Hunted

Fourteen: Suspicions

The air was heavy, saturated, making it hard to draw breath. The firmament itself was a deep blue now, but as the students had risen from their beds and made their way to the Food Hall for breakfast, the eastern sky had been stained with blood – an ominous sign. The air was dead, the ocean still, but the sky had bled, and that was all Iseult needed, to know that a storm was coming; the worst storm of the year so far.

She walked beside Ian, whose mood had picked up once she had convinced him that Charlotte was actually alive. "Are you sure you want me to go with you?" he asked, for the thousandth time that morning, as they shouldered passed the other students, filing from the Food Hall. Breakfast had been a bleak entertainment of food for once, as if the forgotten had finally decided they weren't bothered to feed the students properly. Iseult pursed her lips, contemplating his question again and then nodded.

"Yes – in any other setting your presence would be... a little less helpful," she smiled, watching everybody moving about her, marking them in her mind as friends or enemies to her cause. "But here, you may actually be of some benefit. She likes you, plus I think I may need your alteration".

"So there it is – I knew it! Using me for my alteration! I thought you were better than that Deluca," he teased, acting dramatic.

"Where on earth did you get that idea? I have never tried to conceal the fact that I only keep you around for that one reason," Iseult replied, shaking her head and grinning widely.

Iseult knew that she tended to frown and admonish him, and that she was unable to laugh as freely at his stunts as Charlotte had been, but that was only because she could see the position he was putting himself in. She could see that Ian was close to the point of no return. Elmhirst had a nice place carved out for Ian among the forgotten. But with his level of disobedience, Elmhirst would not merely discard him, he would have him treated like the forgotten used in the detention halls, the one with the phantom fire. He would be caged like an animal until he was completely broken, broken to Elmhirst's will. She couldn't allow that. She would just have to break Elmhirst's will first.

"You know this would be so much easier if she was still here," Iseult sighed, her voice dropping to a whisper as they passed into the Old School.

Ian chewed the inside of his cheek mulling over her words. "She wasn't exactly helpful when she was here. I mean how many times did we tell her that the students were growing restless. Her position got in the way. It was like she wasn't one of us anymore," he said tactfully. 

"Yet this whole thing revolved around her, and in a way it still does. I could kill Alexander for what he has done," Iseult growled. "We would already be under way if he hadn't been such an idiot. I mean, we would never have allowed anything to happen to her, but now Elmhirst is on high alert – they are all on high alert".

"And Porter?" Ian asked, raising an eyebrow, and grinning dangerously.

Iseult smiled widely. "We'll just have to find out".

They passed from the Old School into the New School's bunker like structure, following the stairwell down to the floor where they hoped to find Porter in her office.

"Deluca, O'Connell?" They paused as James appeared behind them, looking serious.

"James," Iseult nodded. He was trying to work with them, though he still seemed hesitant. He was always hard to read, hard to know. James had become somewhat the pariah since the rest of their year had been condemned to detention in lieu of him. It had made little difference to his own friends or to Iseult and Ian, but some of the others actively sought to make his life hell for what he had caused. Lucio Anderson, in particular seemed hell bent on tormenting him, but James was strong, not as strong as he had been before this whole mess had begun, but he was still strong.