by Bob Dattolo
“She won’t be alive to be challenged by Alison.” Daniela’s voice cuts through the general giggles and comments.
Our teacher perks up, “I’m sorry? Why’s that? Is she going to forget how to breathe and collapse?”
More laughter. “No. I’m challenging her.”
He blinked a few times, then looked back at me, “Miss Stricken? Did you somehow anger yet another student?”
“Nope. Never even spoke to her until this morning when she stopped me at breakfast to try and challenge me.”
“I see. You just seem to rub people the wrong way, don’t you?”
“I’d say it’s a talent and a gift, but really, I think it’s a psychosis in the supernatural world that makes it okay to murder someone else for stupid reasons.”
“Just like you murdered Coach Walters?”
“Me? No.” I held up my arms, which are still black and blue, “She did this to me because she hated me. I was running laps at the time. The only one doing it. She thought hitting me with agony the entire time was motivational. When she started breaking bones, I ran up to her and she killed herself. Don’t blame any of that on me. I didn’t start it.”
“You never seem to start anything, or so it seems. And yet better people than you are now dead.”
“I love your teaching style. Find someone vulnerable in the class and pick on them? Is this how you run all of your classes? Or do you save your ignorance for this one and me?”
He stepped forward, “You. Up. Now. Get behind the workstation.”
“Ahh, you do save it just for me. Don’t I feel special.”
“Another word out of you, Miss Stricken, and this will go bad for you.”
My steps slowed as I crossed the space to the workstation in front of the room, “Let me be clear here, Mr. Bailey. You don’t frighten me.”
Magic pulsed around him, “Get behind the station. Now. You have two minutes to perform any spell.”
“Or?”
“Or I’ll motivate you.”
Now, what do I do? I’m not sure what type of motivation he’s planning. I can feel his magic moving, but I can’t quite tell what it is. He’s an ice mage, so maybe something with that? I mean, this is practical application, and that seems like something he’d do.
“I hope you fail!”
“Thanks, Daniela. I hope you figure out why you want to challenge someone that has never even talked to you before.”
“Want to? No, I’ve challenged. You will be accepting.”
“Not that I’m seeing.”
“Enough. I want a spell. Clock is starting. Two minutes.” He began to stare at the clock, so I let my power fluctuate enough that my hair would light up in weak waves. All the while pulling a ton and hiding it just for kicks. I don’t really want people to see that I can do any magic at all. I know people know it, but I’m hoping they keep it quiet. Information here seems to be pretty freaking valuable. I don’t trust it to remain a secret forever, but I won’t give up hiding things until it’s pretty common knowledge.
There’s definitely a scent of fear coming from me as the clock heads towards two minutes. I don’t know what he’s going to hit me with, so that’s hanging out there as a possibility that I don’t like. Not that I’m not acting up a storm, like I’m trying to get spells to work one after another. Frankly, I thought the panicked breathing was a good touch.
“Time. Pathetic. The cops should have put you down like a dog instead of throwing you in here and wasting our time.” His spell went off, and I felt it before it triggered.
It’s a spell for cold.
I was instantly enveloped in an icy blanket. I swear this is cold enough to freeze water, so maybe 20 degrees? Less? Hard to say.
I just know that it’s not doing much to me. You can see my breath when I exhale, but it’s not bothering me. I can feel it, but that’s about it. Still, though, shivering sounds like a plan.
“Two minutes or it gets worse.”
“Just give it up, Maddie. I challenged you!”
“No, Daniela!”
“You will accept!”
“Will you just stop!”
“Your time started already. You’d best get going.”
“Why are you even pretending, stricken?” Levi decides to add to things. “Everyone knows you’re a waste of space. Why not accept Daniela’s challenge and let her end it?”
I’m so tempted to make a comment about his parents, but it’s not worth it. Instead, I concentrate on making a weaker light show. As if the cold is impacting me a ton.
“Time. This is such a waste. Thank God you’ll be gone tonight. I plan on staying and watching.”
“You seemed like the type to like to watch young girls get murdered.”
He stepped closer, “Shut your mouth!” His power surged. “Just for that, I hope you like it even colder.”
Now it’s definitely under zero degrees. There’s a frost starting around me on the table, and my breath is coming out and freezing, then dropping to the surface. Why in the world doesn’t this feel colder than it does? Why doesn’t it hurt? Shouldn’t this hurt? Lord knows that I’ve been cold before. I remember skiing when I was little. I got so cold and someone teased me about it. I think my parents.
Except, wait, I don’t remember ever really being all that cold when I lived with Jean. Or hot, for that matter. Is that a sign of what I am? Instead of the diamond in the rough, maybe I’m some sort of weird ice mage?
Mr. Bailey took command, “One minute this time!”
“Just give it up and accept my challenge.”
“Do it. So stupid. You can’t even cast the most basic spell!” Levi looks like he wants to spit and only holds back because we’re in a classroom. And there’s a teacher present.
My breathing gets worse as I shiver more, trying to play up really being cold. Instead of holding my hand out, I have them under my arms as I hold myself.
I didn’t cast a spell.
That gets another spell fired, hitting me with a snowball every five seconds or so. Not very hard, but hard enough. “Two minutes this time, stricken!”
No spell.
More snowballs.
No spell.
Colder.
No spell.
He starts varying the spells, sending a near constant stream of ice crystals at me, like concentrated sleet.
By the end of class, I’m making a sort of mewling sound on the floor as he stands over me. “Why are you bothering to come to these classes, stricken? You’re useless! You’re taking a space of someone that can really learn and deserves to learn! Not you! We have a promising student that’s gone because of you. We have a teacher that’s gone because of you. Now we have another fight happening today because you just don’t know when to give up! Why don’t you give up!”
The bell rang, and I hopped up as if nothing ever happened, brushing the collected sleet from me as I smiled at him. “Thanks for class, Mr. Bailey. See you at the challenge tonight.”
He was left sputtering as I grabbed my books, stared across everyone there, and walked out. Sooo many questions from them about what the fuck just happened and how I was able to do that.
Parece didn’t ask those questions. My allies didn’t. The rest, though? Oh yeah. Questions galore. Mr. Bailey was the worst.
Oddly enough, my clothes were completely dry by the time I got to the caf for lunch. Thanks to a bit of magic I worked on the sly without anyone seeming to notice. By hopping up and heading out so quickly, I made it to the caf decently early. I wasn’t able to get a corner table, but I was able to get one along the side. There wasn’t anyone there to mess with, so I decided against bothering people that I don’t know.
Angelica, Gage, and Kynal beelined for me after getting their food. They were barely seated before Samantha, Parece, Riley, and Paige took a table to the side. Levi, Ryan, Wes, and Shane were right on their tail and sat a table away, putting them on the other side of us.
“What the fuck was that, stricke
n?” Levi beat everyone to the question.
“I’m pretty sure that was a taco of some sort. Taquito? I don’t know. I don’t have a huge history of eating Mexican food. That I know of. Maybe I did when I was younger. My memory’s kinda shot, so it’s hard to say.
“You know what he’s talking about!” Wes growls at me.
“Hey, Wes! How’s your food?”
Samantha jumped in before he could respond, “What the fuck happened in class? Everyone’s talking about it!” She looked around the room. Sure enough, there are a lot of conversations centered around a certain stricken and cold spells.
“I’ll tell you what happened! She’s a useless twat that can’t do the most basic spell. Mr. Bailey gave her two minutes to cast any spell, or he’d hit her with something. Of course she couldn’t, because she’s useless, so he hit her with cold. Then more.”
“You could see her breath freezing!” Ryan at least sounds a little impressed.
“Then twat over there gets more pathetic. He starts hitting her with snowballs. Sleet. I can’t even figure out what some of the rest of that was!”
“Oookay? That’s bad, but that’s not what everyone is talking about?”
“Right,” he turned back to me, “what everyone is talking about is that she was still getting hit with everything. She’d been on the ground for at least the last ten minutes, shivering and unable to talk. The bell rings, and what does she do?”
“Umm, I can’t even guess? That’s why I’m asking.”
“She fucking hops up as if nothing happened! Dusts herself off. Tells him she’ll see him at the challenge tonight, then walks out. Like nothing happened!”
She looked me up and down, “Okay, I can see why people would be talking about that, then.” She gave me a minute, but I didn’t respond. There was nothing to respond to. “So then Wes’s question stands? What happened?”
Hmm, I have no way around this short of not answering. At least that I can see. “He told me to cast a spell and gave me a time limit or he’d hit me with power of some sort. I didn’t cast one, so he did. Then it got worse from there.”
“That’s not what any of us mean, and you know it.”
“Maybe I do. I just fail to see why I’d have to explain anything to anyone? I have two tables of people that have threatened me repeatedly, including today, at least in the case of Levi, which means I have zero reason to talk or share.”
She shocked the shit out of me by nodding, “Okay, point.”
“No, fuck point. Tell us what the fuck happened!” Levi stands and leans on the table.
Daniela appears from the side. I hadn’t seen her coming. “I don’t care what happened. I challenge you!”
Oh my God, this is crazy. “Daniela? No.”
“Don’t tell me no, you puny bitch!” Her hit took me out of my chair and threw me across the floor to ram into the wall. Her eyes are wide as I push my way up to my feet.
“No, Daniela.” I’m proud of myself for being so calm.
“I…uhh…” she looks across the others in the silent caf, “No. No, you’re not getting out of this! I challenge you!”
“You have no grounds to challenge me!” My voice rose before I could stop it.
“I don’t care! I just hit you, that means you can challenge me! I’m not protected by the seven days thing!”
“I’m not gonna challenge you.”
“You have to! You said you wouldn’t let someone hit you and get away with it! That means you have to challenge me!”
“No. It means I can and will. Except when I don’t want to. I don’t want to fight you. You’re desperate. I get it. I really do. But I’m not walking into a challenge circle with you for no reason.”
“You want a reason? I’ll give you a reason!” She left the table and headed towards the lines.
No. Not the lines. Now I see her. Kaylee is there. I’m pretty sure she sees her coming because her eyes go wide just before she turns and runs.
“Get back here, you little bitch!” Daniela takes off like a bat out of hell, leaving me behind, wondering just what the fuck I should be doing here.
I was moving before I really planned it, carving my way through the tables towards the doors. Given what I’m seeing, the scared dragon is gonna catch Kaylee well before the doors. I’ll be right behind her.
“Noooo!” Kaylee’s scream fills the caf as she runs. I can smell the piss from her already as raw terror fills the room.
“You’re mine! She won’t accept my challenge, then I’ll make her challenge me!”
Kaylee went down in a brutal hit that rammed her into a table and sent it flying to the side. Daniela was a little quicker than I had thought and managed two hits to cowering girl before I pried her off and lifted her by the throat with one hand.
Daniela’s eyes are wide as fuck when she realizes that I’m holding her up. “Daniela? You pushed for this. You decided to force your way into this. Fine. You’re so desperate to kill me or die? Then I challenge you.” Pee trickled down her legs as I dropped her and walked away. “Let me know your answer. I’m finishing lunch.” Kaylee was already escaping, crawling through the doors. She looked bruised but otherwise okay, so it’s best not to draw attention to her right now.
Daniela’s soft, “I accept,” reached me just as I sat down.
Levi laughed from the next table, “I think we know what buttons to push now. So fucking pathetic.”
I couldn’t stop my head from lifting to stare at him. His smile dimmed and died after about a minute, “You want to come after me? Go for it. You want to go after weaker kids because you’re a vicious dick? I’ll make sure you’re insane from the agony before you die.”
Shane was the only one to laugh, “You talk a big game, loser.”
My focus changed to him, “Try me, Shane. You’re so big and bad? Try me.”
No one spoke directly to me the rest of the time I was there. I’d like to think because they understand my upset, but I think it might be because the dragons here can smell my rage.
I don’t like that Daniela demonstrated that I can be manipulated that way. I don’t like it at all. But it’s done. Now I just need to survive another challenge while making it look like I’m barely able to function on my own.
Maybe they’ll forget me chasing down a sprinting dragon and lifting her up with one hand.
God, I hope so.
Chapter 25
Parece found me in our room after classes. Samantha walked in after her and silently looked me over before sitting. Parece stayed up and looked between us. “You really challenged her.”
That’s how she’s gonna start questioning me? “I did.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s fucking mental. She’s desperate and was going after Kaylee.”
Samantha shook her head, “You can’t have such an obvious trigger. Not here.”
“So says the girl that threatened to beat in my skull.”
“Yes, so says me. Why would you let people know that you care that much for Kaylee?”
“Let me be perfectly clear. My caring for Kaylee is tempered by knowing that she grew up like this and is probably looking for a way to fuck me somehow. And not in a good way. So take caring and add a few pounds of salt to it, because it’s not the same. I don’t want her hurt in my place, which isn’t the same thing. If Daniela is so fucking desperate for this that she’s willing to loop someone else in on this, then I’ll stop fighting her about it.”
“Alison’s gonna go ballistic.”
“Yeah. She will. Then she’ll either take it out on Daniela if she wins or have to wait a week to go after me.”
Parece sat, “A month.”
“Umm, what? A month what?”
They exchanged looks, “You didn’t know?” My roommate comes across as perplexed. She matches me.
“Know what?”
“You have a week safe zone after a challenge. If you have a second one within the same month, or 30-day period, you have a 30-
day zone. It’s a way of hopefully protecting people that are in a bad cycle of fights.”
“What happens if I have another challenge at the end of the 30 days? Six-month reprieve?”
She shrugged, “I’m not sure. I’ve never heard of anyone making it that long alive.”
“Wonderful. This is so ridiculous.”
“And yet you have another challenge here. Alison will be here at some point.” Samantha seemed to want to add something but held off.
“Yup. Another one. I’d be shocked if Alison isn’t in the hallway waiting for me. Or in the caf or something.”
“And yet you’re still not worried about her. About Daniela.” Nothing to answer to. “What happened in class today. You…you were acting, weren’t you.”
“Why would you say that?”
“Why? Because I talked to like a dozen others. They all agreed. There was ice on the workstation around you. On the floor. You were shivering from like five minutes in and not even able to stand at the end. Then the bell rings. And you hop up like nothing happened. Brush yourself off. Walk out. You didn’t act cold. You didn’t act hurt. You acted like the entire last hour didn’t happen. You went to the caf.” Her head tilted to the side as she squinted at me, “Then you chased down a dragon and lifted her up.”
Parece hid a tiny smile. I’m thinking she caught that and didn’t think Samantha would. Or didn’t know that she had.
“That’s a pretty novel theory.”
Slow nod before she settles back into the couch, “No…no, it’s not a theory. You’re hiding the shit out of things. You have to be. Are you an ice mage?”
“Nope.”
My instant response shut her up for a bit as she sniffed and sniffed again, “That’s…you’re telling the truth.”
“I am.”
“Yet you shrugged off his ice magic like it was nothing.” Silence for a minute before she waved it away, “Okay, skip that. You’re hiding things. We’re not in gym with you, but we’ve all heard about your performance. Your speed. Coordination. All of that. Given everything I’ve heard, you shouldn’t have been able to do any of that.”
“I was motivated.”