The Unwanted (Black Water Tales Book 2) (17 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

“O
h no,” the words tumbled out of her mouth as she grabbed her chest, panic striking every mortal chord in her body. It was her, the woman from the hallway photograph. Blaire turned to look at the black and white photograph, and she was missing in it, no longer in the photograph, but standing right in front of her. Blaire’s attention whipped back to the front door, which allowed a gust of frigid air to slip in just before slamming shut.

“Ivan!” Blaire charged down the hall and out into the bitter night.

The glacial temperature hit the scantily dressed Blaire and she froze instantly, inhaling deeply and exhaling a great puff of smoke.

Blaire grunted in an attempt to fortify herself against the cold. She ran along the side of the building following the pair. Rocks dug into the bottoms of her bare feet, but she ignored the sting as she saw Ivan and the woman turning the corner at the back of the building. She had to catch them. She had to stop them.

“Ivan!” Blaire screamed again, but both he and the woman ignored her. Blaire ran faster, her thick dark hair whipping in the wind. As she entered the backyard, the gusts off the sea made the night freeze almost unbearable, and Blaire’s teeth were chattering uncontrollably.

“IVAN, NO!” she shrieked at the sight of the boy following the woman down to the basement door.

“No, no, Ivan! Don’t go down there!” Blaire shouted. One last time he looked up at her before descending completely out of sight. Sprinting toward the cement steps, Blaire forgot about the
blizzard
-like temperatures that had already numbed her body completely.

At the top of the steps, she stood frozen in fear, her dilated eyes looking down the stairs that led to the red metal door.

“Ivan,” Blaire called.

No one was there.

Blaire tiptoed down the short flight of steps and yanked at the door knob, but it was locked tightly. Blaire looked around in confusion at the disappearance of the two. She had forgotten the stringent temperatures until warmth came flooding back to her through her feet. Looking down, she saw blood flowing from underneath the door and engulfing her feet. In seconds it was up to her ankles when something hard slammed into the door from the other side, as if all the innards of hell were trying to come into the world of the living in that one moment, through that one door.

Blaire screamed as she shot out of the subterranean compartment. She dashed around the building toward the front door.

Once inside, she ran for the stairs, taking them two at a time. On the second floor, she was shocked at the sight of Travis standing in front of 2E.

“Travis!” Blaire called in a hoarse gasp.

Travis turned to her, “You look like a popsicle! Were you outside?”

“What are you doing?”

“I’m doing my bed check,” he said as if the answer should have been obvious. “What are you doing?”

“It’s Ivan. She took him!” Blaire cried, her chest still heaving up and down from her frantic run.

“What? Who took who? There’s no one here but us, Blaire.”

“No, she was here. Look, she left footprints. She took Ivan,” Blaire said, pointing to the dirty footprints that led to the boy’s room.

“Those are your footprints,” Travis explained. A bewildered Blaire reviewed the prints that resembled her feet. “Ivan is fine. He’s in his bed,” Travis confirmed.

“What?” Blaire pushed Travis aside and opened the door to the boy’s room where she saw a bundle under the covers in Ivan’s bed. She looked down at her feet, covered in dirt, but not bloody. Blaire crept across the boys’ room to Ivan’s bed where her shaking hands reached out to pull down the blanket that covered the boy, and she could not believe her eyes. Ivan lay there sleeping soundly.

Travis walked up, stood alongside her and peered down on the slumbering boy whose cheeks were bright pink.

“That’s funny,” Travis said in a whisper as he pressed the back of his palm against the boy’s pink cheek.

“What?” Blaire asked.

“He’s freezing,” Travis explained.

Blaire looked down to notice that both she and Ivan were trembling.

CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT

U
nbearable sunlight punctured every opening in the building as Blaire shuffled down the stairs and headed toward her classroom. As she passed the large hallway photograph, she stopped. Blaire turned to see that the
curly
-headed woman had retaken her rightful place as a harmless, inanimate image. Blaire stared at her and she stared back. Blaire took a step closer and now they were so close that the woman could reach out and grab Blaire if she were real, and Blaire almost feared she might. A flash blinded Blaire, and for a split second the faces in the photo distorted into drawn and strange images before returning to normal. Blaire looked away and looked back quickly only to be startled again by her own distorted image that glared back at her in the reflection of the glass. Blaire grabbed at her face, and she ran to the bathroom where she stared into the mirror at the ordinary image that stared back.

All of the children were silent when Blaire entered her classroom. Strangely their eyes watched her, giving her deep discomfort. She could hear the sound of someone crying. Blaire saw Natalka standing erect in front of the closet, staring with wild eyes that burned in defiance at her. Whimpers were floating from behind the closet door. Blaire marched to the closet, pushing Natalka aside, and she swung the door open. Dariya lay crumbled inside on the floor. Blaire pulled the little girl out and saw that her lip was bloodied at one side.

“Who did this to you?” Blaire asked, as she lifted the girl and looked down at Natalka.

“Did you do this?” Blaire asked Natalka, but it was clear that her question was an accusation.

No answer. Blaire looked around at the entire classroom of children who all had their
deep
-set eyes fixed on her. “Who did this?” Blaire noticed that she was shouting now. When still no one answered Blaire absconded from the room with Dariya in tow. When Blaire returned from Travis’ office, where she left the injured girl, Natalka was back in her seat.

“Natalka, did you hit Dariya?” The girl was quiet. “Did you?” Blaire was almost screaming.

“No!” Natalka shouted back. “I was trying to help her get out when you came in.”

“Well, who did?” Blaire asked eyeing each of her students carefully.

None of the children spoke. One of them was humming, but Blaire could not tell who. Bo was rocking slightly back and forth. Many of the children’s eyes shifted toward the floor. Sergey sat quietly with his head down, and Blaire noticed a fresh bruise on his arm. She sighed but didn’t bother to ask the boy about his injury, as she was sure he would tell her that he had only fallen down or ran into a door.

“Fine. If none of you wants to talk, then we’ll be silent. No activities, no games, silent reading all day,” Blaire stated firmly, as she slapped her hand down on her desk.

“Good morning,” Anya said appearing in the doorway. “Travis said that you wanted to talk to me when I came in?”

“Yes, Anya,” Blaire answered. “Class, I’m going to step out in the hall for a moment.”

At first Blaire was hesitant, but if she could trust anyone here (and she was not sure that she could), it was Anya. Anya was the only one who did not seem infected with whatever virus of raw strangeness was prevalent in this place, and she seemed like the only one who actually cared for the children.

“Anya, what happened in the basement?” Blaire asked.

The shimmer in Anya’s blue eyes diminished into a sluggish fog before she looked up and down the hall, and then back to the inquisitive young teacher.

“Why do you want to know something like that?” Her voice dropped to a low whisper.

“Something…like…what?”

“I don’t know,” Anya told her.

“You know!” Blaire argued.

“I don’t! That was a long time ago, before my time. No one talks about it anymore. And I don’t know much. All I know is something about the children being…” The young woman’s speech faltered.

“Being what, Anya?”

“Being murdered by the workers,” Anya said, whispering frantically as if she were being tortured and finally forced to give up a military secret.

“What do you mean? How?”

“That’s all I know! It is not something that people talk about, and it is something that you will not talk about either if you know what is good for you,” Anya warned.

“Who killed them?”

“I can’t…talk about this,” Anya said putting the kibosh on the impromptu interrogation.

Blaire rolled her eyes thoughtfully. “Okay, I’m sorry, Anya. I didn’t mean to upset you. Can I ask you for a favor?”

“Blaire, I don’t
think
—”

“Anya, when I first arrived at St. Sebastian, you asked if I were going to help the children and I’m going to, but I need your help. Help me, help them.”

“What? What is it that you want?” Anya said, becoming impatient.

Blaire raised her eyebrows mischievously, which instantly told Anya the favor would be huge.

“MARKO!” Travis banged on Marko’s office door. “MARKO, HELP!”

There was scrambling behind the wooden door before it opened to reveal Marko’s startled face.

“Marko, it’s Anya. I think she’s having a seizure. I need your help!”

“What?” Marko responded, his expression going from shock to terror as he started to his desk for his keys to lock his door.

Travis grabbed his arm sternly, “There is no time. Please!”

Shaken, Marko hurried out the door, jogging behind Travis toward the lunch room.

Blaire peeked around the corner to make sure that both men were gone, and then nodded to Bo, who was inconspicuously stationed at the other end of the hall. She crept along the wall and into Marko’s office. Blaire pulled out the top desk drawer and grabbed his keys. She searched for the key to the file cabinet, sticking random keys into the lock and hoping one would open it. Her breaths were coming short and fast, and she had to make a conscious effort to keep her breathing quiet, so she could listen for the whistling. Swiping at a piece of unruly hair that stuck to her forehead with perspiration, she began looking through the keys.

There’s something in the basement,
the voices clamored in her head.

She went back to the jangle of keys, and this time her shaking hands discovered the correct one.

Blaire hauled the top drawer open. She could hear the continued commotion in the lunchroom. Travis and Anya were obviously putting on quite a show; nonetheless, she worked faster. The top drawer of the file cabinet was filled with financial statements, or from the brief looks of the papers…a
lack
-
of
-financial statements, mixed among other documents containing logistical information on the facility. She shoved the manila folders back into the drawer, closed it, and moved on to the second drawer where there was another sea of ragged folders. Some were labeled with little white stickers, detailing the names of particular children, while other names were simply scribbled directly onto the folder in pen or pencil.

“Bingo,” she whispered to herself, laying her hand upon a file that was labeled,
Natalka
. Blaire pulled the folder out and flipped through several pages of documents, scanning them quickly. She looked for any other folders with the girl’s name, but there was nothing.

A noise, close, Blaire froze. It was Bo’s whistle, signaling her that Marko was returning to his office. Ivan’s name came into view on a cleanly labeled manila folder, and Blaire hesitated. Bodan let out another low whistle, a familiar tune, but Blaire hardly had time to decipher it now, as she was cutting it dangerously close. She grabbed Ivan’s file before shutting and locking the cabinet. She returned Marko’s keys and placed the files against her chest just inside of her cardigan, from which they grossly protruded. With a bead of sweat starting down the back of her neck, Blaire poked her head out the door. Bodan had fled, but she did not see Marko either. He had yet to turn the corner from the other hall. Blaire dashed into the hall, but took only a step before she heard Marko’s squeaky shoes on the floor at the other end of the hall behind her.

Think, Blaire, think.
She chanted to herself silently, but her throat was closing, and she was sure she was about to pass out.

“Blaire,” Marko called suspiciously.

Blaire wiped the sweat from the back of her neck, swallowed hard, and removed the files from inside of her sweater. A contrived but stern expression grew on Blaire’s face as she whipped around to confront Marko with seemingly infallible purpose.

“Marko, there you are, I have been looking all over for you! I need to talk you about some of the educational files for the children that you gave me.” She spoke confidently as she motioned to the files in her arms. “The previous education that the children received here is laughable. I don’t know how you expect me to be able to do my job effectively
if
—” She was well into one of her infamous rants, which caused Marko to dismiss her with a quick wave of his hand.

“I don’t have time right now,” he told her as he blew into his office, slamming the door in her face.

“Whatever you say, Marko,” Blaire found herself speaking to the door with an agreeable grin.