“Hang on, Denton,” Michael went back to the kitchen and grabbed his keys. In addition to keys to the apartment and dormitory main door, he had a master key that opened every room in the building.
Following Denton as the student raced up the stairs, he thought about the patterns in the story. The patterns held together, suggesting Denton was telling the truth. They reached the third floor after a sprint up two flights of stairs that left Michael gasping for air. Several more students were gathered in the hallway in front of the room in question. To a man, they looked immensely relieved to see him. What was going on? This didn’t have the feel of a practical joke. There was a strong impression of fear and dread in the air that Michael didn’t think could be created by students pulling a prank.
Michael pushed his way through the small crowd of students and into the room shared by Tabata, or Tab, Toshiyuki, and Hector Carvallo. Both young men were sitting on the floor leaning against one of the beds. Both appeared extremely frightened. The one window in the room was shattered, and glass was scattered on the floor beneath it.
“Tell me what happened,” Michael sat down on the floor next to a shaking Tab.
Hector cleared his throat. “Well, sir, um…we were both reading. All of a sudden, the room got really cold. Like super cold, and Tab yelled. I looked over and this … thing … ghost … whatever, was trying to push him out the window. The window wasn’t open, and it wasn’t broken then; but Tab was partially out of it anyway. It was f-freaky, sir. The th-thing was sorta inside and outside at the same time, too. I yelled and grabbed Tab’s legs to pull him back in. That’s when Theo and some of the others ran in. When they did, the thing disappeared, but Tab was still halfway out the window. We pulled him in, and that’s when the window broke. I swear we didn’t do it on purpose. But we had to get Tab back into the room!” Hector’s voice shook, but he looked Michael in the eye as he finished the story.
Michael looked at the two boys. Tab’s face was pale, and his eyes were wide. Michael put a hand on Tab’s shoulder.
“Tab? Tab? It’s okay. It didn’t get you,” he said softly.
Slowly Tab’s eyes focused on Michael. “Sir? It was so cold. So cold. I couldn’t move.” His voice was a shaky whisper.
“Tab, I have to ask you…do you think it was a ghost? Or something else?” Michael hated to take the boy back to what was clearly a traumatic incident so soon, but he had to get an idea of what he might be dealing with. If it was a ghoul or wraith, or some other dead creature, it could go after other boys tonight. He didn’t want to think about that possibility.
Tab jerked his head in the negative. “I don’t know,” he whispered.
Michael wondered if Jon was back from his evening out with his friends. He could use some backup about now. He looked up at the boys still gathered in the doorway.
“Denton take somebody with you and go down and see if Mr. Noble is home. Bring him here.”
Denton jerked his head at the student next to him, and the two boys raced off. Michael stood and moved to the doorway.
“Before Mr. Carvallo yelled, did any of you see or feel anything? Did you feel the cold he mentioned?”
One of the boys halfraised his hand. “Sir? I think I did. We were playing cards in my room,” the student indicated the room immediately across the hall, “and I felt cold all of a sudden and thought the window must have a leak or something. And that was right before we heard Hector yell. But maybe it was…whatever Hector saw?”
“All right. Anybody else? Anything feel strange?” He waited. Feet shuffled and somebody coughed.
“Gentlemen, nobody is getting in trouble tonight. This is too dangerous. Just tell me if you felt something and when and where. I don’t want to know why you might have been wherever you were,” Michael added.
“Well, um…we were coming back in…um…just a bit ago…um…in the, uh, back door…” a voice from the back of the small crowd began hesitatingly.
“Yes?” Michael hoped he sounded encouraging. Right now, he didn’t care if they’d been out after hours. “Please just tell me what you saw. I promise. Nobody gets in trouble tonight.”
There was more shuffling, and two boys moved up to the front of the small group.
“Mr. O’Hara, Mr. Patel. What did you see?”
“It wasn’t so much seeing as feeling, sir. We had just … um … opened the back door when Aaka accused me of dumping ice down his shirt. But I hadn’t done anything,” Brian O’Hara began.
“At first, I didn’t believe him, but then I realized my shirt wasn’t wet. But it still felt like there was ice running down my back,” Aakash Patel took up the story. “Then the icy feeling just stopped. I didn’t think too much about it because we were worried about … um … not … um … waking anybody up when we came in.” Patel at least had the grace to look a little bit ashamed.
“All right. Thank you, gentlemen. I will just say, in the future please try to avoid breaking so many rules in one night.” Michael smiled at the two students.
“Michael, what’s going on? Is everybody all right?” Jon jogged up to the back of the crowd followed by Denton and the other student.
Michael gave Jon the shortened version of what had happened and included the information he had just received from O’Hara and Patel.
Jon’s eyes widened. “This isn’t good,” he said in a huge understatement.
Michael nodded. “We need to find a place for these two tonight.” He indicated Tab and Hector.
“Well, we can pull their beds into a couple of the other rooms for the night. Maintenance can fix the window tomorrow,” Jon suggested.
“Good idea,” Michael glanced at the students. “Okay. Some of you grab the beds and help Mr. Toshiyuki and Mr. Carvallo with some of their belongings. Pick two rooms. I don’t care how you do it; but somebody will take Mr. Toshiyuki, and somebody will take Mr. Carvallo.”
Theo Denton moved forward. “C’mon, Tab. Let’s get your stuff.” He reached out and helped his friend to his feet. Tab was still a bit shaky, but at least he was moving. Brian O’Hara and Aakash Patel helped Hector up and others started pulling mattresses off the beds and grabbing books and some clothes.
Confident that the students had the matter well in hand, Michael looked over at Jon.
“I think we need to talk.”
“Yes. I’m assuming you’re thinking along the same lines as I am,” Jon agreed.
“Most likely. I have some scotch …” Michael responded.
“Lead the way,” Jon said, accepting the implied invitation.
Once back in Michael’s apartment, glasses in hand, the two teachers stared at each other.
“Helluva way to begin the school year, eh?” Jon said taking a sip of his scotch.
“No kidding. I’m thinking wraith. You?” Michael fought the urge to down his drink in one gulp.
“Yes. The icy cold feeling described by several boys, and the fact that both Carvallo and Toshiyuki said it put Toshiyuki through the window without breaking it, definitely points to wraith. Any ideas on how to deal with it?” Jon swirled the amber liquid in his glass. The ice cube clinked softly against the side.
Michael stared into his glass. “Wraiths are usually found elsewhere. But that doesn’t mean they can’t cross over to our plane. I don’t like it. It means that somebody either brought one with them, or there’s some sort of anomaly that allowed this one to cross over.”
“I agree. I’m inclined toward the anomaly idea simply because it’s too early in the school year for the students to get over-confident in their abilities to safely travel between here and elsewhere. End of term is an entirely different matter.” Jon smiled wryly.
“Oh, so I have more of this to look forward to?” Michael groaned.
“Not frequently, but it has been known to happen,” Jon explained. “We’ll need to speak with the headmaster. I think it will take some combined workings to send the thing back to elsewhere. And we need to do that tonight.”
Michael looked at the clock. It was a bit after one in the morning. The middle of the night was not exactly the best time to be dealing with a wraith, but they didn’t really have a choice.
Michael gazed at the moon and reflected that it was a beautiful night. Too bad they were hunting a wraith instead of simply enjoying the beauty of the night skies. After listening to their story, the headmaster had immediately followed them back to the dormitories. He was the one who had awakened Juli Ocampo and Elena Akabueze, her co-advisor in Solomons. They all gathered in the main entrance of Solomons.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we have a serious problem. A wraith attempted to destroy a student in Darrington Hall earlier, and it must be sent back to elsewhere tonight. It has already tried to take one student, and we cannot allow it to try again and perhaps succeed.” Nathaniel Davidson was not a man to mince words.
Juli was standing next to Michael. She glanced up at him with wide eyes. “What are you guys doing over there?” she whispered.
He shrugged. “I claim ignorance,” he whispered back.
The headmaster cleared his throat. Michael jumped guiltily.
“Fortunately, we have one kinetic mage,” the headmaster continued pointing to Michael, “two image mages,” he indicated Juli and Elena, “and two element mages,” he waved a hand at himself and Jon.
Michael swallowed. He had previously traveled to and through elsewhere, the area in-between this world and the non-magic world and found elsewhere to be an unpleasant experience.In order to travel to elsewhere you had to create a pattern that included patterns found elsewhere. Since elsewhere was its own dimension, those patterns were headache inducing. He understood the theory behind banishing a wraith back to elsewhere but had never actually put it into practice. Judging by the looks on the faces of his fellow teachers, they were just as inexperienced. Hopefully, the headmaster was working from experience and not just theory.
As if he’d heard Michael’s concerns, Nathaniel smiled.
“I’ve done this a few times. It’s not easy, but it is possible. In essence, Michael will construct a pattern that will create a path to elsewhere. Jon and I will use air to push the wraith as that is the strongest means of forcing it anywhere, and Juli and Elena, you will create an image of elsewhere that will provide a destination for Michael’s pattern. It doesn’t matter how it appears, but you two have to have the same image.I suggest you base your image on those found in the textbooks. By separating these two tasks, the pattern and the destination image, we should be able to cut down on the headachest hat inevitably accompany any connections to elsewhere.” Nathaniel looked around at his teachers to make sure they understood what they would be doing.
Michael glanced at Juli and Elena. “Once you two figure out your image, I’ll need to see it so I can create a pattern that leads to it.”
Elena nodded. “Okay.” She turned to Juli. “Let’s go figure out what we’re doing.”
The two women moved slightly away from the others, heads bent together as they discussed the image they would create.
The headmaster looked at Jon.
“Jon, while they’re doing that, we need to work together so that we’re familiar with each other’s touch when we manipulate the air. We don’t want to be pushing in opposite directions when the time comes.” He smiled again.
In a relatively short period of time, the four teachers and the headmaster had worked out a plan for finding the wraith and sending it back to elsewhere. Michael thought it seemed overly simple, but the headmaster was happy with it, so Michael bowed to experience.
Plan set, the little group moved out of Solomons and went slowly through the garden toward Darrington. The headmaster theorized that, having been driven out of the dormitory, the wraith would lurk in some of the larger bushes in order to ambush the unwary. They spread out and wound their way through the plantings staying alert for the icy cold sensation that signaled the presence of a wraith.
Elena abruptly froze in the middle of the azalea bushes. “Over here!” she called.
The others rapidly moved over to her position. Jon and Nathaniel started the spell that would create the wall of air that would keep the wraith away from the teachers while simultaneously pushing it into Michael’s pattern.
Michael stood next to Juli and Elena and recreated the pattern he had previously put together to guide the wraith into elsewhere. Suddenly, he felt an icy hand run down his back. He jumped sideways and almost knocked Juli over. She wrapped one arm around his waist and braced herself against him.
“Don’t fall! Keep the pattern!” she said tersely.
“Sorry! Wraith touched me. Didn’t expect that,” Michael gasped.
Nathaniel and Jon were standing shoulder to shoulder. Despite the chilly night, and additional deep chill created by the presence of the wraith, sweat was running down both of their faces.
The icy feel left Michael, but he sensed a great deal of anger in the air. A subsonic howl vibrated their ear drums, and the air temperature dropped precipitously. Michael’s head started to pound.
Nathaniel grabbed Jon’s forearm. “Keep pushing it!” he rasped. “Michael. Your pattern, now!”
Michael put his hand on Juli’s shoulder as she and Elena poured their energy into their image. He made a slight adjustment to his pattern and shot a glance at Nathaniel and Jon.
“Go! The pattern starts in front of Juli!” he shouted.
Both Nathaniel and Jon exhaled explosively. Michael could see the faint outline of something vaguely human-shaped. Two glowing red dots appeared in what Michael supposed was its face. The thing reached one long arm toward Michael. As it was pushed, struggling, into the start of his pattern, Michael took over from Nathaniel and Jon and used his pattern to continue to push the wraith toward elsewhere. The wraith was strong, and it clearly didn’t want to return. Michael strengthened his pattern and dug deep into his energy reserves. He could feel sweat dripping down his face and into his eyes. He swiped one hand across his face to clear it off.
The wraith chose that moment to surge back against the pattern. Michael staggered and felt control slipping from him. The wraith felt it, too, and pushed even harder. Both arms reached for him, and its eyes glowed brighter. A gaping black hole opened under the eyes. Panic gripped Michael. If he lost control…
Juli wrapped her arm around his waist again. Her other hand grasped Elena’s as they worked to maintain their image of elsewhere.He felt hands gripping his shoulders. A surge of energy poured into him.
“Keep going! You can do it!” Juli yelled at him.
Michael took a deep breath and drew on the new energy flowing into him, pouring it into his kinetic pattern. The wraith gave another subsonic scream, but he could see it slowly moving through the pattern. Michael directed one more surge of energy into the pattern, and the wraith finally moved through the last piece and into elsewhere. He collapsed the pattern, and Juli and Elena let go of their image.
Michael slumped to the ground. The hands he’d felt on his shoulders belonged to Nathaniel and Jon. The other four joined him, sitting in the dirt among the azalea bushes. Everyone was panting as if they’d just run a race.
After about five minutes, during which the panting died down and they started to look around again, Nathaniel smiled. “Well done, everybody! We do have the best teachers at The Academy Arcane!”
“Please tell me that we don’t have to do that on a regular basis, sir,” Michael managed to gasp out.
“Oh, come now, Michael. You have to admit that was an exciting start to the school year, and to your first year as a resident faculty advisor.” The headmaster grinned.
“Oh, certainly sir. Exciting. Yes. Exactly how I would describe it.” Michael scrambled to his feet and held out a hand to Juli while Jon dragged himself upright and pulled Elena up. Nathaniel bounced up, showing no signs of weariness.
Juli grinned up at Michael. “Well, with that kind of excitement so early in the year, the rest of should be calmer.”
�
��Oh, don’t tempt fate!” Michael returned the grin.
Nathaniel looked up at the sky. “It will be dawn in a few hours. Well, it’s the weekend, so at least we don’t have to worry about classes tomorrow…er…today. I suggest everybody return home and get what sleep you can. I will contact you later to discuss some steps we should take to prevent this sort of thing in the future.”
Juli gave Michael’s hand a squeeze. “I’m about to collapse. I’ll see you later.”
“Sure thing.” He smiled.
Juli and Elena headed back to Solomons and Michael, Jon, and the headmaster walked slowly back toward Darrington. The headmaster left them at the main entrance with a cheery wave.
“Is he always that cheerful after fighting wraiths that have invaded his campus?” Michael asked.
“I’ve never seen him deal with something like a wraith before, so I can’t really say. But it does look like he’s enjoying himself, doesn’t it?” Jon gazed after the headmaster as he disappeared into the shadows at the side of the building.
“Definitely an interesting start to the year,” Michael muttered.
Jon laughed. “Get some sleep. We’ll talk later.”
He turned down the hall toward his apartment.Michaelremembered to lock his own door behind him before shuffling into his bedroom and falling onto the bed. He still had a whole weekend of duty in front of him.
Becky R. Jones grew up in San Diego after spending the first eight years of her life as an Army brat. After college she spent time in banking, building sets for television shows, mobile home park management, and aerospace before going back to school and getting a PhD in political science. That led to 20-plus years in academia. Now, as a newly emerging fiction writer she’s changing directions yet again. She currently lives in Philadelphia with her husband and Max, The Wonder Cat.
Fantastic Schools, Volume 3 Page 22