It was different because she listened to it.
She indulged her vicious streak without hesitation.
She punched people in the face. She hurled cruel comments for no reason. Falling asleep just a few metres away from her suddenly seemed an incredibly vulnerable thing to do.
Still, exhaustion tugged at my eyelids, and before long I succumbed to sleep.
*
I awoke once again at the foot of the North Tower, with the knowledge that something was seriously wrong.
It was well after midnight. Dawn lilac crept up from the horizon. Birds chirped somewhere over my head. I glanced around fearfully for Mordue, but she was nowhere to be seen.
I was lying flat on my back in the shadow of the gnarled tree, damp grass soaking me to the skin through my white pyjama top. Cold had burrowed all the way into my bones until they were stiff and aching.
There was a searing pain at the top of my clavicle; the feeling of a hot knife carving into me.
Dread pooling in my gut like an oil slick, I slowly raised an icy hand to the spot that hurt.
Right at the bottom of my throat was something hardprotrudingfrom my skin.
Panic lurched in my chest. Whatwasit?
But I didn’t have time to examine the fear in any more detail. Mordue could appear at any moment. I had to move.
My limbs were numb and uncooperative as I dragged myself back to Willowood, blocks of ice lodged in my lungs like rolling stones.
The door to the dorm was still open a sliver. At the sudden warmth inside the building, pins and needles prickled up my arms and legs. A sick sensation in the pit of my belly, I crossed to my writing desk and grabbed the small magnifying mirror I used to apply make-up. I held it up to the agonising spot between my clavicle, took a deep, painful breath, and looked at the damage.
At first, my eyes couldn’t make sense of it. But there was no mistaking what it was.
A ruby rosary bead.