by Ruby Brown
Mal had heard enough. She lunged forwards, raising her book and preparing to strike. She had seen this as the perfect opportunity to catch him off guard, but he dropped the syringe and raised both his hands to seize her wrists. As soon as he had her secured, he pressed a pressure point in her hand that made her drop her book. Furious at herself for judging the situation so badly, Mal raised her foot and stomped down hard, crushing the needle in a crack of glass.
“I needed that!” the boy protested.
“Tough,” Mal muttered, attempting to twist her wrists free of his grip. He was holding her so tightly that she was sure she had bruises, and despite herself she winced in pain. He took advantage of her moment of weakness to smash his head forwards, the top of his forehead colliding with the bridge of her nose. Mal reeled backwards as a disgusting crunch filled the air and red blood sprinkled the room. The boy released his grip on her wrists and instead seized her around the waist and threw her to the floor, pinning her to the surface with his body weight. Mal struggled beneath him, and suddenly there was a knife at her throat. The chill of the cold metal bit at her skin, and Mal stilled herself, clenching her fists and fighting down the fear that had risen like bile in the back of her throat.
Her eyes caught the gaze of the boy’s, and what she saw there scared her. When they had been fighting before there was a kind of rash and frantic air about his decisions and an uncertainty about the way he moved. Now that he was in control, his face was cool and calculating and completely devoid of all emotion. In that moment, he may as well have been carved from stone. His eyes scanned Mal’s face, searching for something unidentifiable, and she dared not move. Finally, he spoke.
“I’m going to get off of you now, and you’re going to get up as well. Make sure you do it slowly. If you try anything stupid I’ll stick this knife through your neck.” His voice held a frightening conviction, and with a terrible sense of dread Mal thought that he’d done this kind of thing before. Mal nodded slightly and felt the blade of the knife scrape up and down against her skin.
The boy stood up carefully, keeping his eyes locked on hers and the knife at her throat. Once he was completely off of Mal’s body, he nodded at her and she started to stand up too. They slowly rose up together until they were both standing face to face. He opened his mouth to say something, but just at that moment there was a terrible crash from Mal’s right.
Instinctively they reeled away from the noise and then stared at the intruder. She had come crashing through the window and now crouched in the centre of the room, her entire body covered in a fine sheen of broken glass, making her long, straight black hair shimmer as she looked around the room. The red blood seeping from the cuts her rather dramatic entrance had given her seemed even more vivid against the paleness of her skin, and when it was combined with the raw anger in her dark eyes she looked absolutely demented. She was clad in a warrior’s uniform of dark leather with a bright red symbol Mal didn’t recognise emblazoned on her left shoulder plate. In her right hand she was clutching a short sword with a bright blue gem set in the pommel and the grip engraved with a detailed swirling pattern.
When her eyes fell on Mal, the girl drew herself up to her full height and drew her sword closer to her side. “You!” she hissed, sending particles of spit flying everywhere. One of them landed on Mal’s cheek and she resisted the urge to wipe it away. “You killed my sister!” the girl yelled, and underneath the shield of anger she’d put up to protect herself Mal heard the raw grief underneath it. She had a sudden flashback to that day at the mall and remembered the only girl in the group of attackers, and for some reason she felt guilty. She was only acting in self-defence, but it was only at that point that Mal truly realised the people she had killed had friends and family that must be grieving their loss in the same way Mal had grieved for Felix.
With a frantic battle cry, the girl leapt forward, holding her sword tightly. Mal gasped and curled up into a defensive ball, but looked up when she heard the distinctive clang of metal against metal. The boy had come forward to defend her, his long knife colliding with the girl’s short sword, and he was straining with the effort of keeping it away from Mal’s face. Mal breathed heavily, staring at the point of the sword that was barely a centimetre from her face. He had almost been too late.
The boy pushed the girl back and stepped in front of Mal’s trembling body, preparing himself for battle. The girl’s surprised expression erased only to be replaced by a smirk, and she moved forwards again. The two started a vicious fight, a dangerous dance peppered with beauty as their sparkling swords crashed against each other, each hit reverberating through Mal’s bones like a thunderclap. She stayed in her corner, too afraid to get up, and watched with baited breath.
She could see that the boy was beginning to tire. He was shorter than the girl and clearly less experienced, and while she fought with a rage burning like a thousand suns he didn’t have the same driving passion to kill. Every time his knife crashed against her sword his arms trembled with the shockwave and the girl took advantage of the situation by darting forwards with her sword like a snake. Each time the boy only just managed to block the attack, but his tiredness started to overtake him and eventually his knife clattered to the floor.
The girl raised her foot and kicked him in the chest so that he fell over and lay sprawled on the floor. Grinning wickedly, the girl raised her sword and went to plunge it into his chest. Thinking quickly, his hand darted out and seized Mal’s copy of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, which was still lying on the floor. He used it as a shield to defend himself, and winced as the sword ripped straight through the pages.
“Hey! That’s mine!” Mal shouted.
“I’ll buy you a new one!” Clasping both sides of the book firmly, the boy wrenched it sideways and managed to yank it away from the girl. It went spiralling across the room and hit the wall with a heavy clang. Then he seized his knife from where it was lying on the floor and stabbed it swiftly upwards, managing to get a clear shot straight through her left eye. She reeled backwards, screaming a hoarse, animal-like shriek that pierced the night air like nothing Mal had ever heard before. She staggered a few more steps, and then abruptly fell to the floor, head lolling to one side with her final screams etched onto her face. Her blood was as black and dense as ink as it trickled down her horrified and pained expression.
“Get ready,” Thomas warned. “It might come for you.”
Mal’s brow furrowed in puzzlement and her mouth opened to ask what he meant, but just at that moment the body started convulsing violently. At last, in one final heave, a black, twisted thing flew from the girls’ mouth. It drifted upwards, floating in the air, until it shot directly towards Mal. She screamed and dove out of the way, so it hit the wall behind her and left an ugly black stain. It tried to get Thomas next, but he stuck out his knife and impaled it on the tip. With a shriek, the thing exploded in a puff of black smoke and the wisps disappeared.
Then her body started to disintegrate, pieces of skin peeling away from her frame and floating away on a non-existent breeze. Once her body was completely gone, the knife that had killed her hit the floor with a soft thud, the blade soaked in her strange blood.
Mal stayed in her corner, staring at the knife, petrified and uncomprehending. She watched as the boy picked up the knife and wiped it on his jeans. Then he turned to Mal and flew at her, barely giving her a second to think. He seized a handful of her hair and slammed her head into the wall, leaving a bloodstain on the white paint.
Chapter 4
When Mal woke up, she thought that she was back in the hospital. She was lying in an uncomfortably hard bed with a thin blanket pulled up to her shoulders, blinding fluorescent lights blazing from the ceiling, and all around her she could hear occasional muttered complaints. Her head was pounding with a dull ache, with a particularly sore spot at the back. She groaned and tried to sit up, and that’s when she realised that her hands were encased in leather gloves and tied to the bedhead with
thick ropes. Her eyes flew open.
Sitting next to her on blindingly white plastic chairs was the boy who had kidnapped her. He was talking anxiously to an obviously disinterested older girl with a bright red pixie cut that matched her bright red lipstick, a septum piercing and winged eyeliner that tapered into a perfect point on her snow-white skin. She was wearing a tight black singlet and black skinny jeans with gold studs running across the tops of the pockets. A belt was looped around her waist, holstering two guns, which she fiddled with as she spoke. A silver, heart-shaped locket hung from around her neck, glinting in the sunlight coming from the obnoxiously huge windows around the room.
Fear crashed through Mal and she started heaving against the ropes tying her to the bed so that the fibres creaked, but they didn’t give way. Her legs were free, so she tried to twist her body around and kick the people next to her, but all she achieved was tangling the blanket around her frame so that she looked like a pissed off burrito.
“Stop it, you’re going to hurt yourself!” the boy begged. The concern in his voice was genuine as he reached forward and grabbed Mal’s ankles, effectively pinning her legs to the bed. “We’re not going to hurt you, I promise.”
“Where am I?” Mal demanded.
“Tenebar,” said the boy anxiously, running his fingertips up and down his ankles in an attempt to soothe her. “I promise you you’re safe. Please calm down.”
“You kidnapped me,” Mal said, more to remind herself that despite the friendly nature of this boy he had dragged her away from all she had ever known.
“I know. I’m sorry. I should have been gentler, but they were coming and we didn’t have a lot of time. Did I hurt you?”
“Um...yeah, you did.” Mal was completely lost, a small boat floating in a sea of ignorance. Briefly, she wondered if his kindness and concern was just a façade. She was suddenly aware that the girl had been staring at her the entire time she spoke to the boy. There was something akin to disgust in her brown eyes, and a steely edge that made Mal uncomfortable. That’s when she noticed that she had a thin silver bar embedded into her wrist, like it was a part of her skin. The silver bar had a strip running down the middle that was coloured green at the right hand side, orange in the middle, and then red at the other end. Craning her neck, Mal looked around and realised that the boy was also wearing one.
“I’m Thomas,” the boy said, trying to break the tension with friendly introductions. “This is Rose, my sister.”
“Untie the ropes,” Mal said angrily.
“I can’t.”
“Untie the ropes, or I swear to God...”
“You just got beaten up by a fourteen year old. I don’t think you’re in the right place to be making any threats right now,” Rose said, a hint of a warning in her voice.
Mal looked back at Thomas. “You’re fourteen?”
Almost sheepishly, Thomas nodded. Then he looked at Rose. “Do you think I did a good job?” he asked hopefully, his eyes shining.
Rose shrugged. “You could have done better, you know. There was every chance her parents would have woken up. You need to be more careful.”
Mal watched Thomas’s face fall as he looked away so he didn’t show how hurt he was. Then Rose said “you’d better go and get Blaise. He’ll want to talk to her now that she’s awake.”
Still looking heartbroken, Thomas nodded once and then quietly left the room, walking like a ghost across the tiled floor. The door shut behind him with a loud click. There was silence for a few moments, and then Mal said “so...what is up with the ropes?”
“Precaution.”
“It’s kind of kinky, don’t you think?” Mal said, a hint of laughter in her voice. Rose just glared at her, and that was the end of the conversation until Thomas returned. He seemed to have gotten his confidence back, and was talking and laughing easily with the tall man next to him, who Mal assumed was Blaise. His eyes were such a bright blue that they seemed to dim the colour of everything around him. A thin gold chain dangled from around his neck, and he was dressed in a loose black t-shirt, blue jeans and glaringly white shoes. His hair was styled into a quiff that looked like it needed at least one full bottle of hairspray in order to hold its shape, and it was dyed vibrant shades of blue and purple. He didn’t have the thing on his wrist like Rose and Thomas did, and he walked with a confidence, as if he owned everything and everyone. When his possessive eyes landed on Mal she felt her muscles tighten and her fists clench in a defensive gesture.
“So, she’s the new recruit?” said Blaise in a quietly interested tone as he stopped next to her bed, his eyes flickering like a candle flame as he inspected her. Mal returned his gaze defiantly, raising her chin and staring directly at him. A hint of amusement passed over his features.
“Her name’s Mal. She’s the girl from the mall, remember?” Thomas said eagerly, almost as anxious to earn Blaise’s respect as he was to earn his sister’s praise.
“Oh yes, the fire mage,” Blaise said. His voice was smooth and soft, like velvet. He reached out a hand and started tapping his black-painted nails against the surface of the wooden table next to Mal. She cringed at the insistent noise; it was making her headache worse.
“What are you talking about?” Mal asked.
Blaise looked at Thomas. “You haven’t told her?”
Thomas instantly looked away from Blaise and shuffled his feet on the floor. “No. We didn’t have time. They were coming and we had to get out.”
“They? You mean the girl you killed? The one with the black blood?”
“You actually killed one of them?” Rose asked, sounding mildly impressed. Thomas looked up at his sister and nodded. Something akin to pride crossed across Rose’s face, but then her character hardened and closed off. She crossed her arms and said “it’s about time, you know. Dad killed his first one when he was eight.”
Thomas looked away. “I know,” he said quietly.
“Untie her,” Blaise said. “If she’s not aware of her powers, she’s not going to use them against us. Maybe it’ll be best for Cass to explain this to her.”
Thomas stepped forwards and started loosening the knots. His fingers were unnaturally cold when they brushed against Mal’s wrists. When the ropes eventually fell to the floor, Mal sat up and found herself staring straight down the barrel of a gun. Her eyes flickered up to see Rose standing there, her finger curled around the trigger and her expression carved from stone. She didn’t say anything. She didn’t have to; her message was quite clear as she stared at Mal with eyes blazing like a cold fire.
“Rose, please,” Thomas said, sounding slightly ashamed of his sister. Rose’s expression didn’t change.
“Rose, put the gun down,” Blaise demanded.
With sparks still flying from her eyes, Rose hesitantly lowered the gun.
“Sorry,” Thomas apologised. “She has trust issues.”
Rose’s gaze flickered over to her brother, the glare in her expression slowly dying, but Thomas refused to look at her. Instead, he fussed over the red marks on Mal’s wrists from where the ropes had dug into her skin and apologised for tying her up too tightly. Mal brushed him away and stood up unsteadily, having to clutch the bedside table for support. She was acutely aware of the gentle tapping Rose’s fingers were making as they played with her gun, ready to draw it at a moment’s notice.
“Please, come with me. Cass will explain everything.” Blaise said, and he gestured towards the doors of the infirmary. Unsteady on her feet, Mal started to stagger towards the exit. “Do you need some help?” Blaise asked, raising a hand to support her. Mal smacked it away, and so Blaise just hovered next to her as she walked, smiling slightly. He liked this girl. It’d be interesting to see her develop during her training.
When Mal reached the door she hesitated, unsure that she wanted to know what lay beyond them. Blaise made the decision for her. The ornate gold handle creaked slightly as he turned it, and then he gave the door a gentle push and it swung open. Cautiously, Mal s
tepped through, her shoes clicking as they landed on the polished marble floors of one of the biggest rooms she had ever seen.
Soaring arches led the way to large oaken doors with ornate golden inlays that sparkled like stars in the light radiating from a crystal chandelier hanging from the impossibly high ceiling. The ceiling itself was painted with the various constellations of the night sky, each one meticulously labelled in a flowing cursive script. Through the tall windows you could see bright wildflowers blooming amongst trees of emerald green. Spiralling wooden staircases paved the way onto higher floors, and a symbol Mal didn’t recognise was painted on the floor in a bold blue ink. It was difficult to figure out exactly what the symbol was because it was being trampled on by the dozens of people making their way through the room, filling the air with their talk and the constant opening and closing of doors. They were all wearing the same bars as Rose and Thomas.
“This way,” Blaise said, and placed his hand on Mal’s shoulder, using it to steer her up the staircase. As their feet landed on the first stair, Blaise turned back and looked at Rose and Thomas, who were standing at the bottom of the staircase in the awkward manner of a pupil who wasn’t sure they had been dismissed.
“Thank you for your help,” Blaise told them, and they both nodded solemnly before disappearing into the crowd, weaving their way through the strangely organised cacophony of colour and sound. Mal turned away from them and kept walking, focusing on not slipping on the oddly smooth wood of the staircase. From the top of the stairs you could see the lower floor and you were also close enough to the ceiling to see that the constellations were inlaid with tiny crystals that glinted like raindrops.
Blaise and Mal walked through the second floor, jostled by the constant stream of people pouring through, and walked up a second tightly wound staircase that made Mal dizzy. When they reached the third floor, they turned a corner and came face to face with a large pair of intimidating dark oak doors. Blaise raised his fist and knocked twice before turning the handle and allowing Mal to step through.