“I don’t know what to say,” I replied, secretly glad he was buying it.
“I have to know. Who’s the lucky guy?” Kane looked torn. Genuinely upset that I’d betrayed Ulric. I looked away unable to watch the pain I’d caused to protect Ulric.
“Moldark Whitlock,” I said, “now if you’ll excuse me.” I turned to walk away.
“I never feel like this about anyone and the kinds I’ve had to deal with, that says a lot. I hope you burn in hell for the traitor you are,” Kane said, before he walked away.
“Are you okay?” Valenthia asked, as her and Natalie joined me, having heard what Kane had said.
“I’m fine,” I said fighting off the sting from the tears that pricked my eyes, “let’s go. We have work to do.” I made a bee-line straight for the tunnels and hoped no one else would talk or cuss me out for all that they had no idea about. I really wasn’t in the mood. Natalie and Valenthia followed close behind.
We entered the tunnels and although I had gotten used to their cool darkness, they felt different. I couldn’t tell if it was just me or whether the tension that hung in the air was felt by my friends as well.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” whispered Valenthia as we walked towards where Rugrem was being held.
“He’ll die if we don’t,” Natalie replied for me.
“Fine, then put this on.” Valenthia opened the small sac and held out the charmed bracelet. “I charmed it earlier so I probably shouldn’t touch it, in case some of the magic transfers to me – and I don’t really know how it works,” she admitted.
“Okay,” I said taking in a sharp, long breath and reaching inside the bag.
Eying the dainty little bracelet which shimmered in the dark, I slipped it onto my wrist with the blooming. Heat immediately shot all the way up my arm and I winced by the unexpectedness of it. My arm felt like it was on fire and along with the usual silver swirls that lifted from my body when I summoned my magic, I felt something heavier, more exhilarating coming to the fore as well.
I ran, or maybe streamed through the narrow tunnel, no longer feeling anxious about the task at hand. I felt Rugrem’s presence before I reached him, stopping myself just short of storming the bars of his dank prison cell. Natalie and Valenthia, though behind me, kept their distance. Rugrem watched me in surprise. By his expression, I knew my appearance must have been more vamp than witch.
“Ready to leave this place behind?” I asked, taking a step back to gauge the bars before I summoned my magic – or a combination of what was coming through the charm and enhancing my powers.
“Where will he go?” I heard Valenthia tentatively ask.
“If we can get him out of here, I’ll call on Sophie-Anne,” I boldly replied. Sometime between being berated by Kane and ending up outside Rugrem’s cell I had realized that if I could smuggle him out, I could only rely on Sophie-Anne to come and help us immediately. It was silly but I also looked at a way of starting to build back our bond that had been severed the moment I’d been born. And if she didn’t, it would tell me what I needed to know. Plan B would include Pearl’s help whether she liked it or not. Which she definitely would not. Oh well, getting Rugrem out of the academy would be the biggest hurdle anyway.
“What’s that sound?” asked Natalie, behind me.
“Grunches,” answered Rugrem as I spun around to the sound, which was getting louder by the second. Closer.
“Why are they here?” asked Valenthia.
“This must really be my last night. Le Boursier would have mentioned it as a word of warning to them,” said Rugrem, coming as close to the bars as his shackles allowed him.
“Tell them to leave,” I said. Natalie and Valenthia shrank into the shadows, staying close to the walls. Thanks to the charm, I could probably summon enough magic to use the invisibility shield on all three of us so we could sneak away. But if we did, our chance to rescue the one grunch who probably didn’t want to tear vampires apart given the opportunity, would be lost thanks to the approaching ones that did.
“They’re coming to say goodbye,” said Rugrem, “if I leave, they might be the ones to pay the price.”
“That’s ridiculous,” I said, thinking quickly, “then there’d be no one guarding Tempus Fugit.”
“Hurry up!” said Natalie, beginning to panic, “Do something!”
I closed my eyes and concentrated, feeling a rush throughout my body. The low growls continued to grow louder but I didn’t care. All I focussed on where the chains that secured Rugrem to his cell. And the bars. The bars that had been laced with dark magic. The same dark magic that my magic was coming through, thanks to the charmed bracelet. I heard Rugrem gasp as his shackles fell away.
Next, I raised my arm towards the metal bars, the same way I’d seen Pearl do when she’d allowed us inside Superno. I opened my eyes and found a single bar – the one in the middle – and focused all of myself and summoned. What I had in mind would be much smoother than breaking the grunch out, leaving a mess of twisted and bent iron in his wake. Slowly, the metal bars vanished in a space that looked like a portal and a circular entrance opened up.
“Walk through it!” I urged. Even with both light and dark magic at my fingertips, I couldn’t be sure how long the gap would hold. And how long it would be before Rugrem’s buddies would attack us thinking we were there to harm instead of help him. “Come on!” I said when I saw Rugrem hesitate.
He walked through and as he did, his body appeared to grow a few inches as he straightened his back and stood up to his full height. The magical portal I’d managed to conjure up for him, decreased to about half the size it had been only seconds ago and I watched as it completely disappeared soon after.
“Wait!” he announced and I quickly realized he wasn’t addressing me as his eyes peered over the top of my head. I turned and saw what appeared to be an army of grunches that had arrived and were standing there ready to attack. I counted them. There were seven and they were as sizeable as Rugrem and effectively blocking our way out.
Natalie and Valenthia now stood in the middle of the tunnel, having been flushed out from their feeble hiding places. They edged towards me as a grunt emanated from the crowd of grunches.
“I’ve come here to help him escape,” I said as calmly as I could. Whatever the charm had done to me, I wasn’t scared – more pumped up.
“You put him in there to begin with!” huffed a grunch, one that appeared to be the only female of the lot. She was smaller than the rest but only slightly. And she was taking no prisoners. She charged at us, with Natalie and Valenthia the first ones in her path. I instinctively summoned my magic and a flash of silver, threaded with a streak of crimson shot out at her. The grunch was flung violently into the stone wall and hit the ground like a ragdoll.
“Shit!” I said running over to her. She wasn’t dead. She couldn’t be dead. I heard a few other grunts as the six remaining grunches pawed at the ground.
However, as I knelt beside the unconscious female grunch, instead of advancing at us, the others promptly backed off. I looked up and saw that Rugrem had put himself between us and them. As their head grunch, he pawed at the ground, ready to attack anyone of them that came for us. The grunch on the ground had been hit not only with my regular witching magic but also with the darker stuff of the bracelet. I whipped off the bracelet in case its’ magic stopped me from being able to heal her.
I hovered one hand just above the grunch’s chest and honed in, trying to feel for any pain and damage. There total silence in the tunnels as silver beams began to float down over the grunch. They settled on and around her shoulders and as she absorbed some of them, she groaned. I thanked the heavens that she was alive and starting to come to. I watched and backed up a bit as she flung out an arm. She opened her eyes, looking stunned.
“It’s okay,” I whispered, “I’m helping you. Just as we’re here to help Rugrem.” The grunch nodded. She sat up and I could tell the magic had already done what it needed to. Feeling
in my pocket, I felt the crystal Sophie-Anne had given me. Perhaps I hadn’t even needed the charmed bracelet to help break Rugrem out as I was also channeling from my father’s crystal. The grunch stood up and stretched.
“They’re here to help, Nephili,” said Rugrem looking at the female grunch. Then he looked at the rest of them. “If I leave now, you’ll be in trouble if they think you helped me escape.”
“Why don’t you all come with us? We can take you,” I said before I’d even given myself time to process how crazy it sounded. I avoided glimpsing Natalie and Valenthia, who were no doubt wearing what they thought of my plan, right on their faces.
“Yes, I’m not leaving you if you want to come as well.” There was silence and then the grunches spoke together. “Silence!” ordered Rugrem, “they’ll hear us. Let’s take a vote. Those who are coming with me, stand to one side,” he gestured to his right, “and those staying, come here.”
Slowly the army of seven cast each other glances and the grunch named Nephili, stepped over to the right of Rugrem. Two other grunches followed her.
“What about the rest of them?” asked Valenthia. Rugrem nodded, looking to his remaining team for an answer.
“Those who are coming, know this. We can’t return to the bayous or swamplands. That’s where they harvest us from when we’re young. They’ll easily find us there.”
“Then where will we go?” asked Nephili.
“For many years, I’ve dreamed of my freedom. It lies up north. Where it is cold enough and far enough that the vampires of New Orleans won’t bother to venture in search of mere slaves. We’re like sitting ducks for them in the southern states.”
“I can’t,” said the deep voice of a male grunch who had gone to stand to the left of his leader. “This is all I know.”
“Then also know this,” said Rugrem, “when you are too old to be of use, they will dispose of you, like they have done for generations with your ancestors. I’ve seen the carnage with my own eyes.”
“Knowing my end is better than what might be out there,” said the same grunch, conclusively.
“Then let’s go!” said Rugrem, looking at me with determination. We passed the four grunches that had chosen to stay behind and they nodded their goodbyes to their fellow grunches who had picked a life of uncertainty in the outside world, rather than the eventual unnatural death that awaited them at the academy.
“Take this,” I handed the bracelet to Valenthia, “put it on in case you need to convince a student to move out of our way.” I had no idea where my courage came from. All I knew was that I’d had it with anyone treating others like they were nothing. Tools, to be used and discarded at will.
“And what if it’s a prof?” hissed Valenthia.
“Then we’ll deal with it when it happens.”
We led them through the tunnels and I kept Rugrem close to me. I could literally feel Natalie’s frightened gaze upon my back as we came upon the cavern that served as our Combat classroom. The three of us collectively breathed out relief that it was empty and there wasn’t another class in progress.
Since the first time I’d entered the city up through a tunnel, with Moldark and Natalie, I’d learned that there were various exits leading up and out into New Orleans. I wished I could remember the one Ulric and I had used during the few days we’d spent together before he’d gone searching for his sister. That one that had led straight into a park. I messaged Safi urgently – I needed to ask Ulric.
“Okay, give me a second, I’m in bed,” came the reply.
“Hurry!” I sent back, “Find Ulric and tell him I’m helping someone escape. We need to know which tunnel exits into a park or somewhere open but quiet.”
“Aviar is finding him,” Safi quickly updated me.
It must have been only a minute or so but felt like an hour. Every second we spent inside the academy made it more likely we’d all be discovered. And just as I heard Safi’s voice in my head say, “Okay, I’m with Ulric,” and I felt Ulric’s thought, asking exactly where we were, we all heard the footsteps coming towards us and froze.
Chapter 23
“Hello?” Safi called as I felt Ulric’s panic due to my silence. I couldn’t think enough to describe where we were. All I could concentrate on was the presence that approached. I sensed and knew instantly that it was a vamp. I held my breath as the footsteps came around the corner and into view.
Clara stopped, gawking at us as she walked in on our ongoing escape. I breathed out, a hard sigh of relief but Natalie, Valenthia and Rugrem didn’t share my relief and stared back at her rigidly, unsure what to do next. No one moved, afraid that the slightest change of position would bring everything crashing down into reality.
“What the hell?” said Clara, eyes wide, finally breaking the stalemate.
“It’s complicated,” I said. Inside my brain, I could hear Safi asking repeatedly, what had happened and why I’d stopped communicating, “Now if you’ll excuse us,” I said to Clara and quickly described for Safi and Ulric where we were, just below the passageway with a staircase that led into an old house.
“What are they?” asked Clara, referring to the grunches, looking as coy as a vampire could, when they’d been out-numbered. So, she didn’t know what they were either. This was the only silver lining I could see in a situation that had the potential to get totally out of hand.
“They’re friends from out of town,” I replied before anyone else could. Clara scrutinized me and then Rugrem before concentrating her gaze back onto me.
“But what species are they?” Clara cocked her head in a frown.
“We’re right here, you know,” said Rugrem, followed by a short grunt that I couldn’t help but be amused by.
“They’re warlocks,” I said.
“They look like some sort of a shifter – that got stuck midway between shifting,” answered Clara unconvinced.
“And they are – because they have magic. They had to give up the ability to shift successfully,” I said. Wow, I really was a terrible liar.
“But…”
“And now they’re getting late,” I added, as Ulric’s directions came through. He instructed us to walk over two exits to the right of the one we were at and that tunnel would open up directly under Woldenberg Park. I thanked him and Safi silently and began walking, beckoning our escape party to follow. Clara was left completely flustered, rooted to where she was. I knew my lie wouldn’t keep for longer than we needed it and I really hoped she wouldn’t see the other grunches that had decided not to come along. If I had answering to do, it could be done later.
We climbed the steep and stony stairs that led up to ground level and emerged in the darkness, just behind a mound of grass. I wasn’t too familiar with the park having only been there once before. But thanks to my inner vamp, I could see perfectly in the darkness and scouted the area, making sure there were no immediate threats.
“Can grunches stream?” I asked, wondering where they’d go even if they could.
“No,” said Nephili, who was closest to me.
“I’m going to call my…mom,” I said. “I think if we’re to stand a chance of reaching Superno, we need at least as many vamps as there are grunches in case we’re ambushed.”
“Agreed,” said Valenthia and the grunches nodded.
I called out to Sophie-Anne and then sent Safi a message, asking if there’d be any chance in hell that four grunches could stow away at Superno until they found their bearings.
“I wouldn’t know how to let them in,” came the prompt reply, “should I try and get Aviar on board?”
“No! Ask Ulric if he thinks Professor Frewin can help,” I said, getting a brainwave. “How long have you worked in Tempus Fugit?” I asked turning to Rugrem.
“I practically grew up there – at least fifty years,” he said as Natalie and Valenthia gasped in shock.
“Perfect,” I said as I dug out my speck of a quartz crystal that Pearl had given me, from my other pocket and sent her a
message, “Heading to Superno, bringing four informants who will tell you everything for the right amount of protection. Don’t sidestep, Frewin knows we’re coming.” There. In your face, Pearl.
There was more restless waiting in the silence. The sky was dim as it appeared to be a moonless night. “Maybe we should keep moving?” said Rugrem as there was a sharp rushing sound.
“I’m so glad you called! And that too, so strongly,” said Sophie-Anne with a smile, materializing from nothing more than the whirring stream of energy she’d become to get to us. She surveyed me with satisfaction and raised an eyebrow when she realized there were six others there as well.
“Sorry to disturb you,” said Valenthia, taken by Sophie-Anne, like she’d seen a celebrity.
“You must be Katrina’s friends,” said Sophie-Anne quickly piecing it together, “but who are you?” she asked the grunches.
“We’re grunches,” said Rugrem, “one of the many supernatural henchmen and women at St. Erzsebet’s.”
“I know what you are,” replied Sophie-Anne, curiously, “but how and why are you all together like this?”
“We need your help,” I cut in, “these grunches will be killed if they are found. We need another vampire to help us escort them to Superno. Power in numbers and all that.”
“Alright,” said Sophie-Anne, hesitantly, “but they can’t stream, so we’ll have to walk with them.”
“That is correct,” replied Rugrem.
We made our way out of the park and Safi got back to me, “Professor Frewin is very excited to meet the fugitives! He’s making accommodations with my mom right now!” Pearl must have been thrilled. We’d decided to walk Rugrem and his gang in the middle. However, every few seconds, I looked around with the full awareness that the grunches stood out like a sore thumb, being a good foot and a half taller than us. And for the fact that they were built like horses.
“How did you get caught up in this?” asked Sophie-Anne like we were alone and she was getting ready to scold my stupidity.
Dark Spark: A Young Adult Urban Fantasy Novel (Bloodline Academy Book 2) Page 21
