Vampire's Kiss (8 page)

I needed to delay. The moment this fight began in earnest, the crowd would turn into a mob—and turn on
me
.

Swallowing hard, I shifted the whip from hand to hand so I could wipe the blood from my palms. My shorts were salty and sandy, and distantly I registered the sharp sting in my open wounds. “Isn’t this a little excessive? I mean, shoving me down stairs is one thing, but a public execution is quite another.”

“The vampires will thank me,” Masha said, and I heard Trinity giggle.

My eyes hardened as I thought of the perfect excuse. “Even Alcántara?”

Something sharp flickered across Masha’s face. I’d been wondering why she’d targeted me for her punching bag, but a possibility struck me. Maybe she resented that a vampire had taken a young upstart like me under his protection.

I scrambled for more excuses even though I knew that this train had not only left the station, but was careening down the tracks with me tied and bound to them. I backed up a step. “They’ll be here soon. The vamps. They’ll scent the blood.”

“And each will be thirsty,” Masha purred. “And your body will be carried from here, and you’ll be theirs to feed on.”

“Doesn’t this need to be approved or something?”

She strolled to the head of the table, moving casually, as if she had all the time in the world. “On the contrary, they will thank me when I finish what Lilac started. But
I’ll
do more than burn your pretty hair. I will hit you, and shame you, and whip you until you bleed. And then I will take your broken body, and I will hand it to the vampires myself.”

“There you go with the body thing again.” I almost laughed
at the surreal and gleeful barbarity of it all.
Almost.
“You’ve really thought this through.”

“I’ve dreamt of it.”

A bolt of savage pleasure ripped through me as I realized I had nothing to lose. If I was going to go down, I could go down fighting. I could exact every revenge I’d dreamt of since arriving. I gripped the handle of her whip, lifting it ever so slightly. “Time for a wake-up call, I think.”

“
You
think to fight back? And with
my
weapon?” She’d spoken through clenched teeth—that whip identified her; it was an extension of her. She was
furious
.

“I think I can try.” Taking a deep breath, I reeled my arm back and whipped with all my strength.

But instead of snapping, the leather only flopped, catching on the table and hitting the floor with a limp
thwok
. I might as well have attacked the girl with a fistful of overcooked pasta.

The bravado I’d known a moment ago plummeted. Girls began to titter, and some closed in—I could sense them at my back.

I was dead meat.

Masha gave me a slow smile. But rather than lean down for her whip, she selected an empty glass from one of our trays. “Harder than it looks, Acari. Shame you won’t live long enough to master the skill.” She raised her hand and smashed the glass against the edge of the table. There had been a bit of blood left in the glass, and it trickled into her sleeve as she admired the jagged rim. She beamed at the other girls. “Where shall I carve first, ladies?”

The crowd pulsed around me, and I knew in my marrow all they wanted was to gang up on me, to destroy me. To watch
me be annihilated. My Proctor, Amanda, had warned me once: The girls were wolves, blinded by bloodlust at the scent of weakness. And there was nothing weaker than one girl against several.

My right leg flexed as I instinctively felt for the throwing stars I normally kept holstered in my boot—holstered in my
uniform
boot. But I was wearing only my gym clothes and sneakers.

A shaky, freaked-out feeling jittered through my body, and I took a deep breath to squelch it.

Masha’s eyes narrowed. “Poor baby. Don’t have your pretty stars?”

The crowd practically throbbed now. All they required was a spark to their tinder, one tiny inducement before they were
all
grabbing and smashing glasses into weapons. And then they would attack, and nobody would stand by me.

Rather, Emma would. Good old stoic, prairie girl Emma. I reached my senses outward and felt her standing at my back. I smelled her, too, all gross and carroty. I fought the absurd smile that threatened my composure.

She’d
stand by me, just as when we’d been attacked by that Draug, months ago, before she’d even known me. She’d stand by me again, and we’d both be slaughtered, and the others would watch with glee, jubilant that it was us, not them, taken out on stretchers for somebody’s midnight snack.

Screw that.
I refused to give up any more of my blood than was necessary—I’d spill every last drop if it meant denying some creepy vampire.

“Screw this.” I snatched a glass and smashed it, enjoying the shock that flickered in Masha’s eyes.

But I’d struck the table too hard, and the glass shattered, leaving nothing but the base and a few ragged shards slicing into my fingers.

One of the Initiates sprang into action, reaching for some cutlery, but Masha spun on her. “Back off. Acari Drew is mine.” She paced around the table, quickly now, her eyes not leaving mine. The crowd gave her space, ebbing back in a single wave.

Warmth seeped between my fingers. I was really bleeding now—I imagined even
I
could smell it—and it was in that moment I sensed the first vampires arrive.

Thoughts whirled through my head.
Chow time, boys.

Masha sprang toward me, slashing her glass. “I’ve dreamt of this.”

I hopped back a step, dodging her. “Oh, me, too.”

Killed, not kissed.
The thought fueled me. I decided I might as well give them a show.

Smiling my brightest, I dove in, slashing with the glass in my right hand. But it was a feint. As Masha defended one side of her head, I landed a massive hit on the other, pounding my slightly curved hand over her ear.

She shrieked, and the crowd sucked in a breath.

Blaze of glory.

She peeled back her lips in a snarl—she would
not
have liked the feline sound she’d made when I hit her—and her accent came thick, making her sound like a murderous inmate escaped from the Gulag. “You. Dead.”

I heard the heavy dining hall door open and shut again, and then again. The vampires, gathering. Just in time to see me torn limb from limb by an outraged Guidon and her pals.

Masha sprang again, and I grabbed a chair, swinging it up and at her. The blood made my hands sticky and slippery, and my move was clumsy, but it was enough to stop her momentum.

A blast of cold air swirled in as the door opened again. But this time it brought a voice. “Enough.”

Headmaster Claude Fournier.

Everyone froze.

Our headmaster was gorgeous, and suave, and French—and more carelessly lethal than any other vampire on this rock.

Fear twined through me like cold smoke in my veins. I didn’t need Masha to flay me when
Headmaster
would do it for her. I’d seen him do it my first day here, gutting an Acari up the middle with as much emotion as I might show while cracking open a can of Coke.

His eyes swept over the lot of us. I couldn’t imagine what went through his head as he noted every last detail—who held what, who stood where, and next to whom. His flat gaze settled on Masha. “What is happening here, Guidon?”

“I am attending to a”—she cast a beady eye at me—“discipline problem.” Damned if she wasn’t biting back a smile.

But that smile faded at Headmaster’s tone. “You have a peculiar way of enforcing our laws. Unless your intention was to create this…carnival atmosphere.” He surveyed the room once more, disgust playing on those handsome features. “
Assez regrettable.
Tell me, Guidon Masha, was this carnival your intention?”

“No, Headmaster,” Masha said meekly.

“I will take it from here. Guidon Masha, we will discuss this later.” He stared down the crowd. “All of you,
go
.”

Acari, Trainees, and Initiates scattered like mice from the hall.

I bent to scoop up my bag with pretty much the only parts of my hands that weren’t bleeding—the fingertips of my left hand.

“Stop,” said Headmaster.

I dropped the bag, bolting to a rigidly upright position. I knew that would’ve been too easy. Emma and I were the only ones left in the hall, and I wished I could’ve seen her face.

“You and your peer must suffer some penalty. What say you, Acari? Should your punishment be corporal or custodial? Or perhaps a touch of each?” He seemed almost bored now, his gaze skipping between us as if we were a couple of tiresome adolescents. But his eyes hardened as he came to a decision. “Acari Emma, you will come with me.”

My heart clenched for my friend. Would this be their opportunity to get Emma back for bowing out of last semester’s Directorate Challenge? Would I ever even see her again?

“And
you
.” Headmaster’s eyes pinned me, and I flinched, my heart exploding into double time. “Acari Drew, you will report to Master Alcántara for your punishment.”

S
cared
shitless
just about summed it up.

Crass, yes, but it was the only way to describe how I felt as I walked across the quad to Alcántara’s office. I imagined the experience was not unlike, say, heading to the gallows. Or walking the plank.

Actually, no. It was
worse
than those things.

I slowed as the sciences building came into view. It was a squat stone structure, and if the teachers inside hadn’t been vampires, it could’ve been mistaken for any academic building on any campus in the Northeast. All that was missing was some ivy crawling along the outside.

I chafed my arms, wishing I’d worn my thick parka instead of the lighter navy trench. Summertime, my ass. It hadn’t been above fifty degrees in a week. Stupid Isle of Night…more like Isle of Crap Weather.

I was happy I’d dared the quick detour to my dorm to
change. I may not have had time to shower, but I did feel a little less vulnerable having traded gym shorts for my gray uniform tunic and leggings.

I slowed my pace even more, trudging up the stairs.

At least it was heated inside, the radiators pinging and knocking as though it were fall term already. The lights were dim, though—not many kids had independent studies in science or math. The remedial topics all seemed to be physical in nature, whatever
that
implied.

Alcántara kept his office on the second floor, and I headed to the stairwell at the end of the corridor, passing a row of darkened offices and my phenomena classroom on the right, and a library on the left.

“You have found me.” Alcántara emerged from the shadows.

I jumped, putting a hand to my pounding heart. “Jeez.
You
found
me
.”

It’d been a nervous statement made without thought, but he responded with a low, husky laugh as if I’d said something witty, maybe even suggestive.

“So it seems,” he said with a smile on his face, and his demeanor threw me. As I took in his shaggy dark hair, the form-fitting black sweater over his taut body, his casual pose leaning in the dimness of the library doorway, I became acutely aware of the true and total sexiness of Master Hugo Alcántara.

A shiver rippled over my skin. I might have been a virgin, but I knew sexiness led to sex, and sex was something I’d never have with a vampire. I mean, technically they were dead—did all their boy parts even still work?

I cleared my throat, trying to clear the thought from my
head. Unfortunately, it was replaced by an even creepier thought. “How did you know I’d arrived?”

“I caught your scent. Only this time, it held something fresh…anticipation perhaps? It told me you were coming.” A slow grin spread across his face. “To me.”

He let the statement hang, and that shivery sensation of a moment ago became infused with an alarming warmth. I held my breath, fighting a woozy, must-fall-into-his-arms-like-a-limp-rag-doll feeling. Even as my body was susceptible to him, my mind shrilled,
No, no, no
.