“Say more.”
“Have you met his roommate?” I asked.
“Ashton Hale. Of the impenetrable Hales.”
“Not so impenetrable. Ashton was arrested on Gallows Night, and Peter bailed him out. But he hid it from the family.”
“Why? Grandma would’ve loved snagging the Hales!”
“Peter wanted to collect interest—to buy toys for his Hefnd.”
“Shit,” Sebastian said. “A plus sign in his ledger, for once, and he pissed it away.”
“Because of the Lindqvists.”
Sebastian turned from me, staring into the storm. “Bianca and Xavier loved him.”
“We were his family, Sebastian. Not them.”
“He never felt safe with us. At least he died happy.”
I sighed. Peter wouldn’t have died at all if he hadn’t been distracted by Lindqvist bullshit. I checked my phone.
Eleven fifty-six. Time to confess.
“I found out what his Hefnd was—Mister Fluffernutter, but a hundred times bigger. Something that could’ve brought down Helshire.”
Sebastian’s eyes widened. “Are you serious?”
I checked my phone again. “Eleven fifty-eight.”
“Right—Primal Scream. What was Peter planning?”
I touched his shoulder. “Wait for it.”
The first cries reached us from the Terraces—a solid minute early. They pierced the darkness, opening a hole for more screams to pour through. From out here on the campus periphery, muted by the rain, the chorus sounded less bloodthirsty, more like a distant flock of birds.
Then midnight struck, and a new noise came from closer by—a fizzing, sputtering shriek. The ragged hiss of rockets filled with homemade propellant.
I pointed at Halcyon Hall, but Sebastian had already seen.
Sparks of light filtered through the trees—Peter’s infernal engineroaring to life where I’d placed it on the second floor, lurching across the wet leaves, spreading white phosphorous as it tumbled and spun. A sharpcrackas the device slammed against an ancient wooden wall.
Flames began to catch.
The choir of screams kept up—the rest of Helshire joining in, unaware in glorious unison. “Fucking Peter,” I said.
Sebastian looked at me. “That’shis?”
“Amazing what the kid could do with twelve hundred bucks.”
The clatter and hiss continued, grew more frantic. Exhalations of smoke lifted above the trees, ghostly rags of mist.
“Perfect,” he said. “Except that was Peter’s favorite place. Why burn it down?”
“He lost his way in Halcyon.”
Sebastian stared at me. The flames were reaching above the trees at last. Only the steady rain kept the whole forest from going up. The device would’ve leveled Dewitt—the part of Helshire where rabbits were tortured.