Ordinary Girl (The Dark Dragon Chronicles Book 1)

by Ripley Harper

  He shakes his head, eyes not leaving the road. “No.”

  I give him a side-eyed look because he’s being really weird: cold and evasive and aloof. Since he first showed up, he has flat-out refused to say anything apart from insisting, over and over, that I get into the car, that we have to go to school now, that we have to help them, that it’s really important.

  I know he’s worried about Maggie and Chloe, but I also suspect it might be more than that. The Order of Keepers is real; I know that now. And Daniel’s mother is the Skykeeper whose magic I was accused of stealing.

  “How’s your mom?” I ask carefully after a tense minute of silence.

  “For fuck’s sake, can we not talk about that now? One crisis at a time, okay?”

  I bite my lip. Daniel has never sworn at me before.

  Something is seriously wrong here.

  We park outside the school’s entrance because the parking lot is completely full. The homecoming dance began about an hour ago, and I can hear the sound of music and laughter coming from the gym.

  “Daniel,” I ask as we get out of his truck, “are you sure you’re okay?”

  “I’m definitely not okay,” he says over his shoulder as he rushes toward the gates. “But we’ll talk about me later. Let’s get this thing with Jeffrey over first.”

  There’s a laughing group of people at the school gates, but unlike the rest of the crowd, we don’t head toward the gym. We go in the opposite direction, turning right at the office, down the hallway, past the labs and toward the library. By now we’re almost running. When we finally get there, Daniel pushes open the library door and I follow him inside, scanning the room for Chloe and Maggie.

  And then I feel a burst of pain at the back of my head and everything goes black.

  I wake up with my skull on fire. I groan and try to grab my head, but I can’t move my arms.

  What the…?

  I’m sitting on a chair. I look down to see that my hands are taped to the arms of the chair. My legs too. It’s a heavy library chair, made to withstand years of hard use by high school students. I can’t move.

  I look up to see that I’m sitting in a loose circle with Chloe, Maggie, and Amanda. They’re all taped to their chairs too, and their mouths are taped shut. Jeffrey Black is standing in the middle of the circle.

  He has a gun.

  “Ah,” he says, unsmiling, his head twitching to the side. “She’s awake at last.”

  The other girls turn their heads to look at me.

  “Where’s Daniel?” I ask. My head feels as if tiny bolts of lightning are shooting from the bottom of my skull to the back of my eyes.

  “I’m afraid he won’t be joining us,” Jeffrey says. “This party isn’t for boys.”

  His eyes flicker to the right. Daniel is lying a few feet from us, crumpled into a heap. He’s not moving, and I can see blood coming out of one ear. “He’s not dead yet,” Jeffrey says in a flat voice.

  I look at Jeffrey. I look at the other girls. I look at Daniel. I’m trying to make sense of what I’m seeing, but I’m dizzy and confused and my head hurts so much I just can’t get a grip on what’s happening.

  Jeffrey gives a strange, fake laugh. The difference between what his mouth is doing and what his eyes are doing is confusing me. His mouth is making a harsh, barking sound while his eyes look sad and nervous.

  But he has a gun.

  And I’m taped to a chair.

  And Daniel is lying on the floor, bleeding.

  None of this feels real to me. I wonder if I might have a concussion.

  I force myself to think, grinding my teeth against the pain in my head. The boy with the gun. The helpless girls. The school library. The joyless laugh.

  Oh for God’s sake.

  School shootings happen in other places. It’s something you see on the news. You have a far greater chance of being hit by a drunk driver than dying in a school shooting. That’s what everyone always says.

  My skull is throbbing with pain, my head spinning with disbelief.

  I force my eyes to remain open, in spite of the pain. I see that Maggie is silently crying. Chloe is staring at Jeffrey with hate in her eyes. Amanda looks dazed, as if she’s also been hit on the head. Daniel is lying on the floor with blood coming out of his ear. I am taped to a chair, completely helpless.

  Jeffrey is swinging the gun around. With every second that passes, his pasty skin and his dead eyes and his bad haircut are making him look more and more like the mugshot of just about every school shooter I can think of.

  And yet I can’t feel it.

  Perhaps I have a brain injury, or perhaps everything else just seems unreal in comparison to the constant, throbbing agony at the back of my skull. But there’s also this huge part of me that just wants to go: Really? You’re doing this to me now? Because being kidnapped and locked up and magically tortured isn’t enough for one week? Are you freaking kidding me?

  Jeffrey looks at his watch. “Okay, girls, I have an errand to run. Don’t go anywhere; I’ll be back in a sec.” He’s about to leave when he turns back, tutting. “Almost forgot about this one little detail…” He pulls off a length of tape, walks to me, and presses it over my mouth. Then he puts his gun on the desk and walks out the door.

  I look at the other girls’ faces. Amanda’s dull eyes. Maggie’s helpless panic. Chloe’s fury. I close my eyes. My head hurts too much; I can’t keep my eyes open. I relax my shoulders, let my head drop forward. The pain eases slightly.

  My eyes are closed but I am not relaxing. I’m concentrating harder than I ever have in my life. I’m going deeper into myself, calming my fears, finding my strength. I’m searching for that deep well of power inside me.

  He doesn’t know it yet, but Jeffrey Black has just chosen the wrong damn victim.

  I have magic inside me; all I have to do is find it.

  And so I take deep, regular breaths to lower my heart rate and calm my mind. I accept the pain. I go deeper inside myself, searching for that tranquil pool of power inside of me.

  As I sink into my inner self, the pain in my head gradually becomes less intense. Not that it disappears or even really lessens; it just doesn’t affect me as much anymore. Pain is just pain—a physical impulse, a message from your nerves to your brain.

  Message received. I now have more important things to think about.

  So I put the pain away. I search for my secret well of power. I go deeper.

  And deeper still.

  I bring my mind into total focus. I suppress my fear, my pain, my crazy, panicky thoughts. I search for my magic. I go deeper and deeper.

  I go deeper than ever before.

  But there is nothing.

  I fight this realization as long as I can, keeping calm, concentrating harder, shutting out the panic. But after a while I can’t deny the truth any longer: my magic is gone.

  That terrible night in the cell has drained me of all the power I had inside me.

  I close my eyes and try again. I use everything I have, reaching out blindly, hoping against hope. I search my secret depths for any shred of magic, a tiny little spark. Anything.

  But those bastards have left me with nothing.

  I look up when I hear the door swinging open again. Jeffrey enters the room with a faint smile on his face. He’s looking less stressed than earlier, pleased with himself. I feel a spark of hope—maybe this is just another prank, some elaborate game he’s playing to scare us.

  Jeffrey Black’s revenge. I mean, who could blame him?

  He sits down on the check-out desk, picks up his gun. “Which one of you bitches wants to die first?” he asks cheerfully. Then he points the gun first at Amanda, then Maggie, then Chloe, then me.

  Oh God.

  I can’t believe I’m staring down the barrel of a gun again.

  He laughs, puts down the gun and rubs his chin theatrically, as if he’s thinking. “I bet you girls are wondering what your host has got planned for you this evening,” he says.
His words seem rehearsed, as if he’s practiced them before, in his head maybe. His actions seem fake too, as if he’s acting a role, trying to be someone he’s not. Then his head twitches sharply to one side and I realize that there’s nothing fake about any of this.

  Jeffrey has three pimples on his chin and a bit of a rash in his neck. His eyes are flat and angry and excited. His nails are bitten and bloody. His mouth looks vulnerable in spite of his smirk. His sneakers are new and very clean. His hair is cut far too short.

  This is a real boy with a real gun and years of hate in his heart.

  Horror washes over me, then anger, then fear.

  “I bet you want to know why I’m doing this,” Jeffrey says, as if we couldn’t all think of a million reasons why a boy like him would want to kill some of his classmates. We’ve all been unforgivably awful toward him. Even me. Even Maggie. It wasn’t personal; mainly it was due to the basic laws of survival that all unpopular kids instinctively understand. Disappear into the middle. Stay away from the weakest. Stay away from the weirdest. Don’t let their weirdness and their weakness drag you under.

  Only now it’s going to drag us under in the worst way.

  Jeffrey is talking about his suffering: no friends, no girls, always picked on, always overlooked, always excluded. He says that killing us will finally make him special. In less than an hour’s time, he tells us, he will leap right to the top of the social hierarchy. Everyone will remember him after this. He’s going to be someone, a powerful and inspiring figure that will give hope to others like him.

  Those are his actual words; this is what he actually thinks.

  I stop listening to him.

  Daniel is not moving; I can’t make out if he’s still breathing. Amanda seems to have passed out. Chloe is still glaring at Jeffrey, but her eyes are starting to look a bit glazed. Maggie is struggling to keep her eyes open and is leaning her head back awkwardly.

  Jeffrey has stopped talking. He is playing with the gun in his hand, twirling it around like someone in a Tarantino movie. He seems a bit calmer than he did earlier. I wonder if this means he’s getting ready to shoot.

  I have no idea what to do, but I know I have to do something.

  I start shaking my head from side to side, making a noise in the back of my throat: “Uurghhh! Urrghhh!”

  Jeffrey frowns at me. “What? Are you trying to say something?”

  I nod my head frantically, hoping that my eyes look big and pleading.

  He thinks for a moment, then stands up and walks toward me. For a horrible second I’m afraid I’ve miscalculated, that he’s simply going to shoot me. But he pulls the tape from my mouth, a short, sharp sting.

  “What?”

  To make it clear: I have no plan whatsoever. Except maybe to stall him, to postpone the inevitable a little while longer. In the back of my mind I’ve got this vague idea that crazy people with guns like to discuss their plans with their victims, the way they do in movies when the baddie keeps talking and talking until the hero arrives to save the day.

  Does this happen in real life? I have no idea.

  “Thank you,” I say, my voice as meek and grateful as I can make it. Then I remember hearing somewhere that it’s important to use people’s names in hostage situations. “Thank you, Jeffrey.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I just want to understand. Could I ask you a question? Please, Jeffrey?”

  He nods.

  “Why us?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Why the four of us, Jeffrey? What about people like Josh and Ethan? Why aren’t they the ones taped to these chairs?”

  I’m hoping he’ll give some long explanation involving every humiliation he’s ever suffered at the hands of girls over the years, but he just shrugs.

  “Don’t worry. They’ll be dying too. Everyone at this school is dying tonight.”

  Oh God.

  What to do? What to do?

  Keep him talking. Stall.

  I glance over at Maggie, wishing she could’ve been the one to talk to him. Maggie is so sweet and so good with people; she’d have known exactly what to say. But she seems to be sleeping and Chloe’s head has fallen forward too.

  “What’s wrong with them?” I ask.

  “I gave them some pills. It’ll make it easier for them, later. There’s none left for you though.”

  “Please don’t do this, Jeffrey.”

  “I have to do it.”

  “No, you don’t. It’s not too late to stop. Nobody’s been hurt yet.”

  “I can’t stop it anymore.” His eyes are glittering with nerves and a kind of desperate determination.

  “Of course you can stop it, Jeffrey,” I say, trying to sound supportive, flattering. “You’re the one in control.”

  He shakes his head, looks at the watch on his arm. “It’s out of my hands now. In exactly… twenty-eight minutes, a bomb will go off in the gym. There’s nothing I can do to stop it.”

  My pulse spikes. “A bomb?”

  “Yeah. I didn’t have money for proper military-grade assault weapons, the type that can do real damage when an individual decides to rise up against the group. So I had to make another plan in order to effect maximum casualties.”

  “You’re going to blow up the whole school?”

  “Nah. I couldn’t get the right ingredients for that kind of bomb. It had to be an amateur job in the end.” He shakes his head regretfully. “Still, it will be enough to start a fire. And I’ve drenched that whole area in gasoline so the fire should get out of control pretty quickly.”

  “Jeffrey. No.”

  “If I’m lucky, one or two kids might die in the blast, but most will die in the fire. Once the bomb goes off, they’ll run for the exits. Only, the exits will be locked. First the girls will get hysterical, then the boys will start. The boys will get even more hysterical. They’ll cry and scream like little girls.” That joyless laugh again. “After a few minutes they’ll start to trample each other to death like animals. It will be a horrible way to die. But probably not as horrible as being burned alive, when you think about it.” He shrugs. “So in a way, they can take their pick. Choose their poison.”

  I swallow a few times, dizzy with fear. I have to keep him talking.

  “But what about all the kids who never did anything wrong?”

  He gives me a blank stare. “I don’t know them.”

  “There are a lot of innocent people here tonight, Jeffrey.”

  “No, there aren’t. This whole school and everyone in it deserve to be burned to the ground.”

  He looks down at the gun in his hand. Oh God. I have to keep him talking.

  Think of something to say!

  “You must have worked out this plan to the last detail.”

  “Oh, yes.” A spark in those dead eyes.

  “I respect that, Jeffrey; I really do. But you don’t have to go through with it. Please, Jeffrey. You’ve made your point.” As he seems to be listening, I continue, now more enthusiastically, desperately trying to think of reasons to dissuade him. “And anyway, it won’t work; you have to see that. You’ll just get into really big trouble.”

  “It’ll work.”

  “The firefighters will be here in minutes.”

  “The fire station is right at the other side of town; they won’t hear a thing.”

  “People will call them!”

  He smirks. “Their phones won’t work; I’ve jammed the cell phone signal, and I’ve cut the school’s phone lines.”

  Oh my God. He’s got it all worked out.

  Stall.

  “How did you jam the cell phone signal, Jeffrey?”

  “Pretty simple, actually. You can buy devices over the internet, but I made my own one, and it’s great. Most jammers only work for a few hundred yards but mine blocks all signal for miles.” The flash of pride on his face tells me he must have spent years perfecting this plan.

  We’re going to die here.

  “They
’ll break open the doors,” I manage to say, despite feeling as if I’ve swallowed a stone. “Any moment now, people will realize they’re locked in the gym, and they’ll get someone to open the doors.”

  He shakes his head. “Not going to happen. Right now they can still come and go freely. I’ve only locked the exits to the swimming pool and the quad—nobody will find that too strange. I’ll lock the security gate to the main building as soon as Sweeney starts his speech. Nobody will notice they’re trapped until things go Boom!—and by then it’ll be too late.”

  “What’s going to happen to us?” I ask, sounding as scared as I feel.

  His looks down at the gun. “A bomb is the best way to achieve maximum casualties.” Then he raises his eyes again, a defiant look on his face. “But a dominant male needs to know what it feels like to kill with his own hands.”

  “No, Jeffrey. Please.”

  His head twitches to the side again. He doesn’t look happy, in spite of the smirk, the bragging. He looks nervous and kind of miserable and very young. “It will be a better way to die than being burned alive or trampled in the foyer.”

  “You can still stop this.”

  “No. I can’t.” Another look at his watch. “I’m going to lock the security gate now. See you in five.”

  And with that he picks up his gun and leaves.

  Chapter 25

  And thus, to avoid incidents such as the bloodbath in Gaul, the mass enslavement at the court of the Chinese Emperor, or the religious mania in Egypt, it has been decreed that our Wards be prevented from interacting with the outside world or becoming part of its affairs in all but the most extreme and unusual circumstances. For time and time again, history has shown that, should a Juvenile become too deeply embroiled in human affairs, the consequences can only be unfortunate accident, terrible tragedy or sheer bloody mayhem.

  From Elements of Knowledge: An Instruction into Selected Wisdoms of the Black Clan (1823), author unknown; translated from the original French by Genevieve Bernard (2006)

  He forgot to tape my mouth shut.

  I wait about a minute until I’m sure he’s gone, and then I start screaming my head off. Somebody will hear me. It’s the homecoming dance, for God’s sake; everyone’s at school and people always wander away from the gym at some point.