The Fake Heart (Time Alchemist Series) (10 page)

She was just like Rachel back home.
Bubbly and sweet and adventurous.
Karin was all of those things, plus
super confident and
a natural born leader, and I liked that about her. And, despite her obvious wealth (she personally paid for the pizza’s and drinks at every meeting), she treated everyone on equal ground—scholarship or not.

The pitter-patter of pebbles continued and I slammed my notebook close in defeat. I really only had half of my Biology homework to complete, and
push
come to shove I could
just finish it up early the next morning
. I rubbed my sore hand and opened the window. Dove was standing in plain sight and froze in mid throw. It was actually
kinda
funny, seeing someone as graceful as her about to break my window.

She motioned for me to hurry down, and I mouthed “five minutes” before closing the window again and pulling the curtains. I grabbed my favorite pair of worn out sneakers (I didn’t need to worry about damaging my uniform; it was hanging nice and neat and freshly clean, courtesy of the small laundry room in the basement level of Moore Dormitory, in my closet) and I quickly assessed myself in the mirror. My comfiest pair of faded denim jeans; a black and blue striped polo shirt; and my dark hair brushed in a tight ponytail. I brushed the bangs away from my face, contemplating on putting some hair clips to keep my vision clear, but decided against it.

Thinking it might get cold, I grabbed a light jacket and a flashlight I kept in my emergency kit and dashed out before I could regret this.

But despite the gloomy and pessimistic thoughts…I knew I needed to do this.

And, oddly enough, I was pretty excited about beginning my training as an “alchemist”.

CHAPTER 9

“To put it simply,
alchemy is about studying the basic four elements: fire, water, earth, and air. It isn’t limited to just these four elements, but every alchemist’s own
special core
somehow links back to at least one of the basic elements.”

I nodded as Dove continued her talk. Leaning my back against the nearest tree, I wrapped my jacket a little tighter around me, shivering in the night air.
Being September,
the nights were
usually
warm and sticky, but tonight seemed to signal a fast winter approaching.

“So every alchemist can…only control a certain element?” I asked. Dove nods, a small smile on her face as she realized I was finally getting all of this confusing mumbo jumbo. Wow. It was all so simple; I thought it would involve a lot of
complex foreign languages,
hocus pocus and circles
,
and incantations and stuff.

“Every person,” she continued, “Has the power of alc
hemy within them. Nowadays, it’s
hard to even realize what kinds of power you possess because society has started to forget the old ways of science and magic; it’s all technology and facts. To cut it short, alchemy is a dying art; you have a higher chance of tapping into your powers if you grow up in an environment that practices the laws well, but in certain situations—like, well, yours—can awaken somebody’s alchemic core. Thanks to saving your life, I’ve somehow tapped into your own alchemic core. You’ve felt it at some point, haven’t you? A sort of…pressure inside you that wants to grow out?”

I placed a hand to my beating chest. It was true. Ever since then there was a faint strain on my heart, but it felt as warm as a tiny candle flame. It was both comforting…and scary.

She paced the small clearing in the woods. It wasn’t the same spot where the attacks had occurred, but it was much closer to the old abandoned church. I could see the
pale
white walls
of the church
shine through the mirage of branches and leaves. Obviously it was the biggest party hot spot too, seeing a few scattered cigarette butts and candy wrappers askew in the area. I could just imagine the damage near the church.

The Old C.
The most popular party gathering on campus.
It was perfectly secluded, nestled just so in the woods that, no matter how loud the music was or the shrieking of laughter, unless you were walking directly alon
g the old pathway
, nobody would be able to find...or
hear…what was going on. Not to mention the fact that the “Old C” was the furthest building away from both the administrative hall and the teacher’s apartments.

Who purposely wrecks such a beautiful piece of history like that? You’d think the Headmistress, being so
proper
and
responsible
for St. Mary’s influential image would have done something about it long ago.

Maybe she was just too busy delivering detention to her
definition
of bad behav
ing students, and I could
guess that it was only simple
trashy scholarship students
like me who got the short end of the stick. But a little part of me did see why she was angry—wouldn’t anybody have been if they found a wide hole practically sawed through a school fence? At least, judging from my spot on the ground, the church was relatively intact. Since the punishment in the library’s archives wasn’t that big of a deal, I just decided to suck it up and handle it.

“The sooner we find your
connection to one of the
element
s
, the faster we can find the Elixir,” Dove said, “Although
,
the chances are slim of an
other
alchemist attacking you
here
, we can’t be to
o careful. Not to mention that—
since your alchemy is linked alongside your fake heart, it would be best to prepare in case of…the worse scenario.”

I nodded quietly
, shivering just thinking about the one and only alchemist that Dove was mentioning—how his eyes were just so deep and almost sorrowful looking, swirl
ing with dark blues and greens. I really hoped Dove knew what she was doing…

◊◊◊◊◊

I trudged through the grass on the way to the library, stepping around lazy couples lounging on plaid blankets and narrowly avoiding a group of guys
hustling over a game of Frisbee until
I reached the large, four-story
building
. The red, worn out bricks of the large building gave a warm and familiar vibe as I walked through its glass doors. The inside smelled the same as it had the day before: the scent of new pressed books, warm, gooey sweets fresh from the oven and coffee beans from the small Starbucks on the first floor near the doors, and the always lingering musty sort of smell
that drifted out from the cracks the farther you dove into the library.

Normally coming to the library made me excited to get my studies in; but today everything felt like a symbol of my failure. This punishment was completely and judicially unfair, but there was nothing I could do about it.

Not like I could just march up to the Headmistresses’ office as tell her the truth, “Oh, the reason I
missed
for orientation was because I saw two alchemists fighting near school grounds.
Blah
blah
blah
, something happened and then one of the alchemists seemed to have accidentally stabbed me in the chest, thus rendering me unable to come to orientation. But it’s all good because the other alchemist saved my life.”

Yeah, that was a great way to get the Headmistress even more on my case.
That,
or a one way ticket to the loony bin.

So I tightened the grip on my bag and made my way over to Ms. Callaway, the elderly and sweet Head Librarian to get my punishment started. At least s
omeone
seemed genuinely happy about me being here.

◊◊◊◊◊

“Alchemy….alchemy….” I stroked my fingers over the new and old bindings of the libraries books, scanning the titles. My dad said I always had this bad habit of sticking my tongue out when I was in deep concentration, but I usually didn’t bother to pay any attention.

Until the very moment when Jack seemed have pop up next to me with a wide grin on his face.
“Hey
Em
!
How are you doing?”

My heart jumped and I spun around, “Jack!” I exclaimed (okay, it came off as some shrilly s
queak, but that’s not the point
), realizing what an utter fool I looked (not to mention my tongue sticking out.
Ew
.)
“Uh, hi!
Good. Good, how are you?”

I dropped my hands to my side, playing with the edge of my baby blue shirt. Man, Jack looked so…fine today, and I realized I haven’t seen him or talked to him since Monday when he helped me. And…when I had totally trash talked his girl…
friend
right in from of him. God, Emery, why not act like a moronic, selfish kid in front of him? But he didn’t seem at all concerned or fazed by my careless words with Mallory.

Jack smiled and went on about how busy he was with his track, and I couldn’t help but notice how just
so cute
he was today. Ruffled blonde hair that looked so soft I just wanted to reach over and pet it. Even in a normal white tee and worn out jeans with a rip in the knee, he looked like he walked straight out of a magazine.  I saw the glint of the silver chain clasped around his neck, nearly hidden underneath his shirt; its edges sort of prodding underneath. I wanted to reach my hand out and feel the warm metal next to his skin—