The Roses Academy- the Entire Collection

by Tara Brown

  “No. I saw it. I'm pretty positive Marcus was the one who wiped my dad and made him sinister like them. More winking angels to transport blood whores. Anyway. I'm sorry.”

  My mouth was dry. The past six months made sense. So much made sense. Marcus had barely tried to get Hanna. I gasped, “Hanna.” I grabbed Phillip's hand and winked us to the castle. We were outside one of the rooms.

  I heard a noise and turned back toward Phillip. “They’re having sex?” I whispered.

  “I think so. I think that’s exactly what's going on in there.” He smiled, clueless to what was about to happen.

  I parted my lips to explain, but I caught a smell. It flashed a memory of tutoring Shane. It was the smell of laundry soap and fresh ocean air mixed with deodorant. I kicked the door down. It was the room Hanna always slept in. She was on the floor. He straddled her. He hissed at me, his mouth bloody from where he was feeding off her neck.

  “Go get Giselle. Meet at Lydia's!” I shouted at Phillip and winked when I touched them both. We landed on the street outside the house. Outside the guards. I kicked him in the chest and winked Hanna to the front lawn, within the guards. I left her in a heap and ran at Shane. He squared off.

  “You and I need to have a chat.” I pointed. “You've been smuggling girls.”

  He scoffed. “Sheep. Sluts and sheep.”

  My face contorted. I leapt at him. I didn’t cheat. I didn’t suck or wink. I punched good and hard. He tackled me, rolling us and I ended up on my back.

  I winked on top of him and clenched his throat in my hands. He pushed up hard and we leapt high into the air. He grabbed my arm and pulled me under him. I winked as we landed and thumped him into the ground.

  Giselle was running in my direction. “SUCK HIM!” I shouted.

  She leapt and planted a kiss on his lips, weakening him. Her kind of poison was instant.

  “Don’t kill him,” I said breathlessly.

  I winked back to Hanna when Giselle had Shane unconscious. She was bleeding out. Her eyes widened when she saw me.

  Lydia came running out the door.

  I pointed at Hanna. “Give her back her memories.”

  Lydia didn’t even get onto the ground when the grip I hadn’t noticed on my shirt was gone. Hanna's eyes were blank.

  “Shit,” Lydia whispered.

  Sam came running through the door. His face dropped. “Hanna,” he whispered.

  Lydia jumped up and grabbed him. “She’ll come back any second. We need someone with incredible strength. Get Lorri.”

  Sam was panting. “Hanna, baby, it’s me. Hanna.”

  Giselle cried and dragged Shane's semi-conscious body to the edge of the guards. “Where should I put him?” He was our friend. “Why did I do this to him, Aimes? It was Shane. Aimee?” Her voice was panicked.

  Lorri flashed to us just as I pressed send on my text. She saw Hanna. “Worst day in a thousand years. I swear to God.” She turned to see Giselle, holding Shane, sobbing. Lorri looked at me like I was to blame. “Excellent job, Aimee. This really is the shit icing on the screwup cake.”

  I pointed back at Shane. “He’s a traitor. Him and Mar—”

  A man's scream cut me off, “LORRI” I didn’t get to finish saying his name and he was there. Marcus was right outside the guards. Giselle dropped Shane and ran across the guards. I winked to her and put myself between Shane and her.

  Shane lay still on the ground, but Marcus was fuming mad and pacing the line of the guards.

  “You give her back. We made a deal.” He spoke through his teeth.

  “Traitors. They're traitors.” I pointed.

  Lorri ignored me and stomped across the grass in her big boots. “Screw you and your deal.” She looked at me expectantly.

  I blurted out as much as I could, “He and Shane have been helping Jonathan with the blood bags and blood drugging. He’s the one who double-crossed us on the brothel with Ari. Shane knew we were going there. I told him in the alley when we thought they would take O. He was pretending to try to win me back again. Marcus is the one who wiped Oliver and made him evil.”

  Lorri's face trembled with anger. “You killed Dorian with your actions. Dorian.” Her words were short and sharp. He winced but still forced a smile across his lips in the end.

  “Lorri, it was a bit of fun. You know better than anyone how I feel about the sheep. You know how Dorian felt.”

  “I DON’T GIVE A GOOD GODDAMNED ABOUT THAT! YOU KILLED DORIAN WITH YOUR ACTIONS!” Spit flew from her mouth. She was frothing.

  Something rippled under her skin. Something scary. Lydia motioned her head toward the house. I took a step back from Lorri and Marcus.

  Marcus pointed. “Give her to me.”

  “NO.”

  “Give her over or I will go home and get Henry and he will BLOW YOUR MAGIC HOUSE DOWN!”

  I took another step back.

  Marcus’ eyes landed on me. “You little bitch. I saved Shane for you. This is how you repay me? You steal the one thing that soothes my heart, heals me, and makes me almost human again?”

  I lowered my gaze.

  Lorri shook her head. “She didn’t make you double-cross us or work me and Jonathan against each other. You always were just out for yourself. All along you've been the same selfish little prick you were when Ethan went batshit crazy.”

  A loud rumbling filled the moment of silence between the bickering.

  Marcus’ eyes gleamed as a wicked smile crossed his lips.

  Lorri's head dropped as a sigh left her lips. I closed my eyes. The rumble turned into a groan and then a moan and then a gasp. I turned around. Hanna looked like she was having a seizure on the ground. She was trembling and twitching and vibrating.

  I bit my lip and glanced at Lydia again. Terror crossed her face.

  “Ophelia,” I said quietly.

  Sam vanished from where he stood.

  “None of us is strong enough to stop her when she changes.” His voice was filled with humor and joy. He knew Hanna would need him now.

  A grin crossed my lips. “I know something you don’t.” I smirked and winked home. Well, to my hometown.

  I winked into Blake’s bedroom by mistake.

  “Aimee, what the fu—? How did you do that?”

  Alise screamed.

  I grabbed him off my sister with one hand and grabbed his bathrobe from the floor with the other. I winked us both to where I prayed to God Aleks was. The place he talked about and had showed me a picture of once.

  He was.

  The muted sunlight and the fresh mountain air were majestic. I took a deep breath and smiled. Blake was heaving spaghetti all over the rocks. I grimaced and walked away. Quickly.

  “Hey,” I said softly. I wanted to shout it and tell him to hurry the frig up, but I couldn’t. He was broken and it was my fault. His red-rimmed eyes looked brutal.

  “Hey.”

  I nudged a small stone with my boot. “I'm sorry. You know that, right? I never meant for him to die and for me to live. I didn’t even know what was going on. I didn't know he loved me.”

  He shook his head. “He was such an asshole to you. He was so good at it. You never would have guessed it was all an act. A despicable act. A way to spare himself the pain of you not choosing him and sparing you the choice.”

  “I feel like Harry Potter, I swear. The whole Severus thing blew my mind equally.”

  He clearly didn’t get my reference.

  Blake coughed and shouted, “Aimes, what the hell is going on? Where are we? Why did we come to a mountaintop to talk about Harry Potter? How the hell did we get here? Are we really here?”

  Aleks looked past me and waved. “Hey, Blake.”

  Blake's face got red. “Hey, strange guy I don’t know, sitting on the mountain.” He held his hands out to me. “What is going on?” We’d blanked his memories a couple of times thus far in life so at the moment he didn't know any of the Roses.

  “I don't have time for this. I'll get the girls
to give back your memories when we get back. Just stop being a dork. Think Dr. Who.”

  His lips lifted. “For real? Awesome.” He tightened his burgundy robe and didn’t even think about the fact he was barefoot and it was freezing

  “We have to go. Hanna’s back.” I reached a hand out for him.

  Aleks’ eyes widened. “Wow, we are having a colossally bad day.” He stood and took my hand in his. I dragged him to Blake and winked us all to Marcus’ house. We stood in the hallway outside the lab.

  “Why are we here?” Aleks asked.

  I put a finger to my lips. “Henry, remember? You stay out here and keep watch for him.” I winked myself and Blake inside. “Blake, if we steal these notes, can you make a cure from them? It’s for a friend who is a rage monster. Hanna? Uhm, like the Hulk.”

  Blake cringed. “Am I in a coma? Are we dead?”

  “No, focus.” I dragged him to the notes I noticed the last time I was there. I flipped open the book to show him the formula.

  He read fast. “What is this? This is craziness. Aimes, this says it makes the monster worse. See here. Notes on adding rage.”

  I growled and winked us to the hallway and grabbed Aleks. I winked us to Dr. Jekyll's office.

  He was at his desk. He smiled at me and then saw Blake and frowned. “Odd, but welcome nonetheless. How may I help, Miss James?”

  I took a deep breath and tried to say it all so he and Blake got some details. “We know about your daughter's raging monster condition, obviously. Anyway, you had notes. Last time you had notes. It was on the timeline they made. You gave me notes and Marcus made a cure from them. Well, this time only Marcus has the notes. He knows how to make the cure. It’s the cure he has made for you.”

  “Aimee, I was there for all of it,” he said impatiently.

  I pointed to Blake. “He wasn't. Anyway, you know how it was short term? Well, I was wondering if you could make it long term and make some fast. Like now?”

  His eyes brightened. “Do you have any of the notes Marcus worked on? Without them I won’t get past where I am. He won't give them to me.”

  I slapped down Marcus’ papers and pushed the still robed and completely confused Blake at the doctor. “Totally ahead of you, Doc. Make Blake here understand what's going on. I don't have time to help you or explain further. Hanna died today. It was just like last time. She’s raging around Lydia's house as we speak and Marcus is trying to take her.”

  The doctor's face dropped.

  “Sensitivity never has been a big thing for you.” Aleks stepped forward. “We can get her back. Aimee can wink her. And I have something that will solve the Marcus issue.”

  “You're going to Henry?”

  He nodded. I felt sick.

  The doctor grabbed something from inside his desk and passed it to me. “It's a single round. You can't miss. It'll drop her like a dead deer. You'll need to bring her home after that. Roland and I can keep her safe until the potion’s ready.”

  I focused on Blake. “This is the thing you've always dreamt about. It’s real. All of it. The science fiction isn’t fiction in my world. It’s just science and fantasy meeting. You want in?”

  He grinned from ear to ear. “Hell yes. This is probably a dream, but I'm so excited I don't care.” He chuckled. “So, this was the science grant you were working on?”

  “Something like that. This is my friend Aleks.”

  He put a hand out. “It's nice to meet you.” Aleks shook his hand somewhat awkwardly. I couldn’t imagine how messed up it was for him, remembering everything from so many different times. Especially with Blake and I remembering nothing.

  “So, I can leave him here?”

  The doctor shrugged. “I don’t really see how much use another person would be, but I might be able to use him.”

  “He goes to MIT. He was at home visiting my sister. He’s a genius.”

  Blake's face turned red like he was going to argue, but he didn’t.

  The doctor beamed at him, “A lad after my own heart. Fabulous. Yes, go and save my girl. Bring her home. We have this. How ever did you get the notes?”

  “I've been in the lab before. I know how to wink in there. He never thought about letting me in. I know he doesn’t let anyone else in.”

  Aleks shook his head. “No one. I think he assumes with your memory loss you won't recall the lab, beyond it being a geek thing.”

  “It worked.” I grabbed the gun and Aleks’ hand and winked.

  We arrived in time to hear the screams before seeing the mess and chaos.

  Hanna . . .

  I winked and ran to where she was ripping the boathouse to pieces. Ophelia was shooting things at her and shaking her head. They cut Hanna but the beast didn’t stop. She was disgusting looking. I held up the gun and shot. She turned and screamed a high-pitch shriek at me. She started to run toward me but only got halfway before she dropped with a ground-rumbling landing. Her body shrunk back to her normal form. Her clothes were tattered and destroyed.

  Lorri warned me, “Don’t go off like that again.”

  “Sorry.” Everyone was out of breath and bleeding from somewhere. Marcus paced the line like a cat in a cage.

  I waved back at him. “Screw you, Marcus!” I shouted.

  “Don't taunt him.” Lydia put her bleeding hands on her old round hips. “He can still summon Henry.”

  My eyes must have given something away, because her face dropped. “What have you done, child?” she asked in a hushed tone.

  “Not me.” I looked uneasily at Lorri. Her ears perked up. She turned and gave me a glare worthy of a death sentence.

  “Where was he?” she asked through her teeth.

  “It's done, Lorri.”

  She was gone. She didn’t wait to see if it worked or if anything else happened. She just left. I knew that was for my benefit. She wanted me dead. I'd seen the look before.

  Sam scooped Hanna up. He gave me a look. I knew he blamed me. I didn't bother trying to smile. “Take her home. To her dad. He and Blake are working on some shit. I'm going to find Ari with Luke and Ben. And I guess O.”

  “Okay.” He was curt.

  “Anyone seen Giselle?” I turned around. I didn’t get an answer. I got a scream. I spun to see Henry holding Marcus in the air.

  I winked closer.

  Lydia ran over waving her arms. “Henry, wait. Don't do it. It'll taint you. I suspect this was Jonathan's plan all along.”

  Henry's hand twitched. He thought about what she was saying and put Marcus down, but held him with his power. His focus went to her and back to Marcus clutched his chest. I didn’t see Aleks.

  “Make him a new one, Henry.” Her voice was desperate. “Don't taint your soul. You'll be playing right into Jonathan's hands. I suspect he wanted you to kill Marcus from the beginning. That’s why Jonathan told Marcus about the heart and why he told him if he took it he could control you.”

  Marcus coughed and dropped to one knee, but still squeaked out a word, “Truth.”

  Henry's eyes flared bright red.

  Lydia was gasping for air when she made it to the street from the backyard. “Make him a new one. You can do it. You have to. I know you must take back the heart but don’t murder him. Make him suffer for all eternity.”

  Henry looked sad. He nodded once.

  Lydia stared at me. “You take care of them, child. Don’t let them kill each other. Take care of each other and love each other. I'll be watching.”

  “What?”

  She pulled open her blouse, flashing her old lady bra at Henry. I winced. “What are you doing, old woman? Put that back on. Do those buttons up. Jesus.” I grabbed at her. She swatted at me. It was then I saw the tears streaming down her cheeks and Henry's. He was about to do something he didn’t want to.

  My mouth dropped but as I tried to grab her, she used magic to throw me into one of the huge old oak trees. “NOOOOOOOOO!” I screamed.

  Lydia shook her head and explained, “He has to stay
pure. He has to. If the evil gets into him, Jonathan can corrupt his magic. He was been counting on this moment from the beginning.”

  I sobbed and struggled, but my back didn’t budge from the old oak.

  “Ophelia, Ophelia, help me!” I screamed.

  O walked over. Her body was shifty and weird. Her eyes were magical all the time now. She tilted her head and asked with the voices of the sisters, “Why do you need help? What is happening?”

  I pointed. “Stop them.” I panicked, breathless. “Stop him.”

  “The witch is right. The fae king cannot kill or his soul will be tainted.” She turned and walked away.

  “He killed Aleks’ dad. Lydia, his soul’s already dark.”

  Lydia shook her head. “He removed the curse that gave Jon his long life. He never murdered him.”

  “Aleks, ALEKSSSSS!” I couldn’t flash. I couldn’t move. Henry pulled back. Lydia looked at me and smiled. “Look away, my love.”

  I couldn’t see her clearly, my eyes were so full of tears. “SAM. BEN. LUKE. ANNABELLE. SOMEONE!” Annabelle came through the door as Henry's hand broke flesh but it was too late. Lydia dropped to the ground in a heap. Her heart glowed like a red ball of flames in Henry's hand. Henry lifted it to the sky and shouted something I didn’t understand.

  Annabelle screamed.

  Her ghostly body was pinned by the guards. She couldn't get out of them. She screamed and pounded.

  Henry grabbed Marcus and lifted him off the ground. He shoved the fist into the vampire and came out with another heart. The light of it was too bright, I turned away. He did something I couldn’t see and then the light was gone.

  Henry smiled at me. “She wanted you to know she lived an amazing life.” He walked toward me and put his hand on my face. “She wanted you to have these.”

  The pictures came flooding in. They stretched everything in my mind. I sobbed and screamed and laughed like a madwoman as everything found its way back to its proper place.

  His magic let me go and I dropped to my knees.

  Somehow her words rolled through my mind. Words she had spoken to me in the very beginning of it all. One day we will all see the big picture and where we fit into it. For now, we just try to do the best we can to make the world the place we would want to live if we were human.