Alchemist Academy: Book 1 (24 page)

Verity hovered near me with a smile. She knew she had me, and the rage filled me enough that I was sure I could have made any stone she wanted me to. “Fine, I’ll make it. But heal him first.”

“No. Is it getting close to the shoulder yet?”

Mark gripped his shoulder. The blue had already passed his elbow and was creeping toward his bicep.

“It won’t be long now.”

“Fine, but if you don’t cure him, I’m going to use the stone I make on you.”

Verity laughed. “You can try.”

I would make a stupid stone, if it meant saving him. Just like the first stone, she’d laid out two sets of ingredients. I didn’t pay attention to what they were and collected them. I set each vial on my desk and set my old mixing bowl on the floor next to me.

“Don’t do this,” Mark begged, holding his shoulder.

“Mark, shut up.” I might have been too sharp with him, but I was already summoning my anger. Thinking of what Verity had done last night and what she’d threatened to do to Bridget was enough cause for anger. Toss in Mark dying next to me, and it sent me to an edge I hadn’t known existed.

I didn’t keep track of the ingredients as I poured them in. I didn’t care if I was making a freaking atom bomb for Verity; I couldn’t let Mark just die next to me. The wooden spoon dug into my hand as I gripped it hard. I spun the spoon around the bowl and waited for the sound of the stone dropping.

It plunked and clanked around the glass bowl. I grabbed it with a black cloth and cocked back my hand, ready to throw.

“Done. Now stop it. Whatever you did to him, stop it now.”

She glanced at Mark and threw a stone at him, hitting him in the chest. He caught it with his blue arm and the stone melted into his skin. He yelled in pain, jumped from the desk and stumbled past me, hitting the wall of books. He fell to the floor, grabbing at his arm.

A moment later, relief swept over his face and he wiggled his fingers. The blue was receding and the tan color of his skin returning. He stood and stretched out his hand, smiling.

I dumped the stone into the bowl and ran to Mark.

Verity tiptoed closer, staring at the contents of the bowl. Her brow crunched around her eyes as she approached and then her eyes went wide when she spotted the stone in the bowl. Her mouth hung open and she licked her lips. Lifting the bowl off my table, she cradled it like a mother holding her newborn child.

Another stone clunked around Bridget’s bowl. “Done.” She slumped in her chair and folded her arms.

I thought I heard her sniffling.

Verity turned to her with her mouth still open and gave her bowl a questioning look. She placed my bowl next to Bridget’s.

“You both can leave. You too, Mark.” Verity leaned over the desk, staring at the two bowls.

Bridget got up and rushed out of the room.

I touched Mark’s arm. It felt ice cold, but at least the color had returned and it looked completely normal again. He made a tight fist and sneered at Verity’s back.

“Leave,” she snapped.

I pulled on him and we left room five.

Bridget was standing near the door, bent over with her hands on her knees, looking red in the eyes. Mark closed the door to room five and I took a deep breath. I had saved Mark, but at what cost? What had we made?

“You okay?” he asked Bridget.

“I feel like we just made something very terrible for her,” Bridget said.

“I have the same feeling. Do you know what we made, Mark?” I said.

“I’m not sure. I’ve never seen those ingredients in my mom’s collection.”

“I can’t come back here tomorrow and make another stone for her. It’s going to kill me. Maybe not tomorrow or the next day, but if I have to keep doing this, I’m going to want to die.” Tears filled Bridget’s eyes.

I eyed the elevator door next to room five. “We won’t have to stay here for another day.”

“What are you up to?” Mark asked.

I clenched my jaw. The last piece of the puzzle had fallen into place and I hadn’t even realized it. “I have a few things to get, and then, yeah, we’re getting out of here.” I just needed enough time to make a few stones.

“What’s going on in there?” Jackie called from the street below my window.

“Don’t answer her,” I begged. She would never take silence as an answer. “Take off your shirt and pants.”

“Excuse me?” Mark had surprised eyes and a big, stupid grin on his face, but his hands had already moved to the buttons on his pants.

“We need to have a reason to be alone. If we don’t, she’ll force us down to another one of her block parties.” I reached to the bottom of my shirt and pulled it over my head.

Mark stared at me in my bra. “This is a plan I can get behind.” He tore off his shirt and pants in two seconds flat.

Staring at his body, I stopped at the red boxers. My breath clenched in my throat, and I totally forgot what we were getting undressed for. Mark slid onto the bed and crawled under the sheet.

“You look good without a shirt,” he said.

I looked down at my heaving chest, stuffed in a red bra.
Huh, we match.
Rolling my eyes, I jumped into bed next to him. “Don’t get any ideas,” I warned.

The door shot open and Jackie stood on the other side. Her mouth hung low as she took in the scene. “You little sluts,” she said in a half-playful, half-jealous tone. “No wonder you’ve been hiding in here.”

I pulled up the sheet to cover my chest. Mark rolled over onto his stomach.

“Can we have some privacy?” I asked.

Jackie ignored my request and skipped across the room. Sitting on the bed by Mark’s feet, she continued, “I wouldn’t be a very good house leader if I didn’t make sure my peeps were being safe, now, would I?” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a condom. She placed it on Mark’s bare back and then patted him on the butt. “Very nice ass, Mark.” Ogling him, she looked at every inch of his body with hunger. “Damn.”

“Jackie, get the hell out of here,” I warned.

She laughed, but got off the bed. “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure no one comes up here to interrupt.” She tapped her teeth with one of her fingers. “Do you need any pointers, Mark? I can tell you right now what kind of attention a girl like Allie deserves.”

“No,” I replied for him.

“The first thing you should know about a woman, down there, is—”

“Get out!” I yelled, and threw a pillow at her.

She laughed again, as if it was the funniest thing in the world. “Fine, fine, I’m gone.” She rushed past the open door and reached back to grab it closed.

I let out the longest breath of my life. My body felt sweaty and I fanned my chest.

“She’s an interesting one,” Mark said, sitting up.

“More like crazy.”

“I don’t know. I would have loved to hear her advice about a woman’s
down there
region.” He smirked and held the condom in his hands.

I hit him with a pillow. “If you can help me figure out how to make a portal-the-hell-out-of-here stone, I’ll consider giving you a personal lesson.” As if I had a clue, but Mark perked up at the offer.

Looking at my stomach and chest, he nodded. “I’m going to hold you to that.”

I pulled my shirt back over my head. Mark took much longer to put his clothes back on.

“So, what’s this plan of yours? I’ve seen it on your face since we left room five,” Mark said.

“The elevator.”

“The one where Deegan had to dig through a large key ring that he keeps on his person, just to get it open? And how do we even know where we are right now? We wouldn’t last one hour in Antarctica.”

I took a deep breath and tried to come up with an answer. “I just know we have to get out of here. After seeing what happened to Daniel, I can’t make another stone for her.” Mark opened his mouth, but I talked over him. “She’ll find another way to ‘motivate’ me tomorrow and the day after that.”

“I agree with you. You can’t make another thing for her. I have a terrible feeling each time, like we’re doing a great wrong.”

“You don’t think I know? I made a freaking stone that locked that Dave guy into a perpetual nightmare. Who knows what my other stones have done?” It was hard to keep a serious tone while Mark was sitting at the end of my bed, shirtless.

“Fine, but we have to get the key from Deegan.”

“Oh, God, yes,
yes
. Mark!”

He stared at me with a shocked expression and a bit of color hit his cheeks.

“Jackie needs to hear that.” I shrugged. “I bet I just bought us a little more time before her strange ass comes up here to interfere again.”

Mark didn’t say anything for a while and then swallowed.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. I’m just not used to you calling my name out like that.”

I smiled and covered my face. “Leave Deegan to me, but I need to make a few more stones to prepare.”

We snuck down the stairs. A few Reds glanced at us but kept talking. We walked to the door behind the stairs.

“What if Jackie is in there?” I asked.

“So what if I am?”

I winced and turned to see her standing there with a cocked brow. “Oh, hey, Jackie,” I offered lamely. “We were just….” I glanced to Mark for help.

“We were just looking for more protection. It kind of went quick.”

I lit up at the thought and nodded.

Jackie frowned. “What’s going on? And don’t think for a second I believed your cat-like screeching up there, Allie.”

I covered my face with my hand and tried to wipe the embarrassment away. “Come with us.” I pushed the door open and found a few people sitting at various tables around the room. Some had materials set in front of them, while others were mingling in small groups.

“Everyone out,” Jackie said. “Now,” she added, and waved her hand at the door over and over again.

She got a few grunts and complaints, but they all left.

Jackie turned to us. “Now, why don’t you tell me what selling your good name was worth?”

I didn’t listen as I rushed around the room, grabbing the ingredients I needed. Jackie huffed as I remained silent, but I was going to make these stones before I worried about placating her. In a few minutes I had the stones I needed stuffed in my sack. I turned to Jackie.

“We found a way out of here.”

The building shook.

“Not again, not this soon.” Jackie stared at the ceiling. “Wait, what do you mean, you found a way out of here?”

Verity’s voice sounded muffled in the stone room, but we heard it well enough. “All students, report to your rooms to make booster stones. Room five, report to room ten.”

Mark winced, grabbed at his stomach and fell to one knee.

I reached down to him. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” He grunted in pain and balled up.

“Diarrhea? I told you to stay away from the mystery meat in the cafeteria.” Jackie shook her head.

I scowled at her. “It’s not from bad meat. He’s ill.”

The building shook again.

“We’d better get to our classroom. You’ll disappear if they find out you didn’t help with the booster stones.”

“Everyone will be gone…”  I said to myself.

“What?” Jackie asked.

I pointed to the ceiling. “This is going to be our best chance of getting out of here.”

I remembered the chaos it had created last time. Best of all, Verity would be locked in, trying to portal the whole academy.

Mark groaned again and rolled to the floor in a fetal position.

“Is he going to be all right?” Jackie asked, and knelt down next to him.

“Go. I’ll help Mark,” I said.

Jackie frowned and stood with her arms crossed. “If you two found a way out, I’m not leaving your side.”

“Just go,” I yelled. “I’ll explain it all to you later.”

“Fine.” She stomped from the room just as the building shook again.

I wondered if another outsiders would be dropping in this time. Did the teachers have more suspended animation stones? I don’t think I could consciously hurt another person again. Then I thought of the stone I’d made today. I didn’t remember much, but it was a creamy, opaque color. I’d never seen another stone like it.

Mark winced again but got to his knees. I’d never seen him this bad, and I didn’t know how to comfort him, but I knew what he needed. It was time.

I touched his head. “I’m going to leave you here, but I’ll be back soon with something that will help you.”

“I can make it.” He got to his feet and winced in pain. “It comes and goes. This one is a bit worse.” He looked at the floor and held his stomach. “I’m sorry you had to see this.”

The lie his mom had told him for his whole life couldn’t be contained. “Mark, you’re not well. Your mom told me about your condition and how she’s kept it at bay your whole life, but now nothing works. She sent me here specifically to get what’s in Verity’s office right now. A life stone.”

Mark, bewildered, took a step back. “That kid
died
to make that stone. I wouldn’t use it even if you did have it. It’s all kinds of darkness. I’d rather die naturally with my soul intact, versus live and be damned.”

“This isn’t about wrong or right, Mark,” I said between my teeth. “Stay here and I’ll be back in ten minutes. Don’t come for me. Promise?”

He pursed his lips and didn’t say a word. I didn’t like the way he was looking at me, like he didn’t know me. I couldn’t take that look and left the room. I’d felt the same way when I first saw the life stone, sitting on the chair … the remains of Daniel. The stone felt like a poison pill and if I had touched it, I would never have been the same. Maybe it still held the same fate for me, but sometimes your soul is a small price to pay to save the ones you care for.

With the sack of stones at my side, I walked down the spoke. Reds filled one side, and Blues the other. I searched across the street for Bridget. I couldn’t leave her behind.

Someone bumped up against me. “You want to tell me what’s going on there, Sporty Spice?” Jackie asked as she looked forward.

Another person bumped the other side of me. “Yeah, what’s this I hear about you finding a way out?” Carly added.

I motioned for them to come close as we walked toward the hub. “I’m taking the elevator up and out of here. I don’t care where we are.”

“I thought you might have made some rope, or dug a tunnel,” Jackie said.

I shushed her and looked at the Reds near us. “I need something first. Can you two cover for me in room ten?”

“Yeah,” Carly agreed.

“Good. Meet me back in the stone room in ten minutes and we can come up with a proper way to secure the keys.”

They broke off toward room ten as we entered the hub. I walked behind them a ways, getting blocked by the people rushing by. I spotted Verity talking with Deegan and Priscilla. I walked closer to them, careful to keep out of view.

The din made it hard to hear what they were saying, but Verity seemed furious and pointed to the teachers’ hall. I heard one distinct word: “Dave.”

Priscilla nodded and ran toward the teachers’ hall. Deegan stepped closer to Verity and she placed an opaque, creamy stone in his gloved hand. The very stone I had made for Verity not long ago. His mouth hung open as he stared at it.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“Do it.”

Deegan turned and ran to the outer wall. I was sure he was going to the stone hole to launch it to the dark alchemists above. I didn’t want to think of what horrible thing I had created this time, so I ran. Deegan would be next, but first I had to concentrate on getting the one thing I needed before leaving this place.

Next to my exit, I glanced around and darted to the teachers’ hall door. The crowd in the hub had thinned greatly, as many students had already made their way into the classrooms. Verity walked toward the fountain with her back to me. Not sure what was waiting on the other side of the teachers’ hall door, I pulled out a stone.

Opening the door, I slid into the corridor. Alone, I dropped the stone back into my pocket. I ran down the hall, glancing at the painted door cracked open to the endless hall I’d gotten lost in. Priscilla was probably running to Dave this very moment.