“What is she?” I asked.
“We don’t truly know, her mother is a seer but unfortunately, she doesn’t know who the father is.”
“No wonder she passed out, all of our natures were probably overpowering her senses. Didn’t the mother die?”
“That’s the other thing. She wasn’t raised by her biological mother, she was raised by her mother’s friends. They are who died but Elke doesn’t know that part yet.”
“Did they know about what she could be?”
“I can only assume so, but her mother hasn’t been very forthcoming with information.”
“So why hasn’t she told her daughter about what she could be facing?”
Joan sighed. “I don’t pretend to understand why it’s such a secret, perhaps because the father may very well be human and she won’t have full powers.”
“How can the mother not know who the father is?” I asked, unable to comprehend someone not know who could have fathered her child.
“It happens, Stig. Ianthe was never open with information with us, even as a student she was very closed off.”
“Wait…her mother is Ianthe Sayer?”
Joan nodded.
The infamous Ianthe. She was a legend among students for pulling off the biggest pranks on staff while she attended Ravensbane. The staff were glad when she finally left.
“I want to tell Elke.”
“You’ve only just met her. You’ll frighten her and she won’t believe you. She needs someone she can trust right now. Earn that trust so she will believe you and trust in you when things starts to happen. Tell Tiger Lily to do the same.”
“Tiger won’t do anything for her,” I scoffed. “You know how selfish she can be.”
“Tiger can be difficult, but she would never hurt anybody or allow someone to suffer. You need to have more faith in her.”
“Maybe you have too much.”
I turned to leave the office before she could scold me for speaking of Tiger that way.
“Son, don’t tell her.”
I looked back at our headmaster, annoyed she didn’t see it the way I did. “Always a pleasure to see you, Mother.”
Chapter Three
Elke
“Elke! Wake up!” I heard screaming as I opened my eyes suddenly and felt panicky.
Tiger stood over me with her phone as a flashlight. I covered my eyes before she pulled it away. “You were having a nightmare, a damn noisy one.”
“Sorry,” I said, trying to calm my heart rate down.
“Yeah well, keep it down, okay.”
Tiger seemed hesitant to leave, and yet I could see she didn’t want to be here anymore.
“I’m fine, just go. I have nightmares all the time.”
Tiger frowned briefly before heading out of my room. I sat up and swept the hair that clung to my sweaty face out of my eyes. The nightmares had begun weeks before my parents died. The same thing, we were stuck in a fiery structure, whether it was a car, a house or boat. The pleading in my father’s eyes to stop.
Stop what? I hadn’t started the fire, how could I?
I knew my father had feared me the last couple of weeks, and rarely spent time with me. My mother would tell me it was because of the death of his mother a few weeks ago. That had been the start of the change. She had been looking after me for the afternoon because my mother had been having issues with her migraines, so my father needed to take her out of the city. She’d never liked me so I had stayed to myself while she busied herself around her house. She’d come to tell me off for something, making me cry. Instead of comforting me, she’d gone back inside. I’d been crying all afternoon on the balcony praying my father would come back and get me.
When my parents came to pick me up later that day, they’d found her dead inside. She hadn’t made a sound or cried out for help. Apparently, her heart had given out, but my father had never believed me. He barely spoke to me after that.
Just two weeks after that, a friend at school had died. I didn’t know how, no one spoke about it, but my mother wanted me to change schools. I convinced her that I didn’t need to change schools so soon to the end of my schooling and she relented. No one spoke at school about the death. It was almost like it didn’t happen, but I soon found that quite a lot of people didn’t want to be friends with me. They thought I brought on death. I literally only had a couple friends left who wanted to hang out with me but my mother didn’t want me to go out with them. I felt as if my own parents wanted to hide me away, and blame me for every bad thing that happened in their lives. It was around this time I started to feel like I didn’t belong with them. Maybe I was switched at birth and got the wrong parents. If I didn’t look like my aunt, I would assume I was adopted.
I got out of bed and headed down the halls in my pyjamas and a windbreaker jacket. I needed space, I needed fresh air. The cool night air met my sweaty forehead and made me colder. I shivered in the fresh air, but it helped my racing heart.
“Are you all right, child?” I heard a voice in the distance. Turning, I saw an older woman come toward me. She would probably be in her forties, but she looked younger. It was weird, but she seemed to be an older young person. Did that even make sense?
“Sorry, I just…needed fresh air.”
“It’s all right,” she smiled at me. “We all have nightmares from time to time. Are you finding your way here?”
“Yes, I have some people who are really nice to me.”
Stig. Stig was the only nice one but I didn’t want to tell her that. I figured she was a teacher.
“Yes, Stig has been doing well with you. Tiger will help you as well. They are both school captains here. My name is Joan, and I’m the headmaster.”
“Oh, you look so much younger than I thought a headmaster would look.”
She chuckled. “I’ll take that as a compliment. You’ve had a rough time these past weeks, your aunt has told us of some of it. If you need to talk to anyone, we have people who can help you.”
“Thank you, I will think about it.”
“Go on, head back in before you catch your death out here.”
I nodded and moved off, not wanting to tell her I never caught colds or flus and I always ran a little hotter than normal.
“Oh and just so you’re aware, your aunt will be here in a few days.”
I turned back to Joan with a smirk. “You best lock up your liquor cabinet then.”
Joan smiled but it didn’t reach her eyes. I felt as if she were keeping something from me, but I didn’t know anyone well enough to know for sure. It will be nice to see a familiar face, that of my aunt Ianthe. She was the life of the party and always knew how to make me smile.
Luther
The girl was nervous. I could sense her feelings from afar, it was why I’d come out since she’d been here. There was just something about her that made me uneasy, but not in a bad way, in a way where I’d like to get to know her.
There was a connection I couldn’t comprehend.
Stay away, had been the warning Stig had dished out to me when he’d seen me watching her last night. I knew he liked the girl, probably because she was taboo for him. I knew what she was.
No one else did, but I could feel it in her. The power was intoxicating. The kind of power my family would kill for. But I’d never let my family take her, on that I would stake my life and that’s what scared me so much. She’d never even said hello to me and yet I could tell I would lay down my own life for hers.
I looked away, scared by the admission in my heart. I needed to know her. I needed to see her without Stig at her tail every damn minute.
I needed to protect Elke Sayers from this devilish world.
Stig
Tiger opened my door without warning as she usually did, shining her phone in the room so she didn’t trip. I sat up in bed and pulled on a shirt.
“Tiger, what are you doing?”
“She was screaming, I went in to see if she was okay but her eyes…they were
white. She had no colour in them.”
“White?” I asked. “But it was dark, how could you see?”
“They were glowing, Stig. Glowing like a goddamn neon monster.”
I sighed, leaning against the headboard. “I know what she is.”
“What?” Tiger asked. “I’ve never heard of anything with glowing white eyes.”
I stood up and went to my bookshelf before turning my lamp on. Flipping to the middle of the book, I opened it at what I’d stumbled onto last year when I was studying obscure supernaturals for an assignment.
“Oracles?” Tiger said, taking the book off me to read. “But they don’t exist anymore.”
“They do but they are rare. Her mother is a Seer, and so the gene must have carried. An Oracle is just a powerful Seer.”
“What was her father?”
“They don’t know who he is.”
Tiger looked up from the book with an eyebrow cocked.
“Really? Who was her mother then?” Tiger asked me. I didn’t want to betray Elke. After all, Elke didn’t know her own parentage yet either.
“I can’t tell you,” I said. “Problem is, Tiger, Elke doesn’t know what she is either. Nor what this place is.”
“I know, that was something I really didn’t want to hide from her. She’s going to find out eventually, right?”
“She’ll find out on All Hallows’ Eve.”
“That horrendous night is coming, isn’t it,” Tiger sighed, laying down on the bed. I knew why she was here. She wanted to hook up. I wasn’t stupid, I knew she liked me and once upon a time I liked her too. She was pretty, and she was kind in her own way but I didn’t love her. I refused to be like my father and be with a woman for their looks and what they could do for me. I wanted love.
Real love.
A woman who would stand by me and make me a better person. A woman who could handle what I was and what I needed.
Tiger wasn’t someone I saw myself being with.
“It is and we should be prepared. Some of us will be worse than others. I hope she learns quickly and isn’t afraid.”
“Mariel will be here and she will be able to help her if she freaks out.”
“Having that human has been good,” I agreed. “My father was against it.”
“I can only imagine. My mother has been wanting me to leave this place for years, since father’s disappearance.”
The long-standing feud between our father’s had always had me at odds. They’d been the best of friends, even opening this place together to protect the younger generation. But something had happened and they became rivals.
“How is your mother since he disappeared?”
“Possessive, sometimes it’s not so nice being an only child.”
“I wouldn’t know,” I said. “You should get some sleep.”
She stayed on the bed until I opened the door. Sighing, she huffed as she got up and left. As she turned back to me, she smiled. “One day, you’re going to fall head-deep in love with me, Stig Ravens.”
Just as Tiger was leaving, I saw Elke heading down the hall. She saw me in the doorway, and with Tiger just leaving. Her eyes were wide for a moment before she scuttled off quickly.
“Elke!”
She didn’t turn back around, instead, she continued down the hall until she got to her room. I headed after her, wanting her to know I wasn’t with Tiger like that.
Why did I care?
I stopped before I knocked on the door, held back by something. If I knocked on this door, I’d confess to her everything about herself. Everything she deserved to know.
Hesitantly, I left and headed back to my room. Laying down on the centre of it, I tried to calm the hunger within. All Hallows’ Night was going to be hard. It was going to be hell on earth.
I picked up the book about Oracles and started to read, this time to absorb the information because I was going make damn sure Elke didn’t feel alone.
Chapter Four
Elke
I looked down at my phone and saw the glowing 3 O on the calendar. From what I’d learned, I saw that classes resumed on the 2nd of November. I’d been here for almost a week now, and everyone seemed to be scared of tomorrow night. I had no idea why, maybe they bought into the whole thing of the dead coming to life.
It seemed stupid to me.
My aunt was due any minute and I was anxious to see her. The last time had been almost two years ago. It was going to be good to see family again.
It had been two days since I’d seen Tiger leaving Stig’s bedroom. It had hurt. I don’t know why, it’s not like I ever thought of him more than a friend, but something in me, felt pain.
I couldn’t describe it and last night I had dreamt of him, lovingly, tenderly kissing me until he died in my arms. I’d awoken in a sweat with tears streaming down my cheeks. It had felt so real.
Just like all my dreams do.
Now, it was morning and I’d had plenty of coffee to keep me alert. Ianthe would be able to see straight through if I wasn’t on my A game. Then again, she could always tell when I was not feeling right.
A knock landed on my door and I got to answer it. Tiger stood there, looking every inch as bored as she usually did.
“Your aunt is here,” she said, her eyes told me she didn’t trust me nor did she want to be anywhere near me right now. I followed her down to the food hall where Ianthe sat, her blue hair piled high on top of her head, her face full of makeup to hide the scars near her chin. I never understood where they came from, but she had always been self-conscious about them.
She sat opposite Mariel, laughing, free. I wondered if I could have that again. She spotted me by the door just as Stig was about to come over to me. She beat him to it and I quickly exited, not before Ianthe had noticed.
“Come, Elke,” she ran to catch up with me as I headed out into the fields. “What’s wrong? I can see your red eyes.”
“I don’t sleep well, nightmares.”
“Like before or worse?” she asked.
“Worse.”
“Of your parents’ death?”
“Some nights.”
“It’s a terrible thing, Elke. I can only imagine what you have gone through. I’m sorry it has taken me so long to get here.”
“I know they weren’t related to you, I know they were just your friends.”
She was quiet, but slowly she moved to stand in front of me. “You know they weren’t really your parents.”
I took a deep breath, suspicion validated. “I suspected. My father mentioned something after his mother died that confused me, but I chose to ignore it at the time.”
“I am sorry Elke, I should have come when it started.”
“What started?”
“Look into my eyes.”
She held her hands over the sides of my face and forced me to look into her bright blue eyes. She was panicked, which made me panic.
This wasn’t like Ianthe.
She was scaring me.
“Stop!”
I pulled away from her.
“You know the truth, child. Say it. It will help.”
“No,” I yelled at her and ran for the building again. She ran after me. I could feel her on my heels, tears ran down my face as I scrambled to get away from her.
From the truth I didn’t want to hear.
Stig ran for me, grabbing me in his arms. “What’s wrong? Has she hurt you?”
“No, please, let me go,” I cried out. He held me in his arms and hugged me tight. It felt comforting and yet I didn’t want to hear what Ianthe was about to tell me. I’d suspected it for a while, but it was hard to acknowledge.
“Elke, please,” Ianthe begged as she came toward me. She had tears running down her face as well. I’d never seen her break, she had always been strong, nothing fazed her.
“Maybe this isn’t the time,” Stig said. “She needs to calm down.”
“You don’t know her, boy.”
“No,” I pulled away fr
om him and moved away from both of them. “I just…I need to be alone.”
“That’s not wise, Elke.”
I turned on my heel and ran down the hall toward the empty end of the academy. No one came down here, and I had no idea why. It was beautiful, filled with fancy portraits and paintings, and beautiful views of the pond and woods.
I dried my eyes and pulled myself up on the ledge, looking out at the lake with its placid waters. It was so comforting, I wondered why it was forbidden. It didn’t seem dangerous. Stig rounded the corner and headed toward me slowly, almost as if he were ready for me to run again.
“Why do you come down here?” he asked me.
“It’s quiet and has nice views.”
“Are you okay?”
I looked out at the pond again, but the waters weren’t as placid as they had been. It looked like someone was in the water, splashing about.
“Someone’s in the pond,” I jumped off the ledge. “I think they’re drowning.”
I could hear Stig running after me, yelling something but I couldn’t hear him. It was raining so that was probably why the person was drowning in the water. I ran down the hill to the pond, pulling off my jacket as I ran. Diving in, I searched around me. The water was murky, but I could make out the body falling down to the bottom. I swam for it, only to see the body disappear. I stopped, looking around but I couldn’t see anyone, until I felt something on my ankle. It was tugging me downward. I kicked, trying to free myself.
Finally, I felt my ankle become free and kicked upward. Hair blocked my way, followed by a face. A mean face, with black eyes and sharp teeth. A tail splashed about behind her.
I screamed, bubbles of air blocking my vision. I frantically kicked but my legs were hurting. As I spun around, I could feel my lungs burning for air. That’s when I saw someone swim up in front of me. But it wasn’t a long-haired freak. It was Stig…only his eyes were bright red. The long-haired freak dashed off, frightened, and I saw just how red his eyes were. They were almost glowing.
I swam away from him, toward the surface. That’s when a long-haired freak came for me. I screamed again, losing more oxygen as I kicked furiously. Stig swam at the long haired one and I made my escape, climbing out of the pond and onto the grass. I coughed up water, and my lungs still burned as the air hit them. I tried to pull myself to my feet, but I fell to my knees again. The lake’s surface was quiet again, where was Stig?
All Hallows' Eve (Ravensbane Academy Book 1) Page 2
