STAGS 5, page 1
Contents
Title Page
PRAISE FOR S.T.A.G.S.
BOOKS BY M. A. BENNETT
Dedication
Epigraph
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
History of S.T.A.G.S.
Map of the School
Houses at S.T.A.G.S.
Uniform Policy
Glossary
Acknowledgements
M. A. Bennett
Copyright
PRAISE FOR S.T.A.G.S.
Shortlisted for the YA BOOK PRIZE 2018
Winner of the Warwickshire Secondary Book Award 2019, the Great Reads ‘Most Read’ 2018 Senior Award and the Sussex Coast Schools Amazing Book Award 2019
‘S.T.A.G.S. is a pacey and well-plotted young adult story that champions outsiders and questions out-dated viewpoints in a constantly evolving world.’
CultureFly
‘M. A. Bennett is brilliant at keeping the reader in suspense.’
Book Murmuration
‘M. A. Bennett reinvigorates the boarding-school thriller … This is a darkly compelling examination of the allure of privilege, and the unscrupulous means by which it preserves itself.’
Guardian
‘S.T.A.G.S. is a thrilling and thoroughly enjoyable YA novel with dark undertones. A fun mystery thriller that sheds light on issues surrounding class and society. Highly recommend.’
Book Bag
‘A gorgeous and compelling romp.’
Irish Times
‘Good and twisty and definitely unique … if you’re looking for something creepy and autumnal to read, I’d recommend S.T.A.G.S.’
The Cosy Reader
‘The whole story had a dark humorous tone that really gave this book a unique touch … it’s clever, fast-paced and dark, everything I love in a thriller.’
Alba in Bookland
‘Bennett’s debut is the type of book you cannot put down. I read it in just one sitting.’
Choose YA
‘A cracking debut psychological thriller set in an elite boarding school ruled by a set of six pupils known as the Medievals. Think Enid Blyton meets The Hunger Games!’
Irish Sunday Independent
‘The book almost makes you believe that you are there. I would recommend this book, especially to those who loved The Hunger Games.’
Teen Titles
‘Gossip Girl meets The Hunger Games.’
Bustle
‘Like Mean Girls, but British and deadly … This book is great, from start to finish.’
Hypable
BOOKS BY M. A. BENNETT
S.T.A.G.S.
D.O.G.S.
F.O.X.E.S.
T.I.G.E.R.S.
H.A.W.K.S
The Island
For Mick Ward who loved films too
An Eagle for an Emperor, a Gyrfalcon for a King; a Peregrine for a Prince, a Saker for a Knight, a Merlin for a Lady; a Goshawk for a Yeoman, a Sparrowhawk for a Priest, a Musket for a Holy Water Clerk, a Kestrel for a Knave.
The Book of St Albans, 1486
1
There were no curtains up in my study in Lightfoot, so I could clearly see The Invitation when it slid silently under my door.
It was quite near the end of the Hilary Term – summer term to you – and I’d almost begun to despair that the Order of the Stag would rear its antlered head before we left school. The sands of the STAGS hourglass were pretty much running out.
Heart thudding, I picked up The Invitation. It was completely square – a kind of thick ivory envelope folded over on four sides, just as before. And just as before, it was sealed with a blob of Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves wax, the red of our school stockings. On the wax was impressed a little pair of antlers.
I broke the seal, just like they did in the movies. Inside was a thick square card. There were just three words on it, right in the middle of the creamy card, embossed in red ink this time. The letters were slightly shiny and raised to the touch.
The Red Hunt
I turned it over. On the back, in neat italics, was printed:
You are invited to spend the weekend of Lammas at Castle MacLeod, Isle of Skye.
Coaches departing STAGS at 5 p.m. Friday.
RSVP
The red embossed type jiggled in front of my eyes, and I suddenly had to sit down at my desk.
Shafeen was with me. He was with me most of the time, to be honest. Once we’d got to … well, home base … in India we’d become even closer, and it turns out that playing baseball (as we’ll call it) is quite addictive, so we pretty much lived in each other’s rooms now. Along with my girl Nel and the rest of our year, we’d spent the first part of the term doing revision for the Probitiones, so there hadn’t been much time for baseball. Then the summer had been all ticking clocks and buzzing bees and individual tables spaced out in the gym and the rustle of exam papers being turned over and cramped hands and scribbling pens and the footsteps of the invigilating friars walking up and down the rows, their swishing habits stirring the pages we wrote on. But to be honest since the exams had finished it had been back to baseball, and by the time The Invitation arrived Shafeen and I were basically inseparable.
He read the wording over my shoulder. ‘So,’ he said, and I could feel his breath warm on my neck, ‘this is all going to end as it began – with an Invitation.’
‘I guess you’re right.’ But some things had changed. Two years had passed. Now I wasn’t a newb, I was a Medieval myself. I no longer thought the coaches would be real Cinderella coaches with actual horses. And this time I wasn’t a dumb little bunny rabbit hopping unknowingly into a trap; I would be putting myself in harm’s way willingly.
Because now, as then, I was going to accept.
That’s not to say, of course, that I understood what I’d been invited to, any more than I had last time. ‘What the hell is a Red Hunt?’ I wondered aloud.
‘No idea,’ said Shafeen. ‘But it sounds pretty sinister.’
‘And what’s Castle MacLeod?’ The only time I’d heard that name before was in Highlander. You know, ‘Conor MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod’. But I was pretty sure even the Order of the Stag weren’t going to have immortals running around with samurai swords and quipping with Sean Connery.
‘Never heard of it,’ said Shafeen helpfully.
‘And where on earth is Skye?’
Shafeen looked over my shoulder. ‘It’s an island,’ he read.
‘Wow, I’m so glad we had this chat,’ I said sarcastically. ‘And the biggest mystery, of course, is who sent it.’ And to answer that question, we’d have to bring our Inside Man into play – the guy who had sent the first invitation two years ago. I looked up. ‘We’d better tell Henry.’
From habit, Shafeen got out his phone.
‘You’re kidding, aren’t you?’ I said witheringly. ‘We’ll have to write him a letter.’
‘Bloody Medievals,’ said Shafeen, as I reached for my writing case.
2
Of course, what Shafeen didn’t know was that I’d been keeping in touch with Henry ever since we’d returned from India. He’d been living at Longcross – not in the house, of course, because that looked like the burnt-out shell of Wayne Manor in Batman v Superman, but in Longcross Lodge, a rather pleasant little cottage near the estate’s gates.
Before you judge me, I hadn’t been lying to Shafeen. At least, not exactly. We’d actually written to Henry together the first time, to agree a plan of action, and read the first reply. When we’d all come back from India, Henry had told us where he’d been staying and to keep in touch with any developments. He seemed quite determined in his intention to help us bring the STAGS down, so we’d agreed, just as before, that we Medievals would keep our heads down, revise for our final exams and wait. The slightly awks thing was that, since that first exchange of snail mail, Henry’s letters had come directly to me. I’d written back, and sort of forgotten to mention it to Shafeen. It was all a bit complicated, because of the small matter of Henry confessing his love for me in a hospital corridor in India, as if we were starring in Junoon or something.
I should just make it clear that Henry’s letters weren’t love letters. He hadn’t ever mentioned love again, except for in his nonchalant scrawled sign-off:
Love Henry x
But.
Like some Jane Austen heroine, I’d spent hours studying his loopy signature – in ink p en, of course – and that casual cross that could mean nothing.
Or everything.
His letters had been chatty accounts of the building works, which sounded like a pitched battle between the staunchly Medieval Henry and the Savage contractors. ‘They’re trying to turn it into a bloody hotel,’ he’d written. ‘Power showers and Wi-Fi. I ask you.’ He would also write hilarious accounts of how he’d have to hide away when Louis, visiting from his estate in Scotland and then from STAGS, came lording it around the manor, checking on the building works. Since the Longcross staff were well used to keeping secrets by now, the new earl would come and go with no notion that the true Earl of Longcross was alive and well and chilling in the lodge.
I’d asked Henry when we would have an opportunity to put our vague plan into action – that is, to end, once and for all, the death hunts of the Order of the Stag.
‘The STAGS will move when they are ready to move,’ he’d written. ‘Trust me.’
Then I remembered that trippy snake in The Jungle Book – Kaa – with the hypnotic eyes, lisping ‘Trust in Me’. I wanted to trust Henry, but after so many years of him being slippery, it was a hard habit to acquire. And nothing – not even his declaration of love – made it easier.
Once I’d received The Invitation, Shafeen, Nel and I decided we would write to Henry together. We agreed to meet, out of habit, at the Paulinus well one balmy summer evening near the end of term. I was the first one there and I walked across the manicured green lawn to the ancient well. The well was in the dead centre of a quadrangle of heartbreakingly beautiful medieval buildings, all mullioned windows and climbing ivy, and as I waited in the lowering sun for the others I reflected that this might be the last time we would meet here. Oxford beckoned in the autumn, and I’d just received my reading list from Professor Nashe of Christ Church College this morning. I read it over while I waited for the others. It went like this:
Renaissance and Revolution – Joseph Anthony Mazzeo
European Theories of the Drama – Barrett Harper Clark
Youth Revolution – Anthony Esler
Notion of the State – Alexander Passerin D’Entreves
All’s Well That Ends Well: The Problem Plays – Simon Barker
Rebel Women – Stephen Wilmer
Dramas of the Revolution – Mikhail Shatrov
At the bottom of this slightly scary list was a handwritten note from the Professor herself.
Greer – I think you’ll find these books very revealing.
Regards,
Professor Nashe
It seemed like a lot of reading, but I couldn’t think about that now. I folded the list away as Shafeen and Nel approached from different sides of the quad; Shafeen in his tiger-striped stockings and Nel in her hot-pink Chanel knee socks. I don’t know if they too had figured out that this might be the last time, but we all met together in a three-way hug.
We agreed that Henry should come to the school while he still had the chance. ‘Term ends in a week,’ I said, ‘then we’ll be leaving STAGS.’
‘Never to return,’ said Nel dramatically, placing the back of her hand to her forehead.
‘Well, not never,’ said Shafeen. ‘There’s a big leavers’ party back here at the end of August.’ As he’d been at the school forever, and as Aadhish – his father – had been before him, Shafeen knew about all the traditions.
‘You mean like a prom?’ I asked.
‘God no,’ he said in mock shock. ‘That would be far too American, darling. No, they call it the Surroyal Ball.’
‘The Surreal Ball?’ I echoed, thinking of some nightmarish Pan’s Labyrinth party with people dressed as fish and lightbulbs.
He laughed. ‘No. S-U-R-R-O-Y-A-L. The surroyals are the topmost branches of a stag’s antlers. We’re the top of STAGS school. See?’
‘Clever,’ said Nel. ‘When did you say it is?’
‘End of August. Bank Holiday usually, so people can get back here.’
‘OK – so this is really our last chance to get Henry to STAGS during term time,’ I concluded. ‘Problem is, if he comes here Louis will definitely find out he’s alive.’
‘Well, he’s got to know sometime,’ said Shafeen reasonably.
‘Yes, but I rather think Henry wants to use the timing of that particular revelation to his advantage,’ I said. I couldn’t admit, of course, that I knew from Henry’s letters that he’d been playing ‘Hide the Heir’ with Louis.
‘Let’s get him here in the dead of night then,’ said Shafeen. ‘I don’t know how they do it in movies, but that’s when conspirators always meet in books.’
‘Good idea,’ said Nel. ‘It has to be here, because there’s an added dimension this time.’
‘Don’t tell me,’ I said, because I knew her well by now. ‘Something to do with your dreamboat, Abbot Ridley?’
‘Yes,’ she said defiantly, her cheeks colouring slightly. ‘But not just him. Have you forgotten about the FOXES?’
Incredibly, we had.
‘I’m just saying,’ she went on, ‘that if there’s a whole secret society of people hell-bent on destroying the STAGS, we’d be foolish to ignore them, no?’
‘She’s right, you know,’ I said to Shafeen. ‘It’s time for the Avengers to Assemble. So that means inviting Ty too.’
‘Definitely,’ he said.
‘And what about Cass?’ Nel said.
I hesitated. I was still, after all this time, not at all sure what the deal was with Louis’s twin. ‘No,’ I said eventually. ‘There’s no doubt she’s devoted to Henry. But she’s too close to Louis. Safer not to.’
‘OK,’ said Nel. ‘So, secret meeting to defeat the Order of the Stag. Place: STAGS. Time: Dead of night. Dramatis personae: Us, Henry, Abbot Ridley and Ty. Let’s set it up.’ She snatched The Invitation from my hand and grinned cheekily as she flounced away across Paulinus Quad, her Tudor coat flapping in the evening breeze. ‘I’ll tell the Abbot.’
3
We met, in the dead of night, in a place I’d never been before in the whole of my two years at STAGS.
It was called the Crypt, and it was a sort of underground burial chamber below the chapel. God knows – actually, he’s probably the only one who does know – how old it is, but since the chapel dates from 673 I’m guessing it’s even older than that. It was gloomy and candlelit, and had a few hard dark-wood pews where we sat while blank-eyed saints watched us from little niches. It had those arching things over your head – I think they’re called cross-ribs or something – and that old-stone smell that all churches have. All in all, it was the perfect setting for a conspiracy.
Shafeen, Nel and I sat on the front pew, with Ty on the other side of the little aisle, as if we were at a wedding and she knew the bride and we knew the groom. I smiled at her and she smiled back, a little tightly. I always felt sorry that after a promising start to our friendship a distance had grown between us after all that business of the Boxing Day hunt at Longcross, after which we’d sort of learned not to trust each other. I hoped that all that was set to change – now we were on the same side.
The Crypt had been the Abbot’s idea. He stood before us now, tall and hooded as if he was about to lead a service, but that whole dynamic – of priest, headteacher, authority figure – had dissolved now. We, the conspirators, were equals and I spoke to him as such. ‘How did you know about this place?’ I said.
He took down his hood and ruffled his curls, looking far more human. ‘I got a pretty thorough briefing before I took this job,’ he said.
‘From Reynard, the mysterious leader of the FOXES, I suppose,’ I said, fishing.
He grinned. ‘Among others.’
‘I don’t suppose you’re going to tell us who Reynard is?’ I said.
