INTEGRATION (Bonfire Academy Book Two) (Bonfire Chronicles) (18 page)

“I’m my dad’s heir, so that’s definitely the plan.”

I nodded. I could see why he’d been chosen. He was so amiable. Even I kind of liked him.

Henri interrupted our mutual nosy session. “Okay, let’s start. We have another test to do in a few hours.”

Colton nodded. “I’m going to start with the sound test, then visual and, finally, olfactory.” He tapped on the keyboard, and I heard sounds of dripping water, like rain against a window. The intensity of the noise increased slowly, until it resembled a full-blown storm. The entire time, I kept my eyes glued on Mason, who didn’t stir. Colton added thunder to the track, but even that didn’t elicit a reaction from Mason. The track went quiet for a moment before being replaced by the sound of flapping wings. Mason’s lips twitched into a slight smile. Colton replaced the track again with a recording of me saying
hello
in a loop, again and again. Where the heck had he managed to get hold of that?

Before I could ask, Colton grabbed my hand. “Look!”

Mason had transformed into an eagle and was thrashing around in the chamber like a lunatic. I thought he might hurt himself, but the padded walls did their job. He suddenly fell to the floor.

Henri got up and started walking toward the chamber.

“It’s okay,” Colton said. “I just dosed him with a sedative through the tubes to get him to calm down. He’ll awaken in a moment, back to normal.”

Henri didn’t look fully convinced, but he turned back and sat down. “How long will it take?”

“Just a few minutes, then we’ll start with the visual measurements. He’s going to need a lot of work though, judging by the reaction he just had,” Colton said.

“Where did you get my sound bite?”

“Oh, Professor Bern gave me that. I hope that’s okay. She also gave me a canister of your aroma.”

“I guess.” She should have asked me, but I figured she felt she could take liberties with her apprentice.

“I volunteered mine for Faustine’s test, if that’s any comfort.”

“I think it would be more useful to have Mason’s for her tests.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean. And even though I’m not strictly supposed to, I’m collecting his aroma as we speak, and I have a sound bite from before that we can use.”

“Good.”

Mason stirred, transformed back into his human male form, and sat down in the armchair, leaning back into it.

“Are you okay?” Colton asked, speaking into the mic.

Mason nodded. “Can we get on with it?” he asked curtly.

“Yes. Count back from twenty again.” Once Mason was ready, Colton brought up an image on the screen. “This is very much like the visual stimulations during Initiation. The difference is that we keep the images up for a short time, not allowing the subject time to put themselves into the scenes.”

The first was a static image of a black cat. I looked over at Mason, who didn’t bat an eyelid at that. Numerous images flashed on the screen—clowns, horses, buildings, rivers, planets—without any response from Mason. I held my breath as a bunch of demon-like shapes from literature were put up. Once again, there was no response from Mason. Next came a set of photographs of the current demon Integrates.

Mason tensed and sat up in his chair. His heartbeat showed a significant increase, as did all of his other biological data measurements. Finally, a picture of Faustine appeared. That was it. Mason transformed immediately and went off in a thrashing fit until Colton sedated him.

“Interesting,” Colton remarked. “He seems to be able to tolerate most demons, but he went totally berserk when he saw Faustine.”

“I bet he’d have done the same if you’d put up my picture,” I said.

“Yes, yours was next. Let’s give him a minute to recover and get his olfactory responses. I expect they’ll mimic the ones we’ve seen already, but Professor Kunz likes to be thorough.”

Colton fed different scents into the chamber through the tubes attached to the back of the armchair. The process took longer than the visual tests because between each smell, an odor neutralizer had to be applied to ready the chamber for the next aroma. He started with innocuous ones—vanilla, strawberry, rotten cheese. Then he moved on to essences that had been collected from various demons at the Academy. I wondered how they’d managed to bottle them. Mason maintained his relaxed stance during the first set, but perked up with the second set. I braced myself when the final one was pumped into the chamber—bottled Faustine. Predictably, Mason completely lost it again, flapping around in a comically insane fashion. Colton dosed him up to put him out of his misery.

“Well,” Colton mused as Mason fell to the floor. “That was interesting.”

“Eh? Really?” I asked. “Surely you expected that?”

“Most of it, yes, but I expected him to have more of a reaction to all demons. His issue is more specific than I’ve ever seen, which is good. It means we can tailor his training more specifically.”

“Training?”

“Yes. The aim would be to get him to control his adverse reaction to Faustine to a point where he can converse with her in a calm manner. That’s what Integration is all about.”

I snorted. As if that would ever happen. Still, I guessed that Professor Kunz had to go through the motions.

“You don’t seem on board, Cordelia,” Colton said.

“It’s not that. It’s just horribly unlikely, isn’t it?”

“If I thought that, I wouldn’t bother doing this at all. It will be a challenge for sure, but I’m optimistic.”

“Good for you. Shall I make myself scarce so you can get Mason out of here? I’ll go and bring Faustine over.”

“Sure, but give us a few hours to recalibrate. We’ll see you back at two, okay?”

Perfect. That would give me enough time to check in with Pascal. I texted Faustine to let het know that I’d come by and collect her at one o’clock. I looked at Pascal’s schedule on my iPad. He was at hockey.

At the ice rink, I walked down the bleachers and stopped halfway to watch the hockey team slam their pucks into the goal. I scanned the players, looking for Pascal, but couldn’t tell which one he was under all the heavy padding and helmets. The schedule said that the team was due to come off the ice in ten minutes, so I took a seat and waited.

After the whistle sounded, the players skated off the ice. One of them waved at me and started walking to where I was sitting.

“Hey, Sis! Looking for me?”

“Yep. How are you doing?”

He chuckled. “Mom called you?”

“Yes. She’s worried about you. Care to tell me why you asked her about Quinn?”

He shrugged, lowering his eyes.

I kicked at his padded shin. “Come on, I don’t have a lot of time, so just tell me.”

“Don’t know. I just wanted to know where Quinn is.”

He was totally lying.

“Why?” I kicked him again, much harder this time.

“Ouch!” He sat down beside me. “Promise you won’t tell Mom?”

“Tell her what?”

“Promise first.”

“Oh, okay. Spill.”

“I was there when you came into Mrs. Stone’s office looking for Quinn.”

I gaped at him. “What? Where were you hiding?”

His lips turned at one side. “In her.”

“You possessed Mrs. Stone?” I gasped. “Why?”

“I was bored.”

Typical Pascal behavior. He didn’t think twice about body hopping. It was a sport with him, and he was an expert at it.

“And it’s not like I took over or anything, I just went for a ride. I was kinda hoping that she’d bring up my scores, so I could have a look, but you came walking into her office instead.”

“Well, why are you asking about Quinn then, boulder head? If you were possessing Mrs. Stone at the time, then you were there when she told me that Quinn’s in New York.” I was thoroughly exasperated with him. “And you shouldn’t have said anything to Mom. You know that’s against the rules, right?”

“Yeah. I didn’t really say anything to her. Just asked if she’d heard from him. I have a bad feeling about it all.”

“Why? Did you find out something else?”

“Well, yeah. Something creepy. But I didn’t just hear about Quinn, I saw him, too. At first, I didn’t go over to Mrs. Stone’s office to spend time in her bod. What’s the fun in that? I was hoping that I could jump from her into The Smelt. Now that would be fun. Anyhow, I waited for Mrs. Stone to get called in by The Smelt. She did after what seemed ages. We went in, but very briefly. Quinn was in the office, looking
tres chic
in a new suit and all. The Smelt asked Mrs. Stone to order a helicopter for Quinn. I didn’t really pay them much attention; I was waiting for a chance to switch into The Smelt.” He paused.

“And?” I encouraged.

“Nothing, I guess. I rebounded off something inside her, right back into Mrs. Stone. I was lucky I didn’t get caught.”

“Rebounded off what?” I practically yelled, getting frustrated with my brother’s storytelling skills, or lack of them.

“I don’t know exactly, but it had to be a demon, right? All I remember is that it smelled like a really old woman. Creepy.”

P
ascal’s words gave me goose bumps. Was it possible that an old lady was involved—both with Mason and with Quinn’s disappearance? I had to get to the bottom of it and find Quinn, at least to know that he was okay and had left school on his own accord.

Pascal hadn’t been able to tell me much more. He’d hung around while I had talked to Mrs. Stone and left just behind me, when she’d decided she needed to use the restroom. Even my brother had his
icky
boundaries.

Still consumed with images of old people I had encountered in my life, I walked back to my room to get Faustine. Hopefully, the session would give Ryker some reprieve so he could go to his own classes. Jagger had told me that Ryker was at risk of being thrown out of school if he didn’t start showing up to sessions. I had texted him to let him know that Faustine would be fine with me for the rest of the day.

She was still asleep when I got back to the room. I prepared some sides of beef ready and then woke her.

“Come on, sleepyhead! Get up!”

“Oh, what’s the hurry?” she moaned sleepily and rubbed her eyes.

I wafted the meat under her nose.

“Mmm, mmm. That smells so good! Thanks, Cordelia. Best breakfast in bed I’ve ever had.”

“Not quite breakfast. It’s after one already. You’ve got your Integration test at two, remember?”

“One? Already? I guess I better get up, huh?” She gulped down her food and headed for the bathroom, flinging off her clothes on the way.

“Hey! No maid service here!”

She stopped. “Huh? Yeah, what’s up with that? Let’s get Bern to cast a tidy spell on the room or something.” She turned around and walked into the shower. I could hear her sighing out loud as the drops of water hit her skin.

While I waited for Faustine to shower, I turned on my computer and checked out the staff photos on the school website, looking for old people. I studied the pictures carefully, even those of the men. After what I had learned about gynandromorphy because of Mason, I couldn’t rule out that the
woman
could also be a man. In fact, the woman could be parading around as anything during the day. So, I looked through the whole lot, but didn’t come across anyone who fit the criteria—someone in her eighties or nineties. There were no staff members in that age group at all, not even among the auxiliary, foundation, or fundraising members.

Next, I went through my Facebook account and then Quinn’s, looking at our friends lists and followers. Again, no old people at all. I decided to have a look at Faustine’s followers. She had over four thousand friends, plus she also had a fan page. With no time to waste, I started scrolling down her friends list.

“What are you looking for?” she asked, peering over my shoulder.

“Boy, you have a lot of friends!”

“They aren’t really friends, just people I might have met, and some of them I don’t know at all. I don’t like not accepting requests. If you tell me what you’re looking for, I might be able to help.”

“Old ladies.”

She snickered. “Why?”

“I’ll explain in a sec. Any old ladies among these friends?”

“’Old’ as in thirty?”

It was my turn to chuckle. “No, much older, like in their eighties or nineties.”

“No, and I can’t imagine a lot of people as old as that having Facebook pages.”

True. “Well, do you know any one that old?”

“My great grandma is that old, I guess. And the Upper East Side is full of old ladies, but I don’t really know them. Some of my mom’s fundraising friends might be that old.” She shrugged. “Now tell me why you want to know.”

I told her about my conversation with Pascal and also about the voice I had heard in Mason’s room.

“And you’re sure it’s the same person?” she asked.

“Well, I can’t be a hundred percent sure, but what are the odds of coming across two women that old at the Academy?”

“And you think my dad recognized the voice?”

“Not the voice—he didn’t hear it. But I think he might have recognized the smell or something. I’m just saying that because his expression turned weird and he just said that he’d deal with it.”