Page 56 of House of Korba (The Ghost Bird 7)

“We’ll use these outfits again,” Victor said. “There is prom, after all.”

“Nu uh,” Gabriel said. “You can’t use the same stuff for prom. That’s not the same thing.”

“I like them,” Kota said, walking up behind us. I turned, surprised at seeing him for once without his glasses, the half mask on his face.

“Can you see?” I asked.

He tapped the mask close to his eye. “Contact lenses,” he said.

My mouth popped open. “You...”

“I don’t like them,” he said. “They can get really dirty and I worry about getting an eye infection. I’d rather have the glasses.”

“It’s just for tonight,” Gabriel said. “It would have looked weird with the glasses.”

“I like it,” I said quietly.

Kota’s green eyes lit up behind his mask.

“Let’s get inside,” Nathan said, following up next to Kota. He really filled out his suit, and the red tie swayed as he kept the jacket open.

“Yeah,” Luke said as he approached in his suit with the baby blue tie and mask. He cut in between Gabriel and me, taking my arm and tugging me deeper into the tent. “I smell food.”

Some of the guys chuckled.

I followed the others deeper into the tent. We broke off into pairs, me with Luke for the moment. Later, I’d be switching between all of them about every five minutes to walk around, dance, but most of all, be on the lookout in case anything screwed up.

“At least there’s no fog machines here,” Luke said.

“And no boxes with bombs in it,” I said.

“We’ve got the place covered,” Mr. Blackbourne said in my ear. “Nothing to worry about. Just make sure the students aren’t acting up.”

There weren’t two thousand students under the tent, but the place did start to fill in after a while. The lighting grew brighter and faded with the pulse of the music. There were towers of tiny pieces of cakes, little finger sandwiches and lots of bowls of punch.

I stood by Luke while he loaded his plate and kept an eye on the others. They were easy to follow with their masks. North’s was the only one that was black, and he was with Dr. Green, who wore a purple mask, and blended in with the students rather than the teachers. They stood beside a table near other students holding cups of punch and talking casually.

Only about half of the students danced at all. The rest sat at the tables, or stood and watched those dancing, checking out costumes. Some clustered around the darker corners of the tent.

Luke held up a plate full of cakes between us. “Try these,” he said. “I know the baker. These are good.”

I lifted my mask a little and I pinched off part of a square and took a bite. The cake wasn’t overly sweet. It was fresh, with a hint of chocolate. “It’s good,” I said, smiling at him.

It was a change from this morning. After returning from the church to Nathan’s house, Nathan and I waited up to hear that North was fine, that he’d just suffered some minor burns and a concussion, but he was going to be released in the morning after being monitored at the Academy hospital. Kota stayed with him.

Mr. Blackbourne and the others had left the scene at the school to take care of the Korbas. There wasn’t any more news about the fog machines or who might have manipulated the scoreboard.

The night started to pass by in a whirlwind of music and spotting Academy people. Each of the boys took turns walking around the dance floor with me.

That was until it was Victor’s turn. Instead of making a circle, he cut through the thicker part of dancers. Victor held me by the waist and swayed for a bit to one of the faster songs, but shooed Kota away from his turn, when a slow song came on. Kota relented, allowing Victor two songs and a half before he finally cut in.

After that point, I was on my feet for an hour as Gabriel, Luke, Dr. Green, and North, each took turns to dance with me at least once.

North was the quietest. “I hate this school,” he said.

I couldn’t blame him. It was hard to really relax knowing something was probably going to happen. The goal for the Academy tonight was to ensure, as far as everyone else knew, that nothing happened at all.

I stood by North as someone from the school took the mic to announce the homecoming king and queen. The king would be first.

North and I pulled back as most of the students stood up to gather around the small stage.

“Hey,” North said. “I’m going to go grab something to drink. He touched his mask, adjusting it. I didn’t think he liked it. “Do you want anything?”

I spotted Luke and Gabriel nearby. Luke made a gesture with his hand, at me, pointing to his own mask, and then pretending to lift it up.

I almost didn’t have the nerve for what he wanted me to do.

Almost.

“You know, Gabriel did a nice job on my makeup tonight,” I said to him, reciting the lines I’d practiced. “Would you like to see?”

North’s dark eyes blinked in confusion. “Uh, okay.”

“Come see,” I said.

North leaned in and I hooked my fingers under my mask, quickly lifting it. I leaned in to reveal my face, and I couldn’t help my big grin.

In a jolt, North retreated a step. “What the...Baby!”

I was already giggling, knowing my face resembled one of Nathan’s zombies. When I winked, the makeup made it look like my eyeball was hanging out of my face, and there were gashes on my cheeks and lips, fake of course. The makeup was lighter than I expected, a promise Gabriel kept when Luke came up with the idea that afternoon as we were getting ready. I could feel it, but it was comfortable enough to wear for the evening.

North shook his head. He turned around, scanned, spotted Luke and pointed a finger. “You!” He was loud enough to almost be heard over the music. “What did you do to her face?”

Luke and Gabriel made a run for it.

I laughed as I pulled the mask back down, watching North storm off after his brother. The announcer started the drum roll to declare the homecoming king.

“And the winner is...” he said, “Jared Anson!”

There was a thunderous applause. I didn’t know the boy, but I thought he was on the football team.

And my heart sunk a little.

“Hey,” said a deep voice. “Aggele.”

I turned, spotting the dark blue mask. He reached out and put a hand on my shoulder.

“Hi, Silas,” I said quietly, smiling at him.

“Not disappointed that I’m not homecoming king, are you?”

“Are you?” I asked.

Silas’s mask tilted toward me. “I never wanted to run.”

“Just to let you know,” Mr. Blackbourne said in my ear. “Silas, you actually came in second place. We had to manipulate the database to lower your vote count and still make it fair to the others.”

Silas chuckled. “Crazy kids.”

“So you might have gotten up there,” I said, nodding toward the homecoming king, who was receiving his crown and fanfare. “If you’d tried.”

“Not my style,” he said. “Besides, I would have been up there with...well...you didn’t run, either.”

“I wasn’t even on the roster,” I said.

“Actually,” Mr. Blackbourne said. “To be included on the roster of entrants, a person needs a hundred votes to be considered. Your name came up two hundred and eighty five times.”

I was grateful for the mask at that moment, sure that I was blushing and that my mouth was hanging open. “How?”

“It was a ballot, and people could write in names. Unfortunately, we had to erase you from the official ballot.”

“I didn’t know,” I said quietly.

“It’s been a busy week,” Mr. Blackbourne said. “I apologize for not telling you sooner.”

“Come here,” Silas said, pulling me into him and hugging me. “You and I didn’t do too badly. Maybe one day we’ll run for... well...Maybe nothing. Let’s do something else.”

; “How’s Theo?” I asked him.

“Sent to a retreat,” he said. “Once the police showed up, one of our Academy team members arrived to represent him as his lawyer. He’ll go to trial soon and will probably face deportation.”

“And you?”

“It took a couple of favors from the Academy again,” he said. “I’m off the hook as far as officials are concerned, but the Academy wants a meeting with me...”

“Please don’t talk about that right now,” Mr. Blackbourne said. “The short wave radios in these masks aren’t exactly secure.”

“Nothing’s happening,” Silas said. “This was the big moment of the night.”

We watched and waited as the homecoming queen was announced. It turned out to be Jenny, the girl who had dropped off her can at the diner earlier. I almost forgot about her. “Did she get her can back with donations?”

“She actually got the most, I think,” Silas said. “When she picked it up, she had two other jars to go home with her.”

I was stunned. “She only had three days.”

“Academy people go in that diner a lot.”