathe. Panicking wouldn’t help anything, and if I was going to get myself out of this mess, I’d need my wits about me.

  I was yanked out of the cop car and escorted inside the building. Buzzers sounded as different metal gates opened and closed, bringing me deeper and deeper into the prison.

  I was shoved into a tiny room with nothing but a table and two chairs on either side. The floor was concrete. Three of the walls were cinder blocks. The fourth was a one-way mirror. I was pushed into one of the hard metal chairs, and my handcuffs were attached to a short chain that locked me to the table.

  “Start thinking about what you want for your last meal,” the prison guard said as he gave my shackles a tug to make sure I was firmly attached to the table.

  “Nah,” his partner said. “High crime violators don’t get a last meal request.”

  “Oh, right.” The first one grinned down at me. “Hope you like soggy green beans, then.”

  Still chuckling, they slammed the door, leaving me alone in the interrogation room.

  CHAPTER 6

  It was impossible to tell how long the interrogation had been going on, but I guessed it had been hours. My voice was hoarse from answering all the questions, and my head pounded from the horror of it all.

  Pictures were strewn across the table before me, making it impossible for me to think about anything else. There were pictures of my dorm room with Penelope’s bloody body crumpled on the ground. There were pictures of my bed, which was covered in blood. There was a pile of my own clothes on the floor, covered in blood. There was the bloody message on the window.

  Everywhere, blood. So much blood.

  “Your fingerprints are all over the room,” the detective said again.

  It was the third or fourth time the detective had said this. I knew the repetition was meant to trip me up and expose inconsistencies in my story.

  “Of course my fingerprints were in my bedroom,” I ground out. “I’m not disputing that it’s my room. I’m disputing that I’m the one who killed Penelope.”

  The detective opened a folder, pulled out a few sheets of paper, and slid them across the table to me.

  “Is this your valedictorian speech?”

  I stared at the papers. The words were typed on regular printer paper.

  Welcome, Class of 2070, and congratulations to all of us!

  That was, in fact, the opening of the speech I had been working on before the party. That was where the similarities ended, though. The speech in front of me was full of hate and slurs against Magics that I couldn’t even think, let alone write. It wasn’t a valedictorian speech; it was a rant against Magics and the Alliance.

  “This isn’t mine,” I said. The chain rattled against the table as I slid the papers back to the detective.

  “It was on your computer,” the detective countered in the demeaning way he’d been speaking to me all night.

  “Then whoever murdered Penelope must have put it on there.” I lifted my chin at the papers on the table. “I didn’t write this speech, and I didn’t kill Penelope.”

  “Well, that’s strange, isn’t it?” The detective gave me a mock-puzzled expression.

  “Why would I go to the BSMU and take a job in the Alliance if I hated Magics?”

  “A good question, and one I would like the answer to before your execution.” The detective studied me for several seconds. “I’m told you’re the most well-liked student at the BSMU. My people couldn’t find a single person who had a bad word to say about you.” He rearranged the pictures on the table between us until one of Penelope, smiling and alive, was on top.

  My chest squeezed. I still couldn’t wrap my head around the fact that she was gone.

  Not gone, I reminded myself. Murdered. And everyone thinks I’m the one who did it. I refused let myself panic, though, as much as every part of me strained in that direction. I just needed to explain myself. I needed to understand what had really happened.

  “Maybe,” the detective said, “you’re not used to sharing the spotlight, and you decided to take matters into your own hands. Maybe, in a jealous rage, you decided to kill that Mag so you wouldn’t have to share the stage with her.”

  “That’s insane,” I said, unable to keep silent any longer. “And I don’t use that word.”

  “Even amid all of this,” the detective gestured at the crime scene photos spread out between us, “you’re cool as a cucumber. You haven’t broken down or shed a tear like anyone else in your position would have. Are you a sociopath, Graysen?”

  “I’m not a sociopath,” I replied through gritted teeth.

  Some of my numbness had worn off enough for anger to poke through.

  “Every bit of evidence you’ve shown me is circumstantial,” I said. “Did you find my DNA on Penelope’s body?”

  “Alright, Mr. Fancy-Ass Lawyer.” The detective leaned back in his chair and crossed one leg over the other, like he was playing along. “You didn’t need to touch her. All you had to do was slash a knife across her throat.”

  “And where’s the murder weapon?” I demanded. “I haven’t seen any pictures of it. Were my fingerprints on that, at least?”

  “You disposed of the murder weapon,” the detective replied. “My guess is you threw it in the river.” He leaned forward. “Am I right?”

  “So, no murder weapon,” I continued, ignoring the detective’s question. “And no DNA evidence. Penelope could have been killed by anyone. Like I’ve already said, I wasn’t in my room at the time of the murder. Anyone could have gotten the building code, and my door was unlocked.”

  “That’s right, you did mention you hadn’t been in your room since before the party.” The detective smiled as he flipped back through his note pad. “Where did you say you were again?”

  It was the fourth time the detective had asked some version of this question, and it was the part of my story that got complicated. I focused, making sure to repeat the same version I had given the last three times.

  When I finished, the man consulted his note pad. “Ten students and one faculty member saw you walking to your dorm with Penelope.”

  “Maybe it was someone who looked like me,” I said. “It was dark. They might have gotten confused.”

  “That’s an awful lotta confusion at a school full of smart people.” The detective scratched his stubbled jaw. “Do you have a doppelganger someone forgot to tell me about?”

  “No, but—”

  “And of course, let’s not forget the room of fifty-three students, including yourself, who heard Penelope’s premonition. Or has your memory failed you on this point, too?”

  “I remember,” I grated out. “I also remember her telling me that her visions are often inaccurate and show only partial truths.”

  The detective looked down at the transcript of Penelope’s vision. “I’d call this particular premonition pretty damn accurate.”

  “It wasn’t me.”

  “Your alibi is leaving the party alone and wandering around alone on a night when you should have been celebrating with your nearest and dearest,” the detective said. “Does that sound weak to you?” He dir
ected his gaze at the one-way mirror separating the interrogation room from whoever was watching on the other side. “That sounds weak to me.”

  I knew how it sounded. If I was on the other side of the table, I’d be saying exactly what this detective was saying now.

  If I told the detective about who I’d been with, I would prove my innocence in Penelope’s murder. And I’d also be admitting my guilt in breaking the other two high crimes. And I’d get Kaira arrested along with me. As much as I’d rather be executed for the crimes I’d actually committed—not something as heinous as murder—I wasn’t about to drag Kaira down with me.

  “I’m telling you the truth. Penelope was still at the party when I left. She was with her parents.”

  I held the detective’s stare as we faced off. Finally, the man sitting across the table sighed.

  “I guess we’re done here for now.”

  As soon as he’d finished speaking, the door opened and two prison guards came into the room. They unhooked my handcuffs from the chain on the table. They locked shackles onto my ankles, too, and I was clumsy as I got up from the table and followed the guards out of the room. The only sound was the rhythmic clank-shuffle-clank noise I made with each step.

  We stopped outside one of a dozen identical cells. One of the guards scanned his badge and then tapped a long series of letters and numbers into the keypad. A loud buzzer sounded and a red overhead light flashed as the metal door slid back.

  It was all so surreal I couldn’t bring myself to feel the fear and grief I knew was buried somewhere inside me. Part of me was still convinced this was just some nightmare that I’d wake up from and laugh about with my teammates. The other part was sure there was some logical explanation for what had happened, and the detective would come chasing us down at any minute to tell my guards they had the wrong man.

  These were the thoughts that filled my mind as I was shoved into the tiny cell. The buzzer sounded again, and the door slammed shut.

  CHAPTER 7

  Iwas brought out of my cell some time later and taken to a different room that looked much like the one in which I’d been interrogated. I sat handcuffed to the table for what could have been minutes or hours before two guards returned, escorting a man in an expensive suit.

  I recognized Emmanuel Blytheman, the lawyer my father had hired after the whole scandal with Kaira’s missing file. The lawyer took his seat across from me, put his briefcase on the floor beside him, and stared politely at the guards until they left the room and shut the door behind them.

  “Graysen,” Emmanuel said. He hesitated only briefly before reaching across the table to pat my shackled hand.

  “I didn’t do it,” I said, my voice as fierce as I could manage after so many hours of interrogation.

  Emmanuel reached down and opened his briefcase. He pulled out a stack of papers and put them on the table. Then, he took a pair of glasses out of his breast pocket, carefully polished the lenses with a microfiber cloth, and put them on.

  I could tell from his deliberate movements that the man was staving off the inevitable bad news.

  “It doesn’t look good, Graysen,” he said, frowning at the papers. “The prophecy and the witnesses are pretty irrefutable, and your alibi isn’t going to hold up in the trial.”

  “It’s the only one I have because it’s the truth,” I said.

  I had never felt more helpless and out of control in my life. It made me want to scream.

  Emmanuel Blytheman sighed. “Your trial is tomorrow.”

  My stomach turned over.

  “Tomorrow?”

  I knew that high crimes were tried and convicted quickly, but…tomorrow? I needed more time to figure this out. There had to be some explanation for what had happened, I just needed more time.

  “Can we delay at all?” I asked the lawyer.

  “My team’s working on it, but there doesn’t seem to be much room on this one. The Magic community is…quite angry.”

  “I understand. Penelope was my friend, and I want justice for her, too. But they’ve got the wrong person.”

  “I’m trying to arrange for your father to visit you before tomorrow,” Emmanuel said as though I hadn’t spoken. “There are strict rules about visitors, but I might be able to arrange something so you can….”

  Say goodbye.

  He might as well have spoken the words, because they were written all over the lawyer’s apologetic face.

  “Is there anything that can be done?” I asked, feeling a wave of hopelessness crash over me.

  Emmanuel gave me a small shake of his head and grimaced. “I’ll do what I can to convince the jury there’s enough reasonable doubt, but—”

  But don’t get your hopes up.

  The lawyer cleared his throat. His eyes shifted around the small room as his hands fumbled for another stack of papers in his briefcase. I looked at the header on the top sheet, and my breath caught.

  It was a will.

  I was good at keeping my pain to myself. I’d done it for years—both with my disease and Kaira breaking my heart. It was the only reason why I wasn’t weeping and sniveling right now. That, and the knowledge that my self-control was all I had left. If I let go of it, then I’d have nothing at all.

  Besides, it wasn’t like crying or begging would make me look less guilty. I had read the certainty on the detective’s face, and I could see the apology on my lawyer’s. It didn’t matter what happened at the trial tomorrow. As far as everyone who mattered was concerned, I was guilty. End of story.

  “Do you have any assets you’d like me to allocate?” the lawyer asked, still not looking at me.

  I felt myself shaking my head. I had a few thousand dollars in the bank from last summer’s internship, but nothing else of value.

  “I understand.” The lawyer softened his voice. “Are there any messages you’d like me to deliver, or anything of that nature, just in case?”

  My thoughts immediately went to Kaira. But it wasn’t like I could ask my lawyer to go seek out an unMarked Magic to say…what?

  And after what I’d been accused of, none of my friends or teammates would want anything to do with me. My reputation was destroyed. A sick, twisted feeling grabbed hold of my insides and squeezed. I tried to rub my eyes before remembering my wrists were shackled to the table.

  “Just my dad,” I said, my voice not much louder than the lawyer’s. “I’d like to see him, if I could.”

  The lawyer nodded in understanding. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  He stood, looking relieved to be done with this hopeless and pointless meeting. “Keep your chin up, Graysen. Blytheman and Associates are on your side. We’ll raise hell at the trial tomorrow.”

  I watched the lawyer knock on the door, and then he was escorted away. My two guards took me back to my cell.

  I sat on the square frame of my bed, which was without a pillow or mattress, and tried to think. Someone—not me—had murdered Penelope. If I could figure out who it was, I could get out of this mess.

  If ten witnesses had seen Penelope and I together, could it have been an Illusionist? I discarded the idea as quickly as it came to me. First, the detective had said that there were no Marked Magics placed anywhere near the scene of the crime at the time of the murder. Second, it was unlikely there were any other unMarked Animate Illusionists besides Kaira who were that powerful. And Kaira had been with me while the murder was taking place. Third, a Magic would never have killed one of their own and written an anti-Magic slur on my window. The perpetrator had to be a Natural.

  The motive was clear enough. The murderer hated Magics. The fact that it was the first year when Magics and Naturals were graduating from a combined campus, and the fact that Penelope was the Magic valedictorian, was motive enough for anyone who didn’t like the even footing that Naturals and Magics were now on.

  People who didn’t believe in equality between Naturals and Magics didn’t go to the BSMU, which meant the murderer wasn’t a student at the schoo
l.

  But even with that knowledge of who the killer wasn’t, I was no closer to having a suspect.

  CHAPTER 8

  There was no clock or window, but I thought it must be nearing early morning. My cell had a sink, a toilet, and the square platform that I thought was supposed to be my bed. Aside from the bright white light that shined mercilessly on me from the ceiling, and the cameras spaced in each corner of the cell, there was nothing else to look at. It was obvious this place hadn’t been designed for a long-term stay.

  I tried pacing, but there wasn’t enough room in the cramped space to do it effectively, and it grated on my nerves the way the cameras angled to follow my every step. With little other choice, I sat on the square platform and buried my face in my hands to block out some of the blinding light.

  I kept hoping to hear the buzzer sound and my door open, and for a guard to tell me that my father was here. It hadn’t happened yet, and the minutes until my trial continued to tick by.

  I didn’t think my father would believe any of what the police were saying. Still, I needed to explain things to him. I needed him to hear the truth from my own lips. Mostly, though, I just wanted to see a face that wasn’t filled with hate and accusation before my trial.

  Since my mom left, my dad and I had been each other’s only family. Now, I would be leaving my dad, too.

  I felt exhausted and sick to my stomach. All my joints were aching in reaction to the stress and anxiety of the last several hours. But the physical discomfort wasn’t enough to distract my mind from the horror of what had happened, and the position I was now in as a result.

  I didn’t want to die. All of the what if’s and if only’s hovering on the edge of my consciousness were enough to drive me insane.

  Too bad insanity pleas didn’t work for the high crimes.

  If only I had stayed at that damn party instead of leaving with Kaira, I’d have an ironclad alibi. And Penelope might still be alive.