Good vs. Evil High (9 page)

Miss McCree smiled. “Of course, just make
sure you go to bed when you’re through. Good-night, girls.”

She turned the lights out as she left the
room so that the only thing keeping us from being in total darkness
was the light cast by my con. It only took a couple of minutes to
pick out the sound of bubbles being blown underwater. I thought it
would be a fun way to wake up every morning. And, even though we
both climbed into bed right after that, we did end up spending most
of the night whispering about whatever we wanted to.

* * * *

Luckily, Roman was busy with practice most of
the time after that night, so I only saw him at lunch and in
Algebra during fifth hour. Breakfast the next morning was
uncomfortable enough that I told him I preferred to sleep in and
skip that meal on school days. I didn’t have the guts to tell him I
wasn’t interested. Well, I had the guts, just not the heart. I’m
not big on hurting people’s feelings.

The next couple of days flew by. Sassy and I
picked out my dress, bundled up and walked around outside, and I
helped her with some studying, which was something she really
struggled with. Nadine had soccer and Harmony had activities
committee, so it was mostly just us.

North Haven wasn’t like any school I’d ever
been to or heard of before. It was as much the students that made
it different as the castle. Everyone was so good and nice, like
Harmony had said. I honestly hadn’t expected it since teenagers can
be so cruel.

And then it was Saturday morning.
Miraculously, my hand was nearly healed. Only the palm still had to
be wrapped up and medicated. It was also time to go see Headmaster.
I still had no idea what I was going to tell him. But I threw my
notebook, con, and the tube of mascara Sassy had gotten me totally
addicted to in the navy blue shoulder bag I’d gotten out of the
secondhand room, and went downstairs for breakfast. I was the only
one in our room awake at seven a.m. on a Saturday morning.

The cafeteria was pretty empty when I got
there. I grabbed a bowl of cereal and a banana to eat before I took
the elevator up to Headmaster’s Tower. I was early. Hopefully, that
would help make up for the fact that I still didn’t have any
answers for him.

As soon as I stepped out of the elevator and
heard the voices, I froze. Somehow, I knew they were talking about
me.

“But sir, no one’s even tried. Someone should
at least talk to her about it; try to convince her to do it. She’s
a guaranteed win.” I recognized that as Coach Beckham.

The responding voice belonged to Headmaster.
“Come now, Charles. You know she only just got here and wants no
part in it. It wouldn’t be right to deprive her of finding her
place in our school. She needs time to settle in. Why try to
pressure her?”

“To win. Isn’t that what all this Winter
Competition stuff is about? You haven’t seen what she can do,
Headmaster. It’s not just the fifty-yard sprint. There are a number
of sports her speed could help us win. The girls’ tennis team could
use her. Unless the Cinders are worse than us, that’s a guaranteed
loss.”

“I want to win as much as you do, but the
well-being and happiness of the student comes first. For now,
Kristine isn’t ready. And she’ll be here any minute. You should
probably go down and have some breakfast before the students begin
waking up. It can get pretty hectic in there on a Saturday morning,
as you know.”

A pause was followed by a, “Yes, sir,” and
then Coach Beckham was walking toward me.

I didn’t want him to know I’d heard them, so
I hurried down the curved hallway away from them. I waited around
the corner for him to climb on an elevator, but his footsteps kept
getting closer. He would see me any second.

My hand moved over the door I was pressed
against and turned the knob. Sliding through the slightly open
door, I shut it very carefully behind me.

My adrenaline was pumping full speed. I
turned around, praying I hadn’t entered someone’s bedroom. But no
one was there. In fact, it was completely empty except for a stone
fountain that was at least a foot taller than me. Made from the
same icy material as the walls on the lower levels of North Haven,
it had three tier bowls, the one on the bottom being the
largest.

As I moved closer to it, smoke began to fill
the top and spill over the edges to the lower chambers. But
something strange happened when it rolled over the lowest one. A
purple hand wrapped itself around the edge and seemed to pull a
person up. And then a ghostly figure was crawling out of the basin,
hair drifting in and out of her wild face. And just when I thought
it couldn’t get any more terrifying, one wide eye fixed itself on
me through an open space between her hair.

My muscles refused to move. My voice wouldn’t
work.

Then she threw her head back and screamed a
terrible scream that echoed all over the room, as if several women
were there, all crying out in terror. I covered my ears as she
proceeded to climb out of the fountain. The way her body bent back
as the awful cries continued was enough to get me going.

I bolted back to the door and reached for the
handle. It wouldn’t turn. I twisted with all my might. Nothing. I
was trapped, with no escape.

Looking back, I saw two very scary things.
One: Another hand belonging to a second and equally bloodcurdling
woman wrapped itself around the fountain’s edge and began pulling
up her body. Two: The first body, still screaming, took a labored
step toward me.

That was it. I didn’t care if Coach found out
I heard him or not. I started pounding against the door and calling
out for help. “Can’t anyone hear me?!” I screamed desperately.

I looked back. The first woman seemed to be
rooted to the spot. The second one threw her head back to let out a
new series of wretched cries. Both stared threateningly at me.
Whatever they were, I was sure they wanted to hurt me.

With shaking fingers, my hand dove into my
purse and searched for my con. When my finger touched it, it rose
from my bag and began to unfold. “Call Headmaster, CALL
HEADMASTER!” I screamed, not caring if I got in trouble for being
in there. He was right down the hall, waiting for me. He could be
there before anyone else.

It was difficult to breathe as I threw myself
into a corner with my back to the horrifying figures, my con moving
with me.

“Hello, this is Headmaster.”

I looked up into his kind face. “I can’t get
out! I’m stuck in the first room past the elevators. I’m sorry, I’m
so sorry. I didn’t mean to come in here, but—”

The screen went black. “Headmaster?” I
shrieked. “Call Headmaster!”

Connie appeared on my con. “He is temporarily
unavailable. Sorry.”

“What?”

Chapter
Eleven

~ The Baring Springs ~

The door burst open and Headmaster tore in,
running straight through the two women to the fountain, where a
third one was climbing out. The women broke apart, vapor
dispersing, as Headmaster leaned over the fountain, grasping the
edges of the middle tier. The purple smoke still pouring over the
edge became pink. Bubbles rose from the top, followed by a pink
smoky woman. She began laughing and twirling playfully around.
Headmaster looked back at me. “Are you all right?”

“I—wh, wh,” I stopped to attempt to swallow
down my fear. “What were they?”

“A reflection of your feelings. You were
afraid when you entered this room. I’m sure when you saw what came
out of The Baring Springs, you became even more frightened, thus
feeding the fear and making it all the more powerful. It was given
its name because it bares the naked feelings of anyone who comes
near it.” He walked over to me and held out a hand to help me up.
“The Baring Springs is our school’s invention for this year’s
competition. Every year each school creates something entirely
original. No one but those involved in creating them are allowed to
know what it is. Then when the school’s inventions are presented,
the students and faculty have no idea which belongs to them and
which belongs to their opponents. That way when the votes are cast
for the better one, no one’s partial. I’ll have to ask you to keep
what you’ve seen a secret. You must not tell anyone.”

“I won’t. And I’m sorry I came in here. I
didn’t want Coach to know I heard you talking about me.”

“No harm done. But next time, you might find
it safer to wait in the hallway.” He reached out for the doorknob
and I noticed the little button beside it that he had to push to
make it turn.

“I would have, but he kept coming. I ducked
in here hoping it was a closet or something and I could wait until
he walked past me.”

Headmaster stopped to stare at me. “He didn’t
get on an elevator?”

“No, he kept walking down the hall.”

“That’s odd. What on earth could he be doing
in my tower? I’ll have to have a word with him later.”

I followed him out of the room and down the
hall toward his office.

“Last year, my brother’s school won the
invention point with their shadowing technology,” he said. “I still
don’t know how they do it, but a person can disappear right into
the shadows, becoming absolutely invisible.”

I remembered the Cinders we’d run into the
night I was recruited.

“You’ll win this year with that fountain of
feelings back there. The women were so real. And the happy and
scared ones went with the feeling they represented perfectly.”

“Well, thank you. I did help to choose them.
We felt that women represent emotion so much more powerfully than
men, so we only used female figures, except for rage. We used a
giant red fire-breathing man for that one.”

We both took a seat inside his office. “Now,
tell me how school’s been going,” Headmaster said.

“It’s been a blast. I love North Haven.
Zoology’s my favorite subject and I’m trying to get used to
Physical Fitness. My muscles are pretty sore.”

“Yes, it always starts out that way, but I
promise you, in a few weeks you’ll feel better and have more energy
than you’ve ever had. Your teachers all say you’re adjusting
nicely, making friends and doing well.”

“Yes, sir.” I looked down at my bag in my
lap. How was I going to tell him I still didn’t know what I wanted
to do? I’d thought about it a million times, but still had no
idea.

“Is there anything else?”

“I’m sorry, Headmaster. I know you wanted an
answer from me today, but I still don’t have one.”

He chuckled at that, making me look back up
at him. “Nothing to be sorry for, my dear. Lots of students don’t
have the answers for a very long time. Some even leave school as
clueless about where life will take them as they were when they
arrived. As long as my students leave here being good people who
will make a positive impact on the world, I feel both they and I
have succeeded completely...Aside from all that, did you get the
notebook I left for you?”

“Yes, sir. Thank you. And thanks for the
pencil set. Being able to use shading makes a huge difference.”

“So you’ve had a chance to get a few drawings
done?”

“Mm-hm.”

“Would you mind if I took a look at
them?”

I reached in my bag for my notebook, feeling
really excited about showing off my drawings. They were some of the
best ones I’d ever done. Everything looked so much more realistic
when I was using such a broad range of graphite and charcoal
pencils.

Headmaster took it and leafed through it,
taking the time to study each drawing. Each of my roommates was in
there, surrounded by what they loved most. There was also the view
from one of the verandas I’d sat alone in for awhile Thursday
night, a drawing of my mother, and the girls’ home I’d lived in
less than a week ago. And then there were the places I visited and
things I saw in my dreams, like Harmony and I standing on a stage
singing a duet for a million spectators, and Roman pulling up in
front of North Haven in a pumpkin carriage to pick me up for a
fairytale ball. In the past I’ve always been too embarrassed to let
anyone see what I drew, but since I’d gotten there, I hadn’t
worried about much of anything. It was nice.

“Well,” Headmaster said, handing my notebook
back to me, “you certainly have a great deal of talent. Have you
not even considered life as an artist?”

“I would love to be an artist, but I want to
stay here. And isn’t there a talented artist on every block who’s
working two crummy jobs because it’s almost impossible to make a
living as one?”

“Perhaps, but I was thinking you could work
here. We have Miss Rivers to teach art, but we don’t have an
artist. Harmony is on the activities committee, as you know, and
Mr. Fielding has been heading that. But he’s also the business and
marketing teacher. He got saddled with the activities committee
because no one else would take it. You could head that committee in
a few years. You certainly have the creativity for it, and it seems
like something you would enjoy. You could put art on walls or on
canvas for the girls and boys here. Although Sassy designed the
bags that hang on your door and beside her bed, Miss Rivers had to
paint the Eiffel Tower behind them. There are times when more art
is required of her than she has time to give. I know she would
enjoy the relief you could offer.”

“Okay.” I didn’t even have to think about it.
It was perfect!

“Perhaps I could even persuade you to join
the committee right now. Harmony would be happy to have you, and
they could use the help.”

“Of course.”

“Good, we’ll keep this to ourselves for now,
because you may still change your mind. When our next school year
begins, if this is still what you want, we’ll sit down with Miss
Rivers and Mr. Fielding and give them the good news. But for now,
that will be the plan for you, all right?”