Bad To The Bone

Chapter 2

Two days later

I lost the argument, so now I'm sitting in the back of the car on my way to my new school. What fun! It’s bad enough going to private school let alone a school specifically for the mentally deranged.  I might be a bit of a handful sometimes but I’m not crazy! I have packed every piece of clothing my parents despise and bought more besides with the money from my savings account.

I sulked for the whole drive up there ACDC blaring from my headphones. I refused to be excited or mesmerised by the landscape or the huge fortified castle that is to be my new school surrounded by mountains and huge pine trees in the distance. And why the hell does that stupid driver keep looking at me in the mirror? I’m not a freak show! I’ll give him something to look at in a minute.

We pulled up and I stared open mouthed at what is to be my new school. They weren’t kidding when they said in their leaflet that it was a converted castle with spacious grounds. This is like something straight out of braveheart! Through a set of wrought iron gates an 18th century castle was visible. And I don’t mean a little pathetic excuse for a castle I mean a real big ass castle! It was surrounded by a brick wall double my height and a long gravel path led to the doors. An actual portcullis positioned above them.

I pulled my two huge suitcases from the boot ignoring my audience. My parents and someone from the school watched in silence. I marched straight past them all with my head held high and up the steps and through the door to the entrance. Not even giving my parents as much as a glance.

The woman who had been standing with my parents caught up with me quickly. She’s tall and pale with jet black hair and a strange graceful walk. I'm slightly impressed but no amount of fancy castle is going to put me in a better mood, no way in hell is a fancy castle just going to make everything ok. The woman smiled pleasantly and I kept my favourite fuck off expression plastered across my face. She led the way inside unfazed.  Like I couldn’t have worked that out myself.

Holy shit! This place is like Hogwarts but more gothic. This is the kind of thing you see in movies! A huge staircase with red carpet and marble banisters spread out before me forking off in different directions. Corridors to my left and right twisting round dark corners the walls made of ancient stone and the floor pure marble. Candles flickering in brackets at intervals on the walls. “This way”, she said quietly her voice like a ribbon of music dancing through my mind. I followed her to my left trying hard not to look impressed. As she swept by candles flickered distorting shapes on the wall. I tried to pay attention to where she was leading me but after five minutes of walking through the twisting and turning corridors I lost track. No windows broke the endless expanse of stone walls and gloom, statues of strange animals stood in alcoves and endless wooden doors with brass door knobs stood out from the stone. She stopped in front of one completely identical to all the others, how she knows which room is what I have no idea. I followed her inside; cool air hit my face as I entered. The temperature inside even colder than in the corridors. She sat behind her desk leaving me to stand.

“I’m Daniella a teacher here at the academy and you must be Nakita Johnson” she said in her musical voice. I nodded stubbornly. “Well this is your new school for the next few years and I'm sure you have lots of questions so just ask away and I will try to explain as best I can” she said still smiling at me. Ok this is weird and she is weird. What’s with all the nicey niceness?

“What do you have to do to get kicked out?” I asked, after all that’s all I need to know.

“Umm generally we don’t expel students but I suppose if you killed another student that would mean expulsion” she said slightly confused.

“Hmm bit drastic but ok, I can do that if I have to” I said unabashed.

“I'm sure you will change your mind once you get settled in. This is an academy for special teenagers, gifted teenagers. You can be amongst your own kind here, people you can relate to” she said her eyes searching my expression. I kept myself in lockdown giving nothing away. What does she mean by gifted? If she means my incourageable temper then yeah I'm gifted but apart from that there is nothing. She is blatantly mistaken, unless of course she means special as in retarded. I knew I was right, that bitch has sent me to a nut house!

“Nakita you are different from average humans there is more to you, a different side to you. Your special and I don’t mean as in mental problems special, everyone here is special in their own way. Your part of a very small select group of people, you have powers” she said her eyes boring into me.

Is this woman for real? She is blatantly mad on like a hundred different levels. “There is no nice way to say this so I'm going to be blunt with you, your part of the supernatural community. We aren’t just fiction we are real and you are one of us” she said calmly. What the fuck is wrong with her? This has got to be someone’s bad idea of a joke, ha she is that crazy she believes her own craziness. She probably isn’t even a teacher; she must be one of the nut cases that escaped from their cage that go here. Or it’s the practical joke they play on the new kid, well whatever it is I ain't taking this kind of shit. No one takes the piss out of me; everyone at my old school learnt that the hard way. “I'm not stupid, jokes up. Just because I'm knew it don’t mean I'm thick!” I said giving her a cold hard stare. She just stared right back. The dark depths of her eyes going cold and hard. What’s with this woman? She obviously forgot to take her meds this morning.

“I'm not joking I'm deadly serious and I suggest you treat me with a little more respect” she said her eyes flashing dangerously. Ha respect is just a six letter word to me with absolutely no meaning. Something warned me not to push her though, she obviously has big problems, and she just screams physco. It seeps from her saturating the air between us, danger. I realised later that I should have just backed down but that’s not in my nature, I don’t lose.

I glared right back refusing to be unnerved by her. I have met plenty of crazy playground bullies in my time and they all came away having learnt one real crucial lesson, I'm bigger, scarier and don’t take shit off no one.

“Learn your place little girl because you won’t like the consequences. Your part of this world now so learn the rules” she said flashing an evil grin.

“Rules were made to be broken” I laughed at her showing exactly how unfazed I am. She widened her smile exposing two sharp white canines, fangs. Shit fuck is she serious? They sure as hell don’t look like crappy plastic ones from a joke shop. I kept myself perfectly still giving nothing away. On the outside there was no reaction what so ever, inside I was mess clutching at straws for a reasonable excuse and coming up with nothing. She can’t be serious people like her don’t exist, they can’t. They are just in films and books, right? And who in their right mind would let them be in charge of a school.  They could suck everyone dry and no one would know what had happened. Wait, of course they are allowed to teach here, they are teaching their own kind. They have a nest of parasites teaching them how to suck blood and kill people, oh that is just wrong. So why the hell am I here?