(3) Black Lion Academy

218 9 0
                                    

Chapter 3

“Tell us where to find her!” They'd been screaming and shouting about some girl who was the last of the Negrescu's. Seriously... “I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about man. For crying out loud, just get yourself a life and stop pestering me about some chick I don't know.” I retorted, letting out a frustrated sigh.

“It has been prophesied that The last true Negrescu will be returning to the Negrescu sanctuary this year. Now, I want you to tell me about any new arrivals.”

“Listen buddy, I'm a new arrival around here and have absolutely no idea who the Negrescu's are. The only time I have ever seen or heard of the surname was on a painting I passed earlier today on the way to meet the principal. You have obviously got the wrong girl here. So, I suggest you let me go and run back to your mommy instead of wasting your time rashing me. I've had enough rubbish from the people in this place. Seriously, it said this girl would be coming back this year, that doesn't specifically refer to today. Got it?” His eyes narrowed before his facial features relaxed and he turned to discuss something with his cronies.

A rustle behind me alerted me to someone's presence in the bushes at my back. I looked to where the bunch of men were huddling in the shade, involved in what was obviously a heated discussion. “Arabella.” Someone whispered my name from directly behind me. I moved my head back enough that I was now staring into a boy's face. The boy's face. He gave me a small smile before looking further on to my body and frowning. “Hold on, this will just take a minute.” His obviously well-toned body moved lithely as he made his way around the rock I had been tied to. The boy - or should I say man? - pulled out a knife and started cutting the rope that was restraining my arms.

Blood rushed back into my hands and I rubbed them together, glad to be free. “Thanks.” I gave the guy a weak smile and moved to sit up. He grabbed onto me and helped me move into a sitting position. “No problem. By the way, my name's Nathan.” He introduced himself and I was about to take his out-stretched hand when I noticed what looked like a tree branch swinging towards his head.

“Watch out!” I pushed him aside and we rolled across the grassy ground. The log hit the rock with a loud CRASH and shattered against the same place I had been lying a few seconds ago. It seems the group had finally noticed their captive was making a getaway. The leader, the one who had swung the log, was coming after me and Nathan again. The two of us started to scramble away when a figure jumped out in front of us. She, for it was a girl, stuck out her tongue and pulled a face at the flabbergasted brute. The dumb-bum stood there dumbfounded.

The girl giggled and took off to the right, swerving past the group and disappearing into the bushes. An then there was silence; followed by an angry uproar. The groupies started splitting up and making their way to the tree edges while the leader refocussed his attention on me and Nathan. Nathan got up and stood protectively over me, growling at the tall man who was abruptly turning into some sort of beast. Goodness kill me now! What on Earth was going on? How on Earth was that guy just changing into some sort of animal? My brain was swamped with a million questions.

Loud shouts came from all around me and I spun around to see a bunch of boys bursting into the small clearing. The group who had kidnapped me met them head-on and a fight broke out. Broken bones, the cracks deafening in the forest's silence; blood, pouring from various openings and cuts; Bodies, clashing with a furious rage. I looked on in horror. There was no longer any people fighting, but animals... I think. The leader had left us alone so he could go help his cronies fight the newcomers. I was suddenly lifted up by strong hands on my arms and pulled into a protective circle of masculine arms.

Nathan started pulling me back, moving us towards the edge of the clearing. “Can you walk?” He asked while turning me around to face him. “Yeah. Though we might move faster if I ran don't you think?” I replied with a small smile. I had to be grateful that I was fortunate enough to not have been hurt that bad; these dumb-bums had absolutely no idea how to torture information out of someone, thank goodness for that.

Nathan and I stepped out of the clearing and started jogging slowly to who knows where. “Where are we going?” I asked eventually after we had been going for a good half an hour. My knee was starting to play-up and I had a headache from the sun that had been burning me to a crisp while I'd been lying on the rock.

“Back to BLA of course.” Nathan answered quite matter-of-factly. Something about it made my skin crawl and got on my nerves. In my own twisted way, I had actually started to like the weird decorating style and missed listening to the stupid preppys make pathetic attempts at dissing me. That may be because whatever was going on there was a whole lot better than what I'd had to endure out here. Then again, in the back of my mind there was something telling me that staying there could be a potential personal danger. Usually I would listen to myself and go with my instincts; unfortunately, that just wasn't happening today. Today my mind was more focussed on the fact that I had just seen some spectacular human disfigurement. I'm not sure if that was the right term.. but whatever.

“How long do you think it will take for us to get there?” I asked. Nathan turned to me with a shocked expression on his face. I guess I wasn't the only one surprised at my eagerness to return to that excuse for a school. Considering the events that transpired earlier in the day and the fact that I was currently in this situation because I had run away from “BLA” it was a real wonder, even I was surprised.

“I'd say about four hours. It'll be getting dark soon so we might have to stop and rest for the night and carry on in the morning.”

“Okay.” He lifted an eyebrow.

“No complaining?”

“Nope.” I half smiled and turned my head so I could listen carefully and pick up all the sounds of the forest that we were passing through.

“That's a first.” Nathan was smiling too.

“I'm as unique as it comes.”

“Sure are! So I was thinking we could camp out at the river? A little further upstream there's a small cabin we can bunk in for the night. The school uses it for the biology students who come down to the river to take samples for testing and catch some bugs for lab experiments. It's actually pretty decent.”

“Cool. No problem.”

“Good, good.” After that we just walked on in silence. It was so nice to just be able to walk and enjoy the wonderful sounds of nature that surrounded us. The best part was, it was just too easy to hang out with Nathan. We walked in companionable silence the whole way back to the river. After drinking some water and making an attempt at cleaning myself up a bit we started to move up along the bank. This time around we started talking. Pointing out pretty little birds, butterflies and bugs that we came across.

I nearly jumped out of my skin when we came across a large green snake; unfortunately I jumped straight into Nathan's arms instead. He just laughed. There's something amusing about being laughed at for being stupid so I joined him and let out a hearty laugh. We started dissing each other and making funny comments; that continued until we reached the rather large cabin.

Nathan stepped up onto the porch and I followed behind him tentatively. He fiddled with the door handle a bit before swing the door open wide and moving so I could step in before him. As I crossed the thresh-hold I was surrounded by darkness, the only light coming from the open door. Nathan brushed by me as he moved to flick a switch and turn the lights on.

“Wow!” The room was beautiful!

Black Lion AcademyWhere stories live. Discover now