by Rain Oxford
“Don’t lie to me!” And then she pushed the girl. If she hadn’t been on the top of the stairs, she would have been fine. It could have even been an accident.
The girl fell backwards down the stairs.
* * *
“How is that supposed to help me?” I asked aloud. I was alone in my office. Baumwirt killed two people. The first and fourth visions involved her. That meant the other visions had to be related somehow.
I locked my office and headed to Baumwirt’s classroom. Halfway there, my instincts stopped me. I could read her mind, but she was a powerful wizard who could defend herself. I wanted answers, not a fight. Instead, I returned to my office, checked the housing assignments, and went to the Center. It was mostly empty as all teachers, support staff, and cleaning staff were working. The cooks were taking a break in the dining room.
I went upstairs to Baumwirt’s room and tried the knob. It was locked, not to my surprise. I started to reach out with my power for Henry’s mind before I remembered that he was being an asshole. Instead, I connected with Remington’s mind. “I need to break into a teacher’s room.”
“I’ll send Dani your way with the keys. Who’s room?”
“Judie Baumwirt.”
“Dani is on her way.”
“Thanks.” I closed the link. Two minutes later, Dani joined me.
“Hey, Devon,” she said. She had a ring of keys in her hand. “Ms. Hunt wanted me to make sure this was for professional reasons.”
“I had a vision that---”
She held up her hands. “Whoa, wait. I don’t want to know those reasons. Just say yes so that if we get in trouble, I can say I was following orders.”
“Yes.”
“Great. Ignorance is innocence.” She singled out a key and used it to unlock the door. “There you go. I’m going to disappear now. Don’t break anything.” She left.
I entered the room. It was designed like most of the others, but it was definitely more lived-in. The furniture was older and there were pictures of family and notes everywhere. I checked the writing desk. There were tons of neatly organized class notes, tests, and student grades. I opened the drawers and searched through them. Many of them were crap, but then I found what I was looking for. It was a very simple note that explained everything.
Remington Hunt knows what you did and she’s about to rat you out. You had better take care of her before it is too late.
Judie Baumwirt was trying to kill Remington to cover up her mistakes. That was why I was having the visions and why my instincts were screaming at me. I took off running all the way out of the Center, into the East, and to Remy’s office. I threw open her door, startling her and Sam. They were sitting at Remi’s desk discussing something, probably Sam’s habit of setting himself on fire.
“Baumwirt is trying to kill you.”
Her eyes widened for a moment before she sighed and put her head in her hand. “Damn it.”
“Come with me. We’ve got to break your normal pattern. You shouldn’t be in here, because people can expect to find you here.”
After a moment, she stood. “Okay. Let’s go.” Sam stood and followed us out, confused. As soon as we were out of the room, Remy stopped. “Wait, I have to get that file.” She darted back into the room before I could stop her. The instant she was all the way in the room, the door slammed shut. She shouted.
“Damn it!” All of the classrooms and exterior doors of the school opened outward so that they couldn’t be busted in. Fortunately, that wasn’t the case with the offices. I used the bond between Rocky and me to draw her strength into me. Then, with a deep exhale, I kicked the door in. It gave easily. Remington was inside a glowing magic circle. Like most magic circles, this one had a pentagram and several sigils in it. Her mouth was tight with pain.
“How do I break it?” I asked.
“Find who is doing it and stop them. This is an active spell, meaning they’re focusing on it.”
“How much time do I have?”
“It’s draining my energy. Ten minutes, maybe fifteen.”
“Sam, guard her.” I took off running to Baumwirt’s classroom. I threw open the unlocked door, startling Baumwirt and all thirteen of her students, who were taking a test. Baumwirt was walking around the tables, watching for cheating. She definitely wasn’t cursing Remington at that moment.
“Can I help you?” she asked, flustered.
“No, sorry. Misinformation. I’ll explain later.” I shut the door, closed my eyes, and focused. I spread my power across the school. I felt the minds of all the students, and I knew they felt my intrusion. Most of the teachers were protecting their minds, but true hate couldn’t fully be hidden.
I detected a dozen people who were feeling hate in the East alone. I narrowed in on those ones and determined that all but two of them were students. I doubted that students would have the magic or motive to overpower Remington.
Of the two adults who were feeling intense hate at that moment, one was arguing with someone. Since I knew serious magic required concentration, I focused on the other one and slipped on my ring. I couldn’t find someone just by sensing their mind; I had to see through their eyes or hear where they were from their thoughts.
My power invaded his mind and I saw fire. I cleared my mind further, enabling me to see the person was sitting on the floor, surrounded by a ring of candles, with a bowl of blood and herbs, a picture of Remington, and a dagger. He was definitely the culprit. If I wasn’t wearing the chain, I could have easily made him stop.
But I didn’t have that shortcut.
I searched through his most recent memories. It wasn’t easy to go backwards in a person’s mind. Without my control, I could influence their memories, but not force them. I saw a door I recognized an instant before my chain burned and I was thrown out of the vision. Despite being disoriented, I ran as fast as I could to the room that was just opposite of Remington’s office.
It was the main meeting room in the East. When I reached it, Sam was still in the doorway of Remy’s office. “Nobody has come by,” Sam said.
“That’s because the culprit has been here all along.” Once again, I pulled Rocky’s strength into me and kicked the door down. Shooting it would have been easier, but it wasn’t normally necessary to be armed in the school. The door gave and I saw a man I didn’t recognize in the middle of the room, just like I had seen in his mind.
The man was middle-aged with medium brown hair and hazel eyes. He was pudgy, but he carried it well. My instincts warned me that he was dangerous even though he wasn’t very powerful. I reached out to control his mind, only to receive a sharp pain from the chain.
I definitely should have gotten my gun.
I focused on the fire, gained control over it, and added strength to it. It shot up and engulfed him. He shouted with surprise, but only for a moment before he doused it. I held out my hand, envisioned the knife flying to me, and focused my power on it. Unfortunately, it didn’t float gently into my hand.
Instead, it shot at me. I dodged it and it hit the wall with enough force to embed the blade and inch into the wood panels. I plucked it out and threw it at the wizard. It stuck him in the shoulder. This caused him to shriek with pain. He pulled it from his shoulder and started to throw it, then froze.
Remington was standing in the open doorway with her gun aimed on the wizard. “Try anything, and you’ll be dead before you can.” The wizard slumped to the floor. “Devon, I thought you said it was Judie Baumwirt who was trying to kill me,” Remington said.
“I think she is, too.”
“And Duke Hunter?”
“And possibly Joe Fahrenkopf. I’ve been having random vision/dreams since I got here. I didn’t think much of them because I didn’t know who any of the people in them were. I just found out that Baumwirt was in there, that she killed two people, and that she knows that you know.”
“I didn’t know that she killed anyone!”
“She got a letter saying you did.”
“I had no idea.”
“What about you. Why are you trying to kill Remington?” I asked.
“My name is Thomas Murray. Logan Hunt killed my brother.”
“So you’re after revenge.” He was the one I had seen sneaking into Remy’s room. “Joe Fahrenkopf was mad because he wanted to be the headmaster.”
“What about Duke?”
He must have been the one who killed his wife’s doctor. “I bet he got the same letter as Baumwirt. He killed his late wife’s doctor because the doctor failed to save her.”
“I’ve already dealt with Joe and Duke,” Remy said. “At least we know why now. Is there anyone else?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Leave this man to me.”
“Do you know him?”
“He’s the math teacher for students five to nine.” She made a gesture and the teacher was slammed against the wall. He was knocked out.
“Are you going to call your father?” I asked.
“No, I’m going to tie him up and have Gryphon take him to the castle’s dungeon.”
“Gryphon?”
“Gryphon Yuun, the deputy headmaster of the North.”
“That is a cool name and title combo. Don’t let Darwin hear that. We’ll deal with Baumwirt after classes end for the day. In the meantime, I’m going to go search Duke Hunter’s room to confirm my hunch, unless you want me to help here.”
She shook her head. “Go on, I’ve got this.”
I trusted her. Everyone needed help once in a while, but Remington had studied magic her entire life, unlike me. If she said she could handle something, I believed her.
I met Dani on the way out and she handed me the keys to Hunter’s room. His room, like Baumwirt’s, was well-used. Also like in Baumwirt’s room, I found a letter in his desk, warning him that Remington knew what he did.
I grabbed a sandwich and mug of coffee, then headed back to my office. Most of the way to the office, I saw Kita walking in the same direction. “Everything okay?” I asked.
She blushed. “No. I got mad because Mr. Whittaker made me sit out class. Lauren told him that I pushed her down the stairs and he believed her even though I said I didn’t and she had no proof. You said that if I got mad, I could come to your office. Otherwise, I’m going to slam Lauren’s face into the wall and watch her blood gush from her nose. I bet she’d be less of a bitch if she looked as ugly as she is.” She was shaking with anger.
Yet, she was coming to me instead of disfiguring the source of her anger. Furthermore, she didn’t project any of her anger onto me, and she didn’t even seem mad at her teacher for disbelieving her.
“I’m glad you did. If you want to grab an early lunch and eat it in my office, you can. That way I won’t feel bad about eating in front of you.”
“Can I have coffee?”
“Do your parents let you have coffee?”
“You think if they cared about me, I would be here?”
I stopped, and she did, too. “This isn’t a military school. Parents don’t send their kids here to get rid of them. We can talk about it, but go get some food, first.”
She left and I continued walking to my office. When I reached it, however, I found Lindsey and Oliver waiting for me. Lindsey was sitting with his back against my door and his fingers wer clinching his hair, obviously having a panic attack. He was shaking hard enough that it was rattling the door. Oliver was rubbing sanitizing liquid on his arms like it was lotion.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Kelly got a bloody nose in class, which freaked him out,” Oliver explained. “Then, before we could get out of the room, she sneezed.”
“I can feel it all over me,” Lindsey said, shuddering.
“Do you want to take a shower?” I asked.
He shook his head. “The West showers are so nasty.”
“What about the Center showers? Would that help?” He nodded. “Oliver, can you take him? I’m waiting on another student.”
“Yeah, but we would need written permission to be in the Center and to use the showers.”
Lindsey moved out of the way and I unlocked my office. After setting down my food, I wrote a quick note and sent them on their way. By the time they left, Kita arrived. As soon as she got settled on the couch with a book, Dani stopped by with a stack of discipline notices.
I was not expecting a vice principal’s job to be this demanding, especially in a school with three of them.
* * *
A few minutes before the final classes of the day let out, I went to Baumwirt’s classroom, where Remington was already waiting outside the door. She smirked when she saw me. “Perfect timing. Now you can be good cop while I torture her.”
I laughed. “That’s no fun for me. What do you plan to do with her if she admits to the murder of her husband and daughter?”
“Send her to the council for judgment. I hate to let others do my dirty work, but they’re there for that very reason. If the new council is to have a chance, we have to trust them. I know that the people who are running it this time are good people.”
“That’s responsible of you.”
She shrugged. At that point, the door opened and students poured out. When only the teacher remained, Remy and I entered the room and shut the door behind us.”
“So, you’ve been trying to kill me,” Remy said. It wasn’t a question.
Baumwirt started shaking and backing away. Of course, there was only one door to the room. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I didn’t know you had killed anyone until today,” Remy continued. “Whoever wrote you that letter lied to you. Someone wanted you to try to kill me.”
“That’s not possible.”
I grabbed her arm and turned it over to see a wrinkly butterfly tattoo on her wrist. “It was definitely her,” I said.
“Judie, my temper was legendary when I was a kid, and now I have a hell of a lot of bite to back up my words. Give me the truth and you will live. I’m giving you a warning out of respect to my father. You won’t get another one. Which attempts on my life were yours?”
After a moment, Baumwirt hung her head and said, “I destroyed your office as a warning, but you didn’t tell me you got the message, so I sent the spiders. I thought you knew.”
“Who gave you the letter?”
“I don’t know. It was sitting on my bedroom desk.”
“I know your daughter’s death was an accident. Your husband’s wasn’t. You put your daughter up for adoption and killed your husband for a man. Why didn’t you end up with him?”
“He had a heart attack four days before we were supposed to get married.”
With Remington certain she could detain Baumwirt, I went to the South and asked passing students directions to James Murphy, the Deputy headmaster of the South. He was a scholarly-looking man with narrow, silver-rimmed glasses and styled brown hair. He had an average build with a business suit on under his wizard robe.
“Hello, Mr. Sanders, come on in,” he said when I knocked on the open door of his office.
“Hello. Ms. Hunt found out that Baumwirt is a traitor and needs you to drive Baumwirt to the wizard council.”
He stood. “Certainly. Please, lead the way.”
I did, and by the time we reached the classroom, Baumwirt was restrained with invisible ties. Mr. Murphy greeted Remy politely and then took the teacher away without any questions.
“I really hope that’s it,” Remington said.
“So do I.”
“I want to be in the Center right now.”
“Why?”
“Because then I could kiss you.”
“That sounds like a fantastic idea.” I turned to the door, only to stop as the girl I had seen in the vision appeared in front of the doorway. She looked as alive as Remington, but my tattoo prickled furiously.
“What’s wrong?” Remy asked.
“I’m seeing the ghost of Baumwirt’s daughter.”
The girl turned her head to the door as if she could still see her mother. The back of her head was covered in blood. Then she looked back at me. “Thank you. I have my answers now.”
“What answers?”
“I always wondered why I was thrown away like garbage. Now I know; it wasn’t my fault. She just wasn’t capable of loving me.” She vanished.
* * *
Remy and I did go to the Center, but we weren’t in the mood for fun anymore. She went to take a shower in order to wash some of the stress away. If I wasn’t extremely anxious to solve the comatose students’ case, I would have offered to help her.
Instead, I found Darwin in his room, studying the book.
“We’re running out of time,” I said. “I’m going to use the book to induce a vision.”
“You get way too into your visions when books are involved,” Darwin warned. “I’m pretty sure that’s how you’ll end up dying. Of course, there’s a greater chance that you’ll get shot in the face, but I’m still going to bet on it being a vision that finally does you in.”
“Do you often sit around, contemplating my death?”
“More often than I probably should.” He stood and picked up the book. “I’ll go with you so that I can pull you out of it if it goes too far.” He also grabbed a pair of gloves out of his desk so that he could pull the ring off my hand if he needed too. We headed across the hall to my room and I sat on my bed. Darwin dimmed the lights and sat on the floor. With a deep breath, I took the book and slipped on my ring.
Chapter 14
Vitalis was copying Latin pages from one book to another in an old study. The wizard was young, no more than twenty. There was nothing intimidating about him. He was skinny and rather plain with dirty brown hair and dark blue eyes. He wore a tan tunic, brown pants, and a brown robe.
The tiny room was dim, lit only with some candles on the desk. There was a straw bed in the corner and a small window. I looked out the window and saw what I guessed was Medieval London. I didn’t let that cause doubt, though. Doubt was the fastest way to clog a vision. I believed in the truth, whether I understood it or not.