Unspoken: The Lynburn Legacy (2 page)

For the first time Kami could remember, every window was lit from within, shining gold.

The Lynburns were home at last.

The howling reached a pitch that raked up Kami’s spine and sent her running to the garden gate, where she stood with her eyes full of darkness. Then the sound died abruptly. Suddenly there was nothing but the night wind, shushing Kami as if she’d had a bad dream and running cold fingers through her hair. Kami reached out past the boundaries of her own mind and called for comfort.

What’s wrong?
the voice in Kami’s head asked at once, his concern wrapping around her. She felt warmer instantly, despite the wind.

Nothing’s wrong
, Kami answered.

She felt Jared’s presence slip away from her as she stood in the moonlit garden for another moment, listening to the silence of the woods. Then she went back inside to finish her article. She still hadn’t told Angela about the paper.

Kami had been hearing a voice in her head all her life. When she was eight, people had thought it was cute that she had an imaginary friend. It was very different now that
she was seventeen. Kami was accustomed to people thinking she was crazy.

“You’re crazy,” said her best friend, Angela, as the bell rang to signal five minutes before the first class on the first day back at school.

Angela had moved from London to Sorry-in-the-Vale when Kami was twelve. The timing had been perfect because Kami’s first best friend, Nicola Prendergast, had just dropped her for being too weird.

“They said that about all the great visionaries,” Kami informed her, hurrying down the hall to match Angela’s long-legged stride.

“You know who else they said it about?” Angela demanded. “All the actual crazy people.” She gave Kami a look that said she wished Kami would stop bothering her.

Normally this would not have worried Kami. Angela always looked at people with that expression, and Kami could usually talk her into doing what Kami wanted anyway. But Kami had never wanted something as much as this.

“Last summer, when we volunteered as assistants at cricket camp—”

“When
you
volunteered us without asking me, yes,” said Angela.

Kami ignored this trifle. “Remember how I encouraged the kids to keep diaries, which turned into an exposé about the seamy underbelly of cricket camp?”

“I have found it impossible to forget,” Angela told her.

“And remember last year when I started the petition to get Miss Mackenzie fired, and she chased me around the
pitch waving a hockey stick, and we had to speak before the school board?”

“Again, unforgettable,” said Angela.

“My point is, here we have an opportunity to champion truth that doesn’t involve sports,” Kami persisted. “It’s a step toward me becoming the greatest journalist of our time. You have to help, Angela, because Ms. Dollard has this notion that I’m a troublemaker and she’s only—
finally
—letting me set up a school paper because I told her you were on board.”

Angela rounded on Kami, her dark eyes blazing. “You did
what
?”

“I knew that once I explained the situation, you would understand,” Kami said, holding her ground despite Angela’s looming over her, alarming and overly tall. She continued swiftly in case Angela was considering beating her to death with her schoolbag. “I was hoping you would agree out of real enthusiasm for the project and because you are a true friend, but if you insist on being without vision—”

“I do,” Angela said firmly. “Oh, I do.”

“There is one other factor,” Kami said. “The office we’re being given to run the school paper has a sofa in it.” She paused for effect. “And we’re allowed to go to the office during free periods to tirelessly pursue truth and justice. Or, say—”

“Nap,”
Angela finished, in the reverent tones of a knight who has finally spotted the Holy Grail. She stood lost in thought, her fingers tapping against the strap of her schoolbag. Then her perfect mouth curved ever so slightly. “I guess I do have a few ideas for articles.”

They walked into class in full accord, Kami beaming
with victory. “I have more than a few. I’ve already started an article.”

Angela slipped into a chair one over from the window, and Kami took the place beside her. “About what?”

Kami leaned across the desk, keeping her voice low. “Yesterday I was at the sweetshop talking to Mrs. Thompson about the Lynburns coming back.” She glanced out the window of the classroom. Fields stretched to the south in a green blanket. To the north rose a hill steep enough to look like a cliff. On the edge of that rise stood Aurimere House, and below it were the woods, like a regiment of dark soldiers with a bright general.

She looked back at her friend in time to see Angela’s raised eyebrows. “So you were basically interrogating poor Mrs. Thompson, who is probably a hundred and twenty years old?”

“I was acquiring information,” Kami said calmly. “Also licorice.”

“You are shameless,” Angela said. “I hope you feel good about your life choices.”

Kami looked out at the valley again. There were stories to be found here, and she was going to discover them all.

“You know,” she said, “I really do.”

They were interrupted by the entrance of Miss Mackenzie, which forced both of them, Kami smiling and Angela shaking her head, to turn to their books.

It wasn’t until the end of the day that Kami and Angela had time to make their way up the stairs to the second floor
and check out their newspaper office. The Sorry-in-the-Vale school building—the town was so small that there was no need to have more than one—was over a hundred years old. It accommodated all Vale kids from age five to eighteen, and there were still quite a few rooms in the school that weren’t used. Kami couldn’t wait to use this one.

“So tell me about the articles
you
have in mind,” Kami said to Angela on the first step.

“I was thinking I could write tips for people who are too busy to exercise but want to stay in shape,” Angela said. “People like me.”

Kami nodded. “You’re always busy trying to find a napping spot.”

“Exactly,” Angela told her. “I can’t be distracted from my search by having to do Pilates or whatever. Here’s one of my tips: always take steps two at a time.”

She demonstrated.

“I thought you did that just to mock my stumpy legs.”

“That too,” Angela conceded. “But the main thing is that taking steps two at a time is like a StairMaster workout. The result? Buns of steel.” Angela casually slapped the buns she referred to, proving her point.

Angela had a perfect body. She had a perfect face too, but at least she put some effort into that, her makeup always flawless and her abilities with eyeliner unnatural. Kami focused more on clothes than on makeup. She was always forgetting to put on lip gloss as she rushed out the door, but she felt the likelihood of forgetting her clothes was not high.

Kami slapped her own ass experimentally and made a face. “Buns of corrugated tin,” she said. “On a good day.”

What’s going on with you?
Jared asked out of the blue. Kami felt his mind turn toward hers, away from his own life. It was like being in the middle of a conversation in a crowded room and having someone in an entirely different conversation among an entirely different group of people catch your eye. Multiplied by a thousand because, instead of eyes meeting, it was minds.

Beginning a new era of journalistic history
, Kami told him, sending her cheer through their connection.
Also, to be perfectly honest, Angela and I were slapping our asses
.

As one does
, said Jared.

And you?

There was a feeling like a shadow touching her, letting slip that Jared was unhappy, but he answered:
Just reading. Beginning a new era of being a useless layabout
. He absorbed her cheerfulness gratefully, and she could tell he was pleased for her.

Kami grinned up at Angela, who gave her a forbearing look. Kami realized that she had been standing and staring blankly for a little too long.

“Coming?” Angela asked with a small smile. She knew about Jared, though Kami tried not to talk about him too much. That was what had lost her Nicola Prendergast.

“Have I mentioned, thanks for doing this?” Kami asked.

Angela slung an arm around Kami’s shoulders as they went up the stairs. “Your soul is like the souls of a thousand monkeys on crack, all smushed together,” she told Kami. “But enough about you. Show me to my napping sofa.”

They reached the blue door at the top of the stairs. It had a little window of clouded glass and wire mesh. Kami
pulled out the chunky silver key that Ms. Dollard had somewhat reluctantly entrusted her with, turned it in the lock, and opened the door with a flourish. “Ta-dah!”

Kami and Angela peered into their new headquarters. The room was small. It had a wiry gray carpet, whitewashed brick walls, a big cupboard, several desks, and Angela’s much-desired sofa. It was also filled, floor to ceiling, with empty cardboard boxes.

“I hate you so much right now,” said Angela.

Kami and Angela spent twenty minutes clearing out their new office together. Then Angela gave up, gave a low moan, and fell onto the sofa, which was still covered in boxes. She lay there, her arm thrown over her eyes.

Kami kept cleaning up, whistling to herself as she folded and stacked piles of cardboard and dust fell around her like soft gray rain. Her glittery blue scarf, pencil skirt, and vintage Liberty blouse were not, she had to admit, the ideal clothes for manual labor. But she’d wanted to make a statement on her first day as a journalistic pioneer.

Kami was wrestling with a box that was determined never to fold, when there came a tap on the open door. She looked up from her giant origami creation, into the eyes of the best-looking guy she had ever seen.

There were two things about him that were more important than good looks. One was that he had a serious, substantial camera hanging from around his neck. The other was that Kami had never seen him before in her life, which meant he must be a Lynburn.

K
ami’d always retold her fairy tales to make the fair maidens braver and more self-sufficient, but she had never had any real objection to the handsome prince. And here one was, wearing a white T-shirt and jeans instead of armor, with golden hair that curled at the ends and eyes the ridiculous blue of high-summer skies, drenched in sunlight and melted clouds.

Those blue eyes were, of course, fixed on Angela. “Uh, hi,” said the Lynburn, wearing the same expression all boys did when they met Angela, as if they had been smacked in the face and were enjoying it. “Are you Kami Glass?”

Angela lifted the arm over her eyes a fraction. “Go away,” she commanded. “I only date college guys.”

“You don’t know any college guys,” Kami pointed out.

Angela’s gaze went to Kami, and she smiled. “Which leaves me with more time for napping.” She closed her eyes again, leaving Kami and the Lynburn looking at each other.

Kami had to hand it to the guy. Most males were in retreat or infuriated when faced with Angela’s inexplicable rudeness. This guy’s expression had not changed, apart from a slight widening of his eyes. She admired his self-control.

“I saw a flyer on the bulletin board about the school newspaper needing a photographer, and it said to come here after school.” He had a lovely, drawling American accent: more proof he was a Lynburn.

His voice also sounded unruffled. Was he really offering to be a photographer for the paper, despite the fact that he’d just been insulted and their office was awash in cardboard?

Angela sat bolt upright and glared at Kami. “You put up a flyer? Before you even talked me into this?”

“Angela, Angela,” Kami said. “We can dwell on the past or we can move into the future!”

“I can hide your body in these piles of boxes. Nobody will ever find it.” Angela made a gesture of dismissal at the new kid. “Do you mind?”

He looked at Kami, who gave him a winning smile. This was how it went after Angela dismissed a guy:
then
he would take a look at Kami. Which didn’t always work out for Kami. Angela was the one with the exotic beauty, which was unfair considering that Kami was the one with the Japanese grandmother. Kami’s hair was black but shot with brown, not the raven’s-wing black of Angela’s hair. Kami’s features were subtly different from her schoolmates’, and her skin was pale gold, but she was betrayed by a nose dusted with freckles. Exotic beauties did not sport freckles.