When I was a child and people asked me what I wanted to be when I was older, I gave them all sorts of wild answers. I told a teacher I wanted to be a couch potato so I could spend my days snuggled up under blankets in the living room. I told my best friend Jisoo's mom I wanted to be a kimchi taste-tester because that's what Jisoo wanted to be. And I told me dad I wanted to be a knife so I could cut my grilled cheese sandwiches in two perfect triangles instead of the four dinky squares he always prepared. Of course this answer earned me a raised eyebrows and an explanation about how a girl is a living, breathing thing that can be cut; and a knife is a sharp piece if steel that does the cutting. But now that I've discovered most of my childhood was a lie, I'm starting to think my younger seld onto something with the knife answer. Because in the past few weeks at Hidden Academy, I've come as close to being a knife, or being stabbed by one, as anyone can get.

I shut the door to the infirmary behind me and head down an empty hall that's lit by torches. I roll my sleeve down over the bandage on my forearm, where the nurse smeared my wound with some kind of strong poultice that smells of pine needles and clay. She kept telling me how lucky I was to have survived the fall from the tree in the courtyard, and with no broken bones. She tsked a lot and said, "You young people with everything for granted."I doubt she would have used the word lucky, though, if she knew I was thrown from the tree because the Tiger Family wanted me dead.

As I turn the corner into another silent hallway, I notice the torches have burned down, leaving the hallway ahead of me almsot completely dark. I slow to a stop, eyeing the dying embers on one torch suspiciously. Shouldn't someone have replaced them? And where are the academy guards? There's usually one posted in every hallway. I frown, wondering if I should head back to the infirmary, when I hear a faint gurgling noise.

I leaned forward, reluctant to step into the unlit hallway, as if the dark might bite me. For a second, everything is quiet, and I wonder if I only imagined the sound. Then a gasping cough breaks the quiet and my adrenaline soars.

"Suzy!" a strangled voice calls, and everything in me sinks. I recognize that voice.

"Sehun?!" I shout, and my previous hesitation disappears; I sprint full-speed into the dark.

My boots click rhythmically against the stone and my breathing accelerates with my pace. I run with my hand along the wall to keep my sooting as I chase Sehun's distressed voice.

Ahead of me on the left I can just make out a strip of light-the silver space under a closed door-and the choking sounds get louder as I near it. I grasp at the door latch in the dark, throwing my weight against the heavy wood. The hinges whine as it opens and I burst into the room, only to stop again so fast that I almost lose my balance.

My chest heaves as I fight to regain control over my runaway heartbeat. The room is enormous, with stone walls and a high arched ceiling. It's oddly devoid of furniture-except for the far end, where there are a platform and a large lavish chair that resembles a throne. The walls are hung with fancy portraits and ornate curtains. But what's stopped me in my tracks isn't the architecture or the decor. It's the dead bodies.

My eyes sweep across the expansive floor and my hand flies to my mouth to keep from crying out. Most are people I've never seen, a sea of unknown faces, their features contorted in pain in their last moments. But then I spot him at the far end of the room: Sehun, clawing at his throat as his mouth foams. Lying next to him is Sejeong, and beside her are Lisa, Rosé, and Jungkook. They're spread out, unmoving, their backs arched, bloody marks scratched across their throats. And standing in front of them all with his back to me is a tall man with dark hair styled with gel. He starts to laugh, long and loud.

"No. No no no . . ." I sputter in one fast breath, my pulse battering my temples as I frantically weave around bodies, panic fumbling my footing.

Sejeong's delicate hand is still clutching at as if she's fighting to get air, but her eyes are closed and she's perfectly still. A cry escapes my lips and I trip over someone's arm, my hands skidding on the cold stone floor. I immediately steady myself. Sehun's desperate eyes meet mine and he chokes again, reaching out for me.

The man with gel hairstyle looks down at Sehun as he struggles.

"What did you do to them?" I scream, my words fighting their way past the lump in my throat.

He bends down toward Sehun, a small aqua bottle in his hand. Poison, I think, and I yell for him to stop, but my words don't come out right, twisting into a sob.

"You mean, what did we do, Suzy," the older man says without turning around. His voice is like the purr of a big cat.

He holds the bottle to Sehun's mouth, but Sehun isn't looking at him. He's staring at my hand in horror. I follow his gaze, and there in my palm is a small matching aqua bottle.

The older man pours the liquid from his bottle into Sehun's mouth and I scream.

➶ ⱠɆ₮'₴ ⱧɄ₦₮ ⱧɆⱤ ➴

"Suzy?"

I shoot straight up, my arms flying out to steady myself, and I end up grabbing a handful of gray velvet cushion. The end of a scream escapes my lips, muted and unsure.

Sehun grips my shoulders, steadying me.

"I didn't -" I say, and stop short, disoriented and tense, my heart still racing like I was running in that room.

"Look around you, Suzy, Breathe," Sehun says calmly, and I cling to his voice.

I do a fast scan of my surroundings to find a lit fireplace, a breakfast table by the window, navy blue blackout curtains, and Sehun-alive and sitting next to me on the couch in the common room I share with Sejeong. Everything looks normal, but the feeling of dread is still there. And even though I'm not sure how, the one thing I know- the one thing I'm certain of-is that whatever happened in that dream was my fault.

"You were . . . ," I start, my tone unsettled, my voice shaky. "And it was my . . ." But I trail off there, not able to put words to the awfulness I just witnessed. It felt so real, so very real.

Sehun gives me a sympathetic look, like he knows all too well the type of thing I might be dreaming about. I take a breath, my shoulders dropping an inch. It was a nightmare. Just a nightmare. No one is dead, I reassure myself, but my unease lingers like a bad taste.

"I don't remember falling asleep," I say, and rub at my face, only to discover that I'm sweating.

Sehun studies me, letting go of my shoulders but remaining close. His straight black hair falls perfectly around his temples and his eyes are insistent under his long eyelashes. Even though he's got his fair share of cuts and bruises from being attacked yesterday, he looks more poised and elegant than I do on my best days. The longer I look at him, the guiltier I feel. Maybe the dream wasn't real, but what is real is that Sehun and I narrowly escapes with our lives-and it was all because of me.

"I was reluctant to wake you, or I would have moved you over to your bed," he says, but he doesn't ask me about my nightmare. Strangely enough, I get the sense that he doesn't want to pry. I've come to understand why Strategia guard their Family secrets, but the way they guard themselves and their emotions is something I'm still not used to. If my best friend, Jisoo, had seen me wake in a panic like I did just now, she would not only have insisted I tell her every detail, but would have analyzed the dream with me until the meaning was nothing more than the prediction of a bad day.

I glance at Sejeong's closed bedroom door.

"She went to bed an hour ago," Sehun says in response to my unasked question.

I look back at him, taking in his concerned expression. "But you stayed," I say, relieved that he did. Despite our rocky start when I first came to Absconditi (Hidden) Academy and all the suspicion between us, I've grown to truly rely on Sehun.

"I was lost in thought," he replies with a small smile, and while I'm sure it's true, I'm also certain it's not the only reason he's next to me on my couch late at night. If he were any other guy and I hadn't just had the most gruesome nightmare of my life, I would about how much he obviously wanted to be near me. But knowing Sehun, he had a less romantic reason, such as trying to ensure no one stabbed me while I slept.

"Lost in thought about what?" I ask.

"I was just thinking that we can't be sure who knows about your father," Sehun says, directing the conversation right back to my family's conflict and squashing the small amount of comfort I was starting to feel, which I suppose I should be used to by now-comfort isn't an Academy trademark. This school is more about survival than academics, more about carefully planned alliances than friendships, attributes I learned the hard way when I discovered that the most powerful Strategia Family had a feud against my dad. And it turns out several of the kids-as well as a professor who happened to be my dad's brother-were prepared to kill me to show their allegiance to that Family. "Obviously Dr. Yoo knew something," Sehun continues, "but what about the Tiger Family in general? I think we have to assume they are hunting your family for a specific reason, one we will need to uncover if we have any hope of finding your father."

At the mention of the Tigers, my thoughts flash back to the bloodied bodies in my nightmare. I momentarily look away, overcome once again by a wave of guilt for having gotten Sehun involved in all of this. I rub my eyes with the heels of my palms. "Are you saying you think the Tigers are after me and my dad for a reason other than my parents' Romeo and Juliet defiance?"

"I do," he says. "Think about it. Your mother was a member of the Eagle family, and your father was a Tiger. Twenty-five years ago, they fell in love and decided to desert their respective Families, abdicate their leadership positions, and go into hiding." he pauses and looks at me gently. "And then the Tiger assassins killed her mother when you were . . .?"

"Six," I say, readjusting my position on the couch.

"So eleven years ago," Sehun continues. "But between then and last month, when your uncle was killed and your father sent you here, were you aware of any threats from the Tigers?"

I scrunch my forehead, scanning memories of my childhood, looking for any period where appa seemed stressed or out of sorts, anything that might indicate that the Tigers were after us. I shake my head. "Honestly, I don't think so. Appa would have moved us if there were. I mean, we had a rough patch after Eomma died, of course, but other than that, we were happy and our life was simple." My voice quiets as I realize I've just put happy in the past tense.

Sehun is nodding, as if i've confirmed his suspicion. "You see, the events are spread out. Your parents' initial disappearance, your mother's death, and your uncle's recent murder," he says. 

I watch him for a moment, unsure. "What are you saying, that you don't think the Tigers were after us the whole time?"

"I'm not saying it isn't possible, but it would have required committing resources to the effort for twenty-five years straight. It is more likely that each attack was instigated by some other event, something that have the Tigers insight or intel about your family's movements. Correct me if I'm wrong, but from what I've gleaned from our previous conversations, you've lived in the same small town your entire life, somewhere remote, where you weren't in hiding, but well integrated into the community." He waits for me to contradict him, and when I don't, he continues. "To me, that doesn't sound like you were under siege; it sounds like you were safe."

I chew on my thumbnails, scouring his theory for fault points and finding none. "Okay, so let's say you're right," I reply. "Then how did they find my uncle Jin? What changed?"

My point exactly-something changed," Sehun says. "And I imagine the reason is directly tied to whatever your father is doing at this very moment."

I exhale loudly, my mind once again reeling with fear for appa. At the very least, I tell myself, Dr. Yoo is gone and I'm finally free to leave the Academy. But the moment I think it, I feel ill. Dr. Yoo isn't gone, he's dead, and his death had everything to with me.

Sehun's look is almost apologetic. "I know you've been through a great deal, but I can't stress enough how important it is that everything go smoothly tomorrow. We aren't in the clear yet." My stomach drops at the word we. Sehun offered to go with me to help me find my dad-and offer that is likely to get him killed.

"No one can find out we're leaving," he continues in a calm voice. "You need to go to your classes with Sejeong as usual, eat in the dining hall, and study in the library as if everything is normal."

I meet Sehun's gaze, giving him a look that questions the suggestion that this place was ever normal. "Been through a great deal? Now there's an understatement," I say, making light of how upside down I feel. "It's almost unbelievable to me that only a moth ago I had no idea this bizarre boarding school even existed, that Strategia were real." I gesture at the common room. "And despite dodging death a half dozen times and being framed for murder, my troubles are only just beginning because appa is now being hunted by an assassin-like secret society of Families that is so effective it's influenced the course of history for thousands of years." I give Sehun a please-make-light-of-this-with-me look, seeing as my sleep is already threatened by untold horrors.

"I can't tell you things will get easier," he says, and I groan. "In fact, they are about to get much worse."

"Nailed it on the comforting."

A small smirk appears on Sehun's face. "I'll comfort you when I'm certain we're not going to die."

In spite of myself, I laugh. "That's literally the worst thing you could have . . . Haven't you ever heard of telling someone their outfit looks good when it doesn't? White lies save hearts."

"Your outfit looks good," he replies, playfulness dancing in his eyes.

I look down at my rumpled uniform, which consists of a white button-down, black leggings, and black lace-up boots. "It does, doesn't it?" I say. "I could win a pirate costume contest in this thing."

Sehun's mouth pulls up into a smile, but his expression seems more than amused. He's looking at me like I'm the most unusual and interesting person he's ever met.

"Also, when did you get so worried about danger? Aren't you usually the making light of everything? You're seriously slacking on your duties," I say, blushing slightly under his admiring gaze.

"I started worrying about danger when I started having feelings for the person involved," he says, and his answer catches me off guard.

For a moment we're both silent, sitting only a couple of inches apart, the air between us thick and warm in the fire-light, I struggle to come up with a reply; sincerity from Sehun is always unexpected.

"Taemin," Sehun starts when I don't respond, pulling me out of the moment.

"Huh?" I say, trying to catch up.

"Keep an eye on Taemin tomorrow," he says, his voice low and reasoning. "With Jennie temporarily out of commission and Kai and Dr. Yoo dead, I'm not certain what the Tigers' next move will be, but Taemin is one of their last weapons here. There's no sense in speeding up his timeline by letting him suspect we're leaving.

I sigh, my head swimming as I recall the incidents of the last week: Kai dead after trying to kill me, Jennie banished to the dungeon for trying to skewer me with her sword. And now Sehun is telling me Taemin might try to pick up where they left off. "Isn't there a universal rule somewhere that says it's bad manners to attack people right after they've out-maneuvered you?"

Sehun leans back into the pillows. "Not when you're Strategia. In fact, it only makes you a more interesting target."

His answer reminds me of a twisted version of that old saying: If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. I grab a velvet throw pillow, hugging it to my chest. As I look at Sehun, images from my nightmare fill my head once more. I frown. He survived Yoo's poisoning, but only barely. What about the next time? How would I live with myself knowing I got Sehun hurt, or even killed? What sounded daring, even romantic, when Sehun offered to drop everything to help me find appa is now tying up my stomach in knots.

I stare at the flames as they get lower in the fireplace. "That's the thing, I'm the target. But you don't have to be."

"What are you suggesting?" Sehun asks, unsure.

He waits a moment for my response, but I'm too lost in my tangled worries. He looks me up and down. "You're leaning away from me, Suzy, which means you're trying to protect yourself. And you're rubbing your palm with your thumb-a self soothing gesture," he says. "I can keep reading your body language, but it would be easier if you talked to me."

I shift my eyes from the dancing fire to Sejeong's bedroom door, which adjoins the common area of our suite. She generously retreated earlier to give me an opportunity to talk to Sehun, her brother. "The thing is, I'm unbelievably grateful that you want to come with me to find my dad. But think about the cost, Sehun. First, you're leaving Sejeong. If something happens to your sister while you're away, you'll never forgive yourself-or me. And vice versa with Sejeong, if something happens to you."

"Then we had both better come back in once piece," he says, looking at me curiously.

"Second," I say without acknowledging Sehun's response, "what is your Family going to say?" Given the power Taemin and the Tigers have, I hate to think what backlash there will be for Sehun's Family if he moves against them. "Won't you be putting yourself in a vulnerable position?"

Sehun smiles, but I can tell by his eyes that he's concerned about this, too. "None of which is a problem if we succeed."

"I'm serious," I say. "You just finished telling me how risky this all is about that we could die. We have no idea what we're going to find out there. We have no idea if the other Strategia even know that I exist -"

"I suspect more know about you than you might think," he says quietly.

I stare at him, hoping he's joking.

"Some of the students here-Jungkook, for example-recognized you the moment you set foot on campus. We have to be prepared that others may do the same," he says, answering my unspoken fear. "Then there's the fact that Rosé told the entire school who your parents are, and even though communication to and from the Academy is monitored and often delayed, it's possible it'll get out before we find your father. Not to mention, suspicions will run high after you and I disappear tomorrow. People might assume Kang gave us leave to see our Families after what happened, but it's just as likely that they will suspect we're out for retaliation after how aggressively the Tiger Family tried to kill you. So as I said earlier, we don't want anyone to have information a moment before they absolutely need to."

"See," I say with emphasis. "There is no way you won't be affected by helping me."

"I've already helped you," he says.

"In here, yes. But we're insulated, more protected. Out there, you'll be a member of the Wolf Family, actively attempting to prevent the Tiger from accomplishing their goals. You've worked your whole life to prove yourself as a potential leader; this crazy mission I'm about to embark on could erode that in a flash," I reply.

Sehun sighs like I've completely missed the point. "And if I let you negivate a world you don't know and confront the most powerful Strategia Family by yourself, I might as well give up my future leadership now, because I will always know that I wasn't there when it mattered most."

I stare at him, terrified of what could happen to him and just as desperate to have him with me. "If you join me, you might not live to graduate the Academy, much less lead."

"And I also might never learn to speak English with an undetectable accent. There are just some things one needs to accept about oneself," Sehun says, and the smile returns back onto his face.

"Sehun -"

"Suzy," he says, and takes my hand, the warmth of his fingers sending me goosebumps up my arms. "I've considered the danger; I know very well what kind of risks we're taking. but my decision remains unchanged. I'm going with you."

welcome back to my sequel of 'Let's Kill Her'!

Hope you all enjoy the first chapter and be excited for the next updates. However, this will be a slow update as I am currently working on multiples stories (that you can check out on my profile!) and summer online classes.

Thank you for reading! See you soon.