Force of Nature ▸ House of Anubis [3]

chapter twenty-five. house of tombs

Discotheque? Oh, right, Patricia's excuse.

"But—" Alfie begins.

"Be quiet!" Victor booms. "As some of you cannot be trusted, all of you must pay the price. Trudy."

"Yes, Victor," Trudy says. Her voice is almost small.

"From now until further notice, Anubis House is on lockdown," Victor announces. "This means students are not permitted to leave the house except to attend school. They are to be escorted to their classes. They are to be given basic rations only, which means no cakes, no treats." You've got to be joking with this! Alfie starts to protest. "Be quiet, Lewis! Now go to your rooms."

—

School goes by quick. Before I know it, the final bell of the day rings, chiming sharply as if it's reminding us that we're under lockdown. I find KT in an empty classroom, her laptop in front of her. "You okay?"

She looks at me, sighing. "I don't know. Do you think I'm Robert Frobisher-Smythe's great-granddaughter?"

I sit next to her slowly, trying to think of a response. "I think," I decide finally, "that unless he had another child no one knew about, a secret love child or something, it's not possible. The only Frobisher by blood I've ever met was Sarah. She never said anything about having a brother or sister."

"But what if it was a secret love child? What if... what if—"

"Don't torture yourself with 'what ifs,' KT," I tell her. "Even if it turns out that you are, the only way it'll change you is if you let it. You can't let it overpower you. If it's true, you stand up and show the world you're still you."

KT looks at me, sighing. "When you found out everything to do with your family, did it change you?"

"I think, for a while, it did," I admit. "It changed the way I looked at things, I think it may have changed the way I spoke to some people... but last year grounded me again. The knowledge might change you, but only in terms of having a piece of the puzzle you didn't have before. You put those pieces together, you get a picture of yourself. That picture might not be what you're hoping for, but... it won't be evil. Not you."

"What about you?"

Fabian appears at the door before I can even start to think about an answer, saying, "Denby is herding up the sheep to go back to the house, so we better join them." He sits on the table, mimicking a sheep as he looks at us.

KT looks between us. "I'm going away. I have to."

"No, look," Fabian says again before I can respond, "I know it's been a tough day—"

"I can't unleash evil onto the world," she interrupts.

"You won't," I tell her. "You couldn't. You're too good a person—"

"Who's Frobisher-Smythe's great-granddaughter!"

"You might be Frobisher's great-granddaughter," Fabian says. "Why don't we check Frobisher's records?" KT hesitantly agrees and he pulls up another chair, putting it between her and I.

"You can look up his records online?" I question. He nods, pulling the laptop in front of him and typing away. "At least we won't get paper cuts."

KT lets out a humorless laugh as Fabian starts to pull up the records on the computer. "We can start with his marriage certificate... here we are." He says. I look over, seeing scanned documents on the screen. "Look, there's his wife, and there's his daughter, Sarah. And the adoption certificate for Lily Henry. That's all there is."