Elemental Shining (Paranormal Public Series) (18 page)

Sip rammed her muzzle into my leg, pushing me back. I glared at her but took a step behind Lisabelle. I hated that my friends tried to protect me at the cost of their own safety. I often thought that cost was too high.

But Sip was right to insist on being the one to investigate. In werewolf form she could move quickly, in absolute silence. Her paw steps made no noise, whereas if I had tried to rush ahead I would probably have tripped and fallen.

“What’s up in front of us?” Lisabelle asked. This was her first time in the Long Building, so she had never seen it in daylight.

I shrugged. “A couple of empty rooms, then the doors to the outside. Oh, wait, there’s also a storage room for broken artifacts.”

It was a room I had passed but never gone into. Dacer had waved his hand toward it with visible disdain when he gave me a tour, basically making it sound like a room for stuff that should have been thrown away instead of kept.

“So, it’s a perfect place to hide,” whispered Lisabelle hoarsely. Sip had disappeared in front of us. I wished we had some signal to let us know she was alright, but instead the two of us just stood and waited, with our ears perked to hear the slightest sound.

Then, the deep howl of a werewolf in agony broke the silence. The noise echoed down the hall, surrounding us and passing us. Instead of stopping it kept going, so loud it could probably be heard at the library. Fear gripped me.

Lisabelle and I dashed forward, not thinking, to help our friend.

“SIP,” I yelled. There was no longer any reason to be quiet. Whoever had attacked Sip knew we were there.

The first two rooms were empty, just as I remembered them. The third room, the one filled with junk, was not.

A furry body was sprawled at the doorway.

“NO,” Lisabelle yelled, throwing herself on the floor next to her friend.

Sip changed back into her human form at Lisabelle’s touch. She was awake, but barely.

“He. . . .” Sip said feebly, trying to point, “I thought it was just a Shadow.”

Lisabelle looked frantically around. I stood motionless for only a second, then the commotion at the main entrance drew my attention.

I plunged into the darkness, intent on catching Sip’s attacker.

“Charlotte NO,” Lisabelle’s voice rang out behind me, but she didn’t try to stop me.

I looked over my shoulder. “Get help for Sip,” I yelled. “Call Keller. He will heal her.” I hoped he would. I knew he would come and be very angry at me for putting myself in danger.

 I also knew that Lisabelle wouldn’t leave Sip, and I was on my own. I raced past the main entrance, but I could still hear footsteps running down the hall, so I knew the attacker hadn’t left the building. I put my head down and ran faster. I couldn’t see, so I was going on my memory from when Dacer had shown me around to find my way.

I had only been down to this end of the building once with Dacer. Otherwise I had just walked right to the Museum. Now I wished I knew all the rooms better.

There were too many rooms where someone could hide. I halted, breathing hard, and listened. At first all I could hear was air raggedly going in and out of my lungs, then my heart, beating from running and fury. Then silence. The longer I stood there the quieter it became. Whoever was in the building with me wasn’t moving either, but he was still there. I felt sure of it.

I didn’t stop to consider what I was doing or who it might be. It occurred to me that it might be someone like Dove or Zervos, and if that was the case then I was in big trouble, because I was about to attack. If I ended up attacking a dean or a professor they would kick me out for sure, but I couldn’t worry about that just now. All I could think about was my friend and how I didn’t know if she would be okay.

I stepped into the middle of the hallway, bracing my hands on either side of the wall. Then I lifted my ring, calling a wall of fire.

Forgetting I was exhausted, my anger fueled the fire around me. I watched the blaze grow in front of me.

I had never called to the part of me that was a fire elemental before tonight, not to attack. Now that I did I enjoyed the burning. The fire warmed my skin as it expanded, blasting away the dark. I ordered it to expand into the rooms on each side, swallowing the air as it expanded.

If there was a paranormal in the path of my wall of fire he had nowhere to hide.

I stepped forward, pushing the fire in front of me, hearing the crunch of burned wood that the floor had become. I hoped it incinerated everything.

I heard a scream and the breaking of glass. Instantly I cut off my fire wall and raced into the nearest room. It was filled with junk, a broken chair here, an oversized locket on a massive chain there. I nearly tripped over a yellow tire wheel. As Dacer had put it, this was where style had gone to die a slow death.

Everything looked slightly melted as I picked my way through the debris. My wall of fire had been hotter than I thought.

The middle window was broken, as if someone had just launched himself through it. I darted toward it and peered out into the night. As the cold air hit my face, my feet crunched the broken glass that was now strewn across the floor. Peering outside, I saw nothing but the gentle field and the trees in the distance. This side of the building faced the woods and the force field around Public.

I wanted to scream in frustration.

Whoever had attacked Sip and been following us had gotten away.

I ran back to my friends. Keller was already there, working on Sip. It turned out that she had a pretty nasty gash in her head, and her white-blond hair was stained with blood.

Lisabelle was kneeling next to her, holding one of Sip’s hands in both of her own.

“Is she going to be okay?” I asked, panting a little from my run. I had gone further into the Long Building than I had realized, and it had taken me a while to get back.

Keller glanced up at me, his eyes softening a little. “She’ll be just fine. It’s good Lisabelle called me. Are you okay? They said you went after him?” I couldn’t ignore that Keller’s mouth was set in a thin line, or the worry in his voice.

“I’m fine,” I reassured him. “But I didn’t catch him.”

“I gotta say I’m glad,” said Lisabelle, her brow furrowed.

“I can take care of myself,” I said testily. I was getting tired of everyone treating me like I was some precious object that needed to be protected.

Lisabelle’s eyes hardened. “I wasn’t worried about you. You’re stronger than almost everyone gives you credit for. If the deans knew how hard you worked they’d be horrified, and everyone who wants to defeat the demons would be grateful.”

That might have been the single nicest thing Lisabelle had ever said to me. But before I could thank her she continued, “I didn’t want you to catch him because I want him for myself. I want to make him bleed and cry out in pain.” Lisabelle’s eyes had that disturbing black burning light in them. Sip, who was lying awake but motionless on the floor, said softly, “I don’t want you to get hurt. Not because of me.”

Lisabelle smiled coldly. “Believe me, I wouldn’t.”

“Come on,” said Keller. “We have to get you out of here.”

“Does she need to go to the infirmary?” Lisabelle asked worriedly, looking down at Sip. I had to admit, Sip looked paler and smaller than usual. There was a pool of blood on the floor by the door that I was trying hard not to look at.

“She’s fine now,” said Keller. “No infirmary unless you want, but explaining this is going to be tough.”

“I’m fine,” said Sip, carefully sitting up and touching the back of her head. “Wow, there’s nothing there.”

“Finally, you realize,” Lisabelle said. Sip punched her in the arm.

“Ouch,” said Lisabelle, rubbing the offended area. “I guess you
are
fine.”

Amazingly enough, we got back to our dorms without anyone seeing us. I brought Sip and Lisabelle to Astra. I had gotten permission from Mrs. Swan last semester to have sleepovers, and I just had to hope that she would cover for them when it was discovered that they hadn’t returned to Airlee. When Lough left for breakfast the next morning and realized they weren’t there, he’d be worried. But that couldn’t be helped. Keller walked back to Astra with us, and then I walked him to the door. This was our first night as boyfriend and girlfriend and it hadn’t gone at all as I had hoped.

At the door Keller turned around. His blue eyes looked black in the dim light, but they brightened when he saw me. He was dressed all in black, looking even more dashing than usual.

"How did the practice go?" he asked quietly.

My lips trembled. "As well as can be expected," I said. I was now overly tired and worried, not to mention disappointed that I hadn’t caught whoever was following us. It wasn’t good that someone knew I intended to spend my evenings in the Long Building and had come to spy on me. In fact, it called my whole plan into question. But I had to keep trying; I had no other options.

Seeing my distress, Keller was next to me in two quick strides, his arms wrapping around me and pulling me close. With my nose buried in his shoulder I breathed in his scent of clean clothes and medicine. "Meaning you’re going back?" he murmured as he stroked my hair.

"Right," I said, my voice muffled in his chest. "I have to practice. I have to be able to fight the demons. This can’t get in the way of that. Besides, there’s been no sign of any demons. Maybe they aren’t really after me now.”

He sighed and pulled away so that we were eye to eye. "They are demons and you are elemental. They will never stop coming after you." He pulled me close again, and I let myself feel the relief of burrowing deeper into his protective embrace.

"I'm just glad you're alright," he said. "I don't know what I would do if something happened to you. I just don't."

I buried my face in his chest. I didn’t have to say that I felt the same way. He knew.

The next morning was Friday. I had Museum studies and A History of Death. Risper still hadn’t returned, causing questions among the students. Jenkins was still our professor, which I didn’t mind. He was animated and intelligent, and unlike other professors, he had us perform some spell or other every time the class met.

I went to breakfast bleary-eyed and exhausted. I hadn’t slept well; I was still worried about Sip. My two friends had decided to skip breakfast, instead opting for bagels from the Astra kitchen. On Fridays neither of them had any classes except A History of Death, so they were just going to hang out in my room for the morning. I was supposed to find Lough at breakfast and explain what had happened.

As I descended the stairs into the library basement I nearly ran into Dobrov. His head was down and his eyes were nearly covered by matted black hair. As we tried to avoid running into each other I couldn’t help but notice that one of his hands was covered in a white bandage and there was the stain of red blood on it.

Frowning, I hurried past him. I didn’t want him to see recognition in my eyes, but my mind was racing. Could it have been Dobrov following us the night before? It didn’t make any sense, except that as a member of Cruor he had permission to be out on the grounds at that hour. That still didn’t explain why he might have been spying on us, why he ran, or why he had attacked Sip.

The dining hall was almost empty on a Friday morning. Most students didn’t have classes on Fridays and would have spent the night before partying. There was no alcohol allowed at Public, because it did terrible things to paranormals, but there was some usage of invented drugs that were meant to stimulate the paranormal senses. I didn’t know much about it, having been too busy as a Starter trying not to get kicked out, and then during second semester trying not to get killed. But some of my friends went to such parties now and then, and I was sure to go at some point.