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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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Freezing air and murmuring voices woke Clementine from his sleep. Dread consumed his heart as he opened his eyes to darkness. Anguished voices echoed around him, and as he lay there, his body started to tremble. Someone was dead.
He looked around for Sebastien but he wasn't in his room. Where was he? Was it him? Where was Elliot? Mathew? Mavis? Had it been one of them? Or...could it have been Ian?
With a grunt and a groan, he sat up. But his sudden movements aggravated his sore body; suffocating nausea hit him, his throat started to burn, and his head began spinning. He tried his best to control it, holding his eyes shut, taking deep breaths...but he was going to throw up.
As swiftly as his aching body would let him, he got out of bed, rushed to his bathroom, and reached the toilet just in time to hurl. The moment he vomited, his body convulsed, pain surged through his head, and he felt as though he was throwing up his insides. Each retch pulsated agony through his body, and on his fourth heave, he groaned in distress and grimaced, trying to bear it. And to his relief...it was over.
He stared down at the black bile he'd hurled into the toilet; it was a sight he had hoped he wouldn't see until the last month or two of his decline. But there it was...blacker than night, sending shivers of trepidation through his trembling body.
But then—
"All students, please proceed to the trial hall. All students, please proceed to the trial hall," the gramophones outside blurted.
Trial hall? Who had been discovered? More importantly...who had discovered them?
Clementine scowled as he slowly made his way back over to his bed, both angst and anger consuming him. Could Sebastien have been a complete idiot and gone to the professors with their discoveries? Had he told them that it had most likely been Ian that had poisoned the cocoa—that he had used basilisk venom? He sorely hoped not, but it sounded like something Sebastien would do. After all, his whole reason for forming a deal with him in the first place was because he wanted clout, right? So why would he miss an opportunity like this?
Footsteps echoed through the whispers as he sat on his bed. The sound of an opening door, frantic whispers...and as his bedroom door opened, Elliot, Mathew, and Mavis burst in.
"Oh, thank God," Elliot breathed, moving closer to Clementine's bed. "We thought...we thought it was you."
"Where's Sebastien?" he questioned.
"We...thought he was with you," Mavis said.
He shook his head. "He left to look for something."
