As if hearing my question, Rhapsody said matter-of-factly, “You were probably in your rebellious phase when Professor Martin discussed this.”
I winced at her term. Rebellious phase indeed. She made me sound like a seven-year-old kid throwing a tantrum. Then again, that was a good definition of how I had been last month, with the way I had acted out, and all because I had learned my Master already loved another woman.
I squeezed my eyes shut in mortification. “I’m so pathetic.”
Rhapsody hesitated then patted my hand awkwardly. “You’re being too hard on yourself, Lady Zari.”
I glanced at her gratefully even though I was pretty sure she was just practicing how to be empathetic, which was part of the practical exams for social graces. It was her weakest point, the only subject she got a lower grade than A for.
“You are anything but pathetic.”
I smiled at her. I really hope she’ll pass this year’s exams, I thought. She was trying so hard—-
“Rather, you’re just a girl who may be clinging too hard to the illusion of love.”
I take it back, I thought. I hope Rhapsody fails.
AN ENTIRE RESORT, EXCLUSIVE to otherworlders, had been reserved by LSL for the trip. This was necessary since each student was provided her own room. Sharing was not an option, for there was always a chance a Master might drop by and require privacy for feeding.
It was nine in the morning when we finished with breakfast and the professors had us boarding the buses again. Our first stop was the public hospital. It was located in the old district of Key Moarte and was one of the many abandoned buildings that made up the key’s ghost town. It was also Elsa’s birthplace, and that was the reason why we were visiting it.
Glancing outside my window, I had to shield my eyes from the sun, which seemed to burn more brightly than usual.
As the driver steered the bus into its parking slot, the professor with us came to her feet and clapped her hands to call for our attention. “Listen well, ladies. Once we reach the hospital, I want you girls to note down all your observations. If you are one of the more sensitive types, I caution you against touching anything if you do not wish to have any unwanted glimpses into Elsa’s past.”
The professor smiled, revealing her fangs, and I flinched. She had such a gentle manner, such an unassuming face, that I had forgotten she was only pretending to be harmless.
I glanced outside the window again, and the hospital where Elsa had been born stared back at me, a sad, decrepit building with broken windows, unhinged doors, and long, spindly cracks that spread across its façade like black veins.
Just a harmless old building, but this time I wasn’t fooled.
Rhapsody was waiting for me at the foot of the stairs leading to the hospital entrance. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
I grimaced. “Not yet.”
She blinked. “Pardon?”
I shook my head, mumbling, “Nothing.” We’d be doomed if I ended up scaring Rhapsody, too, with her paranoia. We’d never get anything done if so.
“You’re a little red in the face, too,” she noted. “Are you sure you’re fine? You’re not suffering from heat stroke?”
I wiped the sweat off my forehead with my handkerchief. Thank God we weren’t required to wear our school jackets for the trip or I really might pass out from heat exhaustion. “I’m okay,” I told Rhapsody. “Let’s go?”
Rhapsody nodded. We ascended the stairs side by side, and I frowned when I caught a glimpse of the vandalized walls in the hospital’s lobby.
ELSA. The letters on the wall were spray-painted in orange.
Rhapsody paused at the doorway when she saw me frozen on the third step. The other students filed past her, most of them chatting noisily while the others were busy taking photos and peering at their haunted surroundings through the zoomed lenses of their cameras.
“Lady Zari?”
I started to feel faint. Oh no, not here, not now—-
Someone bumped me from behind, causing me to lose my balance.
I started to sway.
It was the last sign.
I started to see.
HEAT. SUCH SCORCHING heat, burning my skin like the sun was next to me.
Orange. Everywhere was orange.
Swaying. It was hungry and uncontrollable, dancing like…a flame.
FIRE.
I screamed in my mind as my vision burst into life.
La Scala Legaturia was burning in the distance.
I sank to my knees. Sobs of guilt tore out of me.
Katarina was in front of me. Crying. Burning. Dying.
Noooooooo—-
I reached out to her, but the flames kept me away.
This was all my fault, all my fault, all my fault.
Chapter Two
ALEXANDRU
“This is not like any demon we have dealt with.”
Alexandru couldn’t count the number of times he had heard that line before, and yet every time it was uttered, it proved to be true. It was as if Hell had nothing to do but birth demon spawn one after another, and they always came out more evil than the last one.