Blood and Beasts (26 page)

“DON
’
T EVER COME TO OUR HOME AGAIN! DON
’
T EVER TRY AND TALK TO THE KIDS
AGAIN! NOT MANNY OR BOBBY! DEAN OR TERRENCE! LAWRENCE! NATHANIEL! OR EVEN PEARL
AND PEARCE! YOU
’
RE AN ABOMINATION!” The screaming,
frothing woman whirled on her heel before storming off. “BILL!” She shrieked
for her husband, and Bill and Seph just stared at each other a moment.

He was the father she never had. She
had the twins
’
father, but he had left. Was he
going to leave too? He gave her a sad, little smile before turning and
following his wife. She stared at them as they descended the stairs, leaving
her by herself and all alone. She turned, bloody tears dripping down her face.
She saw two people trying to sneak by, holding hands and hoping that she didn
’
t see them. Damian and Yolanda… What
were they doing on the top floor? Damian was a first year, but he should be on
the other side of the dorm area, and Yolanda was a second year.

“Do you think she saw us?” Yolanda
whispered to Damian, who squeezed her hand affectionately.

“
I don’
t think she really cares what we were doing up here,
Yolanda. It looked like she has her own problems,”
he responded, both
not realizing that she could hear them acutely with her sensitive hearing and
mind.

“Ya…” Yolanda trailed off as she
reflected on the scene they had just witnessed, Seph
’
s foster parents basically trying to kill her. “That
’
s why I
’
m happy that I
’
m
not a vampire,” she concluded, and he nodded before they both snuck away.

She should be so lucky, Seph thought
bitterly.

Seph sighed, leaning back against
the door as her tears left red streaks on her face. Now Ruby was going to know,
as soon as the full moon was up, and Oglesby and Raul… They would tell Kendall
and Misty. She let out a little sob. This was all getting to be too much. She
wished so much that she could talk to Francesca or Rodney.

Suddenly, she just had the urge to
run. She just wanted to run and run and run until she couldn
’
t run anymore. She blinked,
appearing at the base of the stairs. Her foster parents were already gone,
although their scent lingered in the air. She half-walked, half-ran out of the
dormitories and into the courtyard. Then, she just started running.

She just wanted to feel free again.
She loved the sound of the wind whistling in her ears, blowing through her hair
and caressing her face. It felt like freedom. She headed for the ravine, for
the Room. Her emotions were so jumbled up, tossing and turning in her mind.

Then she started to pick up new
sounds… heavy breathing, saliva dripping onto the ground, rushing footsteps.
What was that? Was someone following her? She turned just in time to catch the
full brunt of the attack. Hitting the ground, she skidded across the rough
earth, rocks cutting into her back while dirt rubbed into the cuts.

A pitch-black werewolf was on top of
her, snarling. It snapped at her face, saliva flying everywhere. She grabbed
its jaws, holding them at bay as they strained for her exposed throat. It was
strong though, almost as strong as her, if not stronger. Its thoughts were garbled,
all over the place and making no sense at all, but she recognized them.

“Help!” She screamed, looking left
and right.

Everybody was still in class!

“Help!” She shrieked again but to no
avail.

She tried to use her powers, but
they weren
’
t working properly. She was too
emotional right now. She needed to get her mind straight, but her thoughts were
still whirling around her foster parents and her foster siblings and her real
siblings and Nate. Her hand slipped, and his jaws snapped down. She moved her
neck to the side just in time as his jaws dug into the earth, snatching up a
mouthful.

It was Rodney… She stared into its
golden eyes and remembered him when he transformed the night she had tried to
attack Tristan. It was Rodney, and it was the full moon, and he was fully
transformed. He was obviously not thinking clearly. He didn
’
t even recognize her, and he was
trying to eat her.

He was a werewolf, but she was a
vampire. She suddenly remembered her powers, the full extent of her powers. She
held onto them in her mind. She let herself become weightless, become like
mist. She felt herself slowly dissolve away. Rodney fell forward onto all
fours, snout bouncing against the ground hard as she became nothingness.

She simply glided away from him,
concentrating intensely on staying in her mist form. He could sense her though,
and he followed her. That was interesting. She had time to assess all this as
she glided around, Rodney swatting at her mist form and making it harder and
harder for her to stay together.

She guided him towards the warehouse
where they kept the werewolves, Werewolf Warehouse or WW, as they called it.
All werewolves who couldn
’
t control themselves were kept in
there. The ones that could control themselves, and had spent enough time in the
Were Corral, just stayed in their dorm rooms the whole time, pacing or sleeping
or doing whatever werewolves did during their transformation time.

She slipped through the gates of the
warehouse, which admitted beings but did not let them out. She wondered how
Rodney got out, or if he had thought he could control it and had been in his
room. Who knew? Now though, they were both in the warehouse and stuck in it.
That was all fine for him, but for her…

They could sense her. They could
sense her just like he could sense her. She glided around them as they swatted
at her. It was getting harder and harder to stay in her mist state. She couldn
’
t let her thoughts dwell on anything
else but the here and now. She couldn
’
t
think about Rodney. She couldn
’
t think about Nate or Pearl or
Pearce…

She found herself slowly becoming
whole again as they all slowly prowled towards her. She put herself in a
corner, protecting her back from them. She became solid again and looked around
herself. She was in quite a predicament. One tenacious, brown and black
werewolf launched itself at her. She shifted into her half-bat form and
propelled herself into the air. The werewolf smacked into the warehouse wall
roughly as she beat her wings higher and higher, reaching the high ceiling in a
matter of moments.

She glanced down at the masses of
werewolves below her, nearly forty of them in total. There was probably about
every first year werewolf and half the second year werewolves. Their golden
eyes followed her hungrily as she zipped backwards and forwards near the
ceiling. A pure golden werewolf, Francesca, was busily barking madly at them
all, clearly trying to order them back to their senses. However, fresh meat was
dancing above their heads, and they weren
’
t
about to be distracted from it.

Seph studied her surroundings from
this level. There were a lot of windows high up here, too high for the
werewolves to escape through. They were mere slits which allowed the full moon
’
s silvery light to filter through
them. She stared out at the round, pregnant orb. All of this because of that…
She sighed tiredly.

The werewolves could not jump high
enough, but she could certainly fly high enough to escape out the windows. She
stared at the diamond-paned glass a moment. It just seemed too easy. She sighed
again. Might as well try… Her wings were getting tired. Backing away from the
windows, she reached the opposite side of the warehouse as all those golden
eyes followed her every movement. Then, she whirled around and sped towards the
glass at top speed.

It felt like she had just slammed
her body into a brick wall. She hit the windows, or, more to the point, hit
some force field over the windows, and she bounced off of it. Stunned, she
plummeted to the ground, wings not easing her fall one bit. She slammed into
the ground in a heap, shifting back to her human form. She was in another
corner now, kind of near the entrance/exit, but that didn
’
t matter. What did matter were the aches in her bones
as she heard several snarls.

She looked up to see three
werewolves immediately charge at her. She managed to pull herself to her feet
just as they attacked her, one of them Rodney. She gave them her back and
ducked into a ball, unable to focus her powers. She screamed in pain as one
clawed her across her back. She whirled around, catching sight of the jet-black
werewolf that was Rodney with blood on his claws. That was when the sandy-brown
one bit her left forearm, and she hissed at it, tossing it aside as her
strength filled her muscles. The last werewolf, that same brown and black one,
mauled her right thigh viciously. She shrieked, blood flowing and eyes
darkening as the hunger began to overcome her.

She suddenly shook herself once as
they continued to claw and bite at her. The hunger came over her. Her eyes
swirled to pitch-black. She bared her fangs and became just like them. She
became a monster. With a burst of telekinesis, she sent them all flying away
from her, ebbs of her power rippling over the werewolves.

The persistent brown and black one
that had mauled her leg instantly hopped to all fours and rushed her. She faced
it aggressively, hissing, and backhanded the creature across the face
powerfully. She sent the creature flying into a dark-blue werewolf and an
off-white one that were becoming a bit dogged, leaning too far towards her. She
growled at them as well, teeth gnashing ravenously.

She tossed her red hair out of her
eyes, facing forward again, just as Rodney came at her again. She hissed,
sending another punch of telekinesis in his direction. The heavy, black
werewolf went spiraling through the air with a nasty howl. Another werewolf, a
russet-toned one, took this distraction as an opportunity to attack her. She
turned to it in time and bestowed the majority of her mind domination powers on
it, instantly employing the feeble-minded werewolf into her business of
survival.

The russet one prowled around her,
snarling at any werewolves that dared come too close. At the same time, Seph
was constantly sending ebbs of pain towards Phin, wherever he may be. He would
be the being most prone to her emotions and feelings, and she was feeling pretty
desperate and fearful right about now. She let down her shields, praying that
he would see through her eyes and come help her, come rescue her. She did not
care for being the damsel in distress one bit, but she was in a lot of
trouble. 

Francesca jumped forward, assisting
the russet werewolf prowling about Seph
’
s
perimeter, guarding her. She growled ferociously at any werewolf that dared
look twice at her. She was going to protect her best friend. She was thinking
clearly at least.

A light-grey werewolf, seemingly
intelligent, rushed at Seph when the russet werewolf was guarding her other
side, and Francesca was distracted with a yellow werewolf. It knocked her to
the ground, and she cut her left eyebrow on the hard flooring, warm blood
trickling down her face. With a force she did not know that she even possessed,
she seized its great head violently and slammed its neck to her face,
immediately biting into it and guzzling down some blood for strength. She then
tossed it casually aside.

She rose to her feet just in time to
be bowled over by the russet werewolf, whose mind she had lost as she drank
from the light-grey one. She knocked the back of her head against the ground,
but she used her momentum to head-butt this particular werewolf firmly in the
snout. She saw stars. He saw planets. Suddenly, he was wrenched off of her by
Francesca. They rolled away, entangled with each other, biting and snarling
viciously.

Again, Seph turned to see Rodney
jumping at her once more. Her lungs were searing with each breath. Blood was
pumping all over her body. However, she still managed to pull to the side at
the last minute. He crashed into the wall behind her before slumping to the
floor. She picked her leg straight up and dropped her heel violently down on
his back, nearly breaking his spine.

She whirled on the rest of the pack
all slavering to devour her. Red was eating away at her vision. She could
barely stand up straight. She couldn
’
t
possibly take all of them. Had Phin not received any of her feelings… messages…
whatever? He could sense her in the hallway when he walked by, and she had not
even intentionally sent those emotions out. He should have been able to receive
her emotions. She was going to die. She was actually going to die. There was
still so much left to do…

Suddenly, there was shouting. They
all turned to face the entrance. Without warning, a certain light shined
brightly as several persons entered the tense, hot, cavernous room. Seph
hissed, backing away into the corner and cowering away from that vicious light.
She stayed there, huddled, with her eyes squeezed shut tight. She stayed like
that until she felt somebody scoop their arms underneath her. They picked her
body up, slick with blood, and carried her out. She tensed, waiting for
werewolves to slash at her flesh, but nothing happened.

She could barely see. Everything was
red and fuzzy. She could barely move. Everything hurt. She was bleeding so
much. Her right leg was in shreds. Her back probably had not fared much better.
She had a wound on the back of her head that was still bleeding. The cut above
her left eyebrow was not too bad, just annoying as the blood caked around her
eye. It also hurt every time she blinked. Then again, it all hurt. Her left
forearm still bled deeply from the bite on it, and she was missing a hunk of
skin there, by the looks of it. Could she really die? Vampires did not die
though. They lived forever, right? At least a very long time, and sixteen years
was not that long.

“Werewolf bites and scratches affect
beings differently. They don
’
t ever heal on humans. Wizards can
barely heal them. They have to go through intensive recuperation for months.
Werewolves heal easily from each other, and vampires take about a week to heal.
You just need blood, Miss Black. A lot of blood,” Sir Sanzio noted as he
carried her to the infirmary.

“Would I die…” She managed to ask,
hearing him despite the fact that his heart seemed to be reverberating in her
head.

“
No, Miss Black. Vampires don’
t die that easily, as you… thought.
However, as soon as your wounds heal just a little more than they are right
now, give it about another hour, then you would become a monster similar to the
one that attacked Mr. Solitto. That is why we need to get you to the
infirmary,” the blue-haired teacher explained, and she just nodded, head
lolling to the side.