The Spirit Academy

Chapter 20 - The Answers

Dahlia

It had been two weeks since Dahlia had arrived here. Fourteen hours back in her world. They would have noticed by now. Maybe told the police. Maybe she was a missing person. Like her Grandma.

Dahlia had arrived at the same castle she was kidnapped, and it sent a chill through her bones.

But Lana had just impatiently tugged at her hand until she got over it. But Lana could not tug at her hand to make her get over it when she saw the two girls.

Same ones who had kidnapped her... was it really just a week ago? It felt like a lifetime ago.

But the pale girl, was now looking at her with lifeless eyes, and the dark-haired girl was the opposite, whose eyes were kind and warm. She wasn't sure which was worse.

"Lana showed me," Dahlia began, looking over to Rina, Guthrie's roommate. "The memories, I, do you know why? Why am I here?"

Marina was looking at her. "We're both former students. A year above you. Twins actually."

"Fraternal?" Lana cracked looking from both Marina to Roxy.

Marina just looked at her blankly. But Roxy spoke first, "We were fraternal. But actually looked alike."

Dahlia's eyes widened. She had just assumed that Roxy had always had pale skin and white hair.

"We were both cursed they called it. Not the academy of course. The academy called it blessed. Once we graduated, they told us we were going to save the spirit world. They experimented on us, somehow, they wanted to extract our powers, and inject it into the world. They experimented on both of us. But something went wrong with me. Almost died too. That day, a group of our friends escaped with the help of your Grandma."

Dahlia's heart leaped. Her Grandma was alive. She was here. She couldn't talk.

"Is that what happened, because of the experiments?" Lana asked.

"No, no," She chuckled darkly, "I was dying. Marina couldn't save me, so she took me to the black market. There was a woman who gave me a drug,"

"Medicine." Marina interrupted.

She shook her head, "No Marie, It was a drug. Morile. The old town is full of Morile addicts. When I took the Morile the effects were instant. Stopped my internal bleeding, revitalised my organs, strengthened my bones. But it had side effects. It made my face pale and my hair almost white. Saved my life but ruined it as well. It gave me back my strength, but I can't live without it now. Taking it is killing me slowly, not taking it will kill me instantly."

Dahlia looked around but it was obvious both Rina and Guthrie were hearing this for the first time.

"They wanted to take your powers? Why?" Guthrie asked.

"I don't know," Roxy admitted, "But the world is dying for some reason. And there is a stupid prophecy. 'Five girls, each whose blood disappears when it touches pure gold, and each the most powerful of their kind. They will restore the world to what it once was.' That's why they do it, each girl is tested from everywhere, that's why the academy is filled with only girls. But we don't know much else. Like Marie said, we're past students. They had our memories wiped too. You're Grandma is the only reason we're alive. She gave us this ball and hid us in this castle. Haven't left it ever since, just been travelling from here to the academy. We don't know what the world is like, all we know is from our memories. A dry barren village,"

"You know my Grandma? She's alive?" Dahlia asked, filled with hope.

But Roxy shook her head. "Haven't heard from her for a while, but she's been in this world for a long time, saving a lot of students. She managed to save eight of us last year. But now, we don't know what to do. She didn't leave anything behind... just... just gave me this ring."

Dahlia stifled a gasp. The ring Roxy wore was her Grandma's. Why did her Grandma wear the same ring as a GloBal. 

Lana spoke up, "I saw Nawra wearing the same ring."

Silence descended through the room.

"I don't know..." Roxy whispered, "I just don't know."

Marie continued, "Well, it's time you met the others, see, me and Roxy are both water spirits, we then have one earth spirit, two fire, two life and one air. There's eight of us in total."

"You work as a nurse? Surely they remember you?" Lana spoke up, "Why weren't you caught?"

Marina shook her head, "Let's just say I'm not the official nurse. I came in and out, taking the position of Nawra when she wasn't there. Nobody else knew I was there. Here," she said, walking up to the door. "These are the rest of us."

There were four spirits standing there, all dressed in black. They were all around their age.

One with dark-brown plaited hair stepped forward and said, "I'm Rekka, an earth."

One of the blonde girl twins said. "I'm Aithne and this is my twin, Adara, we're both fire."

The girl with straight black hair and ivory skin nodded and muttered, "Raven. Life."

The girl next to her had soft brown hair in a pixie cut. "Fawn. I'm also life."

The last girl stepped forward and Lana gasped at the sight of her.

"Makani."

Guthrie

Guthrie was standing outside the nurse's office. Lynn stood next to her. Apparently, Mishal had lost control and burned Kenna. But fire spirits don't get burned. It didn't make sense.

"She's going to be fine, yeah?" Lynn whispered next to her.

That could mean so many things. Was she hurt? Was she in trouble? Was she in trouble? They still hadn't found out why they had taken them from their homes but, losing control, showing that much power couldn't be good could it?

Then she remembered how Mishal had almost lit the whole hall on fire, how Guthrie had made the entire stables fly away, how Lynn had frozen the lake. She didn't know what it meant. All that she knew was that she couldn't let anyone find out. She had to protect her friends.

Suddenly, Guthrie heard screams coming from the infirmary which she recognised immediately. Mishal.

Without thinking Guthrie burst through the door and saw Mishal being held by two black spirits. "Mishal!" Guthrie yelled. "Mishal!"

Nawra saw her and said in a cold voice, "Guthrie, go back to your room immediately."

Guthrie ignored her and jumped on to one of the spirits that was holding her, tackling her to the ground.

"Well Guthrie, have to admit I always had my hopes for you." Nawra's voice called out from behind her. Then Guthrie felt a piercing pain in her arm.

And the world went black.