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⊹ Book 1 of the Aldergrove Duology ⊹
After being told he has only six months left to live, Clementine decides to track down his sister's murderers, leading him to Aldergrove Academy, a place...
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⤠ ≻ ◈ ≺ ⤟
It was happening again. The walls of the lunch hall seemed to shudder as the academy groaned in the wind. The temperature dropped and the light in the hall faded to something blue. Every student stopped eating to look around, and through their confused mumbles, the academy's whispers oozed through the woodwork.
"Why does this keep happening?" Elliot murmured quietly.
"Maybe this place really is haunted," Clementine mumbled.
But he thought he realized a pattern. The academy went cold a few minutes after those acid-spitting girls had killed that bully, and just now minutes after Nicolette—and he hadn't seen exactly when Molly had died, but he was certain the academy had also grown cold and vocal minutes after she had died, too. Why?
He pondered.... Could it be happening every time a student died? No...if that were the case, why hadn't it happened when he'd killed Harrison? Was it because he'd hidden his body?
With a perplexed frown, and as the temperature normalized, he resumed eating his salad.
"What if its ghosts crossing the veil?" Elliot muttered.
Clementine sighed. "Why would ghosts want to come to a place like this?" he uttered.
"I don't know...maybe all the killing and maiming and injuring excites them."
"Maybe it's the other way around," he muttered.
"What?"
He looked over at him, going over in his head exactly how he was going to say it without implying he'd killed someone, seen someone getting melted, and knew Molly had died before anyone else. "Well, what just happened in the lounge...and then this same thing happened the night Molly died—what if this happens when...I don't know, souls pass on?"
Elliot didn't scoff at his suggestion. Instead, the spotty-faced kid's eyes widened in realization. "That...that makes sense."
Clementine crushed a small tomato between his teeth and slurped its innards into his mouth. "It's happened three times now, so...."
Nodding, Elliot looked down at his plate of untouched spaghetti. "Then...we can assume three students are dead already. But..." he paused and glanced around before leaning closer, "who's the third?"
"I don't know," he shrugged. "Maybe some kid got disembowelled and stuffed into a closet."
"Ew," Elliot grumbled. Then, he poked at his food and looked over at the door. "Do you think the others are okay?"
