Thrill of the Chase (Hunters & Heartbreakers 1)

I - Langdon

^^Above: Kit Connor (pictured here in Netflix's Heartstopper) as Langdon Wilkes.^^

The Institute of Paranormal Study & Prevention

Established 1701

"Audacia pro muro et scuto opus."

(Wee Latin translation: Boldness is our wall, action is our shield.)

Student Handbook, annus 1890

This Handbook is the Property of: Langdon Ernest Wilkes

17 March. — I have no other use for this handbook. I'm not about to read it, and I doubt anyone has. They've printed it with many extra pages, which are probably the only thing keeping me awake in lecture now. At least the instructor, a very old man with a long white beard that makes him look a little like a wizard, thinks I'm taking notes.

And now he's seen me looking at him, which means he'll call on me at any moment.

"Mr Wilkes," he says. "Since you seem to be paying such close attention, perhaps you could tell the class the difference between a ghost and a ghoul."

"Yes, er..." I've read this somewhere just now, I know I have. "A ghost is a disembodied spirit, and appears as a vision. A ghoul is an evil being believed to eat the bodies of the dead."

"And how do you kill a ghoul, Mr Wilkes?"

"Er...well..."

The instructor, whose name is something like Thorpe or Thurber, raises a bushy eyebrow. "Perhaps detention may help you remember?"

"It's iron," I answer quickly. "Through its chest."

Thorpe or Thurber gives me a nod, one that says Lucky recovery. Then he goes on speaking, and I go on paying less attention than I was before.

The bell signalling the end of the lecture rings before he can finish, and I'm one of the first out of my seat and the room, before he can change his mind about giving me detention. I round the corner outside the classroom and wait for my mates Seaton, Isham, and Gifford – or Giff, as we like to call him – to catch up. We'd met in our form group two years ago, after I'd first started at the Institute and hadn't known anyone — and we'd been inseparable since.

"Wilkes!"

The sound of Giff's voice, very loud and very Scottish, startles me. I push myself off the wall and run straight into him. He hooks an arm round my neck and gives my scalp a good rubbing with his knuckles.

"Ach, mate, howya?" Giff claps me on the back, so hard I cough.

"Fine," I squeak, massaging my throat. His greetings are always so enthusiastic I feel a little battered afterwards. "You?"

He shrugs. "Off to see the headmaster again. Can't ye ask your Da to go a little easier on me?"

"My father's going to do what he wants, no matter what I say." I wish it wasn't true, but it is. There's been a Wilkes as headmaster of the Institute for so long nobody can remember who the others were. My father was just another in a long line, just like his father and his father and then ramble ramble ramble interest gone.

"He knows I'm your mate, that should be enough," Giff says, then jerks his chin somewhere further down the corridor. "Look, it's Seaton."

I see him before he sees us. He's easily recognisable too, hair and skin so pale he glows when the sun hits him. It's a miracle no one's mistaken him for a ghost.