Break

Chapter 1: Welcome To My Life

This Story is set after Hunted and before Tempted and Burned. Zooey no longer loves Heath but he is still madly in love with her and she is in love with Stark. She has no idea whether Stark feels the same way but read on to find out if they get together or if they fall apart. And to add the brewing mixture, more complications are arising. As always... I do not own any of the House Of Night Characters but they have currently been kidnapped to star in my story. Please review! I always appreciate it!

Ok, so for the past year my life has been a complete and utter disaster. I mean, I discovered that the High Priestess of my school was evil, corrupt, demonically wicked- whatever you want to call it, next, she tricked me into falling in love with my devastatingly gorgeous teacher whom I thought loved me back but was just doing her dirty work, then, High Priestess Neferet did this ritual thing and the evil Kalona burst from the ground in all his sexy, evil might. To top it all off I have major boyfriend problems. My ex Heath, is still madly in love with me, my friend Stark, has sworn a warriors oath to me and I am constantly falling for his cocky personality and stunning good looks, Kalona, perhaps one of the most evil vindictive fallen angels ever, is turning his charm on me and my re-incarnated soul whom was attached to Kalona in another life is making it extremely difficult for me to resist him and finally, My ex-ex Erik is constantly trying to make me feel like shit and make my life a living hell. Oh and did I tell you i'm wound up in the biggest battle the vampyre world has possibly ever seen with Neferet and Kalona siding together with a plan to kill everyone in the whole world? Welcome to my life- and you think yours is hard.

So I really don't know why I expected today to be any different. I got up, took a relaxing shower, chucked some jeans and a blue Tee on, then went downstairs with my friends for breakfast.

We approached our usual table by the cafeteria line and sat down. Like always, I ended up squished between Stark and Aphrodite.

Until recently, Aphrodite and I had been enemy's (as if I didn't have enough already). Now everything had changed and we were kinda, sought of, maybe best friends. Ugh, I mean I hadn't forgotten Stevie Rae but I hadn't talked to her in ages so I guess she didn't really count as a best friend anymore. It was so weird being nice to Aphrodite, I remember the days when we used to give each other evil death stares every time we passed each other in the hall. Everything had changed now and not just my friendships.

"Hey Zo," said Stark wrapping me in one of his hugs he saved just for me. Stark and I had always acted like this. In a way, I was better friends with him than I was with Aphrodite. It was so easy with us it was like I could tell him anything and he wouldn't judge me. To tell the truth, I really liked Stark and in the more than friends way. I had no idea how he felt about me but my guess was that he thought that we were just good friends. Thinking about Stark had made me think about Heath. Great, Its not like I had forgotten about Heath, its just so hard with me being a vampyre and him being a human to even see each other these days. I still liked him but only as a friend. Honestly, I was kind of avoiding him so he wouldn't go all ultra possessive like the last time I saw him. And that scene was not something I wanted repeated.

"Hey," I replied snuggling into the curves his arms made around me. Stark smelt so good. He smelt of freshly picked cherries and earth. Such a good combination.

"Where's that boy toy of yours Darius, Aphrodite?" Shaunee aka twin one asked. Shaunee and Erin were twins. Not genetic twins but they were so damn alike its as if the were separated at birth. Obviously this was impossible because Shaunee was of Jamaican descent with lovely chocolate coloured skin complete with an array of beautiful coffee coloured curls. Erin was completely the opposite with pale skin, big blue eyes and long blonde straight hair. Both different in appearance but both connected by the soul. Even there cat choose both of them.

"In case you haven't noticed, Darius actually has a job. You know, he basically goes off and saves the world every day while your sorry ass is eating breakfast and bobbing up and down like you've got ants in your pants with twin two over there."

I sighed, okay so maybe Aphrodite hadn't fully changed from her old and bitchy self. That side still lurked within her. I blamed her mom.

"Jeesh, I was just wondering thats all. No need to get your knickers in a knot, but from the satisfied grin thats been plastered on your face all morning, i'm kinda thinkin' Darius got your knickers in a knot last night," retorted Erin waggling her eyebrows at her twin.

"Burn baby," Shaunee high fived Erin and went back to eating her cereal.

"Whatever dorkamease twins," Aphrodite flicked her luscious blonde hair over her shoulder and I saw her hide a grin. Okay, I don't know what worried me more. The fact that Aphrodite seemed to be having fun with the twins or the fact that Darius probably had gotten Aphrodite's panties in a knot last night.

Across the table Damien shook his head and went back to talking to his boyfriend Jack. Okay, Little known fact, Damien and Jack are gay. Together. Thankfully everyone in our group was totally cool with this and the two made a great duo. Damien was the smart one, the one with the wondrously wide vocabulary and Jack was the exceptionally cute one, the one with the amazing electronic skills.

Stark and I smiled. This was practically a typical breakfast meal. We'd sit down, the twins would make some sexual joke about Aphrodite and Darius, everyone would ignore them and then we would go back to laughing and talking about random stuff.

The bell rang for first period and everyone hurried off to there classes. I had History first up and we were studying the Renaissance period. History was one of my favourite classes, they were never boring. After History came Recess then Drama then lunch and before I knew it I was in Equestrian Studies with Lenobia. Equestrian Studies was probably my favourite class because according to Lenobia, I had a unique bonding with horses and Lenobia and I had become great friends over time. I set up in my usual stall with "my" horse Persephone. I was brushing down her back when Lenobia came in.

"Hello Zoey,"she said in her calm and balanced voiced.

"Hi, Lenobia. Whats up?"

"I just dropped in to see what you were doing. As you can see Persephone has settled back in with the other horses." After I had rode Persephone out to the old abbey downtown, I had thought that Persephone might not have gotten along with the other horses. Don't ask me why I just did.

"I can see that. I'm glad, I really did think that she wouldn't fit in anymore."
"You had so much stress upon your shoulders at that time Zooey it was a wonder you could stand let alone banish Neferet and Kalona from Tulsa. Zooey you are truly a gift from the Goddess. I'm afraid without you, we would still be under there spell and be forever entranced in there captivating, delinquent curse."

I blushed so red I thought I could win a competition for, "Worlds reddest tomato." After I had banished Neferet and Kalona from Tulsa, all the students and its teachers had snapped out of there infused daze. To them, it was as if Kalona never existed and life had been going on relatively the same for the past two weeks. This was a shame because it would have been good to have some first hand accounts on what really happened at the House Of Night.

"Thank you Lenobia, that means a lot," I stumbled, Goddess I was so embarrassing.

"Anytime child," and with that, she walked out of my stall and continued on to the next one to see if the student was cleaning it right. From the yelling I could here it wasn't going to well.

For the rest of the lesson, I plugged my ipod head phones into my ears and turned up the sound so loud, it blocked out all other noises. Flyleaf and Escape The Fate could make anyone forget the outside world for a couple of minutes.

What seemed like minutes but must have been at least an hour, Lenobia came into my stall once more and told me it was dinner time.

I packed up Persephone's gear and tack and made my way across the grounds to the Dining Hall. When I entered the hall, it was abuzz with chatter. I knew the House Of Night students liked to talk, but they didn't talk this much. Looking around at the faces of my fellow students I confirmed that this wasn't just the ordinary gossip. Something was wrong. I saw Becca, who, for the record, hated my guts. She had tears streaming down her face and she was explaining something urgently to a girl whom I had never seen before. Looking around, I noticed a lot of people were tearing up and holding soaked tissues in there hands. Oh Goddess, this was not good. I was just about to look around for my friends when the twins came running up to me, faces smeared with black mascara. Stark caught up with them a few seconds later and he instantly took his warrior pose in front of me. I looked over his shoulder at the twins who were mumbling useless nothings into the air. I turned the much calmer Stark around and looked at him quizzically.

He gave me a pained look before he said, "Zoey...Theres been an attack on the school."

My heart plummeted fifty feet and I stumbled backwards. This is what everyone had been waiting for. The revenge attack that everyone knew had had to be coming sooner or later and now it had finally came.

Stark went on, "Five students were killed and Dragon was injured protecting a student who came out unharmed."

My hands flew to my mouth. Oh no, no, no. This was to soon! We had just stared to get the school back on track and now this! Hell they probably planned it this way- wait just long enough that we rekindled our school a little then BAM. They hit us when we are at our weakest. "Who got killed?"

"Ever Montague, Lucas Parker, Violet Jaymes, Seeley Thomas and Isadora Parkins. The twins knew Isadora from one of their classes. And bye the way, no one saw Kalona or Neferet."

Answering my unanswered question I began to tear up myself. So many innocent lives had been taken all for the purpose of revenge. Of course they didn't care about who they did or didn't kill.

"Hey, hey,"Stark soothed. He hugged me close to him and I collapsed willingly into his arms. This was all my fault. Kalona wanted me alive so he could, I don't know, possess me or something and Neferet wanted me alive so she could kill me herself. Cheery.

I stepped out of his embrace and went and hugged the twins who had slunk against the wall in a heap. Stark approached and after him, so did Damien, Jack, Aphrodite and Darius and we encircled the twins in a huge group hug. Apparently earlier on before I had gotten to the hall, one of the teachers had given a speech and updated the students on what had happened. After a while people started departing. No one felt like eating any more so we all went our separate ways. Us girls spilt from the guys at the dorms.

"Are you sure you don't want me to stay with you guys the night?" I asked for the zillionth time. I really didn't feel like leaving the twins alone while they were like this.

"No Zooey, thanks any way but we have each other and Beelzebub. We'll be fine." Shaunee choked out. The twins gave me one last hug before the departed for their dorm.

"And while i'm asking, Aphrodite do you want me to stay with you?" I asked trying to be nice.

"No way, I might come across as desperate Zo, but I inform you now while you still have a chance of getting over your other worldly obsession over me, I am not a lesbian." Aphrodite pulled her chic purple cardigan that looked expensive tighter around her shoulders and smiled at me.

I laughed, "Aphrodite, if I was going to turn lesbian- which I can assure i'm not, you would be my last pick."

Laughing, Aphrodite said, "Thats good to know."

We said our good byes and I slouched silently up to my room. I told you, I had no idea why I expected today to be any different from the others because as it happens its not. So now I have another sequence to add to my drastically long life: The House Of Night has been attacked and I didn't even see it coming. Talk about dreary.

I sat silently for a while at the foot of my bed then came up with a brilliant idea. I got my smudging sticks and ritual tools out of my closet. I then said a couple of incarnations in honor of the deceased students and sent the elements to help Dragon Lankford heal faster.

Packing away the ritual stuff, I ended up having a quick shower then I changed into a black tank top and my Ben 10 boxer shorts. Appreciatively, I slid beneath the covers of my duvet and snuggled against the warmth.

Today I had thought maybe, just maybe I could have one normal day in my life without drama in it. I guess I was wrong, maybe Nyx had created me to suffer everyday of my god damn life. No, Nyx didn't want me to suffer, she wanted me to defeat Neferet and Kalona but I sure as hell wish she would make it easier than this!

After an hour of trying and failing to get to sleep, I got up and started pacing. Over the years I have learned that if anything, pacing does nothing to reduce your worry or stress level. In fact I made a scientific discovery that supports otherwise.

I was tired and I felt like crap. I wanted to be around a familiar face so, I decided to do something I had never done before. I was going to see Stark in the boys dorm and I didn't care if anyone tried to stop me. Emphasis on the try.

Tune in for the second segment of Break soon! Please review! Its always good to know what a person thinks of my stories! Thank you for reading!