Initiated

by Steffanie Holmes

  I jerked my head away. Tillie slapped my cheek so hard tears stung in my eyes. John grabbed my jaw and wrenched it open. I bucked and struggled, but there were too many of them. The bottle came closer, closer…

  I tried to picture flames engulfing my body like they had in the cave, pushing out in a giant fireball and burning Courtney fucking Haynes to ashes. But nothing came except a spasm of fear. I was too far gone, too wrapped up in the god’s visions and the pain and humiliation. I couldn’t find the flames. I couldn’t even save myself.

  Burning liquid hit the back of my throat. I squeezed my eyes shut. Panic seized my body. I tried to spit the stuff back out, but they kept pouring in more and more. It burned all the way down, searing my insides with a pain so intense I knew I had only moments before I passed out. I could even smell burning – an acrid, chemical odor that drove my panic to new heights.

  Inside its void, the god howled.

  Emptiness burned behind my eyes – a sickening black fog that started in my brain and spread through my whole body, taking away the pain on a cloud of oblivion.

  Darkness took me.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  “She drank poison. Quick, you have to help her!”

  My insides are on fire.

  I bounced in someone’s arms as a panicked voice called over my head. I was being carried into the school infirmary. Old Waldron leapt up from her desk. The person carrying me dumped me on the bed, rolling me over onto my side, placing me in the recovery position, stroking my cheek with tenderness.

  “Please.” His voice cracked. “I don’t know what to do.”

  Quinn. He was here. He’d come to save me. My arms ached to reach out and hold him, but no matter how many messages my brain sent out to my limbs, they wouldn’t move. The inferno inside me raged against my skin. My vision swam. Quinn grew three heads that all spoke in unison.

  “Hazy? Hazy? Hazy?”

  I tried to tell him what had happened, but my lips were tendrils of flame. As they moved through the air they turned to ashes. Three Old Waldrons leered over me, three warts bobbling in my vision as she lifted my eyelids and poked around inside my mouth. “You said she drank poison? Why would she do a thing like that?”

  “You have to do something!” The three Quinns were crying.

  “Maybe it’s for the best,” a calm voice spoke from the door.

  The temperature in the infirmary dropped. All I could make out was a shadow moving around the bed, trailing black robes across the floor.

  “Hazel Waite has become increasingly paranoid and erratic,” Ms. West’s voice boomed through the room. She knelt down beside me, her long fingers stroking my hair. Three pale faces with red slashes for lips wobbled in my vision. “I’ve had reports from other students she’s been picking fights, tormenting, defacing school property, experiencing hallucinations. Given her history, I suspect she’s suffering from a type of delayed psychosis.”

  “What would you know about it?” The Quinns demanded.

  “I used to work in the mental health sector,” she replied, leaning over my bed. Her fingers felt like knives slicing through my skin. “I’ve seen cases like this before. Patients who’ve lived with years of neglect and abuse who experience trauma often fall into a pattern of paranoid psychosis. When coupled with a persecution complex, as Hazel demonstrates, we have a profoundly disturbed student who is a danger to herself, and to others.”

  “They tried to kill me!” I managed to choke out. I rocked my body, trying to throw myself off the bed.

  Ms. West threw me back. “Fancy drinking floor polish and then trying to blame it on another student,” she tsked. “This must stop, Hazel. I’m giving you one more chance to get this under control, because I know how much you want to be here at Derleth. But if I hear of one more incident like this, I’ll have you sent away, somewhere you can get professional help.”

  Then her head exploded into a cloud of black shadow. My skin sliced open, and everything went dark as the pain dragged me under.

  I woke with a start. I wasn’t in the infirmary, but on a hard stone floor with my stomach heaving. If that was a dream, then where am I now?

  My body convulsed as a spasm of pain shot through me. I lay in agony, waiting for the convulsions to ease. I tried to push myself off the cold ground, but my arms wouldn’t move. Something sharp dug into my wrist.

  “Who is that?” A voice called out, muffled in the gloom. “Hazel, is that you?”

  “Greg?” I choked out, rocking on my stomach. The smell of rotting flesh hung in the air, sweet and fetid. My stomach heaved, and I dissolved into a coughing fit.

  “Yeah.” Greg broke down into a hacking cough of his own. “Did they make you drink…”

  “…floor polish? Yeah. I can’t—” I bent over as my stomach was seized by a violent spasm. Tears rolled down my cheeks as I threw up the contents.

  Across the room, Greg was also making retching sounds. I spat on the ground and tried to roll away. My wrists ached from being tied behind me. The stench was so thick here that it felt like the smell had form, that it draped over me like a blanket. I couldn’t even wipe my mouth.

  Greg’s arm brushed my back. “Sit up if you can,” he said. “Perhaps if we move close enough, one of us could untie the other.”

  “Good idea.” I rocked onto my side, curling my legs up to force myself into a sitting position. My body screamed in protest. Every movement was agony, but I managed to pull myself up. I shuffled backward until my spine pressed against Greg’s. After a little more fumbling we clasped our fingers awkwardly.

  “I’ll try you first.” Greg curled his fingers under the rope that bound my wrist. It dug into my skin, pressing against the bruises from the beating and the scar on my wrist until red welts appeared in front of my eyes. I was dimly aware of the god’s pain, but it held nothing to my own. Greg grunted as he wiggled and tugged, but the bonds didn’t loosen.

  “It’s no good,” he sighed, sliding out his fingers. “I can’t bend the way I need to pull the ropes through.”

  “Okay. I’ll try you.” I dug my fingers into Greg’s ropes, feeling out the knot. Immediately, I ran into the same problem. I could tug a bit of the rope, but then I couldn’t pull it under and out. My fingers just wouldn’t bend that way. Nothing on my body worked right. But I wasn’t going to give up.

  “Maybe there’s something in this room we can use,” I said. “Like an old nail or a super handy knife. We could cut the ropes. Where are we, anyway?”

  Scritch-scritch-scritch.

  For the first time, I focused on the space, aware not only of the odor but of the vastness around me, and the noise. We were in a large dark room, with rats circling behind the walls.

  Scritch-scritch-scrrrrrrrritch. They seemed to be growing in number.

  “I’ve had a little crawl around. I think it’s a disused classroom. There’s an old blackboard on the wall and a bunch of desks stacked up.”

  “Any windows?” Maybe we could smash the glass, use it to cut the ropes, and then crawl outside.

  “They’re boarded up. That’s why it’s so dark in here.”

  Damn, knew that would be too easy. “Okay, that’s something. If the boards are old, maybe we can get some of the nails out and use those—”

  “Hey!” Greg sounded bright. “You don’t happen to still have that glass shiv on you?”

  I felt around my sleeve, then remembered. “No. I lost it in the attack.”

  I tried to twist my feet under my body so I could lever myself up. Halfway there, my stomach heaved, and I broke down into another coughing fit.

  When my stomach stopped convulsing, I pulled my wretched body to my feet and stumbled around the dark room. My face smacked into a wall. Right, found the blackboard.

  Greg groaned as he pulled himself up. “The windows are over here,” he called out. I stumbled through the darkness, heading in the direction of his voice. “How long do you think we’ve been here?”

  “If I had to gue
ss, I’d say long enough to miss the Eldritch Club meeting,” I said darkly.

  “They made us drink poison,” Greg’s voice shook. “We could have died.”

  “I know,” I whispered. “I know.”

  Apparently, the tattoo on my wrist meant nothing. The senior members of the Eldritch Club knew about the agreement I’d made. But Greg and Andre were supposed to be off-limits, which meant that maybe Courtney didn’t know about the agreement, or that she was deliberately going against it…

  Greg and Andre…

  “Greg,” I choked out. “Were you with Andre when they caught you?”

  “Oh, shit,” Greg breathed. “No, I wasn’t. He was off somewhere. Hazel, what if he’s…”

  What if he’s somewhere in this room with us, unconscious… or worse? My thighs smacked against metal chair legs. “Andre,” I yelled, kicking around the floor, hoping and not hoping I’d find his body. “If you can hear us, make a noise. Kick something if you can. Andre, please…”

  “Andre! Andre!” Something metal clattered and Greg swore.

  A bright shaft of light fell over the room. I squinted into the brightness. What the fuck now?

  A shadow moved across the beam of light. “Hazy? Are you in here?”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  “Quinn?” I choked out, my knees buckling.

  “Hazy?” The shadow moved toward me. A warm hand circled my arm. I lurched myself toward him. My foot caught the edge of a metal chair. Without my hands to break the fall I went down hard, sprawling across the ground at Quinn’s feet. A spasm of pain rocked my body.

  “Owww,” I moaned, rolling over and curling my legs to my chest.

  Quinn pulled me into a sitting position. “Hazy, what have they done to you?”

  “I’m fine,” I cried. “Can you see Andre anywhere? Greg’s here too but we can’t find Andre… They made us drink cleaning liquid. He might be…”

  I couldn’t make the word pass my lips.

  “I’ll look.” Quinn circled the room twice, coughing as he kicked aside the metal chairs and checked under every table and behind every box. “Fuck, it reeks in here. Greg, mate, you need to lay off the beans. Nope, he’s not here. What the hell’s that noise in the walls?”

  Relief flooded through me, to be replaced a moment later by fear. If Andre wasn’t here, where was he? Had they done something else to him?

  “We have to find him,” I murmured, trying to force myself to my feet again.

  “Get back here,” Quinn growled, grabbing my arms. He tugged at the ropes. My hands dropped free. I flexed the fingers, wincing at the red welts where the rope had dug in, while Quinn freed Greg.

  “Can you guys walk?” Quinn leaned under my shoulder, practically dragging me toward the door. “We’ve got to get to that meeting. Trey needs our help.”

  “I… I think so.” I tried to stand under my own weight, but my knees buckled. Quinn looped my arm over his and half dragged, half carried me out of there.

  Halfway up the stairs, I had to stop to throw up again. Greg fell on the landing, his face deathly pale.

  “Shit, man, you don’t look good.” Quinn slid his arms under Greg and hoisted him over his shoulder. “Hazel, I’m going to carry him the rest of the way, but I’ll be back for you.”

  “It’s fine.” I hauled myself to my feet. “I’ll manage.”

  Quinn shot me a desperate look, but he continued up the stairs with Greg. I dragged my wretched body up behind them as fast as I could. We were on the main staircase that led up into the atrium, which meant the classroom we’d been in was deep beneath the school, near the gymnasium.

  That explains the horrid smell and the scritching. And that’s why I had that vivid dream about being in the infirmary – because we’re near the god’s prison. His influence is stronger here.

  Quinn raced for the open doors that led from the atrium down onto the quad. He had to stop there to set Greg down while he emptied his stomach again. I pitched myself across the quad, trying to ignore the pain shooting up my legs. We’re almost there. We’re so close…

  The dining hall doors swung open. Courtney strutted out like a catwalk model, Tillie, Amber, Derek, and John flanking her. “Hazel, Greg, Quinn, so nice of you to join us,” she smirked. The doors swung shut behind her as she descended the steps toward us.

  “You poisoned us,” I choked out. I pooled saliva in my mouth and spat at her. I was so weak it landed on the cobbles a foot in front of me. There was blood in it.

  “Nonsense, silly. I can’t do anything to harm fellow members of the Eldritch Club. You can’t use that as an excuse for your own tardiness. Unfortunately, you’re too late. We’ve just adjourned the meeting after a very exciting vote.” Courtney twirled a string of blonde extensions around her finger and flashed a villainous smile. “You’re looking at the new president of the Eldritch Club.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  “I’m sorry, Hazy. I should have been faster.” Quinn collapsed on Trey’s couch. For the first time since he’d rescued us, I took a good look at him.

  What I saw made my stomach churn.

  Quinn’s eyes had swelled up. His right one was completely shut, and the left was already coloring. Sweat clung to his brow and plastered his shirt to his torso. A long cut along his jaw had leaked blood onto his collar. He clasped his hands in his lap, like he didn’t know what to do with them anymore.

  “Does anyone know where Andre is?” Greg asked. He gripped the edge of Trey’s counter, looking like he was about to keel over.

  “Nancy says she overheard Courtney talking to John about him. He was scheduled into one of the music rooms, but when they went there to find him, the room was empty. So it looks like he saw them coming and hid.” Trey paced in front of his plasma TV. “He’s cleverer than the rest of us. Quinn, what happened?”

  Quinn tried to smile, but his mouth wobbled. “My dad showed up at school. He wanted to have a conversation.”

  I fell to his side and wrapped my arms around him. He winced.

  “What is it?” I grabbed the edge of his shirt. Quinn tried to stop me, but he was too slow. I yanked up the fabric and recoiled in horror.

  Long, red welts striped Quinn’s back, from his shoulders right down to just above his ass. Blood leaked from several of them, and his flesh hung in ribbons where the lines overlaid each other.

  Those are whip marks.

  I clamped my hand over my mouth, but I had nothing left inside me to throw up. My stomach churned painfully, and the sting in my throat burned.

  “Shit, dude.”

  I jumped at the sound of Ayaz’s voice. I hadn’t realized he was here, but then the trip from the quad up to Trey’s room was a blur of pain. Every breath tore at my throat and burned in my lungs.

  Ayaz slid into the chair opposite, his dark eyes sweeping over Quinn with concern and disgust. His gaze flicked to me, and he instantly looked away.

  I can’t worry about Ayaz now. Quinn’s hurt.

  “Your dad did this to you?” My hand reached for the welts, but I couldn’t bring myself to touch them. I didn’t want to hurt him anymore. “And then you carried Greg up the stairs? You must’ve been in agony.”

  “Yeah, well.” Quinn’s single eye rolled back. “Did I impress you? Will you be my girlfriend now?”

  Tears sprung in my eyes. My friend Dante had been in and out of abusive foster homes most of his life. My mom had abusive boyfriends. I knew what people who were supposed to care for you were capable of. But I’d never seen anything this… barbaric.

  We may be dead, Quinn had said. But we can still bleed.

  He’d endured all that, and yet he still came to save us.

  “We have to get you to the nurse,” I said. Just saying the words made me think of that weird dream I had, and I shuddered. But this wasn’t about me. I was fine… sort of. Quinn was a mess.

  “You need the nurse,” Quinn shot back. As he said it, my throat stung. I broke into another coughing fit.

&nb
sp; “No.” I choked out. I had a bad feeling that going there would make that nightmare come true. “I won’t go there. But you can hardly move, Quinn. I can’t even imagine how much it must’ve hurt to drag yourself this far.”

  “Do I get a vote?” Greg coughed violently. “Because I think we should all go—”

  “No.” Quinn circled my arm, pulling me back down beside him. “If I go to the infirmary, word will get back to my father and he’ll do something worse to me. Or to you, Hazy.”

  “Me?”

  “Yeah.” Quinn winced again as he leaned forward, pointing at the wounds. “I’m supposed to take this punishment silently. I got these because I wouldn’t agree to stop seeing you. I’m not putting you in front of him for anything.”

  Shit. My stomach churned, and I almost threw up again. I don’t want to be the cause of this. I don’t want Quinn to be hurt.

  Trey set down a carton of milk on the table. “Drink that,” he said. “I read that if you swallow poison, you can use milk to help protect your stomach lining.”

  I swiped it out of his hands and took a long gulp. It felt like a cloud floating down my throat. Cow lactation had never tasted so good. I finished half the carton before I passed it to Greg.

  “Trey, do you have a first aid kit?” Greg asked, accepting the carton from me and taking a long sip. “At the very least, we should put some dressings on Quinn’s wounds.”

  “Yeah, I do.” Trey went into the bathroom and returned a moment later with a white box. He sat down on the other side of Quinn and pulled out dressings and antiseptic.

  “This is going to hurt like a motherfucker,” he said as he started to clean the wounds.

  “You weren’t kidding,” Quinn hissed through gritted teeth. His fingers crushed mine as Trey finished his gruesome job, taping dressings over the worst of the wounds. Pain shot up my arm as the hand Tillie had stomped on endured more pain, but it only made the god weaker and meant Quinn kept holding me, so it was worth it.