The Spirit Academy

Chapter 13 - The Ring

Dahlia

Dahlia groaned. Her hair was singed at the edges, she was covered in soot, and she was being dragged off to a little humid room. Sweat dripped down the back of her neck and she shifted uncomfortably in her chair. Looking to Terre and Betha she realised they were all feeling the same. Flint seemed oblivious, as he sifted through a pile of papers. After what felt like a lifetime, he stopped, drank a sip from his cup, and then looked to them.

"I'm Flint."

Dahlia sighed, and leaned back in her chair. F

lint eyed her, but said nothing. "Debriefing is a normal procedure, and though this isn't an interrogation, deceiving or purposely withholding information can result in consequences. You are free to leave if you feel uncomfortable, and no information will be used against you. We want to help." He said his eyes flicking over all of them before landing on Betha, "And we want to understand. Betha we'll start with you, talk us through what happened."

Betha looked at him as if she couldn't decide if he was serious or not, her nose was scrunched up and her eyebrows were raised. 

"We got kidnapped," She said, enunciating each word slowly as if speaking to a child.

Flint looked as if he hadn't expected anything better, he leaned forward, eyes gleaming. "By whom?"

Betha didn't move, "Isn't that your job? To find out?"

Flint's jaw clenched, but that was the only outward sign of anger he showed.

"How?" He said, pronouncing it slowly, like Betha had before.

Betha groaned, but talked anyway. "We were walking through the forest. I heard barking, and woke up. I saw Dahlia being dragged off by someone, and I tried to help, but someone got to me first. It was moonsbane, obviously, so I held my breath and pretended to be unconscious. They took us in a carriage, we arrived at this place, it was a sort of castle, though nothing grand. Then, there was two girls."

"Do you remember any of them?" Flint said looking concerned, "Did you recognise any of them?"

Betha shook her head. 

Dahlia continued, "One was pale and tall, and had a scar, across the left side of her face. Like very pale, and white hair. The other girl was kind of the opposite, dark hair, tanned skin, almond eyes and short."

Flint nodded slowly. "What happened next? Terre?"

"Well... I was there in the dungeon, then Dahlia and Betha were thrown in. I don't quite remember much. I think I had blacked out or something. Anyway after that Betha made a vine, and Dahlia climbed it, before pulling everyone up-"

Flint was scribbling on a pad of paper but stopped when Betha interrupted Terre. "And Terre tried to kill me, she held a knife to my neck and-"

"Betha! You did the exact same to me!" Dahlia hissed.

Betha flushed and looked away, she opened her mouth to speak, mumbled a bit of nonsense, and then closed it again and looked to the ground.

Flint cleared his throat, and all three of them looked up at him.

Neither of them spoke after that and Dahlia was glad. Though, Dahlia had been looked at by the emergency nurse, the one with the search party, when they had reached, she had seen the smoke and run towards the burning stables. No-one else knew she had almost drowned, and she wanted to keep it that way. She didn't know why, it was just a bad feeling she had. 

Flint glanced at each of them, narrowed his eyes, but finally he leaned back, sighed and said, "You are free to go."

He waved his hand in an impatient motion to shoo them away and Dahlia noticed something glint on his finger. It was a ring. Dahlia's head swam. The same ring her kidnapper wore.