Bleeding Misery (Threatening Souls Book 2)

by N. M. Lambert

  Rebekah clenched her hands into fists, recalling the Andre she knew, the one who carried the burden of so much trauma and pain and who ultimately saved her. “Don’t talk about her like that!”

  Kat looked taken aback. “Of course you two are close.”

  “We’re not close!” Rebekah snapped. “But she—” Before she could finish her sentence, a hand clasped over her shoulder, and she jumped.

  “What are you doing here, Kat,” said a voice that sounded like Courtney’s, “with someone who’s not a part of your assignment?”

  Kat seemed surprised. “Courtney,” she said, “I just wanted to meet one of the people that Jason seems to have a fascination with.”

  “She’s not part of your assignment,” Courtney repeated. “Focus on your assignment only.” Then, she turned Rebekah away from Kat as they started heading towards the meeting room.

  Rebekah blinked. “How did you—”

  “Are you okay?” Courtney wondered, ignoring Rebekah’s question. “Did Kat do anything to you?”

  “No. Why?”

  “Her false façade doesn’t fool me,” Courtney said. “I know all about her.”

  Rebekah stopped dead in her tracks as she remembered something Andre said to her. “What do you mean?”

  Courtney scoffed. “Those brown eyes of hers are contacts.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Courtney blatantly rolled her eyes, which rubbed Rebekah the wrong way, as if she should understand. As if she were stupid. “Kat’s immortal, Rebekah!”

  Rebekah felt the panic resurface. She felt herself return to the car with Andre before Dimitri ran them off the road. “Her name is Katherine Reid,” she had said, and suddenly, everything clicked, why Kat exuded an odd presence despite appearing mortal.

  Kat was short for Katherine.

  “H-how…” Rebekah gaped.

  “She was banished from Ivanestible under William’s rule many years ago for spying on us,” Courtney explained, her voice sympathetic. “She used to attend the academy with Andre along with her brother, Jerauld, and I guess something happened between the two of them that led to the exposure of Kat’s identity. I don’t know. Aaron doesn’t really tell me much, even though I’m a part of his group.”

  Rebekah didn’t know who Aaron was, but in that moment, she cared more for Kat’s immortal identity and what that meant for her. “Why did Jason let her be a chaperone if she’s immortal?”

  Courtney chuckled dryly. “Because Jason doesn’t know, and Kat’s wiggled her way into that family’s good graces by being their son’s supposed savior.”

  “Kat saved Jeffery from Henri?” Rebekah inquired.

  Courtney scoffed. “I don’t know what Kat’s game is, but she and Henri are as close to each other as people can get.” She shook her head. “I highly doubt Katherine Reid saved Jeffery from her own lover.”

  And just like that, Rebekah’s world shattered again. “What does she want with me?”

  “Possibly nothing. And also possibly everything.” Courtney sighed. “Fuck, we all knew Jason hosting this thing was a bad idea.”

  Rebekah suspected she wasn’t supposed to hear the last part. “What about you and Andre?”

  Courtney looked taken aback. “What about us?”

  “Kat said Andre broke your nose.”

  Self-consciously, Courtney touched her cast. “She did.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I provoked her,” Courtney said. “Because she has Aaron and Reilly wrapped around her damn finger!”

  Rebekah’s eyes traveled to the ground. “You hate her.”

  “I don’t hate her.” Courtney shook her head. “But I don’t understand why they hold her to such a high regard, especially when she—”

  “She saved my life!” Rebekah snapped. “She and Holly saved me!”

  Courtney looked shocked. “She put you in danger with those immortals, and that never would have happened if you guys came with me!”

  “You don’t know that,” Rebekah stated flatly. “She kept us safe!”

  “She killed someone!” Courtney screeched, her eyes widening at her own tone.

  “And let me guess,” Rebekah continued sarcastically. “You wouldn’t have killed in that situation.”

  Courtney opened her mouth to protest but then instantly shut it. “Fuck!” she shouted to no one in particular, and Rebekah knew she struck a nerve.

  But Rebekah wasn’t done. “She deserves to be here as much as you do,” she said. “And frankly, I feel more comfortable with her than you!”

  Courtney closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize to me,” Rebekah said right before she and Courtney parted ways at the entrance to the meeting room. “Apologize to her, and maybe, just maybe, you’ll get an apology back.”

  ~~~

  The chaperones were staying in separate rooms from their assignments, and after the meeting was adjourned—which involved introductions and bringing forth a bunch of strict rules—Rebekah was taken straight there after Jamie was dropped off. After her run-in with Kat, Courtney clung to her to the point where it was nearly suffocating, even going so far as to insist Rebekah stay with her and Andre. “Kat is dangerous,” Courtney had said to her when Jamie was out-of-earshot, too busy studying the competition to pay them any mind. “And her interest in you puts you in even more danger.”

  Now, Rebekah found herself alone with the mortal witch as they traversed the hallway one floor above Eternal Division’s room. From her understanding, all of the chaperones’ rooms were on this floor, and despite Courtney’s assurances she’d be safer there, being on the same floor as an immortal witch nearly sent her into another panic.

  “We’re here,” Courtney announced as she slid a keycard into the door’s slot and turned the handle.

  As soon as Rebekah entered the room, the tension in the air was palpable. There were two double beds crammed in a room that was much smaller than Eternal Division’s suite, and on one of them sat Andre, cross-legged, staring intently at her phone. She barely glanced at them as they entered as Courtney loudly closed the door behind them.

  “Why is Rebekah here?” Andre said, her words chipped and cold. Rebekah felt like she had just entered a warzone—and tentatively, she took a step back.

  “Kat,” Courtney replied, her voice just as cold.

  At the name of the immortal witch, Andre finally looked up from her phone. “What about Kat?”

  Gently, Courtney nudged Rebekah forward, as if goading her to explain for herself what happened. Suddenly, her throat felt too dry.

  Andre narrowed her eyes, and within the blink of an eye, she transformed into the Andre Rebekah knew. “What did Kat do?”

  “She spoke to me,” Rebekah said, and she shook with the memories. Gently, Courtney pushed her onto the unoccupied bed, and a glass of water appeared in her hand. Greedily, she downed the glass and set it aside.

  “I found them outside the meeting room,” Courtney stated. “Alone.”

  Andre shifted her position on the bed as her eyes met Rebekah’s. “What did she say?”

  “She said…” Rebekah began as her eyes flicked between Andre and Courtney. “She said you broke Courtney’s nose.”

  Of all the things for Kat to say, Rebekah knew Andre wasn’t expecting this. “What else did she say?” she prodded, unamused.

  “That’s it.” Rebekah shrugged. “Because soon after, Courtney found us and shut things down.”

  “I figured she’d be safer with us for the night,” Courtney explained.

  Andre glared at Courtney but soon conceded as she slid off her own bed. “You can have my bed,” she said to Rebekah, though her eyes were still on Courtney. “I don’t need it.”

  Courtney sucked in a breath as the reminder of Andre’s half-immortality permeated throughout the room. Rebekah stayed rooted to her spot as she surveyed the two witches, suddenly feeling small.

  “What did Kat do to y
ou?” Rebekah questioned, hoping to distract from the tension but also because she was curious.

  Andre sighed as she took a seat on the edge of her bed. “She tried to force her brother on me,” she explained. “She even killed a human to do so. Someone I was…close to.”

  Rebekah scooted to the edge of Courtney’s bed, begging with her eyes for Andre to continue, but when Andre didn’t, she prodded, “What…happened?”

  “Kat is dangerous and manipulative, and you need to stay away from her,” Andre said coldly. “That’s all you need to know.”

  But Rebekah was left with even more questions, and she scooted closer to the bed’s edge, nearly falling off. “Who was the human? How did she kill him? What happened?” she asked in rapid succession.

  “Rebekah,” Courtney warned, and Andre glanced at the witch in surprise. “Drop it.”

  Rebekah sighed in frustration as she plopped back down onto the bed. “How am I supposed to be prepared if no one tells me anything?”

  None of the witches answered her, and soon, a different kind of tension took hold, one that pitted the two witches against her.

  Rebekah said nothing more, but internally, she was screaming.

  ~~~

  Andre: London, England

  After nightfall, long after Rebekah had fallen asleep, Andre laid beside the human with hands resting on her stomach. For hours, she stared at the dark ceiling, wishing not for the first time that she could sleep like a normal mortal instead of being left alone with her thoughts. She didn’t want to be reminded of what Kat and Jerauld Reid had done to her, and yet, that’s exactly what happened. And Rebekah, unbeknownst to her, had made everything worse.

  Andre sighed a little too loudly as her eyes flickered to Rebekah’s sleeping form beside her. Within an instant, Kat was forgotten as she watched as a few stray strands of Rebekah’s hair fell in front of her face. Carefully, Andre brushed them away, and though Rebekah stirred, she still didn’t wake.

  “Andre,” Courtney whispered from the other bed.

  Andre froze once she returned her hand to her stomach.

  Courtney’s bed creaked as she shifted positions. “Andre, are you awake?”

  “I’m always awake,” Andre replied.

  There was a bout of silence. Then, Courtney said, “Can I talk to you?”

  “Now?”

  “In the hallway?” The bed creaked once again, and soon, Courtney was standing between the two beds. “Please?”

  Wordlessly, Andre crawled out of her bed, careful not to wake Rebekah, as she followed Courtney out into the hallway. “If you’re going to belittle me again—”

  “I’m sorry,” Courtney blurted out as soon as the door closed behind them. “You were right.”

  Andre wasn’t sure she heard Courtney correctly. “What?”

  Courtney sighed as if this was the most difficult thing for her. “I spoke to Rebekah. She told me things. She said you saved her. And…I mean, Kat did steal her while she was under my watch…”

  Andre was silent, not knowing what to say.

  “And I was thinking…I don’t know, maybe I was being selfish.” Courtney paused. “Maybe I was a little jealous because of how highly Aaron and Reilly regard you, and—”

  “Reilly?” Andre raised an eyebrow. She only formally met him once when they worked together in Marywood, and the only thing she knew about him was that Aaron was both their mentor.

  “Yeah.” Courtney chuckled. “It’s almost sickening, to be honest.”

  Andre shook her head in disbelief. “I barely know him.” And then, she chuckled, causing Courtney to laugh as well.

  Afterwards, a comfortable silence descended between the two of them.

  “I’m sorry about your nose,” Andre said after a while.

  Courtney laughed again. “I suppose I deserved it.”

  Yet this time, Andre didn’t laugh. Instead, she took a step towards Courtney. “Let me see it.”

  Courtney slowly prodded her cast with two fingers, suspicious. “Why?”

  Andre closed the gap between them and carefully began to unwrap the cast, and more surprisingly, Courtney let her. “Why didn’t you get this healed? Or heal it yourself?”

  “I don’t know. Healing magic was never my strong point,” Courtney said.

  Andre pursed her lips together as her eyes landed on Courtney’s crooked nose, which had not been set properly. “Did you wrap it in that cast yourself?”

  Courtney nodded. “Like I said, healing is not my specialty. I excelled much more in potion making and illusion magic.”

  “Courtney.” Andre sighed, and then, she got to work. Instantly, her magic flared to the surface, and she pushed it towards Courtney’s broken nose. Per her command, the magic began to repair the bones and set the nose properly—and Courtney gave a little squeak as everything popped back into place.

  “Luckily for you,” Andre said once she was done, “healing magic is one of my strong points.”

  Courtney delicately touched her healed nose as surprise lit her face. “Thank you,” she said.

  Andre waved her off. “I caused the damage in the first place,” she said. “It only seemed right I repair it too.”

  “You excel at healing magic.” Courtney let a laugh escape her throat. “I never would have guessed.”

  “If it makes you feel any better, I’ve never been a great illusionist,” Andre replied. And then, the two of them descended into laughter.

  CHAPTER

  NINE

  Rebekah: London, England

  T

  wo weeks was how long everyone was permitted to stay in London. While the clique participants were allowed to saunter off and enjoy the streets of London, Rebekah was told the same could not be said about the chaperones and host. During the two weeks, Jason hosted frequent meeting with them, supposedly about how they would ensure everyone’s safety. Among those responsibilities were curfews, wards, and even patrol units—the latter Rebekah thought was overkill.

  She, on the other hand, only spent a few nights with Courtney and Andre, and the rest were spent with her clique in order to not raise suspicions. Since the participant meeting, Rebekah also had not seen Kat. Rebekah remembered Andre telling her that Kat was one of the chaperones for the Russian clique, and immediately, her heart went out to Tatiana, who was unaware of the evil disguised as her protection.

  The day of their departure to Munich, each clique was given their own private jet so there would be no inter-clique conflict. Rebekah would have laughed at the absurdity of it, if she hadn’t witnessed Jamie’s hostility towards Tatiana and Natasha two weeks prior. And that didn’t even factor in Jamie’s supposed feud with the leader of the French clique, Julie Duvall.

  Rebekah sighed. Making enemies with the French and Russian cliques was not on her itinerary.

  Eternal Division’s jet was still stationed at the Heathrow airport when Holly took the empty seat next to her. Much to Rebekah’s chagrin, Mandy was by herself all the way in the back, continuing to ignore them.

  “I tried to get her to sit with us,” Holly began as if noticing Rebekah’s confusion. “She wouldn’t even meet my eye.”

  Rebekah pursed her lips together in thought. Perhaps Mandy was mad at them for something they did, but her weird behavior came so suddenly that Rebekah couldn’t connect the dots. Perhaps Mandy was just pissed at having to actually help Eternal Division during this competition, but something about that theory didn’t make sense to Rebekah either.

  “Andre says her aura is all wacky,” Holly said.

  Rebekah met Holly’s gaze. Back when she was with Paige in the candle shop, Andre mentioned auras there too. “You can see auras?”

  “Not see. Sense,” Holly corrected. “Only immortals can actually see the colors.”

  “Then, how does she know something is off?” Rebekah questioned. From what she understood about auras, which was admittedly not very much, they were colors that surrounded a person that represented their personalities
and moods.

  “Auras are more than just colors, and yeah, immortal magic users can actually see the colors, but,” Holly paused to take a breath, “each color has its own…feeling, I guess you can call it, and that feeling is what we can sense. So, like, humans tend to have very warm, middle-of-the-rainbow auras with certain defining flecks that either mark them as regular, Innocent, Foreseer, or Spy. And mortal magic users have very hot auras, whereas the auras of immortal magic users are very cold. And Andre, whose aura is mostly very hot, has some flecks of coldness in there as well, which marks her as half-immortal.”

  “And Mandy?” Rebekah prodded.

  “Andre says Mandy’s aura is still warm with flecks that mark her as a Foreseer, but there’s something else there too. Something that shouldn’t be there,” Holly said as she eyed Mandy intensely. Before Rebekah could ask what Holly was doing, the mortal witch broke her concentration and shuddered. “I see what she means.”

  Rebekah glanced at Mandy, and for a brief moment, their eyes locked on each other. “You pulled up her aura?” she inquired. “What did you sense?”

  “I…I don’t know,” Holly admitted sheepishly. “It’s like there’s something about her that’s…warped.”

  “Warped,” Rebekah repeated, breaking away from Mandy’s gaze.

  Holly sighed, frustrated, as she flopped forward in her seat. “I just wish I knew what it meant!”

  But Rebekah was no longer thinking about Mandy. Instead, as the plane lurched forward as it prepared for takeoff, she thought about Paige and how Andre had sensed something strange about her aura as well. Is Paige’s aura warped too? Rebekah thought.

  Holly laid a comforting hand on Rebekah’s leg, mistaking her confusion for Paige as anguish for Mandy. “It’s okay,” she said. “We’ll figure it out. The ICW facility is going to be extremely safe, from what Andre told me. If something is wrong with Mandy, we’ll fix it.”

  Yet, Holly’s words did little to alleviate Rebekah’s fears. After her brush with Kat, she doubted how safe the facility actually was. If Kat was able to get past Jason’s defenses, Rebekah shuddered to think what else could.