I had been careful so far. About what the others saw of me around the tower. Friends or not, I didn't know how to begin to explain what I was doing. Mom and Dad already knew, I didn't have to explain it to them.

I could barely breathe. My body refused to be still in any capacity. My hands moved wherever they wanted, my legs carried me around the main room of Dragon Tower. My mind raced beyond the walls around me, my heart wanted to escape out of my chest.

"Um…" Russel's voice wasn't enough to snap me out of my episode and I hated it. "Are you okay?"

I couldn't hold in my hysterical laughter, "Do I look okay to you?" I didn't look at him. I couldn't stop moving long enough to.

I should tell him, tell all of them about what I'd just learned. We were in danger, something closer than any threat of the imprisoned Merripen.

Death's Echo was here, in the school.

"You want to talk about it?" Russel sounded hesitant but genuine.

"I have to," I explained. Still not able to just stop moving. But I needed to, regardless of my body's unwillingness to do what I wanted it to do. "I think I need to call a Tower Meeting."

"What's this about?" Russel sounded more concerned.

"Dragon Tower told me something, something that affects all of us. At least I think it does."

"I thought it couldn't…" he drifted off for a moment. "The eyes thing?"

"Yes, but that's not important right now." Not when someone had a stolen murder weapon and an unknown motive. Someone who was way closer than any of us could have feared.

He didn't say anything for a while, and after a few more eternally long moments I could finally force my body to listen and look at him.

He looked worried, and like he was concentrating on something. Hopefully talking to the others.

"Want to give me a hint to what this is about?"

"Dragon Tower can sense Death's Echo," I explained. "Ask it for more details."

"Oh." There was a pause long enough for me to start fully fidgeting again. "Oh shit."

"Yeah."

Another moment overflowing with anxiety and the sound of my nerves fraying. The curse was burning hot enough to boil water. "Just Dragons?"

"I think so, we're meeting in the attic."

"You want this top secret."

"I want discretion and delicacy. More people make that harder."

"I'd say you're making this sound like the end of the world, but the look on your face makes it clear you're serious."

I couldn't imagine what he was seeing but it was strangely nice. To be understood without words for once.

"I'm always serious, but I appreciate it."

I took several deep breaths. I tried to focus on the dark wood beneath my feet, the bookshelves, the heat of the fire.

"Everyone's on the way," Russel told me. Whatever I felt about being Tower Representative, I appreciated the rare moments they took it seriously.

"I'm heading up into the attic," I didn't want Dragon Tower telling on us. But anywhere else was too risky. Too hard to make secure. And who else but us would bother with the attic?

"Almost as classified as an FBI operation," I heard him mumble.

And if we weren't careful, just as dangerous.

I regained more control of my body. Enough to make my way up the stairs and towards the spot on the floor where the runes were. I hesitantly knelt down and spread my fingers over them.

It took several more deep breaths to stop the shaking in my body.

Pink grew up out of the ground, like crystals forming around a string. All the way up to the hatch and firmly attached to the ceiling.

It was solid and warm to the touch. Not sharp, despite the unevenness. The warmth was gentle, like a thermos of hot chocolate.

Yet, lifting myself up was hard. I was aching and my body felt sluggish, but I managed to get up to the hatch and open it without an issue. It was simple, but the weight of the simple door was more than I remembered from last time.

The attic was unchanged from the last time I was in here. Considering how little we used it, I supposed that made sense. I took a deep breath. It was a little dusty, it almost reminded me of the smell of the tower the first time I entered it.

Thankfully this was spider-free.

I had barely a few moments to gather my thoughts before the sound of more footsteps came from below.

I could do this. I had to do this. We needed a plan and I wasn't enough. Keeping this to myself was wrong and could put them in danger. I couldn't do much, but I could keep everyone informed. If we didn't take care of each other, who would?

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I settled myself with a very slow breath and stood just beneath the window. Leaving plenty of space for them to filter in.

I gripped my cursed wrist tightly and kept my eyes trained on the floor. The same familiar wood. The light streaming in from the window. The hint of staleness in the air.

Russel was first, unsurprisingly. He looked at me and then leaned back against the wall. Away from the hatch and quiet. Maybe he was talking to the others, maybe he wasn't. I couldn't really be sure.

A little while later, Fethris was next.

He looked between us, "That serious?"

"That and more," I told him.

Fethris' eyebrows raised and he moved to stand across from Russel on the other side. He didn't look nervous or as grave as I felt. But it was best to get this all out of the way at once.

Then Jarec arrived. "Wow. Don't we all look cheery. Should I be worried?"

"Probably," I mumbled as I gripped my burning wrist tighter.

I don't think he expected that answer. The doubt and worry were all over his face.

He chose to sit behind the hatch, his back against the far wall. Still out of the way for Celica's hopefully soon arrival.

I was grateful she didn't keep us waiting.

"Sorry." Wow, Celica was apologizing. I was glad she was taking this seriously.

I took a deep breath. "So. Dragon Tower can sense Death's Echo. Probably something about being powered by the same person's magic. And it told me it was here. In the school. No idea where exactly, just that it hasn't been in the tower itself."

There. It was out there. Bandage ripped off.

The heavy reality of it all made the pause between my words and their reactions feel like the distance between the edge and center of a black hole.

"What?!" Celica screamed first.

"Are you sure? Is it sure?" Jarec pressed.

There was another pause. Was it answering Jarec? Telling them all what it told me?

I hoped so. I also hoped it was better at this than I was.

"Okay," the panic in Jarec's voice was both reassuring and terrifying, "what do you think we should do about it?"

My nerves boiled over, leaving my throat in a horrified chuckle. "I have no idea."

"We should find it," Fethris commented. "We can't do anything until we do."

I hated that it was both terrible and an almost reasonable idea. "How? How exactly do we do that?" I couldn't talk him out of it, but I could poke holes in it until someone thought of something better.

"Jantres' been dead for two thousand years, the only things with his magic on them are Dragon Tower and that knife. Even if we could scry for it, we'd need a sample of the power we're looking for." Celica was shaking her head as she spoke, stopping the terrible idea in its tracks.

"Who would even take it though? And why bring it here?" Russel asked.

"There's no way someone would go through the trouble of stealing it and the risk of bringing it here unless they planned on using it," Fethris responded.

"It doesn't matter what their plan is. But we do need to find out who has it," I tried to think this through. "Everyone is in danger as long as that thing is on school grounds."

"And if we found it what are we supposed to do with it?" Celica explained. "Give it back to the museum? They're going to ask questions and I don't think 'our Tower told us' will work."

"Could throw it into the ocean," I commented. "Might be better if it just disappeared forever."

"But then we circle back to 'how are we supposed to find it?' I don't think any of are even that good at scrying," Jarec added, not helping but not wrong.

"They didn't attack during the parent weekend," I reasoned out loud. Unable to answer Jarec's concern. "Which means they either didn't have it yet or their target wasn't here."

"There was a lot going on, keeping track of everyone would have been harder," Fethris commented. He sounded contemplative.

"Probably too hard for a student to sneak away," I continued thinking out loud. "Had to have been a professor."

"Not a Tower Head," Celica picked up my thoughts and continued. "They were all too busy."

"Non-Tower Head staff. That's only about two hundred potential suspects." Jarec's sarcasm was not appreciated right now, no matter how warranted.

"And we can't narrow it down further without a motive," Russel added.

Right now, besides the thief themself, we were the only ones who knew it was here. And we had zero evidence to prove it to others.

"Judging by the secrecy, you don't think we should tell Vivian Hearth," Jarec and I made eye contact across the room.

"No. I don't. What would we even tell her? What can she even do? What if whoever is planning something finds out we know?" Too many unknowns. Too dangerous.

"Assuming someone here isn't the target in the first place," Fethris reasoned. "Which seems…unlikely. Given everything."

"That knife is too connected to us." Jarec sighed and rubbed his face, "Grandmother once told me that we're as much Jantres' legacy as we are Malcarg's. And if they're a professor here then they probably know about both of our mothers."

Definitely a worst-case scenario. "Probably," I conceded. "But I don't think that means we can really rule anyone out."

"Not really, the professors are gossips," Jarec continued. "According to my source."

I assumed he meant Vivian. "Does she know that Death's Echo is missing?"

"Probably. I don't think she'd tell us if she knew though." Jarec looked about as frustrated by that as I felt.

"We can't do nothing," I said after a moment of silence. "But I don't know what we can do. Even if there's already a target on our backs, I don't want anyone taking risks."

"And if someone who probably isn't a target gets involved, it could put them in danger too," Celica said. "Is that why you only wanted to tell us?"

"If someone is planning to…" I couldn't bring myself to say it. Not when it was suddenly so real. The probably of it was so high. "Hurt Jarec or me…You guys might get caught up in it too. Just by proximity."

"She's right. It will be easier to plan with more brains thinking about this, and trying to be sneaky with it feels like a waste of energy," Jarec conceded.

"And we don't even know for certain if they are even after us, that's just speculation," I explained. And hoped. Was it wrong to hope whatever terrible plot was against someone else? To wish real danger on a stranger?

"Too dangerous to act, too dangerous to not do anything at all. So, what do we do?" Fethris asked.

"I don't know," I admitted. "I wish I did, but I don't."

"Someone's planning something. And right now they don't know that we know that. Shouldn't we have an advantage now?" Russel asked.

"In theory," I responded. "It almost feels like walking into a trap knowing it's a trap."

Fethris exhaled slowly, "We may have to. Walk into whatever trap. It just won't be entirely blind. For however much good that will do."

This sucked, "I hate that. But we have nothing to go on. Nothing to act on. And not telling you guys felt wrong."

"Good. I would've been pissed off if you didn't tell us this until after something happened," Celica responded.

"The last thing I want is for anyone to get hurt," I explained. "The best way to prevent that is to share what I know." Knowledge was the only power I had. That any of us had against an adult with something so dangerous. We weren't ready for a fight like that. Or maybe it was just me that wasn't ready.

I was the weakest link here, regardless of titles. And if I was the reason there was a guillotine above our heads… then it was my responsibility to stop this.

Somehow.

I took another breath, slow and steady like the movement of the plates of the Earth. "Promise me none of you will do anything stupid."

"Only if you define stupid as trying to stop this person ourselves," Russel said.

"Promise me," I repeated while carefully emphasizing each syllable.

"We promise," Fethris said with a smile. Like we weren't all in danger. And maybe that was enough.

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