Bane Academy: To Run From Fear

Chapter 25

Becca

Dale wasn't hard to find. After a quick lap of the school, we find him lingering with a group of people in one of the brick hallways near the Hall. He seemed to be recounting a story, no doubt what happened in the maze, conducting them like an orchestra. He flicks a hand to the right and they all sway along. He raises both hands and they ahh in response.
"Dale!" Shae shouts, crackling anger in her voice. The kind of anger resonating from the heart, instead of the stomach. The slightly higher pitch gives it away.
The crowd spreads a little thinner as we make our through it, Shae ceasing Dale instantly and pinning his shoulders to the wall. The crowd starts up in a confused mixture of anger and surprise; they recoil as my dagger makes a sleek sound against its sheath. I glare from face to face, feeling Shae's elbow against my back. It was reassuring.
"What do you want?" Dale sputters irritably.
"What did you tell them about Skia?" Shae demands.
"The truth!" He retaliates. "There's a maniac of a tiger roaming the school!"
"You just gave an innocent animal a death sentence!" I yell before Shae can answer, never taking my eyes off the crowd. They're faces had moulded into expressions of fervent interest. I keep the silvery knife held up.
"Where is she?" Shae asks.
"How should I know?"
"WHERE IS SHE?!" Shae yells. I can hear the sobs in her voice. My heart breaks a little more.
"Swap with me," I mutter next to her ear. Recognising the fact that she's too distraught to deal with this, she takes the knife as I slip it into her hand and we make a smooth back-to-back rolling transition that leaves me with one hand on Dale's shoulder and Shae facing the growing crowd. Dale's dark brown eyes swim with fear, yet his face is all hard lines and defiance. After the last forty eight hours, I'd learnt fear can be a tool. I pull my face close to Dale's.
"Listen, buddy," I say quietly. "You really want to take us on? Remember who defeated a goddess in their first term. Remember who won the Battle of the Books in their second. Remember who just got you through a malfunctioned fearlandscape alive." Malice swells in my voice until it was bordering on insanity. His face is cracking open like a pane of glass. "We did. You want to take on trained Scholars, do you? Students of every craft? Go ahead then, I dare you." I leave the gap open, and that does it. The hard lines shatter, revealing Dale's soft features underneath.
"I'm-I'm sorry. I-I saw her scratching on Green's door on the way here. But that's all I saw, I swear."
"John?" Shae asks. Dale nods. I let him go, and within seconds, Shae and I are sprinting away, down the corridor towards John's office. We arrive, and start banging on it, hard.
"John!" We both yell.
After a few seconds the door sweeps open, and we both almost hit John in the face with our fists. His chocolaty hair seems disheveled, his strange eyes glittering slightly. He gives us a tired, lopsided grin before stepping aside to let us in. As soon as the door closes behind us, we both launch into explanation.
"It's Skia, she's gone-"
"Dale told the teachers-"
"Dangerous creature-"
"Such an idiot-"
"They're going to kill her-"
John laughs lightheartedly and raises a hand to hush us. A small spark of anger pinches my insides. Why is he laughing?
"Girls, please, that can be taken care of." Ever so casually, John sits at his desk and opens a beaten looking journal. He flicks until he opens to a clean page and picks up a sleek black pen; one of those fancy ones with metal tips. Anticipation rises in my chest. In impossibly black ink, he starts to swirl the pen across the page. As his hand travels across, I read his words. And all came to love the tiger of shadow. Almost instantly after he plants the full stop, a bell chimes over the PA system and a smooth, magically enhanced voice tumbles out of it.
"The creature being apprehended has been found to not be dangerous and all safety procedures are to be canceled. Further action will be discussed. Thank you."
My mouth hangs open as if on hinges. That's...
"...impossible," Shae mutters in disbelief. John flicks his notebook shut, deliberately flourishing the pages. Amongst the piles of loopy black swirls, five word seem to jump out at me. Shae. Becca. Fade. Dale. Fear.
"You two should rest, you look awful."
As he says these words, a wave of exhaustion rushes over me. I sway slightly, catching a glance of myself in the mirror. My eyes are red, with deep, black moons underneath. My skin is papery and pale, littered with crosshatched scratches.
"No, we're okay," I yawn, even as Shae is crawling onto the opened up lounge John had thrown blankets over. "Really, we're fine," my numb mind is still talking as I reach the edge of the bed and lay down. "It's nothing," I pull the blankets up as if under a spell. Words play over in my quickly slipping consciousness. "We're..." Shae. Becca. Fade. Dale. Fear. "Fine."

A/N I'm so incredibly sorry about the wait, but there, it's finally done and posted. There is one last Bane Academy book in the making, so thanks to anyone that's dealing with the delays xxx