SILVERLIGHT- Book One of the FLY BY NIGHT Trilogy

Chapter 3

Clio shifted her legs in a futile attempt to relieve the more than nagging pain that resonated from her spine. It had grown steadily worse since the morning's dodgeball game. She rolled onto her side, but this too offered little relief. She propped her book up on her pillow and tried to go back to reading, to and forget about the pain in her stupid back. It's was least the fifth time she'd read this sentence. Ugh! The fact that she hated Lord of the Flies already isn't really helping her focus. From the moment her English teacher had told the class about the author's philosophy, she had known she was going to hate the book with a passion. "Man is savage at heart," Mrs Shepherd's words echoed in her head. "Always reverting back to an evil and primiive nature". She turned the page she had finally finished and then, frowning, turned it back. Page forty-two, to fifty-eight, and then back again. She rolled her eyes and then tossed the book carelessly to the floor. Even this movement caused her to wince in pain. God damn it, I'm going to have to tell Dad. She thought, before pushing the covers off grumpily. She was already wondering how the hell she was going to talk to him without setting off a major overreaction. She shuffled into the living room, hunched over in pain like a tired old lady.

"Dad?" She asked. He was dozing in front of the television, and didn't respond. "Dad?"

"Hmmmm?" Clio could tell he was only half listening. Hopefully this would prevent some of the fuss.

"I think I might have hurt my back." She said. His brown eyes snapped open instantly.

"How?" He asked, sitting up.

"I might've pulled a muscle playing dodgeball." She confessed. A muscle twitched in his jaw, and he stood. He puts his hands on Clio's shoulders and turned her around, before lifting up the back of her pajama shirt. He spat a profanity under his breath. Clio blinked. She didn't think she'd ever heard him swear before. He strung together a few more curses.

"What is it?" She asked. He doesn't respond. "What?" She repearted, more forcefully this time, paintfully attempting to twist around and look at her back.

"Wait here." He said shakily, before stalking off. Soon the sound of the clinking and clanking of of jars and saucepans in the kitchen told her that he was searching for something. She stood up, planning to go and check her back in her bedroom mirror, but then heard something smash- with too much force for it to be accidental, and decided against it. What in the world could make him so mad? He walkd through the room at a furious pace, face red and fists white and clenched with rage. And then returned with a small jar.

"This will help." He said. Clio took the jar from him, looking at it curiously. It was filled with small dried leaves, like something she would see on their spice rack. "You need to swallow them quickly." She unscrewed the lid, and then tipped a small portion onto the palm of her hand. She gagged at the smell. It was incredibly strong, and extremely repulsive. Metallic and rotten at the same time. Clio held them at arms length, crinkling up her nose.

"Quickly." Dad reminds me. Somehow, she feelt like consuming those leaves would be wrong. The smell was sharp. Like poison. Of course, she knew that medicine is rarely plesant, and her Dad wouldn't tell her to do something that would be bad for her. He looked so frantic that his irises were surrounded by white. She pinched her nose, and threw it all back at once. They didn't taste like much- unexpected after the smell, but were dry. She choked them down, before Jason immediately poured more into her hand. As she coughed on the second lot, he hurried to the kitchen to get a glass of water.

As soon as he was gone, Clio tiptoe-ran back through the hallway and into her room. She lifted up the back of her shirt, looking over her shoulder into the full length mirror, ignoring the pain. She gasped. In the centre of her back, running parallel to her spine there were two huge dark blackish blue bruises. From this stemed a rainbow of discolouration that butterflied across her back, ending just below her shoulder blades at the top and fading just above her waistband at the bottom. It was almost symmetrical, and almost beautiful in a twisted type of way. She swallowd and forced herself to look away sharply, panicking. The world swooshed, and her stomach dropped like she was on a scary ride at a theme park. Like she was falling off the roof all over again. She staggered a few steps toward the door, but her head was churning, and everything swirled together, rainbow ice cream in a mixmaster.

"Clio?" Jason shouted from the living room. He rushed in a second later.

"I don't feel so good." She told him, her words smearing together like a childish fingerpainting. She saw the colour drain from his face as if looking at him down a long tunnel.

"Clio." He repeated. She tried to take a step toward him, but her feet forget how to work, and she flopped onto the floor. She heard a thud and saw it like pinwheeling green fireworks at the edge of her vision, but felt no pain. The floorboards were nice and cool on her cheek and she could feel the sheen of sweat that covered her body, but neither managed to dull the sickening heat which filled her. She heard herself moan as she was rolled over.

"Clio?" He shook her shoulders.

"Daa.." Her mouth refused to finish the word. For a second she battled against her eyelids, willing them to stay open, but it was like someone had threaded lead weights onto the ends of each of her eyelashes. Jason rushed back in, speaking. A phone call?

"They found us. They tricked me, and she hasn't had any for weeks. Bruises all over her back. I gave her some of the new batch... I don't know. A tablespoon? Two? I'll check." His footsteps faded.

Cliod strugled to untangle thoughts, and fight the blackness, but her brain felt as though it was filled with honey. Sticky. Clumsy. The blackness won. Everything faded to nothing.