Two young men stood with their arms around each other’s shoulders. They looked like they were laughing at some inside joke that only the two of them knew. One man was her father. The other was Jonas.
Anger and confusion boiled under Emmy’s skin. Why would her dad leave this picture for her? What kind of message was it supposed to send? She turned the picture over and found her father’s scrawling handwriting on the back:
We were best friends. We still betrayed each other. Trust no one.
Emmy’s eyes got blurry. She didn’t want to not be able to trust anyone. She didn’t want to be suspicious of her friends—the only real ones she’d ever had. This whole situation was her dad’s fault. So why should she trust him?
Her dad wanted the box of medallions, just like Jonas did. How did she know his motives were any better than the Order of Black Hollow Lane?
She looked at the instructions on the paper again. The medallions would be safe from the Order here. Her dorm room wasn’t exactly burglar proof. She’d thought about leaving them in Connecticut, but what if the Order broke into her mom’s house? She brought them along because there wasn’t much of a choice, but life would be a lot easier if she didn’t have to worry about the Order searching her room again.
The two people in the picture seemed to be staring at her. Trust no one, her dad had said. Obviously, her dad had access to this vault, and she wasn’t ready to hand the medallions over to him. Not yet.
Emmy took the picture so her dad would know she’d been here, then slid the box closed and stepped outside.
“May I have a safe-deposit box of my own, please?” she asked.
“Unfortunately, children are not allowed to obtain their own safe-deposit boxes,” the manager said. “An adult must open one for you.”
“That’ll be fine,” Madam Boyd said.
“Can it be in a different vault?” Emmy asked.
The bank manager and teller looked at each other. “If you wish,” the manager said slowly.
They went back to the front desk and filled out all the paperwork. Emmy paid with the credit card her mom had given her for emergencies. She didn’t know what she’d tell her mom, but she’d figure out something. The teller and manager took them back to the vault room, and Emmy unlocked her new safe-deposit box. Her fingers trembled on her backpack zipper. Was she really ready to say goodbye to this box? She’d almost died for it last year. And if she left it here, it would mean no more exploring in the tunnels under the school.
She slipped the box into the velvet and traced her fingers against it one more time. Then she closed the safe-deposit box and locked it up tight. She was done exploring. It was time to put the Order behind her.
Chapter 3
Wellsworth
Emmy tried to put the box out of her mind for the next few days. Lola and Madam Boyd took her all around London, which was the perfect distraction. Lucy didn’t seem to care where Emmy went as long as she was out of the house and away from her dog. If you could call Mr. Minicomb a dog. He was completely hairless except for a few wispy strands of fur that sprouted out of his paws like wheat grass. Lucy held him close to her chest every time Emmy came into the room, like she was infected with some kind of American dog disease. On Sunday morning, Lucy dropped Emmy off at the train station with barely a goodbye. Emmy hitched her backpack higher on her shoulder. Maybe she could convince her mom to let her stay at school for the holidays.
The station was buzzing with people. Emmy recognized a lot of them from school, which was a relief. She’d rarely taken the train, and never by herself. She wished she could have gone to school with Lola a few days earlier, but Emmy’s mom had insisted on her spending more “bonding time” with Lucy. Like that was even possible.
“Emmy!”
Natalie Walsh was running over, her blond curls bouncing behind her. Natalie threw her arms around Emmy. “Did you have a good summer?”
“It was okay, I guess.” It had been pretty boring, so there wasn’t much to tell.
Natalie pointed a finger at Emmy. “You’ve been practicing, right?”
Emmy grinned. Natalie was in fourth year like Emmy, and they’d both been on the Wellsworth soccer team the year before. “I promise I’ve been practicing.”
“Good. We’ll have to replace Manuela and Mariam. I hope we find some good players.”
Emmy sat with Natalie on the train, along with Cadel, who had been Jack’s roommate the year before. Jack was being driven to school, so it was nice to sit with some other friends. The front two train cars were packed with Wellsworth students, most of whom were catching up and telling stories from their summers.
There was one boy reading a book by himself. He looked like he was in fourth or fifth year, but Emmy didn’t recognize him. He pushed some floppy blond hair out of his eyes and smiled at something he was reading. Emmy’s stomach fluttered in a way that it usually only did for famous, good-looking soccer players. She cleared her throat and looked away. She didn’t know everyone at Wellsworth, but she definitely would have remembered that fluttering if she’d seen this boy before.
When the train pulled into the town of King’s Lynn, students dragged their luggage onto the buses that would take them up the coast to Wellsworth. Emmy smiled when she saw the person standing next to the closest bus.
“Hi, Master Barlowe,” she said.
“Good afternoon, Miss Willick,” he said with a broad smile. Master Barlowe had helped her a lot with her studies the year before, but as it turned out, he’d been watching out for her safety, too. He knew her dad and knew the Order might come after her. “I trust you’ve had a good summer?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did you get on all right with your humanities homework? I know Madam Boyd and I left you with quite the workload.”
That was an understatement. Emmy had to do an entire year’s worth of coursework over the summer so she could catch up on all the English history she’d never learned in America.
“I think I did okay,” Emmy said.
Master Barlowe smiled. “Excellent. Let’s set up a time when I can take a look at your work and discuss any other…uh…issues that might have come up over the break.”
Emmy’s fingers twitched. Did he know that her dad suspected the medallions hadn’t been destroyed? Or did he have another message from her dad, like Madam Boyd? She nodded and got onto the bus, trying to look as relaxed as she could. She couldn’t let any Order members suspect that she and Master Barlowe had anything to talk about other than schoolwork.
The bus ride wasn’t long, and soon they were pulling into the Wellsworth driveway. The spires of the old Blacehol Abbey towered over the rest of the main building, which sprawled out awkwardly across the landscape. Emmy’s whole body felt suddenly warm. She was home.