by Zara Zenia
The guys all agreed that it would be best to go with that plan. I had to agree, since I wasn't feeling all that safe around campus lately either.
9
Marina
The next evening when it was time to meet up with Tom, I got a call from Vlad. He was going to drive me to town. Everyone agreed that if anyone wanted to do harm to Tom or even myself, having a dragon shifter nearby would be the best protection possible. I had not actually seen Vlad's dragon form with my own two eyes, but the video footage of his finals this year were impressive during the combat-magic exam.
I was to meet Tom at 6:00 p.m., and it was just after 5:00 p.m. Since I didn't have much else to do but worry about mope around my dorm, I had started getting ready hours earlier. Hey, it's not like that was uncommon for girls to do, some even doing that every time they left the house. I figured that Tom had been through a lot of bull, so it was only right that I showed up looking amazing.
Also, it was extremely romantic to be going back to the place we had our first date and shared our first kiss. That was also when he'd asked if I would be his girlfriend. How could I possibly resist someone so passionate, charming, sexy, and forbidden? You could say that I was hooked from that moment.
I was getting swept up thinking about it all. My head was kind of racing, almost like the times I'd tried alcohol. I guess they do say that people can act like they're drunk on love. To be fair, I was getting a whole lot of loving all of a sudden, this year as well.
The distraction was amazingly welcome though. In fact, I didn't notice that Vlad was a little late and hadn't contacted me yet. Until I received a message from him. The beep of my phone had me rushing over to it like an excited schoolgirl, which I guess is exactly what I was. Only being eighteen now, I was also a legal adult. What a weird thought. Anyway, I expected it would be Tom checking in to make sure that we were still on, and also probably to let me know that he was excited; looking forward to a special night with me.
It was Vlad though, who wrote: "Hi, my car is broken down."
I wasn't going to waste the time sending texts back and forth. My heart was already racing and my brain scrambling to figure out what in the world I was going to do now. Nope, I dialed his number right away.
"Hello," came Vlad's deep voice, sounding shy and like he'd let down the whole world. "So, you got my message?"
"Yes, what's up? What's wrong with your car?"
"I wanted to make sure it was running perfectly. So, I took it for a tune up. They will not let me leave now until the drive shaft is repaired. They say it's a safety risk and cannot let me leave."
"Is that even a thing? Are they allowed to do that?"
"Well, they are already repairing it now. Either way I will not have it back until tomorrow. We can take the bus together?"
"Oh ... I suppose that's fine then. I'm sorry your car's not running. I hope it isn't going to cost you too much, baby."
"It will be fine. Thanks. So, see you at your dorm soon?"
"Sure, I'll check the bus times since I know the place. I don't want to tell you over the phone. See you soon. Thanks!" I have a bad feeling in my stomach about this, and my head was beginning to feel kind of strange as I hung up the phone. I really started to worry that I might have eaten something weird. All I'd been having was what was on offer at the cafeteria though, since we weren't allowed to order deliveries or go out to get food. No one else had mentioned being sick and there were lots of other students eating the exact same meals.
Tom would be so disappointed if I had to call it off. I grabbed a drink of water from the bottle I kept in the dorm room. No, it wasn't my stomach that was feeling weird now that I really thought about it. The slightly cool water went down without a problem. Maybe it was just all the stress and excitement starting to get to my head. This situation really wasn't bad from my perspective. I needed to stop worrying.
In fact, why was I letting Vlad chaperone me on a date like I was some kind of kid? If my mother didn't have to do that kind of thing anymore for me, why in the world was I letting a boy do it? The urge to just go by myself began to get stronger and stronger, like I couldn't push my pride down or something.
"Screw this," I said as I grabbed my handbag and walked out of the door. The weather was calm enough but would most likely get pretty cold later. I put on my coat just in case and left the dorm room. It was a good thing Laurie wasn't there or she would have lectured me to death about being irresponsible. But she was the one who was always talking about being a strong, independent woman who could do fine without a man calling the shots. In fact, she'd be proud of me!
I began to walk toward the bus stop on the street just outside of the college grounds. It was an open area and I knew people from inside the Sleepy Hollow buildings could easily see the stop. There were plenty of cars going by on the main road that attached to this one, and it was still a little light out. I didn't feel in danger in the slightest. There was plenty of time to spare too.
I waited for the bus. Something kept telling me to just walk, and screw waiting around. I let my feet do my thinking for me and began to walk into town. It wasn't far after all. Now it felt like I'd had a bunch of energy drinks even though I never touch those nasty things. Yeah, this was just natural elation!
I powered along the main road that led to the main part of town. It wasn't that far and there was no one else on foot to worry about. It wasn't until I came to the edge of town that I started to feel really weird.
As I walked by the local hairdresser's where a lot of the students went to get their hair and nails done, I felt something odd around me. My head was competing with two very different emotions: I felt strong and in charge, but there was a sickening doubt now creeping up like an insidious tentacle. It was horrible and made it so I could hardly think straight. The hair and beauty place was already closed for the day. They must have shut early since the students that made up a lot of their business weren't allowed to leave the campus.
For the life of me, I would not be able to say what happened next. I just kept walking, I do know that much, because I ended up somewhere else. This was a part of town that I had never been to before where there were fields and rusted work sheds. How had I walked all the way out here without even thinking that I was going the wrong way? And what was I thinking just ditching Vlad without even letting him know where I was going?
Instinctively I reached for my cellphone from my handbag, but there was no reception out here. The university was built in a spot that would get reception, since the students probably use their cellphones a lot more than the rest of the town combined. But there wasn't even a single bar until you were inside the central area of Sleepy Hollow otherwise. This was bad.
I was on a dirt road that seemed to run between farming properties. Someone stepped out from behind a chicken coop, causing a fluttering of feathers as the birds within were startled. The noises they suddenly made distracted me from my own thoughts for a moment. And then I realized that they had distracted someone else too. Whoever this person was, was using mind magic to make me do what they wanted! Had they been near me right from the time I was getting ready in my dorm and began feeling strange? They must have used their power to stop me from seeing them.
The guy— I think it was a guy judging from their build —had a mask on. It was some cheap Halloween thing that looked like the devil. On a little kid that would have looked cute. On a guy who seemed to be at least my age, maybe more, it might have looked cringy as though they were trying hard to be edgy. This? This was just creepy. I turned to run.
There was another one of them who'd been sneaking up behind me. They had a mask on too, but theirs was a witch. I wondered for a second if they knew who I was, that I was a real witch. Every paranormal kid was raised hearing about the hunters and the bigots, how people might not react to them kindly all the time. That there were those out there who would be happy to harm us just because we happened to be born as paranormal humans.
A chill ran through m
y spine, up first, and then it situated in the pit of my stomach with a heavy sinking feeling I couldn't shake. They didn't speak at first; just walked closer to me, one from the front, one from behind. I turned around to try and somehow keep an eye on each of them. It was impossible since I was outnumbered and partially surrounded.
Thinking back to my combat-magic training, I took a lightning fast inventory of the defensive spells I might be able to use depending on what they did. Then the devil pulled out a kid’s size baseball bat from beneath his black jacket. It was perfectly sized and shaped to be used as a deadly clubbing weapon. No one would have even noticed that he was carrying anything suspicious as he followed after me.
Damn! The one behind me now had the same type of small baseball bat in her hand. I was pretty certain the witch mask wearing was a woman because of her physique. It was difficult to hide what must have been a lot of exercise and a suitable nice feminine figure even with her black jacket on. They both had their hoods pulled over their heads so I couldn’t see anything of but their masks and the hoods.
“What do you want?” I shouted at her, hoping she might show more empathy than the guy. “Are you trying to scare me, is that it? Well mission accomplished okay? You can let me keep walking now!” I wasn’t about to just let them walk all over me, not really. But acting like I was pleading for their mercy seemed like a good first step before I got on the defensive.
The guy was tall but seemed underweight. He probably weighed more than the girl since he was taller and male. However, his center of balance had to be higher than hers and he didn’t move like someone who was athletic or worked out. I sent a force push right at him and watched with relief as he went flying back on his butt, landing on the overgrown grass by the dirt road. Too bad he’d had his fall cushioned, because he started to get back up right away without any noticeable injury.
Offensive magic was far from my specialty. I knew there was no way I could do any actual damage that way. In fact, that force push had probably been a bad idea given that my magical energy wasn’t unlimited. I’d been focusing on the devil too much, and the witch behind me was now getting a lot closer— enough so that she could take a swing as me if she wanted to.
I put a curse on her that should slow her down a lot, hoping that it would allow me to grapple the small bat away from her and maybe use it myself. She did indeed slow down, but just as I did that the devil rushed me. There was no way I would be able to take advantage of the witch’s slowness without being hit from behind now.
I didn’t know what else to do but count on my luck to save me. I focused on letting it work as much as possible, hoping like crazy that it would all push bad luck onto those immediately around me— my two assailants. The guy swung his bat at me and stumbled on a stone just as he did so, fumbling badly and actually losing his grip on the bat in the process. It would have been almost comical if I wasn’t fearful for my very life.
Just as this happened, the slow spell wore off the girl. She’d been in the process of trying to take a full-blown swing at me too. The sudden boost of speed from how fast she’d been going, caused her to wildly lunge forward without control of her body. The bat connected with a sickening thud.
On the skull of the devil masked guy. He dropped like a ton of bricks and didn’t move after that. I felt a pang of compassion go out to him, hoping that he wasn’t dead. No one deserved to die like that even if they were doing something horrible. I used a minor charm on him to protect him from any serious harm, and then wheeled around to face the girl in the witch mask as I stepped back away from the two.
With another force push, this time aimed at her, I sent the girl flying sideways onto the hard, rocky dirt road beside her unconscious accomplice. “And stay the hell away from me!” I shouted with triumph, doing my best to be intimidating. “Or you’re going to get a lot more than a bump on the head next time, I swear!”
As I ran up the dirt road in the direction I was pretty sure would take me back to the main road, and to the town, I didn’t dare look behind me until I was a good hundred feet away. The girl was dragging her friend away behind some of the rustic old farm buildings. They disappeared behind a semi-open shed that contained a tractor and other heavy equipment. Then they were gone just as quickly as they had appeared.
Soon my cellphone was in range and I called Tom. He rushed over in his dangerously fast sports car and helped me drive around searching for my attackers. But it was too late by then apparently. They were long gone.
“If I ever get my hands on them,” Tom said more than once. I knew he wasn’t just trying to sound tough to impress me. He knew I wasn’t the kind of girl who went in for aggressive or violent men. He was seriously furious and the aura of protectiveness coming from him was honestly hot, as much as I’d like to pretend, I was above all that primitive nonsense. We went to our date because we needed to discuss other matters despite what had happened.
10
Colin
I was having mixed feelings about Marina going to see Tom in town. I went over to Vlad and Daniel’s dorm to talk to them, figuring it was time I stopped acting like a jealous little boy and faced up to the situation I had willingly placed myself in.
“Hey, Colin, what’s up?” said Daniel as he answered the door.
Their dorm room had that musky sort of smell you’d expect to find in a confined area shared by two college guys. It was also very messy, but that was also to be expected. I was a little more careful and respectful of my living area than most, so I tried not to judge. When you grew up without your parents or a proper home of your own, I guess it was harder to take what you had for granted.
“Have you eaten yet?” Daniel asked me. “We were going to grab something quickly from the cafeteria before Vlad went to drive Marina to the meeting. But now his car’s stuck in the repair shop until they fix the drive shaft.”
Something immediately felt wrong, but I tried to tell myself not to start worrying right away. “But you’re meant to be taking her there in your car,” I said to the large dragon shifter. He really did look a lot like a vampire. I wondered what his parents were thinking when they chose that name for him. Maybe they weren’t familiar with the stories of Vlad the Impaler, who was apparently the inspiration for the fictional vampire Dracula. There was a chance they hadn’t realized, and Vlad seemed to be a popular name where they came from. Maybe they did it on purpose but making him seem even more like a vampire than he already did from looks alone was a bad idea.
“No problem. I am going to walk to her dorm room now and escort her there on the bus. I will stay nearby their meeting place.”
“Seems like a pretty safe alternative to me,” said Daniel as he watched carefully for my reaction.
These guys already knew me enough to know that I was prone to becoming emotional. Hey, I was a gifted art student, sculpture being my main love. We were a romantic type and being a Fae didn’t really help me much in my emotional ways.
“I guess it’s fine,” I said to try to alleviate their worry. Honestly, I didn’t much like the idea. But a big dragon shifter like Vlad wasn’t going to let anyone mess with her whether they were driving on taking the bus. “I trust you to look after her, Vlad.”
“Me too, buddy,” Daniel confirmed as he looked at his roommate and good friend. “We don’t have a thing to worry about with this guy watching her back. Don’t you worry about that.”
"When are you leaving?" I asked Vlad. We were all standing around near the door of their dorm. There was a strange sort of nervous energy between us, and I got the idea that no one wanted to sit down and risk letting ourselves relax too much. I know I didn't feel like taking a seat. But it felt awkward, nonetheless.
"Give it another five or ten minutes and I will go. Maybe we should, uh, sit down and have a chat?" So even the seemingly happy-go-lucky exchange student was having some doubts about this, maybe had something he wanted to get off his chest too. Perfect, because I wanted to tell them how I really felt.
&nbs
p; Once we were sitting, me on a computer desk in between the beds, and the two of them each on their own respective beds, we got down to more serious talk. "I don't like him," I blurted out. There was no point beating around the bush on this one.
"Who?" asked Daniel like he was not wanting to be the first to say it.
"Who do you think?" I said.
"Tom..." said Vlad surprisingly. It was easy to forget that he was probably deeper than he let on. There had to be more substance to him than just drinking, playing football, and cracking jokes or he wouldn't have been accepted for the exchange student program. That had never really occurred to me. Suddenly, I realized how narcissistic I had let myself be lately. Not exactly a good foundation for forming a meaningful relationship with Marina.
"Exactly," I said.
"Well, that's the cat out of the bag then," said Daniel. He seemed relieved to finally be able to talk about it openly between the three of us. Maybe they hadn't even discussed it between themselves before, even though that was unlikely given how close they were as friends. "He's just not one of us, y'know?"
"No," said Vlad. "He is our rival. The guy has treated Sleepy Hollow students like trash. And now that he wants Marina, he suddenly changes just like that?" He clicked his fingers as he said the word 'that' to make a point. "Like magic?" he added with that trademark humor that lightened the mood a little.
"Good one," Daniel said with a smile that didn't do a lot to hide his serious expression.
"Yeah," I added as we sat silently for a moment, each of us seemingly lost in thoughts of our own about the situation.
Daniel spoke next. "It's not even just about who he is. He has this way about him, like he's looking down on us. Only in a really sly way. He knows how to keep his cool and make himself out to be the good guy in every situation. Even now, even when there are rumors surrounding him in a murder case— Marina still trusts him one hundred percent."