Cauterize
2. Bone Deep
Every one in one-thousand kids is born a summoner, and of that amount, only forty-percent of them are going to keep the ability through pubescence and into adulthood. My Gram told me once that we're a dying breed, so I'm not hugely surprised to find that Bonnie's has only about two-hundred kids. Seventy-eight girls to one-hundred-twenty-two boys. I don't know if that means that boys are more criminally inclined, or if girls are just better at hiding it.
It's probably better that way in any case; the grounds are big, but not big enough to accommodate any more students than there already are, and the school seems self-sufficient enough to make me uncomfortable – no one ever really has to leave. I can feel the wards, too, crackling with demonic energy. They make the air taste sour, like lightning and dark magic. I can hardly summon a house fly, but I've always had particular trouble with dark demons (Gram, on the other hand, has an affinity for them); they make me queasy.
That is, it's not uncommon for schools to put up wards, just in case something goes wrong – a few kids and a few teachers are dispensable, and monsters without masters are nothing short of cataclysmic. These wards though, they feel nasty, and I get the distinct feeling that they're in place to keep us in. Not demons, us.
I pause on the path that leads to the dorms at the back of the property and bend to pick up a pebble, smooth and grey. My grampy taught me this: a sure-fire way to test out a ward. I weigh the pebble in my hand for a second, and then throw it over the wall as hard as I can.
Only it doesn't go over. It explodes in midair with a sound like a gunshot.
"Yikes," I whisper, and scuttle away before I'm seen.
Dark demons, then, or maybe psychic ones. Way back when, during the time when people still believed that the only way to get anything done was to make sacrifices to God, demons were slaughtered in this world and their bodies were buried at the four cardinal points of an area. The magic seeped from their corpses into the earth and created wards. Even then, before the Seventeen-point Star theory, people recognized that certain demons made better wards than others.
There are more efficient ways now (demons are hard to kill), but no modern ward is ever going to be as strong as the ones around the old castles and churches, the countryside towns with their outdated superstitions and prejudiced fear of outsiders.
I pick up another pebble and toss it into a cluster of sparrows. They scatter, but don't fly away, which makes me even more nervous; animals are generally much smarter than humans give them credit for. I don't know anything substantial about wards, other than that they're usually easy to get through going in and infinitely more difficult to get through going out, so I snatch a third pebble from the ground. Just a test, I tell myself, so I know what I'm getting myself into. It's a logical thing to do. I'm proving a theory.
There's a crow perched on a little wooden sign that reads 'Pumpkin Patch' in faded green paint. If I'd been born into a family of baseball players instead of summoners, I'd be a prodigy. The stone whizzes past the crow's head, narrowly missing its beady black eye, and it flaps away with a grating caw. The second its foot touches the wall, it explodes in a splatter of guts and feathers. I wipe a bit of brain off my chin, feeling sick again.
"Hey! What are you doing?"
Yikes, yikes. I don't even look back. I grab my luggage and make a break for it.
xxx
The dorm houses are very Swiss chalet, with big windows and balconies, exposed eaves and peeling white paint. There's a big porch out front and the houses are enclosed in a copse of enormous willow trees. There are picnic tables and tire swings. It's so quaint that it makes me uneasy.
I step inside the foyer, wanting nothing more than to unpack and take a nap. My trick with the crow unsettled me, though I can't say I'm guilty over it. What's one blackbird in the name of scientific advancement?
To my left there's a sitting area, to my right a kitchen, and a narrow staircase separating them. There's a piece of laminated paper stuck to the wall with numerous staples that says: Rooming arrangements posted on each floor at top of stairs; four girls to a room; if you can read you can find your spot – Love, Lauren, your most humble dorm head.
It's kind of snarky and I don't like it; a prejudice I picked up from Gram – she hated any sass from me, so I just stopped sassing her. Grampy used to think my sarcasm was funny, but he's dead and Gram cares so little about what her living relations think, that dead relations are probably somewhere near banana slugs on her List of Prioritized Thinking. I wish I was more like my Gram. I hate thinking about dead people.
As promised by Humble Dorm Head Lauren, there's a list of names and room numbers at the top of the stairs, but none of the names are mine. I count seven doors, but I think one's a bathroom and I keep climbing. Third and fourth floors yield the same results, which puts me undoubtedly on the fifth floor. That makes me nervous, too, having only five other girls on my floor. I'm certain Gram has something to do with this.
The fifth floor has the same layout as its predecessors. I check the sheet on the wall. And there I am: Lamb, Augustine, like a beacon shining in the night, letting everyone know that I'm a Lamb. I'm like the Harry Potter of Bonnie's, except Harry Potter was a hero and the Lambs are more like executioners but I really don't like to think about that. I tell myself that there are many Lamb families in the world.
I'm in room three, between Fields, Rebecca and Whiteraven, Athena which is just the most pretentious name I have ever heard. I met the Whiteravens once, at one of my Gram's many dinner parties. They were a lovely looking couple until they opened their mouths. Gram suffered through their anecdotes with her usual frigid politeness and has since refrained from inviting them back. I'm sure she only had them over in the first place because they're a somewhat prestigious family.
Rebecca Fields, on the other hand, rings no bells. I know at least one person from every prominent family in the Western hemisphere and the Fields aren't one of them. I wouldn't be surprised if this Rebecca girl turns out to be a fluke – a summoner born into a normal family and sent to Bonnie's for her ability. It happens often enough.
The room is predictably bare. There's a window, a bunk-bed and a desk against the opposite wall. The floors are in surprisingly good shape – far from my grandmother's immaculate blonde hardwood, of course, but not bad. There's a wardrobe in the far corner and I immediately begin to unpack. I line up my shoes (Chanel and Louboutin and Valentino) at the bottom and then set about organizing in alphabetical order by brand name.
I'm usually not a very tidy person, but I like my closet neat. If there's one thing that I was able to take away from Gram, it's the importance of looking good: presentable and simultaneously unapproachable. I don't feel as though anyone here will care too much for designer labels, but hopefully if I look rich enough, snobbish enough and bitchy enough, no one will be able to come up with a reason to talk to me.
The school counsellor at St. Celeste's – an all girls' institution I attended up until now – once told me that the way I arranged my clothes was a form of obsessive-compulsive disorder that had manifested from a need to control something, since my Gram controls almost everything else about my life. I felt I could agree with that until she started up on other things about my Gram, and then I got a bit angry.
I don't know.
Maybe I've been trained and brainwashed to stand up for Gram whenever someone tries to talk smack about her, but she's all I got left. I'd rather drink one of Gram's health smoothies than let some stodgy old bat call her "abusive and senile."
But just thinking about that makes me very, very tired. The nap I was wanting earlier is seeming like a good idea.
Everything about this place is draining, from its wards to its trapped little birds to its okay-but-not-great floors. I feel like I need to vomit and I crawl over to the bed, picking up the trash bin by the door as I go. The sheets are scratchy but clean and the quilted blanket is ugly but warm. I sigh against the pillows and miss my Gram terribly.
xxx
Here there is a very specific proceeding of events: when I wake, I understand that it is dinnertime; I follow the trailing parade of girls to what I assume is the mess hall and there are long polished wood tables and high ceilings and flickering fluorescent lights; everyone's lining up with a tray, so I do that too.
This is when I meet Fields, Rebecca.
She's emaciated and terrifying, a shock of red hair, a nasty grin. I take two steps back and she shoves the boy in front of me out of line. I hope he doesn't shove her back, because she looks as though a feather landing on her would snap every bone in her body. But he cowers as I am cowering, and mutters a hurried, "Sorry, Crash," before stumbling to the back of the line.
She doesn't seem to notice me, though, and I watch as she bypasses everyone and goes straight to the dessert counter, helping herself to a cookie and a water bottle. I document everything about her and make a note to send a letter to Gram asking about the Fields family.
It mostly goes spiralling down from there.
I notice that no one really seems to sit or talk with anyone else, except for a girl dressed like it's Halloween, who chats with the people next to her until one of them throws a punch. I slouch in my seat while she cackles, her nose gushing blood, and I wonder why no one tries to step in.
"You wanna go, Ray-Ray?" she gurgles. "Or you just angry cause your mama doesn't want her freak son around?"
"I think," he says, scarily calm, "that you're a bit confused as to who the 'freak' is around here."
I find that strangely funny because as far as I'm concerned, they're all freaks. Every single one of them is a time bomb waiting to go off, and once one does, they all will. I wonder if I can escape without being noticed. I wonder if this sort of thing happens all the time.
"It does," whispers a voice to my left. I jump. "Sorry," says the girl, "I didn't mean to frighten you. But those two are always at it. That's Raven Castiel and Fiddle." My brow jumps up at the names. "And I'm Nat. Fletcher."
I vaguely recall her name from the list of people on my floor. "August," I reply.
Fletcher smiles and shifts a little closer, touching my wrist gently. "Raven's really short-tempered and Fiddle's really annoying – they don't get along well." She pauses. "Not many people get along well around here – oh, look, the teachers will step in now."
I can see why. The Castiel boy has pulled out a Grim, bound indiscreetly in black leather. He spits onto the page – an effective mortal medium I've never considered, though the demon can't be strong if saliva can hold it here – but before he can say the incantation (if he even needs one), an extremely fat lady wrenches the book from his hands. I'm surprised because I didn't see her come in and she's roughly the size of a hippopotamus. Castiel, too, looks slightly taken aback.
"Headmistress Mackenzie Evelyn," says Fletcher cheerfully, but she quiets down when Evelyn clears her throat.
"Welcome back, everyone," she says acidly, giving Castiel a sidelong glare. He doesn't seem to notice. Evelyn has the voice of a smoker, low and rough. Gram abhors smoking, and so do I. I've never met this lady, but I already dislike her. "I'm so very glad you all arrived safely, and I do hope you've been enjoying your meal."
Some nervous laughter and uncertain nodding.
"Now, though, seems like a good time to remind you all the use of Grims is not permitted unless otherwise stated and, Mr. Castiel, it is explicitly forbidden to summon demons for use against your fellow students. Punishment for such a thing is two hours in the Quiet Room." Headmistress Evelyn smiles kindly. "Have a good evening, everyone, and enjoy your last day off. Classes start Monday morning at precisely 8:45!"
And she whirls away just like that, dragging Castiel along behind her. I decide to add her to the list of people I'd like Gram to investigate. She's strangely nimble for her size and if Gram could see her nasty velvet dress, she just might have a fit. Or go blind. Or both.
"A bit intimidating, isn't she? I wouldn't be surprised if she puts Raven in the Quiet Room just to make an example of him," says Fletcher.
"And the Quiet Room is…" I prompt.
"It's a room," she tells me, "in the basement of the main building. It's been soundproofed so that it's completely silent inside. They say that before Evelyn became headmistress, they used to lock the really bad kids in there for full days – so long that they went crazy." She smiles. "Crazier. I've never been inside, of course. I like to keep my nose clean."
"Ah," I say, because I'm out of words.
xxx
I don't notice until much later that the bracelet I was wearing before is gone.
xxx
When I finally meet Humble Dorm Head Lauren, the first thing she does is try to stab me in the neck with a pencil. She squints at me through the three-in-the-morning gloom, her mechanical murder weapon pressed to the spot where my neck becomes my jaw. She's pretty enough that I wouldn't mind stabbing her back.
"'Morning," I sneer.
"Good morning. What, may I ask, are you doing?"
"Getting a drink." Not a lie. I'm a bad liar. I hold up the glass I pulled from the cupboard.
She squints at me even harder and I am suddenly and very acutely aware of the fact that I'm half-naked in only underwear and an oversized button-down shirt. Which is to say: she's in an equal state of dishevelled just-out-of-bed-ness, but she either doesn't notice or doesn't care. I try to give her one of Gram's patent laser-beam glares.
"Are you quite alright?" she asks, like she hasn't just tried to stick a pencil through my trachea. "You look like you're in pain."
I stop trying to give one of Gram's patent laser-beam glares, and settle instead on one of the most deeply unfriendly looks I can muster. Humble Dorm Head Lauren looks completely unperturbed, though she does remove her pencil from its precarious position.
"Listen," I say after a moment of silence, "it's really fucking early so can I help you with something or…?"
She tilts her head and regards me with a quiet curiosity. "You should go back to bed," she says decidedly. "It's still dark. Bad things happen in the dark."
Something about her voice reminds me of Gram, cold and knowledgeable and leaving no room for argument. I do what I'm told.
She is right, after all. Bad things do happen in the dark.
2. A personal theory says that ninety-percent of police officers dislike domestic abuse cases (for obvious reasons, and) simply for the fact that victims, particularly women, are apt to blaming themselves. In any case, Jackinafrickinbox left a very perceptive review about abusive aspect of Gram and August's relationship.
On a different note, I can't say I'm entirely pleased with this chapter, though there are parts that I like. It doesn't flow as well as I wanted it to, jarring ending. If any of you have any suggestions for improvement, I'd love to hear them!
And lastly: to those of you who have intrusted me with your beloved characters, could I trouble you to inform me of their sexuality (if they have one)? By review is fine (and for anyone planning on submitting a character, as I'm still accepting them, just include it in your application).
Kiss, kiss, love you all! Thanks for reading!