The Demon's Apprentice (18 page)

I took the towel T threw me and looked over at him, then shrugged out of my t-shirt and headed over to the showers. Midway across the open room, it got quiet.

“Holy shit,” someone whispered as I walked past.

A quiet buzz started behind me as people got a look at the road map of scars on my shoulders and back. I turned on the shower, and the hiss of hot water drowned them out. For a few minutes, I could pretend I was ignoring the comments and stares. I winced as the water hit a set of scrapes on my lower back I didn’t know I had. Muscles began to loosen up under the spray of warmth, and I began to feel a little closer to human again.

“Man, what happened to you?” T asked from beside me.

“A lot of stuff,” I said. “I got into a lot of fights.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. Surprisingly, he let it drop at that.

I finished showering and went to get dressed, and noticed the rest of Brad’s little group eying me from across the locker room. There was hostility there, like before, but now it was laced with something new. Fear. I kept my back to them while I put on my clothes, and I made sure my shirt went over my head quickly.

“You did pretty good out there today,” Gabe said quietly from the locker next to where I was.

“Thanks,” I replied. “Sorry about beaning you.”

“Forget it. T was right; Brad was just trying to get us to do his fighting for him. But you were cool about it. No hard feelings, man?” He held out a hand, and I took it without having to think about it.

“Forget about it.” We shook hands, and he got up and left.

The rest of the players were at least decent when they walked past. It was like I’d just passed some secret jock initiation, and even though I wasn’t one of them, I was a person to them now. Except for Brad and his little group of boot-lickers. I glanced across the room at them, all huddled together. Yesterday, they’d been the ones walking around like predators. Maybe having me lay them out on their butts had taught them not to mess with me.

As I walked out, I had to go past them, and I noticed something that made them stand out from all the other jocks. Of eight football players, including the one that I’d just knocked on his ass, not a one of them had a bruise, scrape or an inch of tape on them. Even T had some scrapes on his forearms, and he was bigger than two of me. I walked across the field to the rest of the school, and my brain began to piece together something else. When I had taken that last hit, he had hit me so hard that my facemask broke, and he had shoved T aside like a guy half his size. Brad wasn’t the only jock into someone for special upgrades. The whole first string had them. Damn. My life just kept getting better and better.

I limped into the cafeteria as the bell rang, and made my way over to the Goth table after I piled enough food on my puke-patterned tray to feed an army. It was time to pay the price for being strong and healing fast. As I stuffed my face with hot dogs and cheeseburgers, Lucas and Wanda joined me.

“Dude, your arms!!” Lucas cried in alarm, noticing the angry red scrapes that ran from my wrists to my elbows as I reached for my third carton of milk. “What the hell happened to you?” he demanded.

“A football team tackled me. Hard. A lot.”

“That must have hurt!”

“Yeah.” What else could I say to something that obvious? I changed the subject. “Is everything ready to go for this afternoon?”

“Yeah, the
Falcon
is fueled up and ready, and she’ll be waiting at docking bay 94.” Lucas laughed at my puzzled look. “From
Star Wars
?” he said hopefully.

“Still not getting it,” I muttered.

“You’ve never seen
Star Wars
?” he asked incredulously.

“Um, no. My dad was pretty strict about some things.”

“Oh, no,” Wanda moaned. “He’s about to witness to you, Chance. Run, while you still have a social life.”

“Dude, no witnessing needed. You just have to experience
Star Wars
in all its glory. We can watch it this weekend, so you can catch up with the civilized world, and get more of my jokes.”

“Actually,” I said, wincing inwardly at Wanda’s inevitable reaction, “I’d like that.” Wanda only rolled her eyes good-naturedly. That crisis averted, I went back to the serious business of eating.

When the bell rang, Wanda and I headed for the greenhouse, ready to take the next step in our plan. As we took our seats, I was even more aware of the girls in cheerleading skirts across the aisle from us, and I could have sworn I felt their eyes on my back all through class. I saw my chance as Dr. Corwin walked down the rows, handing out botany study sheets.

“Uh, Dr. Corwin?” I asked, as he laid the sheet down in front of me.

“Yes, Chance?”

“Could I drop by after school today and talk to you about the placement test?” I tried to keep my voice pitched as low as possible, but he had evidently never heard the word “subtle.”

“Certainly, Chance!” he said with obvious pleasure. His voice carried across the room. “I’ll be here for a little bit after the pep rally!”

“Thanks,” I muttered over the giggles that came from the other side of the room.

“Oh, man, you are getting the major booty check, Chance,” Wanda whispered, as Dr. Corwin moved on. I rolled my eyes and tried to go back to my worksheet, drawing a cross section of a leaf, but it wasn’t an easy job. “You wear a pair of tight pants
one
time, and suddenly you’re a piece of ass,” I growled.

Wanda’s smile surprised me as she leaned back and gave my seated bottom a mock appraisal. “It’s not bad. Now you know how we girls feel when guys stare at our ass or tits all the time,” she offered smugly.

“I’ll keep that in mind next time I ogle your boobs,” I told her before I turned back to my work.

She chuckled and bent to her own work before Dr. Corwin could make it back by. The bell, of course, took its own sweet time in ringing. French and shop class were mostly goof-off sessions, and then it was time for the pep rally.

My first pep rally. I was excited, since this time, I would be experiencing it from the bleachers instead of waiting outside to make a deal with a cheerleader, geek, or jock for whatever dream they wanted me to make come true. Just walking in to the gym, I could feel the raw power coming from the place. Pack five hundred kids from fourteen to eighteen into a big room on a Friday afternoon and play some marching music real loud. Even if it’s badly played, you’ll get five hundred pulses jumping a little quicker, and five hundred sets of hormones working overtime, especially when you add a dozen or so athletic, attractive girls in short skirts jumping around. It’s a little like a hormonally enhanced version of a nuclear reactor, energy wise.

The marching band was already going, playing some song I’d never heard before, or maybe playing one I did know so badly I didn’t recognize it in its clever new disguise. Either way, the drummers were doing their thing well enough, and working the ancient magick of rhythm on the whole crowd. Add to that the candy the cheerleaders were throwing to the people in the bleachers, and I figured the gymnasium would be pretty much orbital by the time everything was done. I found a spot next to Lucas and Wanda, or I should say, one opened up when I got close enough for the kid in it to see me coming. Having rep as a badass helped sometimes. They were both grinning like loons as I sat down, and I could see the pile of candy wrappers at their feet.

“Looks like you’ve been busy already!” I had to yell over the crowd.

Lucas nodded and dumped a handful of sugary delight into my hands. “We got here early!” he yelled back.

From where we were, high in the bleachers, I could see all the banners the cheerleaders had made, with “Go Howlers!” and “We’re #1!” painted on them. Pictures of battered pirates were mixed in with the fierce wolf-looking things representing the Howlers and the Northview Pirates. It was barbarism reduced to ink and paper.

It was also a great place to pick up a
ton
of free-floating aggressive energy. The air was charged with it, practically crackling to my mystic senses, it was so thick. With that thought, I dug into my book bag, flipped open my pocket knife with my thumb, and let the point of the blade dig into the still-fresh cut I had made Wednesday. When I felt the slickness of blood on my fingertip, I let the blade slip closed and felt around until I found my telekinesis power rod. There was a tingle against my fingertips, and I felt the hair on my arms stand up as a cool wash of magick pulsed from the center of my being, down my arms and into the TK rod. With the connection between my blood and the rod, I could channel magickal power into it. I needed to have it next to my skin, so I palmed it and pulled it from the bag.

Suddenly, the band started up, and I felt the first wave of insistent, martial power slap against me like a hot wave of static. The song brought everyone to their feet, and I certainly couldn’t resist the urge to get up myself. I felt the rod sucking up the energy I was pumping into it, as the lodestones and quartz did what came naturally: drawing and storing power for use later. The cheerleaders got everyone chanting, which drew even more potential into the air, and the rod drew it all in as fast as I could channel it.              

Between the cheerleaders, the music, and the speeches by the coach and Brad, who turned out to be pretty charming when it suited him, the whole school was in a frenzy before it was all said and done. Brad and the coach dedicated this game's win to Mr. Chomsky, which only hyped everyone up even further, in spite of the somber tone of the speech. I was beginning to wonder if my little rod could hold any more juice. Then, as if the whole pep rally had been written just for me, it ended with the school song, which acted as a damper and a focus, keying more to pride and loyalty than to raw force and aggression. It had a feeling of solidity and endurance to it, so it served as a good point of closure. I wove the threads of my will through the song and directed it around the TK power rod, sealing the stored energy inside it for use when I might need it. Both the rod and I were pumped as full of energy as we could be, and I found myself grinning. This wasn’t so different from what I was used to…just less grim. More innocent.

“Man, that is a weird look for you,” Lucas said from beside me. Wanda’s head was bobbing in an emphatic nod.

“What?”

“You, smiling like that,” Wanda said.

“It’s a little scary,” Lucas said as he raised his hands with his fingers making a crude cross.

“I’ll get right back to scowling, then,” I joked. “This was fun!”

“You’ve never been to a pep rally before?” Wanda asked.

“They didn’t have them at the boarding schools I went to,” I lied smoothly. “I’m gonna go talk to Dr. C. You guys go get ready to follow Brad and his crew, okay? I’ll catch up with you as soon as I’m done.” I grabbed my bag and headed down the bleachers toward the door.

As I went, I caught sight of Brad and Alexis by the other set of doors. Alexis was in his arms, looking up at him, looking like she was trapped. Brad’s face was set in hard, angry lines, but there was a hollow look in his eyes that told me he had just lost something, too. All was not right for Princess Pop Star and Prince Not-So-Charming, it seemed.

The halls were empty. You didn’t have to give students a reason to clear out on a Friday afternoon. I jogged toward the botany lab, which was even further back, and even less likely to have anyone in it, hurrying for my own reasons. Though talking to Dr. C had been mainly an excuse, I found myself really wanting to make it into the advanced science classes. That much, at least, Mr. Chomsky had been honest about. It beat the Nine Hells out of being just another juvenile delinquent. As I jogged along, though, my shoulder blades began to tighten up, and I started to get the feeling that I wasn’t alone in the halls.

The sound of a padlock slamming down against a locker stopped me in my tracks, and I spun in place, while my left hand dug in my book bag for my freshly charged TK wand. After a few seconds, I found it and palmed it, drawing my hand out slowly. Soft laughter mocked me from the suddenly dim hallway, and I realized that the lights had been turned off behind me. My eyes narrowed. I was being hunted, stalked. Of course, the hunters had no idea how dangerous their prey really was. If it was Brad and his buddies, thinking that numbers and a little mystical mojo was going to give them an unfair advantage over me, they were in for a huge surprise. I turned my back on the darkened hallway and continued back down the hall toward the greenhouse.

The first attack caught me flat-footed. The only warning I had of something coming was a dry scratching sound, then I was flying through the air with the memory of a heavy weight slamming into my back. I hit the ground with my hands out, and dropped the TK rod with a clatter and a curse. It landed a few feet further down: as good as a couple of miles, if I didn’t get to it fast. I rolled onto my ass first, though, trying to see who or what had attacked me. My brain was dimly aware that I hadn’t heard sneakers hitting the ground, or even hard-soled shoes. Rolling to one side was all that saved me from the second pounce. Even so, I felt it hit the ground beside me, and found myself looking into the blue eyes of a huge gray wolf. I remembered the eyes because they were over rows of about a million big teeth, separated by a gray muzzle and a black wolf nose. And there were teeth, in case I didn’t mention that. My roll had put me closer to the rod, but the wolf’s landing had put it closer to me than I was to the rod. Bad odds for me: better than great for the wolf.