I peeled my hands away to look for myself, and he was right. The gym was empty, lit with non-magical torches, more than usual so there were hardly any shadows to lurk in.
“I’m not going crazy,” I said, clutching to the shoulders of his robe. “I’m not. I saw her, and I’m terrified.”
“I believe you.” He glided his hand down the side of my hair to cup my cheek again, and I leaned hard into it, needing as much comfort and intense warmth as he could possibly give. “And I’m scared too.”
My head jerked in a nod as tears stung the backs of my eyes. “I have to get back to her.”
And I’d lay down my life to protect her.
CONSCIOUSNESS FILTERED in, and I blinked into the darkness of my room. Then I crushed my back teeth together in frustration. How in seven hells had I fallen asleep?
I turned on my side to face Seph, trying to go back to sleep. She and Nebbles snored softly from her bed, so what had awakened me? Maybe nothing. Hopefully nothing.
The slightest whisper of movement snapped my eyes wide. It had come from the direction of the door, bathed in shadows since the single lit torch didn't reach that far.
A creak sounded from the middle of the floor.
I froze in absolute terror. Was it the skin-walker, coming to stare down at me? I strained to see. My heart pounded a warning in my ears. My palms grew slick as I bunched the covers around me.
"Who's there?" I whispered.
Seph stirred in her bed.
Another low creak on the floor. Moving toward me, not Seph. Dread plunged down to my trembling knees. I’d hidden my dagger underneath my mattress for easy access. I could lunge for it, hope I was faster. I had to try.
I reached for it, my blood shrieking between my ears for me to hurry.
"Dawn." A panicked whisper cut through the darkness.
I whipped my head up, my alarm lodged in my throat. "Ramsey?"
He stepped into the flickering torchlight, and the sight of him buckled my stomach. He wore only pants and a black shirt, unbuttoned to reveal he was covered in blood. His chest. His hands. But that wasn't the worst of it. His face had drained of all color, and nothing but stark horror blazed in his eyes.
"What happened to you?" I whispered. "Are you all right?"
"I need you to come with me." He reached out his hand for me, and it trembled violently. "Professor Wadluck came back."
Chapter Thirteen
"Came back? Did he... Is that your blood?" I swept my gaze over Ramsey, but I didn't see any wounds.
"It's his. He was stabbed. The dampener affected the academy’s healer—"
"So you need my help.”
"Yes." He glanced at Seph, still asleep, and Nebbles, who swished her tail and glared at us. "We need to go right now. It’s bad. Really bad."
I studied him carefully, reading every inch of his pinched lips, the tightened corners of his eyes, the worry etched deeply across his forehead. And I believed him. This wasn't a trick. This was really Ramsey in need of my help.
“But I can’t leave Seph. There’s no way.”
“I brought five Diabolicals with me. They’ll stand guard.”
I looked to Seph, still sound asleep, and I couldn’t leave her. Not tonight. Not after the vision I’d had during the séance. Yet the natural healer in me was screaming to run and help the professor. I could save a life and be back in here before Nebbles fell asleep on Seph’s head again.
“Solve fasciculos.” The knot unwound from around my ankle. I shot toward Seph, frantically scooping up the rope that had bound me to her along the way. After I tied her to her bed, I whispered, “Colligationem.”
The knots became unbreakable.
"One minute and I’ll be right back.” I knelt to kiss her on the forehead, and despite Nebbles’s look of fury, kissed hers too. "Watch her, Nebbles. I'm counting on you."
She hissed as I shoved my feet into my boots. I shut the door behind me, then quickly scrawled a protection symbol on the wood. As Ramsey had said, five Diabolicals stood out in the hall, their gazes trained everywhere but on me in my nightgown. It revealed quite a bit of my chest, and because the visiting mages had made the academy warm again, I didn’t care enough to go grab my cloak.
“Guard her with your lives,” I said, jabbing my finger at the Diabolicals. “And no funny business.”
Ramsey turned from halfway down the hall already. “You can trust them, Dawn. Hurry.”
When I caught up with him, I asked, “Stabbed by who?”
“He’s in no condition to say. He stumbled up to the gate in the blizzard, and the mages standing guard there found him and recognized him. I was headed back from stone duty when they brought him inside.” Ramsey glanced down at himself and winced as if only now realizing he was covered in blood. As we rushed down the hallway, he peeled off his shirt, wiped himself down with it, then tossed it to the floor.
“It’s an awfully big coincidence he shows up tonight.”
“I know, but he’s a professor. We couldn’t just leave him out there to bleed to death in the cold.”
We glanced at each other, noting our states of undress with a slide of our eyes, and then quickly looked away. Now wasn’t the time for modesty.
We took to the stairs, and down in the entryway, tension thrummed as tightly as a turned screw. The headmistress stood inside the closed and locked front doors. Her brunette hair, usually swept up on her head, fell around her cloaked shoulders in frizzy waves. Her lips were all but invisible as she spoke to several professors, who then scattered off in different directions. To find the person who’d stabbed Professor Wadluck? I didn’t know.
I caught the headmistress’s eye as we passed, and she gave a nod, her expression softening some.
“Please help him, Dawn. He’s beloved by many,” she said.
"I will." But I still couldn't really believe this was happening. His return seemed so sudden. So...planned. Like everyone was running around like chickens with their heads cut off as a distraction. And with the skin-walker and shadow-walker likely among them, things could go from bad to worse.
"This doesn't feel right," I muttered to Ramsey.
He nodded, his mouth a firm line as he held the classroom wing door open. "I know."
The infirmary was the first door on the left, and as we walked in, I realized I’d never been in here before. A man with a long scraggly beard and hair lay unconscious on the center table with a plump woman pressing cloths to not just one but several stab wounds across his stomach.
“Oh, thank the gods,” she said when she saw me.
I rushed forward, and she moved the cloths aside. The sight sickened me. I’d never seen so much blood or such brutal wounds.
“I’ll wash up and be back to help you however I can.” She bustled from the room.
I touched my hands to the professor’s chest as Ramsey came around to watch. “Bind thee in health, Protect mind and soul too, Boost vigor and happiness, Make it all renew.” My gray magic spread across his body, and slowly, the deep cuts in his stomach sealed themselves shut.
With a gust of hard wind, every single torch in the room puffed out. Complete and total darkness pressed in and stifled my next breath.
A loud crash sounded from somewhere in the school, followed by a shriek—that choked off into silence.
My fingers trembling, I snapped, and gray magic erupted in the palm of my hand. It lit the professor and Ramsey, who held tight to the edge of the table. I snapped it to the wall torches.
"What was that?" I asked.
He stared hard at the door, his whole body tense. "I don't know."
More screams echoed, closer than the first. Like whatever was coming was headed right toward us. Toward the gym, which was just down the hall from us. My pulse spiked sharp and high, and goose bumps skipped up the back of my neck.
Ramsey dodged around the table and reached for my free hand. "We need to go."
I took a single step, and that was as far as I made it. Something pu
nctured up into my heel. I sucked in a long breath as the pain registered, fierce and bright, and then crumpled to the floor.
“Dawn!” Ramsey knelt at my side and then reeled back at what my light revealed. Green tendrils snaked underneath my skin up my leg, and I could feel them curling toward my toes. “What in seven hells did you step on?”
Shining my light at the bottom of my boot, a glowing green worm-like thing pulsed. I had no idea what it was, but when I tried to remove my boot, I cried out in pain. Stiffening my spine, I took hold of the worm and yanked. Pain sliced through my foot once again, and I chucked the worm with a loud hiss. It landed with a sickening splat on the floor.
I blinked up at Ramsey as tears started to fall and as blood leaked from my boot. "I should’ve never left her."
His shoulders drooped with agony.
Outside the infirmary, the door to the hallway banged open.
"Run!" someone shouted.
“Heal yourself.” Ramsey surged upward and tore through the infirmary like a graceful tornado while he collected bandages and antiseptics. “Quickly.”
I did and then I did again. The blood kept seeping, and the green tendrils climbed toward my knee, even without the worm. Whatever I’d stepped on was somehow immune from healing, and I’d never seen or felt anything like it. It burned and ached and twisted through my foot and leg muscles.
Footsteps pounded outside the door. Controlled chaos, organized by whoever was pulling the strings. Pulling Seph’s strings. The vision of her dripping blood while in our hallway... That hadn’t been my blood. That was Diabolical blood, I’d bet, as they tried to stop her.
She was coming for the stone.
Ramsey dropped down next to me, his face washed of all color while he ripped off my boot and wrapped my foot in bandages.
"She's my roommate, my best friend," I said, my voice cracking. "What if this ends with her..." Like how it had with Leo, but I couldn't even say it. Could hardly stand to think it.
Ramsey took hold of my arms and met my eyes with his stormy ones. "We don’t even know what’s happening out there." He glanced behind him at the door. "Which is why I'm going to check."
"But... I... What if you get..." I wasn’t sure what I was trying to say since all my thoughts were jumbled. All I knew was that I didn't want him to go out there. Not without me. Not at all. Yet at the same time, he needed to go help guard the stone.
"What is this?" He tipped my chin up with his thumb, his gaze searching. "Is this what Dawn Cleohold looks like when's she's worried about me?"
"I..." How to answer that?
"I'm a Diabolical. Protecting the stone and all of Amaria comes first." He grazed his fingers up my cheek and smoothed my hair behind my ear. "But as long as I know you're safe, I will come back for you."
I gazed up at him and shook my head. "Are you broken? I tried to kill you, Ramsey."
"Well, what can I say?" he asked and sighed heavily. "I like a girl with fire and heart who would sooner kill me than giggle at every dumb thing I say."
"I don't giggle."
He threw his hands in the air. "I know that. You challenge me, and you're the most beautiful and real girl I've ever met."
What was he doing? Now was hardly the time for this.
He pointed at Professor Wadluck. "Now watch him. Hold the bandages to your foot. And don't you dare leave this room."
I stared after him as he strode confidently toward the door, and then he whirled back around as if struck by a sudden thought.
“If I’m going to die, then screw it.” His thunderstorm eyes flashed with heat as he stalked closer, knelt by my side, wound his fist into my hair, and claimed my mouth with his.
I gasped at how easily he could turn everything on its head. He kissed me hard and deep, thoroughly scrambling my thoughts. My body wanted to both wrench away and sink closer into the heat from his bare chest. His lips were the right combination of soft and firm, the same as his skin as I trailed my fingers down his muscled arm.
No, not the right combination. Nothing about this was right because I still saw him in my memories over Leo’s body.
I shoved him away from me, my pulse racing much too fast. “You’re broken, Ramsey.”
“Because you broke me.” His victorious grin was there and then gone, his shoulders heaving and his cheeks and chest flushing pink. “You’re going to kill me for that?”
“Yes.”
“Definitely worth it.” Nodding, he hurried out the door and closed it behind him without a glance back.
Gritting my teeth, I flopped onto the floor to catch my breath and think, and not about Ramsey Sullivan. We could never do that again. I couldn’t be with him because my memory wasn’t lying. I could never erase what I saw even if he wasn’t a murderer. That moment in time had shaped and molded me with immovable parts, and it couldn’t be undone.
I squeezed my eyes shut. Now that the king of distractions had left, everything had come flooding back. The worry, the unbelievable pain in my foot. Frustration scraped over my skin. I wanted to help, to do something, but I doubted I’d be able to walk.
Eerie silence pressed in around me. It was too quiet. I should’ve heard breathing other than my own.
I hauled myself back up into a sitting position. Professor Wadluck’s thinning brown hair streamed out around his head on the table. The torchlight and shadows moved over him, but I couldn’t tell if he was doing any moving himself.
"Professor?" I whispered and dragged myself closer, every inch torture on my foot. "Professor Wadluck?"
The flickering light made it near impossible to tell if he was breathing or not, so I hauled myself up, leaning heavily on the table, and placed my hand above his nose and mouth to feel for any puffs of air. Nothing. My heart skipping, I slid my fingers along his blood-covered throat for a pulse. Faint, but there.
While I was still leaning over him, he jerked. A split-second after, something seared into my back. I cried out at the pain, at the sudden gush of warmth. Professor Wadluck's eyes met mine, wild and filled with menace.
Stunned, I tore myself away from him and crumpled to the floor. I clawed at my back where my fingertips brushed a knife's blade.
He'd stabbed me. He'd stabbed me in the back.
He sat up and stood, towering over me. "Make her say it," he shouted, spittle flying from his mouth.
Oh gods. His voice. I knew that voice because I’d heard it before. In the gym with Seph.
I’ve read that some mages who are unconscious, but not coma unconsciousness like mage’s oblivion, have sometimes reported that their spirits have separated from their bodies, Ramsey had said. It’s rare, though, and they’d have to be skilled enough to enter another’s body.
It was him. Professor Wadluck was making Seph sleepwalk.
"Make her say it right now,” he shouted.
Make me say what? What was happening here? Shock numbed my brain and spun it in an endless loop. A professor had stabbed me. Why? Why?
The pain in my back and foot grew excruciating. I scooted away from him, leaving a trail of blood along the floor. My breaths scraped from my lungs loudly, too fast.
I looked around in a blind panic for my options, my hand flailing to get a grip on the knife in my back to pull it out. Finally, I did and dropped it, and it slid across the floor.
Movement outside the door caught my eye. Two, long thin shadows were visible underneath the crack, like someone was standing there. Waiting.
"Seph? Ramsey?" I said, but I couldn't get enough air behind it.
Then a trunk suddenly appeared in front of the door, making me jump. Oh...gods. What could be inside?
Professor Wadluck stalked toward me, and I tore my gaze away from the trunk and tried to drag myself away faster. My shoulders hit the wall behind me.
His face split with a mad grin. "Say. It."
I shook my head. I had no idea what he wanted me to say, but... Sinister awareness raised every hair on my body in alarm. I had to say a healing sp
ell. It might not work for my foot, but it could for my back. Was that what he meant? What would happen if I did? I knew what would happen if I didn't. Blood started to pool around my fingers, and already, unconsciousness crept its dark edges into my head. I would bleed out if I didn't heal myself, and soon.
Professor Wadluck knew this. He crouched down like a wild animal in front of me, ready to spring.
“Bind thee in health," I started, but those weren’t the words that came out of my mouth. Latin. A dark magic spell, as well as a gust of green smoke that tasted so bitter, I gagged. It took several precious seconds for my woozy mind to catch up and replay it.
O mors ego eieci te. Something about death, I was sure of it.
I sucked in ragged breaths and shook my head hard. A scream erupted out of my mouth for Seph, for Ramsey, for whoever stood outside that door.
That was the wrong thing to do.
Professor Wadluck charged at me, brandishing another knife. He stuck the blade to my throat and brought his leering face within inches of mine. "Black magic shall not wake the darkest dead. But guess whose magic is a loophole? Yours with your gray magic, not too black, not too white. A perfect balance ensured by the shadow-walker who kept trying to hurt you just so you’d heal yourself with white magic. Turn that darkness inside of you a teensy bit brighter."
The death charm in my pocket. The attack in the Gathering Room. The shadow-walker hadn’t been trying to kill me, just balance my power out to bring me here.
The professor tapped his head, his insane grin growing impossibly wider. "No one ever thought about the uses of gray magic, did they?"
"Where have you been?" I blurted and then slapped a hand over my mouth. More Latin and green gas fell out. Liga corpus et animam.
A symbol that hadn’t been there before formed all across the floor and pulsed a deep-orange color. A symbol similar to the one in Vickie’s room, and the exact same one I’d seen in my vision during the séance.
Professor Wadluck nodded, his eyes sparking with madness as he glanced behind him at the trunk. "Better keep going."
No. No, I would not. I looked to the trunk, too, and thought I was going to be sick. Ryze was in there. I’d bet my life on it.
Necromancer Unleashed: Book 2 Page 13
