Authors: Fabio Bueno
“What now?” she
hisses
, challenging me.
Behind me, I hear Drake stumbling. Jane is still three steps away from me. I get my last flask and try to pop
up
its lid, but Jane closes the distance insanely fast, and closes her fist over my hand
, preventing me from opening the flask. Her
hand is
crushing m
ine
.
I
’m afraid the flask might break. T
he
potion is going to
spill on
me.
Her
smile
is
horrific
—
as if
her face
is
made of pure evil.
I cower. I feel weak, defeated, but something inside me compel
s me to fight. It’s not real
.
Not real.
I force myself to see her how she really is: I try to pierce through her Intimidating Charm.
The glass flask is about to crack under her death grip on my hand. T
urn
ing
the bottom of the flask
in the direction of
her face,
I
push with all my strength, in a stabbing motion.
She tries to turn away, but the butt of the flask hits her cheekbone and breaks. Tiny pieces of g
lass get stuck deep into her fle
sh. Liquid spills over her face and my hand.
I yank my arm from her grasp and
loo
k at my hand. There were only tw
o potions left. One is decay. The other…
Jane
puts her hands over her eyes and
screams. The same scream I
let out
in
the locker
room
.
B
reathing hard, I manage to whisper,
“Bli
nding potion, bitch.”
Broken
glass decorate
s
my right hand, and droplets of blood emerge. I look at them, bewildered. Something inside my head reminds me not to get my hand, dripping with a little blinding potion, next to my eyes.
I barely notice when
Jane
swings her arm
swiftly
in my direction
.
I
try to dodge
, but I’m too slow
.
A sharp pain comes from a deep cut on my forearm, just below the elbow.
I
gasp
and step back, trying
to avoid her wild swings. She’s got her switchblade
in her hand, and even blind
,
she guess
es
my position.
A
while
ago, I took a single self-defense class. I use the only thing I
’ve learned then
.
Her swooping slashes leave h
er body hunched forward
, her arms wide
, and I see
an
opening.
I kick her in the groin with
all my
strength
.
S
he whimpers, falling backward. The knife drops
to
the floor, beyond her reach. She
reaches for her aching crotch, gasping in pain
.
Dra
ke
stumbles
in my direction.
“You okay?
”
Drake
asks with a raspy voice.
He trips and almost falls
down
. I support him with my shoulder.
Looking at his bloodied face, I say. “Yeah. Let’s go.”
I guide him
to
the front while Jane
lays on the floor
.
N
ot screaming
anymore, j
ust moaning. For some reason, it’s scarier.
The street is desert
ed
.
I’m guessing screams are a common occurrence around here.
I help Drake into the passenger’s seat
and run to
the
driver
’s side
, disregarding
the trail of blood
I leave on the sidewalk
.
Jane’s bike
is
parked
behind
us
. Defenseless.
I check
the empty street
for onlookers
,
then
awkwardly use my left hand to
put the Volvo i
n reverse
and smash the side of her precious
machine
. The bike tumbles to the road.
“Whoa,” Drake says.
I
twist again to
put the shift i
n drive and hit the gas, leaving all
things Jane behind.
We don’t go to the hospital this time. We’re in Skye’s bedroom. I suggested going to my house, since Dad’s at work and Mon
a is wherever freakish fourteen
-year-old girls
hang out
, but Skye told me she had
healing
herbs and potions here.
Au
nt Gemma is out
,
bird
watching
again
.
We only need to clean the bloodstains from the hardwood floor, that’s all.
After examining the bump on my temple, Skye
makes a quick bandage and hands
me a huge ice bag.
“They hit you exactly where the tree hit it,” she said.
“Guess I can recycle the scar then,” I say.
I use
tweezers
to pick every tiny shard of glass from her hand.
I
nste
ad of using soap or
antiseptic, she brushe
s
a few herbs
over h
er
wounds
and pours
cold water
over her hand
. I d
o
n’t even ask
.
I hope she doesn’t get an infection.
Even with the odd circumstances, I feel warm inside
,
having her hand resting on mine, while I do
glass-
picking duty.
“How are you going to explain the gash?” I say, nodding to the bandage on her other arm.
“I’ll just wear long sleeves.”
I find another piece of glass, slowly pull it
out
, and drop it on her dresser.
“So, great plan, huh?” I say, my eyes fixed on my job.
The answer is slow to come. “It was a car wreck.”
I’m surprised she’s this calm. She was just attacked—again—by a knife-wielding notorious psycho, and she fought her way out of a room with three adversaries.
“You saved me
again,” I point out.
“I put you in danger in the first place,” she replies.
“
Where we at
?
In s
av
ing each other
, I mean. We should be even
by
now, right?”
“I stopped counting a wh
ile ago,” she says, her voice
lively now.
I chuckle.
“You should get another
CAT s
can
,” she says softly. Her hand touches my
scar
.
“If we go back to the ER, they’ll probably report us to the police,” I say, looking at her now.
She shakes her head dismissively. “Under what charges? Getting hurt too much? Is that a crime?”
I imagine running into baby-doctor once again. “I wonder if the hospital has a
frequent customer punch card
,” I say.
“Hits to the head are serious, Drake.
”
“Tell you what, once the bump goes away, I’ll make a return appointment. I can tell them I’ve been having headaches. This ought to get me another
scan
.”
“Deal.”
The silence comes back, resilient this time. Only when I’m almost fi
nishing up, Skye
mumbles
,
“I feel sorry for her
.
”
I stop
the improvised
surgery. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
She gives me a pained look. “We broke into her house. I attacked her. I hurt her.”
“Awesome,” I say.
“I couldn’t care less about her. Well, maybe I could, if I tried really hard…”
“Come on, Drake. You’re better than this
. W
hat if
I
hurt her?”
I drop the
tweezers
and hug her. “You didn’t, Skye.
She
tried to kill you. Don’t forget it.”
After I break our emb
race, she nods, unconvincingly. She
motions
for
me to resume the operation. I remove another shard
,
and Skye grimaces.
“We made a mistake,” she says
after a while
. I don’t
contradict
her. “Many mistakes.
This is getting way out of control.”
“Well, if they had let me go after I broke in—into what I thought wa
s an empty house, by the way—
nobody would be hurt. Including me.”
“The same applies if we didn’t bre
ak into her house to begin with,
”
Skye says.
“Good point. Useless now, but good. Hindsight is a bitch.”
Something else bothers me.
“Wh
o were those guys? How did she get them to work for her?”
Skye shrugs. “
If she’s really a Night w
itch,
I’m guessing they work for potions, se
x, or money
.
Even drugs:
some of us can brew powerful hallucinogens.
A few
Sisters actually make a living of it.”
“I loved what you did with the potions,” I say. “But you should have told me before. I’d
recommend using a
Super S
oaker:
much more effective.”
She chuckles, but her expression is still pensive.
“Do you think Jane is calling the police right now?”
I ask.
“
I’ve been thinking
—Ouch!” Oops. I made a mistake and pushed a shard of glass even deeper. She removes her hand
,
blows a little on the wound
, and then says,
“I’ve been thinking
about that.
I don’t know. Many things are hard to explain.
Why would we go to her house? What is all that glass and strange liquid all over the place?
”
I take an involuntary look at the bloodied glass I’ve been depositing on the dresser.
“She doesn’t have to explain a
nything. Actually, she just has
to tell the truth. Because we acted like criminals. And she has our blood in her house. And someone might have seen my plates—not that are many caramel
-colored
Volvo
s in the city.”
“I can think of only one reason
,” Skye says, raising the
index finger on her good hand,
“
that would stop her
.
The Veil.”
“Does she care?”
“If she does, she must belong to a coven. And that would be an even bigger problem.”
Jane doesn’t show up at school the next day. Nor do the police.
I’m wearing long s
leeves and
knitted
gloves. When I look at my wounds
, the word that
comes
to my mind
is
“evidence.”
If Jane wanted
to get us in
trouble, it
would
be too easy.
But no sirens and no calls to the principal’s office mean we
g
e
t
a reprieve. At least for tod
ay.
Today
I’m glad I got my Jane
alarm. Drake, however, ha
s no True Sight. He’s so uneasy. J
umpy, really. It’s odd seeing him so subdued.