Tompkin's School (For The Extraordinarily Talented Book 1) (22 page)

“Welcome,” a doorman greeted us as he opened the front door for us.

I literally thought we had teleported into another time and place. The grand foyer looked as if it had never changed from when it once belonged to the school’s founder, Thomas Tompkin. The whole place seemed like a museum, except for the modern music blaring from a room off to the side. We headed towards the music and entered a giant room which could only be a ballroom. Who had a ballroom in their
house
? Wait staff passed by, offering various horderves to the elegantly clad guests, and everyone seemed to be having a grand time.

“Wanna dance?” Lee asked as a dance remix of Hang On by Plumb began playing.

What a strange song for our first dance to be. I chuckled to myself as I thought about how relevant this song was to my current predicament. This would be the exact song Kain would choose for comedic relief or something.

Of course I would
, his voice filled my head.

Stay out of my head, Kain!
I scolded,
where are you anyway?

Just entered the building
, he replied.

Watch out for Chuck or Amadeus,
I advised,
either one of those two could throw a wrench in our plan.

Of course,
he agreed.

“You look distracted,” Lee commented as he took my arm spun me around.

“Just enjoying the music,” I laughed, “I didn’t know you could dance.”

“My mom used to send me to cotillions,” he shrugged.

“Cotillions?” I asked, raising an eyebrow, “you mean those things they used to throw in the seventeen hundreds?”

“Sort of, yeah,” he laughed at my skepticism.

“I guess I just didn’t picture you as the cotillion attending type,” I joked.

Stay focused,
Kain’s voice interrupted my conversation,
find an excuse to ditch Romeo and help me find the journal.

Ugh, we just got here,
I thought in response.

Yeah, well we’re on a deadline,
he thought back.

“Want me to find us some drinks?” Lee asked.

“Oh, sure!” I said, “I’m going to go find the ladies’ room.”

“Meet me over there then?" He suggested, pointing towards a table in the far corner that appeared to have a fountain filled with punch on it.

“Yeah,” I agreed, feeling a bit guilty for having to lie to him.

We went our separate ways and I glanced over my shoulder, making sure Lee didn’t spot me ditching him, before leaving the ballroom.

“There you are,” a familiar voice said behind me.

“Hi,” I replied, spinning around to face Kain, “how’d you get away from Kia?”

“Easy,” he shrugged, “once she starts dancing she doesn’t care who she’s dancing with.”

“Lucky you,” I said, sarcastically, “we need to hurry, we don’t have much time.”

We headed towards the long hallway in search of his gallery. We passed door after door, nothing looked familiar to us anymore. Everything from that night seemed like a dream, probably one of the lovely side effects of transitioning. That and the horrible bruises.

“Do you remember which corner of the house it was?” I asked.

“I think it was the back left corner,” he said, unsure.

We tried to look as inconspicuous as possible as we passed the many partiers of the honor’s society. As we walked passed the students it became ever more apparent that someone had found Tompkin’s finest and had helped themselves to passing it around.

“Hey!” Leslie called, spotting us, “you have
got
to try this.”

“Oh, what is it?” I asked, trying to ignore Kain’s annoyed look.

Quit it
, I thought,
we have to look natural.

“Gin and tonic,” she giggled, “someone found it in this fany room back there.”

“Wow!” I exclaimed, taking a sip, “that’s strong.”

“Haha, yeah,” she agreed.

“Where is this room?” I asked.

“Come on, I’ll show you,” she said, her speech slightly slurred.

Why are we following her?
Kain’s thoughts asked.

Because it could be the gallery
, I thought in response.

We followed Leslie down the hall and when we reached the end of it she pointed to a half opened door.

“They’re being served right through there,” she said, “but shh! Don’t tell any of the chaperones.”

“Okay,” Kain said, rolling his eyes.

We walked through the doors into a dimly lit room scattered with students with glasses filled with gin and tonic, I assumed. Had any of the adults heard about this? And where was the
Uncle
?

“Gin and tonic?" An overly snarky voice asked.

I turned to see who had asked us and there was Chuck behind the bar, of course.

“No, thanks,” I replied, “this isn’t the gallery, is it?”

“Why do you want to know?” Chuck asked, as he poured tonic water into a glass.

Wrong person to ask, Iz,
Kain’s thoughts said.

“Thought that’s where the action was,” I shrugged, “heard someone say it.”

“You look tense, love,” Chuck commented, “have a drink. On the house, so to speak.”

“Come on,” Kain said, taking my arm.

I glared at him as he just stood there chuckling at us. We left whatever room that was and continued our search. We went down yet another long hallway, passing door after door, room after room. Why were we even doing this? We had no idea if the journal was even down there or what kind of security this guy would have in his secret lair. I thought about what we had asked of the Bartholomew brothers and wondered what had happened to them. Were they even successful? Suddenly, my vision seemed to blur and I stopped in my tracks.

“Whoa,” I exclaimed, holding the wall as I tried to blink.

“What’s going on?” Kain asked.

“I-I don’t…” my voice trailed off as my vision suddenly focused on a shadow down the hall.

The shadow was the shape of a boy, but his figure was almost clear. Like he was there, but not there at the same time. The shadow began to move and I was completely drawn to it.

“Where are you going?” I heard Kain’s voice in the distance, even though I could feel him right next to me.

Don’t you see him?
I whispered into Kain’s thoughts.

See who?
he thought back.

I see a shadow,
I thought,
follow me.

The shadow weaved quickly through the random students who had decided to explore the mansion and I tried my best to keep up.

Are you sure you know where you’re going?
Kain asked.

I don’t have the slightest clue,
I confirmed,
but he seems to be leading us somewhere.

The shadow stopped abruptly in front of a small door and stretched out his barely visible hand to the doorknob. Something glistened as the ghost did so and I spotted a faint ring on the shadow’s index finger. A gold band with a bloodstone center. It was strange, the ring seemed somewhat familiar but for some reason I couldn’t quite put my finger on where I had seen it before. We followed the shadow through the door and into what could only be the gallery. The room was filled with various portraits and antique paintings. The shadow did not hesitate to cross the room past the enormous, unlit fireplace and went straight to a large 19th century painting of an old plantation.

This looks familiar,
Kain’s thoughts informed me.

The shadow placed his hand on the right side of the frame, apparently looking for some sort of trigger to unlock the secret passageway. I heard a faint click and suddenly the left side of the painting ever so slightly popped open. The figure opened the painting the rest of the way to reveal a small space with a ladder secured to the wall. We looked down to see where the ladder would take us, but there was no light.

Should we risk it?
I asked, a little concerned about getting trapped down there.

Come on,
Kain replied,
he’s getting ahead of us.

You first,
I thought.

Kain hopped onto the ladder and began the seemingly endless descent into darkness. I soon followed, although I immediately regretted it. I wonder if I was claustrophobic when in transition as well, or if that was just a human reaction.

I’m so not in the right outfit for this,
I complained.

Relax. Just reached the bottom,
Kain’s thoughts replied,
Must be the basement.

I reached the last step and was definitely glad I was no longer on that rickety ladder. The figure we were following had lit a lantern, but the lantern was faded as well as if it was there but not there at the same time. It provided just enough light for me to find a light switch.

“What is this place?” I asked out loud once the light came on and I was able to take in our surroundings.

“Looks like they’ve been tracking students for a long time,” Kain said.

The room was filled with photos taken of students tacked onto a board with a list of school schedules, a map, and a bunch of lines drawn between items which had a connection. It even looked like we had made the board. Our faces were plastered near the top with a giant question mark.

“Where’s that shadow now?” Kain asked.

I looked around and spotted him standing at the far back corner just staring straight up at the ceiling of the basement.

“Here,” I said, motioning him to follow me.

We walked over next to where the shadow was standing and I looked up, immediately spotting what he was looking at. There was a rather large metal pipe that appeared to have a latch on the end.

There,
I thought, pointing to the pipe,
something’s inside there.

Kain got something to stand on and hopped up, inspecting the pipe.

See anything?
I asked.

I haven’t even opened the thing,
Kain’s thoughts growled,
give me a minute.

He reached up and attempted to pull out the lid thing, both of us hoping it wasn’t anything like a gas pipe or something. The lid pulled out with a cling and Kain reached in and pulled out a slightly curled book.

The journal,
we thought at the same time.

Kain hopped down and moved more towards the light.

“This is it!” I gasped.

“Finally,” Kain commented.

We turned the leather cover and saw Thomas Tompkin’s name engraved on the first page and a date. I couldn’t believe my eyes! We were that much closer to finding out what this whole thing was about and who the other beings were.

Wait,
Kain’s thoughts growled followed by an explosion of fury.

“Ugh, stop that!” I said, grabbing my head, “Your outbursts hurt my head.”

“There’s nothing in here,” Kain said.

“What?” I asked, “What do you mean?”

“Look,” Kain said, showing me the book’s empty pages.

“Why is it empty?” I asked.

“Well,” Kain began, “I bet you whatever happened between Theodore and that reporter spooked him enough to move it.”

“Why would he move it?” I asked, “I mean it’s not like reporters are supposed to go around breaking into peoples’ homes and this wasn’t a necessarily easy hiding spot to find.”

“Either way this is a fake,” Kain spat, tossing the book aside.

Suddenly, we heard footsteps above us in the gallery and we knew it was time to get back to the party. Lee was probably looking for me everywhere and I couldn’t imagine Kia not noticing that her date wasn’t around for this long. I didn’t even care about what I was going to tell Lee. Did it even matter? What we thought would get us closer to everything that haunted our dreams only led us to a dead end. I had a strong feeling that this was where the real journal was, but that it was probably long gone. Someone had gone to great lengths to keep it away from us and I had a feeling it was related to whoever that guy with the bloodstone ring was.

The winter break had gone by faster than expected, even though we had just been sitting around in our father’s giant home where he and his bride ignored us with hatred in their eyes. The feeling was mutual. Before we knew it we were back at school and it was already time for Kain’s least favorite holiday, Valentine’s Day. Fortunately, what had gotten me through the break were Lee’s phone calls each evening and so things were going quite well in the romance department. The whole school was decorated in red and pink hearts and throughout the halls couples were holding hands and girls bragging about what how sweet their man was. Kain completely avoided the topic of what had happened that night at the social. Each time I attempted to bring it up he would change the subject or something would suddenly “come up”. Meanwhile, everywhere I went it seemed Chuck was there watching me like a hawk. Probably looking for me to do something suspicious. It was definitely a bad time for Amadeus to call in any
favors
. But our entire life couldn’t be placed on hold until Chuck deemed us uninteresting. We still needed to find out where the original book went and who had led us to the fake one. Did Theodore intentionally leave a fake one there? Or was he even looking for the journal when Kain saw him go through the hidden door behind the painting? Ever since that night the shadow had been haunting my dreams. I kept reliving the moment that I saw the ring over and over again, desperately trying to put a face to the figure we had followed. I
knew
I had seen that ring before, I just couldn’t remember where.

“Hey, there!” Lee’s voice called.

I turned around and saw him heading my way, books in one hand and a giant bouquet in the other.

“Who are those for?” I exclaimed.

“You, of course,” he said, handing me the beautiful flowers, “Happy Valentine’s day!”

“Wow!” I gasped, immediately welcomed by the scents of alstroemeria lilies and roses, “Happy Valentine’s day to you, too.”

I leaned in to give him a kiss on the cheek when his lips moved onto mine. It definitely took me by surprise, but I had been wanting this to happen for a while and so I wrapped my arm around him.

“Hope you don’t mind,” he whispered in my ear when I stepped back.

“Mind?” I chuckled, “I would’ve settled for a kiss on the cheek, but this is better.”

“Good,” he said, a huge grin on his face, “walk you to class?”

“Of course,” I smiled.

He took my hand as we headed to first period together. I was on top of the world. I couldn’t believe we were actually together! Despite how complicated my life had become I still had this one little bit of happiness in my life. When Lee was around I could almost forget the monster inside of me, the lies I saw all around us, and the secrets we had to keep from everyone just to keep from getting killed. Or whatever the Academy would do to us. We walked into the classroom and I spotted Kia and waived in her direction. She barely looked up and when she did she seemed to look straight through me. She did not look well at all.

“Hey, I need to go check in with Kia,” I said, “see you after class?”

“Sure,” he said, leaning in and kissing me on the cheek.

“Bye,” I waived.

I turned and began weaving my way through the aisle of desks filled with students chatting about love, or something related to that.

“Kia,” I said, taking a seat next to hers.

She didn’t even look in my direction. What was
wrong
?

“Hey, what’s going on?” I asked.

“Nothing,” Kia mumbled.

“No, Kia,” I insisted, “it’s not nothing. Something is wrong, I can tell.”

“You know what, Izara,” Kia spat, “Maybe I just
don’t
want to talk about it, okay?”

She grabbed her bag and stormed out before Ms. Morgan could even begin class. What had I done to her? This was definitely not like Kia to react this way to anything. Whatever it was, it must have been a big deal. Or Kain related. I rolled my eyes, realizing that that had to be what this was all about. It was Valentine’s day so Kain must have done one of his signature moves of being a complete ass. Were we
really
related? I mean really?

What did you do?
My thoughts whispered out, hoping they would find their destination,
and where are you?

I sat there in silence, completely ignoring whatever was going on in class at that moment, waiting for an answer.

Answer me!

My thoughts exploded and I knew that wherever he was he could feel my rage. Who did he think he was? He couldn’t just destroy someone’s whole entire day just because they had an issue showing affection. Suddenly, my eyes zoned out and I was no longer in the classroom, but in a forest somewhere. I saw trees all around me, felt a cool breeze and a raindrop fall on my cheek. I reached for my face and when I did so I was back in the classroom. I blinked to be sure it was real and sure enough, I was back sitting in my usual seat in the middle of English class. What just happened? I shook my head and tried to focus back on the task at hand. I looked down at my paper and all of a sudden I was back in the forest. I looked up to the cloudy sky, a flock of birds flew by, and sounds of rushing water came from not too far away.

Get out of my head,
a voice creeped into my thoughts and my vision snapped back into the classroom.

Was that Kain? Was I seeing what he was seeing? But how could that be possible? I guess nothing was technically impossible in this world anymore.

Where are you?
I asked.

Leave me alone,
his voice filled my head.

Whatever you did
, I responded,
undo it. Kia doesn’t deserve this.

Now is not the time, Iz,
Kain’s thoughts replied.

Why are you skipping class?
I asked.

I wasn’t surprised when I received no response so I remained focused on the visions I was seeing through his eyes. There was something familiar about where he was at. I saw someone up ahead look over his shoulder and Kain ducked behind a tree. Who was he following? His eyes peaked around the tree trunk and I got a better look at who it was. He was following Chuck! What was he
thinking
? The sound of water got louder and soon we were right next to a rushing stream. It had changed, but suddenly I remembered where I had seen this place before.

Kain!
my thoughts were rushing a million miles per second,
do you know where you are?

What did I tell you?
his angry voice exploded in my head.

I know, I know,
I thought,
but seriously! You followed Chuck to the Bartholomew brothers’ secret spot!

What?
his thoughts asked.

Look!
I tried to point ahead, but instead I was just standing in the classroom there stupidly pointing at Ms. Morgan with the entire class staring at me.

“Can I help you?” Ms. Morgan asked.

“Um...no,” I said, blushing crimson, “carry on.”

“Thanks,” Ms. Morgan said, her words dripping with hints of sarcasm, “turn to page fifty-seven.”

I sat down back in my seat, wishing everyone would just stop staring at me and turn their shocked heads back towards the chalkboard. I had to be more careful! I couldn’t even get myself to look at Lee, hoping he hadn’t noticed.

You still there?
Kain’s thoughts asked.

Yeah,
I replied,
just having a moment.

Well, let’s please get back on topic
, he asked,
where am I?

Remember when we were…
, I paused, trying to find the right words,
...captured I was telling you about the dream I had? Of how Lawrence took his younger brother to the river where they hid that bottle of whiskey in a huge tree trunk?

Sure,
Kain’s thoughts replied.

I zoned out again and was back in Kain’s thoughts, seeing through his eyes.

This is it
, I confirmed.

I felt Kain’s mind rush with the process of realization setting in, crashing like waves onto a shore. Chuck had to know. He had to know everything. He had a piece of the puzzle that we didn’t. But how?

He got to the journal before we ever arrived,
Kain’s thoughts confirmed before my mind had a chance to catch up.

I had seen him speed off way before anyone else had even started their cars. It had to be true. But did the book even have anything in it about this place?

Your guess is as good as mine
, Kain’s thoughts said, answering my unspoken question.

Okay, you being in my head is annoying,
I thought back.

Kain chuckled in response.

What should I do?
he asked.

I think we should wait until we transition again this Thursday
, I thought.

Are you sure?
his thoughts asked,
I could always practice my boiling power on his blood.

I’m sure
, I rolled my eyes, even though he couldn’t see my eyes I knew he got the message.

If Chuck thought he had all the answers, he was about to get a rude awakening. It was one thing to read about things, but quite another to see them in real life. My vision snapped back to Ms. Morgan’s classroom as a bell rang and everyone began filing out of the room. I quickly grabbed my books and headed for my next class. I felt someone take my hand and I glanced up to see Lee.

“You okay?" He asked.

“Yeah,” I replied, “Why?”

“You just seem...preoccupied," he said, “and what was that all about in class?”

“Oh, I’m okay,” I shrugged, "I just get a little too excited about reading Salinger’s work.”

“Really?” Lee replied, skeptically.

“Totally!” I lied, hoping that this was a believable enough cover for my strange outburst in class.

“If you say so,” he laughed, “do you have Art or Biology next?

“Art,” I confirmed.

“Ahh man,” he said, “I don’t think I have to get to my public speaking class on time and walk you all the way over there.”

“No worries,” I smiled.

“See you at lunch then?" He asked.

“Sure,” I agreed.

He leaned in and gave me a quick kiss on my cheek before heading off to his next class. I watched to make sure he didn’t see me head towards the exit. I had to find Kia and find out what happened. I really wished I didn’t have to always clean up Kain’s mess. It wasn’t like I didn’t have my own problems that I actually needed Kain’s issues, too. I had a lot to juggle and I was near the capacity of my patience. I made my way up towards the dorms in hopes that she had gone back to our room. I couldn’t even imagine what he could have done to make her so distraught.

Would you like to help me out here?
My thoughts asked Kain.

With what?
his thoughts sighed with irritation.

What did he have to be irritated at?
I
was the one running around trying to fix his mess.

With Kia, for crying out loud!
I replied.

Oh...that
, he thought.

That?
I asked, not sure how to take his dismissive response.

She thought we were dating
, he replied,
which we aren’t. I guess she expected me to call over break and do something for Valentine’s, or whatever.

Ugh! What a mess!

You can’t keep doing this,
I thought.

Doing what?
his thoughts snapped back, defensively.

Playing with Kia’s emotions,
I clarified.

Look,
he replied,
she’s the one that read into me asking her to the social. Most of that night I spent with you so I don’t know how she could have even thought of that as me asking her to be my girlfriend.

What do I tell her then?
I asked,
Do you even like her?

Yeah, of course I do,
he replied,
but she’s wanting things that I can’t be right now.

Does this have anything to do with what happened last time?
I asked, remembering the one girl he had ever dated.

Ha!
he scoffed,
I’m not talking about that. I can’t be in a relationship with everything that is going on.

Lee and I have been working it out,
I pointed out.

You might be fine with lying,
he snapped,
but Kia doesn’t deserve that.

My heart skipped a beat. What was he trying to say? Did he think I was
actually
lying to Lee if I wasn’t telling him anything about our transitioning or powers? He knew we couldn’t tell anyone about that.