“What do you think? Is your power enough to stop these attacks?” James asked, keeping his voice low and light.
“Maybe. I don’t know.” I sighed. “I wish I had more control, more knowledge about my powers. Professor Ubel is still working with me, I guess I can ask him if he knows.”
He nodded. “That might be a good idea. Maybe he can teach you a spell to break mind control powers.”
“I’ll ask.” I took another sip of my latte. “So what else did they say?”
“Who?” James asked, setting his mug down.
“Cory, Tran and Kale. What else did they say about all of this?”
“Not much really. Cory and Kale came up with a couple theories.”
“Oh?” I arched my brows. “What do they think?”
“Cory thinks maybe its random in a way, like specific people are being targeted, but that the actual attack parts are random like the magician, for lack of a better word, has no control of when the attack will take place.”
“But what is it about the people who were targeted?” I frowned at him eating the last of my cookie.
James pressed his lips together and looked away.
“What… oh…” I finally got it. “Me. I’m the connection. But I’m not friends with all of the people who’ve been attacked or were the attackers. So that doesn’t exactly fit…”
“No, you aren’t friends, but you’re around them enough that whoever the magician is has noticed. Like when you come over to the vampire dorm to hang out. And most of the witches who’ve been attackers, well, they are in most of your classes, aren’t they?”
I bit my lip and nodded. “Yeah, or they eat near me in the cafeteria.” I glanced at him. “So what does Kale think? You said that was Cory’s theory, what’s Kale’s?”
“Kale thinks that the witches are being affected in order to push the vampires to retaliate,” he said softly.
“Like with last night’s attack, you said a witch attacked a Strigoi, who lashed out to defend himself.”
James nodded. He lifted his mug and drank down the rest of his blood.
“So we’ve learned nothing really new, just gained more theories.” I shook my head and looked out the window. I could see the wind picking up as empty plastic bags and litter chased each other down the street. My gaze went to the tree tops that swayed gently with the breeze. It looked pretty, but I knew it only meant that it had gotten colder out. Spring was like that, mostly chilly, with a few warm days thrown in here and there. At least it isn’t raining, I thought.
“So you’ll ask Ubel about your powers?” James said a few minutes later.
I blinked across the table at him, bringing my thoughts back from the weather to our conversation. I nodded. “Yeah, I have a tutoring session with him tomorrow. I like the spell we’re working on, I just don’t know how ethical it is.” I frowned.
James’ brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”
I lifted a shoulder, half shrugging. “He’s teaching me to drain an opponent’s powers.”
“Like temporarily?” he asked cautiously.
“He says so, but…” I bit my lip.
“You have doubts?” he asked.
I nodded. “Yeah, I mean it’s just a feeling. But he’s a professor, so surely he knows, right?” I glanced up to him and met his eyes.
“Yeah, I’m sure he wouldn’t be teaching you to kill anyone.” James smiled.
I gave him a half smile and nodded, but I still wasn’t convinced. “Yeah, I guess.”
“What are you practicing on?”
“A mimic.”
“Hmmm. Well, what happens to it when you drain it?” he asked.
“It returns to its normal shape and curls up in a ball, but…” I thought about what I’d done during the spell.
“But?”
“Well, I always stop, let go of the siphon as soon as the mimic is back in its true form.” I said it softly, hoping he wouldn’t be disappointed in me.
“So you don’t know if you kept the siphon open longer what it would do to the mimic, do you?”
I shook my head. “No, and I don’t want to kill the creature, so I let Professor Ubel think I siphoned everything I was capable of.”
James reached across and took my hand. “Do you know how incredibly powerful and talented you are?” He smiled and squeezed my fingers. “To be able to stop that kind of magic like that takes a great deal of control, Bethany. I think you are even stronger than we thought.”
I smiled and played with the edge of my mug.
“Ask him again, and if you don’t feel his answer is complete, ask Professor Singh, she’s always been pretty straight forward with us.”
I nodded. “Good idea. I’ll do that.” I smiled.
More people started filtering into Merriwick’s as we sat. James raised his mug and drank the last of it before looking at me. “You ready to go?”
I gulped the last of my latte and then handed him my mug and plate. He deposited them in the bin and the reached for my hand with a smile. I could feel the eyes of the patrons, mostly older Dusk Academy witches, on us as we passed through the door. I shivered at the feeling.
“Cold, beautiful?” James asked, wrapping his arm around my shoulder and pulling me closer.
“Not really, just—” I flicked my eyes at the building, “feeling judged by them.” My words were soft, but I didn’t care what they thought. “Not that I care about their opinion on us,” I said with a smile. “I just don’t like how they are behaving when last week they too were in the company of vampires.”
James grinned and pulled me along down the street. “Come on, let’s not go back yet, what do you want to do?”
I smiled. “I don’t know. If we were on campus, I’d say let’s go to the clock tower.” My smile fell. “But now…”
He sighed. “Yeah. How about the park?”
“Okay,” I said and kissed his cheek.
We turned down a side street and then walked through a residential area. Finally we arrived at a small neighborhood park with a huge jungle gym. It had plank bridges, curly slides, swings, sliding poles, tunnels, and monkey bars, the works.
“Hey this is pretty cool,” I commented. “How did you know this was even here?”
James smiled. “Cory and I went exploring one night last year, looking to see what kind of things we could do. There’s not a whole lot to do around here, if you haven’t noticed.” He smirked at me and his arm slid from my shoulders as he drew his hand down my arm and grasped my hand. He pulled me toward a ramp that led to a plank bridge and into a tunnel.
I followed him, laughing. My laugh echoed through the tunnel and he grinned at me. “Where are all the kids?” I asked.
James shrugged. “Probably home on their PlayStations, Nintendo DSes, and X-boxes. Sometimes I’ve seen moms out here with real little ones, but they tend to stick to the toddler stuff, the baby swings and slide.”
I shook my head. “I would have killed to have a park like this as a kid.”
“Why, didn’t you have a cool park in your neighborhood?” he asked curiously.
“Not really. I mean we had the normal, swings, a merry-go-round, some teeter-totters and a metal slide that curled. But nothing like this.” I smiled at him.
“Well, come on then,” James said as he tugged on my hand. “We’ll race on those zip line things.”
He pointed to two ropes about eight feet off the ground with a rolling handle bar across each of them, one blue and one red. It was locked around the rope so it was pretty secure, but I worried about our weight, and not being kid sized.
“Will they hold us?” I asked looking up at it.
“Yeah, they are made to hold adults too. You’ll be fine.” He lifted me up to the start bar.
I grabbed the handles. “Okay, what do I do?”
“Push off with your feet and the momentum will carry you to the other side.”
I arched a brow. “And what happens if it doesn’t?”
He grinned. “Then I’ll win!” He laughed.
I glared at him playfully. “And what exactly do you win?”
He winked at me. “Guess you’ll have to wait and see.”
“Hmmm, okay then,” I began, feeling a bit wicked, “Go!” I shouted and pushed off before he’d gotten his balance on the bar to push off himself.
Laughing behind me as he started across, he called, “Oh, that so was cheating!”
I reached the other side and grinned at him as he stretched his leg to the bar and pulled himself to the end. “You didn’t say I had to play fair.” I winked at him.
We played for a while longer, until it started to get dark and his vampiric abilities started to give him a significant edge as we raced around the playground. After our final race through the obstacle course, he tackled me and cradled me as we fell to the ground laughing.
We lay there in the grass looking up at the heavens to see the stars just starting to blink into the night sky. I let out a relaxed sigh and smiled. It had been a really great afternoon and I was reluctant to let it end. “Do you have to go to classes tonight?” I asked, not sure what the professors had told the vampires about their new schedule.
James rolled his eyes over to me and gave me a half smile. “Yeah. I guess that means our evening is over.” He expelled a breath even though I knew he didn’t really have to breathe. He sat up and within a flash was on his feet and reaching for my hand to pull me up too. “We should go.”
I nodded, reluctantly. “Okay.”
He took my hand and then smiled, mischievously. Before I knew it, he pulled me into his arms and kissed me breathless. I was a bit dazed by the time we broke apart.
“Wow.” I grinned at him.
“You took the word out of my mouth.” He chuckled. “Come on, beautiful, let’s get you back to campus.”
Chapter 21
Bethany
After classes, I made my way to Professor Ubel’s classroom to meet him for my tutoring session. Hearing voices behind the closed classroom door, I decided I had better knock.
Professor Ubel opened the door and looked down at me. “Ah, Miss Welch, I see you are just a bit early this afternoon. Eager to get started, are you?” He smiled down at me. “Well, don’t just stand there, my dear girl, do come in.”
I gave him a tight smile and ducked under his arm only to nearly run into another person. “Oh, excuse me,” I murmured.
The woman, the same one who’d been with Professor Ubel before, the one with the dark skin and long dark hair stood there, smirking at me.
“Oh my dear girl, let me introduce you to my… friend. Sara De Abrew. Sara, Bethany Welch, my student.”
“It’s nice to meet you, ma’am,” I commented holding out my hand to shake hers politely.
Sara De Abrew looked down at my hand and smirked. She took my hand in hers, not in a shake, but gripped my fingers and I felt a stirring of power behind her grip. “Pleasure.” She turned her maroon eyes from me to Professor Ubel as she released me. “I’ll see you later tonight, handsome.” She reached up and pat his cheek and then strolled out of the open door with her hips swaying.
I glanced up at Professor Ubel and found he had a besotted look upon his face before he cleared his throat and shook his head. “Yes, well. Shall we get started?”
“Of course, Professor.” I nodded and set my things down. “Professor, I’m curious.”
“What about, dear girl?” he asked as he moved to the cabinet and pulled the box with the mimic back out again.
“Well, we’ve determined that the magic being used in the attacks is some sort of mind control spell, so I wondered if my power would be able to counter it.”
Professor Ubel hesitated for a moment before returning to the cabinet and pulling out a second box very similar to the first one. He opened it and pulled out the mimic, molding it into an Edimmu vampire and then opened the second box and did the same to that mimic only instead of an Edimmu, he made it into a Lamiae. “If you are asking if you can break a mind control spell, I have no doubt that you can. However, I don’t believe that is what is going on. I think the vampires are just acting out and are refusing to control their baser instincts, as usual. They are always trying to assert their dominance over us witches. I suggest you do as we’ve all suggested and stay away from the vampires.” His voice seemed firm and dismissive of my inquiry, so I let it go.
“Yes, Professor,” I answered because I knew he was waiting for me to reply.
“Now, let’s begin. Same as yesterday. Destroy them. Siphon every ounce of power. Be merciless, Bethany. Don’t hold back at all.”
Sighing, I set my shoulders and pulled my hands into the proper position. I opened the siphon and began to drain the first mimic of its power.
“You are leaving yourself open to attack from the second mimic, adjust the siphon to cover both opponents, Bethany!”
“Yes, Professor,” I murmured, concentrating, stretching my back as far as I could to get them both in my aim. It hurt to hold that position for so long, but I did it.
“Now, don’t stop! Hold it!” he practically shouted as the mimics dropped to the floor.
“But, Professor—”
“Not yet!” he demanded. “Hold on, just another moment! Now!”
I dropped the siphon and watched the mimics shiver and shrink even more. They were very small now, and fit just barely in the palm of his hand when he picked them up. “Are they okay, Professor?”
“What? Of course,” he glanced over his shoulder at me, a look of annoyance in his eyes, “they are fine, stop being concerned by their comfort. They are your enemy at the moment, my dear girl. Do not give them a second thought, I am sure your opponents won’t for you.”
I frowned, but then quickly wiped my face of thought, because I didn’t want him angry with me for feeling sorry for the mimics. I felt I needed to know more about them and decided the next chance I got, I’d ask Cory about them. He seemed to know quite a bit about magical creatures. Perhaps he knew more about the mimics.
Professor Ubel took a few minutes to coax the mimics back into shapes, this time choosing a pair of wolves.
“Um, Professor?”
“Yes, yes, I know, they look simple and basic, but do not be fooled, dear girl. These are shifters. Full of transitioning magic. See what you can do with the power you drain, like you did the other day with the vampire.”
I nodded. “Yes, Professor.” Curling my fingers into fists, and then stretching my fingers out, I shook them and then formed the position for the siphoning. I aimed at both creatures and did the motions as if they were second nature now. I felt the siphon take hold and before he could yell at me not to drop the siphon, I did, just as the wolves turned back to the little balls of mimics.
As soon as they safely back in their shape I pulled the power into me and felt the transition. My fingers ached and I watched as the skin on my hands bubbled and the shape of my hands shifted. Hair sprouted over my hands and up my arms and just as I started to scream, it turned into a howl. My heart began to race as my body contorted, shifting me into a wolf. I closed my eyes as my body dropped to the floor and continued the shift.
When I blinked my eyes, everything looked different. I could smell… everything. Professor Ubel’s cologne, which I had never noticed before, the unique scent of the mimics, which was kind of like rubber cement, and as I lifted my snout… my snout! I shook the thought to think about it later and sniffed the air again. I could smell students in the hall, no not in the hall, but further away, down the stairs and in the common area. Two of them, both witches, a male, young, probably a freshman, eating a… ew. Tuna sandwich. And the other, a female, older, sibling to the male. She smelled like strawberries, and I knew it was her shampoo. And then, my nose caught another scent, different, older. Not a student. Exotic, like a flower. Female I thought.
I turned my head, taking in the things around me. I was big, bigger than the two wolf mimics were, and the first thought that cross
ed my mind was the wolves from the fictional book, Twilight. The movies had shown them as massive and I figured I was probably smaller than they were, but not by much. While standing on my four paws, ha! Four paws, I shook my head to recall where I was going with that thought. I reached almost to Professor Ubel’s shoulders. If I wanted to, I knew the huge sharp teeth in my mouth could rip his throat out without even trying. Not that I would, of course.
I blinked my eyes again and then things began to get fuzzy. The shift was wearing off. I felt my body going back to normal and I closed my eyes waiting for everything to all go back to normal. After a few moments, I blinked my eyes open and found myself curled in a ball on the floor.
“That was excellent, Miss Welch! Your powers are simply amazing.”
I looked at him and nodded.
“Did you understand anything while you were shifted?” he asked.
I thought over what to tell him, and then said, “Some. I could tell I was bigger than the two mimic wolves. And I could smell your cologne, and everything looked different, almost gray.”
“Outstanding.” Professor Ubel clapped. “Let’s try another,” he commented, moving to the mimics to set them up again.
I spent the next hour and a half draining the mimics of power and channeling the power to become whatever creation he’d chosen. By the time we’d finished, I was completely and utterly exhausted. Still, since Professor Ubel seemed very against the vampires and unwilling to listen to me, I decided I should get Professor Singh’s opinion, as James suggested.
Chapter 22
Bethany
“Thank you, Professor,” I commented as I gathered my books. “I’ll see you, Monday.”
“Goodbye, my dear girl.” Professor Ubel opened the door for me.
I stepped out of his room and started down the hall. As I walked, I started listing to the side and crashed into the wall. My head started to spin and I felt a wave of nausea. I pulled my head up and looked down the hall to see the fuzzy outline of a woman. I had an overwhelming sense of that same exotic flower I’d smelled earlier while shifted into that wolf as well as a spark of magic traveling over my skin.
A Witch’s Immunity: Supernatural Academy - Book 3 Page 11
