daphne

"Stop, Tobin," I say as I catch up to him in the hallway. "What was all that challenge c.r.a.p back there?

You're not going to go and try to punch him again, are you? Because you'd probably get kicked out of the play this time if you do."

"I just wanted to see where he goes next."

"To cla.s.s," I say. "Like everyone else."

"Or so we think."

"I told you, I don't think Haden is a bad guy."

Tobin takes me by the elbow and leads me into a small alcove in the hallway, like he's afraid someone might overhear what he has to say next. "You know there was another attack Friday night?" he says. His voice is low and quiet, but I can hear an edge of accusation in his voice. At first, I think he's referring to what happened to Lexie in the grove and he's mad at me for not telling him about it-frankly, I didn't because I haven't been able to process what happened yet, myself-but then he goes on: "She was a cater waiter at the party.

One of the valets found her unconscious near the lake." "Oh no." I clasp a hand to my face. "What happened?" "They're saying heart attack again. But I don't believe it. And I don't think it's any coincidence that Haden was skulking around a party where someone ended up being attacked. I saw him sneaking over my back fence just after we left my mom's office." I shake my head. "Haden didn't hurt anyone after leaving the party."

"How do you know that?"

"Because he was with me," I say.

"What?" Tobin's face goes ashen. "You left the party with him?"

"Not exactly . . ." I give him a quick overview of what happened to me and Lexie in the grove, even though I know it all sounds insane. But Tobin doesn't balk at my description of the weird screeching noise, the freaky, swooping shadow thing, and the stormless lightning. In fact, he doesn't react at all until I get to the part about how Haden showed up just as the weird shadow disappeared. "He helped Lexie and me Friday night. That's how I know he wasn't off attacking people."

"Are you sure?" Tobin asks. "I mean, you said you couldn't see who, or what, it was that was after Lexie . . . and then Haden just happened to show up? How do you know he wasn't the one who was trying to hurt her in the first place?"

I shake my head in frustration. "Because I just do. And I don't think he had anything to do with what happened to Pear, either. I was mistaken about that. He's not evil. He's just different."

"What, do you like him?" Tobin takes a step back, like the idea of my liking Haden is repulsive to him. "You have a thing for him even after what I told you about Abbie?"

"No. I definitely don't have a thing for Haden. Listen, I agree that there's something weird going on around here. What happened to me and Lexie proves it. But maybe you should stop jumping to all these crazy conclusions about Haden because his last name happens to be Lord. It could be a total coincidence that your sister was friends with someone with that last name before she disappeared.

Maybe this guy is related to Haden, but it doesn't really mean anything. I'm friends with you, but that doesn't mean if I were to go missing, that you'd be suspect number one." I take Tobin's hands in mine because I know what I have to say next is going to be hard for him to hear. "Are you even sure this guy looked anything like Haden? Was Lord really his last name? You were only ten years old, Tobin.

You may have gotten some of the details wrong."

I can hear the anger coming off him before I can see it on his face. I know I've offended him by questioning his theory about his sister's disappearance. But someone needed to.

"You think I'd forget the face of the guy who took my sister?"

"You have no proof that he even did. . . ."

"I do have proof," Tobin says, pulling his iPhone from his pocket.

The bell rings, indicating that our next cla.s.ses have started, but neither of us move. I am sick of our conversations getting interrupted and I'm not going anywhere until I've heard everything Tobin has to say. What proof could he possibly have?

"I'm still listening," I say.

"This is what I wanted to show you at the party." Tobin hands me his phone. The camera roll is pulled up on the screen. The small thumbnail photos all seem to be pictures of doc.u.ments. I click on one of them to enlarge it, and then scroll through the others. They all seem to be dossiers-files containing detailed information about certain people. I look more closely at the information. Not just any people. Each dossier, fifteen total, is about a teenage girl, ranging from the ages fifteen to eighteen, and contains details such as name, date of birth, physical description, last known address, date last seen, and reason for leaving Olympus Hills.

"What is this?" I ask.

"Those are all girls who left Olympus Hills High under mysterious circ.u.mstances before graduating in approximately the last fifty years. The first one dates back to the early1960s-when the school was founded. The most recent is my sister, Abbie, six years ago."

"Okay, this is definitely strange, but what does it all mean?"

"It means that in fifty years, fifteen girls have gone missing from this school. That's just enough to be out of the ordinary, but not enough to draw someone's attention. Unless you're someone like me, who's looking."

"What exactly do you mean by 'gone missing'?" I ask, pointing to the file that's pulled up on the phone. "This Kendare Petrovich, it says that she left OHH because she transferred to Julliard in 2001." I swipe the screen. "And this Adele Berger got pregnant and moved to San Diego in 1982." I swipe through more of the files. "None of these reasons for leaving seem all that mysterious to me.

Abbie running away from home is the weirdest. I mean, I left Ellis High before graduating, but you can hardly call the circ.u.mstances mysterious." Well, only a little. The mystery being why Joe even wanted me around.

"Yeah, but Julliard has no record of a student named Kendare Petrovich, and there were no Adele Bergers living in San Diego in 1982. I talked to the aunt she supposedly moved in with, and she hasn't seen Adele since she was a kid. Yeah, a lot of people have come and gone from Olympus Hills without graduating, but these fifteen people all have stories that don't check out. Like someone was trying to cover up the reason they went missing."

"Who even made these files? Where did you get these?"

"I made them," Tobin says. "It's something I've been working on for a couple of years." I look at him, realizing that I don't really know him at all. Underneath his sweetness and friendly tone lies the heart of a full-blown conspiracy theorist.

"I got all these names from my mother's files. I was trying to show you the master list when she walked in last night."

"Have you asked her about this?"

"Yeah, right. And tell my mom I went through her private government files? You have no idea the grounding I would get." Tobin smirks. "My mom is kind of a scary lady."

"Tell me about it," I say, thinking of the icy reception I got from her after we were caught snooping. "I guess it make sense, though, that, as mayor, she would probably be aware of people who've gone missing in her town. And it makes even more sense that a ritzy place like this would want to keep this sort of thing covered up. Bad PR, you know."

Tobin nods.

"But this still doesn't prove that any of these missing people are connected," I say, putting my hands on my hips. "How does this prove anything about the Lord family?"

"Look at the dates," Tobin says, pointing at the phone. "There's a pattern. One girl has gone missing every three years. There's only one deviation. It's been six years since Abbie disappeared and no others since then."

"Okay, that's definitely eerie." I rub my arms, suddenly feeling cold.

"I thought maybe the pattern had stopped . . . that maybe whatever was going on had stopped. Until I saw Haden Lord. Which made me remember my sister's friend. Which got me thinking . . . I've only lived here for six and a half years, so I don't really know, but what if there were people from the Lord family in Olympus Hills all those other times people went missing?"

"Bridgette said that the Lord family sends kids here from time to time."

"She did?" Tobin almost sounds giddy at the prospect.

"Yeah, her dad's on the school board. She said they come every few years."

"Like, every three years?"

"I don't know." There's a look in his eye that makes me worry he's drawing way too many conclusions. "Tobin, none of this is proof. This is still just a theory. And it doesn't mean Haden knows anything about it."

"That's why I'm going to get some proof. There has to be a way to figure out if any more Lords were here the same years these girls disappeared."

"What are you going to do, hack the school server?"

Tobin doesn't answer.

"Tobin?"

"I bet records aren't even computerized before the nineties," he mumbles to himself.

"Tobin! You're going to get yourself into trouble."

"I need your help," he says.

"Excuse me?"

"I'm going to look into this records theory for the rest of the day. Which means I need you to follow Haden. Find out where he goes. Who he talks to. What he's doing here."

"Seriously?"

"You've already got an in with him after this Lexie thing. Let's use it to find out as much about him as we can."

I'm about to tell Tobin he's a couple of tubas short of a orchestra, but I notice the swirling, lifting notes in his voice as he asks, "Please, Daphne, help me." It's the sound of hope.

Hope that he'll find his sister.

"Okay," I say. "I'll help."

chapter thirty-three.

haden

Kopros.

This Tobin boy is getting too close to the truth.

Champions use Persephone's Gate, which always leads to the grove, to enter the mortal realm, but in order not to draw too much attention to any one town, they spread out and alternate quest locations around the world-usually putting three years between before revisiting a city. Except for in the case of Olympus Hills. It has been six years since a Champion had been a.s.signed here.

Dax .

I hear Tobin and Daphne leave the alcove and start up the hall, so I take off before the two round the corner. I head straight for the counselor's office and ask for Mr. Drol.

"He's on his break," the woman with the cat's-eye gla.s.ses says. "You're not scheduled to meet with him until tomorrow afternoon."

"This is urgent."

"You can see Mrs. Dunfree instead if you'd like."

"No, thank you," I say, and open the door to Dax's office anyway. "You can't do that!"

"It's okay," Dax says. "Let him in."

Dax turns off the screen of his computer and swivels in his chair to greet me. He's wearing one of his ridiculous elbow-patched sweaters. "Now, son. What's all this bother?" he says in an exaggerated Yorkshire accent. I shut the door firmly behind me before ripping into him.

"Why did you send me into that party blind?" I say. "You're supposed to be my guide. So why didn't you tell me your Boon was the mayor's daughter, that I'm attending school with her brother? Don't you think these are important things for me to know?"

"Haden," he says, dropping the accent. "I told you. I cannot speak of this to you."

"But this affects me, Dax. It's jeopardizing my quest. This Tobin kid is onto us. He's determined to find out what happened to his sister, and he's not going to stop until he finds out. How am I supposed to get Daphne to trust me if Tobin is filling her head with vitriol, all because of the mistakes you made?"

"I'll take care of it," Dax says.

"How?"

"Keep your voice down."

"How?"

He slams his open palm on his desk. "I don't know! I just will." I take a step back. "Why won't you just tell me what happened?" Dax stands. "I cannot." His nostrils flare and he takes a deep breath, as if fighting from saying more.

His meaning sinks in. He's made an unbreakable oath. When he says he cannot, he means it would be physically impossible.

But who could compel him to do such a thing?

"If you value our friendship," he says. "If I mean anything to you, you will stop being selfish for once in your life and listen to me when I ask you not to speak of this again. The consequences for me would be far greater than anything you can imagine."

I nod and pull open the door. I leave the office more confused than ever. But I have to go. Because the one thing I need to ask him I can't: If Dax had returned alone to the Underrealm six years ago, but this Abbie girl still went missing, then what in the name of Hades had happened to her that he had sworn to never speak of again?

If it hadn't been for the conversation I'd overheard between Daphne and Tobin in the hallway, I might think she is starting to like me, because she keeps glancing back at me during humanities cla.s.s.

Instead, she's probably just trying to figure out whether or not I can be related to a kidnapper. Or worse.