CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
a major sacrifice, but clueless at the time
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𝐀gnes definitely didn't expect to find Wednesday's dorm room in Ophelia Hall to look like somebody just broke in and wrecked the place. There wasn't any sign of the stoic girl either, and she expected her to be there already if she had even decided to go into town. It only got worse when she saw a pool of fresh blood on the wooden floorboards just below the vintage record player that was coated with the same crimson color.
Her first thought was to find Uncle Fester. She found him in Eugene's shack, and he wasn't the only one. For some reason, relief washed over her when she saw that Wednesday Addams was unharmed. But Thing wasn't. Her heart doubled back, her feet rushing forward to the table where the bloodied hand sat uncharacteristically still. Then it shifted. A tiny movement that told her he was still, well, alive for a creature like it.
"What happened?" Agnes breathed, turning around to face the niece and uncle who watched her.
"The diary is gone," Wednesday said bluntly, but she could tell something in her was different. The girl actually looked like she just stopped crying, but Agnes didn't comment on it.
"Shit," Agnes muttered under her breath, running a frustrated hand through the knots in her hair. Then she turned to Fester. "The cops found your motorbike, by the way, genius."
"The sheriff won't be far," Wednesday realized. She looked at her uncle, her expression not changing. "You need to go... Maybe next time, steal something a little less conspicuous."
"Well, where's the fun in that?" Fester whined.
His niece shot him a look.
Fester exhaled, nodding ever so slightly. "All right. I'll lay low here tonight, keep an eye on the patient, and I'll skedaddle in the morning."
While the two exchanged farewells, Agnes prepared herself for the next few minutes. She let herself out of the shack first, taking a deep breath before she heard the door shut behind her. Wednesday appeared next to her, looking like she might start looking for revenge on whoever stabbed Thing on the wall. The latter slipped her cold hands inside the pockets of her coat, visibly shrugging her shoulders as if asking her, What now?
"We're going to pay Principal Weems a little visit," Wednesday said firmly.
Agnes's face hardened with a newfound determination. "Then let's not waste any time."
Ms. Thornhill found them striding along the hall of Nevermore in the middle of the night, which the teacher wasn't so happy about. Considering they were the most undisciplined students in the academy, she quickly assumed they were up to no good. The air around was thick as the lady guided them to Larissa Weems's office, the two girls letting her because that was their destination in the first place.
Now they stood in the dim light of the principal's office, Agnes and Wednesday standing side by side with the glow and warmth of the fireplace shining upon them. Ms. Thornhill stayed and stood in the back. Meanwhile, Weems was pacing back and forth in front of her huge fireplace, seemingly uneasy and suspicious by their sudden intrusion. Yet for some reason, Agnes thought the woman seemed to believe them either.
"I'm guessing it's not some kind of random prank," Weems muttered.
Agnes shook her head. "Trust me. I've never wanted it to be a prank so bad."
"Whoever ransacked my room also stole Nathaniel Faulkner's diary," Wednesday stated.
The principal abruptly stopped pacing and turned to them. "That's supposed to be safely locked in the Nightshades Library."
"And Nevermore's supposed to be safe from any bad guys out there who have a knack for stabbing a harmless creature," Agnes retorted.
"So you do know about that diary, which means you also know the monster we're after is called a Hyde," Wednesday said flatly with her arms crossed over her chest.
Ms. Thornhill looked at the principal, a deep frown on her questioning face. Weems visibly stiffened, and then she put on the fakest smile on her red-stained lips. She took a few steps forward and plastered a polite expression on her face as she looked at the red-headed normie teacher. "Thank you, Ms. Thornhill. I'll take it from here."
The teacher nodded. "Of course. If you need anything, I'll be right down the hall."
As soon as she left and the door shut behind her, Weems slowly tilted her head to look at the girls, her smile fading instantly. Then she turned her back on them, going over to the fireplace, her gaze straying toward the crackling fire. She leaned on it with one hand on the sculpted fireplace, Agnes watching her with a small furrow between her brows. She knew the principal was about to tell them something she hadn't told anyone.
"Faulkner spent years studying Hydes," Weems began, making Agnes purse her lips at what she said. Hydes. There had been many before this one in their town. "He wanted to determine if they were just mindless killers or conscious of their actions."
"What was his conclusion?" Wednesday asked.
"He was killed by a Hyde before he could reach one. Others tried to carry on his research, but the Hydes were too unpredictable and violent," Weems explained through gritted teeth. "They were officially banned from Nevermore thirty years ago."
Agnes picked at the scabs on her dry lips, in denial that something like that couldn't be understood. Or determined, in Faulkner's case. Maybe he was just bad at his job that's why he wasn't able to figure them out. Maybe he did something wrong that triggered the Hyde to kill him. Maybe she was trying to convince herself that this thing was a human forced to become an unwilling killer in the shape of a monster.
"All of this time, you've known the monster was a Hyde." Wednesday's wide eyes bored holes at the back of Weems's head. "Why didn't you tell the sheriff?"
The tall lady walked over to them with purpose. "Because then Nevermore is done. Over. Shut for good. And that's not happening on my watch."
"And that's more important to you?" Agnes said incredulously. A dry laugh escaped her lips, shaking her head. "People are dying, and you're worried about this hellhole going down the drain? That's big of you, Principal Weems."
"But I'm not the only one withholding," Weems retorted, glaring at the girls. "If you suspect someone you need to tell me."
Agnes instantly looked on Wednesday, alarmed and worried that she might spill her suspicions about Xavier. While the girl was warming up to her favors, Agnes still wouldn't let her best friend get suspected for something that he wasn't. She never believed he was the Hyde anyway. Because she would've known that better than anyone. After all, they'd been practically chained to the hip ever since they were kids. Something like that couldn't be hidden so easily.
"Why?" Wednesday demanded, making Agnes sigh in relief as she sunk back where she stood. Maybe she underestimated her. Wednesday would never do anything people tell her to do. She took a step forward. "All you've ever done is gaslight and obstruct me. You don't care how many people die, as long as your reputation is safe."
Weems glowered at her. "I am protecting our Nevermore family, which also includes you, Ms. Addams."
The girl merely glared at her before she walked off without another word.
Agnes glanced back at the principal, her words slipping out with a certain spite, "There was never a family here, Larissa. Not when you lied to everyone about Rowan."
Then she followed suit, marching out of the principal's office, purposely shutting the door loudly, before Weems could open her mouth and defend herself. With a shaky sigh, Agnes decided to go back to her room, only she didn't quite get there. For some reason, her feet led her to the male dorms instead. Now she stood in front of a closed door, a fist hovering in the air before it touched the wood. Knock, knock, knock. Three for the devil herself.
The door immediately creaked open, Xavier Thorpe looking back at her looking like he'd just been awoken up rather abruptly. His chestnut hair stuck in every direction possible. He had one eye open, and the other squinted as if the lights in the hall blinded him. The boy was wearing mismatched pajamas, and the prominent creases on the clothing told her he was having a really good sleep until she decided to wake him up.
"Agnes?" Xavier asked groggily, rubbing a hand over his eyes. "What are you doing here?"
Agnes mustered a tight-lipped smile before she invited herself inside his room. Her gaze immediately fell on the empty bed across the room, the sheets tucked and made as if nobody had been using it. Well, it used to be Rowan's, and Rowan's dead. Her throat tightened, her hands turning into fists as she thought about her recent discovery—how Principal Weems knew all this time.
"What's wrong?" Xavier frowned, noticing how quiet she was. His best friend was never this quiet. She often has something to say no matter the time or place.
All of a sudden, Agnes did the last thing he expected her to do. She suddenly tackled him and wrapped her arms around his torso. A hug. The boisterous, rebellious, and reckless teenage girl who has a knack for lighting things on fire was hugging him. Xavier blinked at his friend, his hands flailing around the air for a second until he decided to put them around her shoulders rather reluctantly.
"You don't like hugs," He muttered, unsure as he reciprocated her sudden affection.
She tightened her arms around him. "Shut up."
That night Agnes told her friend everything that happened. She told him how she found Ophelia Hall completely ransacked, and that Thing had been stabbed and almost died. Xavier kept listening in silence. She told him about Weems, how the woman knew everything that had been going on in Jericho and she kept it to herself because she was more worried about her own reputation than the lives of people.
Then Xavier decided to tell her about his waking visions. How it forced him to get up from his bed, and despite his shaking hands, his first instinct was to pick up a pencil or a paintbrush and put himself in front of a canvas or an empty page. Because that's all he ever knew. To draw everything that he couldn't tell anyone. Or rather the fact that nobody else was ever there to hear his worries that he found comfort in drawing them instead.
So Agnes believed him when he said he had been dreaming about the Hyde in a way that kept him up at night. That was the reason he had been going to therapy often. Because he couldn't calm down, he couldn't sleep. The monster haunted him for some reason that he couldn't understand. I suppose that was the worst thing about being a psychic. You often get a lot of unreal visions that usually ruin people in the long run.
"You know Wednesday's pretty sure that you're the Hyde, right?" Agnes asked, her tone both held worry and warning. "She's out to get you and she's not gonna stop, X."
"I know," Xavier sighed heavily, clasping his calloused hands together. They sat on the floor, leaning against the end of his single bed. "I don't know how I can make her believe that it's not me."
"I'll find a way," Agnes told him. There was a certain fire in her brown eyes that made the boy feel a little bit better despite the impending doom that he might face. "There's no way I'm gonna let anybody take you. Understood?"
Xavier let out a quiet chuckle as he looked at his best friend. "Understood."
The next day was something. Agnes wasn't sure where it started, but the first person who talked to her that morning was Wednesday Addams. She told her about Laurel Gates and how the woman was alive and apparently, the master of the Hyde. Agnes had to take a breather before the information loaded into her brain. Because for some reason, people in this town just wouldn't stay dead.
Then everything else just gradually became worse. She received the news that Wednesday apparently barged into Dr. Kinbott's office and accused her of being Laurel Gates, the Hyde's master, and completely armed to the bone with very convincing evidence. Then she somehow pulled Xavier into the picture again which she wasn't so glad about, fully convinced that the boy was the Hyde. Hours after that confrontation, Valeri Kinbott turned up dead in the very same office.
Mauled to death. Now, that's where you usually draw back the accusations to someone. Because Kinbott was not the master. Why would the Hyde kill its own master? Exactly. It couldn't be. Now Agnes Turner was stuck with unreliable information and a lot of two-faced people around her in a small town full of freak shows and mysteries that were never solved. Just exactly what she needed.