Fight the Darkness

by W. J. May

  Jason never broke eye-contact, watching as the two girls started circling each other, but his lips twitched up into a hint of a smile. “A colleague of mine down south. Got my attention a couple weeks ago, said I had to come down there to see a girl. After you left my apartment last night, I sent for her. She got in early this morning.”

  Simon looked between the two of them, images of their whirlwind fight still flashing before his eyes. Finally, when he couldn’t take it any longer, he asked the inevitable question.

  “Have you and she...ever...?”

  “Jen?” Jason slipped into a nickname, yet looked surprised in spite of himself. “No, Simon. I don’t sleep with my students.” The conversation lapsed for a moment, before his face twisted into a sly smile. “That should be one less worry off your mind.”

  Simon’s face flushed a million shades of red as he fought to control it. Shit. Here it was. Not even a full day’s work, and Jason was already on to his and Beth’s little scheme.

  “I don’t...what is that even supposed to mean—”

  “Everybody—change it up!” Jason shouted, clapping his hands as the students shifted automatically to the right. “You too, Simon.”

  Simon was quick to melt into the fold, but as he took his place in line he could have sworn that Jason flashed him a wink.

  IT WAS A TRAINING SESSION like Simon had never had before. Not only was the Oratory rejuvenated by the infusion of fresh ink, but the ink in question shifted the playing field.

  Dramatically.

  It was a match-up for the ages. Shifter versus shifter. The raw primal nature of one animal versus another. Punctuated with lethal arcs of glowing blue fire.

  For his part, he stuck with Tristan’s ink for the bulk of the session before shifting at the end to Jason’s. He didn’t want to ask the new girl if he could use hers, and despite being constantly blown away by the sheer force of energy coming off of Beth he hadn’t been able to bring himself to copy her ink. Not since before the apartment, and then he couldn’t even get a fire started. So he never tried or asked.

  He wasn’t sure why that was exactly. Maybe it was that he was worried about t losing control, as she had. Maybe it was because he quite simply cared for her more than the rest.

  Whatever the reason was, Simon not only avoided her ink but ended up avoiding her for the rest of the session, Jason’s cryptic message weighing heavily on his mind.

  But there was still plenty of action to keep him occupied.

  Tristan and Jennifer got to spar after all. And while it didn’t end up going as either one of them would have liked, in a way it was rather self-enlightening.

  Jennifer found out that not every man was vulnerable to her charms. And Tristan found out that, no matter the circumstances, he couldn’t hit a girl. And he got his nose broken again.

  “For the love of—” He broke off sharply, clutching his face. Streams of crimson spilled out over his fingers as both Simon and Jason headed towards him with a laugh.

  “I told you to watch out, Tris,” Simon teased. “She’s even faster than you.”

  “Impossible.” Tristan winced as he glared at her from across the room.

  Jason chuckled and motioned for him to lower his hands. A wave of fresh blood spattered to the floor, but he ignored it as he gently felt for the break. Then his fingers fastened on. Tristan shook his head quickly, realizing at the last second what he was going to do, but by then it was too late. There was a sickening crunch as his nose snapped back into the correct place.

  “Shit!” he cried, stumbling backwards while holding a hand in the air between them like a shield. “First her, now you! Enough already!”

  Jason smiled calmly. “You’re welcome.”

  “...bunch of sadists.”

  He stormed out of the room, leaving Simon and Jason still smiling in his wake. A second later, they were joined by Beth. Her skin was flushed with excitement, lightning the creamy alabaster to a delicate shade of rose, and her eyes were dancing with delight.

  “Simon, did you see?” she asked breathlessly, bouncing up and down. “I was able to hit one of the targets! Look! It’s still smoking!” She gestured across the room to where one of the bulls-eyes on the wall was sizzling from a molten hole in the center.

  Simon swelled with pride, sweeping her up into the air before he could stop himself. “I knew you would.” His eyes closed as he wound his hands into her hair. “You’re a natural. I bet before long you’re going to—”

  His voice cut off suddenly as two slender hands pushed discreetly against his chest. His eyes snapped open again to see Beth staring not at him, but over his shoulder with a slightly panicked look in her eye. Sure enough, the entire Oratory was staring at them curiously. It could have been the fact that the notoriously standoffish Simon Kerrigan had finally found someone who could make him smile, but he was worried that wasn’t it. He was worried that there was something entirely too intimate about their little embrace. Something entirely too bold.

  He put her down in an instant, ignoring the piercing look he saw from Jason out of the corner of his eye. “Congratulations,” he said stiffly, also refusing to meet her gaze. “Your brother would be really proud of you.”

  He didn’t know why he brought Argyle into it. Maybe to bolster the platonic nature of their claim by reminding everyone he was friends with her brother. Maybe simply to diffuse the sudden tension that was radiating off of the room. Either way, just saying the name made everything feel all the more terrible.

  For a second, the image of all those unreturned letters piling up beneath his bed flashed through Simon’s eyes. The weight of them settled hard upon his shoulders. The next moment, he nodded and gave an equally stiff farewell, turned sharply on his heel, and walked away.

  He didn’t slow down and didn’t return anyone’s shouts or stares until he was safely back in his dorm room. Once there, he collapsed upon his bed and didn’t stop screaming into his pillow until he was entirely out of breath.

  When he was finally finished, he rolled slowly onto his back, red-faced and panting.

  How was he supposed to do this? How was he supposed to pretend like he didn’t love her, every second, with everyone watching? It was impossible! Jason had already made vague hints, like he already knew. The rest of them wouldn’t be long to follow.

  He curled into a delicate crunch, lifting his body until he was sitting in the center of his mattress, his face in his hands.

  Beth coming to England was supposed to make everything better, not worse. What if things got completely away from them? What if she wasn’t able to get a handle on her ability, and that horrible dream he’d had all those months ago came blazing into life?

  How could he stop it all from happening?

  How could he keep everything from spinning out of control?

  Chapter 7

  THE NEXT WEEKS PASSED in a kind of blur.

  While the worries and troubles that plagued Simon remained, they grew considerably easier to bear each day that something catastrophic didn’t happen. Each day that the sky didn’t come crashing down on his and Beth’s heads for looking at each other a bit too long. For lingering glances in the locker room hallway. For the way their hands ‘accidentally’ brushed every time they walked by. For the way his heart quickened when she moved or he heard her laugh.

  The rumors were still flying, of course. Gossip of any sort was a favorite Guilder pastime, and when two beautiful girls showed up out of the blue to train, there was natural speculation as to who they might be interested in, and who might be interested back.

  Fortunately, speculation was so rampant that nothing really stuck. Simon had been ‘tied’ to both girls, multiple times. As had Tristan. As had Jason. As had Isaac. As had anyone who had ever bothered to look at them twice. Coincidentally, ‘looking’ at Beth and Jennifer had become yet another favorite Guilder pastime, so with everyone implicated Simon received none of the blame.

  Only Tristan knew what was going on, but he’
d had the decency so far to keep it to himself. It would bubble over one day; both he and Simon knew this. Their fight in the parking lot had only been a preview of things to come. But until that day arrived, neither one seemed particularly inclined to cross the other.

  It helped a lot that Tristan liked Beth. He and Jennifer had taken to hanging out with her and Simon in almost all their free time. There was rarely a moment the four of them weren’t seen together on campus, and the rumors surrounding them were especially juicy.

  But between Simon and Tristan’s clout, and the fact that the two of them were still running an exclusive ‘study group’ that everyone seemed to want to join, no one ever brought said rumors to their face. If nothing else, they only enhanced their budding reputations as Guilder rebels.

  Plus, Guilder students were under strict orders not to mention the girls on campus. To forget they were even there. They were simply there for Privy Council training, not part of Guilder Boarding School. They were living off-campus, also sanctioned by the Privy Council.

  Simon grinned as a pair of first-years gawked at the four of them as they strode confidently into the Oratory. The doors swung shut behind them, but before they did he could already hear the beginnings of another salacious story taking shaping...

  “Rather easily impressed, don’t you think?” Jennifer quipped as she removed her signature leather jacket to reveal a shocking lack of clothing beneath.

  Tristan chuckled and shook his head, while Simon suppressed a grin. Over the course of the last few weeks he had actually grown rather fond of Jennifer, despite the fact that he suspected she was growing slightly too fond of him as well. Beneath her rather bristly exterior, there was actually a lot there to like. To start, she was one of the most sarcastically hilarious people he had ever met. There was rarely a situation that didn’t get a healthy dose of her caustic commentary. It had gotten to the point where the second anything especially ridiculous happened the others would automatically turn to her, already anticipating her rather skewed take.

  And while she was quick to display what she took to be her most winning attributes—those winning attributes being her feminine curves and toned body—it was the things she tried to hide that Simon found the most interesting.

  The vulnerability. The shocking lack of self-esteem made up for by a loud display of bravado and confidence. The fact that she had grown uncharacteristically affectionate and protective of Beth. Two attributes which Simon could relate to entirely.

  There was also the fact that there seemed to be gaping holes in her personality. Holes that should have been filled somewhere in childhood, but somehow were not. Like just the other week, when the four of them went into the city to see an old playback of The Wizard of Oz in the local theater. It was one of Beth’s favorites, and she had forced them all to go. Simon and Tristan had agreed reluctantly, more out of indulgence than anything else. But it quickly became clear that, not only had Jennifer never seen the film, but she’d never even heard of it.

  It was the same way with a lot of things. Foods, movies, music, clubs in the city. Basic cultural references that every child of Britain grew up knowing by heart were somehow completely foreign to her. It was a source of constant ridicule and great amusement for everyone involved.

  “Maybe if you put on some clothes every now and then, they’d stop staring,” Beth suggested lightly. She had grown equally fond of her new friend over the last few weeks, and the two of them never stopped bantering back and forth.

  “Not a chance,” Jennifer swore, proudly flashing her long legs and bare midriff as she headed to the spears and targets resting against the far wall. “This body was meant to be seen.”

  The other three watched her with a set of identical smiles, shaking their heads indulgently as she snatched up the nearest weapon and began threatening a hastily-retreating telepath.

  “Doesn’t have a problem with confidence, that one,” Tristan remarked.

  Simon grinned. “She talks like a guy.”

  “I love it,” Beth cut them off, flipping her hair back as she, too, stripped down into her standard workout gear. While it was slightly less revealing than Jennifer’s, it was no less impressive.

  As usual, Tristan had to elbow Simon sharply in the ribs to get him to avert his eyes.

  “And you said it yourself,” Beth continued, seemingly oblivious to the interaction. “She talks like a guy. You wouldn’t give a guy a hard time for showing off, would you?”

  Tristan watched Jennifer back-flip off the wall with a look of amusement. “Would I give a guy a hard time for dancing around in that sports bra? Yes, I would.”

  Beth giggled and smacked him on the arm. “I’m serious. I think you guys need a healthy dose of estrogen around here. Now, if we could only get some in your damn school...”

  The conversation grew abruptly tense as all three of them averted their eyes. The ban of all women on campus had been a continued source of consternation between none of them in particular; all of them happened to agree, but it was a source of consternation nonetheless.

  Beth and Jennifer had been forced to share an apartment directly outside the gates of Guilder. It was a nice place, to be sure, but the fact that their backyard ended in the high iron wall was a constant reminder, a daily slap in the face that said the same thing.

  We might let you train here, but you don’t really belong.

  According to rumors, even the matter of them training in the Oratory had been under heavy administrative debate. There had been many on the Council who were pushing for a separate training facility altogether. One that would ensure the least amount of interaction as possible between the adolescent boys and girls.

  One time, after a long day when he was feeling less guarded than usual, Jason had returned to the Oratory in nothing short of a rampage, ranting against the ‘antiquated bastards running this place’ who ‘wouldn’t be able to last three seconds against one of these girls.’

  Beth and Jennifer had beamed with secret pride, and returned to their session with double the energy. As many people might be against them, there were people out there fighting for them as well. They would just have to do whatever it took to ensure that they were on the winning side.

  It was for this reason that, when Jason wandered over and suggested an alternative form of training for the day, Beth was eager to comply.

  “By now, we’ve established very clearly that your power is tied to your emotions,” he began practically, leading her to the center of the floor. “I suspected it the first day in my apartment, when I asked you to show me the flame. A little calm encouragement, and you were able to control it no problem. A little deliberate snub, and the flame vanished entirely.”

  Simon listened carefully as he pulled the moment back to mind. He had remembered being frustrated with Jason for his lack of encouragement. Not understanding the sudden shift of tone after they had seen the flame for the first time. Now, it made sense perfectly.

  There was always a plan with Jason. No matter how convoluted it might seem, there was always a plan.

  Beth nodded quickly, piecing it all together as well. “So what do you want me to do?”

  Jason came up behind her and set his hands lightly on the tops of her arms.

  “I want you to close your eyes.”

  Beth did so without hesitation as Jason waved the others off to the mats to continue to work on their own. Simon, however, stayed rooted to the spot. Unable to pry his eyes away.

  In what looked like slow motion, Jason lowered his head so that he and Beth were at the same level. She might have been unable to see it, but they were standing just inches away. And while she might not have been able to see him, she certainly felt his presence. When he lowered his voice to a soothing calm, she leaned in, instinctively closer, every muscle in her body ready and waiting.

  “This isn’t a meditation,” he murmured, “but it’s something close. Something that my old trainer used to do with me when I’d hit a plateau to get me up to t
he next level.”

  “He used to whisper seductively in your ear?” Simon said sharply, unable to help himself.

  Jason’s lips twitched up into a grin, though he kept his eyes on Beth. “Actually, he used to give me heavy doses of narcotics, but it amounts to the same thing. Go train, Simon.”

  But Simon did not move.

  “Now,” Jason continued in that same, soft voice, “I want you to focus on relaxing every muscle in your body. One by one. Work from the ground up.”

  Beth’s forehead tightened in confusion. It seemed counterintuitive. Usually, when she used her power, she was tensed to spring. But by now she had learned to trust Jason just as completely as the others, and she made a concerted effort to do as he asked.

  Even from where he stood, Simon could see her relaxing. First her legs, then her arms, and finally even that little worry line in the center of her forehead smoothed away. She looked as she did when she was sleeping, and Simon wanted nothing more than to carry her away in his arms.

  “Good,” Jason murmured, “that’s good.” He circled slowly around her before coming back to the front. “Now, I want you to slowly lift up your arms. Slowly, alright? Just stay relaxed.”

  To help guide her he took her delicately by the hands, breathing with her as he stretched her arms gently into the air. There was something almost mesmerizing about the image—the two of them standing there, hands connected in the middle, suspended in a world all to themselves.

  It made Simon want to light the room on fire.

  But then, just as he was nearing his breaking point, Jason released her fingertips and took a few steps away. “Now...fire up those flames.”

  Beth stiffened with panic as Simon simultaneously shouted, “Are you crazy?!”

  For the first time, Jason spun around with genuine anger as the mood he’d tried so carefully to create was shattered into a million pieces. “Laps—Kerrigan. Now. If I have to ask you again, you and I will do a little sparring ourselves. I promise, you won’t like how it turns out. Now, bugger off!”