Van Helsing Academy

by Stacey O'Neale

  “There’s a line in there.” She tapped her finger against her lips as she tried to remember. “‘The lady doth protest too much, methinks.’” I had no idea what that meant. She seemed to see my confusion, and she continued. “I’m suggesting that he’s repeatedly telling you he doesn’t like you to hide the fact that he does.”

  I had to admit she had a point, but I wasn’t ready to delve into that at the moment. “Any other theories?”

  “One more,” she winked. “I think all the bickering between you two isn’t bickering at all.”

  “Tell me, Dr. Kiera,” I teased. “What is your diagnosis?”

  She swallowed a huge wad of eggs, and plainly said, “Foreplay.”

  The rest of the day was a collection of courses that focused on anger management and a sixty-minute deep breathing meditation. I fell asleep three times. By the afternoon, all I wanted to do was get dinner and go back to bed, but that didn’t happen because I had detention. I changed out of my uniform and into a pair of shorts and a red t-shirt. When I reached the shed, Sacha was there leaning against the side of the shed, looking all kinds of irritated. He wore tan cargo shorts and a white V-neck t-shirt.

  I didn’t see the older man who had helped us yesterday. “Do you know where we’re supposed to work today?” I reluctantly asked.

  “I don’t think it matters,” Sacha shrugged. “We have to do them all, anyway.”

  The barn doors were already open, and I stepped inside. I found my gardening tools where I had left them. Sacha grabbed the wheel barrel and was heading toward the front of the academy. I followed closely behind him, although I was dragging my feet a little. Two hours of yard work sounded like the last thing in the world I wanted to do, especially since I was still sore from yesterday.

  It wouldn’t have been so bad if I had pleasant company. A friendly conversation or some jokes would’ve passed the time quickly. Instead, I was stuck with a brooding shifter whom I had shared an epic kiss with, and then he repeatedly told me how much he didn’t like me. I sighed as he dropped to his knees and began picking out the dead plants. It would appear that we were going to spend the next two hours in silence.

  I positioned myself a few yards away from him, put my gloves on, and started picking out weeds. Without any clouds or shade, the sun gave off an intense amount of heat. It wasn’t long before I was sweating like a pig. I could also feel the sunburn blooming on the back of my neck, but I’d applied sunscreen before I came, so I should be good. Minutes passed by like hours and not a single word from my detention partner. It was about as bad as it could be.

  After we had cleaned out the flower bed, we dumped what we had into a compost bin and headed for the massive pile of mulch. We used our shovels and loaded up the wheel barrel in good time. Before long, the job was complete. I sat back on my heels and took a much-needed break. My mouth was like sandpaper, and that’s when I realized I forgot a water bottle. I scanned the area and noticed a water tap connected to the side of the academy.

  I got up, brushed myself off, and hiked over. There was a long green hose and nozzle rolled up next to the tap. I connected the parts and turned on the water. To my delight, cold water poured out. I pushed the nozzle and gulped down mouthfuls until fully quenched. When I finished drinking, I poured the stream down my back. Sacha must have noticed at some point. I saw him sauntering toward me.

  He came to a stop right in front of me, and he held out his hand for the hose. “Do you mind?”

  That was it. He had nothing to say for nearly two hours, and then he expected me to hand over the water without a please or even a friendly gesture. He would've never known it was here if I hadn’t found it. That was the final straw. I switched the nozzle to high-pressure spray, pushed the handle down, and water spewed out with intense force. I attacked him with it, hitting him first in the chest. The shocked expression on his face said it all.

  “What the hell?” he yelled.

  I laughed and kept going, spraying him all over until he was thoroughly drenched. He kept trying to take the hose from me, but I had fast reflexes. “That’s what you get for acting like such an asshole.”

  After a good thirty seconds of water attack, he got his hand around my wrist and took the hose from me. I couldn’t escape his grip. He poured water over my head and down my back while I was punching him in the chest with my free hand. He was full-belly laughing the entire time. Once I was utterly soaked, he let me go and turned off the tap. We stared at each other for a long moment, then burst out laughing again.

  “That’s one way to cool down,” Sacha said as he ran his fingers through his wet hair.

  “Yeah, I—”

  I stopped mid-sentence as Sacha reached from behind and pulled his shirt over his head. The first time I saw him shirtless, he was far away. Now I had a front-row seat for the smoke show. His body was a collection of thick coiled muscle from his shoulders to his lower abdomen. Ripples and ripples of sculpted perfection. I tried to force myself to stop staring, but I was frozen where I stood. I’d never seen a teenager with a body like that. How he passed as an average human was beyond me.

  He had a body cut like a model in a fitness magazine.

  Sacha’s biceps flexed while he twisted his shirt, squeezing the water out. My mouth felt like it was sagging on the ground, and I was thirsty once more, just not for water. “Are you okay?” he asked, breaking me out of my inappropriate thoughts. “Hello?”

  “I’m fine.” I gazed out into the distance, pretending I was staring at something fascinating. “The sun is getting to me. I can feel the sunburn on my neck.”

  I dared myself to glance in his direction once more, and he had a cocky smirk on his face. “Is it just on your neck, or are you hot all over?”

  Every nerve in my body was firing at the same time. I tried to ignore the flirtation in his voice. I had to remember he didn’t mean it. He was teasing me on purpose to try to mess with me. I cleared my throat. “What?”

  Sacha closed the distance between us and leaned down until I could feel his breath on my ear lobe, and whispered, “I don’t think it’s the sun that’s getting to you.”

  “It’s the heat,” I replied with urgency, in a tone much higher than my normal voice. “I burn easily, but you wouldn’t know that because you don’t know me. I promise it gets bad. Superbad.”

  Sacha inhaled deeply. “That’s not what I smell.”

  I let out a growl and pushed against his ridiculously sculpted abdominal muscles, but he didn’t move. “You know what? I don’t have any super senses, but I can smell your bullshit a mile away. You’re trying to trick me.”

  He slipped his wet shirt back on. “Trick you, how?”

  “I don’t know, yet,” I pointed my index finger into his chest. “But I’ll figure it out.”

  “I’m not the one with secrets,” he replied as he rolled the hose back up and returned it to the spot where I found it.

  I rolled my eyes. “Are we back to me being a spy again?”

  “I’m still convinced that you’re here for a purpose that has nothing to do with your sentencing.” I followed him as we returned to the flower bed and collected all of our gardening tools. He threw everything into the empty wheel barrel. “Let’s not forget I caught you snooping around in the library. Care to admit why you were there?”

  As much as I wanted to punch him in the face, I couldn’t make an enemy of him. I still had to figure out how he broke through the block in my mind when we kissed. I knew he did something, whether he meant to or not, and the fact that Kiera avoided my stare when I asked her about it only increased my suspicions. I had to find a way to make him trust me, and now that we’re out here alone, it seemed like the right time to try.

  We returned to the shed and put our tools away. Leaning against the barn door, I offered Sacha a deal. “If you tell me how you opened the block in my mind, I’ll answer your questions with complete honesty. You have my word.”

  He paused, then turned to face me. “I’m supp
osed to believe you’ll keep your word?”

  “You don’t know me, but I take my reputation seriously,” I replied firmly. “If I say I’m going to do something, I do it. I swear I will answer honestly. No tricks.”

  “Why are these memories so important to you?” he asked, looking at me with genuine curiosity. “What do you think you’ll discover?”

  “They’ll tell me what happened during the weeks I went missing,” I answered. “And the identities of the two vampires I killed.”

  He shoved his hands in his pockets. “You’re admitting you killed those two vampires?”

  “Yes, and no,” I answered. “I killed the vampires, but I was under the influence of compulsion when I did it.” I couldn’t tell him it was Cassius. At least, not now. “I saw the video footage of me killing them, but not how I got there or why I did it.”

  He leaned against the barn door and crossed his arms. “What do you remember?”

  “Pieces or fragments,” I tried to explain. “They show up as pictures, but they make no sense.” He looked confused, so I kept going. “I remember a room, but I don’t know why I was there or where it was. Stuff like that.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Did you tell the council about the compulsion?”

  I pushed off of the barnyard door and headed for the academy. “Your turn.”

  Sacha caught up and kept pace with me. “I have to say I’m impressed by your honesty.”

  “Impressed enough to help me?” I asked, giving him a knowing look.

  He paused and then watched me for a long moment like he was weighing his decision. “Impressed enough to try.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  I slowed to a stop. “You’re going to help me?”

  “I’m saying I’ll try to bring your memories back, yes.” When I didn’t respond from the shock of his decision, he shook his head and said, “You don’t believe me. Why am I not surprised?”

  It wasn’t that I didn’t believe him. As far as I knew, there was no remedy for compulsion. That’s why the practice was outlawed and punishable by death. They taught us that the effects went away on their own, and eventually, the memories returned. But I couldn’t discount his claim. Shifters were notoriously secretive. “You have a cure?”

  “There’s no cure,” he corrected. “I know of a way to bring back memories.”

  I wasn’t a fool. This offer was huge, and not something Sacha would give away out of the kindness of his heart. He would want an exchange. “What’s the cost?”

  “My freedom,” he said plainly. “I want to leave this place.”

  I should’ve expected nothing less. “I don’t have any way of making that happen.”

  “Okay,” he seemed to accept that I was telling the truth. He rubbed the side of his jaw. “If you tell me everything,” he used his fingers to count. “What you remember, how you ended up here, and what you’re planning to do, then I’ll help you get your memories back.”

  “How can I be sure I can trust you?” I asked. “How do I know you won’t take this information and share it with the headmaster or even your pack?”

  “I’ll only tell my pack if what you say endangers them in some way,” he explained. “Other than that, I will keep it to myself. I don’t give two-shits about the headmaster. He can rot.”

  “And how do I know you’re not making this whole thing up to get information from me?” I thought back to what he said at the witches' ceremony. This offer could all be a rouse. “You did say you would do whatever it took to learn the truth.”

  “I’ll prove it,” he said sternly. “When you kissed me in the library, you said a piece of memory returned, right?”

  “We’ve already established this, and from what I remember, you said it had nothing to do with you,” I countered. When he shot me an irritated glare, I decided to play along, “Yes, there was a flash and a memory. It was small, but, yeah, there was a moment I did remember.”

  He nodded his head. “That’s how you know I’m telling the truth.”

  I cocked my head to the side. “But you’re not going to say how you did it.”

  “Nope,” he replied plainly. “Not until you’ve told me everything I want to know.”

  Sacha had a long list of demands, but I already knew his help would come at a high cost. We were attempting to make an exchange, after all. I made my decision. No matter what it took, I had to get my memories back. I held out my hand for Sacha to shake. “Meet me tonight after dinner, and I’ll tell you whatever you want to know. Somewhere safe where we won’t be interrupted. Can you make that happen?”

  “Go to the stables at nine o’clock,” he instructed, accepting my terms with a handshake. “There aren’t many cameras over there. The shifters only use it during a full moon.”

  It seemed unusual that any place here would be secure for a private meeting. “How can you be sure that we won’t get caught?”

  He waved dismissively. “Let me worry about it. You just make sure you’re on time.”

  “Okay, I’ll be there.”

  I was about to head toward the academy front door when he called my name. I turned around, and he said, “Don’t forget to take a shower.” He made a stink face. “A long one.”

  I gave him the middle finger. He was still laughing long after I went inside. As I made my way back to the dorms, I thought about everything I had agreed to do. I was taking a big chance by trusting him, but I’d already established I needed his help. There was no doubt in my mind Sacha had ulterior motives, but his ability to bring back my memories could be a game-changer.

  I had to take the chance.

  I returned to the dorm with Kiera after dinner. It wasn’t quite time to meet Sacha, and I wanted to change my clothes. The temperatures dropped low during the nighttime, and I had no idea how long I’d be in the stables. This process could take hours, but I hoped not. Kiera did most of the talking as we strode down the walkways. They offered mashed potatoes with the steaks, and she was adamant that they should have served baked potatoes.

  It didn’t matter much to me, but food was a big part of a shifter's life, so I pretended I was just as upset as she was. Once we returned to our dorm, she plopped down on her bed and watched me as I moved around the room. I opened the closet doors and pulled out a pair of thick leggings, a long sleeve sweater, and knee-high boots.

  As I laid the clothes across my bed, she said, “That’s an unusual outfit to wear to bed.”

  “I’m going to meet Sacha in the stables at nine,” I answered as I pulled my top over my head. “He has something I need.”

  “I’ll bet he does,” she winked.

  “Very funny.” I slipped on the sweater, and then shrugged off my jeans. I sat down on my bed and tugged the leggings on.

  She lazily flipped through a graphic novel. “I’ll be honest; I didn’t picture you as one of those girls.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean by those girls.”

  “You know,” she shrugged. “The kind of girl that gets freaky in the stables.”

  I was sure my mouth hit the floor. “I’m not going there to get freaky in the stables.”

  She closed her book. “Oh, come on. I haven’t dated anyone since I got here, and even I know that’s where couples go to hook-up.”

  I hadn’t gone to the stables since I was a child, but I remembered they didn’t have horses in there. It was where they imprisoned the shifters that lost control during a full moon. The place was wall-to-wall cages with doors made of metal bars similar to a jail cell. Brick and cement held everything together that wasn’t metal. They designed this place so that no shifter could escape and do severe damage. There was nothing sexy about it.

  After I got my boots on, I sat next to her on the corner of the bed. Kiera showed me over and over again that she could be trusted, so I decided to tell her the truth. “I’m going to tell you something that practically no one knows.” She shifted her body toward me, eager to hear what I had to say. “I did kill those two v
ampires, but I did it because another vampire had used compulsion on me.”

  Kiera looked puzzled. “Why aren’t you telling anyone about the compulsion?”

  “Because we couldn’t prove it,” I answered honestly. “The tension between factions is at an all-time high, and my father didn’t think it would be a good idea to make accusations against the vampires without solid evidence.”

  “That’s why you’re here, isn’t it?” she questioned. “You want to find a way to prove your innocence.”

  “It’s one of the reasons I didn’t fight the charges, yes,” I admitted. “But that’s not why I need Sacha.” She bit her bottom lip, and I was sure she was taking my comment in the wrong direction. “You need to get your head out of the gutter. I need Sacha because he admitted he could help me get my memories back.”

  Kiera put her hand over her mouth. “He’s going to give you his blood?”

  Sacha never said how he was going to do it, but Kiera didn’t need to know that. Maybe now she’ll reveal what she knows about it. “He never told me how it all works. Do you know?”

  “I know a little bit,” she cringed. “I’m sorry I wasn’t honest about it when you asked me. It’s one of those things we’ve sworn never to tell. Like a trade secret. I hope you’re not angry.”

  “I’m not,” I insisted. “Everyone has secrets. Plus, I’ve withheld things from you too. I promise we’re cool.”

  She let out a relieved breath. “Okay, I’ll tell you what I know, but I’ve never seen it performed. Honestly, I’m surprised he offered to do it.”

  “Why? Does it hurt him in some way?”

  She waved her hands. “It’s nothing painful or anything. It’s just that it’s…intimate.”

  My shoulders tensed. “How intimate?”

  Kiera rose from the bed and paced around the room. I saw her mumbling something under her breath like she was trying to find the right words to explain. The longer I waited, the more nervous I got. I needed her to spit it out, but I didn’t want to be rude. “From what I understand, a compulsion isn’t just a trick of the mind. The vampire who did it has to share some of his blood. That’s why it takes so long for the compulsion to wear off.”