Nocticadia: A Dark Academia Gothic Romance

Tension burned in my muscles, as I drove back toward the university. Unbeknownst to Lilia, I’d stored Angelo in my father’s old lab, down in the mansion’s catacombs, and had given him the dose of larvae that I’d intended to give the sex worker back in Thresher Bay.

Every fiber of my being had compelled me to kill him for putting his hands on her, but I needed to keep him breathing in order for him to serve as my next test subject. I took comfort in knowing he’d suffer a much slower hell than that which a quick bullet or severed artery might’ve inflicted. Not even flaying him alive would be considered tortuous enough to quell the rage burning inside of me.

I also planned to administer a dose to Lippincott. Because there was no doubt in my mind that he’d put Angelo up to killing Lilia. And the connection between the two bastards had me believing he’d likely also been behind Caed’s kidnapping. So blind in my pursuits and desperation to cure my illness, I’d failed to see what was in front of me the whole time.

He’d fucked with the only two people in the world who’d ever mattered to me, and for that, he would die a slow and painful death. As he was well known to stop into my office for a drink, I figured the means of inoculation would be relatively simple. I’d call him in to discuss the new variant, offer him a drink, then watch his world crumble.

I slowed my car to a stop in the small parking lot, just outside of the cadaver entrance, and made my way inside.

As far as he knew, Lilia was dead. I hadn’t given him any reason to suspect that I was involved with her, so unless he’d come to his own suspicions, he wouldn’t have made the connection that she was anything important to me. I’d sent him a text the day before, informing him that she hadn’t shown up to classes. I was merely serving as the informant he’d requested of me. It was then he’d made the lame excuse that, due to budgeting issues, he hadn’t been able to approve another semester for her. I hadn’t squawked about it, hadn’t given the slightest indication that I’d cared–a reaction further reinforced when I’d told him that I’d had success with the latest variant, to which he’d responded favorably.

As far as Lippincott was concerned, he’d dealt with Lilia quietly.

Thanks to Langmore, to whom I’d make a point to offer my gratitude, he’d had the rug pulled out from under him.

I hustled toward my office, peeking in on Achilles and Patroclus, who continued to respond well to the black stone concoction I’d administered. I could attest—I’d also sustained my sense of feeling for days without any decline.

In my office, I prepared the contaminated liquor that I intended to offer Lippincott, injecting the fresh eggs into the decanter. As I placed it back into the cupboard of my desk, I noticed a figure standing in the doorway.

Lippincott.

“Pardon the intrusion,” he said, crossing the room toward the seat across from me. “Been a long day. Someone took it upon themselves to trash my office. I have a feeling it was Spencer.”

I fell into my chair across from him. “Any reason why he’d do that?”

“He’s a fuck-up. That’s why.” He let out a mirthless chuckle. “Can I tell you a secret, Devryck?” The slight lack of focus in his eyes hinted that he’d already gotten into the liquor. “He isn’t even mine,” he whispered and snorted a laugh.

Frowning, I stared back at him, wondering if he was telling the truth, or just drunk. I pulled the decanter of alcohol from the cupboard of my desk and held it up.

Nodding, he flicked his fingers, and I poured the liquor into a glass, pushing it across my desk.

“You’re in deep shit, Devryck. That’s why I’m here.”

“For what?”

He screwed his eyes shut and snorted another laugh. “For what! For what? Are you fucking with me right now?”

I didn’t respond, unsure if it was the alcohol talking, or not.

“Melisandre Winthrop has accused you of holding her at knife point and threatening to cut her fucking nipples off with a blade. That’s what.”

The accusation slapped me across the face like a wet towel. “What?”

“Yeah. She claims you attacked her for some files.”

Files? I had no clue what the hell he was talking about. “When did she claim this happened?”

“The night before last. In her dorm.”

Bullshit. I was cutting out Angelo’s tongue and stitching Lilia’s face the night before last.

“Are you trying to bring this crap back to the fore, Devryck?”

“I’m admittedly gobsmacked by this. I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.”

“C’mon, man. It’s me. Me!” He lifted the glass of liquor from the desk, as if he might drink it, but paused. “What the fuck are you thinking, Devryck? Melisandre Winthrop? The Chairman’s daughter! Are you nuts?”

“I never threatened her.”

Shaking his head, he pulled his phone from his pocket and clicked on a video. “As you know,” Lippincott prattled on, “the chairman does not take kindly to any sort of threats.”

A figure wearing a black hoodie entered the front door of what appeared to be Corbeau Hall. He glanced toward the camera just as Lippincott hit pause, and the breath exploded out of me.

Like staring at a fucking mirror.

An exact replica of me.

Caedmon?

It was a wonder Lippincott couldn’t hear the frantic pounding of my heart, as I stared down at what I was certain was my twin.

My brain refused to accept it, though, even as I studied his features, unable to summon a goddamn word beyond what the fuck.

“A number of witnesses saw you enter the dorm, Devryck.”

My mind scrambled for a reason. An explanation. Every fiber of me stood paralyzed in shock.

My brother. My twin.

For years, I’d thought he was dead. Mutilated.

Was I imagining it all? I couldn’t be. Lippincott had said others had seen him, too.

I schooled my face to avoid showing any of the utter chaos swimming in my head right then.

Lippincott stared down at his drink, swirling it around. He tipped back a sip–a sight I should’ve relished, but I was too busy untangling myself from impossibility. “The Rooks are coming for you, Devryck. Winthrop is fucking pissed. Melisandre is his princess, as you know.”

His voice remained a distant sound to the incessant pounding inside my head right then.

It was only when he drew a gun, pointing the barrel at me, that I broke from my trance. “You’ve always been like a son to me. Hell, more of a son than my own.”

“What are you doing, Edward?” I asked, silently calculating how long it would take, how many days of suffering would have to pass, for him to realize that I’d already ended his life in that single sip.

As he took another, I held back the maddening desire to laugh.

“The way I see it, this ship is sinking. Fast. I’m just claiming my lifeboat, is all.”

“I don’t understand.” No. Not so much that I didn’t understand, as I didn’t give a damn. Bigger fish to fry.

“I want everything you have on the toxin, Devryck. All of your research.” He stuffed his hands inside his pocket and held up an external chip, tossing it onto my desk. “Copy everything onto the chip, and I promise you won’t have to die. I want all the data. All the formulations. Everything.”

“That’s two generations of work you’re asking me to hand over to you.” In truth, I didn’t care about any of it right then. I wanted to go find my brother. To disprove the impossibility clamoring inside my head. This shit with Lippincott was nothing but a distraction.

“Yes. You’re about to crash. You realize, when Winthrop comes for you, he’s not going to let you off, right? Not even your name will spare you.”

My name had never offered much to spare me, anyway. It was only the promise of what I could offer to redeem it. I glanced down at the chip and back to him. “Did you hire Angelo to kill Lilia?” At that point, I didn’t give a shit if he knew about the two of us.

Knowing eyes narrowed on mine, and he tipped his head. “Now, what would you know about that, Devryck?”

“Answer the question. Or I’ll destroy every shred of this study.”

“And how would you accomplish that in a matter of seconds before the bullet hit you?”

Idiot. If he thought for one second that I ever trusted him entirely, that I ever trusted any Rook, for that matter, he was far more foolish than I’d originally estimated. “I’ve installed a failsafe. A virus, in the event something should happen to me. One click, Edward. And everything would disappear.”

His jaw shifted, his eyes a psychotic shade of black. “You were always good at this game. Far more clever than your father.” He rubbed the back of his neck and let out a groan. “Yes. I had her killed. I tried to be discreet about it, but that didn’t work out, so I had to take more aggressive measures. She was a liability.”

Discreet. “You were the one who drugged her with the noxberries at the gala.”

“Well, technically no. The server did. For a rather excessive gratuity.” The fact that Lilia hadn’t gotten infected either proved that he was ignorant about the infectivity of noxberries, or posed a whole new mystery about my little moth that I’d have to unravel later. “Lilia was a liability to me,” he babbled on. “I made a mistake years ago, fucking her mother, and it nearly cost me my career, my marriage, my fucking life.”

“How are you so sure she’s yours?” The last word arrived strangled, my head refusing to allow him any level of possession over her–even fatherly.

“She’s mine. That bitch promised me. Four years ago, she came to me, soon after her own mother had died. She’d claimed she wanted to save their family home. She had assured me then that she’d lost the pregnancy. But when I saw Lilia that day in the dining hall, I just knew the bitch had lied to me.”

“Four years ago. That was about the time when her mother got sick.”

“I suppose it was.” He shook his head on a dramatic sigh and clicked his tongue. “Tragic thing.”

“You killed her mother.”

“I eliminated a problem. She should’ve met a watery grave with the other six women. Why she didn’t is a fucking mystery of the ages.” Perhaps not so much of a mystery, if she’d been exposed to the black rock. If my hypothesis proved true, it would’ve protected her for a short time. “Unfortunately, she was too much of a threat to investigate the why of that. And then the bitch took off. I thought maybe she’d died, after all. Until she walked back into my life again like a goddamn herpes infection. Then that other lunatic showed up. Accusing me of putting worms in her.”

“You had her report altered, just like you had me alter Andrea’s.”

Wearing a smug grin, he lifted his glass like a toast, and I wanted to laugh at the irony of it, but I was too busy imagining what he’d look like with a mouthful of busted teeth. “Blackmail is a beautiful thing. I had so much shit dug up on that coroner, he’d have fucked her corpse, if I’d asked him.”

“Why Lilia? She wouldn’t have even known, had you just left it alone.”

“It was Gilchrist who couldn’t leave it alone. That relentless cunt!” Rubbing his fingers together, he shifted in the seat, seething in his rage. “She’s had it in for me for two decades now. The woman is desperate to sabotage my career and my marriage. She was the one who told your father about my little affair with that whore.” On a long exhale, he rolled his shoulders back. “A whore who swore to me that she’d lost the baby. Imagine my fucking surprise when a walking replica of her, about the right goddamn age, came strolling into the lunchroom that day. I should’ve never listened to you and kicked her out right then and there.” Hands shaky, he frantically tipped back another sip. “It’s a game for Gilchrist. A sick game to watch me fail, and I, for one, am tired of being pushed around by fucking women!” Breathing hard through his nose, he sat quiet for a moment, as if trying to collect himself. With his face lobster red, I wondered if he was about to keel from a stroke. “I’m going to let you in on a little secret, Devryck. One I haven’t told anyone. I shouldn’t be telling you, but you’ve been like a son to me. More of a son than my own.”

“Why do you keep saying that?”

“Because it’s true. Spencer isn’t even mine. He was a product of my wife’s affair with your father.”

The man just couldn’t help himself, dropping bomb after bomb in my lap. “Was there a paternity test to confirm this?”

“There was a paternity test to rule me out. Your father refused.”

There was no point in asking if it could’ve been someone else’s. I’d seen my father with her. Had watched the two of them together.

“So, you fucked Lilia’s mom to get back at your wife.”

“I’m not going to lie. Vanessa Corbin’s cunt was worth the risk. In another life, I might’ve even loved her.” A sickening thought, where Lilia was concerned. “But enough of this. Copy the files, Devryck. Please don’t make me blow your brains out of your skull.”

Teeth grinding in my head, I logged into the computer, thoughts spinning with how to outsmart the drunken fool while my head felt like it was about to explode. A notification popped up on the screen.

An email from Spencer.