Chapter Eighteen
IT WAS drizzling outside so the group found an empty lecture room where they could talk privately about what the magic had revealed. They dumped their bags of books and notepads onto the floor and pulled the grey plastic chairs into a circle, sitting and leaning inwards as if they were about to share all the secrets of the world.
“So Nolan’s not planning on dumping Eva then,” Callie said, sounding surprised. It had been the most obvious answer to his behaviour, but Elliot was beginning to think Eva was right, that there was something strange about this.
“What about drugs?” Barve asked.
“I didn’t see anything like that or sense any craving for drugs.” Elliot looked at Farlden for confirmation.
“All he cared about was Eva,” the Nean said, running his thumb and forefinger over the silver charm on the necklace he wore and making Elliot wonder who had given it to him. “We didn’t rule out drugs but there was nothing to indicate that he was taking them.”
“Did you see anything to explain the change in his behaviour?” Barve said.
“I don’t think so.” Elliot turned again to Farlden.
“There was something about his lack of response to Eva’s friends, as if he didn’t know them, yet they were talking to him as if they’d spent a good bit of time together.”
“I’m not sure,” Elliot said. “You might be right but it seemed to me as if he was so focused on Eva that no one else made an impression on him. My memories are sometimes like that, with hazy parts. He’d missed her and being with her again...” Elliot remembered the emotions and sensations that had filled him. He wondered if he would ever love anyone that much, so that the simple touch of hands became intensely intimate and took on such importance.
He looked up and found the others watching him. His cheeks warmed as it struck him that he had been lost in the memory of that touch, re-living it. He asked Farlden, “Did the magical connection seem stronger that time?”
“Yeah, it was.” Farlden looked away. “I think part of it, though, was that we were experiencing such powerful feelings from Nolan.”
Elliot’s breath caught at the realisation that Farlden had felt the kiss and the touch of hands as strongly as he had, as if the two of them had somehow been sharing it with each other too. He cleared his throat, asking himself where the hell that thought had come from. “So what should we do next?” he asked the others, keeping his gaze fixed on Callie and Barve and away from the teenager at his side, standing close enough to touch.
“Well, if you didn’t get any sense that he was taking drugs, perhaps we should look into what else would make him act differently,” Callie said. “Perhaps he has money problems or maybe his grades are bad and he’s failing university.”
“Is that our business?” Farlden asked. “Eva asked us to use our magic and we did. Maybe we should stop now.”
Callie and Barve frowned at him.
“We’ve only just started this,” Barve said. “We can’t finish without finding out anything.”
“What are you afraid of?” Elliot challenged Farlden, who glared at him. Each time they used magic together the Nean threatened to back away. If Farlden had been anyone else, he and Elliot could have helped each other so much in understanding their magic, but instead it remained as confusing to Elliot as Nolan was. Or Farlden. “It’s a simple mystery to be solved but if you think it’s too much for you...” He let his voice tail off.
“Fine,” Farlden snapped and Elliot had seen a tiger once in Africa that had the same expression in its eyes when it looked at him. “What’s our next move then, genius?”
His mind went blank. “Well, we could, um... We need to find out about his grades to see if that’s the problem.”
“We could hack into the student files on computer,” Barve said.
“Can you do that?” Callie looked impressed.
“Er, no. Can anyone else?” They shook their heads, so Barve suggested, “We’ll have to break into the cabinet of paper files in the admin office then.”
“We could get expelled for that,” Elliot pointed out.
“You’re right,” Barve said. “We should wear gloves.”
“Actually,” Elliot said, brightening, “I know someone whose mum works in the admin office. Her name’s Lila and we’re doing a project for our Nineteenth Century Literature course together.” She was the girl with pierced nose and half a dozen ear piercings he’d been assigned to study with his second week when others refused to work with him because of his friendship with the Neans. They tended to sit together now and were casual friends, her open-minded forthright nature appealing to him. “I’m not sure if she’d help us, though, as she could get into trouble too.”
“Then let’s start with something that’s not illegal,” Farlden said with a glance at his brother. “We can follow him about and see what we can find out and, if that doesn’t tell us anything, we can read another of his memories.”
Elliot at once nodded. “That sounds good.”
Callie glanced at her watch and swore. “I’m five minutes late for my lecture.”
She grabbed her bag and stood up, Elliot doing the same, horrified at losing track of time like this. “So am I.”
“We’ll look for Nolan and see what he’s up to,” Barve said.
Elliot smiled at him as he hurried to the door. “Good luck.”