Violet Blood

by Sophia Stafford

  “Yeah, I think I remember now.” Jaycen threw the bed sheets to the side and shot out of bed. “Do you have a pen and paper?”

  Thornton reached over to the side of bed, picking up a notebook and pen. “Maybe, you should take it easy. Just, sit down for a minute? You’ve been unconscious for nine hours or so.”

  She sat down next to him, taking the pen and paper, and started sketching what she had seen. She really couldn’t draw, but she needed to show him what she saw, somehow. “Gemma, how is she? Is she okay?”

  “Yeah, she’s at the hospital. The paramedics came just after I made the two of you unconscious. Someone called Benedict and he turned up soon after. They moved Gemma to the nurse’s office early in the morning. She’ll probably be awake by now, we’ll go over and see her if you want.”

  Benedict knew she had been drinking; the thought should petrify her. But it didn’t. The pitch-black eyes petrified her. “I saw a monster. It was real, and it was attacking Gemma, and then it attacked me.” Her words were barely a whisper as her hand drew furiously on the paper. No, it didn’t look this, she turned over the page and started again.

  “I can’t believe I’m having to say this again, but they don’t exist. I was there, Jaycen, I didn’t see anything.” His voice was soft, too soft. He thought she was crazy, or just plain didn’t believe her at the very least.

  “Yeah, I didn’t see anything either. But then, it was like I was pulled into Gemma’s head. I could see it all; I could feel it all. It was horrible.” She looked up, holding his eyes before she continued. “And it was real; I swear to god it was real.”

  Thornton just stared at her, his eyes boring into hers.

  “I don’t know why I didn’t remember; it was like my head was foggy, then the fog cleared. Now, I remember, and I swear I’m not making this up.” She held up the notepad and turned it so he could see it. The drawing was just terrible, but it showed the basic idea. The creature was there, its long thin legs or tentacles spreading out. The large lumps weeping and its large, black eyes looking back at them.

  “You saw this?” Thornton took her paper from her as she nodded, one hundred percent certain. “I think we should talk to Gemma. There could be a few things that happened last night.” He stood, picking up a discarded top from the floor.

  “You don’t believe me,” she said simply, feeling completely deflated.

  “No, no. I believe you. But there is definitely more going on here. I’m not lying when I say monsters don’t exist. They really, really don’t.”

  That was enough for Jaycen, so she shot up, thankful she was still dressed from the night before.

  “Don’t worry,” Thornton laughed, noticing her looking down at her clothes, “we’ll go to your dorm before we go to Gemma; you can change there.”

  “I just need to brush my teeth. Do you have a spare toothbrush?” He nodded. “Then, as gross as it is, I don’t mind. We can just go straight to Gemma.” It wasn’t like she had been wearing a skirt and crop top; she was fully covered. Apart from the serious case of bed hair and her heels, people would never know she was rocking yesterday’s clothes.

  He looked amused. “Suit yourself.”

  Jaycen followed him to his small bathroom and he passed her an unopened toothbrush. He had a pile of them. This shouldn’t have bothered her, but it did.

  “Take your time. Come out when you’re ready.” He left her then, closing the door behind him.

  Jaycen stared at her reflection in the mirror, her crazy hair looking like a lion’s mane around her face, her bruised face still incredibly purple, even under her worn and messed up make-up.

  Pulling a hair band from her trouser pocket, she pulled her hair back into a high ponytail, and after brushing her teeth and splashing her face with water, she was ready. She opened the door as Thornton was pulling on a t-shirt, his back to her.

  “What else do you need?” He turned around, twisting the large, gold ring on his pinky finger as he looked at her.

  “I’m done.” Didn’t she look done? Well, that was embarrassing. Thornton looked great; the dark green top he had just shoved on matching his eyes perfectly. She wondered if that had been deliberate; had he bought the top knowing it matched his eyes?

  “That’s it? You look like that with no makeup on and a bruised face?” He was full on staring at her now, his expression completely confused.

  “Yeah,” she shot back, kind of defensively. “You’ve literally just seen me without makeup on.”

  Thornton scratched his chin. “Yeah, but I thought you still had makeup on from the night before or something. Other girls wear makeup.”

  She had no idea what to say to that, so she stayed silent.

  “You look really good, bruised and all.”

  “Oh, well, thank you.” She smiled a little, doubting that he was telling the truth; how could she with such a big bruise on her face? But she loved that he said it nonetheless. Two compliments in one day, she liked it; she liked it a lot.

  Thornton on the other hand looked like he was in pain, like the mere admission that she looked good had hurt him somehow.

  He moved to the door and opened it, waiting for her to walk through. “We should get going.”

  Silently, Thornton led the way from his dorm to the nurse’s building. Jaycen hobbled behind him, her feet still hurting from the night before. Of course, they were getting odd looks as they walked, but nothing new. A few people said hi to him as they passed; he nodded his head in greeting.

  “Is Benedict pissed that I was there last night? You know, out of school grounds and stuff,” Jaycen asked once they were in the nurse’s building.

  “Yes, I was.”

  Well, damn. Benedict was coming down the stairs with a stony face, and his eyes fixed solely on Jaycen.

  “Oh, hey there, Mr Ravensmith. What’s up?” She was in trouble, how much was yet to be determined, but she was definitely in trouble.

  “Apart from the fact that I have a problem with students, underage students, sneaking off campus when they should be asleep in their dorms? No, nothing’s up. Another boring day in my life.”

  She grinned at him. “Check you out, making a joke. I’m very proud.”

  He still didn’t smile back at her. “Well, I’m not of you. Are you really that incapable of following the rules? Do you go out of your way to make my life difficult?”

  She thought about that long and hard. “Me going to the party didn’t cause you any hassle. What happened at the party did. Something, may I add, that had nothing to do with me.”

  Thornton snorted beside her, he then pressed his lips together, trying to hide his smile.

  “Don’t think you’re off the hook either; you knew she was there. You also know she’s underage. Both of you are going to be punished for this; I don’t know how yet, but you are.”

  Jaycen scowled. “A little less of the underage stuff, okay? I’m eighteen in two weeks.”

  Benedict’s head turned to her so fast she was sure he’d given himself whiplash. “This is serious, Jaycen. Whilst you are at this school, you are under my protection. What’s worse is that you know what has happened here over the past few weeks. Both of you do, and yet you still left this school campus to get drunk. How you even got into a bar is a mystery to me. I get it; you don’t look seventeen, but you sure as hell don’t look twenty-one.”

  She thought it was probably best that she didn’t bring up Lara.

  “So… Gemma,” she said, changing the subject as fast as she could. “Can I go and see her? Have you seen her? Is she okay?”

  The sharp look in Benedict’s eyes slipped, showing just a glimpse of his concern, but it was enough to set Jaycen on edge.

  “She is okay, right?”

  “She’s not woken up yet.”

  “What? That isn’t possible? I put her to sleep, not in a coma.” Thornton stepped forward, his sudden concern now making Jaycen even more worried than she already was. “What are her vitals like?”

&n
bsp; “Everything is normal,” Benedict said, now solely talking to Thornton. “Her brain activity is normal too. The medical staff are just clearing up, then Zena will try a few things.”

  “Well, Jaycen has a few things to tell you. Maybe she could shine some kind of light on what happened to her.”

  “Yeah, yeah, but first, I need to see her,” Jaycen cut in, her heart pounding in her chest so hard it hurt. Benedict nodded and turned and led the way up the stairs. Benedict and Thornton were talking about something, but Jaycen wasn’t listening. All she could do was think about Gemma. Nothing could happen to Gemma; it just couldn’t. It was simply unthinkable; she was the nicest person Jaycen had ever met.

  Benedict led the way into a small room. Gemma’s still body lay on a bed, her skin almost grey and her eyes closed.

  “Oh my God.” Jaycen stumbled forward, reaching for Gemma’s cold hand. This was worse than she thought, a lot worse.

  “This isn’t my spell,” Thornton muttered, walking around Gemma’s bed so he was on the other side. He dug in his pocket and handed Benedict Jaycen’s badly drawn picture. “We didn’t see it when she started, but Gemma was on the floor when we first got to her. She couldn’t breathe but nothing was around her neck and she wasn’t choking. I was about to put her to sleep but then, I don’t know, Jaycen started choking too. She said she saw this.” He handed Benedict the picture. Jaycen stayed silent; she didn’t mind them talking about her like she wasn’t there. She was more focused on rubbing Gemma’s cold hands, trying to get them to warm up.

  “What was it like? When you saw this?” Benedict asked, taking a seat at the end of the bed and leaning forward.

  “It was cold, and grey. Everything was grey. It was floating above her. It was like, like I was feeling what was happening to her.” And now Gemma was here, in some sort of a coma. How had everything got so bad?

  “Do you remember what you were thinking before you saw it? The monster, I mean?” Benedict gently pried.

  Thornton’s body straightened as he waited for her answer.

  “I don’t know.” It had all happened so fast, but she had wanted to help Gemma, she had… “I wanted to see what she was seeing,” she said, finishing her thought out loud.

  “You went into her mind,” Benedict told her, his voice mirroring the disbelief his face was showing.

  “How?” Thornton asked, his face showing the same disbelief that Benedict’s was.

  “I don’t know.” Was that what she had done? She let go of Gemma’s hand and rubbed her neck, remembering the feeling of not being able to breathe as something invisible tightened around it. “But it was bloody horrible.”

  Benedict closed his eyes, rubbing his temples, and groaning. “None of this is making sense.”

  “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: monsters. Monsters are hunting down students, taking us out one by one,” Jaycen told them, matter-of-fact.

  “Please, for the love of God, stop saying that,” Thornton stressed. “Monsters don’t exist, they just don’t.”

  She shot him an annoyed look, narrowing her eyes a little as she said, “I’ve seen one, with my own eyes. How do you explain that, huh? How?”

  Thornton’s mouth clamped shut.

  “Yeah, that’s what I thought,” she replied. Her smugness was cut short when Benedict spoke.

  “He’s right; monsters don’t exist.” He stared down at the picture in his hand. “And only you and Gemma saw this, just like Perry was the only one seeing his attacker.”

  Jaycen and Thornton both stayed silent, neither following Benedict’s train of thought.

  “Someone’s casting a powerful spell, making you see things that aren’t really there.”

  Jaycen scrunched up her face. “But the… things—” She shot Thornton a look, hoping he had caught her deliberate word choice. “—hurt people. Me and Gemma were choked by one; Perry was almost clawed to death. No one can sit here and tell me Amy’s death wasn’t also involved. These things are real, or real enough to actually kill people.”

  Benedict got to his feet. “I need to speak to Azrael. Until then, the school is on lockdown. All students will need to stay in their dorms until further notice.”

  “What if it’s one of the students that’s doing it?” Thornton asked, crossing his arms and leaning against the wall.

  “No student is that powerful.” Benedict shook his head, completely adamant. “This kind of spell, or hex or whatever it is, it’s powerful. Too powerful for most alive today.”

  “Deep violet?” Thornton said.

  “Oh, yeah. Real deep.”

  It could be someone at the school, someone from a powerful family. Someone who wouldn’t care about the wellbeing of someone beneath them. Someone who must have been at the party the night before. Before her mind could catch up with what she was doing, Jaycen kicked off her heels, and started running out the door, ignoring Thornton and Benedict’s calls from behind her. She knew who was doing this.

  Chapter 21

  “Stephen!” Jaycen shouted, her running slowing to a fast walk. There he stood, flanked by his followers, and staring at her, a smug smile on his face.

  “I don’t think you’re qualified to say my—”

  Whatever he was going to say was lost as her fist connected with his face, bone cracking under its force.

  “What did you do to her?” she screamed, going down with him, fisting his shirt in her hands and forcing him to look at her. “Tell me. What did you do?”

  “Get her off me! Get her off me!” he screamed, trying to twist away from her. Her grip was too tight for him to move far, so now he stared up at her, eyes wide and nose bleeding.

  He was afraid. His fear was pouring off him in waves, and everyone could see it. Good, Jaycen thought, he should be scared. Before she could get another hit in, two pairs of hands pulled her off him, throwing her on the ground.

  “Get off me!” she screamed, her arms whipping out, her magic sending Stephen’s two friends flying in opposite directions, both hitting the ground hard. Her body was now shaking with rage—or her power, she wasn’t sure.

  Jaycen got to her feet, now face to face with Stephen. Their fight was causing a scene and attracting a lot of attention as students gathered around them.

  “What did you do to her?” she repeated.

  Stephen wiped his nose, his eyes darting to the crowd around them. “You have no idea what you’ve just done. You’re going to be in so much trouble.”

  His threat was shaky and weak; Jaycen stepped forward as Stephen stepped back.

  “What did you do to Gemma?” Her hands were twitching, like they were itching to get to him. Her mind might not understand her power, but her body did. Her body knew it could make him tell her what she wanted to know.

  “Kick her ass, Stephen!” someone shouted out. The shoutout seemed to give him a boost of confidence. His eyes hardened just a second before his arm was in the air. Cheers rang as the other students realised what he was trying to do.

  It was as if she could see it coming towards her in slow motion, a gust of air ready to take her out. Her hands came up of their own accord, catching his spell, and holding onto it tightly. She could feel its energy; she could tell how much power it held just by holding it. The cheers hushed around them, leaving nothing but a deadly silence.

  Stephen turned to run away, his face now pale.

  Like she had done it hundreds of times before, Jaycen shot the power back at Stephen, the force hitting him in the back, and knocking him to the ground. Stephen groaned, rolling over but staying on the floor.

  “Oh god, are you okay?” one of his friends called, none of them coming to help him. Jaycen took her time approaching.

  “Gemma. What did you do to her last night?” She stared down at him, her hands clenched at her sides.

  “Nothing.”

  “You’re lying.” She dropped to her knees, grabbing a fistful of his shirt, and pulling him up. “You’ve done something to her, made he
r see things. Get her out of it, now.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about! I didn’t do anything.”

  “Jaycen, let go of him!” Benedict’s sharp order pulled her from her rage-induced haze.

  Stephen was shaking, blood still pouring from his nose. Those around them were now completely silent, all of them just watching the exchange. She let go of his shirt and stood. Thornton and Benedict had broken through the crowd now and had seen a bloody Stephen on the ground.

  Benedict ran forward and was kneeling at Stephen’s side in an instant. “Try to keep still, Stephen. Jaycen, go to my office, now.”

  “He’s the one who attacked Gemma,” she shot back, her body still buzzing.

  “I didn’t do shit,” Stephen spat. “She attacked me; everyone saw.”

  “I know; don’t worry about that now. Just stay still.” Benedict took off his jacket and placed it under Stephen’s head. Then, his voice turned harsh, harsher than she had ever heard it before. “Jaycen. Go to my office. Now.”

  A few teachers came running over then, Benedict’s brother Caleb being one of them. “I need everyone to go to their dorms now.” Caleb clapped his hands to get everyone’s attention. “Go to your dorms, and do not come out until you are called. Go, now.”

  The crowd started to slowly disperse, most of them staring at Jaycen as they passed. They thought she was a monster, but they didn’t know what Stephen had done; they hadn’t seen Gemma unconscious in a hospital bed.

  Thornton took her arm and tugged gently. “We have to go.”

  Numbly, she nodded and let him lead her away. She stumbled over the uneven ground, unable to lift her legs to walk correctly.

  “Using magic, it takes a lot out of you. Zaps your energy.” Thornton gently wrapped his arm around her midriff, taking most of her weight.

  Thornton led the way to Benedict’s office, letting himself in, and closing the door behind him. He sat Jaycen down on one of the plush chairs and crouched down in front of her.