Betrayals

CHAPTER 19

It got dark early, heavy overcast coming in from the northeast. The sky turned steel-indigo, and thunder rumbled in the distance. Fog didn’t rise, and that was odd. I was used to the whole place being wrapped up in cotton wool. It felt oddly naked, and I didn’t like it.

I also didn’t like the clouds. They just didn’t look right, thick dark blankets boiling lower and lower until they seemed to press the tree-tops in some weird way. It reminded me of the iron-gray sheet of the sky back in the Dakotas, the day I’d come face-to-face with Sergej.

Unusual weather. Vampire weather.

I stayed at the window, rubbing at the locket and watching the shadows stretch through the ruined garden below. The Schola woke up, a subliminal buzz just under the surface of the silence. It was the same as every other night. Except this night I was cold even through three sweater-layers, jeans, and a pair of almost-new boots. I had my bag on, strap snugged diagonally across my body. After some thought, I slid the switchblade in my left ass pocket. Now if I could just remember to dig it, or the gun, out when someone was trying to kill me, I’d be all set.

I ran over it again in my head. Down the stairs once the bell for first classes rang, through the halls, and into the night. Now was my chance.

I gave the room one last glance, from the pile of clothes I’d tossed in front of the closet to the rucked-up bed. I was getting sloppy and not taking care of my space. It would have gotten me another Lecture from Dad.

Christ. I was even missing his lectures about Cleaning Up So You Can Find What You Need When You’re Under Fire, Dru, and That’s Going to Save Your Ass.

Loneliness rose in a wave that tasted like acid. I paused by the door, closed my eyes, and listened, unloosing the fist Gran had taught me to make inside my head. That clenched-tight feeling is necessary if you don’t want to end up saying the wrong thing, or repeating people’s thoughts back to them. Plus, it’s hard to concentrate on your own business if you’re busy listening to everyone else’s, as Gran told me until she was blue in the face.

Gran was big on concentrating on your own business. I wondered what she would make of all this, and missing her was a stone in my throat.

There was definitely a sense of presence in the hall outside my room. I suddenly wished I’d gone up and out of the window again, but the thought of doing that so close to dark made my knees feel kind of funny. Once was enough. Besides, the whole point of this was getting out before it was an emergency.

I waited, barely breathing. The presence slowly slid away, just in time for the first bell. It tinkled sweetly all through the halls, muffled by the door. Time for breakfast. Or dinner, whatever way you wanted to look at it. The boys would be getting up, getting dressed, and getting to the caf.

I took a deep breath, twisted the knob, and stepped out into the hall. It was empty. The whole place seethed quietly. Was it just me, or was there an odd note in the seething? Something feverish?

It’s just you, Dru. Focus on what you’ve got in front of you.

Still, I hesitated. What about Graves?

The farther you get from him, the safer he probably is. The wulfen will look after him. They won’t do a damn thing to help you, though, so get your ass moving.

The door clicked shut behind me. I took two steps and froze again, because a new sound filtered through the air.

It was the Restriction bell, its high hard tones cutting through the silence like a hot knife through butter. I could tell this wasn’t a drill, too. The awareness of danger prickled all over me with little diamond claws.

The Schola took a deep breath, bracing itself, and just as the tones of the bell died away I set off down the hall, my jaw firming and my hands turning into fists.

I would never have a better chance to escape.

Even the best-laid plans have holes in them. My beautiful little plan was to get downstairs and to the intersecting halls, where I could take a hard right and have a clear shot at a gallery with doors on either side. Half those doors led to a courtyard garden; the other half opened up to a crumbling playground with swings and foursquare courts, quietly rusting away. From there I had a chance to get to a belt of shrubbery, and once there—

Well, anyway, I didn’t get that far. I took the hard right, and as soon as I did my head pounded with approaching footsteps. They were running, and each step landed too hard to be human. I backed up, buttonhooked around the corner back into the hall I’d just left, and cast around for cover.

Nothing. Carpeted floor, industrial lighting, bare walls. Locked, empty classrooms on either side, other halls opening up to go down to the caf, two janitors’ closets.

Janitors’ closets. Great. One was locked. The other wasn’t, and I lunged in, pulled the door to, and crouched in the darkness. My hip hit something metallic; I grabbed and stopped it from falling over. It was a metal bucket. I let out a soft, wincing breath and hoped they’d be making too much noise to hear me.

The footsteps ran in lockstep, hard metal sounds like iron poles hitting frozen earth. The taste of rusty blood and wax oranges burst over my tongue in a rotten flood, and the weird places on the back of my palate both opened up like flowers. My teeth ached, even the pressure of my tongue and lips against them agonizing. Little cold prickles raced up my arms and legs.

The steps were going pretty fast, and I shivered when they echoed on the winding stair up into the tower room.

The secret was out. They knew I was here now. A wounded vampire from last time had escaped to tell Sergej so, or the traitor had managed to tell him I was here, all wrapped up in a nice little blue room like a TV dinner in foil.

Holy shit. I… holy shit. The shaking had me by my scruff like I was a puppy, pitching me back and forth. Something crumpled in my left hand, the metallic thing I’d hit on the way down into a crouch making an odd soft sound as it bent.

They’re going up to your room, Dad’s voice said inside my head, pitilessly. Move your ass, girl!

I slid out of the closet on noodle-soft legs, shut it as quietly as I could, and set off down the hall as fast as my protesting muscles would allow. Everything in me wanted to go back and cower in the dark, waiting for someone to find me.

That’s rabbit talk, Dru. Move it along.

Down the side of the hall, hard right. There was my shot at the next part of the plan, and I took it, much faster than I should have been able to. My boots made odd scuffing sounds on the short carpet as I bolted into the gallery. Now the darkness pressed against the windows and glass parts of the door, and I’d forgotten I’d be clearly visible to anyone watching from outside.

Shit. Shitshitshit! No help for it now, nothing to do but to go flat-out toward the door I’d chosen and hope nobody was watching. Maybe they would all be too busy with—

An enormous crashing jolt shook everything around me. The fabric of the Schola rippled like a bedsheet given a good hard shake, and the glass broke with tinkling, pretty sounds, a shower of crystalline snow. It actually knocked me off my feet, tossing me into the side of the hall, directly against the stone facing. My shoulder flared with red pain, I went down in a heap, and it was a good thing too. Because then the screaming started, and I huddled against the wall with my head in my hands, trying to shut it out. It went on and on, scraping against the sensitive inside of my skull without pausing for breath. I clapped my hands over my ears, uselessly, and screamed as well. Hate exploded behind my eyes, fear and pain smashing bright fireworks through the map of my nervous system.

It was a struggle to pull myself back into myself. A thin thread of something warm trickled down from my nose, caressing my upper lip with a tiny wet finger. I licked without thinking, and a warm copper taste coated the inside of my mouth, reached down, and woke up the hunger.

My teeth hurt, a sharp piercing pain. Two pinpricks touched my lower lip, and I pushed myself forward on hands and knees, crawling. Outside. Get outside.

The bloodhunger set me on fire with thirst, but it also smacked the screaming away from the inside of my head and gave me a chance to make myself a fist again. The sheer hatred in that sound tore against my skin, rubbing like a wire brush. Broken glass littered the floor. I scrambled to my feet as cold air poured up the hall, whistling.

I hit the door in a mad tangle of arms and legs and dove into a bath of frigid air. It was a clear night, the stars coming up in small hard diamond-points of useless light, and I took off for the playground as fast as I could stumble. The swings that weren’t broken moved gently, back and forth, and my boot soles slapped crumbling concrete.

The scream behind me ended, and another glassy cry split the air from the other side of the Schola. It was then I realized the entire place was lit up too bright to be night, and when I snapped a look over my shoulder I found out why.

The school was burning. You wouldn’t think there would be a lot in a stone building to burn, but wet orange flames with blue wires in their centers leapt and crawled through the turrets, shone out through broken windows, and turned the night into flickering shadows. Those flames were wrong, and the snapping crackling hate in them told me what I needed to know, that this was something nosferat-based. There was nothing natural about the flames, just like there was nothing natural about suckers.

The fire shaded into regular orange with no blue threads out toward its edges. But that didn’t make it look less freaky.

Wow. I stared. If that reaches the library, fat chance studying afterward. Holy crap. Another grinding crash rocked the building, and I heard more screaming.

This time the voices were young, and human. Well, mostly. Human at the bottom, even if there was growling over the top.

Oh no. I skidded to a stop. Oh, shit no. Fuck. No, no, no.

There were kids in there. I knew them. Cody and Shanks and Dibs and—

And oh holy God, Graves was in there and it was burning.

Stick with the plan, Dru. It’s a good plan, and it’ll let you live.

I hung there for a few moments, sick with indecision, the pinpricks against my lower lip turning more definite as half of me ached to bolt for the belt of scrub brush at the edge of the playground.

The other half told me in no uncertain terms to turn right back around and tear the whole place apart until I found Graves. I had a gun, an extra clip, and a knife. That had to be enough.

But—

But nothing! This time it was Gran’s voice, and it spoke up loud and clear. You get your ass in there and you find that boy! He never would leave you behind!

He wouldn’t. I knew he wouldn’t. But hadn’t I been planning on doing just that to him?

He’s already left you behind! He’s always playing with his happy shaggy friends! Get going, Dru!

They were fighting over me, the two voices, and I had no idea who would win. But my stupid body turned itself around and started running straight for the burning building and certain death.

I really don’t know why.