The Rise of the Fourteen (3 page)

She turns to face away from her mother and silently curses
her for the rest of the drive.

Well, this place does look depressing, doesn’t it?
Nuntios sighs as he begins to climb the foreboding stone stairs. Gnarled
gargoyles look down on him from the roof, as if judging him. This school
screams “reform.” No matter how much his parents try to sugarcoat it, that is
even more evident as he passes through the front door, a huge hunk of cedar
reinforced with iron strips.

The question is, is it supposed to be keeping students
in? or freedom out? Both is the more likely answer.
Students shuffle
between classrooms in the dimly lit hallway. Their uniforms are rather
hideous.
Chartreuse? Really? How could anyone fancy that color?
It is
very evident, even now, that this school is no place for a trickster like
Nuntios.

Some students clump against the walls talking among
themselves.
It’s time to listen. Hearing people talk about each other is
excellent entertainment. Judging by the looks of this place, it may be the
only entertainment.
There are scattered whispers, but no one turns to look
at him, not directly, anyway.

“Ugh, he looks just like Lukas. That’s all we need. Two of
them.”

“He’s not so bad.”

“Maria, you’re blushing.”

Very interesting.
Nuntios smiles to himself as he
sees the two girls chatting, one a very obvious shade of pink.
This will
make excellent fodder.
He looks down at his manila folder. He’s supposed to
be looking for an Eric Berger.
He does sound like a snotty type. How to
circumvent that will be the challenge, but no matter.

Nuntios has plenty of practice, weaseling his way out of
trouble
. Down the hall, there's a gentleman in a suit looking dreadfully
important; maybe he can help.
Nuntios strides towards the man. Judging by
the ashen faces of the other students, this is his highness, Eric Berger
himself. Nuntios suddenly feels naked, his jeans and jacket strange outliers in
the sea of cropped skirts and blazers.

“Well, don't you all have classes to go to?” the man snarls.
“And you, Lukas, you should be more careful in avoiding further infractions
.
”

Ah, so that’s Lukas,
Nuntios muses
. A nice chat
with him later will be splendid.

“And you!” the man shouts, pointing directly at Nuntios. “Why
are you out of uniform?” Now everyone turns to look at the leather-clad new
arrival.

You see, this is fun
—
as
long as it’s not happening to you. But it’s happening to me.
“I’m sorry to
bother you sir, but
—
”

“If you were really sorry you wouldn't have bothered me in
the first place. Now, what's your name, boy?"

“Nuntios, Nuntios Ehrlichmann. You see I'm a new student
here, and I was wondering
—”

“You’re late. Three hours late. The school day is nearly
over! You should have been here at half past twelve. Tardiness is not tolerated
at this school. I hope you make yourself aware of that during your stay here,
Mr. Ehrlichmann. However brief that may be.”

“I’m sorry, but my flight was delayed and then
—
”

“Don’t bother me with your piddling excuses. The fact is you
are late, and that is a sign of inexcusable sloppiness.”

Nuntios clenches his jaw in exasperation.
Eric will be a
tough nut to crack.

“Also, you will address me as ‘sir’ at all times. I
thoroughly despise it when strangers presume such familiarity with me. In the
highly unlikely event that you last at this school more than three months you
may call me Sir Eric.”

“Might I know where my dorm is? Sir?” Nuntios’s face is
blank and coy.
Playing along in the moment is good. Sir Eric will live to
rue the day, just not this one.

Sir Eric takes a crisp manila folder out of his jacket. “Here
are your housing papers. Your room is 1392. Take the second corridor from the right
of the fountain in the courtyard, and it’s the tenth door on your left. Unpack
quickly, I expect you to be fully settled in so that you may start class
tomorrow.”

Nuntios half expects him to stalk off with his nose high in
the air, like a snotty British aristocrat, but Sir Eric sits there, watching,
as if waiting for his trained beagle to do a miraculous trick for some esteemed
guests. Taking the hint, Nuntios hurries off. Unpacking is all well and good
for now, but that isn’t the only thing on his mind. After finding his room,
Nuntios has a very different mission in mind
—
to
splash around some “gossip.” If his luck holds, class should be very
interesting tomorrow.

After unpacking and some unsuccessful snooping, Nuntios can’t
wait to get his hands on the dinner spread. He enters the dining hall in a
rush, and immediately saunters over to the large mahogany buffet table, laden
with hot food.

Looking around at the other students, he is glad that he had
the foresight to put on his uniform, but it’s so stiff.
How does anyone go
around wearing this stuff all day? And again, the color? Terrible.
At
least the food is decent.

Nuntios piles his plate high with lamb and mashed potatoes.
After seeing the “No Food in Dorms” sign, Nuntios was stocking up like a bear
hibernating for the winter.
Going hungry in a miserable place like this? It
simply
won’t
do.

Now, to the boys’ table. He sees a group of boys his age,
leaning back cockily in their chairs. He recognizes Lukas from earlier and
Nuntios allows his lip to curl up in a small smile.
You’re so easily
underestimated when you’re the new kid.
After a simple, harmless conversation,
he would get Lukas and maybe some of the other guys on their own. A few seeds
of doubt and a pinch of lies would make for an excellent drama stew.

“Might I join you?” Nuntios asks shyly.

“Sure! You’re the new kid, right? I’m Fredrick, although
most people call me Rick. And this is Malone, Lukas, and Elias.” He says,
pointing around the table. The three other faces swivel up in interest, turning
to gaze upon the newcomer.

“Yeah, that's me.”
Not this drivel again. It’s always the
same. So, you’re the newbie? It’s like they’re trying to pretend they’re not
judging.

“Sorry no one got a chance to warn you about our dear
headmaster.” This comment is met with sniggers from all around the table. “He
always goes after new students like that.”

He doesn't do that to students all the time?
Maybe
the sniffs of derision that Nuntios heard were just imagined then.
Really,
why do people who hate children always end up working in schools? At least the
schools I end up going to.

“So, what do you guys do for fun around here?” Nuntios asks.
He tries to play it off as a casual question but, beneath his mask of cool, he’s
worried. What kind of freedom does this prison offer? The last school he went
to had been only a few steps beneath a maximum-security institution.

“There’s a ton of wilderness all around the school,” Elias
says through a mouthful of sausage. “It’s great for exploring during free
periods.”

“Unless you get lost like Lukas did.”

“Thanks for bringing that up, Malone.”

“No problem.”

 The next hour passes by in a blur. There is more cheery
small talk about school life, but nothing interesting to Nuntios. He acts
animated as they talk about rules and classes. No one guesses at his inner
boredom. He gradually tunes out, only speaking when spoken to. No one seems to
notice.

Then he hears something, something almost at the edge of his
hearing, but slowly growing louder. As if it was rising through the floor.

“
Listening now, boy?”
A cutting voice, as stinging
as an icicle pierces Nuntios’s ears. He puts his hands up to the sides of his
head protectively, trying to block out the knives that prick his eardrums.

“Where are your tricks now?”

“You are alone.”

“No one cares about you.”

“Listen boy!

“Lackluster mind.”

“How pitiful.”

A cacophony of voices erupts from around the room, each more
biting than the next, each comment more degrading than the next. Nuntios
usually brushes off insults like dust on his jacket; he was never one for petty
squabbling. But these are more than just words. He can feel their chill sinking
into him, consuming him with their venom, drowning out the world with poison.
There are human voices talking too, but they float in and out, like singing
voices underwater.

“Nuntios, are you okay?”

“What’s happening to him?”

“Is he having a fit?”

The demonic voices seem distant for a moment, but reappear again,
whispering right in his ear.

“He needs to learn.”

“Then let him suffer.”

“Struggling already?”

“You’ll have to do better than that.”

“What talent do you have?”

“You have nothing.”

“Don’t fool yourself.”

“Stop, please, make them stop….” Nuntios trails off, bashing
his head against the table as he grimaces in pain, icy tendrils stabbing at his
head. Students look on in horrified confusion as Lukas comes running through
the crowd, dragging a frightened nurse to the scene.

“Scream all you like.”

“You’ll need us.”

“We will never leave.”

Then the chorus goes silent. Only the faintest buzz of
whispered chatter remains, like static. Nuntios is curled up on the floor,
still shivering violently as the chill begins to leave his body. His breathing
is uneven and shallow. He has gone quite pale, and his blond hair seems white
under the fluorescent lighting of the lamps. He whimpers as he is loaded onto
a stretcher, but makes no other sound. He does not feel the blankets being
pulled over his body nor does he hear the worried voices of the teachers,
rushing to call his parents.
It's over at least,
he thinks, taking a
deep breath
.

“
That’s what you think.”

“That was only the first.”

“We shall talk again.”

“Only, when you’re ready.”

“Weakling.”

The chill begins to spread again, and Nuntios is drowning,
drowning in a vast polar ocean of mind-numbing fear.

The sunlight is not what wakes Nuntios up. Nor is it the
chirping birds. He is awakened by the smell, a permeating, putrid smell that
seems to fly up his nostrils.

“Not too much of the smelling salts, otherwise he’ll go
loopy again, you idiot.”

“Since you’re obviously the expert, Dr. Elias, I’ll let you
handle this.”

Nuntios tries to open his eyes, but they’re glued shut.
Tremors pass through his body but he doesn’t wake. The whispers are fainter
now, their voices being carried away on an unseen breeze. Nuntios further
cocoons himself in his blankets, trying to ignore the crystalline fingers
running up and down his back. Then they are gone, as quickly as they came. As
heat floods back into his quaking body, he slowly opens his eyes.

“Welcome back from the dead, bro,” Fredrick says, grinning
as Nuntios sits up. Grins slowly appear on the other boys' faces. Nuntios
blinks a few times and then looks around. He’s lying on a high mattress with
many blankets thrown over it. A glass of water sits on an exquisite oak
dresser. Beside it, a fire crackles, spitting ashes onto the hearth.

Seeing Nuntios’s confusion, Fredrick rushes to reassure him.
“It's okay, you're in your room.” Nuntios opens his mouth in a questioning “O.”
If the dorm room he unpacked in yesterday had been this nice, he might not have
come down to dinner. “After your … fit, Sir Eric decided to move you up here.
You kept shivering, so he gave you a warmer room.”

“Only older students get these rooms!” Lukas quips. “You get
the royal treatment, and we have to wait two more years.”

Nuntios smirks. “Pretty good score for the day then.”

They all laugh at that. “So, what happened exactly?” The
serious gray pallor returns to their faces. Finally, Elias answers.

“You had been quiet for a while and then you started shaking,
like you were having a seizure or something. You just went completely berserk
and started writhing underneath the table. You kept yelling about ‘the voices,’
and you kept asking them to stop. Eventually, you just went limp. Malone didn't
think you were still alive until he saw you were twitching.”

The room had gone deathly quiet by then. The fire flickered,
barely more than a heap of embers glowing faintly. "Nuntios, who are the
voices?"

Nobody answers.

Nuntios resumes classes the next morning, despite the
admonitions of the school nurse, who told him to rest for at least forty-eight
hours. He refuses to return to the dining hall, however, and skips breakfast.
So, by the time he slides into the chair of a hard wooden desk in Mrs.
Skimmer's English classroom, hunger has begun to gnaw at his stomach. Fredrick
slips into the seat beside him, smoothly masking his tardiness.

“You alright?” he mouths to Nuntios. Nuntios simply nods,
half ignoring the other boy. Mrs. Skimmer is actually not half bad (despite the
fact that they're discussing Shakespeare), but Nuntios’s head is still
swimming.

After a few minutes, the voices begin to re-emerge. There
are no clear words, only murmured whispers. Nuntios scrunches his eyes shut,
trying to block out the sound. It slowly dissipates. But when he opens his
eyes, the entire class is staring at him expectantly. Mrs. Skimmer nods
encouragingly. Nuntios’s face twists in a nervous grin.

“Nuntios,” she says, “you only have to read line sixty two.”
Fredrick feigns a loud cough, distracting Mrs. Skimmer momentarily. If you
hadn’t been listening you wouldn’t have heard Fredrick’s whispered words “the
book.
”