Read Shadow Grail #2: Conspiracies for Free Online Page A

of it?”
    “I—” It was Loch’s turn to be at a loss for words. “I don’t know—”
    “Whoever called the Hunt has been doing it for years, Loch! And Doctor Ambrosius hasn’t figured out who they are, either! He would have stopped them a long time ago if he had!”
    “We don’t know that—” Loch said weakly.
    “Yes we do!” she snapped. “We know it had to be someone inside the school to take down the wards, because they were taken down and put back up—not broken. So—if you’re right, and the teachers are handling this and not telling us—who on the staff isn’t here anymore?”
    “Uh … We wouldn’t notice someone gone from the kitchen or maintenance—” Loch said helplessly.
    “Oh, give me a break,” Spirit said in contempt. “You think someone from the kitchen or maintenance is that good a magician? We don’t even know that any of them even are magicians—do we?”
    He withered a little under her glare. “I— Um— Well—”
    Now she was the one crossing her arms over her chest. “I’ll take that as a ‘no’—that the Housekeeping Staff aren’t magicians. And none of the teachers or the Admin staff have ‘left to pursue other opportunities’ in the last three days. So? Still think I’m creating crazy conspiracies to get attention?” It made her sick with anger to think he’d actually accused her of that.
    “Look, just cut Addie and Muirin some slack,” he finally said. “It’s not like they— we —aren’t cutting you plenty.”
    She started to snap back at him, then forced herself to nod. As much as it galled her to admit it, there was some justice in that. All four of them had put up with a lot from her since she’d arrived at Oakhurst. And she had to admit they’d all been on board with finding out what was hunting Oakhurst students and putting a stop to it.
    “Having a good Monopoly game is making Addie happy. Stuffing herself with cookies and candy until she’s sick and babbling on about what she’s going to wear to the prom is making Muirin happy,” Loch went on. “It’s Christmas, for heaven’s sake, Spirit. Give them at least one day off from being The Mystery Gang. You owe them that.”
    Her throat suddenly filled with a big lump. “As long as I don’t have to be the goofy mascot,” she managed to whisper.
    Loch gave her his sunniest smile—looking relieved, she thought. “Nah. I always thought of you as more the ‘cute cheerleader’ type.”
    All she could do after that was nod, and let him lead her back over to the soda table, and fill her arms with cold cans.
    She followed him back to their table, still gulping back tears of grief and humiliation, and if she couldn’t manage to smile and chatter cheerfully, she could at least pay attention to the game to give Addie a good one, and nod when Muirin went on about what an ordeal and a torture session the New Year’s Ball was going to be.
    Because, yeah, Loch was right.
    She did owe them that much.
    But they owed her, too.
    *   *   *
    The next day—Boxing Day—was the day when the students at Oakhurst traditionally exchanged their “personal” gifts with each other. Spirit had made book covers and matching bookmarks out of felt. Privately, she thought the gifts were a little cheesy, but they were all she could manage, and she’d wanted to give her friends something, at least. When the other girls on her floor had seen Spirit’s bookmark-and-book-cover combinations, some of them had asked her to make some for them. She’d done it, even though it had taken precious time from figuring out how to destroy the Wild Hunt, because she’d been terribly conscious of needing to behave as if everything was completely normal. And since the student body at Oakhurst had a flourishing barter economy going, it had meant she at least had some pretty and colorful paper to wrap her gifts for her friends in.
    By prearrangement, the five of them met in their favorite student lounge, the one beside