“No, thank you! I do not need your help,” I yelled. Then, I turned my back to him, walking away toward the exit.
“I cannot leave you alone,” he shouted at me as I rushed into the corridor that was swarmed by students and professors fleeing away.
With shaking hands, I straighten my tight skirt and removed a curl from my forehead. I was not only scared to death, but I had also lost a part of my naïveté. Nothing would be the same again. And I was going to learn that the hard way.
CHAPTER 8
*
After I thanked Allen, the Academy barista, I left the appropriate tip on the coffee bar table, grabbed the hot paper cup with my latte, and left the quiet small café that was located in the basement of the building.
That place was a pleasure to discover. It was not a typical school building. Except for the classrooms and the small cafeteria, there was a huge dining room, an old-fashioned ballroom, a three-story library, an impressive gallery of artifacts, and many more rooms and chambers that I had not discovered yet.
I got to a swirling staircase of black marble and I started climbing up to the floor where my room was located.
“I feel so tired,” I muttered while I was walking fast, as fast as I could. The black-purple tight mini skirt I had to wear as part of my Academy uniform was giving me a hard time. It was that tight, and my black flats could not compare to the comfortable sneakers I used to wear during my past long walks.
It had been one heck of a day. My first day at Avallon Academy. It was a day full of excitement, emotions of happiness and fear, unique experiences. My life had always had its hardships, but I loved the turn it had taken with my enrolment in the Academy.
“I love my life here,” I said out loud, making a passerby turn and look at me. But I didn’t care. Everything felt perfect, except that nutcase who threatened to drink my blood till the last drop.
“And I thought he was handsome! Appearances are deceptive indeed. People can be perverts even if it does not show.”
I was convinced that it was the case of a vampire-obsessed wacko with a fetish for drinking blood.
I recalled this morning’s event. I had never felt so frightened in my life. I was scared to death not only because of the absurd threats that man spat out but also by the coldness of his heart and the dark abyss I met when I saw into his eyes.
It was not only the handsome pervert who gave me the heebie-jeebies, it was my “rescuer”, too. Arthur’s interference made me feel safer for a moment, but when he touched my shoulder, an unprecedented stream of memories of a life I had never lived flooded my mind and gave me a vivid feeling of emotional suffocation. And like the evening was not going crazy enough, he called for the place to be evacuated, without apparent reason. The whole gas-leak incident had been a farce.
“What a weirdo!”
He was cute though. Okay, maybe more than cute. He was handsome. However, something about him was putting me off. He did not even know what his special gift was. Last night he was a speedster, this morning was a telepath.
“Holy crap!”
I cursed when I turned right into my floor’s corridor and I almost stepped over him. He was standing there, hands on his waist, looking around like he was searching something he had dropped down on the floor.
“Jeez, man!” I yelled.
“Arthur, actually.”
Son of a gun, he was laughing. He was standing there, with his blue eyes, his messy ice blond hair, his broad shoulders, and his small waist... Did I mention he had broad shoulders?
“I was waiting for you,” he added.
“Why?” I raised an eyebrow and walked in, throwing glances around the empty corridor. What was Arthur doing here? I wasn’t sure if I wanted to know the answer to that question.
“There has been a murder...”
“A murder? What are you talking about? Oh, my Gosh! Where is Leon? Where are Terry and Lara? Are they okay?” I asked and almost collapsed at the thought that one of my new friends could have been hurt.
“Calm down. None of your friends are hurt. The remains of a dead body were found nearby, and the Board of Wizards assumed that they belonged to one of the students,” Arthur explained calmly.
“Found dead? Where? In the Academy?”
“The corpse was found near the lakeshores. There are indications suggesting that the victim was a man,” Arthur said.
“Lakeshores? Are we close to a lake?”
“We are in the middle of a lake.” I managed to see a smirk on his face before he slightly bowed his head.
Still with the now lukewarm latte in my hand, I was standing by the entrance, staring at him puzzled, trying to understand what was going on.
“Are we on an island?” I managed to mutter.
“Sure, we are. I thought you already knew.”
“I have no idea where exactly we are. Merlin fetched me here through a portal and before that, Mordred had locked me in a prison cell only God knows where.”
My voice cracked as an uneasy sense of foreboding overtook me. “Are we safe here?”
Arthur put his hand on my shoulder to calm me down. “Absolutely,” he said quietly looking me straight in the eyes.
“Are there any suspects?” I nervously tapped my foot on the floor.
“Relax, missy.” Arthur took a small notepad out of the inside pocket of his jacket and, while he was searching in his pockets for his pen, he asked me rather indifferently, “Where were you last night?”
“Am I a suspect now?” My foot was still tapping on the floor, an uncontrollable reaction of my nervous system, afraid as I was for the direction the conversation was taking.
“Here it
