Lady Vampire Knight (Vampire Knight Fanfiction)

Chapter 85: Fortune seeking again

5 o'clock. That was when no student was allowed outside their dorm. Regular lessons started in a few days, but normal rules still applied. I guess the headmaster was pretty keen on protecting and hiding the secret of the Night Class.

So I would have to sneak out of the academy. I don't know if the rule really applied to Night Class students, seeing as we could take care of ourselves, but I wasn't taking chances. Hell, I was almost desperate to see Ichiru. I had to make sure he was okay.

Luckily Maria still had not returned to the dorm, so I guess she was still staying in the main building. That was good. If Maria caught me sneaking out, it would no doubt arise questions, and if I told her where I was going, she would insist on going with me. Either way, it would mess up my plans.

Night Class students were still in the dorm, but they were clustered in their small groups. In the front room. Where my escape route lay. I as certain that if I left through the front door, someone would stop me. Guess it was the window.

Pushing open the window, I peered out to the ground that lay two storeys below. I could try jumping, but- a mental picture of me falling to my death popped up. Looking to the left of my window, I spotted a drain pipe running all the way down to the ground. Voila.

Gingerly climbing onto the windowsill, I swung my legs over the edge of the windowsill. Keeping a firm grip on the side of the window, I reached over to the drain pipe, feeling its metallic smoothness as I grasped it. Time for the scary part.

Taking a deep breath, I slid towards my left, turning over slightly, so I now faced the outside wall. My hands shook as I slid off the windowsill, now beginning to dangle by the windowsill and drain pipe.

"She's not here." The voice came from my room, right above me. Kaien? What was he doing here?

"Maybe she's somewhere else," the gruff voice of his companion replied. I tensed. Yagari as well. My palms were clammy and I felt that any second now, I would lose my grip and fall.

"But where?" This time, Kaien's voice was directly above me. My whole body froze, as I slowly looked up.

Kaien leaned out of my open window, staring at the academy outside completely unaware of me dangling from the windowsill right below. Yagari snorted behind him.

"I'm telling you, she's gone. I found a note in the bushes, telling her to go to an address. No doubt Ichiru sent it." The note! I must have left it there after memorising the address.

I was certain I hadn't made a sound, but the shock of Yagari finding the note must have made me make some kind of noise, alerting Kaien somehow.

Immediately his face was tilted downwards, and the two of us were frozen in time.

He saw me. He saw me. He saw me. The three word phrase chased itself around my head while I registered the panicked thought. Instead of saying something though, Kaien's lips curved into a small smile. Looking back up, he turned to the sky.

"Maybe she is gone," he replied to Yagari. "But I trust that she'll do the right thing." Relief flooded through me so quickly I almost released my grip on the windowsill and drain pipe. Which would have completely forsaken Kaien's faith in me.

"Let's just go already," Yagari sighed. "I hope Shina doesn't find out."

"You care about her a lot," Kaien commented, walking away from the windowsill.

"I owe her my life," Yagari replied simply as the two of them left the room.

I breathed a sigh of relief as I heard the door click shut behind them. My arms ached from hanging there for so long. In my terror of being caught, I had completely ignored the complaints my arms gave. Why did the headmaster even let me leave anyway?

It didn't matter now. All that mattered was getting to the ground safely. And in one piece.

Gritting my teeth, I blocked out the pain in my arms and hauled myself to the right, so I was no positioned halfway on top of the drain pipe. Luckily for me, there was a particularly big crack in the wall, running a jagged trail downwards for about a metre.

Hooking my index finger into the crack, I flattened my hand against the wall, trying to somehow find a grip. Most of it relied on the drainpipe though.

Slowly letting myself slide down, I let out some of the tension bunched up in my muscles. I wasn't going to fall. The drain pipe was virtually my lifeline.

Movement to my left caught my attention. Leaning over slightly, I saw a window right next to me. Inside, there was a sight I recognised often. The dimly lit office of Kaname.

"You have some nerve revealing yourself so quickly." Kaname had his back to me, and his words were slightly muffled. I barely noticed, all my attention was fixed on the person he confronted.

Senri stood there loosely, a malevolent smile on his face. His eyes were still like I saw earlier. One was ice blue, but the other was still a dark cherry-brown colour.

"You know what I'm here for." It wasn't Senri talking. It was a monster consuming his body. "Hand over Yuki and I won't hurt you. Giving me that Level D will also help your case." Was he talking about me?

"I'll give you neither," Kaname replied firmly, raising his hand. Spikes of rock and wood flew out of the ground, all of them pointed at Senri. "I don't care if I hurt your son, as long as I destroy you." I watched stunned, as the jagged spikes shot through the air towards Senri.

Just as they were about to collide, something knocked them aside, smoke billowing from the impact. As the smoke cleared, Takuma stood in between Senri and Kaname, his arms held out to the sides.

"I won't let you harm Senri," he announced, his usual glitter of happiness gone. "He may be possessed by Rido, but he is still one of my closest friends." I wanted to keep watching, but a warning bell in my head rang, reminding me that I had to go and see Ichiru.

Sliding down a couple more metres, I finally pushed off the building, falling a metre or so, before landing with a soft thump on the cobbled stones of the courtyard.

~~~

141 Bural street, 141 Bural street, I repeated to myself as I ran through town. Some shoppers still wandered around the streets, walking into shops or cafés. None of them took notice of a sixteen year old girl running around, looking as though she was running an errand.

133, 135, 137, I counted as I jogged past shops. 139, 141. I slowed to a stop in front of a shop. Seeing it was like having déjà vu. I'd been here before.

Perfumes fragrances drifted around me as I pushed open the shop door. Dream catchers and semi-precious stones lay in an array on some tables, while other mystical and mysterious objects lined the shelves. A poster on the wall depicted a young, dark-haired woman with long, black hair and a billowing cloak. I didn't need to read the words to know what it said.

Hana Akimoto to tell your fortune. Come see her now, to know your path of fate.

"We're closing soon," a sweet-faced shop assistant looked up from where she sorted several bottles on the shelves. "So could you please be quick in your selections?"

"It's okay, Mila," a new voice reassured the petite girl. "I invited her personally."

"Ms?" Mila looked up in surprise. "I didn't know, well, go ahead." She turned back to sorting the small bottles.

"This way, Saki," the cloaked woman beckoned to me.

"You know my name?" I stared at her in shock. Her dark eyes turned to me. With her hood off, long, thick coils of black hair trickled over her shoulders, almost falling to her elbows. She looked younger and not so...intimidating, unlike when I first met her.

"Of course I do," she replied. "He told me about you." Oh yeah.

"Now hurry up and come," she turned to the corridor again. "I'm in a bit of a rush."

You, in a rush?

Without question, I followed the mysterious woman down an all-too-familiar corridor.