Forging Family

by Bob Dattolo

  I’m guessing parents haven’t complained that their precious snowflake saw someone else’s naughty bits? That’s shocking, given our society today. I wasn’t quite naked when we were done, but it’s a near thing. Most of us had to wipe the blood off again before getting dressed. Seriously, that’s too much fun. This would have rocked at the academy, especially if we did it across the dozenals. Not that the mages would have been able to do it well. That would have been a bummer, but it still would have been fun beyond belief.

  I nearly made it to lunch before Syl cornered me, breathing deep and coated with magic.

  “Hey, Syl. How are you today?”

  He growled, magic flaring. “Don’t “hi” me! I warned you! I told you…you can’t be with animals like that! It’s not done! How dare you be with that home wrecker! She destroyed my home! She killed my mother!” He leaned into me, “If you’re with her, you’re against me!”

  His face twitched as I patted his cheek, “You’re adorable, do you know that? You’re gorgeous beyond belief. On the outside. On the inside? On the inside you’re petty and angry and ugly. Ugly. Feel free to hate the fact that I’m friends with Melissa. Or that she’s living with me. It’s a free country. But, and I’ll be pretty freaking honest here, if you pursue this? If you attack her again and hurt her like I know you did with a spell the other day?” I smiled, showing some of my sharp teeth. For whatever reason, people don’t always see them. Too bad mine aren’t like Mom’s are. Hers are freaking awesome. “If you try to touch her again like that, we will come and find you and destroy you in ways you can’t even imagine. Your loser of a murdering father? Dead. Any grandparents? Dead. Cousins? Dead. Any properties? Destroyed. Animals? Dead where they stand. That’s my promise to you. I already have four challenges waiting in the wings to kick into gear. I’d be perfectly fine with making it five. I don’t need the money, but I’d looooove to take it and give it to the fucking girl you’ve made live in a cave for the past bunch of years!” He backed into the wall as my skin started to roil.

  “Leave us alone and maybe you live. Maybe. I’m just waiting for more from her before I decide whether or not you need a little pain in your life for a brief period of time before you slip away. I haven’t had blood in far too long…” I licked my lips. I’m not even joking, I could go for some blood right now, “don’t make me come for you. You’re already on thin ice.”

  He didn’t move as I took a step back, still smiling, “Be seeing you, Syl. Feel free to sit with us at lunch. Trust me though, if you decide to talk for Melissa? I’ll break your hips and crush your voice box and leave you in the woods behind the school until you heal.” I blew him a kiss, “Just a warning.”

  I was beside myself with hunger in the lunch room, catching Rachel standing near one of the lines. I hit her with some light to get her attention and she flashed to my side, startling the hell out of the kids that happened to notice it.

  She sniffed, “Were you talking to the other fey?”

  “Yeah. Syl?” I pointed back over my shoulder with my thumb, “He caught me in the hallway and started to make some threats.”

  She stared through the door before shrugging, “You set him straight?”

  “Pretty much. We’ll see if he listens.”

  “I haven’t met him yet. We crossed paths, but he didn’t introduce himself once he figured out what I was.”

  “Any idea why?”

  “I’m not sure it was intentional? He was in the middle of a conversation both times, so he may not have wanted to be rude.”

  Huh, okay. I guess that’s something. He’s not a rude prick to everybody.

  She pointed at the lines, “So, what’s the deal with everything?”

  Tara joined us, “Oooh, lunch time?”

  I hugged her, “Sure is. Come on, let’s show Rachel what this is all about.”

  My vampire friend followed us into the line and looked over everything, “Wow, this is pretty cool. I like the cart idea. They could have used that at the academy.”

  I shrugged, pushing it along, “Maybe? Then again, it lets the later plates get sort of cold. Or, cooler, I guess. At the academy they only had 40-something people to deal with, so you could get through the line in a heartbeat compared to here. Thankfully, most of the normal kids don’t get into this line. This is the supernatural line, where kids have larger appetites.”

  She nodded along, studying everything everyone was getting. Her eyes started drifting to black as I grabbed my third plate. “You getting hungry?”

  “Yeah? At least a little.”

  “Then let’s hit the table and we can both get a bite.”

  Tara listened to the exchange and followed along until we sat, grabbing her normal seat. “Are you really going to let her feed?” She wrinkled her nose as Rachel took my wrist.

  “Yeah? I heal so quickly that I don’t notice the blood loss.”

  “Doesn’t it…isn’t it…why would you let her do that?”

  “Umm…because I can’t really quibble about what she eats? I’ve had blood before. I eat animals. She doesn’t even have to kill to eat, so why not? Besides…she can make you cum like you can’t even believe.”

  The scent of desire wafted over from her, “Ooh, really? I heard that, but is that true?”

  My scent joined hers, “It’s freaking amazing. Doing it mid-sex? Oh my God…”

  Rachel snickered, “Do you remember when you broke Paul’s fingers when he was fingering you?”

  “Oh my God, that was a good one.”

  “Uhh, what? How did you do that?”

  Rachel’s fangs sank int my wrist, and I was happy that she didn’t make it orgasmic. “I came so hard that I clenched up. Broke the hell out of three of his fingers. Thank God he’s a shifter, otherwise that would have sucked. We had to time things better after that.”

  Melissa, Nathan, Rhett, and Destanee appeared over the next few minutes, joining us. Everyone met Rachel, so it was pretty normal. Then again, folks looked around for Syl. I still haven’t seen him come in.

  “Where’s Syl?” Destanee asked.

  “I’m not sure he’s joining us? He rather has an issue with me having Melissa live with us. Or me driving in Tara or Marisela.”

  She grunted, “Oookay…I’m not sure how it’s any of his business?”

  “No idea.” I nodded at Melissa, “At least this way she can actually talk instead of being overridden each time.”

  That got laughs from the table, even from Rachel as she pulled away. She’s normally done far quicker than this today, but she was milking it. I can appreciate that, since it fills us both with a languid sense of peace as it’s happening. That, plus I kept us connected with light while she pretty much prayed at me.

  I was finally done my food when I caught activity over at the empty table that Dave usually sits at. Or, it’s empty except for him. I should invite him to our table, but I don’t know that the others will like it.

  “Excuse me…I’ll be right back.” The others watched me leave. I left Rachel with a request to stay back for now and she stayed, moving into a light conversation with Destanee about kids in our grade.

  At Dave’s table, his tray is nearly full of food. He doesn’t eat as much as we do, but he has a healthy appetite. Yet he’s not eating.

  Why?

  Because he’s slapping at the air around him.

  The empty air. Well, of anything physical. It’s positively loaded with magic, though.

  The mage table hushed as I bypassed them and hit Dave’s table, plopping into the seat next to him, making sure I sat pretty close. Close enough for the spell to reach out to me as well.

  I immediately saw it. Them. Every person at the mage table with the four losers sent a piece of this spell. It’s really a bunch of little spells, all doing somewhat the same thing. It’s basically a pest spell. I’d say it’s nearly a practical joke spell, but doing it like this? It’s not.

  At all.

  Once all of the spells tried to hit
me, I held up a hand, fist open, and then clenched it, destroying the spells in a wash of feedback that shook the mages.

  Then they began throwing up. Rather violently. And pissing themselves. And, yeah, there was some poop involved. Quite a bit of it. As in all of what they had in their intestines. Everything north of there went out their mouths. It’s very…fountain-like, if you ask me. Just chunkier.

  It seems they weren’t quite prepared for a retaliation spell of any sort. Huh, lucky me.

  Dave watched them with something in his eyes that I seriously can’t place. There’s something about him that I can’t…I can’t put my finger on it!

  “You don’t need any help from me at all, do you.” It wasn’t a question.

  He smiled a little as Mark somehow got throw up into the mouth of a girl that I don’t know. That made her bend over to throw up more violently, and it turns out she has a short skirt on…and no underwear. She sprayed poop across the two behind her, getting some in their mouths. It was delightful.

  When he looked back at me, he kept the same strange vibe going. He nodded very briefly, and I would have missed it if I blinked, “Thank you for your help. All of it. It’s rare to find someone being willing to help me. Or anyone like me.”

  I shrugged, “Well, since I don’t know what you are, I can’t say. I do know that I hate bullies, though, so…”

  His lips pressed together as he fought another smile. “To answer your question…no. I don’t specifically need your help. Nothing they’ve done to me has hurt me much at all and I can stop it at any time.”

  Studying his face didn’t clarify anything for me, “Yet you allow it to go on? Why?”

  He looked back at them, “I’d rather not say totally, but…let’s say that it gives them enough rope to hang themselves.”

  “Umm…rope? To hang themselves?”

  His smile got bigger as our principal slipped in someone’s liquid poop and ended up nearly halfway under the table, where he was liberally coated with liquids. “Rope is offered all around us. In nearly every interaction with people, it’s there for the taking. It’s up to each person to use the rope they have access to. How will they use it? Will they use it to help others? Give them a leg up or assistance?” He nodded towards where I had been sitting, and I somehow knew he meant Tara. “Or will they use it to create something new? Something that has the chance to be amazing?” He nodded again, with Rachel being highlighted in my head. “Or will they use it to pull their people in? To bring them to safety?” He didn’t nod, but I had an instant image of Marisela. He let me think on that for a bit. “Or,” another nod at the nearby table, “will the use it to abuse someone? Someone they perceive as weaker?”

  “So…you, what, make rope available to people and see what they do?”

  His eyes twinkled, “For lack of a better word? Yes. It’s…part of what I am. Now, how about we talk about you?”

  I waved his question away, “I’m old news.”

  “Maybe to you. The same as I’m old news to me.”

  “True. I’m willing to answer some questions, but some won’t be answered at all.”

  “What if I guess?”

  “That’s different. What if I guess about you?”

  He studied me this time, “If you guess about me? I’ll tell you. I would rather not, since it tends to cause too many problems and…heartache…but I will.”

  I nodded at that, “Same for me. I lost most of my friends from my last school when they found out what I am. It…it hurts. So much.”

  He grabbed his now empty tray and his few books, “Then you know how I feel. In light of that, I should get going. I have a feeling the mages are going to start throwing magic here any minute.”

  He disappeared into the sea of screaming and freaking out kids around the lunch room. As you can imagine, there are a huge number of scarred kids here, with the rest filming everything. I wonder how that girl is going to feel about her butt being on video as she shot liquid poop onto her friends and into their mouths.

  Stifling a laugh wasn’t the easiest thing to do, but I did. No sense giving them a clue what’s happening. Instead, I left behind Dave’s empty table and headed back towards mine. Warren climbed out of a small huddle of horrified mages and pointed at me. His look of anger was lessened by the chunks of vomit falling from his hand and the liberal splash of diarrhea across his face. Yeah, he was one of the lucky recipients of the bit of unexpected scat fun. He doesn’t look too pleased.

  “You! You did this!”

  I stopped, looking across all of them. “Me? I did nothing of the sort. I did, however, crush a bunch of spells being cast by every one of you on Dave. They went after me when I sat down too. I believe I told you that I don’t like bullies. I warned you. My mother warned you. You have until Sunday to answer the challenge. After that…? I’ll just show up at your house…and then we’ll see who walks out of the challenge circle.”

  Some of the poop slid down into one of his eyes and he angrily fisted it away, “You don’t have a clue what you’ve done! You have no idea who we are, what powers we have!”

  Everyone facing me rather froze as I let some of me out, making my skin bulge. It’s good to feel all of my powers roiling in my belly. It feels so alive, and sometimes it’s all I can do not to break out the magic for all sorts of things. “You’re right, I don’t know what powers you have. Then again, you have no idea at all who I am or what I’m capable of. Yet. You’ll find out. Now, don’t disappoint me. You need to get your wills written. Not that it’ll matter. I plan on keeping everything you have. Maybe I’ll start a foundation for underprivileged supernaturals that need a leg up. Scholarships? Home loans? Who knows, it’s a wide world out there…and I plan on experiencing at least some of it on your dime.”

  Putting myself away, I winked at him before looking across the other mages. “My challenge has only been made to Mark, Chuck, Warren, and Eric. I’m not looping the rest of you in on it…but feel free to stand up for your friends if you want. Then we’ll see which side of the argument you land on. Do you support the bullies of the world? Or the people standing against them? Your decision. I know which side I stand on.”

  The kids that were left in the lunch room stared at me as I returned to my table. Melissa and Rachel were the only ones that didn’t look shocked as hell at my return and what was taking place behind me.

  “So…this period is almost over, right?”

  Rachel snorted and hit my arm while also connecting to me with a short prayer of her laughing at what I did. Needless to say, I hit her with a shaft of light for that. It was payment for the laugh I so desperately needed. Not that I let it out. No sense alerting anyone else in the room about my real frame of mind.

  Physics and Spanish passed in a blur. Syl made comments about me loving monsters and trash but didn’t say anything outright that others could hear. I think I did a little better in Spanish, which is good. It’s funny, but I can feel my learning earring working in me as I pick up new things far quicker than ever before, but even with that, knowing what a word means doesn’t necessarily mean that I can say it easily. That seems to be the hardest part right now. It’s like my mental memory is far surpassing my muscle memory, so saying the word for car isn’t nearly as simple as knowing what it is.

  Still, it’s far better than I had been doing or than I ever expected to do. I’ve never been a brain in school, at least as far as I’m concerned, so it’s nice to be making progress in leaps and bounds.

  Study hall was missing a certain mage by the name of Warren. Melissa was still in a happy mood from lunch as she dove into to her homework to get it done. After all, her birthday is tomorrow, and tonight at midnight she may get powers since she’s turning 17. I’m hoping she does. I’m so excited for her.

  Dave gave me a sly nod and a wink that no one else saw, then moved back in to his normal shy, awkward self. A freshman girl tried to trip him, although it didn’t work. She talked about him to her friends until the teacher got eve
rything in order and we had to quiet down. She’s a little bully in the making, and I’m thinking she’s yanking on the rope he’s leaving out.

  I just don’t get why he’s doing that. I don’t know of any species that does something like that. The book from the academy is pretty good and covers a huge number of species. I know it’s not all of them, but it’s a pretty darn good accounting of them. Heck, it doesn’t list dragons at all other than to say that they’re extinct. Maybe I should write the next version of the book? I’m getting hourly pings from the dragons, all 22 of them so far. They still have more to bring back, so I’m guessing they’re taking it slow for now. To a member, they seem to love me…and I love them back.

  That’s such an odd feeling, too. How do you go from not knowing someone to loving them? I can’t even explain it. It’s like…I don’t know. When someone prays to me, it’s like they have a direct connection to my brain that connects right to my feels. If they’re connecting and they’re honest and sincere in their prayer, then it hits me hard. Yeah, some of the people are praying for selfish reasons, but then I don’t connect back with them. Others are making heartfelt pleas to me, and I’ll answer them with blessings, for lack of a better word. It’s those that really make a personal connection that bypass it all on the express lane to a love that I never knew I was capable of. Christine? Mr. Reynolds? Stacey? They’re honest and true followers of the goddess of death, and I would scour the state clean of people for them. The people in the city? They’re followers of the queen of the dead. The connection isn’t quite as personal there, although it’s far stronger since there are more than eight billion of them. Yeah, there are more bodies there, but some folks didn’t want to come back. It’s okay, they’ll get an opportunity again. The dragons are connecting somewhere between the folks in the city and my actual followers. They’re connecting on a far more personal level that’s pretty interesting. Almost like lieges or something.

  Then there’s Rachel. She’s connecting as a part of me. What I have for her goes so far beyond love that there’s no word for it in my mind. Not one that makes sense. We’re not mates or even girlfriends…yet the feeling is sort of the same. She’s truly a vessel of my power, and we share so much between us. It’s heady stuff, and I wish I knew it was possible. It would have been something to look forward to in my life.