Hector struggled through the day. He wished there wasn’t so much damn walking. A few times, he considered skipping class to go take a nap somewhere, but he knew Garovel wouldn’t permit it. He tried to pay attention to each lecture, but he felt like he had missed more than a few things.
History class was the worst yet. Mr. Cormac was talking about the rise of workers’ unions, and people kept raising their hands to ask questions about the royal family. Hector stopped trying to follow what was going on and just shut his eyes.
Garovel, however, did not. ‘Something’s strange here...’
‘Hmm?’
‘Raise your hand and ask why everyone is suddenly so interested in the Crown.’
‘What? Why?’
‘Because I want to know.’
‘But... I don’t like to... participate...’
‘I don’t care. You can be a shy bastard on your own time.’
He sighed and raised his hand.
Mr. Cormac stared at the hand a moment, about ready to lose his patience. “Yes, Hector?”
“Uh... sorry, I was just wondering... why... everyone else was asking about the royal family...”
A few laughs rang out, and the entire classroom turned to look at him.
His knuckles went white around the edges of his desk. ‘Oh, fuck. What did you make me do...?’
“You’re joking, right?” someone said.
“He really doesn’t know?” said someone else.
He tried to melt into his seat. “D-did... did something happen...?”
“I know you’ve been absent,” said Mr. Cormac, “but you didn’t hear about it on the news or from your parents or anything?”
“H-hear what...?”
“Three days ago, someone tried to assassinate the Queen.”
Hector and Garovel exchanged confused expressions.
A dark serial novel. Set in a modern fantasy world called Eleg. Mature language. Updates every night at midnight PST by ~400 words.