Sous awoke in the middle of the night, her ears ringing from a piercing scream she just heard. It was an agonizing scream, one she was all too familiar with. A scream that had her think back to times she would rather forget.
The dorm room was dark, all the other girls were asleep. She looked from bed to bed, not understanding how none of the other girls heard that.
She threw the covers from over her bed, grabbed her wand, and stepped out into the hallway. Sous wasn't the only wolf to have heard the screams, a few other wolves were in the hallway as well. She exchanged looks with them, them getting closer to one another unsure.
"What was that?" One of them asked, swear beads forming at their brow.
"It was obviously a scream." Another wolf said.
"What are y'all doing up?" The wolves turned to see a few vampires with their school books walking to them. Sous forgot, at night the vampires who didn't want to attend school during the day went to school at night.
"We heard a scream." Sous said.
The vampires walked past them. One of them shrugging their shoulders. "It was probably just a student having a nightmare. It happens." Sous watched them continue on their way and when they were out of sight in their dorms, the wolves looked at one another again.
"Maybe they're right."
Sous shook her head. "Vampire ears aren't as good as ours. I know what I heard and you should trust your ears as well," she said to the smaller wolf.
The wolves were silent and it was becoming apparent they didn't want to investigate. They questioned themselves at the slightest influence of a vampire. It was pathetic.
The wolves looked at Sous, each apologizing for not wanting to go further, giving excuses to why they didn't think it was anything serious. They left back to their rooms.
Sous remained in the hallway, looking back and forth to see if there was a hall monitor. She walked toward the library, knowing she would find a hall monitor until she heard the sound of blood gurgling. She ran back to the hallway trying to see if she could find the trace of the sound. It wasn't in the house of philosophy. She ran out of the hall once more into the library. Instead of going toward the exit where she knew the hall monitors would be, she ran to the secret passway Faye had showed her last time.
"I won't tell on you if you won't tell on me. I will tell on you if you tell on me."
The books scattered and piled on the floor as the passageway gave way. Sous walked through, making sure to not fall or trip over the rubble. The wall went right back to the book case and Sous ran down the hall trying to find the source of the screams.
The passageway led to the office of the headmaster though so she had to sneak out of the office, and then make sure she didn't get caught by the hall monitor.
"Maybe I should find Alana." Sous said to herself. She walked to the baths where she knew Alana was making her rounds.
Alana stood in the girls' bath, making a walk around the entire pool. She walked toward the exit when she saw Sous crawling on the walls toward.
"Sous," Alana whispered. "Get off the wall and what are you doing up?"
"I'mma vampire, blah!"
Alana stood looking at Sous unimpressed with her stereotypical display of a vampire.
Sous jumped off the wall landing in front of Alana. "I mean and the other wolves heard a scream but its not coming from our house."
Alana didn't know how to take this news. She walked Sous back toward the library. They stood in the middle of it.
"I know a wolf's ears are really strong." She said turning in a circle as well as Sous, trying to see if there was anything she could pick up. She sniffed a couple of times.
"Wait..." Sous sniffed again. "I smell blood." Blood had a specific smell, a scent that was mixed of red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets, the smell of blood was similar to iron. It also tasted like iron.
"Where?"
"I don't know, I'm trying to figure it out." Sous said.
"This could be serious." Alana said, putting her hands on her hips, a bit anxious.
"Its Krampus," Sous said.
"Krampus has to be called upon by a witch or priestess, even a warlock for it to come." Alana explained. She looked over her shoulder, making sure no hall monitors caught them. Its against protocol for a hall monitor to interact with a student then again, they were investigating.
"Thibodeux called it."
Alana scrowled, narrowing her eyes. "That's some accusation, Sous."
Sous paused, and sniffed some more. "The blood is coming from the direction of the garden."
Alana nodded her head. "Go to your room, Ill get the other monitors to assist."
The day was quiet when Sous woke up the next morning. Walking to class felt surreal but she followed the crowd, and the whispers that came from them. Toward the garden, the smell of blood was so strong, Sous nearly heaved over. She pushed through the crowd and saw the scene. The headmaster and...beings that were wearing black robes with hoods hovered over the body.
"What are those?"
"Hunters?"
Sous knew it was Faye that answered her question. They watched the hunters examine the body, the blood. Headmaster Fanu began to shoo the students, not wanting them to see what laid before them. He locked eyes with Sous.
"Sous, go to my office."
Faye raised an eyebrow. "Why is he telling you to go to his office? You didn't do this."
Sous walked away from the area but as she and others left, she saw the body on the ground. His eyes were missing, his hands gone, his lower body gone. She hadn't seen much mutilation since what took place in Red Woods. She glared turning back to head toward the office.
For the past weeks, she focused on krampus but as she saw the images of that boy, she knew that wasn't work of krampus. That was a wolf that did that. The boy on the ground, she wasn't sure what he was. Whether he was a wolf, vampire, elf.
She sat in the office of the headmaster slowly picking her lip. It was a new habit she began to start doing since her panic attacks and she hated it. Sometimes she picked her lips so bad, they would start bleeding. She would have to tell herself to stop or one of her friends would take her hand away from her mouth like Tany.
To distract herself until the headmaster came, she walked to the closet that held the voodoo dolls. When she opened the door, they were all gone. At least that was one good thing even though there was a dead boy in the garden.
She walked to the window to see a beautiful view of the campus. Her nose pressed to it, feeling the cold through the window pain. It was the month of Decembris already. It wasn't so long ago she was sitting on a bench watching fireworks with Tany, and now she was staring outside of window watching the first snow fall of the year.
The office door opened with Headmaster Fanu, Alana, and Thibodeux stepping into the room.
"Take a seat, Sous."
Sous did as she was told with the two other students standing near her side. Fanu sat down in his chair and sighed. He looked from either girl, intertwining his hands into one another.
"Sous, I am to write a report to the hunters. What did you tell Alana last night?"
Sous cleared her throat. "I told Alana that Thibodeux sent a krampus."
Headmaster Fanu turned to Thibodeux. "Did you?"
"Of course, not," Thibodeux lied. "Why would I risk getting suspended after what happened with the dolls?"
"SHE'S LYING!" Sous said turning around in her chair, pulling out her wand.
Headmaster Fanu grabbed out of Sous' hand and pointed it at her, forcing her to sit down in the seat with ropes appearing on the sides to tighten her end.
"It was probably her that killed that boy. She stabbed her own friend," Thibodeux accused.
"ARE YOU KIDDING ME!" Sous yelled. The headmaster pointed the wand at Sous' mouth, tape appearing over it. Sous struggled in the chair while Thibodeux continued to spread lies about Sous.
"It was obvious that was a wolf that killed that boy," the voodoo priestess finished.
Sous' eyes got wide with her not able to say anything. She tried to make eye contact with Alana but the elf was avoiding her. Sous felt defeated. She was probably going to get suspended or even get sent to the leadarch by the hunters. She didn't care about getting suspended but she cared about her friends and about the Krampus she knew was coming. She turned to face Thibodeux. No words were able to come out of Sous' mouth, but her blue eyes said it all...she was going to make Thibodeux pay if anything, anything happened to her friends.