Fragile Spirits (9 page)

21st-Century Cycle, Journal Entry 4:

No events of significance to record.

Paul Blackwell—Protector 993

I
t was all I could do to keep my eyes open. I hadn’t slept at all last night because of the situation with Vivienne, and the temptation to put my head down on my desk and sleep was almost too much to resist. I just knew that with my luck in this class, Ms. Mueller would call on me, and I’d do something stupid—like drool—and embarrass myself.

I stretched and yawned. Class was only half-over. This would be a test of my willpower to stay conscious.

Lenzi and Alden were not at school because they were on assignment somewhere with Race acting as the spare Protector. I looked around the room and realized how isolated a life I really lived. I’d only been in school here a few weeks, but still, I didn’t know anyone. It was probably better that way. Having to keep my real life secret would be more of a burden if I got close to someone outside the IC.

Ms. Mueller glared at me from her podium, cutting a perfectly good stretch short. “Am I boring you, Mr. Blackwell?”

Yes, you’re boring me to tears.
“No, ma’am.” I ran a hand through my hair. “I’m sorry.”

Once Ms. Mueller returned to her monotone lecture, the blond girl to my right smiled over at me and whispered, “Ms. Mule Face finds one person to pick on each year. Looks like you’re it now. It used to be that Lenzi girl who sits in front of you.”

I nodded and wondered what it was about me that had caught Ms. Mueller’s attention. I did nothing to stick out . . . like dye my hair pink. I was the exact opposite of Vivienne, in fact. I tried my best to blend in, follow the rules, and conform. Perhaps Ms. Mueller had singled me out simply because I was the new student.

“My name is Clarice,” she whispered.

“Miss Barton!” The girl shuddered at Ms. Mueller’s shout. “Is there something you would like to share with the rest of the class?”

Clarice shook her head and stared at the notebook on her desk.

“Please confine your flirting to before and after school. My classroom is no place for it.”

There were very few people in the world I didn’t like. At that moment, Ms. Mueller was one of them. I sat back in my chair, arms crossed over my chest, and studied her. “Size up your opponent,” the IC rule book stated. “Study him to discover both his strengths and weaknesses.”

Starting at the top of her head, I began my observations of Ms. Mueller, who, satisfied with Clarice’s reaction, was droning on again about the Battle of Whateverberg. By the time I got to the bulbous turkey pin she wore in honor of the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday, I gave up my mission. The monstrosity had real tail feathers and was so heavy it made her blouse pucker, causing me to decide that she wasn’t really an opponent after all, merely an inconvenience.

A burst of anxiety slammed into me, then a knock on the door interrupted the lecture.

“Open the door, please, Miss Sanders,” Ms. Mueller directed.

A lanky brunette with a severe case of acne shuffled to the door and swung it open. I almost fainted.

Ms. Mueller gave an exasperated sigh. “What do you want?”

Vivienne stood in the doorway wearing her classic expression of hostility. “I’m a new student. The counselor sent me up here.”

Ms. Mueller shuffled the papers in front of her. “My class is closed. The counselor must have made a mistake.”

Vivienne waved a half sheet of paper and laid it on Ms. Mueller’s podium. “Room 134, Margaret Mueller.”

“Well, I . . .” Ms. Mueller’s face pinched up into a scowl as she studied Vivienne with blatant distaste. “Just have a seat until we get it straightened out.”

Vivienne looked directly at me the entire time she walked down the aisle to sit in Lenzi’s vacant desk. Her transmissions were jumbled, but clearly she was nervous. I kept my expression neutral, but my insides were flipping over. One part of me was furious that I’d be forced to deal with her on a day-to-day basis—well, unless Mueller got her way and transferred Vivienne out. The other part of me was ecstatic. Perhaps it was because, as a Protector, I was naturally drawn to her because she was a Speaker. Or maybe it was because it was
her
 . . .

She slid into Lenzi’s desk, faced the front, and I could finally breathe. Clarice leaned closer. “Looks like you might be off Mule Face’s radar for a while. Freak girl will be much more fun to pick on.”

Vivienne twisted in her chair and glared directly at Clarice.

“Oops,” Clarice said under her breath.

Yeah, oops.
I’d seen that look before, directed at me, and it wasn’t good. I looked around and noticed everyone was staring at Vivienne, including Ms. Mueller.

Instead of her usual Goth garb, Vivienne was dressed in the uniform worn by all girls at this private school: a white Izod, blue blazer, and a tan pleated skirt, but even dressed identically to every other girl, Vivienne stuck out. Her pale skin and hot pink hair were certainly eye-catching, but her demeanor was what made her truly unique. And she didn’t seem to care a bit that she had caught everyone’s attention. She stared back at them with calm indifference. I knew better. I felt her anxiety. This was terrible for her, and it made me want to intervene . . . but it wasn’t my problem. She had rejected me. I owed her nothing.

Ms. Mueller cleared her throat and turned the page in her lecture notes. “So, who can tell me about the military order issued by President Lincoln on January 1, 1863?”

As usual, the class members exchanged clueless glances. Normally, Alden would chime in at this point and fill in all the details Ms. Mueller sought, but since he wasn’t here, she was met with silence and shuffling of feet and papers.

Vivienne half raised her hand, wiggling her black-tipped fingernails. Ms. Mueller’s eyebrows shot up. “Do you have a question, Miss . . .” She scanned the paper Vivienne had handed her. “Um . . . Miss . . .”

“Thibideaux,” Vivienne supplied. “And no. I don’t have a question. I have the answer.”

Ms. Mueller smirked, and I felt Vivienne’s anger surge, then that emotion was replaced by something else—something bordering on gloating.

“By all means, please answer,” Ms. Mueller said.

And Vivienne did. In a manner Alden would have applauded, she described in detail the contents of the Emancipation Proclamation, including its positive effects and legal shortcomings as well as the social impact on the Southern states.

My classmates stared at her in absolute astonishment.

Ms. Mueller leaned forward. “You must have had a very fine history teacher at your previous school.”

Vivienne shrugged. “Nah. My school sucked. I just read about it somewhere.”

Well, she was consistently unpredictable-that I knew for sure. And I’d just discovered one of the things she was hiding behind her toxic plant disguise: She was supersmart. Smart and well educated—or at least well read. I thought back to the list on her reader and more clicked into place. She read classics, historical fiction, and books on learning disabilities. Why the last genre? I wondered.

My classmates eventually stopped gawking and turned back to the front, and Ms. Mueller resumed her lecture.

I leaned forward so that my face was close to Vivienne, sitting directly in front of me. So close I could smell her now-familiar scent that reminded me of the candle store. I whispered, “What are you doing here?”

“The same thing you’re doing here,” she whispered back. A twinge of irritation emanated from her.

Ms. Mueller kept on babbling, eyes only on her lecture notes.

“But I thought . . .” The burning on my neck flared when she swiveled in her chair and stared at me.

“Hi. Nice to see you too.” She spun back around and crossed her arms over her chest, anger and sadness rolling from her.

Crap. I’d hurt her feelings. I rubbed my hand over the burning skin on my neck. “I’m sorry,” I said a little louder. “I’m confused.”

“No kidding.”

Clarice leaned across the aisle. “You know her?” she whispered so quietly I had to read her lips. Her eyes went wide when I nodded.

For a very long time, I simply stared at the back of Vivienne’s head. It made no sense that she was here, since she had rejected me. Maybe Charles was so desperate to have another pair protecting Lenzi, he had her here until he could replace . . . a wave of nausea rolled through me . . . until he could replace
me.
I would be the one to go. The Speaker had control, and she had chosen. It only made sense he’d plant her in the school Lenzi’s mother had chosen for her. Alden was here to protect her, and so was I. Vivienne and I were to guard her as a pair.

Not now.

I took a deep breath and caught Clarice staring again. She immediately blushed and looked away. I wondered why I had never noticed her before. Probably because I was so focused on my job and only watched my mentoring pair. She was the total opposite of Vivienne. Her tanned skin and golden hair gave her the healthy look common to the girls at this school. I glanced over again, and she smiled at me before looking away.

In an unexpected burst, fear surged from Vivienne. She sat bolt upright and trembled. With the exception of Clarice, we were the only students at the back of the room, so no one else noticed. Not yet, anyway. The timing was terrible. There were still fifteen minutes of class left.

Vivienne turned and stared at me with huge, terrified green eyes.

I touched her shoulder and concentrated on silently sending her calming energy, but it didn’t work. She made a squeaking sound in her throat and clutched her pen so tightly, her knuckles went white.

“We can’t let the class know what’s going on,” I said. She nodded.

A quick glance at Clarice confirmed she was watching and was about to blow the whistle on us.

“She’s okay,” I told her. “It happens sometimes and will stop soon. It’s kind of like a seizure. Just stay quiet, okay?”

Clarice nodded.

Vivienne twisted around in her chair to face me and grabbed my wrist so hard it hurt. The pen she was holding snapped with a crack. Gasping, she closed her eyes and shuddered. She moved her arm, smearing blood across the surface of my desk. She was under attack from a Malevolent.

“Keep it out of your body,” I whispered, grabbing my jacket from under my chair. I only had two choices at this point: I could soul-share and keep the demon out, which would keep Vivienne safe but put my body in a terrible position and alarm the whole class, or I could haul her from the room and protect her in private, causing a scene but not revealing the IC. Detention was better than discontinuance; my choice was obvious.

I wrapped my jacket around her forearm to absorb the blood and cover the wound, then stood, keeping my hand on the jacket so it would remain in place. The metallic scraping of my chair on the floor seemed overly loud. I pulled Vivienne to her feet. Ms. Mueller said something, but I didn’t even hear her over the fear and panic streaming from Vivienne.

Leaving our backpacks behind, I pulled Vivienne to the door. “She’s sick,” I said, not sure if my voice was audible. “I’ll come back for our things.”

Once outside the classroom door, I picked Vivienne up, ran to a storage closet near the end of the hallway, and flung it open. After shoving some mops and brooms out of the way, I shut the door. The only light was from under the gap at the bottom of the door that let light in from the hallway. We stood speechless for a while, catching our breaths. The musty, sour air made my nose burn.

“Do we need to soul-share?” I asked.

“No,” Vivienne answered, still out of breath. “It’s gone.”

“Are you sure?”

I could feel her fear subsiding, and she felt more like herself emotionally. “Positive.”

After a short while, my eyes adjusted to the darkness, and I could almost make out her face. “Are you okay?”

“What the hell was that?” she said. “That was nothing like Ethan.”

I flipped the light switch. “I know.” I unwrapped my jacket and examined her arm in the dim light provided by the bare lightbulb that hung just above our heads by a wire. The bulb was swinging, probably from being knocked by one of the brooms I’d shoved aside, which made it feel like the room was swaying. “The cuts are deep,” I remarked, pushing down my nausea. The Malevolent had carved letters in her flesh, just like the attack on Lenzi. I yanked some stiff brown paper towels off a roll sitting on top of a box and wrapped them around her arm. The blood soaked through almost immediately. “We’ve got to get to my car for my medical kit. Are you ready?”

“Yeah.”

I wrapped her arm with another round of towels. “Let’s go. We’ve got to stop the bleeding.” I opened the door and peeked out, then jerked back and closed the door immediately.

“What’s wrong, Paul?”

“Stay here. I’ll come get you when the coast is clear.”

Her fear spiked again. “What is it?”

“Ms. Mueller. She’s waiting in the hallway for us. Just stay here.” I slipped out the door, leaving Vivienne alone in the dimly lit, foul-smelling janitor’s closet.

“I hope you can explain yourself, Mr. Blackwell,” Ms. Mueller said, her arms across her chest.

I hoped so too. “Vivienne and I know each other. She sometimes has spells like seizures. They’re rare, but they embarrass her. I got her out of the room before she lost control.”

She lifted an eyebrow. She wasn’t buying it. “What about the blood all over the desk?”

“Nosebleed. They sometimes accompany the seizures.” Pulling on all my training, I stood perfectly still, maintaining eye contact.

Her eyes narrowed. “We need to take her to the nurse’s office to be examined. The school has a responsibility for her welfare.”

God. That would totally blow our cover.
The nurse would get one look at the words carved in her skin, and all hell would break loose. “Please, Ms. Mueller. She’s really shy about it. Let me just get her home, and she’ll be okay.”

She rolled her eyes. “That girl isn’t shy about anything.”

“You don’t know much about her, ma’am.” Neither did I, really. “Appearances are deceiving.” I could tell from her hand- wringing and the fact she was biting her lip that she was considering my words. Maybe she would let it go. “Please. I know what I’m talking about.” The bell rang and students flooded into the hallway. “School is out for the day. Just let me take her straight home.”