On the couch opposite her, Brad and Landon lounge, and they do look at me. Brad wears a rare glint of pity in his sapphire eyes as our gazes meet fleetingly, but I pay him no mind, not when Dray is leaning against the wall, his arms crossed, and his deadly stare piercing through me like blades.
The silence is deafening. It’s thick and suffocates me. Tremors steal my hands. I clench them into fists at my sides.
For a coward, I’m pretty damn foolish, too. “You must have tedious days if you’re seeking me out,” I tell Dray. “Not enough to fill your time.”
His smirk is so small and slight that it sends chills down my spine. The hairs erect all over my body, like those damn invisible spiders are scrambling all over my prickled skin.
He looks up at me from beneath his lashes, a dangerous shadow cast over his face from the lack of dim orange lightbulbs.
“The tray wasn’t meant for you,” he says in a glacier tone. “It was meant for your shrew friend.” He kicks from the walls, his hands slipping into his pockets, and slowly advances on me. “I don’t like my plans to be interfered with, Olivia. I especially don’t like little waifs—who shouldn’t even be in our world, let alone at this Academy—spoiling anything I do.”
“There was a time you didn’t mind anything I did,” I shoot back at him and, out the corner of my eye, I see Brad shake his head slightly. “I remember a time you thought everything I did was magnificent.”
His smirk slips away from his pink lips and a dark look sweeps over his face. I can’t stop the shiver from clutching me.
Purely for survival reasons, the last thing I should do is throw his old crush in his face. But it’s the only ammo I’ve got and his sore spot is once fancying a deadblood. Sometimes, my pride gets the better of me. This is one of those times.
He side-steps my insult. “It seems to me that you not only enjoy bringing dishonour to your family name by being what you are, a rotten waif, no better than a krum,” he says darkly, “but that you also disgrace your elite society by protecting unworthy shrews—”
“You’re the unworthy one,” I spit back at him. “Courtney might be a half-breed, but she’s more witch than most of us in this room. And so what my blood is ancient? Deadbloods happen and I still carry the magic inside of me. You’re the only disgrace here, Dray. All that power and society at your fingertips, but you waste your time on making my life a living hell.”
His face fades to a paler shade than he’s ever been. It takes one flick of his hand and a swarm of wasps spring out from thin air. Fucking makut.
The wasps pift right at me like little bullets. I duck the onslaught and race out of the common room, a scream caught in my throat. Wasps chase me, some latch onto my bare arms and shoulders. I feel their stings like sharp little needles punching into my skin.
I slam into my dorm door, swarmed by a black ball of monsters, and shove my way inside. Straight for the bedside table, I land on my knees and rifle through my drawers.
Amidst the stings, I feel the course material of a protection bag and yank it out of the drawer. I slam it down on the floor hard enough to crack all the crystals and sage inside—
A gust of wind blows up from the charm bag. With it, the wasps disappear in a blow, and I’m left kneeling beside my bed, covered in angry red lumps.
I jolt at the sound of Courtney’s rough, sleepy voice. “What in hell happened to you?”
Tears prickle my eyes as I look at her, defeated. “Guess.”
She whips her fur blanket off of her legs then rushes to the door. She locks it before she finds a salve in her bag and brings it over to me.
With a weary sigh, she unscrews the lid from the mason jar, then scoops out a lump of pale-beige salve. “It’s going to be a long year.”
Chapter 6
It took a whole day and night for the angry stings to vanish completely from my skin. Now, it’s as if it never happened.
And I don’t want to get ahead of myself or anything, but since the wasps, Dray hasn’t so much as looked my way. For the most part, we’ve been left alone. It won’t last, of course, I’m not fool enough to think otherwise.
Still, the reprieve is welcome, especially since the first weekend of the school year has crept up on me out of nowhere and that means the entire Academy is focused on skiing, snowboarding, and trips to the witch village some ways down the mountain.
The gondola will start operating after ten, which gives us an easy morning and relaxed breakfast. No one’s rushing to be served first. In fact, the mess hall is quieter than I’ve seen it in years. There must have been a party somewhere in the chalet last night, because most of the students aren’t in the mess hall for breakfast, and the ones who are largely look like they’re about to throw up their eggs.
I don’t go to the parties. I’m never invited, but even if I was, being around the elite snakes with drinks and no parents seems like the ingredients for a lethal potion.
So, I happily eat my bacon strips and scrambled eggs without a hangover. James reads beside me, ignoring his breakfast in favour of the battered book in his hand. The crinkled spine reads, A TALE OF TWO CITIES. A krum book that he’s pretty damn brave, or stupid, to read so out in the open.
Courtney parks herself beside her twin and lets her tray clatter to the table. She keeps her breakfast light with some gross krum food, like dry wheat rectangles and milk that somehow came from plants. I make a face at the dry-looking meal before I rake my fork over my scrambled eggs, sketching shapes.
“You’re up early,” Courtney says to James. He grunts in answer. “Are you going to the village?”
James grunts again, and I’m not all that certain he’s actually listening to his sister until he dog-ears the corner of his page, then sets his book down on the table. “Going skiing,” he says. “Booked an instructor for midday.”
Courtney’s eyes widen, the same as mine, and we both take in his scrawny, typical-book-lover figure.
“You’re going skiing?” I press, my brow hiked up. A smile dances on my lips, and a laugh bubbles up inside of me. I swallow it back down with a mouthful of fluffy eggs. “Good luck with that.”
“I want to learn,” he says moodily. His mouth takes a pout. “I’ve been at this Academy for eight years and I don’t know my way around the snow at all.”
“Well, why should you?” Courtney frowns. “We live in a city—when are we ever going to go skiing in Scotland?”
“Scotland has plenty of snow,” I put in. “The highlands are loaded with ski resorts, you know. My family owns a cabin in Glenshee—”
“Of course, they do,” mutters Courtney. “And in France, and in Spain—”
“We have a château in France,” I correct lightly, “and an apartment in Spain.”
Someone woke up on the wrong side of the hex-bag this morning. And it sure wasn’t me.
“We don’t have property all around Europe,” she says. “So, I don’t see why you need to learn skiing, James. When are you going to ski outside of the school year?”
He shrugs, his gaze downcast, as if he dares not look at his scolding sister. She’s got on her nine-minutes-older witch hat.
“You should come to the village with us,” she finished with a nod. “We’re all out of sting salve.”
I flush at the memory. We used the whole jar on my stings the other night.
James turns his gaze to me at the memory of my blemished skin. “Looks good,” he says, and there’s a tint to his cheekbones, like roses stained him. “Can’t see them anymore.”
I smile. “Courtney should be a medic.”
“I didn’t make the salve, I just applied it,” she says. “It’s hard to mess that up.”
I snort. “You’ve been healing me for eight years—I think you undersell yourself.”
James cuts in, “Why is he staring at you?”
Courtney looks up at the door. I trace her gaze to the elites pouring into the mess hall. They’re sheathed in their ski gear, minus the gloves and goggles th
ey carry with them. Landon cruelly boots some younger students out of their chairs to take their table. Brad catches my stare and gives a rare nod of the head my way.
I roll my eyes before I make quick work of my breakfast. Don’t want to hang around any longer than I have to.
“Not them,” says James. I pause, fork hanging a breath away from my parted lips. “Mr. Digger.”
My eyes cut to the faculty table, where Eric sits with a few other Masters and administrative staff. A blush creeps hotly over my cheeks as we lock eyes. He looks away, fast.
“Strange.” Courtney finishes before me, then turns to her brother. “Are you sure you won’t come to the village with us?”
“I might come down after my lesson. It’s too late to cancel it now.”
That’s enough for Courtney. She picks up her tray and takes it to the bin. I leave mine on the table and lead the way out.
As I pass the table of elite snakes, my muscles seize under my skin, anticipation clinging to my gut like a pit of snakes, writhing. But they don’t throw any cruelties my way.
Dray only glances at me before he turns back to Serena and listens to her, as if I’m not his greatest enemy and in his line of sight. Not that I’m complaining. I make it out it in one piece, no breakfast drenching me or wasp stings covering me.
That, I will say, is a good start to the morning.
The summer sun pierced through the Alps’ constant clouds, but it brought the barest heat I’ve known. The air was still fresh enough to chill my cheeks and nose pink with the bite of the high mountains.
The little village of Squalls End is nestled between two high reaches of the mountain, and is the last stop on the gondola.
At the mountain’s peak, there is just enough eternal snow for the students to get in some skiing and snowboarding, but not enough to make it worthwhile.
Mind, I’m not that great of a skier and snowboards have me on my backend more than upright. I avoid sports when I can.
So, I happily join the handful of students scattering the misty streets of the quaint, mountain village. I follow Courtney into the café, the Hag’s Closet, that offshoots as a book and souvenir shop.
The warmth hits me the second I step inside. We spear apart, Courtney for the bookshelves and me for a table by the fireplace. I pick my way through a magazine for a while, and down a latte and a hot coco before the tired skiers started to pile into the Hag’s Closet. They all wear red cheeks and noses, as if painted, and peel off their gloves and goggles.
I spot Dray among them before the fresh crowd parts for him and his crew. My face pinches into something ugly.
I turn back to my magazine that’s mostly made up of fragrance adverts than articles. Something from the krum world, left behind by a half-breed maybe.
Courtney reads from the pages of her own brew magazine quietly, one hand loosely cupping at now-lukewarm copper mug of tea. It’s almost midday, I note with a glance at the clock, and James isn’t back yet. He’s not with the skiers who are joining us in the cramped shop—at least, it’s cramped now.
The sound of chair legs scraping over the floors shudders over my skin. My grip on the magazine corner tightens. The smooth paper crinkles like my patience. Even on the weekends, down at the village, there’s no such thing as peace and quiet once the school year starts.
I wait until most of the invaders have gotten their orders before I get up to join the remains of the queue. My stomach is set on a butterscotch rock cake and a black coffee.
I’m leaning over the counter, watching Esmerelda the shopkeeper slice up a piece of peppermint chocolate cake, when a shoulder bangs into mine and sends me into the counter’s edge. My scowl lands on Dray as he slips to the spot beside me, stealing my spot as next-in-line.
He turns to face me, resting his arm on the bar. His cold blue eyes drift over me. “New dress?”
The dirty look I give him lingers for a beat before I turn back to the bar, making a point of ignoring him. Esmerelda finally comes over and, leaning on the bar and wearing her crooked smile, she asks, “What can I get for you?” in her thick Swiss accent.
Dray answers before I can. “Two black coffees.”
“Three,” I cut in. “And a butterscotch rock cake.”
“Two coffees and the cake.” As he drops the money onto the counter, he glances at me, “I only need the one coffee.”
This, this is what I despise about our world, our snub-nosed elite bullshit. Hatred sees him pushing me over when no one’s around, but if I tripped over on my own, our rules say he has to help me up. He’ll order for me, buy my drinks, but spike them with a brew to make me ill, he’ll compliment my dresses but ruin them with chewing gum or whatever concoction he dreams up. It’s all veils and masks with the elite, and all slights have to be done in the right way at the right moment, and no other time or else it defies our propriety.
Elites might largely shun half-breeds, but at least they can own to what they think and feel so openly. There’s no pretence with them, just upfront honesty.
As Esmerelda conjures up our order, Dray studies the hem of my dress. “Your mother didn’t send you that,” he guesses and it’s spot on. The hem is much too short for mother to approve.
I tug on the lilac skirt as if it’ll somehow make it longer. Black tights help add some modesty to the silk dress, but still, mother would have a fit. I might have altered it a little in favour of working on my homework.
“What is the material?” Dray asks coolly, his index finger grazing lightly against my off-the-shoulder strap.
I smack his hand away.
“Wolf hair?” Dray presses.
“No.” I eye him suspiciously. “It’s silk.”
“Very delicate material,” he drawls. “It spoils easily, I believe. You should be careful.”
Esmerelda returns with our coffees and my cake slice. “There ya go.”
“We’ll be needing another cake slice,” Dray says without taking his eyes of me. Esmerelda pushes from the counter and goes off to fetch another.
He does it quicker than I can react to.
I let my guard down. I foolishly let myself think we were playing pretend today. But no, the extra butterscotch cake isn’t for him. It’s for me.
With a flick of the hand, he knocks over my cake and buttery, rich-golden sauce splatters all over the front of my dress.
Arms spread, I stare down in horror at the canary-yellow patch on my crumby dress. My face burns hot as nearby laughs cackle out, mocking me.
Snatching his coffee from the bar, Dray pays me a small wink. “I doubt that’ll wash out.” He leaves me there by the counter, drenched in hot, sticky syrup.
Carefully, I take the fresh slice of cake and my coffee to my small table, and leave them there with Courtney before I rush to the toilets. Wet napkins and lukewarm water only help scoop away most of the cake crumbs, but the silk has soaked in too much of the syrup to be salvageable.
I give up after a good ten minutes of attacking the front of my dress. When Serena comes in and offers me a small smile, I throw the napkins in the bin and stalk out. Her and her whole crew can go fuck themselves.
We left the village earlier than normal. James didn’t show and Courtney was worried.
Once back at the chalet, she heads straight for the sickbay and I trail behind her, finishing off the rest of my butterscotch cake. Might as well enjoy it since I’m wearing a patch of it on a dress that’ll have to be cut up for scraps. I’ll make something out of it, some hair ribbons, gloves maybe. That’s my talent.
Not exactly witch-related and not all that appreciated by my parents.
We’re the kind of family who buys fashion, not the kind of family who makes it. That’s what mother once said to me. Still, I can’t bury the love of it.
I think up a dozen different ways to use the scraps of my ruined dress by the time we get to the infirmary. The heavy wood doors are wide open and already the beds are mostly full from all the accidents on the slopes that morning
.
James is on one of them, a black cast latched onto his elevated leg. Courtney rushes over to him, all panic and fluster. I wander over, not too fussed since the medics at the Academy will have him healed in a couple of days. Broken bones only take two or three days to heal. It’s really not that big of a deal.
Still, Courtney fusses over him as I perch myself on the foot of the narrow, wrought-iron bed. “I see your lesson went well.”
“Don’t tease him, O,” she chides with a narrowed look my way.
“She’s wrong anyway,” says James, a dreamy smile on his face. He’s been drinking too many painless brews. “It was going well until after the lesson.”
“What happened?” My grin is crooked. “You tried to tackle the dangerous mountains on your own?”
He shrugs. “Everyone else was doing it.”
“The best skiers here have been learning since they were kids, you know.”
“Yeah, well it’s because of them I’m in here.” His dreamy look slips away to something tired and sad. “I was doing just fine—” I highly doubt that “—until Dray and his friends caught up with me. It was your brother who barged into me and that’s how I broke my leg.”
A blush heats up my face. It wasn’t me who pushed him over, but it being my brother who did it stirs some layers of guilt in my chest.
“He’s an arse,” is all I say. It’s especially true when he’s around Dray.
After a little while, I leave Courtney and James alone and head back to the dorms. Skipping dinner, I shower, change out of my ruined dress, and return to my room to find a sealed letter on my pillow. Its red wax seal with the family emblem makes my gut heavy with dread.
Father’s writing to me too soon and I get the suspicion that Brad’s been snitching on me for something or other. Brad just has to breathe for father to chide me. Everything my brother does is better. Even if my father loves me more—which I’m sure he does—he never lets me off easy. Always “wanting the best” for me. So he says.
I tear open the letter and it’s exactly as I expected. After the whole ‘hope you are well’ spiel, he goes on to say—
Bluestone Academy (A Bully Paranormal Academy Romance) Page 3