Chapter 20: Petra's Warning
The Graveyard wasn't actually a graveyard.
It was a courtyard behind the eastern dormitories where ancient headstones had been repurposed as benches and tables—King's Dominion's idea of decorating with death. Students used it for after-hours gatherings, the kind of conversations that needed darkness and distance from faculty ears.
Marcus found Petra there alone, sitting against a headstone dated 1847, her notebook open in her lap. She was drawing something—quick, precise strokes that captured shapes before light could steal them.
He approached without stealth. Let his footsteps announce him, his presence register before he got close enough to startle.
"You want something." Petra didn't look up from her sketch. Her voice was flat, unsurprised.
"Yeah."
"Sit."
Marcus lowered himself onto the grass beside her, back against cold stone. The night air carried autumn's first chill, a reminder that seasons changed even underground.
For a while, neither of them spoke. Petra's pencil moved across the paper—Marcus couldn't see what she was drawing, just the rhythm of creation. He let the silence stretch, knowing that Petra didn't respond well to pressure.
"You're on a list," he said finally.
The pencil stopped.
"Finals target list. Someone's assigned to kill you."
Petra's head turned slightly. In the darkness, her expression was unreadable. "How do you know this?"
"Does it matter?"
"It matters if you're lying to me. If this is some kind of play."
"It's not a play." Marcus kept his voice level. "Three Rats are targeted this year. You're one of them. The assignment is redacted—someone with influence wanted their name hidden."
Petra was quiet for a long moment. Then she set down her pencil, closed her notebook, and turned to face him fully.
"Why tell me?"
"Because you're one of us."
"I'm not one of anyone." Her voice was sharp now, defensive. "I don't do alliances. I don't do—"
"You joined the Rat alliance."
"I said I'd help when I felt like it. That's not the same thing."
"It is to me."
The words hung between them. Marcus watched Petra's jaw tighten, saw something flash across her face too quickly to identify.
"You could have let me walk into Finals blind," she said slowly. "Let whoever's hunting me take their shot while I wasn't looking. Why risk telling me? Why risk me asking questions you can't answer?"
Because I saw the names on that list and couldn't live with myself if I didn't try to change them.
Because you remind me of someone I can't quite remember, from a life I'm not sure was real.
Because the dead I carry would never forgive me for watching the living die unnecessarily.
"Because I don't leave my people behind," Marcus said instead. "Even the ones who don't think they're my people."
Petra stared at him for a long moment. Then she reached down, tore a page from her notebook, and handed it to him.
It was a sketch. Him, mid-fight with Viktor—the moment before the nerve strike landed. She'd captured something in the lines that Marcus hadn't realized was visible: the stillness beneath the motion, the calculated precision disguised as luck.
"I see things too," Petra said. "Don't worry about me, Lopez. Worry about yourself."
Marcus looked at the sketch, then back at her. "What does that mean?"
"It means I've been watching this school since I arrived. Mapping it. Learning who's dangerous and how." She stood, brushing grass from her pants. "It means I'm not as random as I look. And it means that whoever's hunting me is going to have a very bad time."
She walked away, leaving Marcus alone with the headstones and a drawing that showed him something he wasn't sure he wanted to see.
She's been building her own intelligence network, he realized. Playing a long game I didn't even notice.
Petra wasn't a chaotic ally. She was a player operating on a level he hadn't understood until now.
He wasn't sure if that made him feel better or worse.