by Zara Zenia
However, we all voted that the party would now be just between us and maybe a few other people we trusted. It was going to be nothing but a cover so that we could all get together, including Tom, and talk about things freely without anyone getting suspicious or trying to use their mind powers to manipulate us. Oh well, we could still have some fun while we were talking.
After getting everything ready and making sure we would all have plenty of snacks, good music, and most importantly drinks, I went to pick up Marina. When I arrived at Sleepy Hollow, I was feeling great. This was going to be an amazing time, and I was sure to get my dick wet, as they say in the states. Maybe Marina would finally be interested in a little action with more than one person too.
I pulled up in my now fully functional sedan and messaged Marina to let her know I was in the parking lot. Daniel and Colin were with her so there was no need for me to escort her around campus. I think she was getting annoyed by how "over-protective" we were being about that. But hey, nothing bad was going to happen to her while we were on watch. That was ... nothing else. I felt bad about her being attacked when I should have been there. Whoever this person was needed to be stopped. If I could be the one to do that, I would be happy. Especially in my dragon form. Maybe some hot girls would see me do it and reward me.
"Hey there," I said as Marina appeared by my driver side window and made her way to the back door after giving me a kiss on the cheek.
"Hi, handsome," she said. "Thanks for picking us up."
"What's up?" said Colin as he went to get in the other side's back door.
"Hold up," said Daniel. "Marina, you have to take shotgun. I'll sit in the back."
"No, it's fine. I know you two are great buddies and all. It feels like maybe you should get shotgun with your boy Vlad." She was making fun like Daniel was my bitch or something.
I laughed.
"Hey, either way doesn't bother me," I said.
"Look, the driver's girl rides up front with him. That's you, Marina," Daniel said.
Once she was sitting beside me and everyone was in the car, we were away. After we'd been driving for some time, Marina took a serious tone of voice.
"Guys, I know you probably wish this were a real party and all, but remember that tonight's about having a chance to talk face to face, all five of us. That's the priority, okay?"
I felt like she was directing that largely toward myself. We all agreed, since that had been the purpose of the party.
And we were true to our word too. I enjoyed two or three beers, sure, but that was basically the same as not even drinking at all for me! Haha. "Are you sure you don't want a beer," I asked Colin again. It was starting to bother me that he would not share just one drink with us. Daniel had partaken in one with me, and Marina had even had a vodka with orange juice.
"This isn't a real party, remember?" said Colin. "Besides ... I've never really drank before. I mean, of course there was the occasional one since I turned eighteen, but I just don't like it that much. No hard feelings."
"You are serious? Alright, fine then." I decided it would be best to leave it there. Americans could be very strange sometimes. Or maybe it was just a Fae thing. When Tom arrived, I was expecting him to give me the same story, but he took a beer and shared it with me too. Dragons were a thirsty people, what can I say?
"Okay, now that we're all here. The few other guests aren't due to arrive for another hour or so. That will give us plenty of time to discuss things, but it won't seem suspicious like we were gathering just the five of us in some secret meeting."
"That's perfect," said Tom. He seemed to act like he was the one in charge; like Marina was running everything by him and we were just secondary in this relationship. I was not entirely sold on his innocence yet, but the evidence was starting to pile up that he had nothing to do with it. Still, I did not like rich boys who needed their parents to help them out all the time.
"Okay, so we all know that there were two attackers yesterday. I am confident they were around our age, not more than five or so years off at least. One was most likely a woman, or a guy trying to make me think he was a woman for some reason. The other was a slim, tall boy who wasn't very physically confident.
"That doesn't narrow it down very much," Tom said.
"Could be just about anyone," Daniel added.
Someone knocked on the door, startling all of us. Marina and Colin noticeably jumped. I was starting to think Colin was a really decent guy, but I would not want to trust him in a fight. He was not only feminine in a strange way due to being a Fae, but he was also the artsy emotional type who had probably never been hit in his life.
"Who the fuck could that be?" I asked no one in particular as I went to answer the door. This was my friend's house, and they had promised not to tell anyone about the little gathering.
"Hey, what's up, bitches?" said an already partway drunk girl who was in second year with me. I did not know her apart from having seen her around campus and in some classes though. She had long blonde hair and big tits, which I did not mind. There were several other girls with her.
"This party is invite only," I said. "You will have to go."
"Are you serious? You're turning us away? Us?" she asked with an honestly shocked look on her face, as though she had never been turned down for anything in her life by any guy. Judging by how attractive and loose she seemed, she probably had not been.
"This is a private gathering," said Daniel, coming to the door to back me up. He also stood by me to prevent the girls from seeing in at the others who were inside. "I'm sure you ladies won't have any trouble finding somewhere else to party. Bye." He closed the door and we returned to our seats, while we could hear the small group of intoxicated young women cursing us out loudly, but only among themselves.
"Did anyone post a status about this?" I asked.
"Are you serious?" said Marina. "Who would be that stupid?" She looked around from one of us to the next. The looks on each of the guys' faces were enough to tell me they were not that dumb.
"That would be crazy," said Tom. He seemed to be acting defensive, but the guy had been accused of a lot lately. I would have been nervous too.
"No," said Colin. "It's not like I post about partying any other time. Why would I do it now?"
"Hey, we can always check. And I don't think any of us would have told anyone directly, right?" Daniel asked. Again, we all shrugged and shook our heads with confusion.
We started to discuss things again, with Marina acting as the head of the meeting. Again, there was a knock on the door. This time it was a lot louder and followed by even more knocking.
"What the fuck?" I said, getting up with force this time and stomping over to the door. "I already told you——" I began to say as I swung the door open, ready to give those girls a piece of my mind. But it was not them. At least, it was not only them. There must have been a good twenty people out there. A van and several cars were parked on the street now.
"Who fucking told you about this?" I asked the guy who had been knocking.
He looked offended, the happy grin disappearing from his face. He had a bottle of rum in his hand that he was about to take a swig from, but he lowered it in a shameful way. I felt bad for the guy. But I was pissed off.
"What are you doing here?" I asked him in a scolding tone.
"What? What do you mean? Everyone's been invited to this party. This is Jay's house, right?"
"This is my buddy Jay's house, yes, and he is going to be here soon for the private gathering between just a few of his close friends. Where did you hear about this?"
"My, my friend told me about it," the nervous guy said. He must have only been a freshman and I didn't not recognize him from Sleepy Hollow. Maybe he wasn't even a student, come to think of it. I did recognize most of the others who had gathered on the lawn not far from the house. They seemed unfazed by what I had told this kid.
"Hey, this is a party, right?" said another guy. This one I did know, because he was o
n the football team with Daniel and myself. "Vlad, my man, what's up?" He greeted me with a hearty handshake and a slap on the shoulder. "We getting messy tonight or what?" He walked by me and I did not try to stop him. It would be very bad form to deny a fellow teammate access to a party like that. My hands were basically tied, you could say.
People began to drink and dance, with the music quickly being turned up loud. That was not a problem, since Jay's parents owned this place and rented it to him and his roommates. The neighbors knew we were going to have a gathering here and were cool with it.
While people danced and drank downstairs, the five of us went up to Jay's bedroom for some privacy. "Well, I suppose the party will still be good cover," said Marina.
"Yeah, and it's not like anyone'll hear what we're saying with all the noise downstairs," Daniel said.
"This might actually be for the best," added Tom as though it had all been his great idea or something. "This is perfect actually."
"I wouldn't go that far," said Colin. Marina was sitting at the edge of the bed with Tom by her side. Colin, Daniel, and I were sitting on the plush rug that I know for a fact Jay's parents had paid a lot of money for. It was pretty comfortable.
"So, I think we need to think about the possibility of a serial killer," blurted out Colin. He was not the best at easing into things like that. Sometimes I wondered if he wasn't a tiny bit autistic or something, not that there was a problem with that.
"What?" asked Daniel.
"That's pretty extreme," said Tom. "We don't even know for sure this was a murder." He was very eager to deflect accusations for some reason.
"Think about it," Colin continued. "One witch is dead already. There is evidence of mind magic, and foul play. And then mind magic was used on you, Marina. And those bats they had; they weren't trying to play ball."
"I know..." she said, shrinking into herself a little at the thought of an attempted murder against her. "I guess I've been trying not to think about it."
Tom put his arm around her, and I felt a pang of jealously that my buddies sitting on the floor must have shared.
"You never thought they might have wanted to do more than just injure you?" asked Colin with no tact at all.
"Hey, she didn't want to think about it," said Daniel.
"No, no it's fine. I told myself to stop acting like this was all happening to me. That worked too, until it did start happening to me. If you tell yourself to stop being so self-involved enough during a traumatic situation, it's hard to reverse that I suppose."
Tom jostled her a little with his arm, and I could only barely see his hand rubbing her back just below the shoulder from where I was sitting. He said, "That is understandable. You've been very brave," he said. "Who here agrees we might be dealing with some kind of witch killer here?"
All of us agreed. "Okay," said Colin, "but that doesn't help us find out who did it. Someone with mind magic strong enough to have such a big effect on Marina can't be a student here, could they? Wouldn't that kind of thing be well known? They'd be at the top of all the mind magic classes."
"Well, one of us here is at the top of their class in mind magic, only they don't go to Sleepy Hollow..." said Marina.
I had to think for a moment to make sure I was hearing her properly.
"What, baby?" Tom asked, leaning back and craning his head forwards so he could look her in the eye better. It was such a condescending use of body language too.
"I'm not saying you did it. I'm saying that someone might be trying to frame you. It would be the perfect way to cover their tracks and turn us all against each other. Maybe they were hoping someone would take you out of the picture for them. Maybe they think they can go after you next and it will be too difficult to figure out who did it with so many students at our school out for your blood."
"Using the angry students who don't like the idea of you two dating ... that would be good cover," said Colin quietly like he had just had an "aha" moment. His contemplation was broken just as Colin was about to speak again. There was a commotion coming from downstairs. I could hear Jay yelling as I opened the door, so I rushed down the stairs three at a time and landed before a fight.
A couple was standing in front of Jay and some of the football guys. One of them had their hand on the guy's shoulder, only he was not doing much arguing. That must have been more of a precautionary measure. It was the girl who he'd come with who was making all the noise.
"Fuck you!" she yelled in Jay's face. "You're a freak just like the rest of these assholes."
"Look, Carlotta, I don't know what your problem is, but you can take it off my property," said Jay.
It did not look like he needed any help. I looked up and saw Marina standing at the top of the stairs trying to remain at least partially hidden. Her other three boyfriends were gathered around her. I felt good that they were there to make sure nothing could happen to her while I helped to calm this down.
"Wait, Carlotta? I think we have some classes together," I said. "Talk to me, what is your problem here?"
The girl wheeled around to face me, and by the way she moved so haphazardly, I could tell she was totally wasted. "Who the fuck are you? A fucking vampire! Get away from me you blood sucking freak!" She looked like she was about to take a swing at me with the small bottle of bright pink drink in her hand. Instead, she took a large drink from that and did not stop until she had emptied the contents completely.
"I am not a vampire," I said. It was common for me to be mistaken for one, given my completion and jet black hair. Plus, my size and the fact that my parents were clueless enough about paranormals at the time to name me Vlad when I was not a vampire.
"Oh, is that so? Well fuck off anyway."
"Vlad, it's cool I got this," said Jay. "Everyone! Just go back to enjoying yourselves. Put the music back on!" It did not take long for the music to start pumping again. A lot of people went back to other areas of the house, or they at least pretending they were no longer paying attention while still remaining close enough to keep an eye on the excitement.
"Vlad? Are you shitting me? You're not a vampire, hey Vlad! Oh, I believe that you neck ripping freak. At least other frat boys like you just fuck unconscious girls. Vampires like you aren't happy with taking that much. No, you gotta drain the life from 'em!" She swung the empty bottle at me, but I had been expecting that might happen and was ready for it. I had consumed a good five or so beers at that point in the night, and I will admit that I lost control just a little.
My dragon form showed itself. I did not take on my full dragon form, or I might have done some real damage. But at I swung my hand up to block the attack from the drunken girl, I took a half dragon form. The scales and spines tore at my clothes and my muscles bulged out. I growled deeply, enjoying the utter terror in Carlotta's eyes as the glass bottle smashed against my thick, scaly forearm.
She turned to run, but two of Jay's friends restrained her. I was about to start yelling at her when I suddenly felt like it was all okay. I was not even mad anymore. She really was a beautiful girl. Lovely skin, kind of dark like mocha. Her warm brown eyes were fixed on me like she had never hated anyone so much in her entire life. But I had no more animosity left for her. The other guys let go of her arms. I noticed her black hair had some of the residual drink in it from the bottle she had swung. That would be sticky later. I felt bad for her.
"Get out of here!" came a voice.
I wasn't sure who that had been, since it came from outside the front door that was now open. Carlotta ran surprisingly fast even for a girl with a well-toned athletic frame. As she made her way through the door, I suddenly started to hate the girl for what she had done.
"What the fuck?" said one of the other footballers standing near Jay.
"I think we need to report this to the campus police," said one of the girls who was standing nearby gawking. It was a good idea. Jay was the one to call it in, while myself and the other football guys cleared everyone else out of the house. They then le
ft too. Jay had not been drinking, so he gave Marina, myself, Daniel, and Colin a lift home in my car. Tom only had one beer and had his full license, so he drove himself home. I was glad to not be around him anymore for some reason. I could not help but feel like he had been involved in all of this, despite how farfetched that was.
Soon enough we heard from the campus police that Carlotta had been found and taken in by the campus police to be questioned. It was about time they did something useful instead of bothering innocent students, as far as I was concerned. Although, I felt secretly vindicated about Tom being detained. He was a spoiled brat anyway.
13
Marina
It was awful timing, but my turn to be questioned and scanned was the next day. I was glad about not having anything to drink. Being the lightweight I was with alcohol, who knew how few it might have taken to give me a hangover? That was the last thing I needed while being mentally and magically probed like that.
They called me to let me know that I was required at the campus police headquarters. I put on some sensible clothes, just a long-sleeved black top that buttoned up respectably high, and a black skirt with a wholesome floral pattern printed on it. That went below the knees, but I wore some black stockings too. Hey, just because I was trying to look like the nice, innocent student I was, doesn't mean I was about to betray my witchiness and give up my favorite color of clothing.
I arrived right after they called me and walked up to the front desk in the receiving area. This section was separated from the rest of the headquarters by walls and solid doors, unlike the glass door at the entrance. "Hello, can I help you?" asked the officer who must have been in his thirties. He looked like he was at least a touch agitated, and like he possibly hadn't been getting as much sleep as he would have liked. They must have been under a lot of stress for all kinds of people to get to the bottom of this.
"Hi, I'm Marina Kendall, you—"
He cut me off before I could finish. "Okay, have a seat over there and I'll let you know when they're ready for you. Please don't wander around or go anywhere." He was curt to the point of seeming almost hostile. I chalked that up to stress and overtime, so I didn't take it to heart.
