VA 2 - Blood Jewel (38 page)

“Mr. Laraby, Madly’s not feeling
well, can we take her down the hall to the bathroom?”

“She doesn’t look very good, does
she?” Mr. Laraby asked, eyeing me suspiciously.  “No, why
don’t you take her to the nurse’s office?”

“Yes, sir,” Aidan replied, coming
around to throw my arm around his shoulder and slip his hand around
my waist.  With virtually no effort, he hauled me to my
feet.

“Jersey, grab her bag.”

I heard the rustling of Jersey
jumping to obey Aidan and then the patter of her feet as she
followed behind us.

As soon as we were clear of Mr.
Laraby’s room, Aidan steered me to the long line of army green
lockers on one side of the hall and propped me up against the cool
metal.

“What was that all about? 
What is it?”

At first when he asked, I wasn’t
sure how to answer, wasn’t really sure what had happened.  But
then, as the fog cleared from my mind, an image was left in its
wake.  It was the mental picture of someone I
recognized.

“It’s Lady Sheelah.”

As my vision came back into
ultra-clear focus, I saw Aidan’s pupils dilate and, for the first
time since I’d known him, the jokester disappeared into the royalty
that he was born to be.

“Then we need to get to
her.”

With that, he took my hand, pulled
me away from the lockers and practically dragged me down the
hall.  I’d forgotten all about Jersey until I heard her speak
up from somewhere behind us. 

“Um, hello? Is somebody gonna tell
me what the devil is going on?”

“Come on, Jersey,” Aidan called
over his shoulder.  “Keep up.”

“I’m trying, but not all of us are
giants,” she snipped.

When I turned to look back at her,
I couldn’t help but smile when I saw her short legs flying in her
efforts to reach us. 

“Just like not all of us are
shrimps,” I teased.

“A shellfish joke? 
Seriously?  Are you actually gonna go there?”

Jersey’s expression said she was
skeptical.  I smiled again. 

It helped to have her around to
lighten the mood.  It gave me a reason not to focus on the
sinking feeling that was pulling at my heart, a feeling that
assured me that what had happened in Mr. Laraby’s classroom did not
bode well.

The three of us made our way
quickly from Building C to the dorms that crouched in a tight
circle in the center of campus.  Veritas Academy was a private
school, so our handler, Lady Sheelah, stayed in our dorm acting as
our Resident Advisor, a very human-looking position.

As we arrived at her room, Aidan
took the lead and knocked on the door.  There was no answer,
so he knocked a second time.   When still there was no
sign of Lady Sheelah, he reached for the knob.  It was
unlocked, turning easily.

Pushing the door open a bit, Aidan
poked his head into the room and said, “Hello? 
Sheelah?”

When there was no response, my
breath began to come faster.  Something was desperately wrong;
I could feel it.

“Stay here,” Aidan ordered as he
swung the door wide and stepped inside.

He disappeared into the dark
interior of the small room and Jersey and I looked at each
other.  Then, as she so often did, Jersey said exactly what I
was thinking.

“As if!”

I took the first step into Lady
Sheelah’s room.  Jersey was right behind me.  I felt her
fingers fist in the tails of my shirt, tails I’d purposely left
hanging out over my cheesy blue plaid skirt. 

Leaving my shirt untucked was my
tribute to individuality among all the other uniform-clad
students.  “They” frowned upon it, but Jersey and I had
decided two months ago that they could make us wear a uniform at
Veritas Academy, but they could never make us all look the
same.  For Jersey, that meant wearing lots of costume jewelry
and fingernail polish in every color of the rainbow.

In the quiet of the room, I heard
nothing but the smack of Jersey’s lips as she chomped on her
gum. 

“Jersey, shh,” I whispered over my
shoulder.

“I can’t help it.  I’m
‘nervous chewing’,” she explained in a hushed voice.

I don’t know how it was possible
that I hadn’t yet become accustomed to her loud gum-chewing. 
She’d done it almost all our lives, ever since she’d bought a pack
of Hubba Bubba on our first trip to dry land.

Doing my best to tune it out, I
called softly to Aidan.

“Over here,” came
his response. 

The normal tones with which he
spoke eased my fretting mind.  In fact, I was just about to
relax when I rounded the corner and saw him standing over Lady
Sheelah.

From behind Aidan’s shoulder, I
could only see her head.  Her dark brown hair was spread out
around her, fanned out almost purposefully.  Her face was
turned to one side, her expression blank, her jaw slack.  When
I saw the splatters of silver on her pale cheek, I gasped. 
There was only one thing I knew of that looked like that.  It
would’ve been red inside her body, but outside it…

Numbly, I edged my way around
Aidan.  My stomach rebelled at the sight that lay before my
eyes.

At the foot of her twin bed, Lady
Sheelah lay prone on the floor, surrounded by a pool of liquid
silver.  It was mercury, the blood of the mermaid.

Connect with M. Leighton
at

mleightonbooks.blogspot

Other Books by M.
Leighton

Blood Like Poison Series

Fragile

Madly Series

Nine Lives Series

The Eclipse Series

The Fahllen Series

Wiccan Series

Please enjoy this excerpt from my
Young Adult Contemporary Novel

GOING
UNDER

1 Mad Skills

Jessie

It was two weeks until I officially
began classes at East Franklin High as the new guy, but today I was
getting a preview of my new teammates and competition on the
football field. From what I had heard and read about Coach Osborne,
he was serious about this team, and giving anything less than my
best wouldn’t earn a much needed position on first string. The spot
was necessary if I planned to get a football scholarship and get
the hell out of the place I currently hung my hat.

I drove to the football field. The
parking lot next to the field house didn’t look like it was filled
with vehicles belonging to high school kids – it looked more like
valet parking at The Peabody. My old jalopy definitely didn’t fit
in, so I took this as the first clue that I wouldn’t
either.

I joined the crowd of guys sitting
on the bleachers and the man standing before us announced, “I’m
Coach Osborne and this is my assistant, Coach Sheffield. Before I
can put you on the field, I need a copy of your
physical.”

We didn’t have to get physicals at
Collinsville, so what was up with that? A physical meant seeing a
doctor, which required money I didn’t have. I thought of the injury
to my shoulder, wondering what I would do if I couldn’t find a doc
to release me to play because of the extensive trauma. Physical
therapy had helped, but it wasn’t a hundred percent and I still had
a lot of pain, which I'd chosen to deal with, rather than control
with narcotics.

I watched the other players as they
lined up to turn in their physicals and thought about how some
things never changed for me. I had spent my entire life raising my
hand to tell someone I didn’t have the things I needed and here I
stood, 18 years old, still doing the same thing.

“Coach, I haven’t had a physical
yet. I’m a transfer student and I didn’t know I needed one. They
weren’t required at my old school.” I tried to make it sound more
like a lack of knowing rather than lack of money.

“I can’t let you participate in
practice until you are released and I have the paperwork on file.
It’s a new policy, but one other schools will be requiring soon.
What’s your name?”

“Jessie Boone.”

He lifted his clipboard and began
writing. “Which school did you play for?”

I sighed. It was only a matter of
time before my new classmates figured me out, but I had hoped it
would take longer than one day. The likelihood of standing a chance
with these brats plummeted to zilch when I announced I previously
attended Collinsville, because everyone knew only poor,
disadvantaged kids attended Collinsville High School.

Coach Osborne didn’t look up from
his clipboard or appear to acknowledge what my attendance at
Collinsville meant. “What position?”

“I was starting quarterback, sir,”
I arrogantly announced, then turned to look at the crowd of guys,
who'd erupted into laughter at that.

“Looks like you’ve got some
competition, Henderson,” one of the guys cackled.

The guy I assumed was Henderson
sized me up and I did the same to prove I wasn’t afraid of a little
competition.

Coach looked up at the guys but
said nothing, then returned his eyes to his clipboard and continued
taking notes. “You throw with your right or left arm,
Boone?”

“Both,” I answered.

“Okay, let me rephrase the
question. Which is your better throwing arm?”

I delighted in informing the coach,
“Both are pretty much equal because I’m ambidextrous. I can throw
about 60 yards from either arm, so I never throw across my
body.”

I heard murmurs among the crowd,
then, “He’s full of it.”

Coach’s interest in me was peaked
and he was curious to see if what I claimed was true.

“Only one way to find out.” He
escorted me onto the field and the crowd followed, waiting to see
proof of my rare ability. Coach Sheffield tossed a ball to me and
said, “Time to show us what you’ve got. Cooper, you can be his
receiver.”

A preppy guy in a polo shirt and
expensive jeans sprinted to the end zone and waited for my throw. I
walked out to the center of the field and stretched both of my
arms. My left shoulder felt a little tight and I prayed it didn’t
let me down because this was my big chance to prove my place on
this team was starting quarterback.

I signaled the guy named Cooper to
start running and I gave my best throw with my right arm, spiraling
the football a little under sixty yards. The pass was completed
perfectly when Cooper caught it in the end zone.

Coach Osborne nodded and said,
“Very nice. Now, show me what you can do with the other
arm.”

Cooper tossed the ball to me and I
rolled my other shoulder in preparation. I cued Cooper to start
running again and gave it my best shot. I watched the football
spiral toward Cooper and he easily completed the pass. I gave a
silent thanks to my recently traumatized shoulder for not failing
me in front of the coach and team.

“That was fine job, son. I’ve
heard of quarterbacks that could throw with both arms, but I’ve
never seen it for myself and I certainly never dreamed I’d have one
show up wanting to play for me. I think you just found a place on
this team, but I can’t let you practice until you’re cleared. Do
you think you can get a physical this week?”

“Yes, sir,” I lied.

“Okay, work on getting that as
quickly as possible so I can put you in. Until you’re cleared, I
want you observing the team to see how they work
together.”

I nodded and took a seat on the
bench while the others dressed out. As the players came onto the
field I heard Henderson say, “Better get used to sitting on the
bench because that’s where your game time will be
spent.”

I turned to see a malicious grin
and I couldn’t resist knocking him down a notch. “Am I confused or
are you not the quarterback that got his ass handed to him in the
state championship game last season?”

Coach walked onto the field between
us and his presence interrupted our debate, but I knew it wasn’t
over – it was only postponed.

Practice started and the team
functioned very differently than the one I had played for at
Collinsville. Although it was only the first practice, they
performed well together. As I watched their familiarity with one
another, I became a little nervous about finding my place among
them.

When the kicker took a water break,
he sat on the bench next to me. “I hear things are pretty bad at
Collinsville. How did you manage to not get shot?”

I wondered what made him so certain
I hadn’t been. “Just lucky I guess.”

He offered his hand and said, “I’m
Dane Wickham, by the way.”

I shook his hand firmly. “Jessie
Boone.”

“Yeah, I heard. You’ve got some
mad skills. How did you train yourself to throw with both arms so
good?” He turned the water bottle in his hand and gulped while he
waited for my answer.

The truth was that it was the only
genetic perk I got from my worthless parents, but I wasn’t going
there with this guy. “I didn’t train myself to do it. I’ve always
been able to use either of my hands to do anything.”